redefining the horror movies genre.

Usually when I have a sleepover with friends or cousins, the one activity everyone wants to indulge in is watching a horror movie.
My reply: I don't do horror movies.
They call me a sissy.

I ain't no sissy. Horror films today are most definitely not horrifying. They don't stab a crippling fear into my heart. Most of them are immensely disgusting and fill you with utter revulsion. Minus the blood, gore and sound effects, nothing substantial remains but really bad acting.

Wiki: Horror films are unsettling movies that strive to elicit the emotions of fear, disgust and horror from viewers.
Disgust? Check.
Fear and horror? Fail.
Unsettling? Yeah. My stomach.


Add to that: A lasting impact, perhaps of dread. I'm not an authority on this genre, but I opine that the movie should end with a sort of hopelessness, where the protagonists think they have got out alive, vanquished evil and everything will now be fine and dandy, but it is far from it. To illustrate: I Know What You Did Last Summer and its sequel.


Horror films can be categorized into mainly 3:
1. The unhinged killer out to savagely slash everyone on the planet.
eg.: Saw and its many unnecessary sequels, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, A Nightmare on Elm Street etc.

2. Apocalypse scenario where all of humankind has been infected with a killer virus mutating them into zombies that a precious few survivors must save themselves from.eg.: 28 Days Later, 28 Weeks Later and others I can't think of right now (feel free to add)


3. Lingering on the supernatural or demonic - the devil, witches, haunted houses, spirits, vampires and the like.
eg.: The Exorcist (this one just made me want to hurl), Devil, An American Haunting, Final Destination etc.


I refrain from watching them all. As for vampires, I prefer them in the form of Damon Salvatore.

Evil, but oh so yummy.

If you agree with me even remotely, worry not. There are movies out there that do not traditionally fall under the genre, but in my opinion they most certainly should.


To name but one:

No one said horror must be limited to the image of a psychotic murdering whack job carving numbers into the flesh of his victims.


Narrated by Matt Damon (I never liked him but now I like his voice) and starring the honourable men who destroyed the American economy, caused a two year long global recession and brought 50 million people around the world out on the street. 
Explained lucidly with graphs and videos so even a layman can comprehend, Inside Job makes intentions very, very clear. Nobody, read nobody in power cares about the common man. Wall Street has corrupt egotists running amok, all out to make a quick buck, no matter whose life's savings are lost to get that buck. As if that wasn't bad enough, they are also pulling the strings in politics. They are in academic institutions that the world holds sacred. They are everywhere. It's like a cockroach infestation. 


When a robbery takes place and the police discover the criminals, all steps are taken to apprehend them and recover the stolen goods, which once inspected are then returned to the owners. So now, when the people responsible for robbing America of billions of dollars have been discovered, why have they been allowed to run home scot free to sunbathe on the decks of their yachts and dive into pools overflowing with their ill gotten wealth like Uncle Scrooge?

not that Uncle Scrooge's wealth is ill gotten.

The movie does not prepare the viewer for the climax. It induces despair and strikes that elusive emotion of terror in one. You think I'm overacting? Watch it and tell me it didn't scare you, even a little.


Only fitting I rate this as per the 'feelings elicited' by a horror movie as stated by Wiki (and me):
Fear, with the knowledge these men are still in power and that nothing will change (that takes care of the hopelessness and lasting dread);
horror at the thought of what they're are capable of and what they have done;
disgust at the insurmountable and insatiable greed that got us into this mess and what the money was ultimately used for.


Definitely unsettling.

of stereotypes, prejudices and restrictive thinking.

I've grown up listening to a number of harmless stereotypes, almost all of which I've disproved.


- Germans are a harsh and cold people.
Completely untrue. Some of the warmest people I met in Europe were Germans.
- Those that wear spectacles are nerds.
'coz those with perfect eyesight have better things to do than pour over academia? Got plenty of bespectacled friends who aren't studious. *thinks for a minute* All my friends seem to wear glasses or contacts. But two. One of them is a great student. The other is my twin from another life and takes after my own heart.
- Americans are all stupid - a statement usually made by an Indian working in a call center, glorified in Chetan Bhagat's book, One Night at a Call Center.
- India is such a sad, desperately poor and polluted country (while this might be slightly true, nobody ever talks about the filthy rich).



