Old memories of times in Iraq

Recently while browsing the net I came across an article about the water quality of Lake Razaza, Iraq becoming more saline due to restricted inflow of water and immediately the floodgates of my memories opened up to the times i was working in Iraq.

After my engineering degree in 1979 I was working in one of the reputable companies in Bombay / Madras (now Mumbai /Chennai) involved in Mechanical projects. My discipline being Electrical engineering I was desperate to go back into that field and when I was offered a job as Junior Engineer Electrical with an Indian Company called Makers Development Services Private Limited(Builder and developers of Makers Chambers at Nariman Point ,Mumbai) who were contracted to build a township in Baghdad, Iraq. The lure of Petro dollars and the adventures to come by I grabbed the offer in spite of objections from my mother because of ongoing war between Iraq and Iran.

Reached Baghdad on 7^th April 1981 with a group of 10 persons after traveling on road for over 20 hours from Kuwait since all international flights terminated there or at Amman in Jordan due to the war. I have written a incident which took place on our road journey in an another note called Carnivorous Brahmin about our dinner on the road side where I got to taste camel meat…an experience. Since I was part of the mobilization team we went direct to the camp area which is within the site premises and to my utter disbelief I found myself staring at few cabins which served as our accommodation and a huge barren tract of land with no buildings in sight and few kilometers away in the line of sight was the Baghdad International airport which was being used by the Iraqi air force at that point of time. The persons with whom I traveled from India were of my same age group and we became good friends during our stay there and we have gone around most of Iraq on sightseeing and fun trips.

Most weekends in summer we take local beer in ice box and travel to Razaza Lake for having a refreshing swim and beer on the shore. This was the second largest fresh water lake in those times and we used to drive 90 to 100 kms  all the way from Baghdad to Razaza lake through the holy city of Karbala and our normal mode of transport was a 3 ton single cabin dyna pickup with mattress at the back where 6 to seven of us would be seated or sleeping. One of such trip is etched on my mind because of the gruesome incident that took place that day. We were coming back from the lake and the roads had little or no illumination except for the headlight of the vehicle and at a distance we saw another vehicle parked on the side of the road with hazard lights blinking and a little ahead of this vehicle there was a dark shape on the road. My friend who was driving the vehicle stated that it is an animal hit by the vehicle and he would take this between the wheel base of the vehicle since we were traveling too fast to avoid it…he did that and we bounced a bit when we crossed over the thing but then we gave no thoughts of it till such time the vehicle started losing power and started stalling and making noise in the crankshaft. 

We then parked the vehicle on the side of the country road in twilight and started checking the crankshaft and to our horror we saw black clothe wound in the shaft..it was a piece of abaya normally worn by women in gulf countries and the underside of the vehicle splattered with blood, bone fragments and white substance which we later knew as brain. We were shit scared because the realization had just set in that we had driven over a women who was initially hit by the earlier vehicle and we were in a place where war time military rule was prevailing and if caught in the check post prior to entering Baghdad , we sure could kiss our ass goodbye forever. Well we pulled out the bits of the clothe tangled in the crankshaft and drove the vehicle in the muddy area beside the road to hide the traces of blood and flesh and then drove towards our camp in utter silence. Cursory check of our papers and we were through the check post with a sigh of relief and immediately on reaching the camp took the vehicle direct to the washing bay and washed the vehicle clean to avoid any unwanted question the next day.

We never dared to go back to Razaza lake for next three months due to the fear of being recognized by someone or the other. Thinking back I feel bad that I had to experience this incident for we never knew if the woman was already dead or was she grievously injured in the first place . Even today this incident sends a shiver down my spine !!!!

Onasadaya........ Today

Crappy feeling this morning..maybe because of the wakeup call from Rahul who did not realize that he is in India on vacation called at 6.40 am that too on a Friday. Tried to go back to sleep but after tossing and turning for few minutes it was evident that I would not go back to the land of the nods.. so woke up and had my morning tea.

Onam being celebrated today by the people from “ Gods Own Country” ( Kerala) so called up few friends and wished them on the festivities. Being curious by nature started browsing the net to find out the reasons for the celebrations and this is what I learnt about the festival

Onam is an ancient festival still surviving in modern times celebrated the annual  home coming of Demon King Mahabali from Patala (Underworld). Onam is an unique festival since Mahabali has been revered by the people of Kerala from prehistory times. According to the legend everybody in the state were happy and prosperous and the King Mahabali was highly regarded by his subjects so much so that the gods under Indra were jealous and they approached Lord Vishnu stating the Mahabali is now equivalent to Indra now and the universe cannot have both as it would create an imbalance. Mahavishnu took up the Vamana Avatar and tricked Mahabali to Patala. By the grace of Mahavishnu each year Mahabali visits his people on an annual 

basis.

