WHERE'S MA RODA????

Daaammmit!!

I miss capoeira so much.. I miss the training, I miss the music, but most of all, I miss the Rodas!!!

What I wouldnt give to play in a roda right now... Sigh!!!

Now i find myself wishing I'd trained harder during those months spent training with Bantus... Sigh, I'm never gonna take Capoeira training for granted again...

On a happy note: I finally started training capoeira in my gym.. had my first workout 2 nights back.. wasnt much, just 30 minutes or so, but its a start...

I think im gonna go play with my berimbau for awhile... No, I'm not speaking metaphorically...

Oh, I'll Da Vince your Codes, alright...

Was watchin Da Vinci Code last night.. barely got thru half of it... no, the movie wasn't THAT sucky, though I gotta admit, it was a major letdown... Half the time I went: Waiiit a second, that didnt happen like that in the book!!! You're screwin up the whole damn thing!!!

The blame must, however, go primarily to the copy that I got... I picked it up from one of the Chinese pasar malams (night-markets).. sheesh.. wut else shud i expect.. i was sparsely treated to 5-10 mins of Chinese dialogue... didnt really matter when they characters spoke French, but even the subtitles were screwed up... Infact, im not even sure the subtitles were from the same movie... I wont go into details..

Anyways, during the first 10 mins, an amusing thought popped up:

What if, instead of writing this on the floor:

O Draconian Devil,
O Lame Saint,
P.S. Find Robert Langdon

Museum Curator Jacques Sauniere had actually written this:

Jacques Sauniere was HERE!!!
P.S. Find Robert Langdon and Kick his ASSS!!!! HaHaHaHa!!!!

If you dont find urself smiling (or at the very least, grinning) upon reading that, seriously, go get urself checked up.. mentally atleast...

Later..

Gimme that damn tyre!!!

This incident deserves its own post, primarily due to its significance as yet another capoeira achievement: I finally learnt how to extract wire from car-tyres and attach it to the berimbau.

No, it isn’t some complicated chemical process… all u gotta do is rip into the tyre n pull the damn wire out… but I didn’t know crap bout which way to rip, since I didn’t know where exactly the wire was..

Neways, firstly, to get tyre wire u need…. BINGO!! Tyres!!.. so I dropped by one of em roadside mechanics n asked em if they had any old tyres worth throwin away.. n Presto!!! within minutes, I was drivin back home with a muddy, dirty, dingy old tyre in the boot.

So, next up… rippin the tyre open… yeah I got lazy when it came to that, so I waited a day..

Now, its Friday nite… im supposed to go to Lahore early morning the next day.. n I haven’t packed anything… wut im worried bout is getting the wire out, hookin it up to the berimbau n playin a few simple tunes… n so I did..

Grabbin a knife from the kitchen, I ripped into the damn thing… tearin along the seams… after 1 hour of excruciating forearm effort, I ripped out a circle from one side of the tyre.. I knew where the wire was, I just hadn’t gone the right way bout getting it out… CRAP!!! Oh well, there’s still the other side.. this time, instead of rippin out an entire new miniature tyre, I actually got the wire… WOOHOO!!!

Neways, another hour gone by, I actually hooked up the wire to the berimbau.. n get this: due to lack of string, I used thread.. Yes, THREAD!!! It freaked me out tyin it up, lest it snap n fling right into my eye… but oh well… I’d already pricked myself in the thumb a couple of times cutting up the wire… n I had glasses to protect me… uh huh.. I was safe… not to mention I had to kiddie cousins paying more attention to me handling the wire than they prolly ever did in class…. Combined!!

So finally, amid consistent reminders to the kids to back off n keep a safe distance, I managed to string up the berimbau… With no kashishi (the rattling thingy), and a seashell for a stone… And for a stick, I used a plastic arrow from a kiddie Archery Set…. Sad, yes… but it worked… not beautifully though…

Oh well, u win some, u lose some… :D

N at 3am, I put the instrument away, washed up, packed a few clothes for Lahore, n hit the sack…

Can I go to China? Please?? Please?? Please?? Ohh, thank you Mr. Immigration Officer, Sir!!!

