Yesterday while passing through "Lady Shri Ram College for Women", something struck me with regard to the name of the college itself (apart from other apparant things...). In this particular name we have the words 'Lady' and 'Women' connoting Feminity, and at the same time there are words like 'Shri' and 'Ram' connoting Masculity!!! Any takes???

Being a late entrant to Orkut has its own oddity. While going through other users profile, I noticed how casually most of them (including me!!) have chosen US-English and not UK-English as the language one is conversant with. Its surprising because most of us Indians do not know those minute and subtle differences between US-English and UK-English, or for that matter, Indian-English. These differences exist not only in pronunciation and spelling but in meaning too. Apart from these there are altogether different words in use for the same stuff, leaving aside the local slang and phrases particular to the US only. Believe me folks, I have learned it the hard way.

Apropos pronunciation, I have a short anecdote to share: During my stay in Chicago to ward off my boredom, I decided to go to a movie theatre. The hotel receptionist gave me the directions to the theatre. Still not confirmed of the direction I asked if its besides the pond (pronouncing with a typical rounded mouth). She didn’t get it. After repeating it numerous times but in vain, I spelled it. Even that took a couple of seconds for her to comprehend after which she enthusiastically said “Oh! You mean the Phaand (stretching her mouth)”. I was glad she got it right. Few days later I drove through a drive-thru and asked for a “Cod fillet” – pronouncing once again in our typical style by rounding my mouth. Again the same problem and so I gave a shot. I yelled ‘Khaad – stretching and rounding my mouth at the same time’. And it worked again. So this time it was me who got it right. That day onwards I knew how to pronounce some other similar words eg Dollars, Bottom, common etc.

This is just one of the numerous instances when US-English clashed with Indian-English. And it was almost an everyday affair till I left that country after almost a year. Now I introspect and ask myself: Why do most of us say we know US-English when actually we don’t? Or, Why don’t we just say we know Indian-English or maybe British-English more than US-English? Is it just ‘IN’ to associate oneself with USA in everything happening in our lives? I guess that’s it. Most (not all) of us are in one way or the other, whether we accept it or not – obsessed with America for no reason. This is true with most people of the world which I can testify after meeting a lot of people around the world. Who knows this will change in a decade or so and we will feel proud to be knowing Chinese!!

Well, I shouldn’t actually be calling it a sojourn because I didn’t move out of the airport. Nevertheless I would like to share the experience I had at the Dubai international airport (Sheikh Rashid Terminal). It so happened that my flight should only had two hours stopover. But due to some last minute changes in my itinerary that brief stopover extended over a couple of more hours. At first I decided to take a transit visa. After being told that it will cost around USD 194, I was quite apprehensive. Shelling out around 200 bucks for few hours, of which I will spend the good part of it sleeping – not a good idea. Suddenly I remembered that there is one “International Hotel” in the airport premises too. I went there only to be told that all the rooms are occupied and that one room costs USD 211. So I decided that if I find a place in the airport where I can take a nap then ok else I am going to take that transit visa. Luckily there are many places in Dubai international airport where one can have a very sound sleep. Ironically, don’t even try to take a rest at places marked as “Quite area” because not only are they full and brightly lighted up, it makes no sense sleeping in not-completely-flat couches when you have other places to lie down. I would recommend places around gate 43 (at the end of the hallway) or downstairs near the passport control (it’s a long way from duty-free area). I decided to sleep at the airport also because since I knew that there will be a long stop-over in Dubai I took one blanket with me to give me that sound sleep I am used to and I long for.

Dubai airport is very beautiful. The construction work is always going on which might be irritating to some, but is also a testimony to the routine maintenance. It also seems that they are also expanding the terminals / building a new terminal building. The airport apart from being well equipped with modern amenities and luxuries has a very good automated logistics for the baggage transfer. But in spite of all these, I found atleast two drawbacks. The first and foremost is the way “Dubai duty-free” has been hyped. Its in no way cheaper than any other European duty frees. On the contrary, it might even be expensive. I checked on the price of a very typical “Apple Ipod nano – 4gb white”. And guess what, it was USD296!!! You can very easily get it under USD250 in many of the stores worldwide. The second drawback is lack of wifi zones. There was none I found. Although there are some small kiosks or cubicles with internet connections but they are full. I am very sure Dubai is very well integrated with internet and wifi but at airport they haven’t invested on this issue. Even in the modest airport of Sao Paolo in Brazil I had seven wifi service providers and of them atleast one was free!!

Yes, I am leaving Morocco for good :-(( But it was an experience I will never forget. As I posted earlier, my opinion about Morocco has changed considerably. Now I like this place a lot more. Maybe because our host (Atmane Said and Madani Said) were one of the most friendly, charming and interesting persons I have ever met. I learnt a lot not only about Morocco but beyond that as well after meeting them. Today was even more special day for me coz Atmane not only invited me to his home (a place appropriately called California) to meet his family but also asked me to join them for Lunch. And guess what, I ate the most typical Moroccan food - CousCous. It is basically some grains made from wheat flour using a special bowl which is cooked on a two layer vessel with this CousCous on the top and vegetables (mainly cabbage and carrots) and meat on the lower level. These two are then served with a special sauce as gravy and another thick mixture made of raisins etc. Believe me folks, it was amazingly delicious.. Yummy...

