Aggh.

Aggh. Just aggh.

Thats all I got to say. Why, you may ask is all that I have to say is aggh? Why, you may ask is there is nothing other than aggh for me to say? And why, you may ask am I unwittingly saying other things than aggh when I specifically said that aggh was all I had to say thus contradicting my first statement about aggh?

I suppose I could say its because just this saturday (20 september) after iftar, a dumptruck filled with RDX and TNT just happened to drive up to the Marriot hotel in Islamabad in pakistan and blow it to kingdom come leaving 60 people dead and a massive crater in the ground about the size of mexico. All this during Islam's holiest month.

Or I suppose I could say that its because Asif Ali Zardari, the worst, most corrupt, and most useless politician in paki history (second to his deceased wife of course) won 281 out of 426 valid votes during the recent presidential elections. (Actually scratch that, he's not really much of a politician either). I'm sad to say this but it looks like its the end of pakiland. Wait, what am I saying. It IS the end of pakiland. RIP.

Or I suppose I could say that after the pakistani electorial dissapointment, that I thought I could count on looking forward to the upcoming US presidential elections.......



...........But alas. To no avail my friends.



Everybody seems to be rooting for Obama. But to be honest in the end there isnt gonna be any substantial difference between him and McCain in regards to foreign policy. Same old useless tactics. Same old AIPAC and zionist lobby ass kissing. Its pretty much down to which of the two lesser evils gets the highest number of votes.

I'm not even sure if I should bother voting this time. The last time I was able to vote, Bush and Kerry were in the hotseats and it was pretty much a no-brainer then. So much that I didnt even bother voting for Ralph Nader (the preferred candidate amongst most of my friends anyways). Eh what the hell. If we as a religious faith are gonna suffer and be marginalized anyways then I might as well put in my two cents and root for the democrats and feel happy that I made the right choice (hardy har har). And besides, anything from getting that self-righteous hypocritical biatch Sarah Palin getting to be vice president.

At least Obama is making an effort to emphasize the withdrawal of troops from Iraq and decreasing the influence the lobbyists. Yessssssss finally! At least somebody has finally said something about those snivelling little bastards. This is definitely a step forward. I guess I might vote after all.



So yea maybe this is why I have nothing to say other than aggh. Aggh aggh aggh aggh. Aggh all the live long day.

hapyp bierthday

Well it was my bday on thursday making me a whopping quarter of a century old. I wasn't really in a celebratory mood but my family took me out to eat anyways. I don't like having birthday parties for myself because I hate being the center of attention. 

Anyways heres a couple of interesting things that have happened in the past on my birthday September 18.

In 1573 - Spain attacked Alkmaar which was a city in the netherlands.  (Huh jeez thats nice)

In 1873 - The Panic of 1873 begins. (How about that)

In 1885 - Riots break out in Montreal to protest against compulsory smallpox vaccination. (oh boy)

In 1939 - William Joyce's first Nazi propaganda broadcast. (this just keeps getting better and better)

In 1970 - Jimi Hendrix dies in London (nooo not jimi !)

In 1982 - Christian militia begin killing six-hundred Palestinians in Lebanon. (you gotta be kidding me)

In 2001 - First mailing of anthrax letters from Trenton, New Jersey in the 2001 anthrax attacks. (nothing like some anthrax on a birthday to spice things up)

Well that was just wonderful. I feel so much more better now. 

Go fish!

Ramadan always seems brings out a deep seated animalistic hunger in people. Near around iftar time you can't help but notice how people sit around and wait, eyeing the meal before them like potential prey which has been caught unaware. Stalking from afar, the hungry predators watch for the right time to pounce. The right time........ to go in for the kill.

Anyways here's a quick and deliciously scrumptious recipe for baked fish fillet that I had to beg (literally) to get from my mother. Now before you all start whining like a bunch of poverty stricken poster children for testosterone poisoning, allow me to say that I have personally taste tested it, and despite being fish, it is actually really really good.

And I'm sure you will enjoy it too. Unless you screw it up. Then thats your fault.

Baked fish fillet

You can get boneless fish fillets from your nearest grocer or super, hyper, ultra, mega (etc) market. Take them home and wash the fish fillets with water (and if you're really adventurous, with detergent too). Leave them aside and prepare the marination.

Before you start, make sure you pre-heat your oven. Turn it on to 350 degrees C.

