Friday, December 26, 2008

Walking The Souq…


Doha’s Souq Waqif is a five-minute walk away from where I live. Yet, it took me close to three years to cover the distance. And when I did, a slice of Qatar’s history unfurled before my very eyes...

It was like going starting at the beginning of time, to the time when Qatar was still very much an idea, in the corner of a thousand minds. It was like turning the pages of the book of history, swiftly from left to right, in breathtaking seconds of sudden realisations...

Mud brown brick buildings rose to kiss the sky, along the two sides of the stone-sown path. Well rounded pieces of teakwood played intricate games of hide and seek with the mud and brick structures. Candle lights, thinly veiled by multi-coloured glasses, painted the evening with different hues of faint colour.

The sky blushed a deep red of evening, reflecting off coloured sheesha glasses. Sweet scents of peaches and myrrh gathered form as wispy plumes of faint white smoke, rising and dissolving into the cold wintry evening. A thousand sandaled feet made rhythmic music on the stone paths, even as a hundred tongues spoke a multitude of languages, selling wares, dreams and more…

Cheeks touched cheeks and noses, noses, in the familiar routine of Middle Eastern familiarity. The faint aura of universal brotherhood hung in the Souq’s air…

When I woke from my trance, I found myself sitting amidst history, watching tradition blend seamlessly with modernity. People smoked scented hookahs, turned their heads, and surfed the World Wide Web. They sipped strong black teas, brewed together with centuries of knowledge, and conquered the distance barrier by speaking into their mobile phones…

How long does it take for a person to cover 300 metres? For me, it was almost three years. But if that was the price I had to pay for getting my first romantic feel of Doha’s Souq Waqif, I consider it as time and money well spent…

Monday, December 15, 2008

Lost, Atlantis, Found...

I recently travelled to Dubai, with my cousin and went to this awesome place called Atlantis. Its in the Palm Jumeira and it simply rocked.

The place virtually teemed with fishes and the whole place was themed around the sunken city of Atlantis. I could have been lost underground for hours, had it not been for the thought of my plane leaving in about five hours time.

I reignited my romance with the seas and these were a few of the sights which pushed me into doing that. Dear viewer, here, I give in no particular order, some of the sights that transported me to a mythical land sunken beneath the sea.

Despite feeling the dread for a lost civilisation, I envy them for seeing these sights almost every single day....

Here is my tribute to the Lost Land of Athlantis... 

1. The Red Dancer.

It undulated before my very eyes, in deep shades of red. It was mesmerising, hypnotic, and simply stunning.  

2. Blue Dancers.

And then there were many of them, ululating, wandering around, gently touching one another, disappearing behind one another, just like the faint whiffs of smoke, coming from a warm chimney, on a cold winter evening...  


3. The Blue Dancers, in a lighter mood...

When the lights turnes upon them, they were fainter than the faintest ghosts. And then they began their dance of hypnotic serenity.


4. The Being. The God. Atlantis.

If ever there was a god in Atlantis, he would look something like this. The King of the Volcanoes, who breathes flame and snorts out tarred smoke.


5. The Five Thousand Merry-Go-Rounders.

I entered their realm, of the deep sunken city of Atlnatis, and this sight greeted my eye. About 5,000 lovely warriors with silver gills, went round and round and round and round in a pure glass chamber. Eternal, lovely, peaceful, hypnotic.  


6. Follow My Leader.

To the end of the world, to the end of time. The view of fishes following one another, to the ends of Atlantis and Back, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth...


7. And The Ethereal Light Shone Down...

The clear lights from yonder shone down, and a thousand fishes answered to its creator. 


8. And A Thousand Bubbles Burst Forth...

This was the most beautiful sight of all. The lights from hig above, from the heavens, shimmered down the deep blue waters above the sunken lands of Atlantis. It ignited a thousand splendid bubbles, all lapped up hungrily through a thousand hungry gills. This sight, I shall never see again. At least, not ever with the same intensity asI did before... 


9. The Sting Ray That Ended A Legend...

He was Australian. And he was the greatest animal lover the world has seen. The Sting Ray which stung him should really have felt bad for years after. 

10. The United Colours Of Atlantis.

Do you see the bright difference between yellow stone and blue fish. It was as fantastic, and maybe even more, than is actually depicted here. Nothing, can recreate god's natural work of art.


11. The Man Who Never Sleeps.

He's 45-years-old, weighs 150kgm, and hasnt slept over all these years. I wonder what must have kept him awake all this while? The first time i saw him, i couldnt help but stare in awe. He was a revelation, and I'll leave it at that.




EPILOGUE: All Good things in life should come to an end. I once again reached the beginning of the end. I was richer by the experience.

And one day, if by a queer chance of fate, i find Atlantis, I'll tell those fishes that I already lived the life with them, in a land high above them, for a few brief moments in time...