Back in Harness

After 19 months I am back to my blog.

Roller coster ride is the best word that describes those 19 months. I experienced life in a very bizarre way and encountered some extreme highs and extreme lows………Any resentment ?…… Not at all.

As Luis Miguel said it “I think we all wish we could erase some dark times in our lives. But all of life’s experiences, bad and good, make you who you are. Erasing any of life’s experiences would be a great mistake.”

 

 

 

 

 

The Pursuit of Happyness

On my way back to home from office on Saturday I dropped at a movie shop to get a nice movie. There were number of good movies so it was darn difficult to take my pick. Finally I decided to go for The Pursuit of Happyness.Wow what a BEAUTIFUL movie with an inspirational message of love and determination. Surely it has become one of my fav movies. Staring Will Smith and his real-life son, the movie is based on a true story of Christopher Gardner. The movie has some fine & touching scenes of father-son relationship and a man who struggles in his life to make his living. Will Smith gave his finest performance and he got an academy award nomination for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role. It’s a must see……… 

Dialogues that Christopher Gardner (Will Smith) had with his son Christopher (Junior Will Smith) in the movie…………..

 Christopher Gardner: [to his son] You got a dream, you gotta protect it. People can’t do something themselves, they wanna tell you that you can’t do it. You want something? Go get it. Period.
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Christopher Gardner: It’s not “H-A-P-P-Y-N-E-S-S” Happiness is spelled with an “I” instead of a “Y”
Christopher: Oh, okay. Is “Fuck” spelled right?
Christopher Gardner: Um, yes. “Fuck” is spelled right but you shouldn’t use that word.
Christopher: Why? What’s it mean?
Christopher Gardner: It’s, um, an adult word used to express anger and, uh, other things. But it’s an adult word. It’s spelled right, but don’t use it.
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Christopher Gardner: Probably means there’s a good chance. Possibly means we might or we might not.
Christopher: Okay.
Christopher Gardner: So, what does probably mean?
Christopher: It means we have a good chance.
Christopher Gardner: And what does possibly mean?
Christopher: I know what it means! It means we’re not going to the game.
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Christopher: Hey dad, you wanna hear something funny? There was a man who was drowning, and a boat came, and the man on the boat said “Do you need help?” and the man said “God will save me”. Then another boat came and he tried to help him, but he said “God will save me”, then he drowned and went to Heaven. Then the man told God, “God, why didn’t you save me?” and God said “I sent you two boats, you dummy!”

Pakistan Bounced Back

Its all over …..Pakistan won the match…..

So High five!!!! What an electrifying performance by Pakistan Cricket team. Afridi…THE GUY…. hammered the South African bowlers and his 74 for 31 balls were a treat to watch. He was too good both with bat n ball. I wonder y he didn’t get man of the match. Muhammad Yosuf and Yonus khan also batted intelligently. Azher mahmood emerged as confident and he bowled well and thus made his mark. He will be a good pick for upcoming world cup. Inzi is such a fine player but he lacks agility between the wickets…grow up dude ….run Inzi run Inzi …u can make it & reposition yourself.

It was darn heart wrenching when Pakistan lost the match against South Africa two days back. I thought Pakistan has zero chance for winning the world cup…..Bunch of twits…wimps….should quit cricket and opt for modeling ….. and today Im all out for my team. I know im being so typical but that’s the way the cookie crumbles. When someone play good they should be lauded but if perform poorly should get hell in order to shape their behavior.

Pakistan team exudes trememdous zip and is pretty pretty capable of beating any team provided players use their mind at the right time.

Hope Pakistan performs during world cup…….keeping fingers crossed…..

One World, One Family, One Festival

I had two back to back rocking trips to Dubai in the month of Jan. The trips were pretty exciting as I managed to see the 11th Dubai Shopping Festival (DSF) which revolved around the theme of One World, One Family, One Festival. From malls to Global Village to new film releases I thoroughly enjoyed the shopping & entertainment extravaganza.

The best part of the trip was visit to Global Village. We stayed there for 8 hrs and covered nearly all the country pavilions. The entire world came under one roof, from Sudan to Greece, in 8 hrs I saw the entire world. Also saw some amazing fireworks. I had my life’s best time over there.

