International

The walk back

Trip to Scotland – Touring Edinburgh

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There were a series of galleries on either side of the Grand Gallery, housing exhibits of world culture and history. The ‘Discoveries’ section had clocks of various shapes and sizes. The show stopper was The Millennium Clock – it was in the form of a medieval cathedral, standing just over ten meters high, with open sides so that we could see the machinery. It is supposed to be a summary of the best and worst of the twentieth century. The clock is intricately animated and has four sections, each signifying something. You could go a floor above to see the top.

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Trip to Scotland

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It was nice and quaint, and very, very green. About half an hour into the journey I realized that it seemed almost criminal (for lack of a better word) to not listen to the Beatles on a train-ride across England, and so I kept down the book and whipped out my headphones, and generally just peered out the window watching the green world pass me by.

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Hajj: The Final Installment – What it means to be a Haji

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To have performed Hajj in such unusual circumstances also means that I would be able to advise others on how to go about performing Hajj in this manner. Only Allah can tell whether this can be construed as a good thing or not. The good thing is that I can definitely advise people to spend more and  go with a comfortable agency, whichever it may be, and preferably legally cleared with the Saudi authorities; to perform Hajj “legally” means not having to suffer as my friends and I did. It means that one gets proper accommodation at Arafah, Muzdalifah and Mina. It means not having to worry about whether eating food properly may increase one’s desire to visit the toilet, especially because they are neither clean, nor easily accessible, esp. at Arafah and Muzdalifah. It means that once one lands at Mina, one can stay there for the next three days to pray and visit the Jamarat whenever one wants to without actually having to walk up and down from Makkah and to it multiple numbers of times. It means that one is not inconvenienced by having to squat on roads at Mina and being told by the police to get up and go elsewhere every single evening/night.

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Edmonton to Seattle USA

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Seattle has a sea shore. Cruise ships proceed from there. It has islands and ferry left every half an hour. Lots of population resides on islands.  Seattle is famous for Boeing factory. Microsoft has head office in Seattle, Bill Gate and other staffs sits there. Total population is less than seven lakh. Green lake park popular among runners, contains a 4.3km trail circling the lake. We were there. Local white people greet us with smiles and waving hands.  We also visited to Indian Restaurant, Food was so spicy, but sweet gulab jamun and kheer was there. Mexican cook was working there. Mexico is also famous for spicy food . In Canada food is normally not spicy.

Weather was windy. There was big merry go round. Some people walking there. On roads there was traffic but not much hustle and bustle. I miss my India here as lots of kids, young couple are present every tourist places there.

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Tense moments

Taste of London

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A lot of people wanted food from this restaurant, and so it took me a good 20 minutes to get out of there with food in my hands, and those 20 minutes were for this microscopically tiny plate of little strands of crispy-fried pork. It was like a golden fried piece of heaven. It had been deep-fried, thus the bacon had gotten crumpled up, but the flavour of the bacon had been retained. There was an almost silky, foreign taste of the oil used. It wasn’t anything in particular. My first guess was olive oil, but it was somehow tangier than that, with a hint of almost a peppery taste in it. One more plus point was that this one wasn’t too salty at all, which is generally the problem with bacon – usually the salt overrides the taste of the bacon. This was, as previously stated, like a crisp-fried piece of heaven.

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Makkah – Performing the Hajj pilgrimage – 4

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Tonight, though, the crowds were huge, and we had to really hunt for a good place in which to relax. Our successful location of a nice spot turned out to be a not-so-nice one after all as a police van landed within 15 minutes and started blowing all the on-board horns and sirens. In tandem with them, foot-soldiers began to ask everyone to get up and take themselves elsewhere. We got up, moved a little way off, and waited for the police car and the troops to move before returning to the spot where we had lain a few minutes earlier. This kind of ritual was repeated once, but we managed to remain at the same spot for a few more sessions of prayer. In between, a Saudi guy came and handed over a pizza pack to Dr. Naheed. We all partook some of the pizza and found it hot and fresh. I also visited the Al Baik outlet (to buy some chicken) , but returned as the queues were very, very long.

At about half past two, we left Mina and returned to our hotel in Makkah.

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Portsmouth & Bluereef Aquarium

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Portsmouth is a small port city famous for many famous naval ships for example HMS Warrior and HMS victory. It is old dry port and is situated on an Island.
ome facts about Spinnaker Tower

The Tower has been a huge success and has received over 2 million visitors since opening.
The high speed internal lift travels at 4 metres per second, taking you to the View Decks in just 30 seconds.
The concrete used to build the Tower would fill five-and-a-half Olympic-sized swimming pools.
The Tower is founded on 84 piles, the longest of which runs 50m into the ground – the equivalent of Nelson’s Column.
The total weight of the Tower exceeds 30,000 tonnes.
The 27m spire weighs 14 tonnes and was carefully lifted into place by crane.
1200 tonnes of structural steel used to form the Tower’s distinctive bows is the equivalent weight of 12 blue whales.
115 metres up and in high winds, the Tower can flex approximately 150mm.
There are 570 steps from the base up to View Deck 3, The Crow’s Nest.

