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Me: “Hello?”

Max: “Hello brother, this is Max. I wanted to call and say hello…”

Me: “Oh hi Max, uhh…”

Max: “…and see if everything’s OK.”

Me: “Yes, yes, everything’s fine…”

Awkward silence.

Me: “So you’re probably wondering where I’ve been…”

Max: nervous chuckle

Me: “I moved out of the area, you see, now I’m near Holborn.”

Max: “Oh. Oh. Yes, I was wondering if everything was OK, you haven’t called us in a long time.”

Me: “Yes, yes, hehe, but thank you for calling. I hope you’re well…”

Max: “Yes, Alhamdulillah. Well, ma’assalam brother.”

Me: “Yes, walaikum salam.”

2 weeks ago, at the very end of Ramadan, I was at the checkout at Sainsbury’s. By some strange coincidence, I’ve found myself at the same cashier’s till quite frequently, a middle-aged African woman with a gap between her teeth. (I wondered if maybe I was selecting a particular line subconsciously, but the lines there are very long, and the tills are set up so that it’s impossible to know where one is going to end up.) Up till this point, we had never exchanged a word, except for my perfunctory “hello’s” and “thank you’s”.

Me: “Hello.” I start unloading my basket.

Her: “Hi.”

Pause as she starts swiping my pile of pastas.

Her: “You’ve lost weight.”

Me: Slightly incredulous. “Yes, I’m fasting.”

Her: “Oh. You should pray for me.”

Me: Slightly weirded out. “Uhh, of course, what do you want?”

Her: “I need to save enough money to go home.”

Me: Feeling slightly like Cain from Kung Fu: The Legend Continues. “Yes, I’ll pray for you.”

Her: Smiles, hands me my receipt.

Me: Smile, nod, walk away.

A week ago, I signed up for the eFinancialCareers website because I had spotted an interesting job in Dubai and wanted to apply for it. One of the questions in the signup form was whether I wanted to make my resume searchable. I didn’t think much of it and ticked it, submitted the form, and went to sleep (11PM). At 8:45AM, I got a phone call on my cell phone.

Caller: “Hello, is this Mr. Aku-eel?”

Me: Slightly groggy. “Yes…”

Caller: “My name is ______. Is this a good time for you to talk?”

Me: “Well, that depends on what this is about…”

Caller: “Well I saw your resume on eFinancialCareers and I wanted to have a chat with you about some positions I’m recruiting for. Now there’s one with the fixed income analytics group at <bulge bracket US bank>…”

Me: “Wait, you saw my resume on eFinancial? I’m not actually looking for a job right now…”

Caller: “Uhh, you’re at <my previous employer> right?”

Me: “No, I left to pursue a Masters degree…”

Caller: “Really? In what?”

Me: “Uhh, math…”

Caller: “Hmm…right, OK, so you’re not looking right now then?”

Me: “Nope. Sorry for the confusion.”

Caller: “Yes, well. When do you graduate?”

Me: “June or July.”

Caller: “OK, well, I’m going to put you down in my diary if you don’t mind then, and we’ll have a chat in July. How’s that?”

Me: “Uhh, OK. Thanks.”

Caller: “Not a problem, have a nice day!” Click.

Five minutes later, another phone call.

Caller: “Hello, Mr. A-keel?”

Me: “Yes?”

Caller: “Hi, my name is ______. I saw your resume on eFinancialCareers and I have a spot I’m trying to fill that you’re going to be really interested in. It’s credit derivative analytics, mostly C++…”

Me: “Hang on, sorry, look…I’m not looking for a job right now.”

Caller: “But your resume…”

Me: “Yes, I know. I’m going to take it down…”

Caller: Sounding more hurt than pissed off. “Uhh, why’d you put it up then?”

Me: “It was a mistake, I’ll take it down.”

Caller: Click.

I got two more calls after that, the last after I had taken the resume down. Not that I’m complaining ;)

In the meanwhile, my script is happily dumping revisions, and I’ve confirmed that they can be loaded up OK. It’s not half as inefficient as I thought it was going to be: I dumped 255 revisions (8.54GB) in about an hour and a half. The other half of the performance equation is loading the dumpfiles into Subversion, which takes roughly the same amount of time.