Next thing is to prepare the marination. Take a big bowl and mix the following ingredients:

• 3 - 4 tablespoons of white vinegar
• 1 tablespoon of any powdered fish or seafood seasoning
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
  
• 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
• 1 tablespoon powdered cocaine ( just kidding)

Note: This is enough for ONE fish fillet only. If you have more fish then make more marination. You can adjust the ingredients accordingly to your taste.

Marinate the fish fillets and leave them in the bowl for about 10 minutes (or for 1 day if you're really hardcore).

During this time fetch a baking tray/pan/whatever and grease the inside with 1 tablespoon of olive oil or any cooking oil you prefer. Take the fish fillets and place them length-wise in the tray. Depending on the size of your baking tray, fit as many fish fillets as you can as long as theres a little space in between them.

Pop them into the oven and bake for around 30 minutes or until they look somewhat dry. And presto! You have some deliciously mouth-watering baked fish which not only tastes good but is healthy as well. Now you can eat it by itself, in a sandwich, or hell you can bring out the bedouin in you and have it with some ruz bokhary. Serve with a glass of chilled ice lemon tea.

Next week I'll tell you how to make delicous octupus & liver eggplant pie.

Sa7tain

Ramadan Kareem

Ho ho ho! Tis the season to be jolly, fa la la la la laaa............oh wait. Whoops wrong holiday. Anyways I wish everyone has a peaceful and prosperous month.

Just try not to get too fat ok.

Driving in saudi arabia Part 2

If any of you were around long enough to remember my post about driving and drivers in saudi arabia you will undoubtedly understand that traffic in this country is a huge problem. Well since my last post Ive come across a host of new types of drivers of whom I'd like to discuss.

The Line-rider: This guy learned nothing about driving on a road from the little that is taught in driving school. Is under the impression that the white lines dividing the road are in fact the lanes themselves. So he drives over the line making sure to keep it within the tires of his car. These guys are completely oblivious to the great amount of honking generated by other drivers.

The Player: Ever watched a game of american football? Where players run and dodge opponents in order to reach the other side? Well considering most young shabab are crazy about soccer, these type of drivers have been watching the wrong sports channel. Think of this guy as the younger unmarried version of The Camel Jockey. Not only do these guys not look when they turn in from an intersecting street, but act like that any ensuing mishaps resulting thereof is invariably the other teams fault. In the event of an accident will either phone his daddy or every friend on his mobile phone's contact list.

The Bus: These big and gentle giants are unfortunately very annoying. Not only are they slow but they take up a whole lane forcing its giant metal ass to take up your whole front view. If you end up being in the unfortunate situation of heavy traffic with a bus in front of you then you will also have to endure breathing heavy exhaust smoke filtering through your car's air-conditioning system.

The Truck: Very similar to a bus however unlike the bus these come in a variety of wonderful forms such as:

The dumptruck. The waste disposal truck. The garbage truck. The people's truck. The water transportation truck. The toxic or potentially dangerous chemical/substance truck.

Either way if you're behind a truck on a road it would be advisable to move immediately. Or you might end up getting some strange substance on the front hood of your car...

And last but not least...

The Pedestrian: Somehow its ingrained in our DNA to be idiots. Why oh WHY don't people use the overhead walkway bridges instead of just stumbling across the roads like they've got a bad case of diarrhea? Some of these people have a death wish. Standing in the middle of the road it makes one think if they actually want cars to turn them into squishy little smears on the asphalt..

Exit musharraf

Well it was going to happen sooner or later. I really don't know if I should feel glad or dissapointed. You see despite the fact that Pervez Musharraf made it a point to ally himself with the US and other pro-western forces, and despite the fact that this was basically the reason why most pakis were unhappy with him, and despite the fact he wasn't democratically elected after staging a coup ousting the then prime minister Nawaz sharif in 1999, he is in my opinion much much MUCH better than the ass-hats now vying to take his place.

Asif Zardari and Nawaz Sharif (again?)?? Are you frikken kidding me?? Two of the most corrupt and useless politicians in paki history? The very fact that Musharraf ousted Nawaz sharif was exactly BECAUSE of clowns like Zardari and Sharif. Not only do these two not care about anyone else except their greedy selves, but have proven in the past to be totally incompetent when it comes to running a country. I would have been ok with musharraf's resignation if the current presidential candidates were actually sane people looking to finally set the record straight with pakistan's messed up past.