Onam falls in the Malayalam month of Chingam (August-September) and 10 days festival showcases the rich traditional culture of Kerala with Intricate flower carpets, elaborate banquet lunches, Vallamkali ( Snake boat races) on river Pamba, Thumbi thulla and kaikottikkali dances by women and folk dances Puli Kali and Kummatti kali. The central feature of Onam is the grand feast called the Onasadya, prepared on Thiruonam ,a 9 course meal have between 11 to 13 essentials and is had on banana leaf with people sitting on the floor.

 The following Malayalam song is generally sung during Onam

“maveli nadu vaneedum kalam,

manusharellarum onnupole

amodhathode vasikkum kalam

apathangarkkumottillathanum

kallavum illa chathiyumilla

ellolamilla polivachanam

kallapparayum cherunazhiyum

kallatharangal mattonnumilla

adhikal vyadhikalonnumilla

balamaranangal kelppanilla “

and the translation of this song is as under

When Maveli, our King, ruled the land,

All the people were equal.

And people were joyful and merry;

They were all free from harm.

There was neither anxiety nor sickness,

Deaths of children were unheard of,

There were no lies,

There was neither theft nor deceit,

And no one was false in speech either.

Measures and weights were right;

No one cheated or wronged his neighbor.

When Maveli, our King, ruled the land,

All the people formed one casteless races

Such a rich heritage of the people of Kerala is celebrated with lots of pomp all over the world where you have Malayalees residing and gulf having a huge population of people from Kerala is no different. So this day I have been invited to have Onasadya along with my colleagues at their mess.

Though an Indian I never really gave a thought to reason for this celebration but today i got to know about this festival. I know many of my friends would know all the things i have written about Onam, however this is for few of them like me who are totally blank about this festival. By the way King Mahabali is the grand son of Prahalad whose father was slain in Narashiman avatar.

Wahiba Sands trip… not to the high expectations we had set !!

Six of us in two cars set out on the trip to Wahiba sand desert camp and then on to Wadi Bani Khalid at 11.30 am as planned on 31^st morning. The beer session dragged on until late night the previous day and the whole day I had a splitting headache and hence I could not enjoy the drive. We traveled toward the meeting point at Badiyah Shell petrol station which is around 206 Kms from Muscat while traveling on the Ibra-Sur highway. Single lane traffic and winding roads meant that we needed to drive pretty conservatively at about 100 Kms/hour max in order to be safe. We reached a Shell Petrol station near Badiyah and were desperately trying to find the office of the Al-Raha Desert camp but then the meeting point was about 20 Kms further up the road and we reached there at 2.30 pm. Al Raha Desert camp’s office within the petrol station complex beside Badiyah Optical and we met the owner Mr.Ali who confirmed our booking and also arranged for two 4x4 vehicles for taking us 20 klicks into the desert to the camp.

We followed the 4x4’s to the edge of the desert where we had to park our saloon cars, had our packed lunch of Poori bhaji’s and hopped on to the 4x4 vehicles with lots of excitement anticipating an incredible drive to the camp…but alas just an ordinary drive on the sands to the camp with hardly any dune bashing. We then thought that the dune bashing would be later in the evening as the drivers sated that they would take us at 5.30 pm in the evening into the desert for sunset view. Reached Al Raha camp which has over 75 rooms and we were fortunate that we could wrangle three rooms with window air conditioners…which can be switched on only at 6 pm when the generator comes on… otherwise the camp has solar power for the lighting. So at 3.15 pm with nothing much to do we broke off for a small nap but then the heat was killing and the fans were of no use and we hardly slept few winks !!! Headache getting worse.

At 4 pm we went to have some coffee and water which was arranged by the camp in the Majlis and we saw a group of tourists climbing a small dune just behind the camp. With more than a hour and half available for the ride into the desert we also decided to go up the dune for some photo shoot. The dune sand was so fine that one of the group member decided to slide down the dune….Sand Butting !!!! Lolz…instead of sand boarding ,a little fun here. At the appointed time we went searching for our vehicles but alas they had already left with other guests in the camp to the dune summit. On enquiry the camp owner stated that all guest would be driven up irrespective of which vehicle they had travelled into the camp and finally we got our vehicles and off they went over couple of smaller dunes and a 45 degree run on a dune and final reached the summit of the dune which should be around 130 meters tall. The time was just about 6 pm and our driver started telling us to hurry back to the vehicle and when we said we would wait for the sunset they just went back to the camp to ferry more guests up…..over 120 guests were ferried by just about 8-10 vehicles (too much crowd due to Eid holidays). Just three of us were able to come back by vehicle down the dune and the vehicle had to travel at about 70 degree slope downwards. Many guests were left on the summit and they had to walk down the dune to the camp………. That’s all of dune bashing we had and we were cursing ourselves of having shelled out RO 60 for two vehicles.. utter waste of money.

