facebook | ~Cruising through my Life~

Since I started working as a part-time free-lance writer for Gulf Times, life seems to have taken an exciting new turn..

After the article for working women in Qatar, I have now written about bloggers in Qatar. In this country, blogging is still not considered as a “cool” or beneficial way of social interaction and with my article I try to clear those myths and misconceptions.

Read it here –

http://www.gulf-times.com/technology/233/details/344940/reaching-out-through-blogs

Although Gulf Times did not include photos of all the amazing bloggers I got in touch with, I will attach their photos here as a token of thanks for their contribution.

# all photos belong to the rightful owners

I worry.

At times, I worry a lot.

Most of the times, there is no solid reason to my worries.

Just the other day I was worrying, my kids will never know how life was without social networking!

So here is this post, for my future teenage son and daughter, how life used to be when I was a teenager.

We had real friends, and we used to “ hang out” by cycling or playing in garden or gathering at someone’s place for a game of carom/ludo/snakes and ladder.
Twitter was just the sound of birds!
To share photographs of someone’s marriage or function or birthday, we used to click the photo with a camera -> get them printed -> arrange them in photo albums -> show to others when there happens another family gathering! Not as simple as click -> tag -> share.
One was popular after an achievement in athletics or academics. Not getting nominated for an online contest started by a bunch of people. Or worse: best dressed, best smile, best hair competitions for people to feel better about themselves!
Sending a mail to someone was a BIG deal. School curriculum taught us how to draft an e-mail and for many years we stuck to that code.
One e-mail id was enough for one family. Later on (after a few more years) every application/forum/form required an alternate email id.
Blogging did not exist till late 1990s and till 2009 it was limited to only a small group of people.
Dating was generally face-to-face, not online.
Bosses were treated as bosses and Subordinates were treated as subordinates They met socially only on special occasions and family gatherings, not every day over internet after work hours!
“Time pass” included reading newspapers (not e-newspapers), listening to radio, reading novels (not e-books), gardening etc. Ladies occasionally got together for buying vegetables or sharing recipes while their kids played. Men talked about politics or soccer games by actually physically sitting with other men.
Acronyms and abbreviations were logical – nt abt nythin v cn mak wid a propr wrd.
Long distance was tough! Colorful postcards, letters in envelopes and stamps of different countries/states were the trend.