Ok yes I know Musharraf kicked out a bunch of high level judges last year and he tried to censure the country's media following that fiasco, and he imposed a nationwide state of emergency, and he toyed around with the constitiution a bit, but to be honest he is probably the most honest and uncorrupt high-level government leader that pakistan has seen since maybe Muhammad Ali Jinnah himself.
At least he managed to open up the paki economy to foreign investment which in '99 was almost negligible and encourage industrialization, which I should add is far far more than Zardari or Sharif have ever accomplished in the past.

Its left to be seen what the future of pakistan holds, but if you ask me they've taken a major step backward.

Cats

soundtracked by: Al Stewart - "Year of the cat"

I know what you're thinking. As you scroll down you're expecting to see a couple of pics of some cute furballs and possibly a hand or two stroking one of their fuzzy heads. Well nothing could be further from the truth.

This post isnt about why I like cats. Its about why they're so annoying. You see I have this backyard. And the only thing in this backyard are......my 11 cats. Yes I have 11 cats (well technically 3 cats and 8 kittens) running around my backyard.
I've noticed that cats are just like homeless people.

You give them food once, they come back asking for more.

They try to become your pal when you really don't wanna know them.

They're always raiding the trash cans 3 or 4 times a week.

And they pretty much plop down and sleep anywhere they want. Like on the side of the street or in the middle of the park. The only difference is cats can give themselves baths and homeless people can't.

Plus they use their cute fuzzy exteriors to induce sympathy amongst people in order to manipulate them into giving them food. Homeless people don't have fuzzy exteriors. And even if they did it wouldnt be cute.

------------------------------------------------------

So anyways when a guy has a cat it tends to be a sort of a father-child relationship. You have to take care of the cat, feed it expensive cat food (btw those bastards at the supermarket raised the price of whiskas again), and provide it a place to sleep...just like a child. The good news is at least you dont have to potty train it.

Now, the 10 of my 11 cats are the result of my three-legged cat called Gato. Yea she's been sleeping around the neighborhood alot. Now as a 'father' this sort of presents an upsetting situation. First of all the cat that you've been nurturing for all these years, one day decides to get up, go out the door and disappear for like a month. You don't know where she is and what she's doing, and even if she's alive and well. And then just like that BOOM she returns back pregnant with a kid (or kids). Now what do you say to this cat? You can't yell at her because the poor thing is pregnant and all emotional and what not, and besides its not like she really listened to you much anyways to begin with.
And thus this leads to the birth of a whole batch of new furballs and then the nightmare starts to repeat itself. This is also compounded with the fact that you have to deal with your friends making inappropriately perveted jokes like "So dude...which pussy you gonna feed tonight?" (wink wink).

Now you might simply say...well gee don't keep a cat if you don't wanna have to deal with all that. But apparently theres an upside to a guy having a cat....

....Women love cats.

(well except for Sous and Pinkish's sister)

So therefore if a guy has a cat, women will automatically like you. And even IF women don't like you they'll still wanna see your cat, which means they'll be around you alot resulting in the likelihood of them possibly hooking up with you. So it pretty much works out in the end.


So why am I still single? Damn cats.

Tagged by a whole bunch of people.

Oh wait a minute. I'm a guy. I don't do tags.

Oh well. Maybe next time.


suckers :)

Arabic blunder # 3

Don't you just hate it when people drive up to you when you've stopped at a red light, ask you for directions and you don't know what the hell they're talking about?
You see people ask me for directions ALL the time when im out driving. And I mean ALL the frikken time. I dunno is it the way I look or something? Do I exude some kinda superficial charm that I'm unaware of? Is there some kinda sign that makes people think "oh gee you know what I think i'll ask him, he looks like he knows everthing" ?? WTF man

Anyways this was back when I just got my driver's license after spending 2 weeks in that shitty excuse of a driving school (and people wonder why saudis can't drive). So its a hot summer night and I'm ready to go out somewhere. I stop at a red light and lo and behold a white landcrusier driven by some saudi in his 40's (as usual) pulls up next to me. He pulled down his window and motions to me. So being the good natured idiot that I am I pulled down my window to hear what he had to say. This is what ensued:

Him: Hala ya shabab. T3aref wen Abqaiq?

