Desi Adventurers in ... San Francisco

Product differentiation vampires

2011-05-24T01:52:00.000-06:00

Nuha came down with a fever yesterday evening. Ever since we had the scare of our lives last year when she went into febrile seizures, we've been apprehensive whenever her temperature rises. Today there were a few instances when it hit 103 degrees, so Saeeda made the call and I took her into urgent care.

There wasn't anything to worry about - the doctor found a mild infection that needed an antibiotic, so I decided to pick up the prescription at at the nearby Walgreens. It was while the pharmacist was completing the transaction there that he asked me a question I was not prepared for.

"Would you like that flavored?" he asked.

Puzzled look on Faisal's face. We're talking about antibiotics, not lattes, right?

"Uh. Is that an option?"

"Sure - we can make it cherry or strawberry flavored."

Cool, I thought. I wish this had been around back when I was a child and my mother was shoving the world's worst tasting concoctions down my throat. Back then, you measured the potency of a medicine by how badly it burned your throat as it went down. The more gag-inducing the medicine, the more likely it was to annihilate whatever was bothering you.

"Um, ok, sure," I said.

"That'll be $2.99 extra."

And just like that, it was oh hell no time. First of all, I was annoyed that some executive thought it cool to make flavoring an option for children's medicine rather than keep it standard and making life easier for parents all over the world. Second, the economist in me was annoyed that Walgreen's expected me to believe that adding a spritz of flavoring could possibly cost almost $3 extra for a generic medicine that didn't cost that much to begin with. Finally, I was incensed that this whole idea was a play on a vulnerable parent's susceptibility at a time when sick children were likely to be waiting at home.

I decided to decline the offer for a tastier antibiotic, and mentally made a note to never become a product differentiation vampire as a marketer myself.

Housework x10

2011-05-21T19:20:00.000-06:00

People told me that having a second child would more than double the work for us. That the second child would create one of the toughest transitions I would experience as a parent. I listened politely, because I didn't entirely believe them. And for the most part, I feel that I was right - yes there's more work to do in the two weeks since Ziyad made his entrance, but it's no tougher a transition than when we had our first. What has broadsided me is the amount of housework.

All my wife and I do now is pick-up stuff and put it back in its place. We turn around, and our entire universe is instantly thrown into chaos. So back we go again, redressing naked dolls, replacing refrigerator magnets (why do we have so many?), and re-organizing the DVD shelf (why does my Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Xbox game have a copy of the Potty Power: How to Train your Toddler in 5 Easy Days DVD?). We're in hell, assigned the Sysiphean task of rolling the proverbial boulder up the hill, only to watch it roll back on us. And Hades (our daughter) mocks us. You see, the corollary to having a second child is that one of us can no longer clean up while the other distracts the cause of the mess. We are now constantly busy and distracted - while one of us tends to a chore, the other is busy with Ziyad. Which means that Nuha has the run of the house.

Used to be a time when if there was silence my wife and I would breathe a sigh of relief, knowing that either a) Nuha was asleep, or b) she was keeping herself busy with her toys. Now, when there is silence, it is cause for immediate alarm and a reason for the Khan household to move immediately to code blue.

Nuha left to her own for 10 minutes as I clean dishes:

The tormentor, mocking me (hint: I'm the one in my undershirt, dishtowel on my shoulder, and a haggard look on my face):

Two weeks later

2011-05-19T00:12:00.000-06:00

So Ziyad has been home now for two weeks now, and it's amazing the transformation that has taken place in such a short period of time. For one, he is a better feeder than his older sister ever was at this age, which means that he is filling out his newborn clothes at a rapid pace. Nuha was a tiny baby for a long time - Ziyad is adding heft quickly.

I'm not sure why I thought child number two would provide us with the same experience as the first one, but already the differences are starting to make themselves clear. Ziyad is a mellow baby, crying occasionally, but mostly only for food. Putting him to sleep isn't hard, whereas Nuha required all sorts of rocking and walking. Our parenting style has changed too, from the classic over-attention and fussing to a more relaxed "he'll be fine" attitude. I remember how when Nuha was born Saeeda would hang at the edge of our bed all night long, drifting asleep for 5 minutes before darting awake to see if Nuha was ok. Now Saeeda's reaction is to feed Ziyad, putting him to sleep, and slap me awake if Ziyad starts to cry so that I can do diaper changes/swaddling/rocking to sleep. This whole having to parent thing is a lot of work.

I'm going to find out more, I guess, as my paternity leave started on Monday. That day was fine, as Nuha was in daycare. Tuesday, however, was not so smooth - elder sister was home, had the run of the house, and decided that having mom and dad's attention diverted away from her is not that cool a thing. Lots of throwing things, screaming, and generally pushing boundaries. By the end I was exhausted, as I was tasked with keeping Nuha away from Saeeda and the baby. I might have to rethink growing the family to five kids.

Ziyad Khan enters the world

2011-05-02T12:42:00.003-06:00

It's funny how different this pregnancy has been from when we were expecting Nuha almost three years ago. Back then, everything was new and brought with it tremendous uncertainty. Conflicting advice would send us scurrying to the internet to determine tie-breakers. We considered everyone to be an expert. "What to Expect when Expecting" - that Bible of Pregnancy - made us dread the most benign of Saeeda's symptoms. And a trip to Babies R Us would always leave me paralyzed and disoriented.

This time around, however, we've been able to focus much more on us as a family, and on preparing for an arrival that will completely change the way we interact with each other. Granted, this "preparing" has sort of crossed over into territory in which I am not comfortable. For example, this past weekend Saeeda, having run out of things to organize, acquired a label maker and decided to label the entire contents of our spice cabinet. When finished, she proudly declared that I would now finally be able to find the right spice when I needed to do so. I stopped short of informing her that finding the right spice had never been the problem - it was what to do with the spice after I had located it that was the problem.

But for me, "preparing" for the new arrival has meant spending more time with Nuha. With busy lives and crazy schedules, I've relished the recent, rare weekends where she and I have just goofed around in the park, chasing after each other, hunting down daffodils, making fun of other kids too scared to try the big slides, and generally making a mess of the nice clothes Saeeda always picks for Nuha. We've spent time meticulously apply band-aids to each other. Me, because of small blisters suffered through all-around clumsiness, and she because ... well, who doesn't want to sport five, multi-colored Dora the Explorer band-aids on their leg? Sure, I've had to suffer some worried looks from Nuha's day care teachers, each wondering what damage I'm doing to my child. And sure, Saeeda has had to stealthily rip off one bandage a night, having had to wait until after Nuha has fallen asleep. But so what?

In general, I've worried that the attention and love that we've provided will soon have to be diverted, and that makes me a little sad because of the tectonic shift Nuha's world is about to suffer. This morning, after Saeeda had gone into labor and we were preparing for the trip to the hospital, I snuck into Nuha's room to dress her. We would be dropping her off at a friend's house, and I needed to quickly make sure everything was ready to go. I paused at Nuha's bed to watch her sleep, with curly hair splayed in a mess on her pillow, mouth in a smile, her trusty stuffed giraffe and cow clutched tightly in either hand. As I started to move her, Nuha, still asleep, instantly started yelling at her mom to leave her band-aids on. I couldn't help but smile. How nice would it be if my biggest nightly concern was anger at my mother ripping off unnecessary band-aids?

We dropped Nuha off at 4:30am this morning, silently offering thanks for having developed close friendships that allowed us to substitute for having family around. Driving quickly, we were at the hospital by 5am, and checked in within another 10. Saeeda was in bed with nurses swarming around her almost immediately, but we soon realized there was a slight problem - Saeeda was too far into labor for the administration of any medication whatsoever. In the 20 minutes of pushing that followed, Saeeda convinced me that no matter how much CrossFit I partake in, I will never approach a level of resilience, endurance, or stamina to hold a candle to what she proved she was capable of.

And just like that, Ziyad Khan entered the world. Mother and son are now doing well, with Ziyad as alert and quiet as Nuha was when she was born. I'm leaving them in the hospital room to go pick up Nuha in a bit, and to introduce her to someone who I hope will become her partner in crime and best buddy for life. Saeeda and I cannot be more thankful or grateful for the prayers and well wishes of all of our family and friends. Success as parents, I think, will now depend on how well we can transition from 2-on-1 to man-to-man defense.

Tragedy and beauty

2011-03-02T11:29:00.028-06:00

Our last full day in Maui … already? Yes, a little hard to believe, but then that’s sort of how quickly time flies in this place, even though you feel like things move reaaalllly slooowly. Like the cars on the "highways" of Maui, obeying the 35 mph posted state speed limit.

Given that we had hit the pool yesterday, today was more about the beach. Still on Pacific time, we woke early, munched on our bagels and downed some cereal, just in time for the sun to begin warming up the water. I decided to rent some snorkeling gear, having been told that there was some good coral reef right on the beach that our hotel looked out upon. I was skeptical at first, especially since my last snorkeling experience had been at the Great Barrier Reef in Australia - it would be hard to top that adventure. I remembered from that trip that we had to travel a fair distance out to into open water, so I didn't think I could just wade into the water, and within a few feet be amongst coral. But it was true. Kaanapali beach had coral that were so easily accessible that you could not be blamed for thinking that it was an expensive, fake, set-up.

My snorkeling adventures did come to an abrupt end, however, when I noticed a lot of commotion on the beach right by where I had left Saeeda and Nuha. I decided to swim back to shore, and no sooner had I got there than I realized that the excitement was due to a group of people trying mightily to revive a lady who was lying prone on the sand. Saeeda and Nuha were huddled not far away, having had to scatter as the lady had been pulled in from the surf. A few minutes later EMT’s arrived, and it became clear from the conversation that the woman had been snorkeling and had passed out. Her family had dragged her out when they had noticed something wrong.

Saeeda, Nuha, and I decided to leave the crowd of gathering onlookers – the EMTs were trying to revive this poor woman who had gone into cardiac arrest, and gawking was not going to help matters. What I found strange was that the same thing had happened the day before, while we were at the hotel pool. From our poolside chairs, we had seen an older gentleman pulled from the surf, also having passed out while snorkeling. The EMTs had not been able to revive him, and he had been rushed to the hospital.

The three of us went back to our hotel room to change, sobered by the reminder that tragedy can strike even in the happiest of places. Still, in a way that made me appreciate Hawaii's beauty even more. There's only so much time that we have on this planet, and the beauty that surrounds us is vast. Being able to visit some of that beauty is a blessing, and for that I am grateful.

The island's affect on the mind

2011-03-01T01:27:00.002-06:00

Ah Maui. Boy did we enjoy it the way it was meant to be enjoyed today. We woke up late, had breakfast in the room, and headed for the pool, where we lay around some more. The lounge chairs reclined at the perfect angle, the sun was just the perfect amount of hot, and the kiddie pool was just right for Nuha, who if left to herself, would have remained there all day.

All that hard work in the morning required a nap back in our hotel room, after which it was time to get ready for the luau that we tickets to. As with other native traditions in places that depend so much on tourist revenue, the Hawaiian luau has become more of a spectacle that amuses visitors than an accurate depiction of local custom. Despite this, the kid-friendly Polynesian Village luau that we attended was a pleasant experience, one made more so by what came across as genuine hospitality by staff that looked as if they enjoyed what they did for a living. Nuha enjoyed making leis, I got to taste kava juice (which the muscled, bare-chested, islander manning the station promised “was good for my banana”), and Saeeda delighted in seeing me up on stage trying to imitate one of the warrior dances. There were plenty of dances thrown in from neighboring islands – Fiji, Samoa, New Zealand all got a shout out. And the firedance was really neat too.

In all, a great day to relax and cleanse the mind. I’m starting to rethink this whole having to work for a living thing. Why can’t we just live in an island state of mind?

Are you ready for that now?

2011-02-28T01:17:00.007-06:00

Of all the places I’ve wanted to travel to, Hawaii is the one destination about which it has been hard not to form preconceived notions. So many people have traveled there and then come back with great reviews, that it’s been hard keeping expectations low. Still, when we started looking around for one last, quick vacation to take before baby #2 arrives, Hawai’i was at the top of our list.

Given the limited vacation time that we both get, we decided to stick to Maui for the four days we would be here. Arrival and getting the rental car was uneventful – what struck me was the tropical heat, and how similar it was to the heat and humidity of Pakistan. It then also struck me that Maui and Karachi could not possibly be more dissimilar in just about everything else.

For example, you are unlikely to find a Costco right beside the Karachi airport. Here, it seemed natural. Visitors from out of state often come to stay for weeks in rented condos on the various islands of Hawaii, and it makes sense to stock up on food and sundry items immediately upon arrival. Although we were staying at a hotel, it was still hard for me not to pull our rental car right up to the megastore. Why pass up an opportunity to buy that 400-pack of AA batteries? Or 200 rolls of toilet paper? Or 20-pack of Calvin Klein underwear? I might need any of those items at a moment's notice!

The Sheraton Maui, which was to be our home, was a pleasant enough property located in Kaanapali, in the northwest of the island and a 45 min. drive on a winding ocean highway. Surrounding the Sheraton were the Westin, Hyatt, and Marriott properties, so we were definitely in resort central. Despite the concentration, I didn’t feel that the place was overrun with tourists

Our first afternoon was spent eating a lazy lunch by the beach, getting some ice cream, and doing some grocery shopping. By this point we had only been in Maui a few hours, but already we could tell prices were exorbitantly high here. Eight slices of Kraft’s American cheese? $4. Gas? Over $4.50 a gallon. Being thrifty here would not be easy.

Dinner that night was an interesting experience. We drove into Lahaina town, a short 10 minutes from all the resorts and a pleasant oceanfront area with lots of shopping and dining options. However, service at Lahaina Prime Rib and Seafood was … interesting. Our server kept forgetting to bring out things that we had ordered, and every time we reminded him, he would say, “Oh, sure – are you ready for that now?” Of course we were ready – we ordered it, right? I would understand if we had a 5 course meal that we were gently savoring at a leisurely pace, but that was not the case.Shouldn't we be provided with things like water and silverware right away?

“O sure – are you ready for that now?” Yes, please, I’ve decided against eating my fish with my fingers, and will instead use a knife and fork. “O sure – are you ready for that now?” Yes please, I’d actually like to try the food that I ordered. I’m ready for that now.

Weird. Just weird.

Rookie traveller

2011-01-17T20:13:00.000-06:00

I'm in Brazil for a weeklong meeting - I arrived today in Sao Paulo expecting chaos because of the torrential rains that have already killed so many, but everything was smooth sailing. We got picked up at the airport on time, and were whisked an hour into the countryside, where we are staying at the Bourbon Spa Resort. Sounds fancy, but I've had to struggle to get my internet connection working. Wireless is slow as molasses, so I'm having to use a LAN cable. A what? Yes, they still have those, youngling - wires that physically tether you to a specific location. Cruel and unusual punishment, that is.

Also, despite the grand-sounding name of the hotel, the place is guilty of one of my pet peeves - no iron in the room. I don't get it. I mean, I know I'm a little anal and like to iron my clothes in the morning, but how can a hotel - a large, resort-style hotel with attached convention center which attracts business travelers from all over the world - not have in-room irons? What's more, the front desk didn't keep irons either. What the h#$%! Are South Americans the world's greatest luggage-packers? Do their clothes simply not crease? I understand when a small, family-owned inn in a quaint European town, keeps irons only at the front desk because there is a clear fire and electrical hazard to keeping irons in guest rooms, but I'm staying at quite a modern facility. I've had to spring for expensive ironing service for half of my wardrobe, the other half of which I will simply wear wrinkled. Trust me, though - I'll be keeping an eagle-eye out for folds on the clothes of the other meeting attendees. Because if I don't find any, they know something this experienced traveler does not.

Losing Lost

2010-05-23T02:07:00.000-06:00

Tomorrow will be a watershed moment in TV entertainment history. "Lost", that show that millions have come to love, is scheduled to come to an end. I don't know if the conclusion will be enough to satisfy me and the other rabid fans out there, but it will be a conclusion nonetheless. Perhaps this is for the better. We've been annoying non-Lost watchers for long enough, going on and on about our lunatic theories of moving islands, parallel realities, quantum physics, smoke monsters, and the meaning of ... well, just about everything.

But this has been more than just a TV show for me. My wife and I have been married for seven years, six of which (i.e., almost our entire married life), have been spent avidly watching this show together. Not only can we measure the milestones of our life with the passing of Lost seasons, but we can also give thanks for the many friends we've made who are prone to the same nervous tics and mad rantings that each episode of this show gives rise to.

Things are not perfect though - the executive producers enjoy going on talk shows touting how they won't answer some of the questions their own writing has raised so that "the show can live on after the finale." This is just code for "we didn't know what the heck we were doing at various points of the story arc, and now have no way of wrapping up that particular sub-plot." Still, I'm willing to forgive these transgressions. Lost represents the most intellectual and intriguing show that has graced the airwaves, and does not shy away from questions of philosophy, faith, and science. It requires devotion to the nuances of each scene of each episode, and encourages discussion afterwards because no individual can hope to parse the meanings of each plot twist.

So it is with a heavy heart that my wife and I will sit down to watch the series finale tomorrow. Regardless of what happens on the show, we know that we'll have spent the last six years on a crazy ride that promises one last, unknown, reveal.

Final thoughts on Istanbul

2010-05-12T18:09:00.027-06:00

What an amazing adventure this has been. Turkey is one of those places where no matter how many times pictures you see, you have to experience it in person. You can't walk in Istanbul without gaining an appreciation for the historical crossroads that the city occupies. Of why empires have chosen this place as their seat of power, and why they have built magnificent monuments to honor the city.

And the people! So friendly and willing to help at every turn. Their love of children is something that took me aback at first. Random strangers would come up to Nuha while we would be walking around a site, and would pick her up and pinch her cheeks. Behavior like this back home would have me half-reaching for my cellphone to call the cops, but here there is a genuine love for children. Security guards at airports would take Nuha from us and play with her while we went through security. Even school children, no older than eight, and present at almost all the historical sites on their daytrips, would come up to us, ask us how old Nuha was, and start to play with her. At the Blue Mosque, where Nuha started crying hysterically for Saeeda, who was still inside, I was approached by a mother who wiped away Nuha's tears, consoled her (something I as her father was unable to do), and gave Nuha her own child's snack to keep her calm before just walking away. Incredible.

What I enjoyed the most about Istanbul was being surrounded by vestiges of Christian and Muslim buildings, each singing to their Lord through their architecture. Saeeda and I made an excuse every day to somehow end up at the Blue Mosque at one time or another. It was impossible to rip yourself away from the beauty and significance of that structure.

Even the south, with its heavier commercialization, was beautiful in its own way. Beautiful beaches, stunning mountain ranges, unspoilt countryside. No doubt there is much to see in Turkey for the outdoor enthusiast, or someone just wanting to get away from it all for a while.

This is not going to be our last trip to Turkey, if there is anything that I can do about it. The country is too beautiful a jewel to be left unappreciated for long.

Of Pamukkale and Permanence

2010-05-09T18:08:00.047-06:00

Not having a GPS made us a little nervous in trying to attempt a long drive to Pamukkale from Fethiye. But after yesterday’s Oludeniz experience (nothing but a really nice beach), and time spent in Fethiye (not much beyond the waterfront), we didn’t want to spend our last full day in the south of Turkey driving to yet another coastal city to see more of the same. So despite the hotel staff’s incredulity at our desire to drive into rural Turkey, we packed our gear and headed to Pamukkale.

Pamukkale, meaning "cotton castle" in Turkish, is a city in south-western Turkey containing hot springs and and beautiful travertines, which are basically terraces formed from carbonate minerals left by the flowing water. People have bathed in its pools for thousands of years and the ruins of the old city of Hierapolis, built in 200-300 BC, can also be found here.

Not sure of the best way to get to Pamukkale, we decided to take the direct route from Fethiye, which unknown to us meant cutting across a mountain range. We knew something wasn’t right when the narrow, winding, ever climbing lane became so harrowingly tight that it would have been impossible for any tourist bus to comfortably fit on the road. What of the loads of tourists that were supposed to be heading to Pamukkale all the time? We hadn’t seen any rest stops, or restaurants, let alone the tourist buses themselves.

Our car, with it’s puny engine, struggled mightily to climb the mountains on a road that practically disappeared from out beneath us. The markings gradually vanished, paved blacktop gave way to dusty gravel, signage vanished, and detours abounded. Saeeda and I exchanged some nervous glances, as by now we were more than 90 min. into our drive, but had no idea where we were. More worryingly, I couldn’t picture myself trying to make the same drive back at night - there was no lighting or barrier between us and steep mountain drops. What if the car broke down?

It was then that we started to hit a string of villages nestled in the crevasses that we were traversing. Life here seemed pleasantly stuck in the 20th century. Sheepherders tended their flocks in meadows, elegantly dressed old men sat by the street, engaged in obscure arguments, and grandmothers walked by the road while their grandchildren playfully ran ahead. The scenery was stunning, and the people were wonderful – we stopped often to ask directions and appreciated everyone’s help in keeping us on track. It wasn’t long after that when we finally burst out of the mountains and onto a highway again. The same highway that was being plied by tour buses galore. Yes, not only were we back on track, but we had found the highway we would take on our way back when we were done.

Pamukkale’s white cliffs appear high above you as you make it into the city, and there is another 10 min drive that takes you up to the entrance. From there all visitors are carefully funneled to the cliffs themselves. Some time back there had been so much tourist traffic that the brilliant white cliffs had started to erode, and the clear water had started to run muddy instead. Since then the government has defined where people can walk, which is just as well. The effect of suddenly sticking to a path that suddenly veers and places you before the white cliff adds to the experience.

There was understandably a lot of traffic here. The scene is surreal because you stand on these brilliantly white surfaces as you look out onto the valley before you. It’s hard to imagine how many millennia of calcium-rich spring water was needed to create the natural wonder beneath you. And the warm spring water makes it fun to wade around in the pools that form all around you. For me, the experience was enhanced, comically so, by watching the other tourists pose for pictures here. Something about this brought out the exhibitionist in everyone

And this

And then this

I decided not to snap pictures of bikini clad women who were posing as if they were auditioning for the latest Sports Illustrated Swimsuit edition – I wouldn’t have been able to come up with explanations credible enough for Saeeda afterwards. But suffice it to say that in certain parts of the cliffs it felt like we were disturbing a modeling agency’s photoshoot at times.

The ruins of Hierapolis area walking distance from Pamukkale’s cliffs, so after grabbing lunch at “Cleopatra’s Pool”, we headed north to the well preserved ruins. The most spectacular of these was the amphitheater. Beautifully preserved, and located on a steep hill, it wasn't hard to imagine siting here as an audience member thousands of years ago, and enjoying not only the spectacle on the stage, but also the view of the white cliffs and of the valley as it fell away beneath you.

While Saeeda and Nuha sat on the steep steps and rested, I walked around, wanting to touch the old worn rock that formed the walls, and perhaps in doing so connect with the ancient civilizations that had built this place. The engineering was a marvel - sound carried effortlessly, removing the need for modern sound systems, and there truly wasn't a bad seat in the house. I climbed back up to Saeeda and Nuha, and sat down to admire the view, and to try to understand the talent of those that had built something of such great permanence.

It was then that the call to evening prayer came wafting over the air from the city of Pamukkale beneath us. I couldn't understand how, but voices of the muezzins seemed to amplify as they made their way to us. The melody was one that I'm familiar with, but it was beautiful nonetheless.

God is Great. God is Great, they called. Bear witness that there is no deity but God. Bear witness that Muhammad is his messenger. Come to salvation. Come to prayer. God is Great. There is no deity but God.

It was a spiritual moment. Just a moment ago I had been remarking on the magnificence of man-made permanence. The calls to prayer that continued to waft over me provided a stark reminder of the fallacy of my line of thought. Civilizations vanish, buildings crumble, and history fades. The only thing that remains permanent is the Force that placed things in motion, and which will be there for us to turn on the day it all comes to an end.

Oludeniz

2010-05-08T18:43:00.000-06:00

Driving in Turkey isn’t as bad as everyone was making it out to be. “Turkish drivers are crazy,” I was told. “Don’t drive at night,” they said. “Are you serious?” asked one of my friends. But I’ve harped on my driving adventures enough times now, most recently here. I’ll say it again – I’m not the world’s best driver, but I’ve driven enough around the world, and enough in my home country of Pakistan, that I’m not skittish behind a wheel anymore.

Turkey was no different. Granted, my fellow voyagers wanted to overtake my car at every available opportunity, regardless of whether I was on a mountain switchback or whether there was an oncoming truck barreling our way. But the Turkish countryside in the south is the sort of pleasant Mediterranean environment that makes you forget traffic troubles, and focus on what the unspoiled, rolling hills must have looked like when this part of the world dominated Europe centuries ago. Until you hit Oludeniz.

If I thought Fethiye was commercialized, Oludeniz was basically a European tourist heaven. We had come here for the unspoiled beaches, but to get here we had to pass soulless pubs catering to tourists, kitschy souvenir shops with useless paraphernalia, and unending tour operator offices, advertising the same thing over and over again, yet still claiming to provide a unique experience.

Oludeniz’s saving grace was its beach, which is why we had come here. Nestled at the end of the commercial strip, this pretty stip of sand hugged jutting peninsulas amidst sloping hills, which created a beautiful picture and enhanced the feeling of seclusion. Until your sight line was spoiled by Speedo-wearing men sunning themselves all around you.

So it was a hit and miss experience for me. Saeeda and Nuha enjoyed playing in the water – my daughter especially found great pleasure in constantly splashing my wife and I (but did not enjoy it so much when I started splashing back). I enjoyed swimming in the water, which because of its higher salt concentration meant that I was more buoyant than normal (I generally sink in any given body of water, and am incapable of floating). But walking around afterwards meant walking into the lion’s den of tourist traps, and it’s not like we got any sort of an authentic dining experience either.

Tomorrow we’re planning on making the 3 hour drive to Pamukkale, that interior city famous for its calcium springs and ruins of Hierapolis. I’m hoping that that experience will be less soul-crushing.

Fethiye

2010-05-07T18:03:00.003-06:00

We’re done with Istanbul, and off to the Mediterranean coast for a little taste of the slow life. Usually, with eight days in a country, we’ve been able to spend time in multiple parts, jetting from one region to the next. With a 2 year old this time around, we decided instead to take things a little slower. Hence our decision to pick just two major destinations - Istanbul and Fethiye - and to drive around to see anything else that was around.

Our hope upon arriving in Fethiye was to find a quaint seaside town, where we could immerse ourselves in a relaxing environment, and interact with the locals to our hearts content. However, Fethiye is not quite that quaint. Walking around this evening has revealed a very commercial, tourist-ridden beach destination. A large chunk of the commerce here caters to the Western European tourist, most often from a Nordic or Germanic country – a fact made obvious by the channels available on our in-room TV. Five German, three Danish, one Italian, and one English. Nothing American.

The waterfront is pleasant, and there are few ruins in the city that we might check out. For this first night, though, all we did was grab dinner in a bazaar restaurant. I walked around a little, and came across this puzzling barbershop that was advertising "Shaves", "Leg Shaves", and "Haircuts". Are hairy legs that big a problem here? Since the sign is in English, I suspect this is meant for the tourists. Are the Turkish people so fed up with ugly, unkempt, hirsute tourists that they've opened businesses whose sole aim is to make the visitors look more presentable? And why is the store called "Berber" and not "Barber"?

How I did my part for the Turkish economy

2010-05-06T17:59:00.002-06:00

Saeeda came to Turkey prepared with a list of items she wanted to purchase before we left. Evil-eye charms that are so prevalent here, some Turkish tea, a calligraphic wall hanging, and if possible, a small Turkish carpet. In all our international trips, shopping has been an organic experience. We will inevitably find ourselves in a marketplace where something will catch our eye, or we will learn of a trinket that we feel defines the country we are touring, and we will make the purchase. Rarely have we set aside time dedicated to the pursuit of shopping for something specific.

