I owe you one, Dubai!

Yes, I do!

It's incredible how spending 5 days outside my comfort zone, in the company of people I really enjoy, I have changed:

• I don't need to sleep with FRIENDS anymore. 5 days I was so exhausted I was collapsing in bed every night. And, now, suddenly, the dependence is gone! It could also be partly because I know someone broke up  with someone's girlfriend, but that is of 0.025% interest to my life. But, such a coincidence, right! I started with knowing about Little Miss Precious and I ended with knowing that Little Miss Precious is over - at least for now. 
• I really want to LIVE! And, LOVE! Unconditionally, fully, with all my soul. I want to love all that life has to offer! The dry leaves falling on my head as I take a walk down the road in the morning, the smell of the sea, checking out Brain Pickings in the morning, asking Vikram how if he had a shave there is still hair on his face :P, checking out the view from my super cool glass office, leaving early from work and marvelling at all the time that is available... everything! I want to live each day like I am living just 1 more day. I did it today - even had a happy-looking ragda pattice for lunch. And I am going to do it everyday!
• Friendship is FUN. Be it my Gunjie, be it the Whatsapp group, be it Vikram, be is all of L'Oreal LUXE, be it even Devashish and Bhavin... life is fun with friends! I love how Vikram and I can be such good friends - he is just one hell of a guy and some times, when he talks about travel and about music, I am just bowled over by how much I have to read, write and learn... And all those Mossad conversations hehe!... And, he knew all about Ray Bradbury and we actually had such a brilliant conversation today about the article I sent him - it is insane how 2 people can have such good FUN!

All in all, this is just one more post where I get to speak about how cool Vikram is .. except that it is masked as something else :P 

Ray Bradbury on Mars Exploration

So, I have landed on Brain Pickings on the day when my boss is not in town and when he asked me explicitly to chill out! So, here's what I fell passionately in love with when I chanced upon it. This is Ray Bradbury on space exploration. 

I think it’s part of the nature of man to start with romance and build to a reality. There’s hardly a scientist or an astronaut I’ve met who wasn’t beholden to some romantic before him who led him to doing something in life.

I think it’s so important to be excited about life. In order to get the facts we have to be excited to go out and get them, and there’s only one way to do that — through romance. We need this thing which makes us sit bolt upright when we are nine or ten and say, ‘I want to go out and devour the world, I want to do these things.’ The only way you start like that is with this kind of thing we are talking about today. We may reject it later, we may give it up, but we move on to other romances then. We find, we push the edge of science forward, and I think we romance on beyond that into the universe ever beyond. We’re talking not about Alpha Centauri. We’re talking of light-years. We have sitting here on the stage a person who has made the film* with the greatest metaphor for the coming billion years. That film is going to romance generations to come and will excite the people to do the work so that we can live forever. That’s what it’s all about. So we start with the small romances that turn out to be of no use. We put these tools aside to get another romantic tool. We want to love life, to be excited by the challenge, to life at the top of our enthusiasm. The process enables us to gather more information. Darwin was the kind of romantic who could stand in the middle of a meadow like a statue for eight hours on end and let the bees buzz in and out of his ear. A fantastic statue standing there in the middle of nature, and all the foxes wandering by and wondering what the hell he was doing there, and they sort of looked at each other and examined the wisdom in each other’s eyes. But this is a romantic man — when you think of any scientist in history, he was a romancer of reality.

On top of the world. Literally.

Picking Vikram up on his birthday. Spending the check-in line together. Celebrating his birthday at the airport. Whiling away a 3-hour flight with Shive - an Indophile who thinks she is the female incarnation of Shiva :D. A grand old man sipping Irish Bailey and grunting his way through our conversation. Getting a ride to the hotel in a... hold your breath... LIMO... and, while we are at it... a HUMMER LIMO :D Staying at Le Royal Meridien at Jumeira :D Taking in the desert safari with steely determination and then giving it all up at the roundabout and being ribbed about it, the combo of camel rides, sand boarding, belly dancing and dressing up as an Arab :D Spending the night with everyone lounging and drinking around Vikram's room. "The T-Shirt Thing". Getting the alarm set by him because, hello, we both have the same  phone! :D  "Room 613, okay, room 613." "I will drop Sowmya," when it was not really possible to even stand steadily :P

The grand BREAKFAST!! LUXE lessons. Dubai Mall. Dior. Oh, Dior! Mango Tree. The world's biggest fountains. The second song. The rum and coke. The world's tallest building. At.Mosphering. 442. "Have mine." 1 coaster for Rs. 800 = souvenir! :P

The GRAND breakfast!  A walk by the cleanest beach ever! The Mall of the Emirates. Barasti. Beach. Dancing at midnight! Being propositioned by random strangers! The mad rocks :D Mohitos. All the eyeing!

Dubai Marina and breakfast by the boats. All the eyeing, again! Old Dubai! Bank of BAR because the ODA was not lit up, haha! The SOUK. Metro stations that looked like malls. Jumeira Medinath. Deciding what to drink from the tantalizing choices in the tantalizing playing-with-fire deeply-exciting few minutes before we got pulled up. And, yet, "The T-Shirt Thing" again. Unguardedly being upset at not being taken to Old Dubai on day 3.The gentlest of gestures to display consideration.

Sports bar. The big  black gift bag. "I can't see Sowmya." "Vikram, you seem to be missing us."

Ah, sigh. Vacation thrills! \m/

...And, yes, the first stamp on my passport! :D

Pillion Riding on the Bike

Two L'Oreal LUXE boys. One bike. One with helmet, one riding pillion. Honking loudly as they pass by us. "Aey, watch where you're going!" "Ah, I am  more afraid for the pillion rider." Pillion rider overhears. Pillion rider starts slapping the driver on his helmet like on horse-back. (!!!!!) :D Mad laughter.

Work-place camaraderie. \m/

Elevator Race

Two elevators. Both sliding open nearly at the same time. Eye contact. "Race you!" Jumping into the opposite elevators. Hurrying the liftman to go faster. Reaching first! Leaping out! "Ha!" :D

Albino Onion and the Elevator Shaft That Wouldn't Close

I promised myself I will start writing, so that I will have something to look back upon.

I thought I will start reading and commenting and opinionating on things that matter to me and enjoy a fullbloom Sowmyaissance. :P But, I have come to the conclusion that talking about albino onions is just more fun.

There is a little mom and pop store on the main road where my office is. The store sells only onions and potatoes. So when Vikram and I were searching for an interesting lunch place today, we peeked into this store and laughed at how it was ONLY onions and potatoes. And... "White onions!" So,  what are white onions? I love white onions - I think they are the juiciest of all the onions, especially when sprinkled with lime juice. We started wondering why onions are white. We will google  rates for a hot-air-balloon over the Arabic desert. But, on why onions are white? Nope! I think doing a Google search absolutely kills the joy of not knowing. And, we are not the types to google why onions are white. Imagine the fun to be had with wherever our minds take us! So, he said, "Why are they so white?  Do you think they are Albino Onions? Imagine they must have been born without the pink pigment or something... Albino Onions!" And as an aside, he added "I'll probably shorten them to Albinonions." Heee! :D

I marvel at the absolute nothingness in this conversation. And, this is why I don't write. Because I don't just report, but analyze. Ah, when will I learn? :D

Anyway!

P.S. Hi, regular readers! How have you been! :D

The Elevator Shaft That Wouldn't Close Will Be Written Tomorrow. Ooks? Ooks!