June 02, 2006

winds of Turrrrrrrbulence

one, two, three Johnai was counting...he was on call with me while i was driving home.Like everyone out there I had no clue as to whatsoever this Bob Hope kinda guy was saying !!! 'Da enthuvadaa (what happened)' i asked him ??? To which he replied " Rafeeq there is a plane out there on the airport runway, it just now made its third attempt to land but couldn't do so and it still got airborne again "

Oh my GOD !!! it was a spine-chilling statement to hear and the first thing that i prayed was "oh god it shouldnt be an AIR DECCAN flight"! I rushed home, ran up the flight of stairs to the terrace where i have an ample view of the runway and nonetheless here came the flight! shit it was an Air Deccan flight!! on its fourth unsuccessfull attempt...

we waited for its next attempt!!! as the plane approached the runway we (me and my owners son Krishna) caught hands and prayed that this time they would make it !!! but it wasn't to be ...

I didnt want to imagine the spite of travellers on that flight.Would they have called home and said goodbye, if it lands safe will they travel in Air Deccan again ???, will the ATR ask them to crash land ??? these were some of the questions that pondered my mind at that time.

This was it for us !!! we couldnt take anymore of this from this far, all we could think was to rush to 'aeroview towers'. As the name suggests that is the appartment closest to the runway from whose terrace you could have a clear view of almost 90 percent of the runway.But we had a roadblock - facing the watchman at 11:44pm. Johnai was to meet us at the gates. Neyways we guys just walked past the gates to be confronted by the eyes of the watchman, guess what ??? Nothing happened and we walked past the watchman, to the staircase and reached the roof.

We could see the whole plane of the runway in its beautiful blue neon lights!! awesome view it was woawa!!! The plane was circling in BIG circles overhead, soon it geared up for landing.We could see it approaching the runway on its sixth and final attempt, B H O O O M!!! the tyres touched down in what seemed to be a perfect touch down. aa This time all was well and fine !!! if only anything was annoying, it was the "anyday i can fly that baby and do that" dialogue from Capt.Janardhanan Pillai from North India, who startled us from behind. He was smoking his cigarette, and mistook us for pilots ( seeing our enthusiasm for 'just another' plane landing ). Amidst his confession that he is hallucinating after consuming some pharmacopoeias he said he is from Airforce. I have never ever heard of a Capt in Airforce, though!!!

That flight made our day !!! soon after,we sneaked back to our houses. And i started blogging about that flight :P

May 27, 2006

!i!i!i!i!i downPOUR !i!i!i!i!i

this is a recollection of my memories about rain...

What is it that I love about rains?
i love to hear the sound of droplets kissing everything on its way down.
When i was in hostel, i would be looking for rainy evenings as we were allowed to play football (my fav game) only on rainy days as on other days we played cricket !!!

What I hate about rains?
I hate rains cos the smell of poozhi(loose sand) always used to sent a shudder down my spine.There is story behind that, i used to ask my mom 'why do we have this smell when it rains' and she used to answer 'it is cos the snakes come out of their burrows' and i HATE snakes...

Worst ever rain?
the worst ever rain that i can recollect is when we were driving to Muscat from Dubai.As soon as we crossed the border into Sultanate of Oman it started to rain heavily and the rain water started gushing in from sideways on to our car through the valleys between the hills.The current was so powerful that it could hurl anything and everything out of its way but we luckily escaped !!!

Best recollection?
hmm...well there are far too many.Some of 'em are the boiled cauliflowers, potatoes, amma's elaichi tea, peanuts, pistas, icecream, paper boats etc...We used to play this game of throwing stones on to the pool of stagnant water that filled the ground behind my house in Ras al Khaimah and the guy with the max no of hops wins :D

Oh my Goodness !!! I really miss those days ...

wanna read more rain memories ??? chk out nina's When it rains and john's when it rains

May 23, 2006

' X ' roads

There are two types of people in this world...people who reach ' X ' roads in life cos they dont know which route to choose further, among all the routes visible and people who reach ' X ' roads as they have no futher routes visible.I certainly am of the former category, where i have so many routes to choose from but am finding it really difficult to choose my route to destiny, more so as i have to await decisions taken by some stupid clowns known as managers.I do not believe in the latter category of people as, until or unless ones vision is not clouded one can come up with many routes.

The Cannan Tourism Department's signboard on my left side displays directions to the following routes :

To join my parents in Dubai
Complete the SAP training that I started
To wait tenaciously for the project in Mumbai
To look for Oracle 10g DBA opportunities
To get my Oracle Certification
To file for my H1B visa to the US of A

But which route to choose ? I am totally confused.
Hence i decided to look back...

...I have often taken intuitive decisions and never regreted, so for the timebeing i am counting on my most trusted intuitions.Lets wait and see whether this intuitive decision of mine will carry me all the way to SUCCESS...in career & life.