Yesterday also I got a chance to try another typical Moroccan dish served normally on most of the wedding ceremonies - Pastell del blah blah blah.... It had in any case a little hard topping like that over a Lasagne albeit sweet with a very unusual brown colour meshed mixture of meat and vegetables inside.

Drifting away a bit from delicacies, here are some more facts about Morocco that you might be interested to know:

- In most of the languages, morocco is spelled marokko (or marocco). I don’t know how 'a' was replaced by an 'o' in English! I asked Atmane too but he also had no answer.

- Morocco is called "Al Maghraib" in Arabic which means land of the west. Probably because it might be called the western-most Arabian country of the world.

- There are many Berber speaking people in morocco but Berber was not granted an official status until as late as 2003.

- Casablanca might be the capital, but its governed from Rabat and Marrakech is its tourist hotspot and probably Feh the cultural capital.

- While the great mosque of Casablanca was being built, all Moroccans were coerced to contribute money. When the King of Saudi paid a visit, he asked if Jews also contributed some money. Getting an affirmative answer he was naturally very disappointed. The king of morocco tried to pacify his concerns by telling him that the money contributed by Jews have been used to build toilets!!!

- Although its prohibited to serve alcohol to Muslims, most people get around this very easily without doing anything because most of the bars have some nexus with police itself. Remember that nepotism looms large in this country.

- This country is one of the largest producers of oranges but alas, almost 70 percent of them are thrown into the sea because of shortage of domestic and foreign demand.

Today I got an opportunity to see this country from inside. We went through their bazars constituted mainly by narrow arcades and promenades. There was a lot of hustle and bustle all around. The narrow streets, half of them encroached by small businesses and kiosks, seemed to lead us nowhere. There was an unending mesh of those narrow lanes. Finally, we saw the majestic Hassan II Mosque. It took almost 13 years to complete the construction work. It is also the second largest mosque in the world (after the Shah Faisal Mosque near Islamabad). Its Minaret is the tallest in the world at 210 metres. The mosque and its courtyard can also accommodate more that 100,000 people at a time!!!! The view of the atlantic in its proximity adds immense beauty to its grandeur. All in all it was a superb day.


Trivia: Casablanca is also called "white house" because there were many white colored houses when some portuguese landed some ceturies back(In spanish 'Casa' means 'house' and 'Blanco' is 'white').

Since my arrival last week, morocco has constantly belied my previous impressions and thoughts about this country. Everything is being defied. My impression of morocco was of a typical poor african country inhabited by mostly black religious people. Contrary to that, its more arabian than african and its sparsely inhabited by typical arabian race people.

Talking of weirdness, today I got to know something which stumped me for a while. Morocco is the world's largest exporter of Hashish!!! To bate my curiosity, one of the local guys even brought some grass (Hashish means grass in Arabic) and started smoking.
Apart from Hashish, morocco unlike many arabic countries consumes much alcohol too. I have been told that corruption is also crossing its limit (inter-alia Nepotism and bribery are commonly acceptable). The cost of living is also quite high comparable to that of any european country (Our four star hotel is leaving us around 150 Euros dearer everyday!!). Then the question arises: what is good about morocco? Well, I am still looking for the answers. But there is certainly no doubt about the friendly and affable nature of people. They also play a good host:-)

contd....
Today they somehow accepted my application and after much nagging they even told me that they (the visa section) received the fax. I am keeping my fingers crossed till 3'O Clock when they will tell me the status. As promised here are two snaps from the embassy's rear entrance (I have been although told that the front is very impressive).

Notice how they manged to identify themselves by collaging the number "33" which is their building number highlighted by a red circle, and the words "Mor" and "occo" marked on the right by another red circle!!!!!!

Apropos 3'O Clock, do you know what does 'O' Clock means? As per my information it means "Of the clock"

A very wierd topic, right! Well, it certainly deserves a place in this blog and that too in golden letters to remind me and everyone else of the horrific experience I went through.

It all started last week when I was supposed to fly to Morocco (a not-so-known country in NW Africa - will write more if I make this trip after getting a visa). As always the first and probably the only hurdle was getting a visa which, by the way, I thought was not a problem anymore since I have traveled a lot and seen many countries. But that turned to be a bad thought. Firstly, my travel agent who normally procures visas for me was shown the way out three times in a row citing zillion ridiculous reasons. It was time I went there but it didn't fructify as well. I was told that the Embassy has not received any invitation letter from my sponsors in Morocco. Cross-checking revealed that the letter was already sent last week. Nevertheless, I asked them to resend the same. The next day after three trips to their awful and dilapidated building (will post the photos tomorrow), I was told that they have received the invitation but the visa section (which is a stone's throw away from their main office where the fax was sent) didn't receive it. Therefore, I need to wait till they receive the fax and reapply for the visa. I was rendered speechless. Today is now the third working day and they have still not managed to send the fax few tables across!!! I hope to get some success tomorrow, getting which I am gonna yell at them like hell.

In one word this odyssey was a "Nightmare". The battle is still on.