Nostalgia: '97 - '99

My father got an offer to work in Dubai arnd Dec '96. The company my father was working for in Madras was performing dismally and almost going to collapse. So, after a lot of thought put into it, my father decided to go ahead and work there. He left for Dubai on Jan 19th '97.

It was the first time that my father was away from us. Started feeling about it but within a month my cousin sister's wedding was there. So these feelings got dissolved in the festivity. This was the first marriage of my generation in my mother's side (Most cousins on my father's side are as old as my parents!!!).

The plan was to visit Dubai for 20 days during the summer hols and return. Then we will wind up our house and I will shift to hostel while my mom joins my father. We looked at different residential schools in Madras as well as Nellore. None were to upto our total satisfaction but I was ready to join a residential school in Nellore as my uncles were there.

After my grade 8 exams, my father sent us our visas, a visit visa for me and a residence visa for my mom. We left on May 1st. The first time I was flying abroad! When we landed, I was simply amazed at the place. It looked like a fantasy world, so clean, so modern, so western, just like in the films. The tall glassy buildings, the wide smooth roads and posh cars. The more amazing thing being all this in the middle of a desert! My father recieved us and took us to our studio apartment (which is our house here till date...) - a hall partioned into a hall and bedroom. It was small but good enough for us - especially since my mom didnt have a domestic maid to help her out.

Those first few days in Dubai were great - a totally new place but with lots of Indians, esp mallus. So I didnt find myself totally alien. It was like a perfect amalgam - a western city but with an Indian feel to it. Of course, the weather was horrible and my father hadn't installed a/c's by then, but being from Madras helps.

After going there I had more insight into the schooling system there. There were innumerous Indian schools which were affiliated to the CBSE Board. But of course it was costly! arnd 4k a month was the cheapest. I had not paid that much per year before! But everyone advised me to join school there - it will be a new experience and I will get to stay with my parents. And so, it was decided that I will join the school in Dubai. It was also decided that I will return to Chennai for my XI and XII so that I can prepare for the entrance exams. The system in the Gulf schools was to run classes from April to June and hold quarterly exams and the vacations were in July-August, as those were the hottest months there. Since I couldn't join just as yet, we decided that I will finish my quarterly exams in my old school and come to Dubai in August.

So I arrived in Dubai in August and got my residence visa in about a week. Joined school on September. This was the first time I changed my school. I was put in 'P' section. The class was mostly made of Malayalis, Sindhis and a few Konkanis. Only one Tam, Ashok, who had shifted from Chennai a couple of years earlier. I topped the class by far in my half-yearly exams and that made me a geek in other people's eyes. That impression pretty much remained for the two years I was there. Some of the friends I was close to were Ashok, Khushroo, Sachin, Nitin and Ravi. The school used to start at arnd 12 and end at 6 in the evening. So the morning was spent watching Zee TV (as there was nothing else to do....) - Hum Paanch especially. I was introduced to taped tennis ball cricket here. All the car parks were the playgrounds (Now its impossible to find space to even swing a bat!). There were many instances of police snatching away the bat and ball. This was my main outdoor preoccupation during my two years in Dubai. We played in peak summer with temperatures arnd 45C in open areas, turning me into a barbaque version of myself (look at my pictures!). We even played during my 10th board exam study holidays while my contemporaries in India would have been working like a horse drawing a tonga.

During my 10th grade itself, we applied to DAV, Chennai. They admitted me provisionally to be confirmed based on my 10th board marks. Eventhough my overall percentage was a dismal 83 (67 in Hindi!), my good maths and science marks ensured that I got a seat in the Comp Sci grp there. When I returned to India after a gap of 20 months, it was a wonderful feeling - coming back to the place where I belong to. Of course, the roads are nasty, the traffic was horrible, blah blah.... But, its India maan, India! I am not able to express that feeling in words.

'99 - '01 - My IIT prep years - in next blog.