Once back to the camp we met the camp attendant and arranged for a bottle of chilled red wine of South African origin since I do not take Whiskey which we had bought over from home…another expensive purchase almost triple the price available at Muscat . We started our drinks early and went into the dining hall at sharp 8 pm.. the time the camp opens up the buffet dinner and finished our dinner early …ok food nothing to rave about and we had a choice of non vegetarian and vegetarian food to choose from…tandoor chicken and mutton, pulao, rice,sambar, bhindi sabji and salads.

Couple of local Omani singers were already performing in the Majlis one with stringed instrument known as Ud  and it looks similar to guitar and singing Arabic songs and the other playing the doumbek (similar to a drum). So we guys spent few minutes at majlis taking few snaps of the singer and ourselves. Then I was so bushed that I called it a day and went to the land of the nods early …just about 9 pm. At about 11.45 pm I suddenly woke up feeling hot and I notices that there is no power…came out of the room and saw that rest of our gang standing outside in darkness..they had been relaxing in Majlis enjoying the holiday atmosphere around a bon fire. On enquiring about the power supply we were informed that the generator has tripped and the power would be available soon…well we did get the power but then the generator kept failing quite often throughout the night ….generator was getting overloaded since all the air conditioners were working (100% occupancy due to holidays). My suggestion to all those people going to Al Raha camp not to travel there during public holidays…too much crowd creates such failures !!!

Somehow forced myself to sleep and next day woke up early and at dot 7 am we were the first guest to hire Quad bikes at RO 5 for half hour each and had real fun of driving these four wheeled bikes in desert sand..this was fun and we thoroughly enjoyed this. Then the breakfast of bread butter jam, macaronis and fruits and after that the check out from camp. By 9 am we settled our bills at the camp and were driven back to the edge of the desert where we had parked our cars…this short trip was the highlight of the trip wherein our drivers took over few dunes at breakneck speed and at last we got the taste of dune bashing…though not enough to get our adrenalins  going up. Finally reached the car and decided to go back to Muscat instead of going to Wadi Bani Khalid as was feeling tired and spent!! An uneventful drive back home and the trip to an end!!

Plans for Eid holidays outing around Muscat

Hectic planning in progress for the trip to Wahiba Sands on 31^st August and the reason for this haste is that each one of the team members are desperately looking out for booze bottles. Being last day of the holy month there are hardly any stocks around since the entire month the permit shop was closed and most of the black marketers have also depleted their supplies. Bookings at Al Raha desert camp has been done for 6-8 persons @ RO 20 per head which includes room, night dinner and morning breakfast. We have also booked two 4x4 vehicles for the ride into the desert from the Shell Petrol bunk at Bidhya…dune bashing and sunset from top of the dune. 

Ramlat al wahiba or Sharqiya sand is the desert region of Oman has a boundary of 180 kms  north to south and 80 kms east to west and is named after the Wahiba tribe who are the inhabitants of this region. This lies between Muscat and Sur while traveling through the Ibra route and has vast beautiful dunes and is one of the tourist spots of Oman. A number of hotels and camp dot the region each one offering various facilities and are priced according to the facilities.

Myth and mystery surrounds this region and as the legend says the Persian Shahryar incensed by the infidelity of his wife vowed to take a new wife each night and kill her the next morning. Shahrazad who consented to be his queen was beautiful and as well clever spent every night telling him legendary stories and would leave the climax of the story untold at dawn and thereby the king used to postpone  her execution  so that he could hear the complete story . 1001 nights she used to narrate thrilling stories and in the end she gave birth to three sons and the king was convinced by his wife faithfulness revoked his decree. Thus the legend of One thousand one nights.