Now this was before I even knew any of the other cities in shargeya besides dhahran, khobar and dammam. I can't say "maafi maloom" again because I already tried that and I'm not afghani. So while trying to think of something to say I see across the road a bakery with the name "Bayt al Cake" in arabic. I dunno what happened but all of sudden I made this instant connection with "abqaiq" and "bayt al cake". So thinking I'm a genius I say with a smile on my face:

Me: Cake? Aha! Shoof cake hinak (pointing to the bakery)

The guy stares at the bakery for a minute and then looks back at me as if I was the strangest looking creature he had ever seen.

Him: Aghollak wen abqaiq. Ma t3aref?

Me: *shrugs* uhh la2.

Him: Tab gol hada! Ish feek? *drives off in a huff*

Of course now that I know lots of arabic if anyone asks me wheres abqaiq is I'll just say "Up your ass thats where you mofo! Ask somebody else!".

laterz.

Checklist

Things I need to do this summer:

1. Practice using 3D studio max

2. Practice graffiti

3. Improve my guitar skills

4. Join a band

5. Lose some weight

6. Work out at the gym

7. Get laid (im kidding)

8. Get drunk (im kidding again)

9. Get high (ok i'll stop)

10. Brush up on my illustration and graphic design skills

11. Somehow get the Unreal Tournament 3 engine and map editor (along with the game)

12. Study through the big textbook on architectural sustainability issues.

13. Check out everything the library in the jam3ah has on "Anamorphism".

14. Start writing story and developing concept and character designs for graphic novel.

15. Start developing character designs for future 3D animated episodes.

16. Get a job.

17. Get a life.

18. Get a woman! Oh Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa! lol


.....Its gonna be a busy summer. I gotta get ready for those two interviews too. Wish me luck!

Its Friday the 13th

No wonder I don't feel so good.

Speaking of which, when that happens I usually go on youtube and watch the music vid for that song "hulm romancy" by hamad al amri al wasmi or whatever his face is called.
I dunno theres something upbeat about that song, makes you feel like its Eid all over again. And of course I just find something hilarious about two grown men singing about the wet dream they had, and not to mention the group of women wearing white gowns in the vid showcased like they were a herd of sheep wandering around the place. Ahahahaha sweet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtIyH_OBFgA

Fool of a took!

Soundtracked by Nine Inch Nails - "Just like you imagined"

"And thus I, Ren_crow aka Rys-Raziel returned back from the precipice of madness. The long absence from the blogosphere had destroyed me as I surely had perished in the darkness of the deep abyss (university)...................yet I lived! And now at this dire hour of need I must relinquish my presence furthermore (until mid june)..........so that I may henceforth learn and prosper............and not become an unwitting pawn to the foul machinations of life insurance scams, overtly priced tech accessories, and assholes (uni professors)."


See you after the semester. Wish me luck.

Arabic blunder # 2: "maafi maloom"

Back in the day when my arabic wasnt as sophisticated as it was now, i usually picked up on anything I heard. After hearing the bengali workers constantly using the word "maafi maloom", I thought that this was basically what I should say whenever I dont know anything. Unfortunately i would frequently end up getting into stupid situations like this:

*walking down the street in the university housing area*
Lady: Ya shabab! T3al dageega...

Me: *walks over* n3m

Lady: T3aref wen makaan "Al-hayel ferdaws"?

Me: uhhhh *thinks for a while* hmmm hayel ferdaws.......wallahi maafi maloom.

Lady: Huh? Maafi ish? Ish gult?

Me: Maafi maloom hayel ferdaws.

Lady: Maafi maloom?

Me: Eywa

Lady: .......inta afghani?

Me: .............


And no i'm not afghani just in case you were wondering. Close, but no.

Arabic blunder # 1

I only just realized today that I've been saying "abgha saksouka" instead of "abgha shakshouka" to the cashier guy sitting in my local mat3am in the mornings. No wonder he's been looking at me strange all year. How embarresing.

Felicity

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hc4gL1zusoQ

Hehe i remember watching this show back in 10th grade. Kind of made me think of what exactly would happen if I got into college or grad school. Would I go through the kind of things felicity went through? Now that I AM in that stage I realized its not as dramatic as I thought it would have been like, in context with friends, ex BF's (non-existent GF's in my case), and her problems with choosing the right college major (hint: Do NOT take pre-med. You'll just break up with the love of your life, proceed to cut your hair off and look like some dumb english school teacher from those black & white Charlie Chaplin films).
Then again who am I to say that if I had gone to college in the states instead that I wouldnt be going through that kind of drama?