Ok, so its now bout 3 weeks since my arrival here in Paki-land… Nothing really eventful has happened so far… just messin bout, learnt about a dozen new card games from the kids here.. a few moments to ponder on this:

There’s nothing more embarrassing than a grown man (that wud be me, I think) surrounded by a bunchs of kids, learning their games, and then LOSING (Hey Kid!!! Get back here with my frikkin dignity!!!)… However, there is no moment more worthy of rejoicing than when you beat those very kids at their favourite game… (In Your Face, Kid!!! You think u can beat ME?? Who’s the BIGGER MAN now???) Yes, I know I’m way beyond help…

Neways, so I’ve spent my time learnin card games, stuffin myself with my aunt’s delicious cooking, ate a lot more chili chips (They’re addictive, I tell u), introducing myself to my newest kiddie cousin (she’s bout 8 months old at the time of this post… pictures to follow).. I cant help it, I just get along extremely well with kids (Don’t believe me?? Take a look at the previous paragraph again… would a kid-hating dude sit thru all those card games), and I had a couple of good solo workouts, just workin on my kicks n a going thru a ton of pushups… n ofcourse watching my collection of capoeira vids… I restricted myself to headphones when listenin to capo music for fear of freaking out not only my family, but the entire neighbourhood as well…

I met up with an aunt who used to live with us in Dubai… haven’t seen her in ages.. apparently her kids dun recognize me.. that’s alright, they aint seen me before neways :P…was great catchin up with her… she visited us for bout a week or so, every night of which was spent playing card games till 4am, which usually ended with me bein kicked outta the room (hey, I was bored… wuts a guy gotta do??) n headin to bed…

Moving on: I wasn’t able to apply for my visa to China straight away, as I was waitin for some invitation papers from dad.. those hadn’t arrived yet, so I was pretty much killin time.. even met up with another one of my uncles (dad’s side, this time) n his family…

So the papers finally arrive, and dad asks me to go meet some dude n pass him the papers, who would pretty much guarantee visa issuance upon acceptance of a generous sum of money… neways, I had to travel out of town for that (applause to my aunt for drivin me so far), n turns out the bloody assclown doesn’t do this service for people anymore… I dunno y he didn’t tell me this over the fone… n he cant do anything to help me, cuz it seems ive got pretty much every document I need to apply for a business visit visa (at this point, I did a double take: business visa?? Wutthe… I dun even know the intricate details of dad’s business here, n im gonna have to explain it to a bunch of immigration officers????), so I wud do better to head to the embassy n apply myself.. anyways, long story short, it was an unsuccessful trip all the way outta town…

At this point, it didn’t seem like I’d get to China, being banished as I had to the land of Pakis… Shit!!!

Neways, so I decided to head to the embassy myself… unsuccessful at the first attempt, I shud add, since I underestimate the crowd outside the embassy and could get inside before it closed down… Hence, I tried again the next day… Got up REALLY early (6am), made it to the embassy REALLY early (8am), decided to apply for a social visit visa using business visit papers (don’t ask.. but I made it work… apparently them Chinese immigration officers assume we pakis r angels… go figure :P ), and got everything done by 11am… dude said I could collect the papers in 3 days.. that wud be August 4th…

The visa problem being effectively solved, I next booked my flight to Shanghai (10th August, via Doha, Qatar) n then decided on a long overdue trip to Lahore, to visit the rest of my aunts, uncles, n cousins… Booked that for the 5th… n proceeded to shop my ass off in Islamabad until then…

N shop I did indeed… Bought bout a dozen reference books on computing, a stack of DVDs, n 2 suits… that’s pretty much the gist of it… along with some crap that preferred not to work when tested.. oh well, u win some, u lose some…

Well, that’s all I’ve been doin in Paki-Land…

Next Up: Gimme that damn tyre!!!

Paki returns to motherland after 6yrs, causes massive thunderstorm..

Okay… so here goes… after mom unexpectedly decided to NOT allow me to leave KL on the 8th of July, I finally got to leave on the 11th.. Don’t get the impression that I did it gladly, as I must admit I was unwilling to leave.. I mean hey, I avoided it for 6 months, didn’t I? ;) Anyways, I was to fly to Karachi, remain onboard for a few mins, and the flight would continue to Islamabad, my final destination in Pakistan.