On 1^st morning after driving around in quad bikes we plan to go to Wadi Bani Khalid and swim in the natural soft water lake and then back to Muscat. Would write in detail once we are back

WORK LIFE BALANCE

Gone are the days when work means that we had to work from 9 AM to 5.30 PM with a half hour lunch break. I still remember the early days of my career way back 1979-1980, when I used to take some files to be cleared by my immediate boss at about 5 PM ,he used to ask me a question that could the file wait till next day morning and if I answer affirmative then he used to ask to  just relax and have a smoke. He always used to say that while you work the whole day in full concentration you do need to relax every now and then so that you do not burn out. This was a very important Lesson learnt for me and this has helped me being more relaxed in my job throughout my career. I have seen friends being prey to stress and tensions as they are not able to relax a bit during work nor at their homes where they are still thinking about the office works.

Things have changed from those days and the present day culture is that a person who is office much beyond office hours are considered to be hard working employees. I have gleaned another lesson from this attitude while I was employed in Middle East in mid 1980’s we used to have an colleague who used to sit late till about 8-8.30 PM while the office used to close officially at 6 PM. This was noticed by our managing director for a week while staying in the guest room within the office complex during his visit from India and the next day in front of all employees stated the following quote “ If somebody is working late each day to complete his work then there are only two possibilities… one is that he is overloaded and the second that he is inefficient and then looking at that person who sat late he said I do not think I have overloaded you”… This made me realize that if you consciously do your share of work during the office time then you would not have to take the burden much beyond office timing thereby giving you sufficient time for relaxation and time to spend with your loved ones.

In this rat race  of present time most of us are so busy to attain recognition and fame  that we start neglecting ourselves and our families as we are getting obsessed with materialist gains that would come with the success. This generally leads to stress related health issues and frictions within the families. Well in my case we did take a conscious decision to be apart during my employment in Middle East for varied reasons such as children’s education and also more moola !!!! I have seen families tearing apart even though they stay together since the work pressures are pretty high demanding more time of an employee’s thereby he is unable to spend more quality time with his wife or kids. Initially all seems to be goody goody but then cracks start developing slowly and when you hardly expecting, it blows out. I know life is uncompromising in this matter and we need to take steps that everyone is satisfied i.e. employer, wife and kids…and in some cases even your parents. Work life balance needs to be maintained somehow and a person who is able to do that would be a happy and a successful person !!!

You all must be wondering why is that I have written about office and timings…. Well just couple of days back I received a mail from a friend which I have reproduced below

In this life, What did you miss???

The wife asked the husband when she was 25

Despondently the husband replied

I missed a new job opportunity

When she was 35

The husband angrily told her that

He had just missed the bus

At 45, the husband sadly said

I missed the opportunity seeing my close relative before his death

At 55, The husband said disappointingly

I missed a good chance to retire

At 65, The husband hurriedly replied

I missed a dental appointment

At 75, the wife did not ask the husband anymore

The husband was kneeling in front of a very sick wife remembering the question wife used to ask him and this time he asked the wife the same question

The wife with a smile and peaceful look replied

In this life, I did not miss having you

The husband was in tears and he thought they would be together forever. He was busy with work and trifles so much that he had never been thoughtful to his wife. The husband hugged his wife and said

Over 50 years, how I have allowed myself to miss your deep love for me,

In this busy life there are many people who are always busy with their works and these people revolve their lives around their job. These people all their times and health to meet the social expectations. They are unwilling to spend time on health care. They miss the opportunity to be with their children in their growing up . They neglect the loved ones who care for them and their health. Nobody knows what is going to happen tomorrow, Life is not permanent so always live in present !!. Express your gratitude to your loved ones in words, Show your care in actions, Treat each day as the last episode of life.

In this way when you are gone your loved ones would have nothing to feel sorry about.

Wow quite a powerful mail this was !!!! So friends have a happy and love filled life and yes you really need to make few adjustments in all facets of life to achieve contentment and happiness !!!

Coincidences …………does make you wonder of unseen forces

Life is full of coincidences , some very minor and occasionally extraordinary and some unbelievable. I have had my share of coincidences during y life till date and I have shared partly with you in a note Jinxed June sometime last year.