........ok thats just starting to sound a little too girly-ish for my comfort. I think i'll grow a beard.

I'm not dead. Just fried like a zombie.

Ok before I say anything i'd like to say:

1. Eid Mubarak
2. Merry Christmas
3. Happy new year 2008!!!!!!!!!!!!
4. Krispy Kreme finally opened here in shargiya
5. Happy Mother's day
6. Happy Valentines day.......actually scratch that, its a bullshit holiday
7. Happy Easter
8. I got married :) .......................



...................yea April Fools ya fools!

Anyways, my new semester started in February, and so has my senior project. Which is why i havent been on the blogs much. Which is a really lame excuse because ive been spamming the hell out of facebook. But you get my drift right?
This is my second last semester and the last semester in which i have my studio classes. One more semester and I will graduate and be officially outta here!

Summer, Bahrain, Procrastination

Didn't think not blogging for 4 months would have left these many cobwebs on my blog. But anyways, Yes the one and only Mr. Ren is back from the dead..........yet again.......mwahaha (hust trying to ghet into the halloween mood here). You're just gonna have to blame facebook for this. I'm innocent.

Well alot of stuff has happened and come to pass since my last post. Namely the summer training/internship/torture that I managed to survive through. Ok it wasnt torture, but it wasnt as great as I thought. I got into a design office in Khobar called VADO which stands for Vision Architectural Design Office. Lol no shit? Even though its not the largest design office, it however does recieve most of the commercial projects in Al-Shargiya. They were also the ones who designed the landscaping for Khobar corniche & Dammam corniche. so that was kinda cool. The general manager/head architect was a pretty decent guy. A bit demanding at times, but in general he was nice.
However its not the work, or the amount of work which bothered me......its just the actual sitting in an office for like 10 hours for 5 or 6 days a week (depending on the work load) which bugged me. It is SOO boring. I cant stand it. I was destined to move and wander around (as is explicitly apparent from the meaning of my arabic name, which unknown to my parents who gave it to me in the first place, is what I would be doing for the latter part of most of my life).

Tres creepy, non?

Anyways besides the internship, my summer was also the season for Bahrain! Im sure alot of people have heard of the notoriusly amusing stories of saudi shabab going to bahrain and getting drunk or harassing girls. Well this is where it all happens.
Of course I dont go to get drunk. I dont drink, nor do I plan on drinking. I go for what most guys I know go for. The Movies ;)
And since I live in Khobar, it takes like what......40-60 minutes maximum to drive there? Which is why its usually reserved for a weekend thing. Though one must be careful. It does take its toll on your bank account.........as I so unabashedly found out.

Procrastination should be categorized as a degenerative disease. Seriously. Its one thing to be lazy, but its a totally other thing when you're scrambling to finally do assignments like an hour before its due because you were too dumb to do it in the 2 weeks that you had *grumbles*.
I really need to start praying more taraweeh. Now that we finally got our ramadan vacations starting since yesterday, I should have no problems praying the extra mile. Hope everybody's ramadan is going well. Inshallah you will gain great barakah from this most holiest of months. Why, if you like i'll even make du'aa for all of you. Yes I'm that nice.

*waits patiently for someone to send baklawah to his house for iftar*

Its all about science, mom!

Mom: Just look at your room! Its a mess!

Me: Hey, Its not that bad

Mom: Not that bad?! Astghfirullah! You're a senior college student and you can't even take care of yourself?

Me: Hey i'm a busy guy. Besides, its just a couple of shirts and jeans on the bed...and my desk and chair but thats all. No problem.

Mom: Oh? And for what reason do we have closets?

Me: Because it's a good place to store my guitar?:p

Mom: No sir, so you can hang your clothes nice and properly instead turning them into cloth balls like this *points to random bundle of clothes on the bed*

Me: Its not like anyone is gonna see. Nobody comes into my room anyways.

Mom: So what about when you get married? Whats your wife gonna say when she sees you cant even keep yourself tidy?

Me: Uhmm err ahh *quickly tries to change subject* actually theres a scientific reason for why my room is messy.

Mom: Like what...

Me: I rememeber reading in my high school physics book about the Law of Entropy. It says that disorder is the natural state of the universe. Anything that is in order will eventually turn to disorder. So theres really no point in cleaning up my room because it'll just get messy all over again. I can show you the chapter in the book if you like.

