have you ever wondered where the story ends and how it all began?

disclaimer: this is a completely random post.

so first things first, wishing everyone who reads/stumbled on this blog a very very happy new year.. May the year bring you whatever you wish for and more.

I was away the last 10 days on my super short holiday (ok new years resolution: no complaining. no whining) , at least i got a vacation, which is a big thing. So I visited the UK for 4 days, mainly Leicester, Lake district and Birmingham. after that it was a 4 day stop over in dubai. UK is super laidback its unbelievable and i dont know what recession people are talking about coz the days after christmas, all the stores were chaotic, like you would think the stuff was for free the way people were shopping. after christmas, and they werent being cheapos like us picking up holiday cards at 50% to be used in 2009. hahah. but quite a few desis doing that, we all think alike. it may just be genetic.


i ended up sitting next to a guy from tzakistan (sp) on the plane who got terribly offended that i had not heard about the city hes from. For a moment I felt like whats his problem, but then it occured to me, I feel irriated too when people dont know what Dubai is. He then proceeded to show me all his pappers, his admission letter to college. I was quite shocked as to how pple can be so open.

Anyway Leicester, I didnt see much apart from looking at trees and brick houses worth millions of pounds and which incidentally are owned by cabbies. yes, that is the hot profession for the year. =). i kid u not. i think i may have taken some pictures, will post a few.

Birmingham, is desi town, and all desis look alike. The desi girls/ladies,all super thin and have 1 kilo of make up on, and something which i observed and thought was pretty great was how people wore their salwar suits bindaas in malls, that too the young young generation, whereas here in US even in very desi-ish localities like Queens, you wont see too many pple in salwar suits. The desi guys all look like SRK in Rab ne Bana di jodi. They all have the same hair cut, maybe better dressing sense.

Lake district is the place one should go if they want to get away from it all. We stayed in those lodges in the middle of mountains, with no internet connection and cell phones connection and a 12 inch size tv. its the antitech and i was totally loving it.

Dubai, nothings changed really in terms of infrastructure. A new mall has popped up again and has an aquarium inside,which honestly is pretty neat. The bad news is that dubai is on the verge of being bankrupt, and had to ask Abu Dhabi for help. The effect isnt immediate but a lot of pple have been laid off at banks and real estate companies, people who had taken loans be it personal, home, car loans and now can't afford to pay back the loans, so apparently they leave. Some huge number of cars were found at the airport with the key in the ignition. The situation will be even more grave in Dubai than in the US, since its a smaller country and made up of expats who take personal loans to actually build a house in their home country and for the Dxb govt to actually take possession of that will get messy and Im not sure if there are any laws that will help. jo hoga dekha jayega. a friend of mine who gave up his job in the US to move to Dxb, now cant find a job no one is hiring.

Me and doctorsaab (aka as my mom) finally did the road trip of Ras Al Khaimah and Fujairah. And since we dont have a GPS system in Dubai, we relied on highly built up places from the internet. So we ended up driving around aimlessly in Ras Al Khaimah. Considering it was new years, the park, the mall all were empty. And Fujairah, an older version of Dubai, definetly pretty was a bit shady I thought. We ended up eating at a dhaba and everyone kept staring at us. Finally we decided to ask someone, anyone kya hai at least to see in Ras Al Khaimah. We see a pathan walking on the road, we stop the car and motion to me. Heres how the conversation
went.

me: Khan saab, Ras Al Khaimah ki beach kahan hai
Pathan: Beach, toda paani hai wahan par, jidhar bachei shaam ko kheltei hai. Par aisi koi beach nahin hai.
me: Ras Al Khaimah, mein dekhnei kei layk kya hai
Pathan: Kuch bhi nahin, hum logh khud pareshaan hai. Dubai wapis chalei jao. Kuch bhi nahin hai yahan par. Chalei jao wapis (im sure he wanted to add aur hamein bhi lei chalo)

and so, we drove back home.