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Southampton & Stonehenge

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Southampton is a small city…very quiet, beautiful and attractive. There is nothing much to see in Southampton, but the Titanic Museum and remains of old Southampton fort. Next day we started our exploration of Southampton. We went to the market and saw the gate of Southampton Fort. In WWII, SH was completely destroyed and it was re-built. The pier from which Titanic sailed, was also destroyed and there stands the new port.

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London 2012 – Getting there

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We went in and did the usual hoolah of checking in and immigration etc., and headed for the duty-free/lounges. My dad waited patiently while mom and I took a look around the duty-free, and finding nothing to our liking, commenced to the lounge. It was the same lounge and, of course, nothing had changed since last year – the couches, the low impossible-to-eat-off little coffee tables, the lights, everything was the same. The food was kept on a granite table with L-shaped counters around it. They had patties, sausages etc for starters, and rice, Mexican chicken gravy and different curries for people wanting a full-er meal. I first went to the patties, which were kept in that microwave-y, revolve-y thingies. I took one and got back to the couch we were sitting on and picked up the day’s Daily Mail, and spent the next 10-15 minutes savouring ‘delicacies’ (okay, it was just a patty, but still) and reading about what’s going on in the country hosting us for the next 14 days or so. I then went on to get myself the other things – I got myself sausages and sat down to eat, and in my mind thought, ‘wow, pretty delicious’, but the truth was, I was gonna learn what delicious sausages really are. I decided not to pig out anymore on the food on land and fill myself only once in air, and so for the rest of the time all I did was drink various kinds of juices, call all my friends to say bye and generally watch the news and listen to music, thinking of all the delicious cuisine I was going to savour soon.

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St. Martin’s – A Hidden Coral Island

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The Naf river rises in the Arakan mountain ranges of Myanmar, thence it flows through Myanmar and Bangladesh. Akyab in Myanmar is on its left Bank, Teknaf in Bangladesh is on its right bank. Outside the famed Sundarbans, the river is home to Sundari trees . Flowing between mountain ranges, dotted with little fishing boats, Silver Hued and wide as the heart of a Saint, the river was in true sense the “Daughter of the Mountains”. As the boat cruised through the Naf, Myanmar came into view, the 36X zoom of my Nikon P-500 revealed a beautiful land nestled at the foot of sky kissing Mountains and dotted with beautiful pagodas, but fenced with tall barbed wire fences all through. It was a reminder that this was a country which is warning the entire world , “Keep OFF”. Cut off from the world for the last 24 years , Myanmar is an enigma in itself. We are all awaiting the day when Myanmar will be opened up to the world at large and tourists would flock back to this lovely place.

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हेरिटेज मेला

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इस फोटो में आप कैनेडा  के मूल बाशिंदों को देख सकते हैं, यह इनका पारम्परिक घर है. कुछ लकड़ी के डंडे खड़े किये और उसके इर्दगिर्द एक कपड़ा लपेटा और घर त्यार. यह अपने आप को नेटिव या ऐबओर्जिनल कहलाना पसंद करते हैं. सब से पहले यह लोग ही कैनेडा आये थे.

इस स्टाल पर घाना का नाच चल रहा है, यह जोड़ी देख कर नहीं लगता नाचना इनके बस का है शायद गीत संगीत बजा कर लोगों का मनोरंजन कर रहे हैं, नीचे वाली फोटो में मार्शल आर्ट दिखाया जा रहा है, काफी बहादुरी से मुकाबला चल रहा है,  यह लेडी आसानी से परुष को पटक देती है.

यह रशिया की स्टेज है, यह नाच का कौन सा स्टेप है, काफी प्रेक्टिस के बाद ही इसे किया जा सकता है, रशिया के लोगों को काफी महारत हासिल है  पर बाद में दूसरे नर्तक दल ने आसान न्रत्य पेश किया काफी अच्छा लग रहा है .

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Makkah – Performing the Hajj Pilgrimage – 3

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In reality, we returned to our hotel room in Makkah and snatched a little sleep before dawn. After the Fajr prayers, we proceeded to go to Mina, which is about 2 km away. Just ahead of Mina is the “Jamarat” or the place where the three “devils” are located. Before I describe this, let me say that stoning of the three devils is a ritual more to remember and praise Allah than to actually denounce the devils.

The route to Jamarat goes through a tunnel that is over a kilometer long. This tunnel was full of devotees right in the morning; only police and emergency vehicles are allowed to pass (and some motorcycles, which had one Saudi and one pilgrim … a private arrangement where the Saudi earns some quick bucks). We also saw several guys with wheel-chairs for hire; they ferried the willing pilgrims to Mina for 50 Saudi Riyals. However, theirs is an illegal enterprise, and we frequently saw the police blocking them and asking the pilgrims to “disembark”. However, the thing I wish to say is … the road to Mina, and beyond, to the Jamarat, is easily traversed as you are walking with hundreds of others. We went past the tunnel, and via a busy but narrow road, we finally reached Mina.

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