Mom: .............that is the dumbest thing I ever heard. Who made up that theory?

Me: Uhmm I'm not sure. Cant rememeber.

Mom: Yea he must have been a slob just like you. Now fix up this room!

------------

So the moral of the story is..........well actually there is no moral. Basically I'm a junkie.

Hail the procrastinator

soundtracked by Sarah Mclachlan - fallen

OKAY so yea i know said i was gonna update my blog over the weekend. But as always something came up and I had to.......hey whoa! *dodges crowd of angry stick waving blog readers* ....stop! take it easy! Gimme a break already.

Actually I didnt even know I had fans. I personally think my blog is full of useless crap not worth reading......but theres actually people who LIKE reading it. I know it sounds crazy, but its true! Hmm I suppose this is somehow the remainder of an unbalanced equation inherent to the programming of my blog. It is truely the eventuality of an anomaly, which despite my sincerest efforts I have been unable to eliminate from what is otherwise a harmony of architectural precision. While it remains a burden assiduously avoided, it is not unexpected, and thus not beyond a measure of control. And the reason which has led you, inexorably, here.


Yea whatever


Anyways last week was horrendous. I had to prepare for my final presentation for my project. So being the genius I am (emphasis on genius) I ended up working almost 3 days straight without sleep (however i managed squeeze in 3 hours of sleep somewhere along the line), and I STILL didnt get everything done. Damn im good. Hail the procrastinator indeed.If only you could have seen me during that 3 day period. Ahh yes I was a blubbering blurry-eyed unshaven greasy-haired mess of a monkey.
I need as much practice as i can get with my last studio project for the semester because of the fact that I'll be doing my internship/training this summer. And I dont wanna screw up. Unfortunately......due to the inherent unbalanced equation i mentioned above, screwing up may be unavoidable....and thus inevitable.

Speaking of screwing up...ive been feeling pretty screwed up lately. For the first time in a very long time, ive started to feel.........lonely. I guess being a good unfoolish little boy for the past 7 years is seriously starting to take its toll on me. Besides, is it me.....or do girls in this country like u as long ure some fugly chain-smoking crazy assed lunatic? Well apparently it seems that way. What does a man have to do to socialize but still keeping his dignity intact? He stays on the internet 24/7 thats what he does lol. I guess the problem is i'm not like those desperate guys who are always looking for some relationship in order to keep them to mentally stable (unlike some guys i know:p).

I know ure probably thinking "well gee thats a good thing!". But the hard truth is that those half-assed shabab that go running around after girls....are the ones that eventually hook up with some. I'm sort of a loner by nature. U know...like in those movies. The only thing is, in the movies they're either reluctant heroes or complete psychos:I personally think dating is kinda....corny. Of course I wouldnt know anything about it cuz I havent been in one, but u know...u can make an educated guess.

======================================================

Spider-man 3 opened up this week in theaters across the states! How many of you actually used to read the comic books before the movies came out? I know I did. Hmm i'll make a note of driving to bahrain on one of these weekends...

On a serious note, I want to give my condolences to the family of the people who were killed in Virginia Tech last month. I remember visiting Blacksburg occaisonly as a kid because my dad was doing his phD at VT at the time. Seriously sucks how people can just get up and murder a while lot of people because they think their life sucks. Deal with it!

Anyways verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose so I will thus bid you all adieu.

Oh btw, rememeber I said I would show u all my dubai pics? Well uhhh....due to a technical problem it seems that............... *dodges crowd of angry sword wielding blog readers* will you all just chill out? I have some other pics to show you. For all the people who know me on facebook, this is will be nothing new. But for the sake of the crazy sword wielding bloggers, I have generously provided the link to my photo album on facebook. Enjoy!

enter your doom

Dude I love your shirt

Well well well guess where I was off to during this past weekend(thats Thursday and Friday in Saudia just in case u didnt know)? The one and only Dubai!
What was i doing in dubai u ask? Why i was getting ready to attend the Dubai Desert Rock Festival, the first day which took place on friday(Mar 9th). One word: AWESOME!

The line-up for the first day was Junkyard Groove, Lauren Harris, Mastodon, In Flames, Stone Sour, The Prodigy, and the one and only Iron Maiden! Of course if u're female the chances of you knowing any of these bands is highly slim, even though given that there were tons of girls at the concert.
But dont worry ladies, all your lame sappy bands were on the second day mainly being Robert Plant, The Bravery, Prime Circle, and Incubus(Ok ill make an exception with incubus).