This time around, though, things were a little different. As we have continued to spend time in Istanbul, Saeeda has fallen in love with the beautiful rugs that we see in all the stores that we pass. At the same time, we’ve realized that we don’t really know much about rug buying, especially since the nice carpets that we do own were wedding gifts. We confessed this naivete to our hotel concierge, who immediately recommended what he professed would be a great carpet-buying experience. A friend of his worked at a genuine antique store that specialized in carpets, and this store was run by a family that had been in the business for three generations.

Yeah, ok, nice story, I thought to myself. It’ll probably still be the same song and dance these things are everywhere, and going with a “friend” of his that just happened to work at a carpet store was probably not going to lead to anything. Still, it would be an opportunity for us to educate ourselves before perhaps buying at a different store, and it would be a chance to avoid the Grand Bazaar area – that infamous, notorious tourist-trap that sits not far from the Blue Mosque and has been a merchant hub for centuries. Shopping there for a rug would be just asking to be fleeced.

I told the concierge that we’d try to go to his friend’s store in the evening after we were done with our sightseeing for the day. I was immediately reminded of this commitment upon our return to the hotel that evening.

“Sir, your car is ready,” said the concierge when he spotted us.

Car? What car? I learned that the carpet store where the concierge's friend worked had offered to pick us up.

“Ok, give us ten minutes,” I requested. We quickly washed up, came down, and walked outside to a waiting, well-appointed Mercedes.

Alright, I thought to myself. You’re hitting us with the Reciprocity Principle. Offer us a service that is, on the face of it, purely a gesture of goodwill, but will later make us feel like we need to reciprocate and make a purchase. Please, I thought to myself, you’re not dealing with an amateur here.

Still, the ride was smooth, and the modern car contrasted nicely with the ancient buildings we passed. Just make sure they give you a ride back if you don’t make a purchase, I reminded myself.

Our destination was tucked away in a quiet corner of the old city in Sultanahmet. A few cafes dotted the streets, and a side door, labeled simply "Antiques" led down into the store. A winding stairway suddenly opened up to an extremely large space that looked like it was part of a beautiful, old building basement. There were archways leading deeper into the space, and sandstone brick decorated with repeating, fading patterns decorated the ceiling. And there were carpets everywhere.

We were greeted by a lady who introduced herself as our concierge’s friend. She smiled at Nuha, and immediately picked her up to start playing with her. No sooner had she done so, than a smartly dressed, middle-aged gentleman appeared at the foot of the stairs, shook hands with us, and introduced himself as Salman, the store owner.

What followed was one of the most amazing sales jobs I have been subjected to, and despite my ability to recognize what was happening, I was unable to resist. Salman first gave us a tour of the building basement that we were standing in, discussing the history of the space that itself stretched centuries into the past. He sat us down beside a loom, and explained in detail the process by which a carpet is put together, taking the time to let us hold dyed yarn, pluck at the loom, and play with the texture of the partially woven carpet on the loom. A half hour later, he had us take a seat on comfortable cushions against a wall, at which point he started to educate us on the history of carpets, and their place in Turkish culture. Saeeda and I were captivated – Salman knew his subject well, and something about learning about carpets from someone who was third-generation, while sitting in a ancient space surrounded by beautiful rugs was mesmerizing. Tea appeared beside us magically as we continued to learn from Salman. Our daughter was nowhere to be seen, but we could hear peels of laughter emanating from the corners of the store as the concierge’s friend continued to play with her.

These guys are good, I thought. Nuha has been removed as a distraction, and Salman is doing a great sales job.

It was then that a muscled helper appeared bearing silk rugs. The large open floor space in front of us was empty, but this helper quickly began to fill it with a dazzling array of the most spectacular silk rugs. I had no doubt that this gentleman’s physique was due in no small part to the weight of these rugs that he carried around effortlessly. He would approach us and all of a sudden shake out a rug in the air. The rug would fall towards the floor as it opened and rolled towards us, landing at our feet as Salman switched conversation to discuss the new rug, telling us about the motifs, symbolism, source, and heritage of the rug. It was all a well choreographed dance.

An hour into our visit, the topic of price finally came up. I realized that I had to start moving this process along, as Salman showed no signs of slowing down. My blunt question, tactless, though it was, helped start the real buying process. When Salman mentioned the prices of the rugs splayed open before us, I had to do everything in my power to ensure that I did not bring up the tea I had been drinking. I will not name the number here, but suffice it to say, it was well beyond our reach. I felt Saeeda shift a little, and knew that she was working hard not to let things show on her face as well.

Now exercising more tact, I crafted the most subtle way of informing Salman that we needed to see something cheaper. I started by asking about other materials used to make carpets, and of carpets that came from other regions of Turkey. A smart salesman, Salman picked up on this, and began to show us carpets that were progressively lower in price, but which came with a simultaneous decrease in quality. It was also at this point that I knew I was going to make a purchase at this store. Don’t ask me to explain – the dynamics of the entire experience until that point had been such that it would have been impossible to walk out without making a purchase. My only goal was not to be goaded by the extremely high anchor that Salman had set.

So I did the untactful, and mentioned our budget to Salman. Ever obliging, he said he could help, and started showing us yet more rugs. As the floor space piled thick with carpets that Salman’s helper continued to bring, I realized that despite my stated budget, the rugs that Salman was showing us remained well above the number I had told him. Nicely done, I thought. Salman was using my number not as a ceiling, but as a starting floor for everything that he was showing me.

But the carpets were just … so … beautiful! I had never made a snap purchase of this magnitude, but nothing about the experience was high-pressure, nor did I feel at any point that I was being led on as the dumb tourist that could be taken advantage of. Salman was incredibly knowledgeable, and his staff amazingly friendly, a point driven home when Nuha came squealing around a corner, pecked us on the cheek and ran off with her store friends again. Man this was going to be hard, I thought.

In the end, despite my initial intention to use this simply as an educational experience, I made a purchase, and one that I feel will make a beautiful addition to our home. This was not a store where you bargained in price – I had picked up on this early, and this was something the concierge had also mentioned earlier in the day at the hotel. If you want to bargain, he had said, go to the Grand Bazaar. My friend is a wholesaler, and does business the right way, he had said.

Regardless, I spent way more than I had ever budgeted for this. Again, I will not mention numbers, but will tell you that I paid 500% more than the price I had initially told Saeeda I would shell out when we walked into that store. I had plenty of time to contemplate this as I signed all the paperwork, and when Salman personally drove us back to our hotel (in another Mercedes).

Sometimes it’s ok to be taken on a sales ride, especially if things are handled in a polite and entertaining manner. Or at least, that’s how I'm justifying what happened.

Topkapi

2010-05-05T17:47:00.030-06:00

Palace of the Sultans and a seat of Ottoman power for hundreds of years, Topkapi palace promised to be a great place to soak up some history and immerse ourselves in stories of palace intrigue. It did not disappoint in either respect. Laid out over a spacious strip of land that looks out over the Bosphorous, Topkapi palace reminded me a lot of the Forbidden City in Beijing. The parallels were eery - no commoners were allowed past the first courtyard, both were home to courtesans that spent their entire lives without setting foot outside the palace walls, and both are stunning in architecture and scope.

Out of all the areas, I found the Harem to be one of the most fascinating (but then, what guy wouldn’t?) A variation of the Arabic word “Haram”, meaning forbidden, the Topkapi harem was massive, and at one time housed 500 of the sultan’s concubines. But to me the Harem buildings could only be described as a gilded cage – amazingly beautiful in the craftsmanship of its many residences and gatehouses, but completely enclosed and secluded from the rest of the already secretive palace. Women brought here could spend their entire lives and not see the Sultan once, and had to rely on intrigue and scheming to make it up the pecking order. Murders were not out of the question, and poisonings were commonplace. A dangerous place, indeed.

The Treasury was equally spectacular, but not for its architecture. Here, the jewels and finery on display were breathtaking. 86 carat diamonds, thrones inlaid with gold, emerald and ruby encrusted daggers – all bore testament to not only the craftsmanship and creativity of the Ottomans, but also of their ability to bring home impressive treasures from far-flung conflicts. Three vast rooms, with case upon case eventually wore us down – there’s only so much glitter one can take before depression sets in.

Finally, the rooms dedicated to religious relics were also a great stop. Among artifacts from Mecca and Medina lay a display that I found inspiring – swords of all four caliphs, surrounding that of the Prophet Muhammad’s. As a child, I grew up hearing stories of the incredible persecution these men had faced, and of how they had fought back with faith and conviction. To see the swords they used, each a reflection of their personality, was special. Omar’s and Ali’s were massive broadswords, whereas Abu Bakr’s and Uthman’s were smaller, more elegant. The Prophet’s? Simple.

Although a big part of me wanted to believe that all articles in the Religious Relics museum were real, at least two of them engendered skepticism. In one room, I had a tough time believing that I was looking at the actual wooden staff of Prophet Moses, perhaps in part due to the cheesy animation in the background that keep showing the parting of the Red Sea. And I was similarly skeptical of the “cooking pot of Abraham,” which looked suspiciously like any other metallic cooking vessel I had ever seen – except this one claimed to be millennia old and claimed a credible chain of possession that somehow had been traced back to its original owner.

But then, if those artifacts were not real, what about the imprint of the Prophet’s foot? And pieces of the Prophet’s beard (also on display)? And those swords I found so inspiring? I guess in the end the faithful choose to impart authenticity to their religious artifacts in defiance of logic, but is that so bad? Science will not convince these individuals otherwise, so let them believe in the authenticity of their religious relics, as long as these are used to magnify the positive of each faith. As for me, I think I’ll believe in the Swords, and ignore the Staff of Moses and the Cooking Pot of Abraham. Probably not consistent, but as I said, so what?

Harems, treasures, and relics. The all-day visit to Topkapi was exhausting, but was a complete experience that was absolutely worth it.

No longer hip

2010-05-04T17:31:00.001-06:00

I’m fortunate that I've made friends from all over the world, including Turkey. It's been these friends that I have relied on heavily for advice on things to see and do while in Istanbul, as well as to find out about “insider” restaurants away from the tourist hordes. Now that we're here in Istanbul, we hit up one of the recommendations for dinner – a great place with great food and great views. But the moment this recommended eatery we knew something was wrong.

The maitre d’ looked at us with obvious skepticism. “Do you have a reservation?” she asked. Her tone was layered with barely hidden incredulity.

“Yes,” I said. “Our hotel concierge had called ahead, and had even asked if it was ok to bring a two year old.”

The maitre d’ laughed – a mirthless, you-must-be-kidding-me laugh. “I don’t think so. We don’t allow children in our restaurant.”

Hmm, ok. Obviously there had been miscommunication somewhere along the way. I peeked into the restaurant, and realized that I should probably not be too concerned about this person’s attitude. Inside, the trendy restaurant was filled with young people, decked out in designer clothes. Lounge music was playing, lighting was dim and the china looked fine. Not a place for a loud two year old.

Saeeda sensed the dilemma as well, and half turned to leave – she’d rather not deal with the stress of dinner in a place like this. However, Saeeda's movement may have made the maitre d’ think that she may be offending us, because as Saeeda headed to the door the maitre d' softened her tone somewhat.

“Ok, don’t worry. I have a table in the back." Then the following: "Is your baby a good baby?”

Good baby? What the hell sort of a question was that? Was her baby a good baby? What was a good baby? Was she implying I had a bad baby? So many questions, but I bit my tongue. The stubborn mule in me prevented me from walking away with Saeeda, and instead I agreed to be seated. We'd show her.

Inevitably, we were seated in a corner of a well appointed room, away from almost every other diner who was enjoying their food with great views of the Bosphorous. From the point our butts touched down on our seats, we began a stressful dance with Nuha, basically ensuring that she remained distracted and entertained, and never in a position to utter a peep. We made up our minds on what to order in record time, wolfed down whatever was put in front of us, skipped dessert, and were ready for the check within 30 minutes. I have to admit, I think Nuha picked up on our desperation too, because she remained beautifully well-behaved throughout the short meal. Whenever a neighboring diner would look our way, Nuha made to sure to look her cutest and coo back at them. She refrained from throwing silverware on the floor (which happens to be one of her favorite pastimes). At no point did she insist on running around the restaurant, and she ate what we put in front of her with gusto.

As we left a surprised maitre d’ behind us on our way out (how’s that for a good baby, you arrogant excuse for a restaurateur?) I realized that I would not only have to start filtering any advice I receive from friends who don’t have kids, but that hip eateries such as these were going to be off limits for a long, long time to come.

Oh well.

Humility

2010-05-04T15:43:00.008-06:00

From Paris to Istanbul, and the transition could not have been starker. Although both are ancient cities, with layers of history just asking to be peeled away, Istanbul occupies a special place in Islamic history, and therefore makes it a city with which I, as a Muslim, can form a deeper connection. We arrived here late last night, and were not able to see anything on our drive into Sultanahmet, where we are staying and where some of the most important cultural sites are located. Our inability to see anything turned out to be for the better, because the true impact of the first two monuments we visited – the Ayasofya and Blue Mosque – was best appreciated in daylight the next day.

And what an impact! The Ayasofya simply took my breath away. The emperor Justinian, who commissioned its building around 537 CE, is said to have dropped to one knee when he first walked inside the completed structure, and to have proclaimed “Solomon, I have outdone thee!” It’s hard to argue with that emotion.

The external structure is not as special as the inside, which has the effect of falsely lowering your expectations of the interior – until, that is, you step over the threshold, and are faced with the soaring interior. The cavernous space is just beautiful, with domes ascending ever upwards, and unlike the typical European cathedral, the entire structure has an incredible feeling of lightness to it. It’s not easy to understand why that is initially, until you realize that there are no large support columns that split up the interior. Instead, the massive central dome of the Ayasofya is supported by smaller surrounding half-domes that create an ingenious distribution of weight. In addition, the use of windows around the base of the dome allow in beams of light that bounce around the entire building, creating a mystical quality. The net effect on a human being standing within that space is to make them feel … puny.

Although Aysofya was the largest cathedral in Christendom for a thousand years, it was eventually converted into a mosque after conquest of the surrounding lands by the Ottomans. The, beautiful, immense medallions hanging from the ceilings that bear calligraphic representations of Allah and Muhammad are testament to this part of the building’s past. I felt this picture captured the duality of the Ayasofia's past, with the two medallions I mention suspended below a mosaic of the Virgin Mary.

We spent over an hour inside, even though there were no special exhibits to soak up our time – just standing in that hall was enough.

Ripping ourselves away from the Ayasofya was hard, but made easier by the fact that across the main square lay the beautiful Blue Mosque, so called because of the thousands of blue Iznik tiles that adorn its interior. Unlike the Ayasofya, the Blue Mosque presents a striking image from the very beginning. The intent, which is clearly achieved, is of size, majesty, and splendor. All visitors can enter the mosque, as long as they are appropriately covered. However, unlike the other visitors, as Muslims we were allowed to enter the actual space for prayer. This was significant, as it provided a symbolic differentiation, and helped make me feel a little special. I mention this not to describe a sense of superiority of my faith over others, but to explain how hard it is in these times to openly profess one’s adherence to Islam. Being in an environment where my faith is celebrated meant much to me.

I’ve heard that the interior of the Blue Mosque is not considered as architecturally significant as that of the Ayasofya. From an artistic point of view, I guess I can understand that – Ayasofya’s dome, as I mention above, stuns you into silence, where the Blue Mosque provides a subtler and gentler welcome into its religious space. However, while I offered prayer there, my mind was far from considerations of architectural achievements. It was deep in contemplative thought, feeding off the trappings of the beautiful mimbar, the mihrab, and the calligraphy, all of which served to heighten the beauty of this amazing, ancient structure. It was easy to close my eyes and imagine the centuries of supplicants who had stood where I stood now, bowing their head in utter humility.

Humility - the Ayasofya and the Blue Mosque have a way of imposing that upon you.

The kind Parisian

2010-05-03T15:30:00.000-06:00

The weather has not been very cooperative. Paris in the spring, unlike the saying, is very wet. However, the weather has been more than balanced by the good natured people of this city. Yes, you read that correct – all the Parisians that we’ve interacted with have been extremely helpful. This is in contrast to what we read in every guidebook we picked up, all of which wrote (with appropriate political correctness) that French can be perceived as rude, and that one should communicate in French first, because trying to blurt English at every opportunity is asking for trouble.

I’m not sure I buy into this whole haughty Parisian stereotype. There was one point this morning where Nuha started acting up and crying in our hotel lobby while we were trying to ask the concierge for directions. Before we knew it, one of the bellhops came over, took Nuha, grabbed apples from a complimentary fruit tray, and started to juggle for her. I’m not talking an amateurish three apples in the air at the same time – we’re talking Cirque du Soleil caliber theatrics. Not sure how many hotels back home have staff that receptive to a guest’s needs. You could argue that well trained hotel staff will look to help a guest at every turn, but I feel that the kindness we’ve been experiencing extends further. Every time I have tried speaking my halting French, I have been interrupted and spoken back to in English, without a trace of an attitude. In fact, I’ve felt that the person I’m speaking with has been more willing to speak in broken English to make it easier for me, rather than things having to be the other way around.

Communication in general has been very interesting. There have been a few occasions now where I have asked if the listener speaks English, and once told no, I am in turn asked if I speak Spanish. When I’ve said, we’ve suddenly discovered a language we’re both comfortable with. It makes for an interesting interaction – Pakistanis and French communicating in Spanish. Crazy world.

The Eiffel tower was really cool, literally and figuratively. The weather was brutal this morning, and reminded us of the blustery Chicago winter. We had purchased advance tickets, which meant shorter lines, but the French staff and tourists generous yet again, and offered us the opportunity to skip to the front of our line and get inside the visitor’s center where it would be warmer for Nuha.

One thing I’d like to highlight is that desis will be desis, no matter where you place them. The couple below was appropriately bundled for the day, wearing warm, puffy jackets, woolly hats, scarves and gloves. However, when it came time to taking a picture, they made their volunteer picture-taker wait 5 minutes as they slowly disrobed in the frigid weather, until the couple was down to something more stylish and appropriate for posterity.

Long lines

2010-05-02T16:09:00.000-06:00

Day 2 in Paris, and how can one skip out on the Louvre? Quite easily actually, when it is cold and raining, and one has not planned far enough ahead to purchase tickets beforehand. Because if one does not do so, one is then faced with improbably long lines, as if free doughnuts were being handed out (what else would be worth such a line?)

Saeeda was disappointed, but honestly, I’m not an art expert, and I doubt that my two year old daughter is either. It would only be a matter of time before one of us (most likely me) would have melted down and gotten on Saeeda’s nerves. So instead we made the best of a wet situation and had some coffee and croissants under the shade of a tree, as tourists rushed around us to find some cover from the rain.

With French café au lait coursing through our vein, we set out to walk the neighborhoods of the Seine. It was only an hour or so later that the sun came out, drying things up quickly and generally lifting the mood. So we walked and walked, marveling at the sheer splendor and … age … of everything around us. It got to the point where I silently just started multiplying by 10 any estimate I had of how old something was. This looks about 100 years old to me – nope, sorry, try a 1,000. The 3,300 year old oblelisk in the Place de la Concorde (the largest square in Paris) really blew me away. How many man-made objects have you been around that are over 3 millennia old? I thought so.

The very wet evening was capped by a beautiful boat tour of the Seine, with great views of the Notre Dame cathedral and the Eiffel tower, which we hope to ascend tomorrow.

Paris

2010-05-01T01:36:00.005-06:00

Ah, Paree. What can one say that has not already been said? Arrival was uneventful, and the bus to the hotel was simple to figure out. The hotel itself is great – a new Marriott property that reminds me of a W, although without the pretentious, clubby staff that makes you feel really old if you’re anything north of 21. Saeeda and I have been really fortunate in our travels in finding great new hotels that haven’t quite been discovered yet. For us, this has meant that our hotel points go far, and we stay in places that lack the tourist crowds.

Jet lag wasn’t bad, so we freshened up and headed out, hitting up the Arc de Triomphe, which was a 5 min. walk from our hotel, and then the Champs D’Elysees, where we had some overpriced (though still good) croissants and coffee, before heading into the Metro system. With the evening approaching, we decided to make Notre Dame cathedral our one and only stop for the day.

There is something to be said about structures that man erects to attempt to connect with the God of his religion. There is a sense of proportion, a sense of permanence, and a sense of beauty that all combine to humble the supplicant. And Notre Dame captures this essence with great power, despite being what I would call a moderately sized cathedral, and from what I'm told, nothing close to the magnitude of the Sistine Chapel. The interior was beautiful, and I was lucky enough to catch a mass in progress, which made the experience all the more authentic.

Afterwards, Saeeda and I walked around the Latin Quarter, struggling to control the stroller on cobblestoned streets, but enjoying the window shopping and the great variety of restaurants. We settled on a crepe place (for dinner – why not?), and dug into some delicious fare.

On the way home, we passed the Champs D’Elysees again, and spotted that mecca of luxury goods:

We also came across signs that Paris is full of culture, filled with a desire to learn more about little known parts of the world in order to increase a mutual understanding:

As well as signs that Paris has no taste in music, and insists on throwing lifelines to individuals who should have faded into a hazy memory a long, long time ago:

All in all, a great first day.

Travel – we’re getting the hang of it

2010-04-30T01:32:00.000-06:00

I’ve chronicled our travel debacles since Nuha’s birth in a couple of places now. Travelling with multiple pieces of luggage, frustrated and harried at airports, struggling to console our daughter on planes. But I have to say, we did real well this time. As we left home for Paris, and eventually Istanbul, we did so with two medium sized suitcases and a small carry-on, all well under the weight limit. Beyond that, I had a small backpack that I planned to use during our treks. We were ready before the shuttle arrived to pick us up, patiently waiting by the door, which in itself represented a marked change from our previous trips, where I’d usually be busy with last minute things, praying for the taxi to be late.

But the hot streak didn’t end there. Security lines, which once used to be child’s play, had become terrifying ordeals that we hated. This time around, however, it was like a finely choreographed dance - eliminate liquid containers before the line, grab multiple bins in one go, deposit jackets/belts/shoes in one, laptop in another, and backpack in the third. Shoes off, ticket in one hand, baby in another, deliver strategic ninja kicks to expertly collapse stroller, and walk through. Done!

Actually, the entire journey was a series of high fives between Saeeda and I. All except for one incident. We had boarded our KLM flight from SFO to Amsterdam, and the flight attendant, sitting in a jumpseat directly in front of us, asked us to buckle Nuha in. Nuha, however, wanted nothing doing . And so began a Class A, Premium Quality Meltdown of the 1st Degree. We’re talking writhing, hollering, hell-raising screaming, with tears and snot streaming out in copious amounts. Our neighboring passengers did their best to ignore the tirade, and we did our best to control Nuha, but to no avail. We were “those” parents with the uncontrollable child, and I could tell everyone was doing mental math to figure out how long they would be stuck beside us. Thankfully, the tantrum stopped the moment we reached cruising altitude and unbuckled Nuha. I think the flight attendant figured out what was in her best interest too, because during landing she turned a blind eye as we waited until the last possible minute to buckle Nuha, and then unbuckled her the first opportunity we got.

Still, all in all this was one of our most successful trips ever, and I’m hoping that it’s something that we can build on.

A volcanic disruption in review

2010-04-22T04:21:00.006-06:00

My European travel adventures finally came to came to a successful end on Tuesday. On that day, the authorities in charge finally relented and airspace opened back up, allowing stranded passengers to start making their way to their respective destinations. All in all, this experience was an interesting and not entirely unpleasant one

Traveling in Europe is fun at any time, but doing so by relying completely on your own wits, rather than the boring predictability of planned schedules – there’s something exciting about that. Of course, I was blessed throughout this experience in that I was traveling on business, and hence was the ward of my multinational employer with covered expenses and dedicated travel agents ( albeit ones who refused to pick up the phone). There was also never a pressing emergency that had me desperate to be home, although it has emerged since my return that my wife and I have different definitions of “emergency” - a wailing, inconsolable toddler constitutes an emergency, I now know. Finally, my contact with stranded families aching to be home, or of stranded students running out of money and living off airport cots was sobering, to say the least.

Perhaps most interesting was the dynamic that was in play between the airlines and the governing authorities. At the outset, the public saw the decisive action taken by the EU as reassuring, despite stranded passengers grumbling about the delay - visions of planes with clogged jet engines falling from the sky made sure that few questioned the initial decision. But then something interesting happened. Airlines began to bleed money. As the shutdown stretched from hours to days, it became clear that grounded air traffic was going to lead to a severe financial impact. Airlines began taking “test flights” to check if it was ok to take to the skies, although I found it interesting that none of the test flights took place through the ash clouds themselves, or flew at much lower altitudes than normal. CEOs began exhorting the authorities to open up the skies, that the shutdown was draconian and excessive. There was even talk of bailouts.

And the EU relented. Despite any conclusive evidence that proved it was safe to fly, the Net Present Value swung in favor of letting planes off the ground. Someone will write an interesting analysis on this someday, but you could sense the equation changing on a daily basis.

Day 1: Planes crashing as a result of volcanic ash = no planes allowed to fly.

Day 3: $200 million in daily losses = hmm, is this volcano thing really that bad?

Day 5: Screw the volcano. We need to get s#%* moving again!

Ah economics. What a truly dismal science.

I leave you with a few pictures I was able to snap on my crappy Blackberry camera as I decided to make the most of my stay in Germany and Switzerland:

Chili flavored chocolate? Really, O Swiss people? Have desis so pervaded your society that you feel you need to cater to us?

Entrance to Dachau. "Work will set you free"

Surfing(!) in Munich. This is in the middle of the city.

With Mike's Bike Tours

Marienplatz - the old town center at night. Much prettier in real life.

Me, the Autobahn, and Lady Gaga

2010-04-19T12:24:00.000-06:00

The norm for “seeing Europe” is usually after one’s college graduation, and before the start of one’s first job. It is an American rite of passage – a last hurrah before one has to buckle down and begin worrying about things like contributing enough to a 401k to make sure to get an employer match. But given this stupid volcano, I’m now living every fresh college graduate’s dream European vacation.

Today I bid goodbye to Munich, and headed to pick up my rental car for the journey to Zurich, which is where I had managed to find the next available flight out on Swiss Air. Driving in Europe is a ton of fun – you invariably get a German car with a great engine, and you get to speed on autobahns where it’s easy to push 100 mph. Picking up the car was just as much fun for me, though, because the rental car agency I had found was at the main train station in the center of the city, which meant having to use zigzagging alleys and one-way streets to get out of the city and on to the highway.

It’s hard not to feel a little like Jason Bourne during the process. Ok, maybe it’s hard for me not to feel a little like Jason Bourne. But come on! I don’t speak the language, but I’m at ease in my alien environment. I’m at places of mass public transit, wending and weaving my way through strangers who know nothing about my mission. I convince agents to lend me a car, using one of my many credit cards linked to offshore accounts. I locate my vehicle in a non-descript, off-site parking structure, load my minimalist belongings, rev the engine, and zoom my way across narrow roads, knowing where to go only by instinct … and by the aid of my GPS (which I set to speak at me in a haughty British accent).

Driving is indeed a lot of fun in Europe, even putting aside the great highways with no speed limits. The countryside is so ridiculously postcard perfect. In my case, I passed countless small villages clinging to valley riversides, with the Alps soaring in the background. Farms flew by, with cows lazily lounging in the fields. And every now and then I’d pass through small towns where I’d pull up next to an old church, built an impossibly long time ago.