Then there are the damaging stereotypes. The ones that destroy lives.


Like all Muslims are terrorists.


It's been over ten years since 9/11, but the impact remains. Because of the nefarious activities of a handful (in comparison) of extremists, an entire community of over a billion strong has been branded.. forever? When people make statements like the one above I just come to the conclusion that they failed Statistics in school.

The double standards and hypocrisy have me outraged. Major cities in Britain have witnessed the worst side of its young population. I am not generalizing here but what's to stop me from following the same example and calling every Britisher a pillager and an anarchist?

I love this guy.

The Colbert Report had a brilliant tongue-in-cheek piece on when the American media 'assumed' the Norweigian killer was a Muslim terrorist before his true identity was revealed. They had no proof, it just seemed to make perfect sense to them. Crazed man goes on a seemingly senseless rampage killing 92 kids, what else could he be but an Islamic fundamentalist? When it turned out he was actually anti-Muslim (huh? what's that?) the media didn't apologize for their baseless presumptions. They called him a lone killer.
Do you see a pattern emerging here?

I digress, this is not the point I want to make. A week ago I read about Wholefoods, a supermarket retail chain in the USA and their Ramadan online marketing campaign - which was scrapped by one of its operating regions, as a few haters got too vocal and threatened never to step into Wholefoods again. This shouldn't have deterred the company, considering the vast untapped potential of the billion dollar 'muslim' market. To hell with the hypocritical so-called 'ideals'. News flash! America thrives on consumerism and is a capitalist society. A lot of those Muslims are American citizens that pay tax dollars. What's wrong with targetting them with products they can buy?

Looks tempting.

Wholefoods along with a company called Saffron Road, has introduced a wide range of halal products. Halal refers to food that Muslims are allowed to eat under Islamic law.

Now if you're a vegan, vegetarian, an animal rights activist or just get downright squirmy with the details, please skip the next couple of lines.

Islam forbids its followers to consume blood because of the impurities, germs and wastes it contains that are to be carried out from the body. Paraphrased from Wiki: Muslims slaughter animals in a particular way (called Dhabiha) by cutting at the carotid artery, jugular vein and the windpipe with a rapid movement, in order to drain the blood out and let the animal suffer as little as possible as it loses consciousness. This is the same procedure followed by Jews, explaining why their meat is lawful for consumption to Muslims.

When Wholefoods announced their campaign there was an immediate backlash, albeit the support from most was immense. I came across a blogger that used her blog as a medium to spew hate making the most of her misconceptions. On some forums, it was unacceptable to some that the company wish 'Ramadan Kareem', even though it's perfectly okay that they wish any other religious community in accordance with their festivals. Infuriated readers and customers made lame and weird comments such as 'does that mean I can't walk past the halal food section with pork chops in my trolley?' This supermarket chain also sells kosher meat. It's a well known fact that pork is forbidden to Jews. Would this intolerant ignoramus have made a big deal out of it in that respect? Others called it jihadist (that's a new one) and simply vowed never to step into the supermarket again.

Why the hate?
They believe we're all terrorists.
They don't want us to get our protein.

Why is that, in this day and age, when we boast of 'open-mindedness' and advancement of modern thinking do people still hold such ignorant and prejudiced views?
Here in the East, I've heard statements like 'they're so broad-minded in the West, unlike here' too many times. I don't see it. Just because Westerners will never make anything of a guy talking to a girl like they do in the East, doesn't mean they are the authority on liberal thinking.

If I spoke about Muslim stereotypes in particular, this post would be much longer than it already is. Let's just say we're viewed as a bunch of hateful insular idiots out to kill. Funny thing is, the individuals that make such accusations are usually not far from it themselves.

