Fun tiring weekend

This was definitely a busy but tiring weekend. On Saturday, Junaid and myself discovered a new Halal place in/around Harrisburg. It's Moroccan, known as Sahara. Very nice food and the ambiance was great. Had some really traditional Moroccan stuff, Tajine, Hummus, Khezzu, Zaalouk, their awesome Mint tea... it was great. Also, watched Rendition later in the evening.

Then, Sunday bunch of us from work headed out to the Ricketts Glen State Park, about 2.5 hour drive from Harrisburg. It was amazing, there are 27 waterfalls, the tallest of which is 94 feet. Also, because of the fall foliage, we got to see the trees at the best of times with changing colors and falling leaves. The temperatures were comfortable as well, in the 70's. The pictures just don't do justice to the awesome scenery. I'm hella tired though after 3.5 mile hike through the woods with steep climbs and all. It was fun.

You can run but you cannot hide...

First, it was the laptops, the notebooks. Then, it was secured VPN's. Further, along came the Blackberries and the smart phones with email capabilities. Now, it's the usage of phones on board airplanes. Seems like we're running out of excuses day by day. "Yeah, I'd really like to finish it but I have to go home, will continue on it tomorrow." That stopped working some time ago. "I would've totally answered your call, but it was during flight." Now, you won't be able to use this one either. Ah, the amazing technology!

Eid Weekend

Since Eid happened to be on Friday in Da Burg, my roommate and I had the whole day Sat. for our little weekend trip. So, off we went to NJ early Saturday morning with a little stop at the Delaware Water Gap which wasn't all that actually. I've seen better stuff in Mass and Colo. Still, it was nature and the weather was perfect to be out and about. We got bored pretty quick and started driving toward Oak Tree Rd. in Edison, NJ, Jersey's version of Devon St. in Chicago. I had heard rave reviews of the whole Indian/Paki portion of this road from some guys at work. They must not have seen Devon in Chicago, cause Oak doesn't even come close to it. Yeah, there's a lot of Desi businesses from restaurants to cafes to clothing stores to DVD stores, but the sheer size of Devon and the number and variety of stores there is by far superior. One thing I gotta give to Oak Tree Rd. is that there's a heavy South Indian influence here, there's totally vegetarian businesses etc., that wouldn't fly with me any given day. So, we ended up going to Shezan and pigged out on their special Eid buffet, absolutely delicious, highly recommended! And after a long day of exploring nature and pigging out on Desi food, we smoked peach shisha with pina colada in the base of shisha at Aladdin Lounge which was a sight in its own.

I also learned that NJ and OR are the only two states where by law all the gas stations are supposed to be Full Service, meaning your lazy ass can relax in your car while someone will fill 'er up.

Eid Mubarak!

Kullu 3am Wa Antum Be7'air

You know what really grinds my gear? Cell phones going off in the mosques and at work. We've all seen our fair share of these instances. I heard a couple this morning at the Eid prayers too. But what happened last week at our daily status meeting was just over the top. This guy's ringtone is some new Indian movie song and his volume is set to MAX. Now, I've heard his phone go off quite a few times on the floor, but pu leeese not during the meeting when there's 25 people present in the conference room and the PM is trying to get the status from the team members. I mean how long does it take to silence these things when you're walking into a mosque or work? I think I hate ringtones regardless...

Perils of working in the IT

I was shocked the other day by what I texted my friend as we chit chat on GTalk. I go, "I had slept all night and had shown up at the mosque for prayer only". No, you just didn't do that!!! The usage of "only" at the end of a sentence is a trademark fobulous Indian thing to do. By the way, the term fobulous was coined by my brother Fahad to refer to fabulously FOB'by guys, whereas FOB stands for Fresh Off the Boat. Not to say that my brother and I are not FOB's, but there are varying degrees of FOBiness. Fobulous are the ones who wear white sneakers with dress pants and knee high socks etc. They're the ones who'd use only at the end of almost every sentence. As I noted earlier, the development team here at IBM predominantly consists of FOB's. And I'm sure they've rubbed off on me over the past 6 weeks or so. No offence they're all really nice guys and gals.

The Kingdom

Except for a few exaggerations, I think it's a pretty decent movie. It's set in Saudi Arabia but actually shot in Dubai and Arizona, which is quite obvious to someone who has lived there in Riyadh. Otherwise it would fool most of the people. They did a good job of showing that it's actually Riyadh by somehow putting the legendary Kingdom Tower in the background in one of the sequences where they're all on a roof top figuring out whether the movie of the bombing was made on top of that building. The Saudi car plates on the black Suburbans are also convincing, but I did see Dubai/Abu Dhabi plate in one of the scenes. Also, the location of the Rahmah compound (where the attack takes place) is dubious, since it's shown to be 2-3 miles from the Kingdom Tower. No Western compound of that size is located so close to downtown Riyadh. They're all 10 miles or more from the city center. And yeah, the way Jamie Foxx talks to the Saudi Ambassador in Washington is highly unbelievable. I think Colonel Ghazi, the Saudi police chief did a great job.

Bottom line: the movie was mildly entertaining!

Saturday night shooting incident...

I thought I heard something and wasn't dreaming. I was awakened by pretty loud gun shots late Saturday night around 2 AM. I got up and looked out the window and saw 6 police cars racing down Chestnut St. and turning on to the alley where my apartment building is located, 2 of the cars apparently secured the perimeter and the rest went further inside the alley til I couldn't see no more. They were followed by an ambulance as well. I figured someone might have been hurt considering there were quite a few shots fired. I went back to sleep and saw the news in the morning. I know downtown Harrisburg is not the best of areas, but to have a shooting incident less than a block from my place is scary.