The only blemish on this driving experience was the music. Europop itself is fine – I kinda like the catchy pop-tunes that make up most continental hits. And I really enjoyed listening to German, Italian, and French songs, even though I didn’t understand a word. It was part of the experience of being in a foreign land. But that’s what made the amount of American crud playing on each and every single radio station absolutely infuriating. I don’t claim to have a trained ear, nor do I claim to have any deep knowledge of music, but even I can tell good American music from formulaic, vapid crap. Among the songs that were on infinite replay on all the radio stations was that ludicrous song by that guy who would like to make himself "believe that planet earth turned slowly” and for some reason wants to “get a thousand hugs, from 10,000 bugs” (why is he asking each bug to hug him ten times?) Or something like that. Owl City, is the name of the band, I think. And then there was Lady Gaga. You know that song – the one where the chorus sounds like she’s trying to gargle while singing – “rah-rah-ah-ah-ah, roma roma-ma, ga-ga ooh la la.” WTF?!

Both these vomit inducing songs played with such regularity that I eventually just had to turn the radio off, and resort to my trusty British GPS guide to entertain me the rest of the way. The three and a half hour drive went by a lot quicker than I expected, and I pulled into my Zurich office in the afternoon, surprising my coworkers who thought they had seen the last of “that corporate guy from California.”

Tomorrow promises to be another exciting day – will I get to fly out? Will I be moving to yet another city? Will I have to endure more Lady Gaga? Who knows.

Unpronounceable volcanoes

2010-04-17T09:36:00.000-06:00

My ability to withstand infuriatingly unhelpful travel agents continues to amaze me. Yesterday I stopped living in 90 min. increments (average wait time for an operator), and resigned myself to the fact that I will get home when I get home. This means that I'm no longer splitting time between keeping my bags packed in case my flight leaves from Munich, walking around the city entertaining myself, and wasting away on hold on the phone. This is a better approach anyway, since now I can relax and catch up on email, and spend time surfing the web again.

I arrived in Switzerland last week, and eventually moved to Germany for meetings. I was supposed to fly out of Stuttgart on Friday, connect to Munich, and then go straight to San Fran by Friday evening. That's when that silly volcano with that unpronounceable name started to mess with a finely tuned aviation system, and all air travel went haywire. Since then, I've taken a train to Munich, scrambled for a hotel over 1,000s of other people (and with the year's biggest convention starting here this week), sat around for three days while my rescheduled flights were cancelled repeatedly, contemplated taking the 8 hour train to Greece or Turkey (only places functioning close to normal), commandeered a rental car, and will be driving to Zurich tomorrow.

We have an office there where I should be able to camp out - perhaps literally as I have not found a hotel room yet. The second-biggest problem right now is finding lodging. People who were supposed to leave, haven't. And people who were in transit have arrived, which means availability in cities is tight. Still, being productive in an office, surrounded by my coworkers who speak the language and can help with travel arrangements is bound to be better than being useless in Munich.

I was on the phone with our travel agent for the umpteenth time this morning, re-booking yet another flight, when she mentioned that I should look into cruise lines. Apparently some forward-thinking passengers booked themselves on ships last week when the airports started shutting down, and many of them are already arriving in the US. Craziness. And it's not like the airlines know more than the rest of us - yesterday I ran into a pilot from Delta and stewardesses from Continental who had no idea when they would be leaving. When I used my Blackberry to look up the latest info on Lufthansa's website on airport closures, they were grateful because it provided them more of an update than they were getting from their HQ. I learned that flight crew are provided with company-issue laptops or cell phones, and instead just rely on wherever they get internet access.

By the way, I'm looking forward to my 3.5 hr drive tomorrow, since the only car that was available, and which I snagged, was a Mercedez sedan. The problem is that it's a manual transmission, which I last drove when I was in high school in Pakistan. I'm not worried though - I maintain that anyone who learns to drive on the streets of Karachi can out-maneuver James Bond in a car chase. I'll get to put my theory to the test tomorrow as I try to navigate out of Munich's old-town , with its classic windy, narrow, European streets, and onto the autobahn.

Possibly the worst part of all this (other than trying to convince my wife that no, secretly I'm not having the time of my life) is that I can't swear at this f#$%!@* volcano properly. It's not like, "Damn Mt St. Helens!" or "shit Pinatubo, why did you have to screw things up?". No, the ridiculous name of this volcano is impossible to pronounce, which makes venting of anger near impossible.

Maybe I'll dial my travel agent again.

i-Yawn

2010-01-30T17:51:00.000-06:00

I wanted to wait a while before posting about the new i-Pad. So much hype preceded the launch of the latest device from Apple, so it wouldn't have been fair to discuss it without some time going by and letting thoughts settle.

But really? An oversize iPhone is all Apple could come up with? Granted the pricing is attractive, but netbooks continue to drop in retail price, and satisfy the needs of the casual websurfer just fine (albeit with some performance issues, but these should diminish with time). So Steve Jobs couldn't have thought this was going to displace the mobile computing marketplace (especially since the iPhone is already leagues ahead of competition in this regards).

No, I think the real value of the iPad is going to be in the eBook space, and the skirmish this has started with Amazon. There are several things going for the iPad in this regards - the iTunes-like store for books, the ePub format, and an interesting revenue-sharing contract with publishers are a few of them. Amazon doesn't need to worry about it's online bookstore engine, but the proprietary Kindle format and its pricing agreements with its publishers is of concern. I own a Kindle, and love it, but already the iPad has forced Amazon to move away from its loss leading $9.99 price for eBooks. I won't be too happy to see prices for books go up, so I'm waiting to see what happens.

Extra competition is good, and eventually you'll see innovation drive advances in the electronic publishing industry. As a consultant, I worked on eBook projects in 1999, but the platforms just weren't there, and projects fizzled. Now, with the iPad and Kindle going at each other, I'm looking forward to some true change (I haven't played around with the Sony Reader or the BN Nook to form much of an opinion on those devices).

But to come back to my original reaction to the iPad. Only the Apple fanboys can truly believe they are getting a successor device to the iPod and iPhone when they buy the iPad. For the rest of us, it's the shot fired across the electronic publishing world that should get us salivating.

What defines career sucess?

2010-01-18T21:02:00.002-06:00

In the next six months I’ll be making a transition in my career. I’ll be staying at the same company, but will be moving off from a program that I’ve been part of for the last three years. The opportunity is a rare one – there are only so many times in one’s career where there is the opportunity to choose from multiple positions, knowing that some of these can take one’s career in a completely different direction. However, let me be clear - given the economic environment, there are multiple candidates vying for these same opportunities, so it’s important to network with senior management and get your name out there.

So last week I set up time with a Senior Manager to discuss opportunities on her team, but more importantly to get general career advice regarding the division in which I am interested. This individual has been at Abbott for a few years now, and has several staff reporting to her. Most of the half hour conversation was spent discussing my strengths, and what sort of a fit positions on her team (if they materialize) would be for my goals. Towards the end of our friendly conversation, she asked about my transition to California, and how the experience here differed from other places where I had lived.

When I mentioned that I had started out on the East Coast, her eyes lit up. Probing further it turned out that we were alums of the same institution – the University of Virginia. She mentioned that she obtained her MBA from the Darden business school at UVA in 2002, and I responded that I had attended UVA as an undergraduate.

“So did I,” she said.

“Really?” I asked. “I graduated in 1998 from the Engineering school. You?”

“1998. From the Engineering School.”

Although I should have been excited to find an alum from the same school and program all the way out in Santa Clara, CA, I felt like the air had been sucked out of the room. Here I was, having spent 30 minutes getting career advice from a personable, accomplished Senior Manager who had clearly achieved success. And yet we were the same age, and had started our careers at the same time. And she was my senior (by quite a bit).

I tried to recover a little by expressing surprise at what a small world we lived in, and asking who else I should network with.

“Do you know X?” she asked. Of course, I replied – he was a General Manager in charge of our Asia-Pacific operations, and I had heard his name mentioned often.

“He also graduated from UVA. 1998”

I don’t remember the rest of the conversation, other than her telling me to stop by if I had any other questions in the future. I was too busy trying to figure out where my career path had slowed down relative to these successful individuals, to do anything other than meekly thank her and leave.

So that remains the question. How does one define career success? A title, a corner office, multiple direct reports? A high salary, great responsibility? Personal fulfillment? And what timelines should be attached to those goals? I understand that I switched careers – from consulting to healthcare – and that I should not measure my path directly to the Senior Manager I met with, since she graduated with an MBA three years before I did. But how should I advise my daughter as she grows up? Should she try to get to b-school as soon as she can? Is working for seven years before grad school (like her dad), going to slow down her career trajectory? Or is the perspective that comes with time in the industry reward in itself?

Whatever the answers, I know I’ll continue networking. After all, I have lost ground to make-up.

H1N1 success ... at last

2009-11-21T14:34:00.004-06:00

Burned twice, nothing was going to stop me now. I was a freaked out parent on the prowl, willing to go to any length to get my child that elusive vaccination I had been seeking for weeks now. I'm sure part of it had to do with the paranoia sweeping California regarding the virus, and part of it had to do with me not willing to consider the scenarios where I *could* have done something, but didn't.

So it was off to the Santa Clara fairgrounds again, where yet another free clinic was being held. Except this time I showed up at 6:30am. And this time I was ready. I had my cold weather gear (it was 35 degrees), I had my lawn chair, and I had my New York Times (the Sunday edition takes me hours to read cover to cover). Once the line started to move, I planned to call Saeeda to drive over with Nuha, and then the three of us would hang out until we got the shot.

As it turned out, my showing up that early was a good idea, because there was already a ridiculous line of people waiting before me. And with that line came the associated entrepreneurs, selling everything from churros to eternal salvation (some Church group or other passing out pamphlets). One guy was even dressed up as a Subway sandwich and was handing out coupons.

By 9am, I had called Saeeda, who arrived with an unsuspecting Nuha in tow. It was a good thing they got there when they did, because the line had started to move, and beyond a certain point the police were not letting anyone hold places in line for anyone. There were a lot of distraught parents, one of whom had been holding a spot only to realize that they had gone past the point where they could usher their family in later.

It was around 11am by the time we finally made it INTO the fairground building where the shots were being administered. The scene was surreal, and instantly made me think of a Hollywood disaster flick - queues of confused people in a vast hall being directed by authoritative staff and conflicting signs; nurse stations quickly processing vaccine administrations; doctors and emergency personnel standing by in the wings; relieved patients walking out quickly, just glad that the ordeal was over.

The unsuspecting victim before heading inside:

The line inside:

Uh oh:

All done!:

The Quest for the H1N1 vaccine #2

2009-11-14T02:11:00.001-06:00

Wizened by last week's H1N1 experience, Saeeda and I spent the last few days strategizing which clinic to attend to get the vaccine for Nuha. I know that we've moved beyond the rational with our panicky approach, but we're parents. We're not supposed to be rational entities anymore.

Son on Friday, after poring over the clinic information and mapping out distances to each, Saeeda and I settled on a Sunnyvale clinic. At 6:30am on Saturday I was awake and dressed. Armed with a water bottle and some reading material, I was ready to be dropped off to hold a place in line for the vaccine.

Saeeda dropped my off by 7am, but already there was a line wrapping around the clinic building. The staff had resorted to handing out numbers to people so that entire families did not have to wait in the morning drizzle. You took the number and came back with your family at the assigned time. However, it was the line for these numbers itself that wrapped around the clinic.

By around 8am things started moving as the folks at the very front of the line began to receive numbers (the clinic wasn't set to open until 9:30am, but they decided to hand out the numbers earlier). Still, the going was slow because people were being interviewed about the number of high risk individuals in their family that needed the shot. Given that not everyone spoke English fluently, and things started to slow down.

While waiting, I decided to strike up a conversation with the guy in front of me. It turned out, to my surprise, that he was an alum from the University of Chicago. Not only that, but since he had gone on to study law at Northwestern, he knew my cousin (alum of U. of C) and many of my friends who were lawyers in Chicago. Small world.

The line kept moving, the rain kept falling, and I continued texting Saeeda with status updates. But around 9:30am something changed. The line started moving a lot faster, and no one knew what was going on until we rounded the corner and saw that a police officer and clinic staff member were turning people away now. They had run out of vaccine, and were therefore no longer handing out numbers. There was no point in waiting anymore.

I silently cursed fate as I dialed Saeeda to come pick me up. Two weeks now, and I had nothing to show for all the waiting around I had done. Today, the vaccine was gone in 90 minutes. What would this country do if there was a true virus outbreak of pandemic proportions? If California couldn't handle the situation for a limited at-risk population, what would happen if everyone were to need a vaccination because of a lethal virus spreading through the community?

Boggles the mind.

The Quest for the H1N1 Vaccine - Attempt #1

2009-11-07T00:31:00.001-06:00

Perspectives change once you become a parent. I detest getting flu shots for the very logical belief that I'm Wolverine and no earthly malady can lay me low for long (I know, I'm asking for it). However, this H1N1 thing has me and Saeeda concerned about the little one. At the end of the day, should something bad happen because Nuha went unvaccinated, I don't know how I'd live with myself. Somehow I don't think saying, "but the odds were against this happening..." would make feel any better.

As far as the swine flu - for some reason California trails the rest of the developed world and is rationing out its H1N1 vaccines. Supply is outstripping demand and those pediatrician offices lucky enough to receive a stash are only handing it out to pregnant women or mothers of little ones under 6 months old. The rest of us have to resort to a scouring of the internet to locate free weekly clinics where the shots are available to the remaining high-risk population - kids between 6 months and 24 years of age. Which begs the question - why the hell are 24 year olds considered high risk - doesn't the fact that they've survived college grant them immunity from all known toxins?

Saeeda found a listing for a clinic that was being offered at the Santa Clara Fairgrounds, so this morning we decided to check things out, hoping to get Nuha vaccinated and then to move on to other errands we had for the day. Oh, how naive we were.

Admittedly, we rolled up to the Fairground at 11am, which we thought was relatively early. But already the line of people stretched outside and wrapped for at least a half-mile outside the parking lot. Families were camped out with lawn chairs, blankets, toys, food - had I not known, I would have guessed it to be a national holiday of some sort, with the families waiting for the parade to start.

I rolled down my car window and asked a departing family how long it had taken them before they received their shot.

"4 hours. We've been here since 7am."

I looked at Saeeda - getting in line now was futile. The wait would be even longer. Maybe not wanting to wait in line would make me a horrible father. But another, more reasonable part of me just said to wait until next week, when we'd be able to properly plan for a clinic and actually show up earlier. With that, I turned the car around to head home.

The Quest to get the H1N1 Vaccine was on.

Feeling young again

2009-10-31T14:25:00.002-06:00

Does U2 put on a show or what? Saeeda and I had never been to a concert together, so a while back I had bought tickets for the Irish band's stop in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, CA. Getting to the concert brought with it some trepidation - I was simply worried about being too old to even be at such an event. After all, aren't people of my demographic supposed to gently ease into listening of NPR and to start attending classical music performances?

But I was pleasantly surprised to see that most people were like us - middle-aged and having grown up with the music we were about to hear. The venue was amazing, the stage was cool, and the opening act - Black Eyed Peas - pumped up the crowd with energy. I didn't know half their songs, but that didn't matter. People around us muffled my mutilations of the lyrics.

Then Slash from Guns 'N Roses took the stage and kicked off that classic guitar riff from Sweet Child. Pure sweetness, even for someone like me who knows so little about rock. And then there was U2, a band that justifiably occupies a spot in history as one of the iconic musical acts of all time. 24 songs, ranging across both decades and albums, almost all of which we spent listening to while on our feet.

The funny thing is that Saeeda and I left the concert energized, almost as if a few years had fallen off our shoulders. This music thing was cool, and going to concerts didn't have to be a struggle against a tide of humanity. To some degree, the experience has caused a mini-transformation, and we're now on the prowl for other great musical events to attend. Ones where being middle-aged will be irrelevant. Ideas?

The Blackberry finally claims me as a victim

2009-08-10T13:42:00.003-06:00

I’ve done my fair share of travel, most of which came while I hopped from city to city as a management consultant. It was really exciting at first, with the wonder of new places, different time zones, and new friends always promising to make each trip unique. But eventually the flight delays, cramped seats, and horrible airport food became annoyances that I could no longer ignore. Out of all these nuisances, perhaps nothing galled me more than the loud executive on his cell phone.

Keep in mind that this was still back in the day (i.e., late 1990’s) as far as mobile phones were concerned. They were still these ugly, hulking beasts, that weighed 5 pounds, ran on satellite systems, and were owned by a only a few self-important people. And I hated watching these “important” individuals pace around the terminal, obviously showing off the fact that they had a cell phone, and yelling things like, “YEAH HONEY … CAN YOU HEAR ME? YES, I’M CALLING YOU FROM THE AIRPORT ON MY CELL PHONE. YES, MY CELL PHONE. NO, I’M NOT IN THE OFFICE. NO, I’M AT THE AIRPORT. I CAN MAKE CALLS FROM ANYWHERE WITH MY CELL PHONE, AND I’M DOING SO FROM THE AIRPORT. NO HONEY IT’S NOT MAGIC. LISTEN, DO YOU WANT ME TO PICK UP ANY MILK ON MY WAY HOME?”

So I promised myself that I would never be like these idiots, and that I didn’t even need a cell phone. Well, that didn’t get me far, because before I knew it cell phones were everywhere, and my friends were making it a sport to mock me as a luddite. I never understood why a home and work number were not enough – why did I have to be reachable while I was grocery shopping, or at the gym? Still, I eventually caved and bought a clunker of a cell phone. You know, the one that resembled a brick, and which could definitely not be carried in your trouser pocket, unless you wanted to send the wrong message. I held on to my first cell phone for so long that Sprint sales reps would marvel at it whenever I would take it in for servicing at a store. They'd have to dig around for an old timer who remembered how these clunkers worked.

So it should come as no surprise that I swore I would never get a “smartphone”. I would never become slave to a Blackberry, jumping at every ring/ding/vibration to check who just texted me, or what email I just received. I promised that I would reject any offer from my employer to foist one of these devices on me, because I would inevitably just be tying myself down to work. But alas I failed in my quest to keep this promise as well. With this new position in San Fran comes the mandatory requirement to carry around a Blackberry, and I find myself slowly being seduced by this device. But I don’t want to! I don’t want to repeatedly look for a blinking light to see if I have a message, I don’t want to scroll through easily-accessed web pages, and I don’t want to tap out messages on the surprisingly comfortable keypad. Argh, corporate America, why must you turn me into a drone!

The Bay Area - home of the Desi

2009-08-04T23:11:00.004-06:00

Ah yes - the adventure continues, but the location changes (as per the title of this blog).

We've been in the Bay Area for a few days now, and already there are a few things that are going to take some time to adjust to. Specifically, this place is teeming with desis. We and our Asian brethren rule Silicon Valley.

One example that made this fact hit home - our rental car. The moment Saeeda got in, she remarked at how it smelled "desi." Now I'll admit, there are times when South Asians eschew the use of deodorant, and instead engage in some sort of macabre contest to see how quickly their body odor can burn through a bystander's olfactory nerves and cause their eyes to tear up. But still, it was unfair of Saeeda to blame the slight whiff of BO to a desi - it really could have been anyone who had used the car previously.

But she was proven right, because the moment I turned on the radio I heard a really old Bollywood movie song come blaring out of the car's tinny speakers. On the AM band no less. Only a desi would preset a rental car's radio station to an AM channel playing ethnic music.

It also turned out that the channel was promoting some sort of "Friendship Day", when friends the world over were supposed to profess their love for each other by calling in with "friendship stories". And desis from across the Bay Area were obliging. One caller wanted to send a shoutout to his friend who was always playing pranks on him, like shoving him out of a whitewater raft while navigating a Class 5 rapid. Ha ha, how funny. This caller loved his friend very much and wanted to dedicate, randomly, a song from a 1950s movie called "Laila Majnoo" (the desi equivalent of Romeo and Juliet).

I'm going to like living here. I'm a FOB (Fresh Off the Boat) at heart, and Saeeda has worked hard over the years to eliminate all traces of my fobbiness. But I see my brothers everywhere - in malls, on the roads, in every office. It's only a matter of time before I start wearing sandals and skinny jeans (they're fashionable again) and eating some good, spicy, ethnic food on a daily basis. Oh, and dancing to Bollywood songs in my car.

Yes, I'm going to like living here very much.

Thank you for the memories Chicago

2009-07-31T11:38:00.008-06:00

I'm sitting in my living room, with movers milling around, boxing up our belongings. I'm amazed at how much stuff we've managed to accumulate over our four years here, especially since we live in a two bedroom apartment where space has always been at a premium. I'm also surprised at how sad I am as I see my apartment get emptier by the minute. Perhaps it's the depressing white of the walls as they slowly reveal themselves, or perhaps it's the echo of my voice as it bounces around empty rooms.

A few weeks ago I was having a conversation with my friend Savyon, in which I was expressing frustration at having to start all over again in a new place. Savyon, who is not from the US, remarked at how this nomadic existence was such a quintessentially American experience. In this country individuals are solitary beings with loose ties to community and family, always in search of their fortune. By its very nature, this search constantly takes these residents to new geographies.

On the other hand, in places like the Middle East and Asia (home for me and Savyon), centuries old culture places different demands on an individual, who is never solitary but instead a part of a much larger social whole. Here, familial and cultural ties inhibit movement, and cause entire generations to live out their lives in spacial stasis.

I do not know which is better. Personally, I've lived a nomadic existence, never having spent more than seven years in any one place. But despite the emotional wrenching that occurs with every move, I know that I've found personal enrichment with each new home. And trust me, leaving Chicago has come with its own emotional costs.

After all, this is where my wife and I fell in love with an unparalleled lakefront lapping at the feet of stunning skyscrapers. This is where the midwestern winter made a man out of me. This is where my daughter first opened her eyes. This is also where I was taken kicking and screaming through a master's education at the University of Chicago, to emerge on the other side someone more appreciative of the workings of the world. This is where I watched my nephews born and grow up. This is where I watched Obama stand a field away from me, breaking historic barriers with his accomplishments. This is where I shook Blagoevich's hand, and have since wondered what the hell I was thinking. This is where I entered the world of healthcare, and met mentors against whom I will measure all future business leaders I work for. But probably most importantly, this is where I have met individuals whose kindness and support I will never forget, and whose friendships I will treasure for a lifetime.

If being a nomad is what I have to be ... well then, so be it. Life is only a set of memories, and I leave Chicago knowing that I have amassed some of my most precious memories in this city.

For that, thank you Chicago.

Visa, what visa?

2009-07-17T11:05:00.000-06:00

Man what a whirlwind stay it's been . I came with high hopes of exploring two great, summer, European destinations, and instead just saw the inside of the hotel room, and of the office. The work was interesting though, and since medical devices is a field that I know little about, I'm looking forward to the new learning experience in the coming year.

But the regret I feel at not having taken advantage of this travel opportunity has far been overshadowed by the joys of having an American passport. This was my first trip abroad as a US citizen, and the difference in treatment I received from the days when I had to travel with a Pakistani passport has been indescribable. But old habits are seared into my brain – before I left home I went into a panic attack when I wasn't able to find copies of my German visa, as well as a letter from Abbott verifying employment, and a letter from my bank verifying the presence of funds, and a letter (lots of letters) from my manager stating the purpose of my travel, and a copy of my wife’s passport, and a copy my previous US visas (H1-B, student, etc.), and a copy of my travel documents containing numbers and addresses where I could be reached at all times, and a urine sample (ok, not that last, but you get the idea). Then Saeeda would step in when she would see things were getting out of hand, and remind me that I had a US passport, and I would start to calm down.

Still, during this trip I was nervous when I approached German immigration on flight into Europe, and US immigration on flight into Chicago. In both cases I handed over my passport knowing the drill – the harsh questions that would follow, the convincing job that I would have to do, the skeptical looks that I would receive. But these did not come, as the officer just gave a cursory glance at my passport. Nevermind, I told myself. The secret red button under the desk had been pressed, “Code Red” was probably flashing silently across computer screens in a control room somewhere, and Chuck Norris and the Delta Squadron were already en route to ferret me away.

But none of this happened. Instead, I looked like a complete idiot as I stood staring at the immigration officer, while the officer stared back at me with a “what else do you want?” look. The next person in line behind me coughed politely, and I realized that I really truly was being allowed to go through. I clumsily shuffled my way through, mumbling to myself in a daze of confusion, not sure how my world had changed so drastically.

But I wasn’t complaining.

German dining

2009-07-15T19:04:00.002-06:00

I met up with the rest of my coworkers yesterday at the car rental counter in Stuttgart airport. Even car renting is an exciting experience in Germany - walking down the garage aisles all you pass are BMWs, Audis and Mercs. Meanwhile, back in the US I'm usually told that I'll be squeezing into a "sporty compact", usually built for a midget and with all the horsepower of a mule-drawn carriage.
From the airport it was off to the small town of Ragindingen, where the hotel was a small, cosy building just off the town river. The hotel is something that I would describe as having "character", but Saeeda would describe as "old." And old it was, since there was no central air conditioning and an elevator straight out of the 60s. Still, I liked the ambience - no two rooms were the same, and all the furnishings had an Old World feel to them.
Our first meal in Germany? Italian food. Excellent Italian food. Which left me really confused at the end of the night, because I had yet to try to typical German food, which in my mind consisted of high calory, saucy, beef/pork boiled in various ways. Why didn't I expect there to be a thriving dining scene in German cities? Ignorance.

To Germany, in style

2009-07-14T09:00:00.000-06:00

Although I’ve traveled a lot, and in doing so have racked up airline miles galore, I haven’t had much of an opportunity to fly business class, which is an experience unto itself. I finally got the opportunity to do so for work this week, when I was asked to attend a set of meetings in Germany and Switzerland. Given the distances involved, I was eligible for business class, and so booked my travel with glee. So much glee, in fact, that I think I was more excited about the flight than the fact that I was going to visit two spectacular European vacation destinations.

The experience did not disappoint. I flew Lufthansa, and knew that I was in for some special treatment the moment I sat down in the comfy leather chair. This thing needed its own on-screen instruction manual – with a push of a button I could move it in any direction I wanted, change lumbar support, tilt into “relax” mode, or go fully flat into “sleep” mode. I was served gourmet snacks throughout, provided newspapers and reading material, and practically waited on hand and foot by a flight attendant assigned specifically to me. My only slight disappointment was dinner – appetizers and dessert were delicious, but I was forced to eat my pre-ordered Muslim meal, which was nothing more than a spicy, greasy chicken dish, tasting like it had come straight from a bad desi wedding. Meanwhile, my fellow business class passengers got to dine on steak and fish. The price I pay for eternal salvation, I guess.

The travel was so pleasant, in fact, that it never felt like the long flight that it truly was. Part of me felt guilty. What right had I to such luxury, when my fellow passengers were squeezed into cattle class a few feet behind me? Ordinarily, my 6’ 3’’ frame would be scrunched into a tiny seat with my surgically repaired knees pushing into the seat in front of me, praying fervently that the passenger in front would not tilt their seat too far back. Sleeping would be out of the question, and even going to the bathroom would require asking permission of the five passengers seated between me and the aisle.

But I bet airlines do this on purpose. They give you a taste of what air travel should be like (and was, at one point in time), then warn you by saying that you better continue to buy the more expensive ticket, otherwise look what could happen to you. Nefarious, I tell you.

Nuha turns 1

2009-06-17T14:49:00.002-06:00

The party was grand, and held true to the LA tradition of big productions. We had a theme (an Enchanted Garden), delicious food (Persian catering), specialty ballons (in the shape of butterflies and dragonflies), grooving music (a desi-Western mix), a candy buffet (all in pink and green colors – the colors of the theme), a specialty cake (in the shape of a towering garden), and entertainment for the kids (Tinkerbell showed up to play games, tell stories, and paint faces).

However, our daughter wasn’t very interested in the hard work that her mother and father (mostly her mother – father isn’t so creative), put in to organize everything. Instead, she was happiest crawling around on all fours, alternating between picking up things to eat from the floor and trying to eat the flowers embossed on her dress. It was only after the party was over, when I had a brief moment to sit and observe my wired daughter - she had just had taken her first ever bite of cake frosting that evening and was zooming from end of the party room to another - that I marveled at how quickly time had flown by.