A lot of the fault lies with the Muslims, definitely. The dastardly deeds performed by the sanctimonious self-righteous monsters somehow give a regular TV watcher the 'understanding' that the purpose of a Muslim's existence is the annihilation of non-Muslim races and world domination (of course!). What is this? Independence Day? It's terribly ironic that masses are given to believe that this is what Islam preaches, when Islam itself means peace. Just look a little closer, dig a little deeper, what these men advocate is nothing close to what Islam is all about.

I'm a practicing Muslim. I certainly do not want anyone dead. Why on earth would I want anyone dead? I have plenty of close friends from other faiths and close friends from my own, who don't want anyone dead either. I believe peaceful dialogue, friendship and an open mind (a real one, on both sides) are the key to bridging the gulf. Hate is a terrible all-consuming evil. In school, students develop an aversion to subjects usually because they do not understand them, also because the teachers that teach them those subjects haven't done a very good job of it. The same is true here. Seek understanding of a subject before you dedicate a life full of hate and animosity towards it; look for the people that can give you the right answers.

And for God's sake, don't generalize.

home is where the luggage is.

I thought Pune was home.
It ceased to be.
Not just because I moved back to Kuwait.
It seemed distant this time. It's exhausting living in a city where the people lack any consideration for other human beings and where you have to be on your guard consistently 'coz you will encounter some moron or the other who WILL try to fleece you. It wearies one.

I love Bombay. I love my family and cousins. But Bombay is more foreign to me than ever, with its shallow and materialistic lifestyle. I don't care for the damn designer clothes and shoes or the 'branded' crap. I don't drink, I abhor loud noises and mainstream music so a pub is the last place you'll see me in. I've stopped watching Hindi movies. I don't follow Bollywood or Hollywood gossip and muse on who slept with who. I feel a deep disgust for Indian television and despair at how self-absorbed Bombaiytes are and at their money is God attitude. I write, I read and my renewed passion in these has made me an alien there.
The freedom there, is what I miss.

Even though I lived most of my life here in Kuwait, it was never home. I could never call it that except when saying stuff like, 'I wanna go home and crash.' NRIs love the comfort, low gas prices and tax free income of the Gulf and quite a few of them could never adapt to India again. But a place that doesn't accept you is not a place you could call your own.

So.. where the hell is home?

I wonder now, am I a third culture kid (TCK)?
Wiki defines a TCK as 'someone who, as a child, has spent a significant period of time in one or more culture(s) other than his or her own, thus integrating elements of those cultures and their own birth culture, into a third culture.'

Oh yeah. Fosho. Definitely closer to that than anything else.
At 5 months, I flew way before I took my first step.

Third culture kids aren't supposed to fit in anywhere. But they are very open to different cultures. Sure, I got that. I love meeting people from diverse backgrounds and expanding my awareness about their cultures and traditions.

TCKs are also multilingual. Er. No.
Having lived in Kuwait I'm supposed to speak Arabic. I'm ashamed to say I don't. I can fathom just a bit.
Again, having lived in Pune I'm supposed to atleast understand basic Marathi. I don't.
The only couple of words I bothered to learn is 'shut up', 'stop' and 'idiot' (you may roll your eyes, but they were pretty handy). I know a hell lot more Japanese watching anime than I know Marathi. I picked up and spoke more Czech in my two week visit to the CR than I ever did Arabic in all these years.
French? I'm glad I still remember quite a bit of French from school.
Hindi you ask? My dad is from Hyderabad and the mother from Bombay originally from a region called Kutch in Gujarat so the dialect I speak is a bit.. strange. Hyderabadis speak Urdu (based on Hindi structure, with words from Arabic and Farsi) in a manner no one else does, honing a drawl while they speak, stretching out the words. I disowned the accent and developed my own, based on the mother's and her family's. My grammar foundation though is not strong. Back in college, even if I attempted a conversation with my friends in their Hindi, my Urdu-Hindi whatever, some pronunciations, due to my linguistic background were different. My friends found it a scream.
They're darn tootin' lucky I never laughed at their English.

So much for multilingual. I only seem to have a knowledge of languages that have so far been of no real use to me. But for English.

