Tid Bit from My Diary

This weekend the dark clouds gathered around the global economy once again and this time it was on concerns that two of Dubai - owned companies may default on their debt obligations. Watching the news develop in the television stations a thought crossed my mind … “How happy we were there”. I was transported to another world when I read Oscar Wilde’s “Selfish Giant” for the first time. The statement “How happy we were there” remained closed to my heart and popped into my mind every now and then. This time it was not so much for us as we had reached Dubai as matters had already started to get sour, though I would have loved to live there. There has been hundreds of thousand s of families who had to leave the land of their dreams. The economy was buyout many people lost control over their lifestyle started to live beyond their means. They were sitting on the edge spend their past , present and future income with an illusion that they are immune to the global economic downturn without ...

We are scared to turn on the news stations these days and we wonder every time we switch it on about where has humanity gone and what value does a human life have today? We are dying in hundreds without any reason or fault of our own. This week there was this gore incident in the Philippines, where political rivals have killed 60 opponents and buried their body in a mass grave. Just for having different political views or was it the usual struggle for control? Tomorrow is the first anniversary of the Mumbai attack. For us it is only a day to remember those people who lost their lives for just being there … wrong time wrong place for them. But for the families of those 165 people, it had been 365 days of painful existence. Then there are two wars (would rather not call them war) being raged in Iraq and Afghanistan. The question is whether to increase the number of troops and if that will do any good. In brief they are putting more life at stake. My question to them is why do you str...

As a kid we used to have radios, the SW/MW kind of gadget and a few years into our childhood we met the first TV set. It was a black and white television set with a selector which could tune into 6 or 8 stations the selector came with an extra ring which was used to fine tune. In addition to that was the off/on and volume knob and all built into one. The radio used to have exactly similar set of control to tune in to a station or control the volume and a knob to switch between short and medium wave and I cannot recollect the existence of FM (frequency modulation) in those days! And the telephone was a solid black piece of equipment and well connected (with wires off course!). Life was so simple then. Whenever one of those gadget failed transmit we immediately knew the cause. If it was not the power source it was the antenna connection unless the station is having trouble with transmitting the program. In latter case we a sweet voice would invariably come up apologizing for the int...

Last week while I was being driven around I had noticed a building with big neon sign announcing that it housed the “Jarir Book Store”. I had decided on that very moment that I will have to visit this place, and I will have to do it sooner rather than later. Yesterday when I reached home after work, I was very disappointed to find that someone e has occupied my parking. So I decided to venture out in search of the Book Store…. in quest of knowledge, so to say. But with my level of road sense it is never easy to find a new location and as I lived up to my expectation. Fortunately for me there is a roundabout very close to my house and so I could first go straight, and then right and finally left, every time coming back to the roundabout to change direction. After taking a few turns at the signals I could see the neon sign I have been so desperately seeking to find. At that moment I thought of giving a “Land Ahoy!” cry but restrained myself somehow. But all was not as smooth as I had to...

Last few weeks have been very hectic for me. Tough decisions are always tough to take. It was not at all easy to decide to leave Dubai and go. The stay in Dubai was short but sweet. We had some of the best moments in our life while living in Dubai. But as it turns out I am only a modern day Nomad ……. a gypsy of the 21st century. I have tried putting up a home in so many times in so many cities in the past decade but could never stay long enough to grow my roots and that is the reason why I am able to relocate myself to a new place with relative ease. As they say that a rolling stone gather no moss… I am on the roll once again! I do not have any regrets in leaving that place, but I am a bit sad that I had to leave in such a short notice. The boom of the past few years had attracted people from all walks of life and from around the world. There had been a mad rush in the past years to reach there to make a living and build the city. When I landed there, it was as if a grand party was in...

Few days back I had written about the living statues in my other blog A Slice of Art & Design . What a coincidence that a very similar technique was being used in one of the popular malls in Dubai last week. A few stores had come together with a Radio station (who runs a few FM channels in different languages) to host a competition. The competition was quite uncommon (I shall not comment if I liked the idea or I did not) for this city where there is a constant attempt to inject new ideas to promote consumerism. This particular competition was called “ Spot the real model ”. There were a few (5 to be precise) model who were posing with the mannequins in the display windows of the stores spread all over the mall. It was exactly the same act as one of those living models. The only difference probably was that they were working under a corporate or a modeling assignment and not as street performers. All one had to do to claim a prize (shopping vouchers) was to be one of the first...

Probably there are two types of man in this world. There are those ones who let out a sigh after reading an “Andy Capp” cartoon and the ones who does not. Every morning while reading this comic strip a smile lights up my face and I always end up dreaming for a few moments "what if" I was going to spend the rest of today like Andy. But never succeeded to cross the "what if" threshold. Even if I am at home, I would not be able to spend the entire day for instance in that sofa couch of Andy. What amazes me the most is the extent that a person imagination might reach to create and keep a character like "Any" and "Flo" alive and filling up the morning of millions like me with their sense of humor and a feeling of freshness. In the early days of my blogging I had written about the "Stay At Home Dads" where we spoke about the lucky “stay home husbands”. The lot who doesn't really have to struggle for daily sustenance and on the cont...