One year and Dubai Rain 2006 (warning one long post)

Woah feels like it was just a while back when I took off from Karachi to start my work here in Al-Ain but no a whole YEAR has passed. Time surely flies. Looking back at it, it was one hell of a year it has all the ingredients to be a memorable one. This was the year when I..

1) Started cooking like proper wala.
2) Started driving sahee kee.
3) Got my License (I mean after passing an actual test :P ).
4) Got my first car.
5) Started living on my own like really on my own.
6) Attended my first ever Tennis tourney, Sidz and Abid they both know how precious it is.
7) Bryan Adams ka concert, bhai how can I forget that, grrrrr.
8) Got Engaged yup that too.
9) Made some wonderful new friends, strengthened bonds with others (that includes each one of you).
10) Not really lost anyone but yea few got distanced (ok why I am writing crap now).
11) Great trips from family members, first Dad in last ramzan and then in summers brother and cousin visited, it was great fun with them.
12) Oh yea Azzurri were crowned the World Champions :P and in Cricket we had two great series wins and one very baistee walee defeat.
13) Most importantly got to know you fellas a lot better who I don’t know for what reason do come here on regular basis and bless this blog, you people are simply amazing.
14) Have couple of regrets but lets just keep them under the carpet, shall we.

There must be more but right now I cant think of any thing else maybe if something else comes in mind I might add it. Oh well this is it and though I had quite a good idea that 17/09/2005 was the date when I landed here but it was later confirmed by my mobile service provider who quite efficiently blocked my Sim for non-renewal grrrrrrrrrrr and that too without any prior notice more grrrrrrrrr. And it took them four hours after I paid the fee which is by the way freaking 100 dhs (multiply it by 16.5 :P) to reactivate it , sigh.

Ok that was a kind of recap now coming to the fun part :P, yup Dubai rain. Well Dubai rain is a hip hop kind of event here in Dubai all bhangra and dj stuff (the kind of music I hardly care about) and last year it was a huge hit. What’s with rain? Ok there is this setup at the back of arena where they arrange artificial rain through showers hence Dubai rain. So its like dancing in rain kinda thing :P and it is supposed to be hot butttttttttttttttt big BUT this time it was stinky errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Ok let us start from the beginning. As you mite all know how good your highness is when it comes to navigating through maze of roads, interchanges and exits and it was proved once again, hehe. Well it started quite well, my friend who was sitting next to me was my navigator and we were getting it all right but just before reaching our destination we took one wrong exit and had to drive for another 15 kms before we could hit the actual track. But that was not the end , next came the correct interchange where for God knows for what reason I tried to be extra smart and didn’t take it (thinking it would lead us to another dead end) and hahaha poor souls had to suffer another extra 20 kms. And when finally once we entered the correct junction for Country Club, we lost our way again hehe. Apparently the organizers thought that everyone who is gonna be there would know venue’s location at his/her finger tips so they didn’t bother to put up any directions . Khair after asking for directions finally we were there. Only to be confronted with huge chaos for parking. So after roaming around for another 10 minutes looking for space finally found a car workshop whose guard quite kindly allowed us to park the car inside. Happily we walked towards the place totally unaware of chaos we were about to face. It was like Pakistan revisited, same pushing , shouting, people without tickets trying to sneak in, some still trying to get hold on tickets, security guards screaming and asking people to stay in lines. And that was just not from my fellow countrymen our neighbors were equally involved too. After being pushed for 15-20 minutes in queue we heard a shout and everyone started running towards the gates by the time I arrived at the gate guards had already secured it so kapoot again I had to wait for another 15 minutes before they allowed us to cross the preliminary check post yup actual ticket checking was further inside. Oh and during all that fiasco the concert was on hold too, apparently some lady had passed out. Plus people were too close to the stage when Himesh, the “bara adakar” (big star) that is what he himself claimed, came onto stage so he decided not to go ahead with it. It took quite a few persuasions and multiple announcements from FM VJs for crowd to finally back off. All this time we were standing in queue in front of the main entry but as soon as the “bara adakar” resumed another chaos broke out and mob started pushing and running in. I had to literally push and run for my own good my friend had a bad fall but was lucky that he was able to pick himself up. Stupid me had my ticket in my hand and suddenly I felt someone got hold off my hand and trying to snatch the ticket :O I was like what the hell (ok not hell a little more), I had to tear the small piece which that guy was holding onto and ran hehe. Anyhow after such trouble finally we were in but place was jam packed there was hardly any place to walk. It was full with Homo sapiens we normally avoid in concerts in Karachi and they were all in “mood” plus since alcohol was easily available so they were extra high. Anyhow we had to bear Himesh, after him it was RDB team and then our very own Ali Zafar with four chicks hanging all around him :P. I would say he was the only worth mentioning performer at that night, plus he performed his new song which had Kishore Kumar inspired written all around it. In between I tried going into that rain area but had to come back after just spending a minute in it, it was too stinky, too crowded for my liking and I had no interest in trying to find my way through half naked men, grrrrrrrr. So basically Dubai rain might have rocked last year, this year definitely it failed. There were too many desperate mailaas looking for their chance and it was just too over crowded.