People generally have a place they chill out at. Like the mall, a cafe maybe a pub. The only place I can admit going to regularly is the airport. Any airport. I don't seem to have gone anywhere else more often than once. Except the bookstore, but then I interned there.

So maybe I am a TCK, atleast partly.
Nursing the incurable bite the travel bug left me with, I desperately want to travel more. It's just been about two weeks since I got back and I'm already planning a trip in my head which, most probably, will just stay in my head. Maybe it's 'coz I can't seem to connect to any place anymore and I want to find it. It would be nice to feel a sense of belonging to something more than your AT suitcases. The sister doesn't even bother unpacking anymore. She's the first one to finish packing every damn time; all she has to do is zip up her bags.

So after some retrospection, I have come to a conclusion.

I am a nomad.

I have no home. But I prefer to think I just haven't found it just yet.

Have you?

..till the fat lady sings

We made two trips to Prague (landing there doesn't count). In the first trip we had tickets to the opera and ballet at Prague State Opera House! =D With a little over two hours to go for the evening show, we were at the train station on a Saturday with no hotel booking, undecided as to which way to turn. We went in the direction of the opera house, lugging heavy bags (the memory is too painful to brood on). The first hotel we passed was full. We turned into the main square admiring the opera house we were to come to in a short while, and the Národní Museum. 

Narodni Museum, Praha

On asking a policeman in queue at MacDonalds, he directed us to a hotel 'yalta' straight ahead. A few steps and we were there realizing it was spelled Hotel Jalta - j in Czech is pronounced y. It was the swankiest place we stayed in (the hotel in Fussen comes a close second). I heaved a tremendous sigh of relief and thanked the Lord for the bellboy and his trolley. Loving the bathroom and exclaiming in deep disgust at the prices of food in the minibar (90 CZK for a single lousy teeny bar of Toblerone? I think not) we decked up in our evening finery and hurried to catch the show.

The evening show was Aida and matinee the next day was Swan Lake. Honestly I never thought I would like opera so much. Strangely enough, I preferred it to the ballet. Maybe due to the English subtitles that appeared above the stage, in sync with the Italian. Understanding every scene and dialogue was a BIG plus. If you're in Prague and enjoy either ballet or opera try to fit a show into your budget and schedule. Matinees are not expensive. Check the website for the schedule and prices. And try to get seats in the pit; they're the best!

We took our seats in the balcony (don't sit in the balcony - the chairs are uncomfortable and ruin the viewing) and settled down gazing open mouthed at the gorgeous ceiling. Aida is the protagonist; an Ethopian princess captured by the Egyptian army and offered to the Pharoah's daughter Amneris as a handmaiden by the army general Radames. Aida and Radames fall in love (of course). And Amneris is passionately in love with Radames and is exceedingly jealous of Aida. What transpires? Read the story here.
Amneris' performance enraptured me. Her personality was a clash of so many intense emotions - love, jealousy, guilt, remorse, sorrow - and what a voice! Her powerful voice effortlessly expresses the storm raging within her. Aida and Radames on the other hand were wimps in my opinion, just wanting to die because they couldn't be together. The scene that REALLY got onto my nerves was when Radames tries to persuade Aida to live in Egypt with him. Aida is tempted but misses her country; she asks him if he would be willing to flee with her instead. Radames is close to horrified - leave his homeland? His beloved Egypt? So it's okay for Aida to live in a place where she belongs to lowest strata of society (being a slave), but not take her rightful place as a princess in her own country? Get a life.
In the end, when Aida and Radames die in each other's arms, I was pitiless.
I loved the sets, especially in the scene where the moonlight iridescence falls upon Aida and her father and later Aida and Radames. The Ethopian king and Pharoah were stupendous. But for me, the show stealer was Amneris.

Prague State Opera House

The ceiling took my breath away. Note the 3D statues of pixies seemingly flitting about! Me camera didn't do justice. Take a panoramic tour (the option is on the left).

