Trip log - Prague September 7, 2007

Friday, September 7, Riz and I found a gap in our schedules to walk around Prague and do the tourist thing. Prague is indeed great for architecture lovers. Here are some pictures from our day.

St. Nicholas Church

St. Nicholas Church

St. Nicholas Church

After a hard day of work, one deserves to Relax

I feel like that almost everyday

Rizwan's New Car

Mamoon's New Car

The path to success

The Prague Castle

The Charles Bridge over the Vlatova River

The Altar at St. Nicholas Church

Tower at the Charles Bridge

The National Museum

The Municipal Hall - where the members of the Czech Symphony Orchestra Perform.

Powder Tower - Right near the Marriott Hotel

Rarely get to see a Russian Aircraft. This one is a Tupolov 154

Rizwan's on the lookout for a bride.

This was my third trip to Prague and with every trip I seem to enjoy the city more. Although it has become very touristy, it is still a city one can just frolic around and absorb the architecture. There is still a very Eastern European flavor to the city with significant Russian overtones, but it seems that over the years that may be something that will be lost with The Czech Republic rapidly becoming a part of the mainstream Europe. I guess Hungary and Romania are other countries that I should visit before they start to lose their Eastern European charm.

Trip log - Prague September 6

Although I spent most of the day inside my hotel room working and it was a dreary day, the evening had a special unexpected surprise. On a whim, I decided to go to The Municipal House, Smetana Hall to see if I could get tickets. They were available and for less than USD 60, I got seats in the third row.

Members from the Czech Symphony Orchestra did a wonderful job playing great pieces such as:

• J.S. Bach Air
• J. Dvorjak Humoresque
• J. Dvorjak Largo from Symphony No. 9
• Schubert Ave Maria.

With Lucianno Pavarotti passing away today, I want to pay my tributes to a great icon of our era who will always remain in our memories. Here's Pavarotti singing Ave Maria that I just saw the Czech Symphony perform today.




Also, I was moved by Dvorjak's Humoresque. Perhaps one day Mikaeel will make me proud and play this piece for his dad. The video below is at the Municipal House.

Trip log - London - August 31-Sept 2

Trip log - Rome - August 29-30

This is my second trip to Italy in the last 18 months. Although I do love the architecture and history that Rome has to offer, I haven't been a big fan of Southern Europe until recently. Eventually, everything grows on you - and it's Rome's turn now. Rizwan and I landed just before mid-night. From the moment I got on the Alitalia aircraft, I got flashbacks of Pakistan and India. The Italian demeanor, body language, facial expressions, usually aggressive tone is very reminiscent of the sub-continent culture. Perhaps it is the hot-blooded middle-eastern streak that is common between Southern Europe and the Middle East/Sub-Continent that results in such similarities.

Our taxi driver from the airport to the Marriott Hotel, Via Veneto, may as well have been a Grand Prix driver. Both Riz and I were quick to put on our seat belts. He was friendly and courteous, much like most of the Italians we have dealt with so far. And he was playing 80's tunes on the Radio - even played "It's just an Illusion" - the first album that I ever purchased. The Marriott - Flora on Via Veneto, is right next to the American Consulate. Here's the view from my room:


After checking in, we decided to walk to the Pizza Espania. To my surprise, at 1:00 am, the place was still hopping with people just hanging out, drinking and playing music.




We woke up early and headed to our meetings. After a grueling schedule, we raced to catch our flight at 5:00 pm back to Heathrow. I had enough time to grab Mikaeel a Ferrari bag and a I treated myself to a few shirts as well.

Trip log - London - August 27-29, 2007

Landed in London Monday morning August 27, 2007. Virgin Atlantic flight was fairly uneventful. The lines at Heathrow immigration were just out of control. Over 1.5 hours of waiting. Of all my travel in the Western World, this has to be the worst wait time ever. Nothing like immigration in Zurich or Boston - even Parague and Rome are quicker in immigration processing.

Monday was rest and recovery day. Caught up on emails and calls. Met with friends later that evening.

Tuesday was Reading Office review day - what a pathetic business decision. Past management had no idea on how to control costs and run an efficient and effective business. Well, that is rectified now. It is a simple cost-benefit analysis that my 9 year-old can understand, but somehow grown seemingly mature executives ignore or can't comprehend.



Wednesday, August 29, we reviewed our status with BT in London. It is always great to engage customers that have invested heavily in your technology. Providing direct, verifiable information is again a simple enough task, yet past management failed to deliver on such simple tasks. It's thrilling and humbling to meet customers that rely on your product for their core corporate strategy. It puts tremendous responsibility on products and companies that large enterprises have made such heavy bets on. It is this sense of responsibility that keeps one grounded in the most challenging of times.

Rizwan and I departed for Italy late that day on Alitalia. To Rizwan's shock, I chose to eat London style, Chicken Tikka Masala at Heathow. I did follow up with a half dozen Altoid chasers. Whether that helped or not, I will never find out. The passengers next to me didn't seem to frown or hold their noses.

Arrived in Rome, Italy at 11:30 pm

Trip log - Synovus, Columbus, GA

Rizwan and I embarked on a hectic 2 week+ business trip starting with a customer visit on Friday August 24. We left for Atlanta on Thursday and then drove to Columbus, GA to meet with Synovus, one of our largest and most sophisticated customers. It's always great to meet like minded technologists that really know how to use technology to drive their core business. John Woolbright, CTO Synovus and David Mize VP Applications, are 2 such individuals that really get it. No buzz words, no pretentious high-level hand waving - it's down and dirty with such customers - 24x7, mission critical deployments that have to scale and be robust.

Our flight back to Boston was delayed because of sever weather, so we decided to move our European trip forward by 1-day. It was the right choice, giving us time to recover and also for me to spend precious time with the kids and Haroon & Co.

Sunday evening, we embarked on our trip to Europe (London, Rome, Zurich, Prague, London and back to Boston). It was all business, except for the weekends and evenings of course.