N so I left KL, the land where I pretty much came into my own… I attended uni there, made friends for life, none of which I will ever forget (well, maybe some of them I will, but I highly doubt they read my blogs anyway :) ), and well, did a lot more than I can mention right now. In short, I left my life back in KL.

While waitin to board my flight, I made some calls to folks I’d spent a lot of time with recently.. to all those I didn’t call, I sincerely apologise, as I tried making as many calls as I could until they literally dragged me aboard the plane and specifically directed me to turn off my hand-phone… HONEST!!! u can even ask the staff.. just ask em bout the dude with the extremely long, well wrapped, curved shaft (I’m talking bout my berimbau… nothing else.. Honest!! N speaking of the berimbau, muito muito obrigado to Rafael, who’s now chillin his way thru 2 months in Brasil, for patching up one of the old berimbaus and allowing me to take it away with me… it plays sweetly, and I learnt how to rip out tyre-wires myself… a good workout, I must admit).

Anyways, the flight was pretty much uneventful, save for me splashing my coke everywhere due to some supposedly ‘minor’ turbulence.. Oh well, that’s Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) for you (I am not a good Pakistani, am i… just another reason for me to change my nationality :D ).. I dared not violate the ‘Handphones Off’ rules, hence I was unable to take any pictures.. I did get a couple of mean stares from a bunch of pathans, one of whom strikingly resembled Eric Bana (who played Hector in Troy, Bruce Banner in Hulk).. Pathans are sometimes known to be gay, but thankfully I didn’t get any of those looks… Phew!!!

So I landed at Karachi airport, and was surprisingly told to deplane… Confused, I made it to the waiting lounge with a number of other similarly-confused passengers.. Turns out there’s been a massive storm in Islamabad, which caused a delay.. I couldn’t help but wonder if that had anything to do with my returning after 6 yrs… neways, long story short, after 4 hours, 3 packets of chili crisps n 2 Pepsis, I finally boarded the flight to Islamabad.

Thanks to the storm, instead of staying up till 2-3am, my uncle ended up going sleepless on a weeknight, as yours truly arrived at 6.30am… I must congratulate him on hiding his displeasure (on losing sleep, that is.. not on my arrival), as it is well-known how beloved his sleep is to him…

Anyways, so I headed home, gave a long overdue shout out to my grandmother, had breakfast with uncles n aunts (during which I endured several taunts about what the sudden thunderstorm upon my arrival meant), said good morning to several bleary-eyed kiddie cousins (4 of them, at that instant, I think.. kinda hard to keep count), and after several minutes of refusing a bed for an immediate nap, I carried my luggage to a room, and gazing longingly at the bed, decided to sleep in for a few minutes… which turned into a few hours…

So that was my arrival in Paki-land… or pretty much the gist of it…

Next up: Can I go to China? Please?? Please?? Please?? Ohh, thank you Mr. Immigration Officer, Sir!!!

I is Back!!!

Hey peeps!! Dunno if y'all recognize me anymore, since I haven't blogged in bout 5 billion years... Well, maybe not 5 billion years, but its still been a while :P

Anyway, the reason behind my non-blogging status is primarily the fact that Blogspot's permanently inaccessible in Pakistan, where I've been for the past month or so.. N check this out: Theyve blocked it in such a way that you cant access any blogs, but you can still log into your Blogspot account and post... Go figure... I dun mean to appear condescending, but the solutions my country comes up with... No wonder we're at wherever we're at...

Ok, gettin down to business.. the business of blogging, that is... I've got alot to write bout, n unfortunately, despite my numerous attempts, it appears I dont have the magical gift of turning back time and being able to blog everything as soon as it happened, therefore I shall attempt to narrate all narratable events as chronologically correctly as possible... but bear with me... especially since its 2am in the morning right now, n i'm probably not making any sense right now anyways.. n i hate proofreading.. :)

So keep an eye out for: Paki returns to motherland after 6yrs, causes massive thunderstorm..