Wishing You Selamat Hari Raya

To all my muslim readers,



I just wanna wish you guys "Selamat Hari Raya". May you guys happy with the love one. If you are driving to go back to your home town, please drive carefully. Enjoy your ketupat rendang, cookies, biscuits etc.

For those who aren't celebrating hari raya, this is the time for you to take break.

and Don't forget to come to work.

Regards
Zayed

Escape to Hyderabad: Chowmahalla Palace

After went to Charminar and Mecca mosque in Old City of Hyderabad, next pit stop is at Chowmahalla Palace (as if i was in Amazing Race). Again, this is another magnificent architecture, 300 years old and it is stand still. Compared to other building, the palace is still in a good condition, well maintained. The landscape and plenty of security guards watching the palace.

While Salabat Jung initiated its construction in 1750, it was completed by the period of Afzal ad-Dawlah, Asaf Jah V, the V Nizam ensured its completion between 1857 and 1869.

It is believed to be modelled on Shah of Iran's palace in Tehran. The palace is unique for its style and elegance. Building of the palace began in the late 18th Century and over the decades a synthesis of many architectural styles and influences emerged. This palace consists of two courtyards , southern courtyard and northern courtyard. They have elegant palaces, the grand Khilwat (the Durbar Hall), fountains and gardens. The palace originally covered 45 acres, but only 14 acres remain today.I heard if i were to go there by night, it will be totally different from day tour. I dunno and don't care as my original agenda in Hyderabad was meant for business; so didn't have much time.


I let my photo do the talking. A picture worth a thousand words. All i can say, superb. By the way, you have to pay in order to capture picture around the palace but I didn't pay and I took the picture illegally and sneak around...heheheh.. Enjoy the pic though.

The picture of myself with the palace was taken at the backyard




INSIDE THE PALACE
Below are the photo taken inside the palace. You can see the chandelier, the floor...Wow! I was speechless.

As usual, i refused to go unless my picture taken with the thrown background.Cool and Nice. This kind of view can't really be seen any where else.

Escape to Hyderabad

I went to Hyderabad in mid July 2008. Didn't have much time to write up a story until today.

As mentioned before, this was a business trip. As usual, I took chances to look around especially the historical place. One of the trip was going to old city of hyderabad. Hyderabad was the last state taken by India. Prior to that, Hyderabad was an independent state ruled by Sultan Nizam. You can see a few amazing architecture, just like the taj mahal. I can conclusively say that ancient indian was full of tremendous architect.

This is Mecca Mosque. It's about 400 years mosque. The mosque stand still. But too bad, it is not properly maintained. You can see pigeon flying around.



I was trying to snap bright sky picture from Mecca Mosque. You can pigeon flying. cool huh! as if i am the professional photographer. This was accidentally taken. hehehe



This is Charminar. Its function during those day as the sight tower. Another superb architecure from far. When you get close to it, you can irresponsible people who didn't appreciate historical heritage; vandalism on the wall.



This is bangle street. Took this photo from charminar tower. Why it is called bangle street? the merchants along the street only sell bangle. Nothing else.


This is myself. From charminar, the background is the mecca mosque. Cool view



This photo also taken from Charminar. You can see so many traditional indian taxi. Got meter just like any other taxi. Note that in India, they honk a lot. Signal light (left and right) are unused at all. Every 30 seconds to 1 minute, they will honk each other. Reason is to make other driver alert that you are on road. Traffic light? There are but they don't really follow sometimes. But rarely you see major accident.



You can see thousand of people here. If you see this and assume this is really crowded, then you can imagine New Delhi is even crowder than this.

All in all, i can say i can enjoy the trip. but what really disappointing me is that, it's very hard to find souviner item i.e: t-shirt, key-chain, fridge magnet etc. I found one but it was enuff.