But I also experienced two major probs in Dubai – one the massive traffic jams & the other expensive cost of living. Traffic jams in khi are nothing in front of the jams I saw in Dubai. We are far far better off. The jams on Sheik Zayad road and the road that connects Dubai to Sharjah were the worst I had ever seen. But the taxi driver told me that this prob would get solved in 2008 as subway making inroads to the city. Apart from jams the taxi fares were dent on one’s wallet.

Pretty Much Off-the-wall

As tagged by Inspirex 

I am pretty much sane but when deviate and act wacky exhibit following bizarre behavior:

• My colleagues get sore feet on international trips; brothers always refuse to tag along, mom n dad get irritated when it comes to shopping with me. I am being pegged as shopaholic whether real or window, I exude tremendous energy for this activity. 

• Hollywood movies which r big time flop at box office are close to my heart.

• I need a glass of water after having something sweet and I go for sprite zero with cheese burger or fried chicken or fish. My family and friends have objection on having diet drink. They don’t get my smart strategy that by having diet drink I am cutting off my calories. 

• I don’t put sugar in tea & coffee. I like to retain the strong & original taste of tea n coffee as sugar makes it lil weird.

• I am obsessed with colorful shopping bags esp of Kaadi, Threads, Kids, Zara, Mango, H&M, Giordano. I have kept many shopping bags under my mattress, safe n sound.

• I don’t answer missed phone calls, sms, and emails. All my friends hate me for that but I am not rude or arrogant. I believe I am kinda communication shy. 

Tag all the untagged lot………..

In retrospect, 2006

2006 was a splendid year for me and I am thankful to God for making the year so peaceful n sound for me & my family. I didn’t plan anything special for the year as I am a person who goes with the flow and takes whatever comes my way. God was kind enough n blessed me with peace, happiness, new friends, international trips, etc.

Going down the memory lane of 2006, my best friend got married and interestingly she also became mother of a baby boy. Another close friend was hitched to a guy whom she loved from last eight years and a dear college friend tied knot with handsome doctor.

Thanks to my job which is darn amazing as it gave me marvelous opportunity to travel to exotic places like Bahrain, Dubai, Frankfurt, Cologne, Hanover & Paris. All the trips were stupendous and a great learning experience.

I made few good friends and celebrated my 25th birthday with them. Also reunited with old buddies and on their encouragement started blogging. I even tried my hands on playing squash which was so refreshing and enthralling .

The most exciting thing that gave me real pleasure was my elder brother‘s admission in LUMS & my bhabi’s job at IBM. Both r samrt lot and i take pride in thier roaring success.

The year aslo unfolded IDEAS 2006 through which I met so many different people & made some indelible memories. The handshake with President Pervaiz Musharaf was also a riveting moment of 2006.

Other things which I enjoyed during last year were reading WINNING by Jack Welch, watching MI3 on big screen, having Starbucks in Dubai n Frankfurt, COSTA coffee in khi and shopping in Frankfurt, Dubai n Paris.

All in all 2006 was a rocking year…..

Time’s 25 Top Ten list

While browsing I came across Time’s 25 Top Ten List which entails ranking of the best & bold of 2006 for tv, music, movies, sports, buzzwords, breakups, scandels, websitse & more. Its very interesting & I came to know so many new things that i missed in 2006 coz of my busy schedule.

Three days in Paris

After good 3 months I am back at blogging. I was preoccupied with international traveling & IDEAS 2006 so couldn’t get time to revert to blogging. The month of November started with a trip to Dubai & Paris This was my second visit to Dubai & first to Paris. We stayed in Dubai for three days, finished our work and took a flight to Paris. Watched lake house, Super Ex Girlfirend & Romancing the stone during 6.5 hr flight.

I heard and read about Paris that it is one of the most exciting places to visit. God gave me the chance to experience it and now I can say that the fashion capital and city of lights is simply awesome and worth visiting. Love n romance in the air of Paris which was simply refreshing for my soar eyes…lolzz. The weather was really cold but I enjoyed it coz we hardly experience such cold here in Karachi.