I imagine the script might be useful to other people, so I’ll probably write some documentation and post it here once I’m done with my testing.

• I told everyone at work I’m leaving end-August. Well, beginning-September is probably more like it, given that I expect September 1 to be my last day at work. Interestingly enough, I didn’t even have to initiate the OK-so-you-don’t-drink-so-what-shall-we-do-in-lieu-of-leaving-drinks conversation, EC brought it up himself (he’s probably the person I was most likely to ask anyway…if I asked). Frisbee in the park was one suggestion, though I think that sounds dead-boring, and I’m not sure how it might be organized. I think the cleanest option is to take the team out for lunch. And then take my work friends out for lunch. And then take … Yeah, it’s not the most efficient, but it’s easiest to work with.
• I have a bit of a visa conundrum. I’m going to Denmark this weekend, so I can’t submit the UK student visa application until I get back. But then I’m going to France on the weekend of August 4, and that’s probably not enough time for processing, so I can’t submit before then either. And then I’m hoping to leave September 1 or thereabouts, so that’s a very tight window to get my visa processed. Also, I was planning to stop by Dubai to see Munni Begum (Inshallah), so I have to get a UAE visa too! I’m doing some research now to see how best to lay things out, but it’s looking like I might have to apply for the UK visa in Pakistan. Which should be OK.
• Zinedine Zidane is the man. Not because of the headbutt but because the two coherent memories of WC’98 I have are of Owen’s goal against the Argentinians and Zidane’s headers in the final. I found an old interview by The Observer that has lot of interesting stuff in it. I always find it somewhat amazing when dominant sportsmen turn out to be ‘timid’ in their private lives. That interview with Imran Khan I wrote about a couple of weeks ago was similar in that sense.
• Related to the above — read Paul Shirley’s journal and be reminded just how human we all are. This guy is amazing (well, apparently not as a basketball player). He’s a surprisingly good writer, remarkably introspective and completely open about his emotions and self-doubts. He’s like the goofball tall, white friend who just also happens to play basketball. Awesome, awesome.
• Those bright green/shocking pink tights that actresses in Pakistani movies have on under their qameezes are apparently a somewhat smaller fashion no-no than I thought: I see them all over London. I’m not kidding. They’re black, but they’re the same thing — tights with the foot-bits cut off, serving godknows what purpose. And I see them most of all in Hoxton, so apparently they’re a hip thing.

• I watched Superman Returns. And it didn’t stink. That’s the best thing I can say about it — it was a little uncomfortable watching someone other than Christopher Reeves on the screen, but I was bracing myself for that. Observations:

  • He (and Lois Lane) are waaaaaaay younger than the actors in the original movies. That’s important because those are meant to serve as prequels to this one (with a gap of 5 years having elapsed since Superman 2). Also, Kate Bosworth is just plain wrong for Lois Lane — she doesn’t have the cagey-veteran look at all, and her cold, impervious incisiveness comes off as a teenage temper tantrum. (This alliteration is just rolling off my tongue…aakhir Ammi ka beta hoon!)
  • He has a narrower frame than Reeves, so they had to shrink the ‘S’ on his chest, which makes it look stupid. And he’s perpetually flexed, which makes him look buff but stupid.
  • I didn’t want to have to go here, but they forced my hand: the cut of Superman’s undies is completely different. It’s a little jarring because it calls attention to itself. More than ’nuff said.
  • They darkened the costume, so the blue is a dirty-ish blue and the red is burgundy. Looks horrible. Actually, looks like the bad Superman from Superman 3. Oh, and the cape looks completely plastic, which blows. And he’s wearing platform shoes — we’re told he’s 6′4″ (wrong, he’s actually 6′2″ in the comics), and he needs platforms!?

  All that said, it’s still a Superman movie, and I gotsta love it. The story is all over the place and the climax rivals the stupidity of the turn-the-world-backwards-to-make-time-go-back trick in Superman 1, but it’s still worth watching. And hearing — the original Superman soundtrack is back!

• The tickets for afore-mentioned Superman movie cost 13.05 pounds apiece, probably because it was the Leicester Square Odeon. Tickets at the IMAX at Waterloo? 12.55. (No regrets though — IMAX didn’t have tickets for the first day.)