First, I had not screwed up. I had made it to Nuha’s first birthday without making major mistakes that would scar the girl for life. Much of the credit for that goes to my patient wife, who has made sure to gently but forcefully set me straight when I start acting irresponsibly around my daughter. As in when I let Nuha run around the house without a diaper on because she should be allowed to “air out” all body parts.

Second, seeing how quickly Nuha has progressed from a helpless baby that fit in the crook of my elbow to a toddler who knows how to aggressively demand what she wants – this makes me marvel at the mysteries of God and my intellect’s puny inability to comprehend the magnitude of what is occurring right before my eyes.

My evolution as a father continues, and so does my gratitude towards my own parents and the sacrifices they made to ensure the successes that I enjoy today. In this evolution I also gain increasing confidence in my abilities as a parent, and I wryly think back to pre-Nuha days, which I spent reading parenting books and browsing websites, all in the quest to try to be a good father. Although I stopped that practice a long time ago, Saeeda has not, and occasionally encourages me to read postings by hyperactive mothers who worry about the smallest development needs of their precocious babies. One mother posts on her blog about how important it is that we position babies facing us while they lie in their strollers - studies show they develop faster when they are able to observe a parent’s facial expressions. Or my favorite, this same mother encourages parents to point out landmarks in descriptive, adult language to our babies when we walk around with them: “Look baby, a big, black building. Look there – a red stop sign. A yellow bus moving by.” And so on. Meanwhile my drooly baby is more interested in her pacifier than anything. I imagine showing this "advice" to those of my parent's generation, and imagine how long it would take before they laugh me out of the room.

Nope, Nuha is turning one, and so far I think we’ve done a decent job. We’re watching her grow, and in her own way, she’s making us grow as well. I’m excited about the years ahead and the adventures they promise to bring. More immediately, I'm excited about tonight, when I get to take care of the baby while my wife runs errands. I sense another opportunity to let Nuha "air herself out” ...

How I lost faith in humanity … and my short term memory

2009-05-25T09:50:00.002-06:00

It took me 10 months after the birth of my daughter, but I’ve finally managed to return to a weekly workout regimen, albeit to a limited extent. There’s a great gym at work, which is small but functional, and one which I try to visit twice a week during my lunch break. This gym has free weights, treadmills, machines, showers – the works. So to take advantage of this facility, and free up time in the evenings, I’ve taken to bringing gym clothes, a towel, and miscellaneous toiletries with me in the mornings. Except that I keep forgetting the gym bag that contains these items on the train into work.

Apparently there is a Lost and Found process in place to recover items left behind by passengers, but I have yet to see it work. First, you have to rely on the honesty of fellow passengers and the train conductors to not make off with whatever you’ve left behind. Second, you have to wait a day before misplaced items are collected together and sent back to downtown Chicago for storage in the Lost and Found office. Finally, you have to navigate the world’s most arcane office hours to contact someone at this office to figure out if your article has been located. Below is a picture of the hours that the Lost and Found office is actually open:

Of interest is the fact that the office is not open before 8am and after 5pm, and is not open on weekends or holidays. 90% of the passengers on the train have to be office workers, some of whom are leaving the city to get to far-flung suburbs for work (i.e., yours truly). How we are expected to make it back to the city before the office closes is beyond me, unless I have the gall to walk into my boss’s office and say I need to leave work over an hour early because I need to find a missing gym bag.

Of even greater interest is the set of random times that the office remains closed: 9am- 9:30am, 11am-11:15am, 1pm-2pm, and then 3:15-3:55pm. What the hell are these? Bathroom breaks? Union mandated smoking breaks? Why do you randomly need a 30 minute break, then a 15 minute break, then an hour break, and then, bizarrely, a 40 minute break at the end of the day? WTF?! Every time I’m between meetings at work, or have 5 minutes to myself, I’ll reach for the phone to see if I can call the Lost and Found office … until I realize that the office is not open.

The rare instances where I’ve gotten through to someone, I’ve been told that nothing matching my description has showed up. Why? Who wants my old gym clothes? This is the second time I’ve lost a gym bag – the first time I lost the shoes in which I ran the Chicago marathon. They were old, but nice. The second time I lost the second pair of shoes I bought to replace the first pair. These were not old at all, and were nice. Who looks inside a gym bag and says, “Cool – size 12 ½ Mizuno shoes for medium pronators with a large toe box. Just what I needed!” And both times the gym bag was nice – the second time it happened to be a bag I had received as part of a recognition award at IBM. Why people, why?! Why are you walking away with my stuff and not turning it in? I’d understand if I’d misplaced an iPhone. I’d know better than to expect a return of something like that. But gym bags with sweaty clothes and used shoes? Really?

I’m losing faith in my short term memory, and fast. But I’m losing faith in humanity faster. Give me back my gym clothes!

Soft hands

2009-05-16T22:10:00.001-06:00

I suffer from a frustrating inability to get my hair cut regularly. My work hours and long commute mean that most places are closed by the time I get home on weekdays, and weekends are so busy that I just try to find the closest, cheapest hair salon to where I’m running errands. So it was a pleasant surprise to receive a coupon in the mail for Halo for Men, billed as a “hip and relaxing environment where men could comfortably enjoy salon and spa services.” The salon and spa services weren’t what I cared for - it was the fact that they had just opened a location in the very train station that I use daily, and that this location offered hours that worked for me.

The coupon itself was for a set of services called “the Man”, which included a “Signature Haircut & style, Shampoo & conditioning treatment, Scalp massage, Paraffin hand wax, Hand massage, Hot towel & facial toner, Cleanup shampoo after the man, Free touch-up within two weeks of previous appointment, and Complimentary beverage.” [the crazy capitalization is all theirs]. Although I needed only the haircut, the coupon was $25 for $45 worth of services. Nice.

However, this statement on their website troubled me – the salon was designed to be a “sophisticated yet modest environment where men could go to comfortably enjoy luxurious salon services without worrying about feeling out of place or being gawked at, like at other female-dominated salons and spas." Not sure about you men out there, but the only time I get gawked at when I go get a haircut is when I’ve gone two months without trimming things, and I look like a Chia Pet Head on steroids. And how could you be “manly” in a salon? I had trouble reconciling this – I pictured a place where macho men laughed loudly at lewd jokes and downed beverages in one gulp and watched an Ultimate Fighting Championship match on flat screen TVs, while … getting pedicures?

But I made my appointment anyway and showed up at the place last Friday. I received a friendly greeting and was ushered inside to a room with an industrial design. There was music playing over speakers – music that had a lot of guitar riffs in it, so I figured that made it manly. And there were flat screen TVs on every wall, but instead of playing Ultimate Fighting, they were playing “Goodwill Hunting.” Hmm, I thought. This isn’t too bad.

I was offered a beverage, and chose a simple bottle of water. Appropriately hydrated, I was led over to a small tub at waist level, asked to roll up my sleeves and then dip my hands in hot paraffin. “Umm, what is this for?” I asked meekly. “To moisturize and soften up your hands,” came the answer. Duh.

Gloves were quickly slipped on, and with the paraffin slowly congealing, I was led into my chair. On the TV, Matt Damon was solving crazy math equations while MIT professors looked on in awe. Suddenly, my vision was obscured – a hot towel had appeared out of nowhere and was firmly wrapped around my face. I started to resist, but lost my resolve as the warmth from the scented towel caused my facial muscles to relax. Mmm, this is good, I thought.

Gloves were taken off my hands, and the paraffin peeled away. Are my hands softer? I wondered. I had no time to answer, because a hand massage immediately ensued. Mmm. This is REALLY good.
With the massage done, the towel off my face, and Matt Damon on screen again, the haircut finally commenced.

“How much hair would you like taken off?”

I was confused. The people at Supercuts usually just slapped a guard onto a clipper and buzzed the same amount off from all over my head.
My hairdresser sighed knowingly, and proceeded to go to work. Snips here, there, everywhere. Locks of hair fell from my head in small bunches. Ben Affleck and Matt Damon got into an argument. Then my hairdresser paused.

“Who cuts your hair?” she asked.
I had no answer. Lots of people cut my hair. A different person cut my hair each time. I believed in presenting an equal opportunity head of hair for everyone.

“They’ve got your hair at all different lengths,” she said when I didn’t respond.

Huh, I thought. Interesting.
And so it went. She would ask me a question, or make a statement, and I would have no answer for her, and she would go about fixing things. And fix she did, because by the time we were done, I looked good. That’s right, I looked Matt Damon good. And I felt bad-ass. Jason Bourne bad-ass. Because my hair looked good and my hands were soft and my facial muscles were all relaxed.

I walked out of Halo for Men thinking that I would have to find a way in my budget to make this happen again soon. The train station was crowded, it being Friday, but I walked confidently through, daring anyone to get in my way or threaten me in any way. Because with my new haircut I had gained the ability to pull Jason Bourne moves on my assailants and leave them broken on the floor.

And as they lay there defeated they would think, “Damn that guy kicked my ass. But he had the softest hands…”

Hello? God? Could you please induce Chicago?

2009-04-27T08:24:00.002-06:00

It’s the end of April – May starts this week – and I’m still walking around with my poofy North Face jacket on. I still lean into the 30mph wind gusts and try to ignore the biting 40 degree weather, telling myself that I’ve made it through worse weather in this city. I tell myself that I only need to hang on for another few days, and surely things will warm up then. Except that I’ve been telling myself this for the last month – a month where the rest of the world long ago decided to usher in Spring. While elsewhere flowers bloom, birds sing, babies laugh, and people sing Louis Armstrong’s “What a Wonderful World” to each other – in Chicago I still wipe away my tears of frustration and soldier on.

What makes things worse is Chicago’s schizophrenic insistence on sprinkling balmy warm days between the regular arctic blasts. This continues until one day it will be summer and 90 degrees out. Chicago plays sick mind games with its population, and for the longest time I struggled to find the proper analogy for what the city goes through, until it finally hit me – every year Chicago gets pregnant in September, and tries to give birth to Summer nine months later.

Think about it – the city starts out happy and giddy with possibilities in September. The first trimester is not too bad – sure there is morning sickness here and there as the mercury drops occasionally, but there’s the bigger picture to keep in mind. The second trimester the hormones go out of whack, and things get dicey. You can’t do anything to please the city, and even if you take one wrong step you get hit with freezing -20 weather, with snowstorms that make you wonder about this whole global warming nonsense. You eventually round the corner into the third trimester, which is when you begin praying for the pregnancy to conclude. This is the most frustrating part, especially the last few weeks.

Here is where the false contractions begin. One day it’ll be cold and blustery, and then suddenly it’ll be 65 and perfect. Is this it? Do you rush to pack away your winter clothes and bust out the flip-flops? Haha – no. Just kidding. False contraction – the next day it’s back to 30 degrees and depressing. Then the contractions start coming closer and closer together – two warm days here and there separated by only four or five cold ones. But your patience is being tested, because it is May now, and you really, really want to feel the sun on your face.

Now the contractions are close enough together that Chicago has to be taken to the hospital, where you as the useless significant other wait around, twiddling your thumbs, leafing through old magazines and drinking bad coffee from the cafeteria. And you wait. And wait. And then suddenly it begins. The city is ready to give birth! You rush to its side and hold its hand and ice its brow while it flings obscenities at you that make you blush. “C’mon honey, c’mon, you can do it” you gently encourage.

Suddenly Summer starts to crown, and the city tries to push, and you hold your breath in anticipation, and time slows down. And then it’s there – with a wet plop Summer arrives into the world. Temperatures immediately soar into the 90s, you are dazed and confused, but weirdly happy. You’re a new person now, with new responsibilities. You have to wear lighter clothes now, and purchase things like running shoes and bikes and roller blades. You wonder what life was like before Summer, but can’t quite remember, and anyway you don’t really care anymore. The city has blessed you with warm weather, and that’s all that matters.

Personally, I’d rather we just induce pregnancy or have a C-section every year and get Summer here on time in April – so what if Chicago thinks that’ll result in a premature baby? I don’t care. It saves me from the agonizing depression that I’m currently going through. Unfortunately I know I’m not in control. It’ll be warm when Chicago is ready to let it be warm. Until then, I’ll have to suck it up, and continue to wear my poofy North Face jacket.

Guilty pleasures

2009-04-20T14:48:00.002-06:00

My work productivity has been creeping up during business hours. Whether this is because my nascent coffee habit is turning me into twitchy yet efficient worker bee, or whether I’ve reduced the frequency with which I browse www.cakewrecks.com, I don’t know. But I’m happy with this development, especially since it means that I have less work to do over the weekend, and can actually tackle those pesky projects that have been sitting on my to-do list, collecting the proverbial dust.

This weekend’s project entailed taking my calcifying CD collection and ripping the songs onto my computer's hard-drive so that, you know, I too could act like today’s cool youth and listen to music on something called an “i-Pod” (you should check these devices out, seriously). My ulterior motive, however, was to do away with damning evidence that I have no taste in music – it’s easier for me to secretly store my Michael Bolton collection as mp3s in a folder cryptically titled “Bichael Molton”, than to have my daughter accidentally discover the “Best Of” collection years from now, and go crying to her mother because she doesn’t understand why daddy is this way.

Along the ripping process I discovered that at one time I enjoyed listening to all things Jackson (several Michael CD’s, as well as multiple Janet compilations), that at one time I had an affinity for Celtic music (go ahead, laugh – I’m proud of being the only Pakistani who enjoys jamming to a rollicking Irish bagpipe number), and that I have a fetish for Backstreet Boys songs. There, I said it. It feels good to let that out. I can finally move on now.

And don’t you dare judge me. I know you have secret song crushes too, even though you hate to admit it. Act nonchalant if you want. Flaunt your love for indy music and that obscure band from Turkey that no one else has heard, as evidence that you’re a music cognoscenti. But at the end of the day, I *know* that when you’re cruising down the highway with no one in the car, you’ll roll up the windows and secretly blast “Quit Playing Games With My Heart”. And that you’ll sing along. Loudly. And cry, because you don’t want others to play games with your heart.

Anecdotally I know this to be true. But I obtained evidence this weekend as well. I was ripping songs from a mix collection that a special someone gave to me while I was a freshman in college [special someone shall remain unnamed but this was well before I met my wife, my true special someone (I love you honey!)], when Saeeda brought Nuha into the room and started playing with the baby. It just so happened that I was burning a Backstreet Boys song from this CD at the time, and I couldn’t mute the computer volume fast enough. I don’t know why, but I felt flustered and dirty almost, like I was browsing an adult website and was trying to Alt-Tab my way out of the screen or something. Still, a 3 second clip managed to escape before I could mute the speaker. That’s when Saeeda turned around and casually asked why I was listening to “As Long as You Love Me.” From the Backstreet Boys.

Let me repeat – she identified the song from a three second clip. I’m not the only one people …

Making It

2009-04-14T16:59:00.002-06:00

Yesterday I had to go to one of our team members to give him a heads up on a new project that was coming down the pipe, and which would need a pretty quick turnaround on his part. This team member has been with Abbott for a lot longer than I have, and his grasp of things is impressive. So we started our conversation and he began to ask me specific questions. I started merrily answering away, until he suddenly interrupted me.

"Wait ... hold on Faisal. You ... actually ... sound like you know what you're talking about dude!"

And I paused. Not because I was offended, but because he was right. I DID know what I was talking about. Heck yeah! It only took me eight months in my current rotation to get to this point, but I had made it!

See, I prescribe to the Infinite Monkey Theorem - if you give a monkey sitting at a keyboard enough time, it will eventually type out the complete works of William Shakespeare. And I sometimes think of myself as that monkey - stringing together random jargon endlessly in the hopes that one day it will make sense to someone. And today it did.

Now, if only I can game the system so that this guy writes my performance review, I'll be set.

I'll beat you silly .. when I'm 60

2009-03-19T06:46:00.000-06:00

Last week we concluded play in our Abbott basketball league. My team, playing in the competitive division, came in a respectable 3rd, although I feel that we did not live up to our potential. There was plenty of blame to go around, including some for yours truly - ever since the marathon last October, I've engaged in activity that can very loosely be defined as "exercise" - and even that I've only managed to do once a week. Although the almost daily cleaning out my daughter's diaper pail should count - the little thing is a champion poop generator, and carrying that pail to and from my building's trash chute would leave anyone winded.

What disappointed me most about my play, however, was my inability to keep up with the younger whippersnappers on the court. I'd be guarding someone who would blow by me with ease, and I'd be left blaming my aging knees. Or I'd go up for a jump shot only to have my shot rejected into the bleachers. My coping mechanism focused on the fact that I was more than 10 years older than some of the competition, and that I was actually pretty physically fit for my age. In fact, were I to face my opponents when they were older - say we were both in our 60s - I'd kick their @$$. Wishful thinking, perhaps, but it helped justify why I kept tripping over myself.

Still, I need to figure out an exercise routine, and fast. And cleaning out my daughter's diaper pail does not count.

Stewart vs. Cramer

2009-03-17T13:31:00.003-06:00

I wanted to wait a few days before putting pen to paper on the recently concluded Mad Money/The Daily Show Battle Royale. There are plenty of opinions floating around, and I wanted to add mine to the mix, but only after spending a few days digesting last Thursday’s events.

Basically, I think that the Cramer interview was one of Jon Stewart's best ever. Which is funny because Stewart has had dignitaries, celebrities, and luminaries on his show before, and has handled controversial topics galore. But this time he clearly chose to dispense with the gloves, and to aggressively pursue his guest at all cost.

I don’t know why Cramer chose his approach of almost complete subservience. I was expecting to see some of the vigor he displays on Mad Money or, at the very least, the aggressive recitation of a couple of talking points CNBC had to have provided him with. But in retrospect, it was probably smart on Cramer’s part to avoid from being confrontational. How would he have been able to remain aggressive in the face of video clips of him touting hedge fund strategies that were at best shady, if not borderline illegal? How would he have been able to remain aggressive when trying to defend the idolizing of CEOs by his network?

Throughout the interview, the passion in Stewart’s voice was obvious, and his language and delivery could not have been more potent. I also can’t say enough about the research and writing teams that support Stewart’s interview prep – they have got to be one of the best in the business.

Stewart’s performance was eerily reminiscent of his takedown of bow-tie wearing Tucker Carlson on Crossfire several years ago. Given the result of that confrontation (Crossfire canceled, Tucker Carlson subsequently condemned to bouncing around), and now this Cramer interview, the powers that be can no longer afford to underestimate TDS. Jon Stewart has become the unofficial outlet of frustrated masses that have no special interest group to represent them, no talking head to spin their points, and no lobbyist to pressure Congress. Don’t get me wrong – there is an undoubted leftward lean to the politics of TDS, and there are differences that I have with Stewart. But he invariably presents a reasoned, logical, and impassioned argument of the type that you just don’t see used anymore.

So what will be the likely outcome of this episode? I don’t think CNBC can tout “In Cramer We Trust” as the show’s tagline anymore. Doing so would be crass and disingenuous. Cramer’s ratings are likely to suffer – the spat with Stewart and the subsequent outcome has been covered by multiple media outlets, and has had to have reached his viewership.

Unfortunately, unless the network loses advertisers en masse, I don’t expect to see changes to the channel itself. But I’m positive GE executives were watching to see what would happen during the TDS interview, and are now contemplating making some modifications, however superficial. Is it too much to ask that CNBC reporters actually fulfill their responsibility to the public and do hard-core investigative reporting that ensures we don’t get blindsided with a financial catastrophe next time? Probably. The existing culture is too far ingrained to change overnight. But I do believe that there are good people working at CNBC, and I hope their voices are going to be heard a little more clearly now. The tomfoolery of “Fast Money”, the coddling of CEOs and the bombast of Mad Money has got to tone itself down, if not stop altogether. Because, at the end of the day, what is happening around us, as Stewart so clearly stated, is not a f*#$&^% joke.

The reason the economy is where it is today – me

2009-02-21T15:31:00.002-06:00

Last week I got to be a guinea pig. Abbott’s continuing education people wanted to test the value of a new financial modeling class they were considering rolling out to the company. Before they did so, however, they wanted to offer a pilot course for approved individuals to attend for free – as long as the participants offered feedback at the end. My team was one of the ones approached, and being the junior-most member I was dutifully offered up as sacrifice. When I read the description for this class I was quite skeptical. Pshaw! I thought. I have an MBA from the University of Chicago, and I eat P&L statements for breakfast in my current role. What could I possibly learn from this experience?

But I showed up dutifully at the start of this two-day class anyway. The morning of the first day, I learned that we would be breaking up into teams of three to four individuals, and would be running a company for the remainder of the class. The company would be a manufacturing concern, where we would have to make decisions such as how much raw material to buy, how much to produce, what price to set for our goods, what loans to take, and how to manage our expenses. We would get to observe our company for the course of a “year” – at the end of each “month” we would see what happened in the market the instructors created, and have the opportunity to adjust each of the variables above. The emphasis throughout the course would be on managing the financials of the company by monitoring cash flow, the balance sheet, and the income statement, with the goal of learning what made a company financially sound. Pshaw! I thought (again). I got this.

Except that I didn’t. My team, egged on by yours truly, made a couple of bad decisions, caught a few unlucky breaks, and ended up as a marginal takeover target by the end of the game. We did so poorly that we barely had anything of value left at the end, but I took solace in the fact that we weren’t alone. Inevitably, those teams that had individuals with financial backgrounds performed poorly. Instead, the team that won consisted of one person from Abbott’s foodservices division (the people in charge of stocking Abbott’s employee cafeterias), someone from Abbott’s library, and someone from Abbott’s technology arm (the IT folks).

While I spent the game acting out my investment banker fantasy (“Guys, let’s borrow up to our eyeballs and get all the loans we can. This is called ‘leveraging’ in the financial world. What good is it to own a building when it doesn’t do anything for you? Better to sell it, then rent it back, and use the cash from the sale instead.”), and while a fellow financial wizard at a neighboring table urged his team to price their product absurdly low (“Let’s capture market share and crowd out the competition – those suckers won’t be able to compete at these low prices and will go out of business”), the winning team was employing a slightly different strategy. For them, it didn’t make sense to take out large loans, or sell their buildings and land. Instead they borrowed only what they could comfortably repay. Neither did they horse around with pricing too much – they set a decent price that earned them an honest profit, and they reinvested that profit back into the company.

Around halfway through the game it became clear that my team wouldn’t be able to make its debt payments. On the other side of the room it struck the other financial geniuses that they had priced their products so low that they were selling at a loss so bad that they weren’t even covering their expenses. Meanwhile, the librarian, foodservice manager, and tech lady kept chugging along. The humiliation was complete by the end of the game, when each team got to walk around the room and see how the other teams had played the simulation. “Why would you take a loan that you couldn’t repay?” someone would ask. “Why would you sell all your assets?” I had no answer for either question.

I left that two-day seminar happy that I had learned more about financial statements than I could have imagined. Abstract numbers on a sheet weren’t so abstract anymore, and the interconnectedness of the various statements that measured the health of a business became a little less arcane for me, the snooty MBA graduate. But as I packed my things and left class to go home that last day, a depressing thought came to me. I realized, in a flash of distressing brilliance, that it was because of idiots like me that we found ourselves in the economic mess we see now. Some overly clever bankers got together and thought they could game the system, except that the system bit back hard. But as soon as I had this epiphany, I also understood the way we could make sure that this would never happen again: when the dust settles on this economic scandal, and all guilty financial whiz-kids have been identified, they should be stripped naked one by one, taken out back, and slapped silly by librarians, foodservice managers, and tech ladies.

How to write a consumer complaint

2009-02-05T13:51:00.003-06:00

I've found my inspiration for any future customer complaint that I ever write. The letter below was written by a Virgin airlines passenger at the conclusion of his flight. You have to check the link to see the pictures that he refers to in his beautiful prose. Enjoy!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/4344890/Virgin-the-worlds-best-passenger-complaint-letter.html

Dear Mr Branson

REF: Mumbai to Heathrow 7th December 2008

I love the Virgin brand, I really do which is why I continue to use it despite a series of unfortunate incidents over the last few years. This latest incident takes the biscuit.

Ironically, by the end of the flight I would have gladly paid over a thousand rupees for a single biscuit following the culinary journey of hell I was subjected to at thehands of your corporation.

Look at this Richard. Just look at it: [see image 1, above].

I imagine the same questions are racing through your brilliant mind as were racing through mine on that fateful day. What is this? Why have I been given it? What have I done to deserve this? And, which one is the starter, which one is the desert?

You don’t get to a position like yours Richard with anything less than a generous sprinkling of observational power so I KNOW you will have spotted the tomato next to the two yellow shafts of sponge on the left. Yes, it’s next to the sponge shaft without the green paste. That’s got to be the clue hasn’t it. No sane person would serve a desert with a tomato would they. Well answer me this Richard, what sort of animal would serve a desert with peas in: [see image 2, above].

I know it looks like a baaji but it’s in custard Richard, custard. It must be the pudding. Well you’ll be fascinated to hear that it wasn't custard. It was a sour gel with a clear oil on top. It’s only redeeming feature was that it managed to be so alien to my palette that it took away the taste of the curry emanating from our miscellaneous central cuboid of beige matter. Perhaps the meal on the left might be the desert after all.

Anyway, this is all irrelevant at the moment. I was raised strictly but neatly by my parents and if they knew I had started desert before the main course, a sponge shaft would be the least of my worries. So lets peel back the tin-foil on the main dish and see what’s on offer.

I’ll try and explain how this felt. Imagine being a twelve year old boy Richard. Now imagine it’s Christmas morning and you’re sat their with your final present to open. It’s a big one, and you know what it is. It’s that Goodmans stereo you picked out the catalogue and wrote to Santa about.

Only you open the present and it’s not in there. It’s your hamster Richard. It’s your hamster in the box and it’s not breathing. That’s how I felt when I peeled back the foil and saw this: [see image 3, above].

Now I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking it’s more of that Baaji custard. I admit I thought the same too, but no. It’s mustard Richard. MUSTARD. More mustard than any man could consume in a month. On the left we have a piece of broccoli and some peppers in a brown glue-like oil and on the right the chef had prepared some mashed potato. The potato masher had obviously broken and so it was decided the next best thing would be to pass the potatoes through the digestive tract of a bird.

Once it was regurgitated it was clearly then blended and mixed with a bit of mustard. Everybody likes a bit of mustard Richard.

By now I was actually starting to feel a little hypoglycaemic. I needed a sugar hit. Luckily there was a small cookie provided. It had caught my eye earlier due to it’s baffling presentation: [see image 4, above].

It appears to be in an evidence bag from the scene of a crime. A CRIME AGAINST BLOODY COOKING. Either that or some sort of back-street underground cookie, purchased off a gun-toting maniac high on his own supply of yeast. You certainly wouldn’t want to be caught carrying one of these through customs. Imagine biting into a piece of brass Richard. That would be softer on the teeth than the specimen above.

I was exhausted. All I wanted to do was relax but obviously I had to sit with that mess in front of me for half an hour. I swear the sponge shafts moved at one point.

Once cleared, I decided to relax with a bit of your world-famous onboard entertainment. I switched it on: [see image 5, above].

I apologise for the quality of the photo, it’s just it was incredibly hard to capture Boris Johnson’s face through the flickering white lines running up and down the screen. Perhaps it would be better on another channel: [see image 6, above].

Is that Ray Liotta? A question I found myself asking over and over again throughout the gruelling half-hour I attempted to watch the film like this. After that I switched off. I’d had enough. I was the hungriest I’d been in my adult life and I had a splitting headache from squinting at a crackling screen.

My only option was to simply stare at the seat in front and wait for either food, or sleep. Neither came for an incredibly long time. But when it did it surpassed my wildest expectations: [see image 7, above].

Yes! It’s another crime-scene cookie. Only this time you dunk it in the white stuff.