The most extraordinary coincidence in my life is the birth of my daughters and this is the story behind this. My marriage took place in 1983 and both me and my wife planned to start family in about 3-4 years time. We then tried to have a child but then nothing seems to work out in spite of both of us being normal and healthy human beings. There has been lots of peer pressure from both our families to start a family which is quite common in India and this led to tensions and stress in both our lives and this went on till 1995. One day in the month of August 1995 we get a call from my brother in law saying that his wife is carrying their second child and they wanted to terminate the pregnancy as it was not possible for them to increase their family by another member. It was then we decided that we would adopt the baby and we requested my wife’s sister in law to continue with her pregnancy and we would take the child once it was born. The only condition was that she would have to be admitted for delivery in my wife’s name (I was working in UAE then and the adoption procedures would be so immense that my family would not be able to come back) and the same was accepted. The delivery was scheduled to be in the month of March 1996 and both me and my wife went to India during the first week of March on annual vacations. My elder daughter Sanjana was born on the 15^th of March 1996 at Chennai and as we had promised she flew back to Dubai after 2 months along with my wife. My elder daughter brought lots of joy to our family and within couple of months of my wife joining me back she became pregnant and the doctors in Dubai advised complete bed rest as the child was a precious child as termed by her ( being pregnant after 13 years of marriage) . During the early pregnancy of my wife a colleague’s wife staying in the same building and on the same floor helped my wife and the elder daughter and also took care of the lunch for both our families. This went on for some time and then my friend was relocated to Delhi and while they were leaving back for India I sent my wife back too along with them since she would not be able to handle a growing child and the house.

We were informed that the probable date of delivery would be in March and things were going on normal and finally during the due date in first week of March 1997 my wife went to hospital as she did not get any labor pains but the doctor said though it is few days late they want to wait for a normal delivery instead of a cesarean section … the wait went on till the 15^th of March and finally my second daughter Yamini was born on the same date as her sister… the only difference being that elder one was born in the morning and the second one in the evening !!!.

Both of them have been a great joy and fun to both me and my wife and I am amazed by their attachment to one another for they grew up together almost similar to twins but just a year apart.

 A coincidence which can never be forgotten throughout my life time and it makes me wonder that if there is some unseen powers that make such things happen in one’s life.

The most current coincidence is that My flat number is 413 and I took up this flat when I relocated to Muscat from Salalah in January 2011 to take up a new project assignment being booked by our company. Once the project is booked the systems in the company would allocate a running job number and to my utter surprise the computer spat out the number 413 to the very project I am handling now !!!

 I leave these two experiences to your own imagination !!!

Relationships....good, bad and the ugly !!!!!

I know I am writing crap but then it’s my crap and I am writing this down to release the tensions of my mind prevailing at this point of time. This is not about lovers or mistresses but the normal relationship one has in and around him or her !!!!

You try to do something good for someone and if that does not work out why is that person blaming me for the failure. Well I think this is very common world over and the person who has tried to help feels hurt. This has happened to me in my life many times over but then I do not wish to list out each one of them since it would take quite a few days to write down all such incidents in life. By the reactions I have been getting to my actions I have decided that I would not take a step to help out relatives and friends for it leads to misunderstanding and possible strain on relationships. The negative feeling have been implanted in me by the actions of others..yet I try to be nice so that I avoid souring of the relationship. I am penning down some of the main factors that does affect a relationship and I hope each one of you would have different thoughts on this issue.

Money is one of the main issues which rip apart relationships and this is very true in real life.. no so in reel (movies) life where everything is shown rosy !!! So one of my dictum's is to avoid any issues in relationship coming up between relatives and friends and hopefully to this date there is been no major issues except for few grumblings here and there !!! Yah I am managing it well !!!!
Ego in a person does spoil the relationships within the team or life and you generally encounter these in work premises. Most places where you are employed operates on team work and if you have one person who has an alter ego the whole team can be demoralized and not operate efficiently. I do tread very softly on this issue because some feel that the ego in the person is for demographic reasons or that he is over qualified…  well the only way to avoid any confrontation is to defuse the situation and to carry on as nothing has happened…………… but then this may not succeed if the person is consistently egoist and only way is to get disassociated from that person !!!!!

Adding this paragraph today based on input by a friend on comments...ahhh yes expectations are also a cause of heartburn's and pain in a relationship be it whatsoever... friends,love, mistress ,partner or an organization. If the other persons expectations are very high and if not met leads to a situation of discomfort and hurt. It is always better not to set a very high expectation from a person for it is sure going to fail...in other words if things happen with out any expectation then the pleasure derived is even greater !!!I have seen the impact an expectation can do to ones life in the close family circle and also in an organization and i tell the amount of pain it creates to a person is so immense that the relationship turns sours and mistrust set in !!!! what says you????

We can elect to spend time with friends, romantic partners, relatives, and/or pets who love us. It is important to not only initiate these relationships, but maintain them with attention, care, and thoughtfulness. While we can't change the wrongdoings from our families and friend but we can make things better by tending to our relationships in the present. And in doing so, we may be surprised by the flowers that blossom. But then if we are in confrontation mode at all times we could see a withered flower instead !!!

Choice is ours !! Have a great relationship and revel in the that and am sure you would be a better human being !!!