Frescoes and fairies

Next day.. Swan Lake! It was a headache getting there çoz we had walked far away and on the way back I lost the mother and the sister 'coz I was too fast (turn to see a sea of tourists with them nowhere in sight) .. But we found each other and made it in time for the show. Our seats were somewhere in the middle of the pit =D This particular production of Swan Lake commences with Odette daintily picking flowers in a basket. Looming up behind, advancing towards her is a monstrous creature. Keeping in pace with the music as it gets more dramatic, she notices it and drops her basket with a terrified start as the creature envelopes her (depicted with waves of a cloth). She is then turned into a swan. Fast forward to when the Black Swan makes her appearance at the ball and dances with the Prince (Siegfried) who proclaims his love for her (you get a glimpse of Odette desperately trying to catch Siegfried's attention by the window.. awesome effects!) by handing her a bouquet. The deed is done as the Black Swan maliciously flings the bouquet to the ground and Siegfried realizes his fatal mistake. It's too late for the White Swan. I got really drawn into it and was completely on edge with this scene and the finale. This time, when the doomed lovers died in each other's arms, I was upset. Siegfried was handsome and regal just as if he was a Disney prince. The court jester brought out gales of delighted laughter and thunderous applause from the audience with his ridiculous antics, prancing about, somersaulting in the air in tune to Tchaikovsky's music which is of course, unparalleled.

I left the opera house thirsting for more.

hell must feel like this

We chose really REALLY bad luggage for the Euro trip. No really. I doubt I ever swore as much in my entire life as I did when lugging that crap (the politest word I can muster) all over the Czech Republic. It was a horrendous green and orange monstrosity (not the best colour combination in the world, is it?) and flames danced in my eyes (like an anime character) whenever they fell upon it. While I was struggling with it, I had one consistent fantasy - what would happen if it were to accidentally fall upon the tracks. It was the cause of many disputes between us. The mother suggested we buy another bag but the towns we went to didn't even have a general store forget a luggage shop. About 4-5 days into the trip when we were changing five trains to go to the Moravsky Kras I discovered it had wheels on one end. Boy did I feel stupid. But I was ecstatic. Atleast I could drag the cursed thing around and I did.. over everything. Like the stairs at Valtice station.. oops. An old man called me from behind and pointed to a black something that looked suspiciously like a wheel. Arghh!! Well, I still had one left. I tried to tilt it sideways and continued to wheel the bag over everything.. we found a hotel about half a km from Valtice town and thankfully took the bags in.. and then my sister called out from behind me. The black residue scattered over the ground was all that was left of the second (and last wheel). DAMMIT!!
Under severe duress, I determined not to let the lousy bag get the better of me as it unfeelingly whammed into my thigh when I swung it across my shoulder. Gritting my teeth, willing myself to think it would build character, all it really did was give me a chance to mumble expletives in every language I knew how to swear in.

It did however also give people a chance to show some humanity.

At some train station (the names escapes me.. perhaps it was Brno), I was dragging it up the stairs to take it to the platforms (underground tunnels not overhead bridges connecting platforms in CR) and a very pretty girl around my age took one strap and helped me take it up right to our train. Such a sweetheart! =D
Another time, we were chatting with an elderly lady in a train to Blansko. We had to take a bus to a hotel near Moravsky Kras (the limestone caves in the Czech Republic). But walking from the train station to the bus stop was another matter. The lady helped me carry it! I'd have preferred if she hadn't, bless her! But I was thankful all the same. Later, on relating these incidents to others, we were told assistance of this kind is not usual in Europe. Whatever it maybe, it reinstated my faith in humankind. We're not all bad.

Day 1 (no it's not over yet)

The connecting flight takes us over Turkey's lush verdure over the Black Sea and South Eastern Europe to Prague in the Czech Republic.

frost on my window! =D I think we were flying over Bulgaria

We wait in the arrivals section looking around for a guy sent by a friend (T) to drive us to Hradec Králové (pronounced hradets kra-lovay) a small town about 1.5 hours away by car. We wave a paper with the guy's name printed on it, frantically trying to catch his attention if he's around (we obviously don't know what he looks like). After about 30 minutes, a short man walks over to us holding up a small note, the size of my palm with something scrawled on it, against his waist. Peering at it, I made out the handwriting to say - 3 ---- (our surname). Were we supposed to have caught sight of that amidst the thousand or more passengers around us?