Richard…. What is that white stuff? It looked like it was going to be yoghurt. It finally dawned on me what it was after staring at it. It was a mixture between the Baaji custard and the Mustard sauce. It reminded me of my first week at university. I had overheard that you could make a drink by mixing vodka and refreshers. I lied to my new friends and told them I’d done it loads of times. When I attempted to make the drink in a big bowl it formed a cheese Richard, a cheese. That cheese looked a lot like your baaji-mustard.

So that was that Richard. I didn’t eat a bloody thing. My only question is: How can you live like this? I can’t imagine what dinner round your house is like, it must be like something out of a nature documentary.

As I said at the start I love your brand, I really do. It’s just a shame such a simple thing could bring it crashing to it’s knees and begging for sustenance.

Yours Sincererly

XXXX

Paul Charles, Virgin’s Director of Corporate Communications, confirmed that Sir Richard Branson had telephoned the author of the letter and had thanked him for his “constructive if tongue-in-cheek” email. Mr Charles said that Virgin was sorry the passenger had not liked the in-flight meals which he said was “award-winning food which is very popular on our Indian routes.”

Survival of the Fittest

2009-01-20T14:48:00.002-06:00

It is cold in Chicago. Absurdly cold. Cold enough to make your eyeballs hurt. Cold enough to make your nose hairs freeze over. This last is particularly annoying anytime you walk outside, because as your nose hairs start to freeze, they also start pulling away from your nose lining, which is excruciatingly painful. Cold like this makes you feel alive … and stupid for continuing to live in this city.

Currently adding to all this discomfort is the change in Abbott shuttle management. There are dozens of employees who take the train every day to work (myself included). Abbott very graciously provides for shuttles that pick us up once we arrive, and which drive us to the office campus. However, due to a transition with the contractor who manages these shuttles, life for the Abbott commuter has become a mess.

At a basic level, the number of seats available on these shuttles has declined because of both fewer and smaller shuttles. Which means that inevitably some people have been getting left behind at the train station in the morning. In the cold. The absurd Chicago cold. To be fair, a backup shuttle is dispatched and picks up the remaining passengers within 20 minutes, but that is still an eternity in this weather.

The change that this has affected in human behavior is classic survival of the fittest. It started out slowly at first – people would walk briskly after getting off the train so that they would be first in line at the shuttles, therefore ensuring themselves a spot. That brisk walk became a healthy jog, and last week I saw a lady break out into an all out sprint (and subsequently slip and fall on the ice).

When people realized that they were not Olympic decathletes and would be unable to win a footrace as they tried to hurdle over parked cars to get to the shuttles, they adapted again. They started sitting in train cabs that stopped at just the right spot, thereby providing them a straight line to the waiting shuttle in the parking lot. They no longer had to pretend to be Usain Bolt and break any world records – by starting at a more optimal point, they would still beat out the sprinters. But eventually all the seats on the ideal train cab started filling up early in the journey, therefore reducing the effectiveness of this strategy – no one wanted to stand for an hour. So there was more adaptation.

Passengers began to sit wherever they wanted to on the train, but started leaving their seats before the Abbott stop to queue up in front of the train doors. At first this meant leaving your seat a few minutes before the stop, but as more people caught on, people began to leave their seats earlier and earlier – from five minutes, to ten minutes, to several stops before our destination. The result? Passengers that had nothing to do with our shuttle issues, and who needed to get off earlier actually started missing their stops - our crowding at the train doors had become so bad that other passengers were unable to fight their way to the doors to leave.

I still find this fascinating – a seemingly insignificant transition in shuttle management at a specific company is having ripple effects that are making life miserable for the entire ridership of our train line. Whatever, if things continue to get worse I know I'll be ok. I have a black belt in karate and know how to incapacitate an opponent, even if that opponent is a benign market research analyst.

Only in LA

2009-01-06T07:58:00.001-06:00

Saeeda, Nuha and I were in LA for the holidays – even though I have no affinity for Hollywood-land, I’d trade Chicago’s arctic chill for LA’s more moderate climate any day. Saeeda’s family lives here, which always gives us a place to escape to when Chicago weather makes you question your sanity in choosing that city as a home. Every time in LA however, I am confronted with something that is unique to this area, and which strengthens my desire to continue living in Chicago (Saeeda will eventually make me move to LA – I just know it).

This time around, the unique experience came during a post-Christmas trip to one of the swankiest malls in the area – the Costa Mesa mall in Orange County (“the OC” of television fame). I’d visited this mall with Saeeda before, but the current state of the economy had me curious. Would we continue to see hustle and bustle at a mall that boasted high-end designer stores for all ages? Would stores and food courts still be crowded? The answer, as it became abundantly clear while spending 30 minutes looking for a parking spot, was yes – there were crowds galore, seemingly thumbing their noses at the idea of a recession.

[As an aside, trying to find a parking spot in an LA mall is a little like going on safari in the South African savannah. The person riding shotgun acts as a tracker, sniffing out signs of people leaving the mall, then making sure that the driver stays locked on this prey as it tries to locate its own vehicle. The driver must prowl slowly, making sure not to spook the prey by revving the engine too much, but always matching the prey’s speed. It is also the driver’s responsibility to conduct outflanking maneuvers to effectively block other circling predators from staking a claim on the hunted. The thrill of finally pulling into a spot cannot be much different than sinking one’s fangs into fresh kill]

As Saeeda and I finally walked towards the mall entrance, I was struck by a beautiful site. In front of us was a serene waterfall in a large plaza flanked by dark walls of granite. The cascading water collected gently into an infinity pool that lay bounded by simple benches shaded by planted trees. The collecting water then made its journey to a single water channel that dipped and turned its way out of sight, leaving only its gentle murmuring behind. The sense of peace was palpable, as was made obvious by the number of people sitting around the reflecting pool, silently contemplating life’s meaning.

“What’s this memorial for Saeeda?” I asked. Such a monument made perfect sense for a community poignantly trying to remember fallen heroes. I could not however, think of the sad tragedy that had to have occurred in Costa Mesa that would require such a monument.

“It’s not a memorial,” replied Saeeda as we walked into the mall. “It’s for shoppers when they get tired.”

Only in LA.

The Stalwart Father

2008-12-15T17:18:00.002-06:00

Nuha’s doctor’s appointments are always a source of excitement. As anxious first-time parents we always want to know how much weight our child has gained, and whether she is over or underweight for her age group. Of particular interest to me is how much taller she has gotten, and what percentile she fits into as compared to her peer group. If she is to have a successful career as a college basketball player at a top school (I’m thinking Lady Vols at Tennessee, or the Tar Heels at UNC, although nothing would be more satisfying than to see her set records at my alma mater, UVA), she’s going to need some height.

But the most eventful part of the doctor’s appointment is always the point when she has to be administered her shots. This week, she was supposed to get multiple shots, for everything from the flu to the diptheria, tetanus, and pertussis vaccines. Saeeda and I spent time prepping her – playing with her to soothe her nerves, giving her some milk to settle her, and generally holding her to encourage her to relax. When the nurse showed up with the ridiculously long needles all ready, I did what any stalwart, strong-willed father would do – I handed the baby to Saeeda and hid in a corner.

Luckily for me, the nurse was too far along her preparation process to wait for Saeeda and I to fight out which one of us would hold Nuha down while looking into her large, pleading eyes as the shots were administered. Saeeda was closer, and I was hiding behind one of the office cabinets, so it would have to be Saeeda.

The first shot into Nuha’s thigh wasn’t fun. That’s when Nuha went from “la la la, the world is a great place right now, I wonder when I’m up for my next feeding” to “WHOA, mother$%^&*# what the hell was THAT?!” The nurse didn’t waste any time, discarding the spent needle and picking up the next shot in one swift move. This next one went into Nuha’s other thigh. That’s when Nuha realized things were seriously wrong with her world, and that her mom was not doing anything about. Cue the trembling lower lip, rapid expansion of her eyes, and the flow of dishearteningly large tears.

Saeeda’s face crumbled as our daughter pleaded with her mother to make the pain stop. And just when we hoped things would get better, the nurse picked up the third needle and administered it back into the first leg. That’s when Nuha's cries turned to the whimpers of a wounded animal, and I sensed Saeeda was going to lose it. Time for action!

As the nurse left the room, I moved in from behind the cabinet and scooped Nuha into my arms. “It’s ok babe, daddy will take care of you,” I whispered. Nuha looked at me and I could clearlyt read the accusation in her eyes – “You're supposed to take care of me! Why did you let me suffer so much pain?” I had no answer for her, so I simply turned Nuha to face her mother. “I’m sorry, sweetie,” I said. “Mommy is bad, very bad. Daddy will take care of you though.”

I got a cold, murderous look from Saeeda, but I didn’t care. I was just being the stalwart father, always there for my baby daughter.

Supervising Kids

2008-12-10T14:10:00.003-06:00

Nuha is getting to the age where objects around her are no longer to be simply observed, but to be touched, tasted, and thrown around. This makes it entertaining to watch her explore everyday items, such as our TV remotes, because she treats them as if they were alien technology meant to perform unimaginable tasks. For example, she’ll pick up the remote gingerly with both hands, look at it wide-eyed, and start turning it in different directions. After several minutes of this examination, and when she realizes that simple observation will not be enough to understand the remote's purpose, she does the only thing left – stick it as far into her mouth as possible. A cute activity quickly turns not-so-cute when you have to wipe off kid-slobber from sticky buttons every time you go to change channels.

Her other favorite activity is playing with paper napkins, because of their texture and the sound they make when crinkled. I put this fascination to great use this past weekend, when Saeeda left me and Nuha alone to run some errands. Now that I was in charge of supervision, I faced a dilemma. I badly wanted to read the newspaper (something I hadn’t done in a really long time), but also had to watch the baby. So I solved both problems in one shot. I read the paper, and gave the back page of it to Nuha to play with, correctly assuming that she would treat it like one huge paper napkin.

It was great. I got to read the Financial Times while Nuha went to town on the paper, crunching it, ripping it, throwing it, and picking it back up again to repeat the cycle. A half hour flew by like it was nothing. I had just finished reading the last page when I looked down at my daughter, and realized the folly of what I had done. You see, the Financial Times is printed on orange paper, and its ink isn’t exactly permanent (you’d think that a paper like that would be of a little higher quality, no?). At my feet sat my daughter, with her hands and mouth turned black from the ink, and with little strips of newspaper hanging from her lips.

My first thought wasn’t, “I wonder if this ink is toxic” or “I wonder if she swallowed any paper,” but “Oh $#%!, Saeeda is going to kill me.” Now in all fairness, the next two thoughts were centered around the toxicity of the ink and the ingestion of paper. But initially all I knew was that Saeeda was coming home any minute, and my daughter looked like a crazy clown.

I sprung into action. All shreds of newspaper were immediately removed from within reach of my daughter and discarded. The baby was quickly spirited to the bathroom for a complete scrub down. While she squealed murder I attempted to wash her hands and face, and to make sure that there was nothing inside her mouth. In my enthusiasm, I managed to completely drench her clothes. So then it was off to the changing table to change her into a new outfit, and then finally back to her playmat in the living room. Knowing that she had just changed out of wet clothes I cranked up the heat in the room, because the last thing I needed was for her to catch a cold.

It was only five minutes later that Saeeda returned. She walked into the living room and paused, surveying everything. Ohmygod she knows, I thought to myself. I don’t know how but she knows!

“It’s really warm in here,” she said.

I struck a casual pose as I tried to wipe some dried slobber from the TV remote. “Oh yeah?” I asked nonchalantly. “Honey, I think it’s just you – you just came in from the outside.”

She waited, hesitating, processing what I was saying. Something didn’t feel right to her. She looked at Nuha, who by now was busy playing with her stuffed bunny rabbit. She looked at me. I felt a bead of sweat start to form. Could she tell that Nuha was in a new change of clothes? Could she spot that last smudge of ink on her pinky that I had been unable to remove? Was I in trouble?

“Hmm,” she said. “I guess so,” and headed to our bedroom to sort through her shopping.

I sighed in relief, as my daughter munched on her bunny, oblivious to what had just happened. Crisis averted.

Lady in Black

2008-11-19T23:43:00.004-06:00

We all have a strange coworker. I know I’ve had my share. There was that guy in my first job who used a backscratcher at work (basically a two foot long pole with a hand attached to the end, used to reach hard to access places on your back). But rather than use it occasionally, this dude would permanently be scratching his back, and he would therefore just leave the backscratcher inside his shirt, sticking out his neck while he worked. Then there was the guy on a project in New York who flossed his teeth obsessively, but was also ridiculously absentminded, so he’d walk around the office with pieces of floss string still hanging from his mouth. You think I’m being absurd, but I swear I’m telling the truth.

And now there’s the Lady in Black. I take the train in to work every day, and that’s where I see her. Dressed all in black (or, at best, varying shades of gray), head to toe. I’ve been taking the train to Abbott since August, and not one day have I seen her wear something of color. It’s all high-end clothing too – a fashionable jacket, a smart dress, shiny shoes, and a designer handbag. But everything is always in gray/black. She has straight, jet black hair, and wears large sunglasses every day. We live in Chicago, where it seems that we're currently getting only 3 hours of daylight, but still she wears these shades. Even her “accidental accessories” are all black. These are the random items in her possession that she should have no chromatic control over. Items such as shopping bags or newspapers or snacks – but these too are always black. She sucks color from everything around her.

The kicker is that I’ve never seen her smile either. As if looking like a female agent from the Matrix weren't enough, she's stern-faced to boot. Once the train deposits us near Abbott, we board company shuttles that take us to the corporate campus. Countless times I’ve held doors open for her, and countless times I’ve seen others do the same. But she won’t smile. It’s gotten to the point where I just want to sidle up to her and tell her a really good, funny story. Everyone laughs at my funny stories. But will she? I don’t know that, and it’s killing me. I mean, wouldn’t she be the greatest test of my ability to amuse others? But what if I failed? What if I told her my funniest story, and she just stared at me, unsmiling, my face reflecting back at me off her sunglasses?

I can’t do it. But I need to make her smile. I have to.

My French nephew

2008-10-28T14:00:00.005-06:00

Last week was chaotic in the Khan household. Not only did my small two-bedroom Chicago apartment play host to my parents (visiting from Karachi), but it also tried to valiantly accommodate my sister, her husband, and 18 month old son (all visiting from London). The last time we had all been together was almost three years ago at my sister's wedding, and at the time there were no children in the mix. With new additions to the family for both my sister and I, it was wonderful (and crazy busy) to have everyone in one place last week.

My favorite moments, by far, revolved around interaction with my nephew. First of all, the litte dude is HUGE. Easily in the 99th percentile for his age group, his mother is forced to buy clothing meant for 3 year olds. Second, he is a typical little boy - virtually indestructable. And finally, he's endearingly weird.

While most children are happy giving parents fits about what they will and will not eat, my nephew will voraciously devour anything in sight (which may, now that I think about it, explain his size). While most children start getting sleepier as evening turns into night, my nephew acts as if he's just chugged a 16 oz. can of Red Bull. This is obviously quite the problem for us in my apartment, because there aren't very many clear pathways for a kid to zoom around in. We eventually resolved this by moving as much furniture as we could against the apartment walls, so that by 10:00pm, when my nephew first started to crave the need for speed, he was able to run full tilt from end to end in our apartment without injuring himself (given his size, this was probably a good thing for our furniture too, as I'm not sure what would have borne the brunt of the punishment). When tired from all the running, and in an attempt to catch his breath, my nephew would ocassionally go sit inside the refrigerator to cool off. Once recovered, the breakneck sprinting would resume, until finally about 11pm he would start to run out of gas, and would sputter to an abrupt stop.

My favorite memory of him from this trip, however, will be listening to him try to communicate with us. As would be expected of an 18 month old, he has a limited vocabulary. What would move me to fits of laughter would be his enunciation of this vocabulary, specifically because he would insist on pronouncing his words using a French accent. This imparted a bizarrely haughty demeanor to all his attempts at communicating with us.

"Shoes" became "shuss," "food" became "fewt," and my favorite, "potty" became "pottay." Actually, that last was pronounced as two words "po" and then "tay." Which is a great way to tell someone that you need to use the facilities. "Excusez-moi Monsieur? Ou est le po-ttay?" Gives the message such a sophisticated touch. Especially when we'd be getting ready to leave to see Chicago for the day, and he would cycle through all of his words with us. Even now, several days after my last interaction with him, I find myself pretending that he is speaking to me before I leave home for the day.

"Excuse me," he would say to me. "Are you sure you are ready to leave? Did you have your fewt? We will not be eating until lunchtime. Do you have your shuss on? Because it's going to be terribly inconvenient to walk around barefoot. Oh, and please make sure to void your bladder and bowel by using the po-ttay before we leave - there will be no clean facilities available for quite some time."

Ah, to live in Europe. No wonder kids grow up multi-lingual there.

26.2!

2008-10-13T22:43:00.008-06:00

On Sunday I ran the Chicago Marathon. I've detailed some of my running adventures before here , but by some miracle I was able to actually complete the training program and show up to toe the line with runners from all over the world. The start corral was crowded, and I was surrounded by athletes who were barely able to contain their nervous energy. Among them were people I knew - friends I had made during my many months of training runs. There was Aaron, the University of Chicago researcher with his trusty water bottle strapped to his hand; Seth, with the amazing midwestern ability to shrug off any amount of discomfort; and of course, Melissa, a constant source of energy and conversation for the group.

These were just three of the friends that I had made over ten months of running endless miles on the Lakefront Trail in Chicago. All of us - all 33,000 of us - were there for different reasons. Some wanted to set personal records, some wanted to run for a cause, and others wanted to run for the memory of a loved one. My reason for being there was admittedly selfish - a desire to "check the box" on that great list of Life's ToDo's, and to prove to myself that I could conquer my distaste for running.

The marathon did not disappoint. I was amazed by the sheer number of physically fit people around me - so many that it took over 15 minutes for me to cross the start line once the gun went off. All I saw ahead was a sea of bobbing heads and wondered who all these people were that were willing to endure such a gruelingly long distance. I don't know if I figured out the answer to that question in the five and a half hours it took me to complete the course. However, along the way I did manage to amass a set of memories that I will treasure for a long, long time:

- Hearing the national anthem play while thousands of people stood in hushed silence. There was something about the melodious strains, the early morning light, and the sheer silence of the crowd around me that made it a very special moment.

- Crossing the start line, and telling myself, "this is it - I'm not giving up until I'm done, come hell or high water." Crossing that line was my way of looking my age in the eye and saying "bring it on."

- Running into my friend Mansi the first ten minutes into the race. She was there snapping pictures, and I couldn't believe that we found each other between all those runnners.

- Experiencing Chicago's beautiful neighborhoods. As with any big city, one spends time confined to well worn locales. Running the Chicago marathon helped me experience this city's streets and avenues in a wonderfully intimate manner. I know that I'll quickly go back to walking the city briskly, head down, and looking up only to check street names, but for the duration of the run I was able to admire the texture and grit of Chicago like never before.

- Running with my training buddies. We lost Seth around mile 6, but Melissa and I managed to run together for 21 miles. I could never have run the race were it not for the constant partnership of someone running beside me. And God bless Melissa for her own non-marathon friends, who were waiting on the sidelines every 10 miles or so. We somehow managed to find them every time, and we would all run together as a big group until they would bow out and a new group of Melissa's friends would join us. The constant supply of fresh legs and energy kept our spirits up, especially when the temperature started rising and our legs started to weigh a hundred pounds each. One of these runners proved to be my angel, and ran the last quarter of the marathon with me, egging me on the whole way. And just as I crossed the finish line, he melted away anonymously.

- The hilarious signs. From the witty ("Marathon, a 10k with a 20 mile warmup" and "2.62? WTF?!") to the political ("Amy, you're a better running mate than Palin.") My favorite by far was one about two thirds of the way through - "Sure it hurts now, but keep pushing through. It'll feel a lot better in the end (that's what she said)."

- The adoring crowds. Bless their souls, every one of them. Each neighborhood had its own flavor of spectators cheering us on. In Lincoln park there were teens with their bands on the street, playing "Eye of the Tiger", in Boystown there were drag queens and men in cheerleader costume ready to make us laugh, in the West Loop there were homeowners with garden hoses to cool us down, in Chinatown there were dragon dancers distracting us, and near Bronzeville there were people with candy, snacks and treats for the starving runners. But most memorable of all were the cheering crowds for the last few miles of the race. It was as if each one of them had a stake in my completing the race.

By the time temperatures hit 84 degrees on mile 24, I hit the proverbial wall. There was no energy left in the tank and lead was coursing through my veins. I was tired, hungry, and just about ready to stagger to the sidelines when a lady saw me slowing down. She immediately started yelling at me. "Don't you dare quit now! Don't you dare!" she yelled. "I can see the determination in your eyes - dig deep and find that energy. You WILL finish this race, and you WILL finish it strong. Don't you dare quit!" I don't get emotional much, but I started sobbing like a baby - it could have been my depleted physical and emotional state, but I didn't care. She was saying things that I need to hear, and from that point on, I resolved to lumber on.

- Finishing the race. Arms raised, looking like a fool, relishing every second of the experience. Yes it took me 45 minutes longer than I had expected, but I didn't feel so bad. Experienced marathoners that were pace leaders had succumbed along the way because of the sweltering heat, so I didn't care that my pace had slowed down. Yes I hadn't set any records, but I had proven to myself that I could run this distance. And yes, in the grand scheme of things this will matter little, but knowing that I had the willpower to set a goal and see it to the end meant the world. My wife and daughter were there to greet me, and for the second time that day I broke down. I hugged Saeeda tight and just wouldn't let go. I'm sure she thought it wonderful that this immensely sweaty and stinky lunatic was hanging on to her, but I couldn't stop squeezing her. It took a couple of almost incrompensible "thank you for letting me do this" sobs, and a few kisses before I was ready to peel off. And my baby was a little annoyed at being woken from her nap, but I didn't care. Her father, a world-class athlete, was holding her in his arms, and that's what mattered.

So much in life is centered around making things easy, or finding shortcuts. Running a marathon is a way of returning to the basics. It provides no privileges to the wealthy, and no breaks for the accomplished. All, wealthy and poor, are treated alike because no amount of kicking and screaming is going to lessen the distance from start to finish. No matter your station in life, all you need is a good pair of shoes, a trusty friend, and a healthy dose of ignorance for what convention says is possible. Beyond that, it's just a walk in the park.

We're "those" parents now

2008-10-05T11:51:00.001-06:00

Having a baby keeps one busy. No matter how hard I plead with Nuha every evening that I need to update my blog, she simply wails until I relent and agree to change yet another poopy diaper. Not only does she require 100% of our time, she demands that we service her with a smile. One day I'll make her pay me back. Maybe by embarrassing her in front of all her high school friends by showing to pick her up in a spandex Spiderman costume. That'll show her.

Saeeda and I spent the last week on vacation in LA. Saeeda had left two weeks ago, with her mom helping with the baby on the flight over. I joined the family later, spent a week in LA, and then we all returned to Chicago together. So the return trip was the first time I had ever traveled with an infant. It also marked the first time I became "that parent" with the baby who slows everything down.

See, in my past life I was a high-powered tech consultant, flying from city to city on a weekly basis. I was cool. I was hip. I knew which belt buckle to wear so that it wouldn't set off the detectors. I knew exactly which order to place my belongings for screening at the security checkpoint. Laptop in a bin by itself, followed by laptop bag, followed by my carry-on luggage, and end with shoes and jacket in another bin. This way I retrieved my most valuable belonging first, placed it back in the laptop bag as that came through, then put on my shoes and jacket before heading on my way. Less than 3 minutes start to finish.

Here's how things play out now. Saeeda and I struggle to squeeze the baby stroller through the narrow Disney-land lanes at the security checkpoint. We get to the screening area, then need to spend ten minutes disassembling the Transformer-like contraption that is the stroller (see my post here on how long it took me to assemble the damn thing). We then struggle with the diaper bag, which we don't realize has bottles of water in it for Nuha's milk. The water bottles need to be tossed, which takes some more fumbling. Starting to get embarrassed at how long this is taking, I simply start flinging stuff onto the belt for screening. I almost toss the baby into the x-ray machine before my wife stops my arm in mid-swing. My daughter looks at me accusingly ("hey, free x-rays!" I think to myself). I walk through the detector, only for alarms to go off because I haven't emptied my pockets. Embarrassed and defeated at having made such a rookie mistake, I step back and run into the passenger behind me so that I can sheepishly empty my pockets into a tray.

With our security screening adventures over, Saeeda and I make it to our gate and start boarding the plane. Now we have to navigate the narrow plane aisle in search of our seats while carrying Nuha in a baby seat. Nuha, suddenly claustrophobic, decides its time she is taken out of the car seat and lets out a piercing cry. I look at her and plead with her to hang on, which does no good. Now the tears and the flailing start, while I try mightily to hold on to the car seat. I silently curse the passengers ahead of us blocking the aisle as they take their own sweet time trying to figure out why a gargantuan suitcase won't fit into the tiny overhead bin. When I see them try to shove the luggage in for the fourth time, I feel like yelling at them, but am saved by the flight attendant who gently admonishes them and tells them that they need to gate check their bag. In-flight Twister ensues as those passengers try to get by me while I hold a car seat with a squirming, squealing infant. As I maneuver the car seat, I clock a seated gentleman squarely on the head - afterwards I can't tell whether he is unconscious or simply resting his face on his copy of of the Wall St. Journal. I glance at my ticket, praying to God that our seat is coming up. No such luck - we're the absolute last aisle on the plane, just before the bathroom (I bet the airline does that on purpose - stick parents with stinky babies by the stinky bathroom and no one will notice).

Now attracting evil glares from every passenger, my wife and I (who have become "those parents" with the screaming baby) apologize our way through to the back of the plane and to our seats. We slowly shed all our gear - the diaper bag, our carry ons, my wife's purse, food for the flight, reading material for the flight, jackets, base for the car seat and then finally the car seat with Nuha still ensconced within. The moment we set her down, she stops crying, and looks up and gives us an angelic smile.

I'm so wearing that spandex Spidey costume in front of her friends.

The defining crisis of our times

2008-09-28T10:48:00.004-06:00

If you haven’t been living under a rock, then you’ve heard of the financial world’s collapse over the last two weeks (if you have been living under a rock, then congratulations - as Jon Stewart said, yours is the only real estate that has appreciated in value). Starting with Bear Stearns, the list of firms where the destruction is absolute is mind-boggling. Merrill Lynch, AIG, Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae, Goldman, Washington Mutual. And who knows which firm is next? In essence, you have what I believe is the defining crisis of our times, and not the War on Terror, nor the Rise of China.

The reason is simple – the Subprime Crisis has affected every level of the economy, and will impact the lives of individuals in every wealth bracket. That can’t be said of the War on Terror, an event that is highly relevant for military families and the war industry, but almost irrelevant for the majority of Americans, who still struggle to locate Iraq and Afghanistan on a map, and wonder what we are doing so many, many miles away from home.

The Rise of China had had a more pervasive effect on the American people, no doubt. It is hard to go one day without purchasing something that is not either made in China, or relies on components that were made in China. But outside of the economy, what difference is China making? Are we experiencing a cultural impact? An intellectual impact? The Olympics were widely hailed as China’s coming out party – despite China’s decade-long stranglehold on cheap manufacturing, it took an event as grand as the Summer Olympics for China to make a public impression on the outside world. “Hey!” China was saying. “Look at us – we matter!” This despite its long pace of breakneck growth, and increasing influence in foreign affairs.

No, it is the Subprime Crisis that has fundamentally changed, or is about to fundamentally change the way we live our lives. Homes are no longer safe economic shelters, loans for everyday purchases are disappearing or becoming harder to obtain, jobs are vanishing en masse as firms collapse, and most importantly, the global ripple effects form this crisis continue to magnify the pain. And I don’t even want to begin talking about how our retirement wealth is evaporating before our eyes, or how the phrase “consumer confidence” has descended into irrelevance.

The Great Depression, the Cold War, and now the Subprime Meltdown. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to this generation’s defining crisis.

