Choudhary Shahid Nawaz' Blog

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Dig mountain, Find Rat ;)

November 4th, 2010 by Choudhary Shahid

There are a lot of fantastic ideas coming into the brain when you are not sitting in front of your computer (maybe when dreaming..lol) and sooner you decide to write those in a form of article/blog post, ideas tend to go away like they never existed. I have been suffering this problem since quite long :) .

“Dig mountain …find rat ” :) is my friend’s way of translating a Urdu saying “khoda pahar nikla choha” …lolz. Anyhow last night I had a dream to write something which will be beneficial to readers in some way…..I couldn’t remember what I was up to but …oh yeah . Couple of days ago I received an e-mail in my inbox saying something like this:

“From:               DHL Express Services (usps.id1179@dhl.com)

Sent:                   Tuesday, November 02, 2010 8:36:06 PM

Subject: Track your parcel NR42874‏

Body:

Good afternoon.

Your parcel has arrived at the post office on October 04

Our Driver was unable to deliver the parcel to your address.

To receive a parcel you must go to the nearest DHL office and show your mailing label.

You need to print mailing label, and show it in DHL office to receive the parcel.

Thank you for your attention.

DHL Services.”

I was very surprised and shocked at the same time. Surprised..? why, because I was about to receive a parcel which I never excepted and Shocked….because it said my address was not reachable to deliver the package. I did a deep search inside my little brain to find out any clue about that mysterious package but couldn’t got any lead. Birthday gift….”No”, engagement present…..”No way”…. a present from GF….. maybe if she…then what?

When I tried to track the parcel on DHL’s homepage, I got nothing :( . To that point I was desperate at least to know about it. When I spoke with customer service, she said “…don’t try to open the attached file in your email….it’s a virus.”

Wow! lucky enough I didn’t open that attached receipt and un-lucky enough I didn’t receive what I started to dream about.

Rightly said by Albert J. Opitz : “Good luck is inversely proportional to good timing.“

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Ever wanted to get a Driving License in Sweden ?

July 23rd, 2010 by Choudhary Shahid

To get a driving license in Sweden is not that difficult as we normally have heard of but a bit tricky. Based upon my personal experience I’ll try to summarize it here.
First of all I would recommend going through the whole driving book thoroughly at least once. Once you have read the book next step is to do some practice tests. Practice tests will give you an idea about how the real test looks like. It’ll also help you to get prepared that how the composition of questions in the real test will be. You can buy practice tests from www.str.se. It will cost you 15 kr per test. I would recommend doing at least 10 test before you appear in real driving test.

Once you’ve passed theory test, next step is to appear in driving practical test. I assume you already know how to drive but you never been to test ever. Practical driving in front of your examiner is nothing more than just acting. If you are good at acting you’ll get the license provided that you don’t break any rule :) . There are four basic things which an examiner normally checks:

1- Vehicles knowledge
2- Eco Driving
3- Follow Rules
4- Follow sign boards towards destination.

1- Vehicles knowledge means you should know general information about the vehicle itself. Knowing where and how to fill up engine oil, break fluid, coolant etc. And you suppose to know how to do security/complete check up of your vehicle before you start driving. Security/complete check up of your vehicle means to make sure that, front head lights, front/back and right/left indicators, brake lights, fog light and wipers are working along with good air pressure in tyres . You should know how to check peddle break and hand break as examiner may ask you to check either paddle break or hand break is working or not.

2- You should know the rule 1 -> 3->5 and 2->4 while changing gears. That is called Eco-driving and environmental friendly driving as well.

3- Most import part which no examiner is lenient is to follow the rules on road. Follow every sign board and do special care to speed limit sign boards. When you want to change lane you have make sure 3 things first before you start indicating:

  • Rear view mirror
  • Side mirror (Right/left depending on your turn)
  • Blind spot (moving your head to left/right to see any following car behind)

4- You should be able to read and follow the sign boards. Let’s say your test starts from Sollentuna (Stockholm), examiner may ask you to follow signs and go to Arlanda airport.

“Congrats! You have passed the test” will be statement which you’ll hear from your examiner.

I hope the above helps you :) and best of luck.

Last but not least, if you are so ____ than no need to follow above to get a driving license :p

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1st Inter-University Cricket Tournament

July 21st, 2010 by Choudhary Shahid

Being a member of PSA Stockholm, I have honored to write the 1st blog post. In this blog I’ve tried to summarize the highlights of 1st ever Inter-University Cricket Tournament held at Husby Gård, Stockholm, last weekend (17-18 July). You might be wondering what PSA actually is? Well PSA (Pakistan Student Association) is a registered association with Stockholm University and KTH student(s) union, actually representing Pakistani Student(s) in Stockholm.
PSA Stockholm aims to play a dual role. Firstly, that of facilitating current and prospective Pakistani students by organizing practical information and creating awareness about the Swedish culture in contrast to social and cultural norms in Pakistan. Secondly, we aim to raise awareness about the culture and identity of Pakistan amongst the diverse student community of Stockholm by arranging Pakistani cultural festivals and information dissemination through our website and seminars.
Last weekend (17-18 July) PSA had held its 1st ever inter-university cricket tournament at Husby Gård. There were 9 teams in total representing different universities (Stockholm, KTH and Halmstad). Tournament was started on Saturday at 09:00 with first pool match between SU Tigers and KTH Jagaur. All teams were given colored t-shirts with PSA logo on it. Each teams consisted of 8 players. PSA Stockholm had been planning for this activity for one month to make it a successful event and no doubt they had achieved what they wanted to. Head of PSA sports & event committee Mr. Mazhar Mirani took initiative with his team members with full support of PSA working board and advisory board to plan a successful event. Special Pakistani food (Chicken Qorma) was served during two days to all participants. Ground was full of crowd and players during both days. On Sunday morning tournament was resumed with super sixes 1st match.  People enjoyed two whole days under outstanding weather conditions. Super sixes matches led to semi finals. Final match between SU Tigers and KTH Sardar was a real crunch game.  KTH Sardar set a total of 75 runs on board in 7 overs. Since from the word go SU Tigers had been the hot favorite for that tournament but unfortunately SU Tigers could reach the victory stand by the margin of only 2 runs. Well played to KTH Sardar and better luck to SU Tigers for next time.  During semi finals and final, our commentators (Mr. Saud Saleem and Mr. Muhammad Farooq) provided a lively commentary to the audience. The Western Union was official sponsor to PSA for this event. Final ceremony was held at the end of final match in which officials of PSA Stockholm had given prizes to man of the match, runners up trophy and the Winners cup. Indeed it was a successful tournament for PSA and an entertaining event for its participants.

I hope PSA Stockholm will continue arranging such events in future in order to bridging gap between Pakistani and Swedish communities. Some of pictures taken during the event are available here.

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