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.

Rash's ?9th Birthday

There were two Birthday Balloons that were gifted to Rash on her Birthday. Apparently, one of them burst and only the one with "9" on it was left. It's anyones guess how old Rash really is - 19, 29, or perhaps just 9.

Mika's 9th Birthday

Mikaeel's Medowbrook Talent Show

Mikaeel's Summer camp ended with a talent show. It was quite fantastic with a performance of Queen's "We will Rock You".

Rizwan's Birthday

Haroon, Tehmina and Samar hosted a sumptuous BBQ for a number of folks including the standard crew from Newton (Mamoon, Zehra, Mika, Emaan and Nano), the Scottish bunch (Zain, Saneeah, Anoushay, Mira and Zamin) and Rashiqay. It was Rizwan's Birthday and he pledged a new alias: Ramone in hopes of appealing to the Spanish population.

Mika's acappella performance of Queen's "We will rock you" served as post lunch entertainment for the court.

Mikaeel's Summer Piano Recital

We had a busy Saturday: Karate in the morning and then Piano recital in the evening. We arrived early at the Steinert Hall, Boston, where the recital takes place. 5:30 pm the kids started their warm-up rounds. Mikaeel was flawless during his practice round except for almost tripping over the foot stool. His recital included:

1. Musette - Anonymous
2. Allegro - S. Suzuki
3. Christmas-Day Secrets - T. Dutton
4. Au Clair de la Lune - J. B. Lully

Mikaeel was treated to Tapas at Tapeos on Newbury Street. He insisted on Armani Cafe or Top of the Hub, but we settled for Tapeos.

Today, we also recorded Emaan's first private recital. She improvised Twinkle Twinkle, Baba Black Sheep and ABCD-EFG. One small step for Emaan, one Giant Leap for Mum & Dad's expectations.

Haroon turns 37

Haroon gets ready to cut his 37th B-day cake with Samar looking over to make sure that daddy leaves some cake for her. Best wishes to Haroon and his family for many more years of health, happiness and prosperity.

A Little bit of Travel and a Lot of Change

May has been a hectic month. Things have been fluid at work with a number of significant changes. All this, while I have been travelling between conferences. A few days in Brea, CA, a conference in Baltimore, MD and another in Orlando, FL. I did enjoy all trips.

Through all the changes, activities, stresses, trials and tribulations, I have had clarity and focus on why I am doing all this. When people commit their livelihoods and careers to you, either by deciding to work in your team as employees or through purchasing your products as customers, there is no other outcome other than success. Failure is only an option for those that have nothing to fight for. And yes, let me not forget the investors that bet on you with their money.

In a true company, there are 3 constituents that are important: 1) Customers 2) Employees 3) Investors. If one sincerely cares about their interests beyond ones personal interest, I firmly believe that a company can successfully sustain value for all 3 constituents.