Faisal's Miracle Hair Gro - only $29.99 if you call now!

2008-09-15T22:21:00.003-06:00

Many of you have kindly informed me over the years that I am losing my hair. I don't know if you derive pleasure from pointing out the ever-increasing patch of empty real-estate atop my head, or if you are just concerned that I may actually enjoy sporting the Captain Picard look. Nevertheless, I have decided to do something about it. This weekend I spent countless hours in my lab, pulling together a chemical concoction destined to blow Rogaine clear out of the water. Like any good scientist, I needed a human subject for testing purposes. My 3 month old daughter was sitting at arm's length, and since I didn't need to worry about her signing any consent forms, I went to town on her scalp. You'll agree from the results below that I have a winner. Please feel free to submit your order requests in the comments section. Satisfaction guaranteed.

The unsuspecting victim, before Miracle Hair Gro:

The satisfied customer, after Miracle Hair Gro:

How to screw up an important presentation

2008-08-24T00:12:00.006-06:00

My friend Kunal and I recently gave an important presentation to a group of senior leaders at Abbott. This presentation marked the culmination of several weeks worth of furious work, and was designed to get buy-in from upper-management for an initiative our teams had been working on. There were several reasons that this presentation was critical:

The project promised to bring attractive revenue to Abbott, and as such was a topic of interest to upper-management - one that had to be presented in a precise, methodical, and detailed manner.
The collaboration between our two teams (mine and Kunal's) had yielded great results, and we wanted to highlight the potential to work on future projects in the same manner.
This was an opportunity for Kunal and I to shine, impressing our seniors with the thoroughness of our work, and thereby enhancing our visibility within the circles we moved in.

So this is how the presentation unfolded:

On the elevator ride down to the meeting room Kunal turned to me and wondered if there was going to be a projector in the room. I realized I had not bothered to check.
Kunal and I arrived late to the presentation. All senior leaders were already present and seated around the table, waiting for us. Our tardiness was a result of getting pulled-in at the last minute to make changes to our presentation slides. Changes that we should have reviewed with our immediate managers hours (if not days) before the meeting.
There was no projector in the room. We did not have printouts for our slides.
Upon seeing the assembled management team, I decided to busy myself with introductions, as Kunal agreed to go hunt for a projector. Before the door closed behind him, I saw him run frantically in a circle outside the meeting room, before sprinting towards the elevator. Where he was going, I had no idea, but I now had to stall until he returned.
I decided to introduce myself to everyone in the room, but this didn't take long. Naturally, I then decided to introduce everyone to everyone else, not thinking how many of these individuals already knew each other.
With introductions complete, I started to wonder if I should break out into an interpretive dance routine when I was mercifully saved - one of the managers asked if anyone else had heard about Abbott's"greening initiative and the drive to cut down on printer paper waste."
For the next ten minutes I became the most inquisitive student of the environmental impact of Abbott's printing output. I passionately wanted to understand why such an initiative had not been implemented earlier. I asked questions both simple and complex. I took notes. I brought up philosophical and political objections. I think I started losing people when I made the topic a metaphor for the search for extraterrestrial life.
We were now fifteen minutes past the meeting start time, when God took mercy on my soul, and in ran Kunal, sweaty, out of breath, and with shirt untucked. Who he had killed to obtain the projector, I did not know, and did not care. My life depended on getting the presentation going.
The power cord for the projector now had to be snaked under the table, between the legs of the assembled party, and into the outlet that lay embedded in the floor, positioned conveniently under the exact center of the table. I think I tackled aside the Alliance Management Director for Oncology in my eagerness to get that cord plugged in.
As I wove my way, on hands and knees, between the legs of people that could fire me without skipping a beat, I had a sickening realization. The power cord was not long enough to make it to the outlet
I re-emerged from beneath the table, dust bunnies hanging from my face, only to see Kunal's hopeful face turn despondent as I shook my head.
Kunal and I then scrambled to reposition the projector precariously on the side of the table closest to a wall outlet. This meant pushing aside the Director of International Business Development and stretching the power cord taut so that it just made it to the wall. With the projector supported on the table in a Rube Goldberg-esque manner, and with its power cord stretched at waist-high level to the wall outlet, we had succeeded in effectively blocking all exit from the room.
All attention now moved to powering on the projector. In our hurry, we pressed the On/Off button multiple times, so that the projector kept powering on and powering down. Kunal and I glared at each other as our hands performed kung-fu techniques on the projector in a vain attempt to get it turned on. Being the more gracious person, I decided to cede and sat down - no sooner had I done so than Kunal succeeded in turning on the infernal device.
We had never hooked up our laptops to the version of projector in front of us, so another five minutes ticked off the clock as we attempted to bring the slides up on the screen in the room. A picture would appear on the projection screen for a fleeting second, vanish, then reappear, all as Kunal pressed the correct key combination, followed immediately by the wrong key combination in an attempt to get things started.
Just as I began to mentally calculate how many months of savings I had stashed away, and what non-essential expenses my wife and I could cut away to stretch until I found a new job, Kunal's face lit up. The presentation was on the screen, and we were ready to roll.

Trying our best to ignore all that had happened up to that point, Kunal and I launched into a scripted delivery that ... was irrelevant. We realized that we had changed just enough information in the half hour before the presentation that each slide kept throwing us off our intended message.

I honestly don't know how we made it through that hour. However, despite our miserable start we must have said something right, because as we sat slumped in our chairs, exhausted and relieved that we had finished, our managers congratulated us on a job well done. It was all I could do not to break out into tears right there and then. As I wiped at the welling moisture in my eyes I silently thanked God for continuing to provide a few more weeks worth of paychecks. Thank you God. Thank you.

Awkward medical issues

2008-08-23T23:46:00.003-06:00

*gasp*

Ah, fresh air.

Man, what a set of two weeks it's been. Work has been crazy - Abbott is finally getting a return on what they pay me. I say "finally" because my sales rotation didn't really count as work. Sure, I was away from home 9-5, but I never really put my MBA-honed skills to work. Business development (my current rotation that started three weeks ago), is completely different. 10-12 hour days, the constant burden of meetings and email, spreadsheet analyses, analyst reports, powerpoint hell - the whole nine yards.

On my current team, I'm the least accomplished (as well as the most recent) addition. I'm the rookie that knows diddly squat, and the Directors around me are fully aware of this fact. Their way of remedying my lack of knowledge is to hand me a project and let me sink or swim. These past two weeks I felt like I'd been haplessly treading water, barely breaking the surface enough to grab a lung-full of air before going back under. But I made it. With some much needed support from fellow newbies, I finally turned in a deliverable that did a half-way decent job of explaining why Abbott should pursue a certain business opportunity in the prostrate market. Reflecting back, I find certain things a little awkward. Like the fact that I now consider "prostrate" to be a market.

Breakfast foods is a market. Athletic shoes is a market. A man's prostrate gland? When did that become a market? But in business, as I've come to realize, everything can be packaged in a way that creates a market around it. The market for casual underwear. The market for cool whip. Perhaps even the market for toilet flush-handles. However, what makes things especially awkward in the healthcare industry is that some medical conditions can be difficult to discuss without giggling (or sometimes wincing), in front of your boss. I came close to doing this several times recently, as it is hard to discuss a man's urination problems, or the invasive surgical procedures designed to correct these conditions, without wanting to cross your legs in empathetic pain. Ouch.

But this project wasn't as bad as some of the work I did while I was at Pfizer. I distinctly remember sitting down regularly with the Viagra marketing group to see how my consulting team could assist them with their information needs. Inevitably talk would move to how effective certain ED meds were in giving men the sexual satisfaction they needed, and what side effects turned these men off, and how to measure the happiness level of spouses. The problem was that the entire Viagra marketing team consisted of women. Seven women and Faisal would sit around a conference table, earnestly discussing the sexual advantage of taking a pill that lasted 36 hours vs 3 hours, or how the quality of the erection was paramount, or how useful it was that a specific pill could also boost urine flow.

Awkward. Really awkward.

The birthing pain equivalent - trying to negotiate a car deal

2008-08-02T18:46:00.004-06:00

Saeeda went through a lot during the birthing process. Any wife will attest to the pain of pushing out a baby, and when I ask mine, she asks me to imagine squeezing a tennis ball out of my nostril. The painful analogy is apt - watching her struggle in the hospital made it clear that there was nothing as physically demanding and painful that I could ever do that would compare to her experience. But Saeeda, it turned out, had different ideas.

Soon after Nuha arrived, I was given a seemingly straightforward assignment: find us a new car. At the time I thought that this was a reasonable request - we haven't had a car in more than three years, and with Nuha's doctor's appointments and my job in the suburbs, we're going to need one. However, I didn't completely understand Saeeda's true intentions. She simply wanted to punish me for putting her through the labor process.

You see, car buying remains a process as pleasant as having a root canal. The players involved have not evolved much over the years, despite the fact that the internet has helped educate the average consumer to the point that there is little we cannot find out. Within seconds, we can learn the true price of a car, read reviews on experiences past customers have had with dealerships, or study common pitfalls to avoid.

But car salesmen don't seem to understand this. From the moment you enter a dealership you are marked, and are worked over by the sales person until you either give in and buy the car, or decide you've had enough and want to leave. Rarely are you ever able to make it in and out on your terms, which are usually to test drive the car and get a price quote. Instead you have to dance the dance.

I'm meticulous about my research, and throughout this car buying process I've tried to have the maximum amount of information at my fingertips. But yet I've still had to endure the sales person asking me what monthly payment I'm looking for (never negotiate the monthly payment), how much I'd like to put down (minimize the downpayment, especially when leasing), or if I was ready to buy today (absolutely not). I've still had to cool my heels while the salesperson handed me off to their manager, who always jovially asked me how he could help me, or what he needed to do to earn my business.

Any time I asked an intelligent question, I got responses along the lines of, "well, it's a complicated calculation, and the city tax only makes matters worse, but I can bump up the term of the deal and drive payments down ... but tell me, you like the car, right? It's a great car, isn't it?"

*sigh*

So often it's taken all my self-control not to be rude and tell them that guys, I've been in sales for the last year. I know all about soft-closes and getting buy-in. I studied this stuff in business school. I can tell when you're trying to get me to commit. I understand numbers - moving the term of the deal out will lower my monthly payments, but I'm just making lower payments for longer, which in the end adds up to a larger amount. Please, just tell me what price you're willing to sell the car for so that I can go to the next dealer and shop around.

After about four dealers, I decided I'd had enough, and I started making phone calls instead. This I'd highly recommend. Call up a dealership, ask for their Internet sales manager. Tell them exactly what you are looking for, and that you are going to buy within a week if you can get the right price. If you get the "come into the dealership, we'll talk then" song and dance, tell them you'll do so if you get the right price, and that you won't come in until you've shopped around. Find out the MSRP of the car they come back at you with, as well as their sale price. Don't bother with financing questions if you are looking to buy, or leasing questions if you are looking to lease. All you care about are those two numbers.

The MSRP is the number you will use when you call another dealer about the same car. You want them to quote you a car that has the same MSRP as that of the first dealer. That's the only way you'll be able to compare apples to apples - that way you know both dealers are quoting you prices for the same type of car with the same features. However, it's the sale price that will clue you into how good a deal you're getting. After three or so quotes, it's up to you - how much you enjoy bargaining and negotiating, and playing dealers against each other? Do you love it? Then keep shopping, otherwise go with the lowest sales price.

My entire paternity leave was consumed by this process. I swear I was at a breaking point towards the end. But finally, on Friday, it happened. The right dealer with the right price, with a decent sales rep - all of it came together wonderfully, and I walked out with a shiny new Lexus RX 350. A stretch for our budget, no doubt, but not having bought ourselves anything nice in three years has earned us the right to splurge a little (screw those student loan payments!). And we won't be driving long distances, given that we live in the city, so gas prices are not a concern. I can't tell you how much I've missed that wonderful new car smell!

It's almost like ... giving birth. You go through immense amounts of pain and curse at your spouse, but your baby, when it arrives, makes it all worthwhile. Thank you Saeeda, for making me understand.

Sales comes to an end. Finally.

2008-07-28T21:06:00.002-06:00

Today I woke up at 6am, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.
Today I had to run to catch the bus, making it just in time.
Today I had to endure a 60 minute train ride, squeezed between two very large passengers.
Today I was introduced to my new cubicle, which consisted of fading gray felt walls, dull gray cabinets, and a dark gray chair. And I was happy.

Yes, I was happy.

You see, today was my first day in my new rotation at work. After having spent a year in Sales, the powers that be finally deemed me worthy of a new assignment, and despite the hardships and inconveniences that I will be facing, I am grateful. I will finally get to do MBA-worthy things like attend meetings and answer email all-day long. I will have to read bulky PowerPoint presentations and eat cafeteria food. But after the hardship of sales, this is a welcome change.

Sales was hard. Not because it required feats of intellectual achievement, because it didn't. Sales was hard because I stopped wanting to be in an environment where the person I wanted to engage in a conversation usually thought I was an idiot, and not worthy of attention. Where the hardest part of my day consisted of ensuring the food I had ordered for an office lunch arrived on time. Sales was hard because I realized I never had the energy and determination of my colleagues, all of whom had the amazing ability to keep coming back, bad day after bad day. To them, the lifestyle and the importance of the product being sold was enough to overcome rude office staff. Not for me.

I've realized that I'd much rather spend my day filling out TPS reports. Well, maybe not quite. But I know that I don't mind a desk-job that has me staring at a computer screen as long as my mind is engaged in problem-solving. And that's what this next rotation, focused on business development and partnership management promises to be.

So I'll put up with getting up early, enduring a long commute, and sitting in a cubicle. Because I don't have to be in Sales anymore.

A citizen, finally

2008-07-19T21:23:00.004-06:00

Those of you who follow my blog know that I've been on a long and tortuous path to citizenship that has lasted 14 years (depending on how you start the clock). I won't rehash, and you can read about some of the interim stages I've had to pass through here and here. However, it all came to a much-awaited end for me this past Wednesday, when I took my Oath of Citizenship at a downtown Chicago District Courthouse.

In a letter I had received two weeks ago, I had been told to "dress appropriately". Loathe to wear a suit in Chicago's 90 degree summer heat, I decided to go business casual before I left home, kissing my wife and baby goodbye. I'd be returning a changed man.

The courthouse and its interior were no different than any other government building anywhere in the world. It doesn't matter whether you are in sub-Saharan Africa, Communist China, or Democratic America. A government building is a government building - a place where good taste goes to die a slow, agonizing death, and where the facilities belie trends that were popular at least three decades ago. Drab concrete facades, ugly faux-marble tiling, fading carpeting asking to be put out of its misery - the list was endless. But I noticed little as I got to the designated courtroom and joined the line to present my papers.

I was expecting mostly Hispanic immigrants, given Chicago's sizable Latin American community, but in fact there were mutliple ethnicities present, with no one geography dominating. All waited nervously, fidgeting with their papers and straining to hear any instructions that the officers of the court called out to us. One dude in particular caught my eye, and I have to mention him here because of what has to be either sheer ignorance or huge cojones. The man in question was a balding Asian gentleman, in his sixties, who was wearing a white t-shirt and light-colored pants. You could tell that this was a man that had never really dressed himself, relying at various stages in his life for his mother, his wife, and what was clearly a sadistic set of children to lay out "appropriate attire" for him. I say sadistic, because this Asian gentleman was waiting to take the oath of citizenship to the United States of America wearing a t-shirt that said "Proud to be Canadian."

Like I said. Sheer ignorance or huge cojones.

Once we had all taken a seat, the judge entered the chamber, and congratulated us on making it this far. She said a few inspiring words and asked us to continue to strengthen this great nation with our diversity, and then asked all to rise as she adminstered the oath. Reciting after her, I felt no real emotion until we got to the last line. As I finished reciting the "so help me God", I realized that I was now a citizen. That I had attained that Holy Grail that many immigrants aspire to, but so few attain. I got a little emotional actually, considering the set of rights I had suddenly come to possess. Spontaneous clapping broke out soon afterwards, and those who had family in the stands dispersed to take pictures with their loved ones. The first stop I made was outside the courtroom, where volunteers had conveniently set up posts to allow us newly-minted citizens to register to vote. My first act as a citizen - doing something responsible. Woohoo!

All in all, I'm elated at the ability to breeze through airport immigration around the world, and cannot wait to test things out. However, benefits of US citizenship aside, my Pakistani identity is ingrained in my DNA, and I will remain a Pakistani-American. What is strangest to me, however, is that I will no longer be able to disdainfully blame "you Americans" whenever discussing disagreeable policies that US citizens have supported via their politicans. Instead, the phrase will have to become "we Americans" now. That's a lot of responsibility.

Anyways, enough with the deep talk. If you will excuse me, I need to go fill out my NRA membership form, and join the local chapter of the Minutemen. After that, I need to figure out which legislator to lobby to prevent these damn immigrants from taking jobs away from us hard working Americans. Go back where you came from buddy!

Nuha reacts as her father explains how much a 4 year college will cost in 18 years

2008-07-16T23:37:00.004-06:00

I try to explain to her that I can either pay my monthly TiVo membership fee, or contribute to a 529 Savings Plan for her. Unfortunately, unless she can figure out how to pause live TV, I'm keeping the TiVo membership...

Separating the men from the boys. I think I might be a boy.

2008-07-06T07:13:00.004-06:00

Four weeks ago I started formal training for the Chicago Marathon, which will be held in October later this year. For those of you who know me, I don't particularly enjoy running, unless it has a purpose. Evading a basketball defender to get to the hoop, tracking down a tennis ball for a return, and sprinting to accept a soccer pass all qualify in my book. Better yet, running to save my life from a crazed, armed mugger is the ultimate in running reasons. Jogging in a loop, voluntarily and with no purpose, doesn't quite make sense to me.

However, in January I sprained my ankle severely playing hoops, had to go to rehab, and was told to lay off any activity requiring side to side motion for a while. So I took up running to stay in shape. Since I'm a glutton for punishment, and I know how quickly I will lose in interest in an activity, I decided that I'd also set a goal of completing the Chicago marathon to keep myself motivated. So, as a novice runner who had never thought twice about what sort of shoes to wear before heading out for a jog, I decided to join a formal training program.

CARA - the Chicago Area Runners Association - has fit the bill nicely. CARA's training program lays out the mileage you are to run each week, with short and long runs mixed in. The "long runs" are group events (for motivation) that are held on Saturdays at 6am, close to where I live. Although the timing is brutal, I find it convenient to roll out of bed, change a poopy diaper, get milk spit-up on my shirt, put a fussy baby to sleep, and head out for a jog.

The problem is that these jogs have been getting longer and longer. This weekend we had to run 9 miles as part of our program, something which had me quite apprehensive. One reason was a lack of faith in my running ability - last week I was running my assigned mileage when I heard a loud "excuse me!" behind me. As per running ettiquette, I moved to the side to let this obviously gifted Olympian runner pass me by. Except that this professional runner was a woman pushing a jogging stroller with two kids tucked comfortably inside. And she was still outpacing me.

The other reason for my apprehension was the lack of the "runner's high" in my runs. I was discussing this with my friend Marvis the other day. We talked about how people fondly reminesced about the euphoric feelings that suffused their bodies as they ran, where their minds detached from the bodies and everything just went to autopilot. This state of being was where the meaning of life became clear. Not so for me.

Running those 9 miles yesterday, I felt *every* footstrike, gasped for breath the entire way, and had my body cussing me out with gusto. Either runners are lying through their miserable teeth when they talk about a runner's high - sort of like a survivor bias where painful memories of past experiences are painted in a good light to justify their participation - or these runners truly are high, from the weed they must be smoking before the run. I, unfortunately, don't know where to get any pot, nor do I want to set a bad example for my kid. Which meant that once the run was over, I limped back home, dreading next week's 11 miler and thinking that this was going to be one loooong training program.

I hate running.

Hawkeye

2008-07-01T19:06:00.008-06:00

I've noticed subtle changes in our behavior over the last few weeks, quite obviously as a result of Nuha's arrival into the world. We now live life in three hour bursts, necessitated primarily by the gap in Nuha's feeding times. We team up and split baby responsibilities to enhance productivity - Saeeda feeds the baby, I burp and change her, then whichever one of us can keep our eyelids propped open will put the baby to sleep. Finally, we now choose entertainment options that fit our schedules, such as using the Netflix movie delivery service over watching a movie in the theater.

But perhaps no change has been more dramatic than the heightening of my wife's senses. Like a superhero subjected to high doses of radiation, Saeeda has developed an enhanced sense of awareness that put's Peter Parker's Spidey Sense to shame. Her ability to hear subsonic sounds is mind-boggling. We can be watching a tv show in our living room, and in the middle of the ridiculously loud commercial break Saeeda will matter-of-factly announce that she hears the baby, and walk over to our bedroom to check on her. I'll skeptically grunt, and secretly congratulate myself on remaining comfortable rather than worrying needlessly - until, that is, I see Saeeda walk around with a baby just ready to wake up and be fed. Although I am jealous that I haven't developed this superpower, I am happy that at least one of us has. This is a good thing, because it means we're more aware of when Nuha need's attention.

Sleeping arrangements are a different matter. Whatever superpowers that Saeeda has gained, they do not stretch to the visible spectrum. She cannot, for some reason, see in the dark, which leads to extremely annoying bedtime habits. For one, the bathroom light must constantly remain on through the night so that it allows Saeeda to see the baby at periodic intervals. Not an unreasonable request, except for the fact that the lighthouse-strength beam from the bathroom bulbs falls right on my face, and the fact that I'm not allowed to shut the bathroom door a smidgen to blunt this blazing output doesn't really help matters.

For another, Saeeda must sleep right on the edge of our king-sized bed, practically hanging off all solid surfaces, so that her face is suspended into the baby's crib while her body is only nominally on our bed. She achieves this in part by pulling the crib so close to our bed that it is practically fused with it. Before the baby, our bed used ot be a beautiful place of rest and relaxation, where both our tall frames fit comfortably, and yet where we were simultaneously able to enjoy intimate proximity. Those days are long gone. While I continue to sleep in my normal spot, Saeeda now places herself in a small bundle at the foot of our bed, in the aforementioned, gravity-defying pose. I've included a little diagram in this post to help you understand how far apart we sleep now.

Saeeda tells me this is so that she can keep a watch over the baby. Again, why her powers do not extended to the visual senses, I don't understand. What I do know is that I miss my wife. Perhaps one day she will sleep near me again.

Disgusting no more

2008-06-21T15:29:00.005-06:00

Not that I've been a parent long (8 days to be exact), but already I'm noticing the increased tolerance for all things decidedly unpleasant. Babies, as the parents amongst us will attest, are poop-generating mega machines. Laws of physics do not apply to them - they crap out more waste product than the amount of fuel they are provided.

Proof that my gross-out tolerance is inching higher came a few days ago while I was in a doctor's office, making my last sales call for the day. The call was typical - I walked in, reminded the receptionist who I was and what I was doing there (I've been in this office twice a month for the past 11 months, and she still doesn't remember me), and asked her if the doctors were ok on their samples. While she checked, one of the doctors came running out of the patient room and spotted me. "You!" she ordered. "You, come up help me!"

I had never met this doctor (there are several in the practice) so to make sure, I looked around and realized that the physician was definitely referring to me. After a split-second of thought to determine if I would be violating any rules, I decided I was ok, and I followed her into the back of the office. I was led into one of the patient rooms, where I was greeted by a nice, eighty-year old lady sitting on the examining table.

"Ok, I want you to hold her right ear open. Grip it tight and pull out on it," ordered the doctor.

I started to worry that I was going to hurt the elderly patient, but it was obvious from the doctor's tone of voice that she wanted me to do exactly as she said. So I grabbed hold of the patient's left ear, and yanked out on it. Surprisingly, the poor old lady didn't object, so I relaxed a little.

The doctor then positioned herself near the lady's left shoulder, and stuck some instruments into the patient's ear cavity while using a pen light.

"Hm," I think. "Just a normal ear exam." The doc just needed my help keeping the ear open.

Which is when the doctor started extracting golf-ball sized dollops of ear wax from within this lady's ear. I'm not joking about the size of these monstrosities. They were huge. And glistening. And colored an ungodly shade of orange.

My normal reaction would have been to instantly hurl out the contents of my stomach, which that day would have consisted of Panera Bread's excellent Sierra Turkey sandwich with chipotle mayo. That would have been a fun sight - me holding on to an old lady's left ear lobe while projecting vomit onto her and her doctor.

But that didn't happen. You see, in the eight days that I've had my baby, I've already been pooped and urinated on multiple times. I'm not counting the times that I've had half-digested milk regurgitated onto my clothes, nor the number of times that spittle has just been discharged onto my face. And the diaper changes - oh, the diaper changes! Baby crap starts out this tarry black color, then gradually makes its way across the color spectrum, making pit stops at dark green and mustard yellow. Baby books euphemistically describe the consistency of these discharges as "small, round, curd-like, about the shape and size of cottage cheese."

Needless to say, I've completely sworn off cottage cheese for the rest of my life. But at least my gross-out tolerance is way up.

When copyright infringement goes too far

2008-06-14T13:22:00.006-06:00

I'm starting to regain my senses somewhat, but I'm still amazed at the amount of sleep deprivation that occurs right after you bring your child home. Yesterday was the first time I found a few minutes to myself and turn on the TV to watch a little of the NBA finals. As I was watching the game the telecast cut away for a little bit to the "NBA copyright message." You know, the one where an announcer tells you that the following is a service of the National Basketball Association, and may not be rebroadcast without authorized permission, or else someone will come to your home and eviscerate you.

That made me think of one of the videos Saeeda and I had watched while we were in the hospital. Northwestern Memorial Hospital is one of the finest in the country, and its Women's wing caters to a discerning clientele. Each room has wonderful views of the city, a free wifi connection, and a huge flat screen TV. One of the channels on this TV is constantly tuned to educational programs for new moms - child safety at home, breastfeeding, bathing, etc. Each of these programs, however, is preceded with a stern copyright message that warns incarceration for unauthorized rebroadcast.

Incarceration? Really? Do they honestly think that someone is surreptitiously copying a breastfeeding video, smuggling it out of the country, and distributing it in the shady alleyways of Shenzhen, China? I can just picture it now: a highly organized ring of smugglers gets one of their female members pregnant, just so they get access to Northwestern's post-partum rooms, where a pretend "father" whips out a videocamera the moment the nurses leave, and quickly starts taping the images on the TV.

I'd feel bad for whoever buys the end product. Not only would they be getting an obsolete movie (is there really anyone in the world who thinks breastfeeding is a bad idea?), but they'd be getting a bad 90's version. The episode we watched sounded like it had been recorded down a toilet, with a horrible soundtrack and voiceover. All the women in the episode were wearing silly dresses with stuffed shoulder pads, and sported huge hairdos that I was convinced contained a spare change of diapers and a baby bottle or two.

Anyone watching on the other side of the world would be too distracted by the makeup on these women to focus on the breastfeeding and learn anything useful. But perhaps its because of this that Northwestern puts that warning in the beginning of its programs. You see, they've probably realized what a crappy video they've created, and would rather that their mistakes not be broadcast throughout the world.

It's a girl!

2008-06-14T07:24:00.009-06:00

Dear world,

By the grace of God, Saeeda and I were blessed with a baby daughter on Friday, the 13th of June at 7:29pm. Although initially reluctant to leave the comforts of her mother's womb, Nuha Maryam Khan arrived in one sudden push, weighing in at 6 lbs 15 oz. and stretched 20.5 inches long. One moment Saeeda and I were a happy-go-lucky couple with few cares in the world, and in an another instant we were parents, responsible for another life.

