I was born in Bangladesh in the year 1982 in a district called Sirajgonj. It is located in the north central part of Bangladesh. I cannot recall the place but I have a connection to that place. I was the first child and I did not know that I would not live for long in my birthplace. My destiny was somewhere else. Somewhere far from green in a quiet city in a different country. My father was in Abu Dhabi. In 1983, I along with my mother went to live with my father which shaped the reset of my life.
Yes, ever since I knew life, I was already in a land which was mostly desert. I still remember that my feet was in the sand and we played on the grass in front of our building. I thought that it was my country which was not in reality.
School
I got into Junior KG when I was four years old. The school name was Bangladesh Islamia School. It was an evening shift school since in the morning it was used by an arabic school. School life was really good. After few years, we got our own school. It had a big auditorium and a big playground. Our school was big but students were not that much at that time. It was a bengali medium school and english medium was upto class 5.
AIUB – The golden years
My life changed when I got to study what I loved. Since my father was an engineer, it was obvious that I would also like engineering but choosing what to study was not a very easy task. But since I grew up with computers and I loved to work with computers, the first thing that came into my mind was to study with computer. In my first semester, with very few resources, from a small cyber cafe in Banani, I launched my first website which I named aiubians.com. It was develeoped in ASP.net and in the backend it had Microsoft Access database.
IIT DU
I was ready to go Abu Dhabi after finishing my University life. I also got a job at HawarIT as a software developer. But one fine day I saw that there is an opportunity to study Masters in IIT, Dhaka University. Like many things in life and in our country, there were very few seats. Only 30 students would get admitted. I sat for the exam with a brave heart but I was very much skeptical that I would get admitted. When the result day was declared, just out of curiosity I went to the university and started to look at the notice on the wall. My name was third from the top. Life in IIT was great. We had some of best teachers. We had a big computer lab.
Starting Business
After I completed my Masters, I wanted to go back to Abu Dhabi but I knew that it was not country. I had to get a job or visa to live there. The place I stayed for almost 18+ years was never mine. I had only three months to stay. If I did not get a job, I had to come back. I tried to get into a lot of software companies but since I did not had adequate experience in any company, I hardly found a suitable job.
I started to work in a software company in Dubai but soon I realized that they would not give me a visa rather they were just giving false hope. After consulting with my father, we decided to start our own business.
We rented a place to start. We started small but I was soon getting orders from different companies. Life was getting busy day by day. It all seemed like a very big challenge. As I was already developing websites, I started to look for companies who needed one. One of my uncle who was a friend of my father started to give us some orders for his company. It was a good start. I did not have any previous experience running a company so I had to struggle a lot. Getting a license in UAE was really difficult but Allah made it easy for us.
Joining Etihad
Being in Etihad was one of the best part in my life. I got an email alert for a position through email. I immediately applied. After around nine months, I got a call from Etihad HR while I was parked in front of a shop in the city. I faced the face to face interview. Then I got the offer letter. There was no looking back. I got into Etihad one fine day as I leave the business behind. I was in the Service Desk team with a bunch of great people to work with. Etihad is one of the best companies in the world. In Etihad, people respect each other and help each other whenever someone needs it. I always looked at the simulators and wished someday I could also fly.
The big change to IBM
I never thought of being in IBM but it was an experience which was good and at the same time it was painful. As I was at the peak of my professional life and was thinking of settling down in Abu Dhabi and thinking of staying in Etihad for a long time, we heard that our department was about to get outsourced. For many months we were just hearing and one fine day, we were told that we had to move from Etihad to IBM. That meant a lot to every one of us. It was very hard to accept. I knew of the situation where certain nationalities were not getting work permit for new visas. I was one of them. I was not provided a visa and I had to leave Abu Dhabi for good. I can still remember every day I spent thinking that things would change but Allah had some plans for me. I tried and left all stones turned but after several months of struggling, I decided to move on and come back to my country which was the only option at that time.
In IBM Bangladesh
As soon as the plane was landing in Dhaka, a sudden fear wrapped me. The feeling of being in my country was not that I expected but I knew that life would be normal and things will be ok. I was jobless again but deep in my heart I believed that Allah has some plans for me. He will show me a way.
Being in NOVOAIR
I never thought that I would again work for an airline. But, as I followed the path, I got into NOVOAIR. I was again in the midst of planes and my previous experience helped me to recognize the difficult tasks.
Zakaria Bin Abdur Rouf 