Switching LAND

Hong Kong to Auckland. Cathay Pacific. I should thank S of admin department for opting Indian vegetarian food for me. No Hindi movie in the onboard entertainment system. I watched the few episodes of Friends and Just for Laughs Gags repeatedly. It was nice to have a gentleman who laughs aloud, without any inhibition, at Just for Laughs Gags, seated next to me. He told me that I can find people who call themselves Kiwis all over New Zealand, but I need to visit the zoos if I want to see the actual Kiwis. He also recommended Kiwifruits.

Auckland. It is now the end of Summer here. They say that over a quarter of New Zealand’s population is in Auckland and that it is heavily populated. Heavily populated?? They must be joking. I guess they haven’t seen Madras or other Indian cities. If Auckland is heavily populated, Madras is heavierly populated.

I don’t know why, but I tend to compare the two ‘pardes’ – Netherlands and New Zealand at every possible point. Netherlands is a flat land. Auckland is bumpy, full of steeps and slopes. Auckland has new and modern looking buildings, while The Hague has a mixture of new and old buildings. Bicyclists are very rare in Auckland (Should be because of its bumpiness). Compared to Europe, fewer people smoke in Auckland (Thank God!). Public transportation service in Netherlands is much better compared to Auckland. Be it Netherlands or New Zealand, Indians are everywhere.

I couldn’t find my favourite cereals, fruit juices and hair gels here. TV channels available at the appartment are very few. No CNN and no BBC. Very few sitcoms and movies. The complete collections of Friends and Ally Mc Beal that I got from Netherlands are in Pondicherry. I didn’t even open those cute DVD boxs. I didn’t try out the functionalities of the new DVD Recorder properly. Shinoj laughs his head off whenever we stumble upon the topics of my DVD collections and DVD Recorder. And here I am, in workload that is neck-deep, in a technology I have very little knowledge about. Damn.

NetherLANDs... New ZeaLAND... AuckLAND... Too many lands, isn’t it?

Rasthe mein...

Singapore. A Tamil Nadu outside Tamil Nadu!!?? Read a lot about it at Sayesha's bar. Changi Airport. As I had heard from colleagues, the airport does look great.

Voice-inside-my-head: "What on earth are you doing here in front of the computer??? Saw the free internet access spot and started blogging... Go around and see a bit of the airport before you take your connecting flight".

Next Destination - Hong Kong. There I would have just an hour and a half to board into the next flight.

Heard @ Cafeteria

Cafeteria is where I get to hear all sorts of freaky tales.

Colleague1: “This happened during my early days with the organization. There was this guy, Veeru, seated next to me. We were good buddies. One morning I got a call at my extension. The caller asked for Veeru. It was well inside working hours and Veeru hadn’t turned up yet. I thought it was some manager looking for Veeru. Just to cover-up his absence, I said, “I don’t see Veeru in his seat now. He was here sometime ago. Probably he is at the restroom”. The voice said, “Abbe, how come you saw me sometime ago? I am still at home. I called you just to inform you that I would come to office a bit late today”. God! So much for trying to protect him”.

Colleague2: “Listen to this. Do you remember S, our old teammate? He once called me at my extension. I was a bit busy then. So, I told him, “I have a high fever. I have taken a day off today and am taking rest at home”. He heard me out, recommended some tablets, wished me a speedy recovery and disconnected the phone. He saw me at the Cafeteria during lunch that day. He demanded why I was in the office when I was ill and was on leave. I reminded him that it was at my extension that I told him the whole story about my leave. He went red all over his face when he realized the prank that I had played on him. I sensed that one more teasing word from me and he would happily beat me up. I always knew when to stop”.

Colleague3: Cafeteria was a lot better a few months ago. With the transparent roof and all, it was bright and brisk then. I don’t know why they blackened the roof.

Colleague2: “I know the reason. When the cafeteria was bright, our guys had this habit of finding weird stuffs in the lunch and made it a point to lodge complaints against the caterers. The caterers somehow got the roof blackened. Now they receive fewer complaints about the food they provide. It is a bloody scam”.

Colleague2 to Colleague3: “If you think that you take a lot of time to finish your lunch because you eat slowly, I am sorry to say that you are wrong. You actually take a lot of time to finish your lunch because you eat a lot”.

As I said, Cafeteria is where I get to hear all sorts of freaky tales.