I had done my research beforehand, reading all the requisite guidebooks before the delivery. Among these were "What to Expect When You're Expecting" (overrated), "The Girlfriend's Guide to Pregnancy" (great), and to balance things out "Mack Daddy: Mastering Fatherhood without Losing Your Style" (funny). But something strange happens to you at delivery. In the blink of an eye, you forget everything. Every last word you have read. Every last piece of advice you have heard. And in my opinion that is proof that the brain's capacity is not infinite. The moment that your child is born, your neurons overload so quickly and completely that they have no capacity to hold a single thought or memory. The result is that you transform into a quivering slob of choked up emotion, much to the benign amusement of the gathered nurses.

I think Nuha is going to be an introspective child. Upon arriving into this world, she took a good long look at her mother. Then she looked at her father, and finally, the doctor who had delivered her. I fully expected her to begin crying, but instead she continued observing the world around her. It's been almost 24 hours now, and the only sound we've heard from her is a brief "I'm hungry!" wail this morning.

But although Nuha is going to have her own traits and characteristics, I wonder how I'll guide her development. I spent last night's fitful sleep thinking about that. I know, for example, that I want her to break barriers. Whereas her mother prefers that this be in the form of a medical researcher discovering new cures for cancer (commendable, but so typically desi), I'd prefer that this be by way of being the first Muslim team captain to win the NCAA women's basketball championship. You know, something a little more ... hip.

I also know that I'm going to spend time embarrassing her. I know that I'll be that silly dad that cheers too loudly for their child at performances, or that father who insists on kissing his child goodbye in front of all her high school friends.

I'll also probably be that father who is completely wrapped around his little girl's finger, and serves as solace when her mother has categorically refused to give into her petulant child's immature demands. I'm going to be the ATM machine she uses for shopping sprees. I'll be the sucker that does all this in return for a bear hug.

I will definitely be the father that stands ready to kick the ass of any guy who dares to mess with her heart. I'd be happy if Nuha decides to remain single until she magically finds a perfect mate without ever having spent time "dating" (the supervised Islamic version or otherwise). But if not, I'm going to be the psycho father who silently stalks my daughter's love interest, and when he makes contact, just silently mouths "I'm watching you."

But for now, I'm going to be the father that changes some really poopy diapers, or that laughs hysterically every time his little girl burps after a feeding. I'm going to be the dad that gets excited when funny cartoon movies come out because he'll finally have someone to watch them with. I'm going to be the dad who takes enough pictures of his child that he fills up his laptop's ample hard drive.

Basically, I'm going to take advantage of all the advice, well-wishes, and prayers that each of you have sent our way. Hopefully, I'll have the ability to absorb all this information to become the best dad that I can be.

We're off to the hospital!

2008-06-13T06:14:00.002-06:00

Still waiting...

2008-06-12T22:21:00.002-06:00

No news yet. This baby continues to cling to its mother. Saeeda isn't that far removed from when she was originally supposed to have delivered (Monday), and it's quite normal for mothers to be off by several days from that calculated date. But her contractions have started, so it's only a matter of time.

So today I took the day off from work to stay home, and we tried to enjoy our few remaining, worry-free moments together. We took a leisurely bus-ride down to the neighborhood cafe for lunch, then a nice walk to the Borders store to browse through some magazines, then an expensive cab ride back home (anyone else notice how much more expensive cab rides are since they started tacking on the mandatory $2.00 fuel charges in Chicago?).

I got plenty of "me" time in, checking email, reading, and going to the gym. I've heard enough friends tell me to enjoy this time that I am trying my best to do so. What freaks me out a little is the expression that always comes across the faces of my friends who give me this advice - always a little wistful, always a little haggard, always a little sad. That worries me.

What is the name of the President of the United States?

2008-06-10T23:19:00.003-06:00

Ok, so I'll come right out and say it. I passed the citizenship test. Woohoo! Now I need to wait for the results to make it to the desks of the powers that be, and for them to in turn assign the date for my oath ceremony. Then, once I'm finally a citizen, the first thing I will do will be to figure out what country I can vacation in next WITHOUT having to mortgage my soul to get a visa. Oh, sweetness. I can almost taste it. So close!

The day of my interview started well, since Saeeda thankfully decided not to go into labor. Confident that I would not be missing the birth of my first child, and would therefore not be in the proverbial doghouse for the rest of my existence, I took the second half of the day off from work to show up at Chicago's USCIS offices. Here, I was directed to a large hall on the 3rd floor of a massively ugly building, where there were at least a hundred other individuals waiting for the same thing that I was - the test itself.

Officers would magically appear from some hidden door, call out names, and gather the applicants to take them back through their magical door. My name was called 20 min. after I got seated, and I was led back into a nondescript office. My officer asked me to take an oath that I'd be telling the truth, asked me to take a seat, and then got started on the quiz.

Keep in mind that I had studied all week long from the USCIS study guide, and was ready for anything. Anything. I was not prepared, however, for the mind-boggling simplicity of the questions.

"What is the name of the place where the President lives?"
"What was the name of the boat that the Pilgrims came over in?"
"What is the capital of your state?"
"What is the constitution?"
"What is the name of the President of the United States?"

And so it went. At one point I started wondering who had thought up this process. You make an immigration applicant spend years in the system (ten years in my case), only to cap the journey with this? That's what it took to become a citizen? Ten years of excruciating, snail-paced, mind-numbingly complex form-filling (you think tax returns are bad? hah!), all to get to a 5 minute questionnaire that was ridiculously straightforward?

But all of that didn't matter, not to me, and not to the hopeful individuals waiting back in the hall outside. Individuals who in some cases had probably sweat blood and tears to get here. Individuals for whom English was a challenge, for whom memorizing Constitutional amendments was akin to learning Martian, for whom it was not important what the capital of their state was or what the names of the 13 original colonies were. For them, all that mattered was being allowed to become a recognized part of their adopted country, to enjoy the rights that many ignored willfully, and to be able to defiantly look the next xenophobe squarely in the eye and with nothing to fear.

To us, all it mattered was that we be allowed to become citizens.

Priorities

2008-06-08T16:08:00.002-06:00

Those of you that know my immigration history, know that I've been in this country since 1994. In those 14 years, I have largely self-navigated the morass of US Immigration rules and regulations, applying for all the right statuses, making sure all my paperwork was always in order, and always grinning and bearing the less-than-civil treatment I've received at the hands of every immigration officer at a US port of entry. But always, I've know that if I did everything properly; that if I forgave bored, racist officers their manners; that if I put up with all the "random" screenings and profiling; that if I set a good example and in doing so made a favorable impression on the behalf of other South Asian immigrants; if I did ALL that, I've known that one day I'd be rewarded with the opportunity to become a US citizen, and to become a full participant in the development of my adopted homeland.

That opportunity arrives tomorrow, Monday the 9th of June at 1:20pm, which is when the US Citizenship and Immigration Service has asked me to appear for my citizenship interview in Chicago. But by the type of great cosmic coincidence that make you admire God's sense of humor, Saeeda is due to give birth on Monday, the 9th of June.

Right. The birth of my first baby or US citizenship, which do I think is more important?

While I've made it clear to my wife that the only reason I married her was for the quicker path to citizenship, and that the kid is not going to remember if I was in the delivery room or not (honey, that's what Photoshop is for), I'm honestly walking around on eggshells at home, trying to make sure my wife doesn't laugh to hard in case she goes into labor. All garlic and ginger has been put out of reach (a coworker told me that these induce labor). All physical contact between us is strictly prohibited (hey, even though an internet board says that it is sexual contact that is supposed to induce labor, I'm not taking any chances - this morning I nodded hello to her and then flew out of bed before I could receive a good morning hug).

So the plan is to keep the USCIS appointment, and to hope and pray that Saeeda goes late. In the meantime, I'm busying myself with learning who my state senators are (Obama is one - that was easy), the term length for representatives (two years - a little harder), and that the amendments guaranteeing voting rights are the 15th, 19th, 24th, and 26th (wow, I had NO clue about that one). I can only hope that the interviewer, who will ask me ten verbal questions amongst other things, will ask me who the president and vice president are. Or what my state capital is. That I can handle.

Crap, I think I see Saeeda headed towards me. Gotta jet.

The most over-engineered products

2008-06-01T19:00:00.003-06:00

I went to college. No, change that. I went to a good college. One of the best in the country, where I earned a degree in systems engineering with a minor in economic systems. I learned how to resolve complex thermodynamic problems, how to create virtual desktop environments using C++, and how to crunch differential equations for breakfast. In doing so, I sank four years of my life and thousands of dollars of my parents' hard earned money into getting a degree that I hoped was going to serve me well for the rest of my life.

Yeah, right.

Last weekend I tried to optimistically tackle the assembly of our baby's crib, it's swing, and the stroller. Not only were the instructions arcane ("Insert an M5 x 30 mm bolt through the opening in the opposite side of the upper seat tube, and tighten three quarters of a turn anti-clockwise using an Allen wrench"), but they were peppered with bold red warning symbols alongside statements such as "WARNING! Make sure that components click into place. Not doing so poses a serious hazard to your child's safety, and could result in permanent injury."

Exactly how was I supposed to keep a cool-head in situations like these? All I could do was obsessively ask myself, "Did I hear a click? Was that the right click? Did it click loud enough? What if it didn't? Will this kill my child?" Inevitably, I would disassemble and reassemble everything until I heard a loud enough click.

And then there was the stroller. This amazingly over-engineered product with levers and release buttons situated all over its body puts any Transformer character to shame. Touch one button with the right amount of pressure, and the device magically collapses into itself, in the process defying the laws of physics and taking up less room than should be possible. Flip another lever while stepping on another part of the stroller, and it instantly transforms into a sturdy device for transporting your child. The only problem is that the force, and the direction in which it has to be applied, is so precise that it takes you hours to master the proper techniques for opening and closing the contraption. My wife gave up after 30 minutes, which now means that I'm going to be the poor slob who will have to struggle with the stroller for the entire duration of my child's toddler years.

By the end of the day I was a sweaty mess, dehydrated and exhausted. This child better appreciate all that I'm doing for it.

Life's crunch periods

2008-05-26T00:35:00.002-06:00

Yes, I know, I know. I've been gone for a really long time. And yes, there's not much in the way of excuses, other than to say that life decided to speed up in the past month, and in doing so has been throwing things my way that have taken priority over blogging.

For example, there has been extensive travel - to LA for my brother-in-law's wedding, back to Chicago, back to LA for more wedding events, and then straight on to Orlando for Abbott's National Sales Meeting. There has been backing out of contracts for the home we wanted to purchase (and therefore the restart of a housing hunt for us). There has been the tentative initiation of the training needed to run the Chicago Marathon in October of this year. There has been the fruitless search for my next assignment at work (the nature of a rotational program inevitably means that you find your own next gig). There has been a mad scramble to register for baby items, buy baby furniture, read baby books, take baby classes, and in general have this upcoming addition to our family take over our world before it's even here. Oh, and the need to buy a car has also made itself apparent.

So, in short, things have been busy. But in the midst of all this "busy"-ness I've come to the realization that putting pen to paper (or tapping keys on a keyboard), is a wonderful way to organize the thoughts swirling around my head and shove them into categories and containers where I can tackle them in a more orderly manner. Besides, my misadventures hopefully keep you guys entertained.

So I'm back, and will be posting as things promise to get even crazier in the days to come. Take care!

Why you should DEFINITELY memorize cab numbers

2008-03-26T19:17:00.002-06:00

Now for the second, much more disturbing story.

Saeeda and I went to catch a movie on Friday night (Vantage point – wait for the DVD), and decided to take a cab on the way back home. The guy drove over the speed limit, and swerved across lanes multiple times. That in itself is not unusual behavior for taxi drivers in a big city, but it was dangerous nonetheless.

The fare was $5.85 by the time we pulled up to our apartment building. I had a brief internal debate over whether I should give the guy $6.00, therefore punishing him for the bad driving by giving no tip, or whether I should give the guy $7.00 (the amount I would have paid normally). I generally tip cabbies, because I know the hard work they put in, and how little they make. So despite my better judgment I gave him $7.00 and started walking away from the cab.

A yell from the cabbie caught my attention, and I turned around. Next thing I know, the cab driver is approaching me aggressively, and shoving a quarter in my hand. I ask him what that’s for, and he makes a face and says it’s my change. Confused, I asked him what the change is for. He says that the fare was $5.85, and I only gave him $6.00. I say that he is wrong, and that I gave him $7.00.

Despite this guy’s aggressive behavior, I ask him to count the money I gave him, because I’m still willing to give him the extra dollar. Of course, it turns out that he has counted incorrectly. He looks up at me sheepishly, and I say that in the future he should count the money properly, and walk away.

This sets him off. He charges at me, yelling and cussing at me that I can keep my dollar. I’ve walked into my building lobby by this time, where Saeeda is waiting for me, and this cab driver comes INTO my building, still yelling and swearing at me. Dangerous though his behavior is, and even though avoidance is the best approach, I lose it the moment he takes a step towards Saeeda.

Placing myself between Saeeda and him, I get in his face and yell at him to get out. But I’ve also managed to lose my temper by this time, and start swearing right back at him. Somewhere along the line we both realize that we’re Pakistani, and the Urdu curse words follow. One part of me is amazed at myself, but another is just waiting for him to touch me. The adrenaline kicks in, tunnel vision kills my perception of my surroundings, and my face is an inch away from his.

Saeeda told me later that it was only through our doorman’s intercession that no physical violence ensued. The doorman managed to push the guy out of our building, and Saeeda somehow managed to get me into our elevator.

I had trouble sleeping that whole night, because I could not believe that cab driver’s actions. If you don’t get tipped appropriately, you can yell, curse, flick off the passengers, whatever. You do NOT leave your car under any circumstance. This guy did it TWICE. Once to shove a quarter in my face, and another to confront me once he realized he had counted incorrectly and I had called him out on it. That he was unstable was obvious, but that was no excuse for his actions. I spent the night kicking myself for not remembering the guy’s cab number or company.

Luckily, our doorman had noted down these details, and I got these from him the next day. The city of Chicago has heard from me, and I fully plan to see this idiot taken off the streets before he causes some serious damage. In the meantime, make sure you memorize that four digit number. You never know when you’re going to need it.

Why you should memorize your cab number

2008-03-26T19:16:00.001-06:00

I’ll start with the more innocuous (though no less harrowing) of the two stories that make it imperative that you ALWAYS memorize your cab number when you get in for a ride.

I was wrapping up a weekend trip to Austin, and some friends and I decided to share a cab to the airport. Because there were three of us, and there wasn’t enough room for my backpack, I placed it on the front passenger seat.

The ride to the airport didn’t take long, and pretty soon we were in line to get boarding passes. Which is when I realized that I had never picked up my backpack (which contained my laptop, amongst other valuables) from the cab. The feeling that hit me next was sickening – you know the one. Your head starts spinning, and no sooner does the world come back into focus that your stomach drops through to your groin. Anger hit next – anger for being an idiot and not being able to do something as simple as keeping track of my belongings.

Once I was somewhat more composed, I asked my friends what cab company our taxi was part of. Blank stares.

“Guys was it yellow, white, what?”

Blank stares. We didn’t even remember the color of the taxi, let alone the company name or the cab number. I ran out of the terminal, hoping beyond hope that the cab driver had realized he still had my bag, and had decided to wait curbside. No such luck. Instead, I ran into one of the people that are always yelling at you to move your car because the nation is at a perpetual Code Orange. Thankfully, the person I found was a nice lady who started calling the main taxi dispatch lines to see if a driver had reported the missing backpack. I was then put in touch with the airport lost and found department, which also came up empty. As I began to mentally reconstruct the gigabytes of personal information on my laptop, and whether it was worth taking a later flight so that I could recover my bag, one of my friends grabbed my attention.

“Did you hear that?” he asked. “What?” I replied. “Your name – they’re calling your name on the PA system.”

Breathless, we ran back into the terminal to the airline counter, where sure enough a lady cop, my backpack in her hand, was trying to locate me through the public announcement system. Amazed at my good fortune, I thanked God, and then offered to hug the cop. Then I thought better of it, since as a general rule, you don’t want to be excessively emotionally expressive around people who carry guns.

So the cab driver who had dropped us off turned out to be a good Samaritan, and left my bag with airport security. Still, if I had memorized the four digit, unique cab number in the first place, I could have had taxi dispatch instantly locate the cab and put me in touch with the driver.

So memorize that number next time you get in a cab.

Patience and restraint

2008-02-19T22:34:00.003-06:00

Let me set the stage for the letter above. It is Valentine's day, and Saeeda and I decide to go to the Second City theater in Chicago to watch some good comedy (Second City is where many of today's popular comedians got their start). This being the city, parking is a pain, and so we find ourselves following a street sign that says "Second City Parking." Except that, this being the city, the sign leads to a parking structure that gives cars barely any maneuvering room. We see signs for "Guest Parking" and follow the ramps up to the very top floor, park our car, and leave to enjoy the show.

Upon returning later that night, we find that access to this top floor is no longer available from the parking structure. We ask the clueless night attendant, who casually tells us that we parked in the wrong place. Second City parking, as the fading, barely visible, bent-out-of-shape sign clearly states, is on the ground floor. It is freezing cold, Saeeda is pregnant, and I now need to find someone to let me into what turns out to be resident parking for an adjacent building.

Long story short, I manage to get in, and get to the car. And I discover this lovely letter stuck in my windshield wiper. Let us deconstruct this letter together:

"I hope you have enjoyed my parking spot because you will never park in it again."

A strong, bold statement that sets the tone of the message right away. Sinister, because it doesn't quite state how I will be decapitated should I park in that spot again. Sarcastic, because of the "I hope you have enjoyed ..." Brilliant.

"You are welcome for my incredible patience and restraint"

More sarcasm, because I am supposed to be overwhelmed with gratitude at this point. And here's the most poignant part of it all - the writer is declaring their angelic nature by describing their incredible patience and restraint. Incredible, I tell you. Incredible.

Now let us step back for a moment. In sub-zero Chicago winter weather, some sorry, sad, sod of a person took the time to find quality lined paper and a good pen to neatly channel their rage into a two sentence message to me - a stranger who mistakenly parked my car in their spot because of a lack of proper signage. In all fairness, the garage had such low ceilings and tight turns that a tow truck would never be able to get in there to move my car. Which means that the person whose spot I took had nothing they could do about the situation, other than to try to convince me of their incredible patience and restraint that stopped them from ... what? Keying my car? Breaking in my window?

Some people just need to take a deep breath and relax before they put pen to paper.

Exactly how stupid do they think we are?

2008-02-11T19:12:00.001-06:00

The other day I read a news report on how United is going to start charging passengers $25 to check a second bag. Yup, that's right. You will now have to shell out money if in case you are unable to pack your life into one regular sized bag. The kicker, however, was some statement from United that went along the lines of, "... by charging for bag checks, we will be able to keep base fares lower and offer more options to our customers." More options? What the $#%!?

This nickel and diming is ridiculous. How stupid do they think we as consumers are? Do they think we'll just sit back and let them rip us off like this?

It's almost like saying that banks should be allowed to charge you, like, $3 to take your own money out of the ATM. Or like saying that digital media companies should be allowed to dictate the device on which you play a song that you purchase from them fair and square. Or like ...

Wait a minute.

Maybe we are this stupid.

Its going to be a ...!

2008-02-06T22:36:00.000-06:00

If you haven't heard already, then I have some news for you. Saeeda and I are expecting our first child sometime in June. Yes, exciting stuff, and while we've both been overjoyed these last few months, I didn't realize how quickly our lives are about to change until this past Monday. That's when we visited our doctor for Saeeda's 22nd week appointment, and got to use ultrasound to see our baby chilling in it's mothers womb.

There was something about seeing the tiny hands and feet, and seeing the baby turn this way and that to get away from the annoying ultrasound wand that finally made it hit home. Uh, dude? I heard a voice say inside my head. You're going to be, like, a father.

A father? Me? I can barely remember where I put my car keys, or how to properly slice a tomato, or whether the your bread plate sits to your left or to your right. And I'm going to be responsible for the safety and security of a whole new life? And the child is going to look to me for direction? Uh oh.

But thoughts like that are fleeting. I take solace in the fact that there have been countless other clueless dads throughout time, all of whom have learned to cope. It's not like babies come with an instruction manual. And "What to Expect when you're Expecting" doesn't count.

Our ultrasound technician also told us the gender of the child, which had both of us overjoyed. The problem now lies in the fact that my dad has asked that I not tell him the gender, and that he wants to be "surprised" at birth. The kicker being that my mother has said that she wants to know the gender the moment we find out. Exactly how I'm going to be able to keep this information from one parent and not the other, I'm not sure. Especially since my parents are slowly becoming tech savvy, and my dad at least has started reading this blog (Hello!).

I will try, however. Hopefully this blog post has been gender neutral the whole time...

Inspiring confidence ... not

2008-01-22T13:17:00.000-06:00

As part of my ongoing struggle on the path to US citizenship, I had to have my fingerprints taken a few days ago. Keep in mind that I've been fingerprinted over a dozen times by now - during the days of special registration, when you had to be "processed" any time you entered and left the US (before even 9-11); for the various immigration applications I have submitted over time (H1, green card, etc.); and just randomly for security checks. But the immigration services, in their wisdom, still require a set of fingerprints, just in case I had burned off the last set of prints that I was bestowed with.

In any case, fingerprinting required trekking to an "Application Support Center," which is always a cold, lonely place in an isolated strip mall somewhere. Mine was on the south side of Chicago, not exactly the safest of places to be. But what always amazes me about these places is the complete lack of customer service. Allow me to explain.

I entered the above facility and was instantly faced with a dilemma. On the right, where it said "STOP, check in with agent at desk" there was no one. On the left, a lady sat at a desk taking clipboards from people turning them with completed forms. So I waited a little, looked around a little, and saw large signs that stepped you through the process. One sign, with a huge number "1" on it, asked you to fill out a registration form. Another sign, with a huge number "2" on it, asked you to turn this form in. A third sign then asked you to take a seat. You get the idea. So I spot some clipboards with empty forms lying on the desk where there is no agent to tend to me, and naturally think that I should complete this form and turn it in to the agent at the left desk.

No sooner have I picked this form up and begun filling it out, that I get yelled at by the agent at the left desk.

"Did you just pick up MY clipboard from MY desk?"

"Umm. Yes. I thought I'd start filling out the forms."

"Uh uh. You didn't just pick up MY clipboard from MY desk!"

*keep in mind that there were at least twenty identical clipboards sitting on the untended desk*

"I'm just following the instructions posted on the signs ma'am."

"Uh uh. You didn't just pick up MY clipboard from MY desk!"

At this point I realized that the exchange of useful information had come to an end. So I just stood there, with a half-complete form, looking at this lady who was upset at me for taking HER clipboard from HER desk. This face-off would have continued, had it not been for another lady that was processing fingerprints further down the hall, who poked her head out and told me to have a seat.

Grateful at the provision of some useful information, I took a seat and proceeded to complete filling out the form. The cantankerous lady at the left desk went back to snatching clipboards from the people in line.

Once I was done with the form, I got in line to turn it in to this lady. It annoyed me no end to see her treating the people in line with a disgust that she made no effort to hide. I didn't understand what these agents expected - you're working in an environment where your customers, immigrants unlikely to speak English fluently, are going to be confused and are going to need direction and patience. Individual after individual would go up to this lady, deferentially bow their head, smile, and hand her the completed forms, which this lady would scan for mistakes. God forbid mistakes would be found, because the lady would then rip into the person.

By the time I got to the front of the line, I simply handed her the clipboard without a word of acknowledgment. I don't know if she remembered if I was the individual she had been yelling at about HER clipboard on HER desk, but she simply stamped my form, gave it back to me, and told me to be seated until called.

The fingerprinting was routine, and I was told that I'd hear back with the results. No timeline was provided. As I left the service center, I glanced at the wall that had the instructional signs on it. Beneath these signs hung three portraits of suited gentlemen smiling into the camera.

Bush, Cheney, and Chertoff. How could I possibly blame organizational incompetency on a staff when its leadership was so incapable itself?

Creepy tributes

2007-12-29T17:43:00.000-06:00

Saturday arrived in London, and against all odds the sun decided to put in an appearance. Not that it warmed things up much, but Londoners are depressingly deprived of sunlight, and every little bit helps, especially when it starts getting dark at 3:30pm. Ugh.

No matter how hard we tried, though, we were unable to leave the house before 2pm. That's because it takes my sister forever to get my nephew ready for the road. And THAT is because my nephew is royalty, and must get his gourmet breakfast, morning snack, lunch, and light exercise (and associated bowel movement) before he agrees to remain stationary long enough to be put into a stroller. I took my revenge on him, though, by bundling him up so tight that he wasn't able to move an inch for the rest of the time we were out.

We spent the day walking around the Tower of London and the Tower Bridge, and then heading over to see the Parliament buildings and Big Ben. I know I'll be back in London again, and I want to take tours of these places to learn some of the history behind them. That's one thing London has in excess supply - history. Outside of the Mediterranean countries, there are few places that can boast continuous civilization for millenia, not just centuries. London is one of them. Construction on the Tower of London, for example, started in 1078 and Westminster Abbey was built in 1045. These are old places which have withstood countless footfalls, from those of peasant farmers, to empire kings, to ... me. That was a cool feeling.

No trip to London would be complete without a visit to Harrod's, that iconic shopping mega-destination that is one of the largest department stores in the world. Although a pioneering British shopping icon, since 1985 the department store has been owned by Egyptian billionaire Mohamed Fayed. Fayed's name is famous not just because of his financial empire, but also because of his son Dodi Fayed's romantic association with Princess Diana. Which is where the creepiness begins. Since their death in a 1997 Paris car crash, Dodi and Diana have been memorialized at Harrod's by way of some strange tributes.

The first is a whimsical cast iron statue, showing Dodi and Diana dancing happily with what looks like a seagull, and with an inscription that reads, "Innocent Victims."

The second is a shrine built on the lower level of the store, with soft-focus shots of Dodi and Diana looking down upon the public. As if this wasn't weird enough, there is glass case front and center at the shrine which contains:

A wine glass with visible lipstick marks, supposedly the last dinner vessel to touch the lips of Diana.

A huge ring, with a mega-diamond rock stuck in the middle, supposed to be the engagement ring that Dodi purchased for Diana the day before their deaths.

The entire display evoked a sad feeling. Maybe this was a father's heartfelt way to grieve for his son and daughter-in-law to be, but instead it comes across as a kitschy way of shoving a conspiracy crusade in the faces of passersby (Mohamed Fayed has repeatedly claimed that the death of Dodi and Diana was planned at the highest levels of the British monarchy, with involvement of the British Secret Service).

Our visit to Harrod's was shortlived - the massive crowds eventually got to all of us, including my nephew, who by this time had managed to break free of his bonds. With his umpteenth diaper change starting to fray at my sister's nerves, I wisely recommended that we head back home and call it a night.

An ode to Facebook

2007-12-28T23:31:00.000-06:00

There are few applications that I feel have changed my life - Gmail is one, and MS Money is another (does that make me a complete geek?) Facebook is definitely a close third.

I was a grudging adopter of Facebook at first. Social networking sites have been around for a while, and I've managed to stay detached from them all, despite emotional pleas from my friends. Friendster, MySpace, Naseeb - all have come (and in my opinion, gone). But there was something elegant about the simplicity of Facebook that drew me from the start. It wasn't gimmicky, and it wasn't a place dedicated to online firtation. That, and the fact that within days of creating an account, I was in touch with people from all over the planet, some of whom I had not seen in almost twenty years - both helped to make me a big fan of the site.

So why mention Facebook while I sit blogging in London? Well, it is because of this website that today I met up with an old friend of mine from grade school in Spain. We had discovered each other online, and on a whim I shot him a message to see if he would be around while I was here. Sure enough he was, and we picked today afternoon to meet for lunch.

I found the pre-meeting anxiety comical. I took extra care picking out my wardrobe for the day, and of grooming my increasingly sparse hair (it's a good thing Saeeda was not around, because she would undoubtedly have felt a twinge of jealousy.) The train ride into the city from my sister's house was uneventful, probably because I kept my mind occupied with reading material, but before I knew it, I was standing in front of the ticket counter at the Bond Street tube station, anxiously sifting through the strange faces milling around me as I tried to strike as non-chalant a pose as possible. Would I be able to pick out James from the crowd? I hadn't seen him since 1991, and he didn't have that many pictures up on Facebook.