So we drive to Hradec Králové (henceforth abbreviated HK) and though fascinated by all the gorgeousness passing by us, my eyelids couldn't take it anymore and banged shut and I knew nothing until we next stopped, in front of the hotel right in the middle of the náměstí  (square). Somewhere between getting myself and the bags out of the car and checking in, the mother lost the bag which had all the goodies from Istanbul Duty Free and my sister's jacket. The sister made sure the mother never forgot her dastardly crime.
Post shower *deep sigh of gratitude* and checking out the room/view, I plugged in my hair styler that I had so thoughtfully brought along with me, in the converter (remember to buy one before travelling) into the socket. I dry my hair for a minute and then.. silence. No electricity. Having lived in India my first thought was loadshedding?? Are you friggin kidding me?!? But then I looked at the device I was clutching. And then I looked into the corridor. Mumbling expletives it dawned on me that the hairstyler that I had so *thoughtfully* brought along had blown a fuse on the whole damn hotel floor. Shoot!

a view of the náměstí

Deciding that somebody else on our floor would complain about the electricity (or lack thereof) soon enough, we went down to the lobby to meet our friend T (friend H's friend who become our friend) who showed us around town. But before that - FOOD! Being a small town, HK has only one restaurant that serves halal food (being Muslims we can eat only halal food, explaining why will ruin the continuity of this long overdue post so if you're curious comment/email me/google) but we were too ravenous to walk there. So we crossed the square and sat in the cellar of a restaurant that specialized in serving.. I don't remember what. Fish I guess. I looked at the soups - the descriptions were in Czech and English (how considerate right?) - and I liked the look of one but it had something called 'Chorizo' in it. I'd never come across the word and asked the waitress what it meant. Not a native English speaker she struggled with the words for a minute and said 'cheese'. No meat and it looked scrumptious! Perfect right? DING DING DING NA-UH!! So I bit into 'chorizo' on my first slurp (do keep in mind my tendency to exaggerate) of the soup and it turned out to be meat. The waiter (another dude) kindly took it back on account of the misunderstanding.
(later Google told me chorizo is pork sausage. To Muslims who take care not to eat pork, watch out for this word and ESPECIALLY the people that tell you it's cheese. And carry a bloody dictionary.)


After lunch we headed into town. And made T walk. A LOT. He grumbled later to the mutual friend - saying we never get tired and we made him walk till his tongue was hanging out =D It was a BEAUTIFUL day. Lord knows how thrilled I was to see the riveting blue sky after all the dust storms in Kuwait!!

these colours remind me of ice cream

this was definitely taken by the mother

the cathedral.

So we walked. And we walked. Right till sunset which was 9 pm =D Bought groceries at Tesco! I've always wanted to shop at Tesco! I've yearned to sign up for the Tesco Clubcard program ever since my internship at The Sultan Center =P Didn't get to do it though :( Tesco has this neat self-checkout section. Should definitely be introduced here - the waiting time would reduce drastically *sudden image of three overloaded trolleys* Or.. maybe not.
There was a fantastic thunderstorm as we were walking back to the square. A brilliant flash of electric blue appeared as a bolt of lightening crashed right behind a building we were walking by. I wouldn't have liked to have it fall any closer.
We were back at the hotel room at around 11 pm and the electricity hadn't been turned on - seems we were the only ones on that floor. We got it on soon enough - Reception sent a guy to fix it while I hid all evidence of converters, suspicious looking plugs etc. From then on there was never a day my wet hair was not scrunched up in a pony tail, unless we stayed in a hotel thoughtful enough to have a hairdryer in the loo.

Picture courtesy: the mother and me. I don't remember which are hers. I take firm credit for the frost pic.