Harvard of HYDE

The moment i passed the security gates at isb, my eyes fell on the signboard which warned " peacock crossing " which reminded me of the go slow signborad and zebra crossing in front of my school in Ras al Khaimah. The air was warm and filled with a redolence smell that is native to most such prestigious institutions. Driving ahead on my bike i had to pass couple of student villages ( how I wish my dept was named that way !!! ), past the main building, pass a group of corporate gals n guys playing 5-a-side football ( from a friend i came to know that a tourney was going on... ) and manoeuver humps to reach the executive housing where my friend resided. The facilities there were a class apart, on one side of the campus you have the student villages with the library ( wifi one ) and mail building on the center And on the other side of the campus there is a BIG pool, squash courts, table tennis, pool, carrom boards, basket ball courts, badminton courts, 24hr Hospital, and my favourite - lavish food courts serving anything from Chinese to Mexican dishes!!! One never feels he is in Hyderabad or for that matter in India.The atmos was very Harvardish like...

...I want to go back in there !!! It really fueled my wish to get an mba ;)

! ! ! AuTiSM ! ! !

Often in life u and i feel like slipping into an autistic state of mind, where we wouldn't be held back by the reponsibilities/burdens of this burgeoning world.

Thou, take me into that real world where :

I can be immersed in thought unremittingly
I can float through my emotions
I can communicate to the butterflies
I can choose not to speak . . .

Amidst all the hurry-burry in life, I have always wanted to escape :

into the clear blue skies where the sun shines,
into the soothing yellow flowers in the garden full of flowers,
into the green convolvulus clinging every bit of land.

I believe every life is what you maketh out of it and the end result is the same,
where these autistic moments are the most gratifying escapades you can make...

C R A S H E D - krashed !!!

Crash hurtled all the other thoughts in my mind out of the way, so that the whole of my mind cogitated to one thought ' racism '. One can argue that the movie is so lifeless, as you have numerous characters that keep colliding into one another every now and then, BUT while watching the movie at some point or the other, director Paul Haggis have made sure to lure his audience into a CER ( conditioned emotional response ) state.

Discriminatory or abusive behavior towards members of another race or Racism as it is defined cannot be eradicated in this globalized world. It has always existed and will continue its existence in one form or another. We have all been victims of it, eventhough we might not have realised it. The ' hindi ' (Indian) in Middle East have gone thru it, the Pakistani's in UK have experienced it, the Blacks in North America, the list goes on and on...

A character often lingers in our minds because of the on-screen goodness (in terms of deed) of his/her. We all hate it when fate befalls such a character in the form of a bullet/accident or something. But in crash one particular character you would love to see fired at will be Officer John Ryan played by Matt Dillon. This character lingers because of his on-screen racism. This Officer first molests a black female and then at the call of duty risks his life to save her. The emotions flowing through this character's mind will be worth brooding over. Watching the Officer suffer made me riant...

...the curatins were being dropped, the lights in the auditorium was slowly coming back to life, the darkness was giving way to the brightness of the artifical neon lamps, that was when i was startled by the voice of a young boy of not less than 12, chewing pan, pointing to the door and enunciating to me in his Hyderabadi accent "chalo sahib picture katham hogaya" ( get going sir the movie is over ).

"I don't know why"

I dont know why i started writing at this point of time, when some nutty people are after IAEA to impose sanctions aganist Iran, when Palestinians still fight for their birthland, when Union HRD Minister confronted medicos and assured them to address their issue on 'quotas' in medical colleges, and when the whole world is crying about Plagiarism. The few lines i read from the book 'How Opal Mehta Got Wild, Got Kissed and Got a life' was very intriguing that i wanted to finish the book in one sitting itself. But like anything in life i had to dipose of with the idea, and i know who made me do it, " YOU dont think YOU can get me to Dispose all that I Propose !!! "

I am here not to debate whether, what Kavya wrote was copied or not. All I know, By Jove, is that my life is not copied from someone or anyone and I pray that no one gets to do so...It might be that sitting alone and staring at life must be getting me on a 'high'. We always strive to become someone or the other But once we have attained what we seeked Do we ask ourself ' Hay Allah, ye mein Kaha Phas Gaya ' ( hey Allah, were am i stuck up ) then we know for sure this is not what we wanted, But Fate as we call it, takes us for a ride.

All this didnt make sense to me when i was studying in 4th Grade nor does it now. But there is some immese unknown pleasure in making others think to the point that they grumble, well that is so humane i guess. There is always a question that comes to my mind whenever i am in a tough situation, "I dont know why", i am the chosen one for this. In the short span of 8952 days of my life i have asked myself this question couple of times and also on couple of occassions like when i was burning midnight oil during my 10 board exams, actually then it was like why am I studying why not be a farmer, then again during the days running upto the Engineering Entrance Exams, also on countless nights prior to the University Exams, as students the toughtest test we are bound to undergo is exams i guess...and, yet again when searching for a job while most of my classmates had one, or had some other source to make money or flaunt it. We ask this question only when the scent of failure is nearer, that is the most noticeable part to me, WHY dont we ask this question when we are successful.

I don't know why.