Paris is divided into twenty arrondissements in the form of a clockwise spiral & we stayed at Holiday Inn in 19th arrondissement. Reached hotel, freshened up n went for lunch at nearby Turkish café. Then headed for Eiffel Tower and went at the top of it, at 1000 ft. The view from the top was one hell of an experience; put a coin in the telescope n saw the bird eye view of Paris. I read some where that Tom cruise proposed Kate Holmes at the top of Eiffel tower….wow what a place to propose!!!! Though it was night but truly it was looking city of lights. Also visited Champs Elysees, known as the most beautiful avenue of the world. The avenue is lined by cinemas, theaters, cafés and restaurants, and luxury specialty shops. Window shopped at Louis Vuitton, MontBlanc, Zara, lacoste, Guerlain, Gap, Celio, Disney Store & other French brands. I did my homework on shopping in Paris so I only shopped from Sephora coz rest was totally out of scene for my tiny pocket. We had dinner at an Indian restaurant & ordered grilled jumbo prawns, biryani, bhaji, muter paneer with chapatti n sweet lassi. Also saw arc de triumph, monument by Napoleon on our way back

Second day we went for our official work and came back in the evening. Our MD left for Pakistan so I n my colleague took a train to Rue de Rivoli for some more shopping. We both are shopoholics and go crazy on our trips. We went there to find our all time fav stores H&M & C&A. We had dinner at Turkish Café and had pizza. All shops got closed till we had our pizza. All dark n deserted so we decided to leave coz we both were lil scared. Took a train n got off to wrong station, went back to the same station n this time got the right train with the help of some native people. The subway system of Paris is very very confusing as there are three lines. So it was great learning experience being alone and managing ourselves in Europe. Also caught glimpse of Notre Dam, situated on the bank of river seine. I learnt few things from French people like a friendly smile; a warm greeting of “bon jour”; a simple “merci”; politeness & an expression of etiquette.

Third day we went to exhibition & conducted our meetings in the first half took a train to our hotel. We decided to explore the street near our hotel. We found Pizza hut on that street n had veggie Pizza. Eating out in Europe is one difficult task coz of haram & halal issue. After stuffing pizza it was time to burn off those calories so went to nearby shops. It seemed like a downtown of Paris.

At night we had a flight to Dubai to Khi. Left hotel and headed for airport (Charles De Gaulle). The taxi took 35 Euros……duhhhh…. that’s why we used to prefer train…heheheh

We checked in and waited at emirates VIP lounge coz my colleague is Gold card member of skywards. We had dinner there. We were so tired so slept in the entire flight of 6.5 hrs. Reached Dubai n took a flight to Khi. So on the whole it was a very good trip.

Hope to get a chance to visit again coz there are plenty of monuments to see like Louvre, Moulin Rouge, Notre Dam, Disney resort, gallery lafayat etc.

When the cat’s away, the mice will play

I got up early today and left home before my usual time, assuming to reach office a bit early but I was downright wrong in my head. I arrived at office 10 minutes late due to heavy traffic at chundrigar road. Strangely the office was exuding tranquility & serenity that I never came across in usual days. The office weather forecast was extreme chilly day. Everybody was exhibiting their true selves, relaxing & chirping. The reason behind such a different office ambience was the non existence of our MD…..lolzzz. As the saying goes when the cat’s away, the mice will play, the news came as pleasant surprise that our MD will be out of country for one week thus bestowing a week long rock n roll on the entire office.

I started my day with a cup of strong tea to give a jerk to my groggy head, skimmed & scanned CNN, brecorder, Dawn, fortune & businessweek, quickly checked important emails and drafted few replies so that I could indulge in blogging without any guilt. Finally im here writing this post for my blog. For me Blogging is pure fun, it revitalizes mind n soul and a superb way to kill monotony. No age limit & highly recommended for everyone.

Weekend……An Unsolved Mystery

A rocking weekend is the one which is spent with friends & family, going out with them for dinner, movie, coffee or picnic. But such a weekend happens to be a rare case. Very often weekends are total failure.

I always look forward to weekend with great excitement and make a TO-DO list that predominantly includes cleaning my wardrobe, renting DVDs, checking pending emails, picking or dropping clothes at tailor, pedicure & manicure, cooking, shopping etc. But weekend is just like an unsolved mystery as it vanishes in jiffies and Monday comes from nowhere.

On Sunday night, before going to bed I just tried to recollect what I did over the weekend and all I could recall was sleep, breakfast & lazing around. What about my ambitious TO-DO list ???? …. arrrgghhhhhhh ….Nothing, it went down the drain. So finally I came to the conclusion that Weekend is not meant for executing the plans made ambitiously during the week days rather it is the name of relaxation and peace and should be realistically look forward. I fancy a weekend that stay longer and full of fun & frolic.