Masjid at terminal 4 at JFK airport, New York

Traveling business class comes with lots of perks. The flight, chaufferservices, lounges, foods and extra pampering and what not. But the experience that I am going to share with you is something that is beyond any expression. And it did not come because I traveled business class.

After two weeks of praying alone at my hotel room (with the exception of Juma prayers), I was craving for a prayer (in congregation) with my brothers in faith. And getting that fulfilled in JFK airport was not what I expected. Well, I got a surprise. A full fledged masjid at terminal 4. 3 people already waiting for Isha (early night prayer). That's what Allah had planned for me. And His plans are always the best.

A wonderful start to the journey back home. Alhumdulillah!!!

My tryst with RDX

I was recently part of an office organized cricket tournament. My team RDX (Rebellious Defenders XI – why this name? That is the story for some other time) was considered one of the favorites to win the title. The matured team consisted of like-minded people, playing brilliant cricket delightful to the eyes and knowing how to execute a winning action. The preparations leading to the tournament was such that even though we are at our nascent stage of team formation, bonding between players were done, team spirit and winning recipes were blown and a nothing short of being champions were the mindset from the very start. That’s not an exaggeration, our first few matches in the tournament was an evidence of it. We truly dominated the league matches. We totally controlled our first knockout match too.

With the victories like; chasing 34 in 3.4 overs, 62 in 5 overs and bundling opposition to mere 37 runs while defending 98 in 10 overs were instilling a belief in ourselves that we could be title holders this time. But I guess, we were thinking too far. We were pushed to walls in the quarters and all our dreams were shattered. The loss gave us a reality check but there was no second chance.

We can condole ourselves by saying every great team faces this type of situation. Two great teams and their great matches comes to mind immediately. It befits our situation perfectly.

1.South Africa were considered the favorites to lift the 1996 cricket world cup. They had won all their matches comfortably before they met West Indies in the Quarters. But majestic Lara send them packing.

2.India in the recent times are dangerous outfit in all the formats. Under the able captaincy of MS Dhoni they were charging in WT20 2016 but hit an unmovable stone in the Semis of WT20, the Windies. Our favorite Indian team scored only 4 sixes and 16 fours in 20 overs while the West Indies team just wielded their bat and it went for a six, in total they scored 11 sixes 20 fours, simply saying they just stood ground and scored bulk of their runs in boundaries. Similar thing happened to us in the quarters, we kept on taking wickets of opposition while defending 84 in 10 overs, but it looked like whoever came to bat had just one thing in mind that is to score boundaries. 5 wickets fell but they overcame the target in 8^th over. We were in such hapless state that any regrouping or new ideas simply didn’t worked.

A victory is always sweeter

We can only contemplate a better performance next year but who knows what Almighty has in store for us. As of now we can cherish the memories and bundle our sadness into a container, lock it and throw the keys into the sea.

Remembering Hans Rosling

My journey to data visualization started with a video of Hans Rosling, The best stats you've ever seen | Hans Rosling. It was probably the most mind boggling thing, I had ever seen by then. It was just after moving into a company after graduation and an introduction like that had a tremendous effect into my way of thinking about data. That was an inspiration for many similar dashboards and reports and presentations I created in later times.

This great educator and visionary died last week. the world will be ever thankful to him for the immense impact he had.

What others say

“Rosling believes that making information more accessible has the potential to change the quality of the information itself.” — Business Week Online

Do they not see the birds above them?

I stood near the road waiting for my cab to come. As I waited, I saw hundreds of pigeons flying over my head. It looked majestic and I couldn't but keep looking at those beautiful creatures. Pigeons are found in abundance in Hyderabad while crows are not found as much as I used to see in Kolkata. This could be the reason the locals does not find it interesting enough to admire the beauty that was happening just above their head. 

The flocks of birds around 200 in number were moving around in a circle of around 50 meters radius. My eyes traversed their path. They continued doing round and round, the cheerful aura involved was hard to resist. A couple of rounds later few of the birds rested on top of rooftops, street-light poles and mobile signal towers. Was it a rest? I may not be able to tell, but they took turns in getting back to the original flock. After few more rounds they changed their direction to clockwise. This intrigued me, I thought okay let's find a pattern here. It was difficult but I pressed myself to dwell into the minds of the flock and understand their behavior in this activity. After their directions changed, the number of birds kept reducing after each round. Some flew away which I couldn't track where; while some rested on rooftops and towers. Then only two left, I thought of them as chief and his wife probably trying to convince others to keep doing (whatever they were doing). While I kept myself focused on those two pigeons, I was taken aback when all of a sudden another set of birds flew just behind the building and joined those two. The scene completely transformed to its original state leaving me and my pattern findings abilities in wilderness. At the very moment my cab came and I was left thinking, "Okay some other day I will try again to understand what really happened."

While feeling comfortable in the cab, I remembered an aayah from Surah Mulk (screenshot below) where through Quran Allah tells us to go out and look at those birds, ponder how they spread their wings, how majestically they float. Who would hold them except Allah. Subhan Allah! This amazing activity from Quran was nothing short of upliftment of one's imaan.

The water flow

Have you ever wondered what are blessings? If you pondered carefully you will realize we are surrounded by blessings. Look no far, you will find blessings in yourself. The eyes that we use to see, ears to hear, legs to take us to places, hands to do all kinds of work, intellect that makes us distinguishable from other animals; these are all blessings from our Creator. If there is even a bit of doubt if these aren't blessings, then think about giving it away or ask the ones who doesn't have these. Of such many uncountable blessings we have, perhaps the most desirable of them is water. As is with any desirable gifts, we should preserve it and not let it go as waste.

I come from Kolkata, capital city of West Bengal, India. Though it's not a port city, it's very near to the sea bay of Bengal. It is also in one of the dis-tributaries of river Ganga. The water is in abundance in my city. I have never faced scarcity of water in my city with an exception of a day or two. Although I've heard about some places in Rajasthan and Gujarat where people face immense drought, it wasn't in my destiny to practically feel what shortage of water causes until I had leave Kolkata due to call of duty. 4.5 years in Bangalore and 1 year in Hyderabad made me realize how importance water is to our life.

Water is distributed early morning in Toli Chowki locality, the place where I stay in Hyderabad. Locals are happy because by the time they wake up, their water tank is already full. On the way to the Masjid for early morning prayer it is really painful to see water trickling down from plenty of houses. People are lazy to even get up and switch off the motor machine so as to stop the water flow. I am not sure what they are; lazy or selfish. Just think of those who are deprived of this blessings. There's a beautiful campaign to illustrate the feelings to save water;

Abdullah ibn Amr reported: The Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, passed by Sa’d while he was performing ablution. The Prophet Muhammad ﷺ  said, “What is this extravagance?” Sa’d said, “Is there extravagance with water in ablution?” The Prophet said, “Yes, even if you were on the banks of a flowing river.” Source: Sunan Ibn Mājah 425

Just think, of our actions. If this causes anger to our creator and He takes away the blessings we are enjoying now. The scary feeling is depicted in the aayah in Surah Mulk.