Sorry folks! This page hasn't
been updated since the longest time, but here's my tally so far:
countriesvisited
19 |
citiesvisited
88 |
In summer 2003, I escaped to Dubai
in the United
Arab Emirates. It was a homecoming of sorts, because I was returning
back to the Middle East after spending seven years in India
where I'd gone to get an undergraduate degree. After living here for almost
six years, I've found it to be a paragon of pseudo reality, a haven of
hedonism and rampant consumerism lacking any form of charm.
Dubai
is a very vibrant and colorful city in the Middle East with even less culture
than Las Vegas.
Before coming to Dubai,
I was in India
for seven years (1996 to 2003) where I lived in Bombay
(one of those spicy old, hot hellholes that are leftover from the Legacy of
the Raj, and whose charm is slowly eroding). From time to time, I miss: the
wave patterns of heated air rippling up from the tar-slathered asphalt, my
friends and I riding our beaten bikes around the city, and the pedestrian
insanity of India's most overcrowded city. There wasn't a lot to do there,
but a few highly intelligent under-motivated slackers
made my life there bearable. You know who you are!
Bombay
is dirty, over crowded, over polluted and on the brink of collapse. I escaped in
2003!
All my schooling
was done in another small and forgotten city in the Middle East, Muscat
in the Sultanate
of Oman where I spent my entire life growing up. That experience was highly
rewarding and it's hard to imagine what life was like back then all those
years ago. I made many good friends there and I'll never trade that
experience for anything in the world.
Muscat
is low-profile and quasi-non-existent. I still visit the place once a month.
What can I say? These days
everyone loves Malaysia. I decided to
join the bandwagon and scope out its capital city
Kuala Lumpur in January 2005. Think of Dubai the way it looks now and the
prices 20 years ago. I fell in love with the place and the cheap prices! It's
basically a fast-growing business hub for South East Asia. I plan on returning
there for a vacation real soon.
Kuala Lumpur is a city with high-rise ambitions in a swirl of cultural
diversity
London: The Greatest City on
Earth!
Singapore - colonial history,
oriental mystery, occidental charm, Asian ant-farm!
Believe it or not, this is the world's most densely populated country.
Frankfurt - the
busiest city in mainland Europe, Germany's 5th largest city and
continental Europe's 2nd largest stock market.
Paris - A vibrant city that
conjures evermore memories of history, art, wine, art, music, art,
pleasure, art, passion, art and Algerians
Milan - Where The Last
Supper rests. Business hub of Italy, fashion capital of the world (also
visited Verona and Bergamo)
Brussels - NATO, EU & EC
headquarters for starters. Waffles and chocolates for seconds!
Bangkok - Mumbai of the Far East;
dirty, filthy, overcrowded, polluted - a city of ancient dreams and
post-modern despair
Abu Dhabi - Okay so just because
this one's right in my backyard doesn't really mean it doesn't count does
it?
Istanbul - Tales of wonder from 2
continents, Ottoman folklore, European enigma, the secret of Asia Minor
Last
updated 23 January 2010 |