But there he was. Bearded, wearing glasses, and a lot taller than I remember him, but James nonetheless. With pleasantries exchanged, and the requisite repetitions of "@%£$ man, how the hell are you?" out of the way, we walked over to a corner cafe near Christopher Square, and away from the maddening crowds of Oxford St.

There are few things in life more epiphanous than reviewing your past with an old friend, because you come face-to-face with someone who knew you when you were a completely different person. Through the reminescing, you are able to review the different paths that your lives have taken, and you learn a tiny bit more about that most confusing person in the world - you. And reminesce we did.

We talked about old teachers, places, and most importantly, old friends. There were stories of sheer tragedy - the friend who turned his brain to mush on an overdose of drugs; the friend who lost his mother to cancer and his father to financial ruin; and the intelligent friend who hit some bumps along the way, and is now stuck in a no-hope situation in the middle of nowhere. But there were also stories of great success - of friends who were never going to amount to much, but are now raking in the millions on the European race car circuit (!); of friends who completed their PhD's in engineering and are pursuing successful careers in Spain; and of friends who settled down continents away, and are married to the people they love, with children that they adore.

Time flew by, and I was struck by how lives for our children are going to be different from those of my parents and those of ours. My parents speak nostalgically of childhood friends that went their separate ways and are now only vague memories. In contrast I can reconnect periodically with my old acquaintances using applications such as Facebook. Will our children ever have a valid excuse to fall out of touch with their friends? Will social networking sites make it impossible for them to say they don't know what someone is up to these days?

Seeing James was one of the highlights of my stay in London, even though I've only been here two days. Experiences such as these are invaluable, since they allow you to circle back on your life and strengthen the delicate bonds that are always at risk of snapping. Hopefully we'll stay in better contact from here, and hopefully there will be others that I will reconnect with in the future. For making this happen, I thank you Facebook.

(PS, the picture at the top is from when I was in Spain, and was around twelve years old. James is in the blue shirt in the back row, and I'm two to his left).

Death of a leader

2007-12-27T23:13:00.000-06:00

I wanted to write a separate entry for this. Even though my day was spent having fun in London with my sister, I was never really able to keep the thoughts of the day's events in Pakistan from my mind.

Benazir Bhutto had been assassinated that morning (London time). With an unpopular war abroad and racial and civil unrest at home, Bhutto had represented a challenge to the heavy-handed Musharraf that had caught the attention of policymakers around the world. Until today, she had led the only truly "pan-Pakistan" political party, one that had managed to reach across the ethnic and sectarian boundaries that are so prominent in South Asia, and had successfully withstood the Pakisani army's efforts at emasculating it (practically from the time of its founding by Benazir's father). With her death, the experiment with democracy that Pakistan has pretended to flirt with for the past 60 years can be returned to the cryogenic freezing facility from whence it originated.

The riots that have followed Bhutto's death have been no surprise, especially to the people in Pakistan. I spoke to my parents immediately after I found out what had happened, and they told me how markets and workplaces had emptied in the blink of an eye that day. One of our relatives was shopping in the busiest areas of Karachi, when suddenly people had started running in every direction. Someone somewhere had started yelling that Bhutto had been killed, and it didn't take long for people to understand what was coming next. Karachi was going to burn, and it was only a matter of time until the first flames arose. Customers ran so fast that some tripped out of their shoes and didn't bother to return for them.

It was the same at workplaces too. Businesses and corporations shut down immediately, and employees tried their best to get home before the rioting started. Not all of them were successful, though. My parents were surprised at home by my cousin and his friend, who showed up unannounced. Both of them lived on the other side of town but worked closer to where my parents live. They had tried to make it home, but the rioting had already started - after trying to weave past mobs on a rampage, burning vehicles, and advancing police, they had wisely decided to come over to our place for shelter for the night. My dad told me he had never seen two grown men as scared as those two. And that scared me.

The question is, can Pakistan recover? Will Bhutto's death shine light in areas that need it badly, and force Musharraf and the other political parties to come together in an attempt to keep the country from burning? Or will there be a doomsday scenario - extreme violence leading to civil war, with the army losing control of the country and perhaps its nuclear weapons, forcing the US and its allies to pre-emptively invade and seize control?

Scary times, my friends. Scary times.

Madame Tussaud's

2007-12-27T12:58:00.000-06:00

A little more refreshed, today my sister and I decided to head into the city to visit the big landmarks and meet up for dinner with Kaleem after he got off work.

Certain memories from the time I lived in London have came back to me quickly. As we spent the day in London, I remembered riding the Underground to get around town, visiting the city's parks with my parents, and of course, hanging out at Madame Tussaud's. My sister commented that the last time we had visited the venerable museum was as kids with my mother. Now we would be visiting the museum together, with one of us towing along a child of her own. Life doubles back on itself in interesting ways.

The museum was crowded and there was a lot of jostling as people rushed to stand with their favorite celebrities. Travolta and Samuel Jackson were chilling off to the side, so I hung out with them for a little bit ...

... before I ran into Jessica Simpson and found myself mesmerized by her big ... hat.

It was only a matter of time before I was going to run into a desi celebrity, and sure enough Shahrukh Khan was standing in a corner with a goofy smile. Well, anything that SRK can do, FRK can do as well, goofy pose and all (and yes, those are Amitabh and Superman in the background...

The funniest part of the museum, I felt, was running into pranksters who would stand really still in silly poses, and I kept thinking they were wax statues too. The museum added to this confusion, because throughout they had placed occasional statues of "tourists" snapping pictures of the other statues, or of walking with their "kids" beside them.

After the museum Saima and I headed over to Canary Wharf, where we met up with Kaleem and had a delicious dinner at Nando's - a halal Portuguese chicken restaurant, which provided a combo that is not quite typical.

London, like any other major city, is bustling with energy. It was ten at night and it was freezing outside, and yet people were still out shopping and having fun. I took this time-delayed shot on Regent's street, one of the prime shopping areas in the city:

London, land of the CCTV

2007-12-26T12:52:00.000-06:00

The flight over to London was uneventful, other than the fact that someone somewhere took mercy on my knees, and upgraded me to United's Economy "Plus". Although it is the most dastardly form of price discrimination ever, the extra three inches of leg room were a life saver for my aging frame. I watched "SuperBad" during the in-flight entertainment segment, and have to admit that the movie was hilarious even though I was watching it on a tiny screen with sound that went in and out the whole time.

Memories of London from my six-month stay here when I was eight years old started coming back to me as my brother-in-law drove me to his place from the airport. The same narrow lanes, the same rows of houses huddling together, the same driving on the wrong side of the road. My sister lives north of the city in Greater London, and her house is in a quiet cul-de-sac shared by three other houses. My arrival here soon caused commotion though, as I hugged my sister (who I hadn't seen in two years), and came upon my nine month old nephew (who I had never seen). I'm still trying to figure out how his facial muscles are able to support his cheeks and lower lip all on their own:

Most of the rest of the day was spent sleeping off the jet lag, eating lunch, sleeping off some more jet lag, and then venturing into the city with my family. We headed over to St. Christoper's square for some Lebanese dining, and I was completely taken aback by the number of CCTV cameras everywhere. One corner had FIVE cameras pointed in every direction. Can you even imagine something like that in the US, where people complain about privacy issues with red-light traffic cameras? Kaleem, my brother-in-law, told me that on average, one is photographed THIRTY FIVE times between stepping out of their house in a suburb and getting to work in downtown London. THIRTY FIVE!

I'm going to have to make sure I drop my nose-picking habit while I'm here.

I'm off to London!

2007-12-25T12:34:00.001-06:00

As the title to this blog reflects, I have fallen prey to my desire to travel again, so I'm off to visit my sister in London. Although I've transited through Heathrow and Gatwick multiple times, the last time I spent more than a night in the land of the Queen Mother was in the 1980's, when my dad was briefly posted there for work.

The goals for this trip are to introduce myself to my brand new nephew (almost 9 months old now), and to see what all the fuss about this "Europe Rising" thing is. Stay tuned!

True heros

2007-12-06T20:59:00.000-06:00

Imagine my surprise the other day when I got an email from my friend Rangina Hamidi. Any time I hear from Rangina is a pleasure, and to be honest, a relief. You see, Rangina is in Kandahar, Afghanistan, and I get to hear from her so infrequently that inevitably I start wondering if she is doing ok. Until I get another email from her, and I get to rest easy for a little longer.

Rangina is an Afghan American who I became good friends with while we were both undergrads at the University of Virginia. After graduating we went our different ways - I started my career in consulting, and Rangina decided to go work for a nonprofit. Until 9-11 and its aftermath.

Fiercely independent and an ardent believer in women's rights, Rangina wasted little time leaving all the comforts of the US for the hardship of Afghanistan the moment the Taliban regime fell. I don't think she had any idea what she was going to do once she got there, but she knew she wanted to help somehow. Today she is being honored live on CNN for the work she is doing in her home country (www.cnn.com/heroes).

Watching CNN describe Rangina's work makes me think long and hard about the opportunities for impact that each of us are provided with, and how many of us actually seize those opportunities. Rangina is working with the women of Kandahar, helping them market their beautiful embroidery across the world (you can find out more at www.kandahartreasure.com), while I am handing out notepads and pens to receptionists. Ok, I know, I exaggerate. I'm doing more than that, and I'm proud of my work. But my point is this - not so long ago Rangina was faced with a difficult decision. She could remain in the US in relative comfort and try to help Afghanistan remotely, or she could pack up her belongings and head to a dangerous environment to use her upbringing and education to help the women of her country. Rangina chose the latter.

What would I have done, if faced with the same situation? What would you have done?

The reality of the field

2007-11-10T20:14:00.000-06:00

So it's coming up on three weeks since I've been out of training and have been placed in the real world of field sales. I've learned a few things that our trainers conveniently forgot to mention, or simply did not emphasize:

Doctors have better things to do with their time than to listen to a sales rep deliver a marketing message.
You occupy the rung below single-cell amoeba on the food chain as far as the people you interact with are concerned.
Doctors think they know everything, but they don't. In turn, their patients risk receiving suboptimal treatment because of the doctor's refusal to listen to facts that run contrary to their beliefs.
With all this pressure, saying what you want to say in a precise, effective manner is an art form.
If you can't develop a thick skin, don't show up to work.

What a wake up call this has been. Before I started this job, I thought of sales reps the same way most other people think of them - nuisances that make your product purchasing decision unpleasant. This image shattered once I got to training, where I developed immense respect for the sheer volume of knowledge a pharma rep needs to learn in order to do their job effectively. Being in the field has been another wake-up call. I can't imagine how some of these reps do their job day after day for years on end. I don't understand how they dig deep within themselves to find the motivation to go on after facing yet another close-minded physician. I don't understand how they spend hours on end working by themselves, with almost no support or interaction with their coworkers.

So far I've been happy if I can get my name across to a doctor before he starts walking away. My favorite story from these last three weeks happened in week 1. I was visiting an office for the first time, and walked up to the receptionist to introduce myself, mention the products that I carried, and ask if the doctor was available. The nurse looked me up and down and asked what else I had with me. Confused, I repeated the products I was responsible for. No good. "What ELSE do you carry?" she asked. At this point I admitted defeat. "Umm, what would you like me to carry?" I asked.

Which is when the receptionist told me that unless I had some premium items (i.e., pens, pads, etc.) for the staff, that I wasn't getting back to see the doctor anytime soon. Of course, yours truly had no premium items at the time, so I started to leave, crestfallen and teary-eyed. I had almost reached the office door, when I heard the receptionist call out behind me, "Sugar, I'm just messing with you. The doctor is on vacation!" The entire office staff laughed heartily.

*sigh* Abused AND ridiculed. I need a hug.

For me, this experience is a dose of bad-tasking, albeit necessary, medicine. I thought I had strong communication skills coming out of business school, but I've quickly learned that I don't stand a chance against a polished sales rep. In school we were taught to develop 5 minute elevator pitches - speeches to have on hand to deliver to your company's CEO should you run into them on the elevator up to work. 5 minutes? Are you kidding me? Seasoned sales reps that I've seen in action can deliver impactful messages that will stop a doctor in their tracks in 20 seconds. If this is the only skill that I pick up from this rotation, then I'll be a happy camper.

Hawaiian shirt day

2007-10-19T20:06:00.000-06:00

Bill Lumbergh: "Oh, and remember: next Friday... is Hawaiian shirt day. So, you know, if you want to, go ahead and wear a Hawaiian shirt and jeans." [Office Space]

Training is almost done with. It’s been a really, really long slog. Really long. In fact, I was discussing this with one of the other MBAs going through this experience with me, and we realized that we’d been studying medicine non-stop for the last 60 days. I’m practically ready to open my own practice.

This last week of training has been different, since it has involved attending a real live Regional Sales Meeting. These are events held every few months where the sales force of a large geographic region – Chicago in this case – comes together to hear about the latest updates from management, discuss performance-to-date, and study the latest articles/research that has been published regarding their drugs. But it all starts with Hawaiian Shirt Day.

That the people in Sales are different is by now old news to me. But the way this difference manifests itself in all aspects of a salesperson’s life continues to surprise me. I’ve attended regional meetings before when I was a consultant, and they are usually serious events with some revelry on the side. Sales meetings are revelry with some serious events on the side.

We started with Hawaiian shirts, which we were all asked to wear for the first day of the three-day meeting. This was to get us in the right spirit of accomplishment, since the most successful salespeople (the “All Stars,” as they are called) get to win an all-expense paid weeklong vacation to Hawaii at the end of the year. These All Stars represent the top 10% of the sales force, and attaining this ranking ensures that great stardom will accompany you everywhere you go. The difference in making an All Star versus winning a consolation cash prize for second place is measured in the tenths of a percentage point, which means that things get pretty competitive. It’s an interesting concept, and not one you see repeated too frequently in industry. Sure, there are performance appraisals that lead to higher bonuses, and some sort of chairman’s awards that lead to a desk display piece, but the prizes are generally not the kind that great memories can be made of.

This particular regional meeting opened with goody bags, Beach Boys music, and hula hoop concerts. I didn’t know anyone there other than my fellow trainees and the sales team that I had done some field travel with, but it seemed every other person was best friends with everyone else. There was a lot of hugging, high-fiving, and merriment for the first hour. Although the day eventually progressed to more serious discussions of the state of the business, things quickly got back on track towards the end with music and limbo contests. Yours truly decided to get into the spirit of things, but rapidly realized that a) I’m too tall to limbo, and b) I have zero hip flexibility. How cool would it be if other industries lightened up like this? Can you imagine a regional meeting of strategy consultants partying it up, with the managing partner teaching a group of junior consultants the finer points of hula-hooping? The world would be such a better place.

Although part of my brain is completely fried from all the training that I’ve been attending, the wiser part of me realizes that life is going to be different once out in the field for real (next week), and that I’ll be praying for the next sales event just so that I can wear a Hawaiian shirt again.

Throwdown on Church Street

2007-10-03T20:37:00.001-06:00

Saeeda and I have been diligently hunting for houses in the Chicago suburbs, while I've been in Sales training, . Although my Sales rotation will keep me downtown, it is only a matter of time before I am transferred back to HQ, which will then require a horrendous 2 hour commute (one way) from downtown Chicago. So we've been mostly concentrating on looking at places in the northern suburb of Evanston, from where both of our commutes are going to be manageable.

We taken our time, probably more so because of the great buyer's market that we're in right now. Home sellers are receptive to cutting prices, houses are staying on the market for months, and buyer are generally not competing for the same property. I say generally, because this past weekend it became clear to us how quickly things can change.

On Sunday Saeeda and I returned to a new housing development that we had first visited in July, just when we were starting our housing hunt. Located conveniently close to public transportation, this development on Church St. pushes up against the lower-income part of Evanston, and so our concern for this entire time has been whether this is going to be a good investment. This Sunday we wanted to revisit to see how much more construction had taken place, and what units were still available for sale.

The sales office was a zoo. There were prospective buyers everywhere, and the agent working that day was clearly overwhelmed. Luckily, we were one of the first people there, so we were able to corner the agent and ask most of our questions before he got pulled away by another lady. It quickly became clear to us that interest in this development had picked up significantly in the time that we had been exploring our options elsewhere in Chicago, so we decided to put down a reservation on one of the units. The reservation was a refundable amount of money that would simply enable us to spend 10 days to decide whether we wanted to put in a contract. So we pulled the selling agent away as soon as we got the option and told him of our decision. The agent gladly got us the forms, which we filled out and returned to him. At which point he turned a little pale.

Apparently the other lady that he had been attending to had decided to put down a reservation for the same unit. It was amazing how quickly our entire mindset changed. Faced with the prospect of losing a desirable property, we completely abandoned the laissez-faire attitude we'd had for the last three months. Panic set in. The agonizingly long debates that we'd had each night debating the pros and cons of the 30 or so properties we'd seen so far instantly became irrelevant. The list of top properties we had been considering for the last few weeks quickly whittled down to one - Church Street. We had to have this place.

Which is when our real estate agent stepped up her game and earned her keep many times over. Nancy had come recommended to us by a friend of mine, and had been the perfect complement to our easygoing attitude during our entire real estate hunt. Not pushy, always supportive, and a pleasure to be around, Nancy was more a nice older relative than real estate agent. But the moment she realized that there was going to be a rumble, and that some tough negotiating was called for, she transformed before our eyes.

With quiet, commanding authority, Nancy calmly told us to leave the sales center, as things could get ugly. She told us to immediately head home to retrieve our checkbooks - the reservation amount was completely refundable and it would give us an edge against the lady now looking to reserve the same property that we wanted. As I left the sales office, I could clearly hear the other lady begin to complain loudly upon learning that someone else wanted the house that she did.

The drive home to pick up our checkbook was an enlightening one. I realized that this whole time Saeeda and I had been suffering from option paralysis. Just the fact that we could take our time and look at all the houses that we wanted meant that we were stuck trying to figure out exactly what we wanted. Facing a high-pressure situation had quickly whittled down our options and forced us to make a decision, one that we had been agonizing over for months.

It took us 40 min. to return to the sales center, where we were met by Nancy - there was no sign of our competition and the house was ours to reserve. I would find out later that Nancy had negotiated quickly and efficiently to find flaws in the other lady's candidacy, and to instead promote our own. Faced with the option of picking, the builder's agent had decided to go with us. The relief was immense, as was the gratitude I felt for Nancy's ability to negotiate hard. I know I've learned this stuff in class, but theory is one thing and the practical reality of a situation is another completely.

Now begin the 10 days of making sure this is the perfect place for us. I wonder if we're going to wait until day 9 to make that final call...

I begin to understand

2007-09-21T19:46:00.000-06:00

Week three of sales training just ended, and all of us sales-reps-to-be head home for a week of regional field travel, where we'll get to visit actual physicians and practice the theory and techniques that we've been learning in class. I'm excited to finally use the Jedi mind tricks, and especially the cool Vulcan death grip, should a physician prove more stubborn than I expect.

Actually, there's been none of that in training at all. And therein lies the dilemma I am now facing. I'm starting to understand what this is all about. I'm starting to see how little I knew about the business of selling pharma, and how hard it really is. I'm starting to appreciate my fellow sales reps, and am beginning to be humbled in their presence - some of these people are tremendously hard workers, and care deeply about improving patient lives, even if it means facing up to an ignorant doctor. And that's the most surprising transformation of all for me. I'd never have used the word "ignorant" with the word "doctor" before, but a big part of the charisma and mythology surrounding physicians is turning to dust right before my eyes.

I'm starting to realize that there are a lot of doctors out there who stopped learning once they left med-school. That there are simply too many demands on a physician's time to keep up with all the research that can direct them to patients in the best manner possible. That even those doctors who got "C" grades in college and barely cleared their board exams truly believe that they know everything, but that I, a mere sales rep, am better informed about the cardiovascular disease state and the best cholesterol treatment algorithms.

I'm also beginning to see that somewhere along the way things went horribly wrong with the US healthcare system, and with the process of selling medicines. Sales techniques got out of hand, doctors began to abuse favors provided by the reps, and the reps began to bend over backward to provide the most unethical of benefits to physicians that were willing to prescribe their products. There is a reason we are hated and treated like dirt. But as with all systems that swing too far in one direction, there is a reversion to the mean. Abbott has a zero-tolerance policy and FDA oversight means that now there is no leeway for reps to do the things they used to be able to do (i.e., take doctors out on all expense paid cruises).

It'll take a while before our reputations are restored. And maybe one day this system of selling is going to have to be done away with completely. But for now this is how things are. And if I want to change any of it in the future, I must spend time in the ditches, learning the ropes.

This sales rotation is going to be more of an eye-opener than I ever thought that it would be.

Sales Training

2007-09-18T18:32:00.000-06:00

Ok, yes, so I've been bad about blogging for a while, but it's because I've been wrapped up in the excitement of starting a new job, and making sure I work hard to impress everyone. I must say, though, that at times I feel like I'm back in business school, which is disturbing. Allow me to elaborate.

Given that I've entered Abbott Labs's rotational program for MBA grads, I get to choose where to spend my first year-long rotation. The natural place to start is Sales, where you get to see at the most basic level how a pharma company generates sales for its products. However, this means swallowing a humility pill, and becoming one of the unwashed - a sales rep.

Yes, go ahead, stare - I don't mind. Really. Ok, well, just a little bit. Alright, I want you to stop staring now. Seriously.

I will agree that pharma reps generally generate the same warm fuzzy feeling that do used car salesman. When I told my cousin Ahmer, who is a doctor, what I would be doing for the next year, she flat out refused to believe that I had spent $150,000 on my education to get to this point (she then told me how much she hated sales reps - don't worry Ahmer, we're coming after you). For that matter, my father still doesn't completely know what I do (although he suspects - shhh, don't tell him). My friends know simply that I am in a rotational program. Finally, I myself have had to suppress major doubts before jumping into this situation. But slowly I am beginning to understand.

Part of this enlightenment has come from the last two weeks, where I have been sequestered in a hotel near Chicago, undergoing Sales training and cramming my head full of medical knowledge. Because I will be working with cholesterol medication, I've had to learn the ins and outs of cardiovascular diseases, their causes, their diagnoses, their treatment algorithms, and the competitive landscape. For eight hours a day I join fellow MBA grads to sit in class, listen to lectures, and study. And take exams. Which I have to clear at a 90% or better. I'm allowed to fail a test once, but I have to retake the test the next morning and pass at 90% or better. Or I'm fired.

When was the last time you felt pressure like that? When was the last time YOU scored a 90% on anything? I know mine. I was in 5th grade and I got a 95% on my math test. Heck, even scoring high wouldn't be that big a deal if it wasn't for the fact that my livelihood depended on it. I'm competitive, and studied hard to get an "A" just as much as my fellow student throughout my school years. But at the end of the day I could always go home even if ended up with a "B" grade. Not here buddy. This place isn't for the weak of heart. The pressure, as they say, has been on for two weeks. And I will be the first to admit that I failed my first test, but I will just as quickly add that I recovered, and passed the makeup test with flying colors. I also feel better knowing that fellow students also tripped just as I did - the picture below was surreptitiously captured on my cell phone camera, and shows the review session that was held for all those individuals who failed the first exam. As you can see, I am hardly alone (I have blurred faces to protect privacy, for now - you know who you are and you better play nice.)

Still, suffering through the equivalent of a semester of med school every week would be ok if it weren't for the other individuals in the class with me (in addition to the ten or so MBAs) - the 160 or so sales reps. I am surrounded by happy, energetic people. Type A personalities. Energy levels are so high that were anyone to consume ANY caffeine I'm convinced they would explode. Everyone applauds everyone else all the time. No instructor question ever goes unanswered. I am never left to myself, because someone is always approaching to engage me in a conversation. By the end of the first two weeks I have found myself withdrawing and becoming "the quiet guy." It's crazy. The whole situation is like being in b-school again, but with super-high energy, happy, energetic people who would put the competitive b-school type to shame.

It has, in other words, been a rough start.

Scones with a side of Saudi oil

2007-08-26T16:41:00.000-06:00

For the last big outing before they left for Pakistan, Saeeda and I decided to take my parents to high tea at the Peninsula hotel in downtown Chicago. Both Saeeda and I had wanted to sample their afternoon tea, after having done the same at their sister location in Hong Kong. Since my parents are big tea aficionados, we thought this would be a nice experience for everyone.

Although the hotel is tucked away on a side street off Michigan Ave., the interior of the hotel is beautiful, and is befitting of the "Peninsula" brand. Spacious, luxurious, and well appointed, it practically smacks you in the face with it's premiere status as you walk its halls. I found myself thinking if my clothes were expensive enough to be worn inside.

Tea was held in a grand ballroom space and was delicious. The china was fine, the scones perfectly warm, and the teas flavorful. The real fun that I had, however, was listening to conversations around us, one of which caught my attention the moment we sat down.

Soon after we had situated ourselves, several gentlemen in dark suits came and sat down beside us. There were three people of Arab origin, and one white gentleman, all four of whom spent some time exchanging pleasantries. About ten minutes into our tea, two more men joined the four - again, one was Arab, and the other white American. Through the discreet glances that I was able to steal, I could tell that all men were wearing the finest suits possible, and had lavish accessories to go along with them - Rolex watches, silk ties, gold tie-pins - the works. The two American men sat next to each other, and the four Arab men sat across from them.

It was clear to me that this was some sort of business meeting, and that a negotiation was about to take place between the Americans and the Arabs. After all, what better place to conduct business than over tea in a nice hotel, after which all parties can retire to their rooms and fly back to their places of origin the next day? It was the actual scale of the negotiation that blew me away. I soon began to hear snippets of conversation such as:

"We see a great future in a Saudi oil partnership"
"... that much money is going to have a significant impact on our liquidity, not to mention an effect on global markets..." (this from the two American gentlemen)
"... $2 billion ... " (the Arabs)
"... we can go no higher than ... [couldn't hear the rest]" (the Americans)

and so it went. It was really hard for me to concentrate on our own conversation, especially since this was the last time the four of us were going to be dining out together for a long time. The whole time I was thinking about the sheer amount of money that was about to change hands just a few feet from me. Who said that these things happened only on a golf course? Hogwash.

The men were still negotiating when we left, and it was all I could do to prevent myself from asking for their autographs as we walked by. After all, these guys are the real powerbrokers in our world.

It also got me thinking about what location I'd pick for my own business negotiations. I think golf is overrated, and I refuse to play the game. However, I do appreciate the concept of an athletic competition rather than tea for conducting business. So should I ever make it to the point where I need to buy or sell a company or two (or move $2 billion in global markets), I think I will do so by asking the other party out to the basketball court.

We'd start by shooting free throws, which is where I'd gauge their accuracy and general shooting form, from where we'd progress to a general shootaround. That's when I'd casually broach the topic at hand. Serious negotations wouldn't start until a game of 5-on-5. I would let my deputies hash out the details with their counterparts between plays. The heavy negotiating would take place between myself the other lead negotiator. I picture getting the ball in the low post, dribbling twice and saying, "your asking price is much too high; you're going to have to reconsider," and turning around to shoot over my man. Upon scoring (you actually think I'd miss?), I'd run back to my end of the court, giving my adversary time to compose his response. He'd dribble to his right, fake left, and dribble back to his right to drive to the basket for a layup. "This is our final offer," he'd say as he would leave the ground for a layup.

At which point I would jump from behind and swat his shot away. "I think it best that you reconsider," is all I'd say as the ball would fly out of bounds, with one of my deputies running to recollect it.

And so on it would go. So much more fun, no? Besides, it'd mean that I'd only ever negotiate with worthy physical adversaries. And after concluding a tough game of street hoops, THAT'S when we'd head for tea at the Peninsula.