Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Travelling Some More

In early-August, I went to Boston, New York, Dubai, and Karachi. I went to Pakistan for my brother's wedding and it was quite an experience. I really like the fact that I am older now and can connect with my aunts, uncles, grandparents, and cousins in a whole new way. I appreciate my family history so much more now. In fact, I was able to update my family tree substantially during my time in Karachi. We've managed to trace our ancestry for a total of 9 generations, which is pretty amazing to me. I went through old photo albums and found people that were forgotten, too. I'll post an image of the family tree in a few days.

I was in New York for another day when I got back from Karachi. Then I flew to my apartment in the Berkeley Hills and packed everything up to move to Cupertino, CA. I'm working on a longer post about moving, so more on that later.

After I moved, I flew to Oahu and then the Big Island of Hawaii. On the way back, ATA cancelled our flight and then told us there was a 19-hour delay (which eventually turned into a 25 hour delay). Luckily we forced ATA to book us a flight that same night to LAX and a connecting flight to SFO. Of course, the flight to SFO was delayed and we sat on the runway for about an hour and a half due to fog in the Bay Area.

But even when we finally arrived in SFO, we had to get our bags and then take the BART all the way to Oakland Int'l Airport, where our car was parked. That trip took another hour, followed by us having to call a shuttle to have us dropped off to the parking lot. And if that wasn't enough, we had to drive another hour down to Cupertino to get home. Surprisingly, I wasn't dead tired.

Soon I will start fasting for the holy month of Ramadhan (most likely tomorrow). I am looking forward to it this year, although the fasts are getting longer and longer each year because Muslims use the lunar calendar. When I was younger, the fasts were in the dead of summer, so it was hot and humid and the fasts would not open until 8:45pm. Then during high school and college they became amazingly short because they were in the winter. A few years back we finally jumped the daylight savings date so they end between 7:00pm and 7:45pm depending on the day.

Anyway, I'm going to be away for a few days while I take a road trip to Portland, OR with my friend Jeremy. I promise some more awesome pictures when I get back.

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