Day 1: Istanbul not Constantinople

Once upon a time, people would dress up for the airport, ie when they were travelling. That's changed. Why though? Here's a theory: Back then, you wanted to create a great impression on the people who would greet you at your destination. All four generations of your family would crane their necks trying to look into the airport from five in the morning in the summer heat eagerly waiting for you to coolly walk out with your trolley. But now your family has a life, choosing their beauty sleep over that first glimpse of you and you're lucky if you have a single relative waiting impatiently on the other side. More often than not, it's just a driver. And so, travellers have started dressing down and are wont to make mucky appearances.

But the transit passengers at Istanbul airport dashed this theory to smithereens. Great sense of style!

We (the mother, sister and I) didn't have Turkish visas, we were just gonna spend 3 hours in transit at Istanbul. BUT! We got off the plane - onto the ground to get on the bus that would take us to the airport building! We stepped on Turkish soil (or cement)! That totally counts!

That being said, Istanbul airport is gorgeous. I always opined that Dubai Duty Free was hyped and it is. I dislike it intensely. No one EVER talks about Istanbul airport. The decor is beautiful and has an old world feel to it. There's a bookstore on your right just as you step into Duty Free and so it was a hit with me the same second. There are plenty of shops that a 'commoner' must just pass by (as many did) - Armani, Bvlgari and the like but who hasn't seen those anyway? The REAL shop that's worth a browse is one called the Old Bazaar (how apt) and sold wines, bracelets, baubles, ceramics, gorgeous scarves (anyone who bought one wore it =D ) with the evil eye image painted on every object conceivable (except the scarves). Conscious of my bare neck, I squandered a LOT of time trying to pick one, my indecision driving the mother into a frenzy about missing our connecting flight to Prague. And when I finally made my selection the cashiers were dawdling, driving me into a frenzy. We almost missed the flight!

don't miss the eye under the board

Superstition? Call it what you will. The image of the blue eye is said to ward off the 'evil eye' of envious people who may not wish you well.

it's all over the place! @evil eye: BE GONE!

Heard the song in the title of this post? No? Give it a listen. If nothing it'll bring back childhood memories of watching Tiny Toon Adventures :P

Picture courtesy: the mother. I was too excited to take pictures.

in retrospect: the year so far

A friend (the twa) pointed out to me that I got my wish of wanting to visit atleast one country this year (one of my New Year resolutions). Not one, but SIX! He's right! HOLY MACKEREL I VISITED SIX COUNTRIES THIS YEAR NONE OF WHICH WERE INDIA, KUWAIT OR THE UAE! (will tell you about the sixth in a later post)

This brings a crude but apt phrase/song in Hindi to mind - dene wala jab bhi deta, deta chappad phaad ke =D
which roughly translates to: 'when the one who gives, well, GIVES, then boy does He give! (literal translation is that the roof collapses with His giving)
I like my translation. It's cool. But I think one of my Hindi speaking blogger friends/followers can probably do a much better job even with the literal one. (Hindi speaking blogger friends and followers, that is your cue to pitch in)

I sort of got the rest of the resolutions taken care of as well.
Except getting a job by Jan end. Perhaps that was a bit ambitious. Let's make it year end then shall we? By saying year end I expect to have got one by next month. Although I did have a pretty great internship.. is that supposed to count? It shouldn't! I specifically said job! J-O-B. JOB!! One can still hope.. and pray. And continue scouting and networking.

Here's looking forward to an equally exceptional second half of 2011.

So long, farewell..

auf wiedersehen, goodbye..
No blog not to you, you silly goose!

It's been a delightful month in Europe. A long adventure in the 5 countries we visited -  the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Austria and Germany. We saw splendid sights, marvelled at the glorious castles and palaces and the exquisite taste and imagination of the royal families and architects that designed them, learnt to greet people in three more languages, meandered in landscaped gardens, posed with scantily clad but awesomely buff sculptured fountains, clicked millions of pictures, expressly ignored the 8 degrees Celsius temperature of the limestone caves of Moravsky Kras while going nuts walking past the gorgeous stalactites and stalagmites, persistently nagged and heckled the patient persons behind the information desk in every town and city from Budapest to Munich for hours on end, sang with fellow fans in the Sound of Music Tour at Salzburg, eagerly devoured any information or tidbits on the local history and culture, breathed in the crisp mountain air of the Alps, ran down lush green meadows dotted with wildflowers wet from the rain, mentally swore at ourselves for packing terribly having to lug impractical luggage while changing trains under severe time constraints, ambulated through the forests of the Šumava, befriended wonderful people and finally, we are now prone to severe tooth decay from gorging on one dessert too many (two words: apple strudel. In vanilla sauce..).