Anywayz, it was me and four other guys, A and N who were friends in uni and the fourth guy Z who was their friend from Riyadh. We decided to not to take a plane to dubai cuz they were on a tight budget as it is so we made a plan to drive there in A's car which was btw a stylish nifty Saab 93 convertible. Oh yeaaa. A bit cramped but it was alright.
I was the one who made the hotel arrangements. I never realized just how expensive Dubai could be until i started hotel shopping. Cuz the room prices were nutz! Fortunately I booked through a travel agent and he found us a better deal than I could ever find on the net.

We decided to leave early on Thursday morning and after a 5 hours of driving and blaring heavy metal music on the car stereo, we reached the UAE border checkpoint. We could have gotten there sooner if we didnt get stopped along the way by some idiot cop. We werent even speeding or anything. Eventually we had to follow him to some dumb police station in the middle of nowhere where we discovered that him and the police chief of that station were the only two people there!
When we asked the chief why we were stopped he didnt give us an immediate answer. Eventually he made up some excuse about us not respecting police officers on duty, after which he let us go. But we figured out why they stopped us. They were just plain bored outta their skulls.

Anywayz we reached the border checkpoint and after doing the necessary arrangements we were finally allowed into UAE. We still had a good 4 hours drive ahead of us to Dubai. At that point it really didnt look too much different from Saudia (except more cleaner). 4 hours later we finally reached the outskirts of Dubai only to discover that we had just gotten ourselves stuck in a traffic jam on Shiekh Zayed road! Dammnit!
We must hav stayed for like an hour just on that road. At least one of us was having fun. N was busy pointing out all the "muzaas" in the surrounding cars lol. Welcome to dubai ya wierdo.

So we finally got outta the jam but our journey was far from over. We still had to find the damn hotel! The name of of the hotel was the Grand Moov hotel on Moqqarabaat st. in Rigga district. Or at least that was what was written by the travel agent. So after an hour of driving around asking clueless indian taxi drivers ("Gaaraanda mooov hotel? ahh yes u take right turn here*he was pointing left*), I remembered I had a phone number so I gave them a ring. I discovered first of all it's not on Moqqarabat St, its on Rigga street! The dumb travel agent got the address mixed up!

Eventually we found our way to the hotel and were pleasantly surprised to find out that even though its a 3-star hotel, it looked like a 4-star or even 5-star! What a relief. It must have been around midnight that we finally settled in and we decided to go out and eat something. fortunately there were loads of restaurants nearby at walking distance. Some were already closed but a few were opened. We decided to go eat at Nando's, after which we went over and ate some ice cream at Haagen Daz.

The next morning we got up and and got ready. Today was the big day, the day of the concert bwahahaha! We checked out of the hotel and drove our way to the Mall of Emirates. Man that place is freakin huge! We went guitar shopping for a while and then had lunch at the food court over there. Now the time had finally come. We had to make our way to the Dubai Country Club. So we drove there with the roof of A's convertible car drawn back enjoying the great weather.

The concert started with Junkyard Groove and then Lauren Harris as opening acts. Eventually as the other bands started playing things started getting rowdy with guys moshing like crazy. I was in the crowd near the front and it started getting hectic! I was getting squashed like a bug. People even starting throwing bottles of water and cans of beer up into the air. I must have gotten like 20 cans of beer spilled over my shirt because of that:S
Speaking of beer, what kinda dissapointed me was seeing guys who i KNOW are from saudi guzzling down beer by the bucketloads. Fortunately the guys I was with werent like that.
Eventually Mastodon came up, and then In Flames, followed by Stone Sour and then The Prodigy. Needless to say the crowd went nutz.
Last but not least Iron Maiden came up, the headliners of the concert. The singer was a really nice guy. They finished and left the stage but the crowd kept shouting for more. So they came back and played not one, not two but three extra songs! how about that eh? Up the Irons!

Oh btw. Three different people came up to me and told me they liked my shirt and thought it was awesome. Lol huh? I dont know what was up with that. I was wearing a black t-shirt with the new "Tool 10,000 days" logo which I bought in the states during the summer (Tool is the name of a band, "10,000 days" being their latest album).