It's my last night in this continent and although I am saddened at the thought of leaving, I can't help but long for my own bed and shower and most especially the WASHING MACHINE. Oh Lord, bless the man that invented the washing machine..


Nashledanou Europe. You've been good to me.


(chronicled blog posts and pictures to follow when I am back in Kuwait, well fed and rested and all my laundry done)

No. 31 aaaand.. 32

Add to my Before I Die list:

31. Watch a movie at the drive-in.

'Coz they're more or less extinct. The drive-in cinemas. No more. Whoosh. All gone.

I was just contemplating how Shane West helps Mandy Moore complete her wish list in A Walk to Remember. And I expect the same to happen with me, that my soul mate (when he plans to show up) will enjoy accompanying me and planning surprises to help me carry out the stuff I have listed (and vice versa). Hopefully without a terminal illness imposing a deadline.
But since I'm expecting it to happen, I would probably ruin the surprise element for myself. You see, this is how I imagine No. 31 to be carried out.

Scene: Evening. Soulmate (SM) takes me out in the convertible (hey this is MY imagination) without telling me where we're going.
Me: Where are we going?
SM: You'll see. (I hope SM comes up with a better dialogue than that. Right now, I can't)
Methinks - Could it be? Is it finally time to cross No. 31 off the list? Where did he find a DRIVE-IN in 20xx for God's sake? Awesome! :D
SM drives car into a compound with a ginormous screen playing Camille (I have a thing for Robert Taylor right now)
SM: Surprise! :D
I feign surprise and overact superbly (I have a flair for exaggeration if you haven't guessed as yet): *gasp* No! You didn't! You remembered!
SM: You guessed.
Me: I kinda did.

You see?! I ruined the surprise for myself by expecting it as well as the possibility of the pleasure the soul mate might have derived from giving it (coz he's gonna be that kinda guy).

Or, not happen. We might have an alternate scenario such as:

Scene: Evening. Soulmate (SM) takes me out without telling me where we're going.

Me: Where are we going?

SM: You'll see. (You know my thoughts on this)

Methinks - Could it be? Is it finally time to cross No. 31 off the list? Where did he find a DRIVE-IN in 20xx for God's sake? Awesome! :D

SM drives car into parking of a concert of Russian pop singer Maksim Galkin.

SM: Surprise!

I am too genuinely surprised to feign surprise.

SM: Well? No. 17! Attend a Maksim concert! Here we are!

Me: Maksim Mrvica. Pianist.

SM: Oh.. So you don't like it?

Methinks - You think?

Mesays: Err..

Bigger disaster. Although, even I don't really see this ever materializing.. (actually Maksim Galkin ain't all too bad. Discovered him while searching for Maksim Mrvica's tracks on the now defunct Limewire.)

But if nothing else, I am an optimist. Consider this scenario:

Scene: Evening. Soulmate (SM) takes me out without telling me where we're going.

Me: Where are we going?

SM: You'll see. (Again, you know my thoughts on this)

Methinks - Could it be? Is it finally time to cross No. 31 off the list? Where did he find a DRIVE-IN in 20xx for God's sake? Awesome! :D

SM parks car in front of a row of shops and leads me to a pet shop right to an adorable little puppy (haven't decided what breed yet)

SM: Surprise!

Me - wide-eyed and not daring to believe it. and then..

Me: OMG! It's so cuteeee!! OMG! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!! *more shrieks of excited indiscernible exclamations* 

SM wishes he'd just brought it home.

I could live with that one :D 

Add No. 32: Get a puppy.