Emotional Landscapes....

2007-09-21T19:43:00.000+05:00

The 8th roza is over and done with....
and just a few days, or rather months ago we were saying k abhi to ramadan bohat duur hai. Time just flows by, u don't even get a chance to appreciate how fast it goes. Right now m all for it flying as fast as it can :)
Uni has become so boring [it never was interesting in the first place] and due to ramadan we are taking a break from all the bazaar work. So, i kinda have nothing much to do these days... that is if u don't count thinking and worrying as 'work'.

It's such a pity theres nothing blog worthy happening around now that i have some time.... who knows where will i be next year the same time around..

on a separate note, i was just blog-hopping and realized how the blogosphere has changed. So many old people have taken a break from blogging or just simply committed blogicide. So many new people have joined in.... but most of all i feel so totally out of place...

2007-09-20T22:49:00.000+05:00

I posted here earlier....some where in March about my best-est friend getting married. She got nikkahfied in March. And i remeber that feeling which i had when she was signing on the papers...which heralded beginning of a new life.... with a new person....and as a new person. I felt as if she was going away..
...and if that wasn't enuf... a phone call today made it all the more harder.

'Toobz m going..to Canada. today. but don't worry. i'll be back in december. just in time for your wedding'

...and i was speechless.

HOW ON EARTH do u come to grips with the fact that ur best friend has suddenly decided to fly away to her husband just on ONE day's notice?? everything happened in a matter of a day...thats what she says. but STILL. i mean i am REALLLLLYYYYYY happy for her.... realllly.... beyond words..... but still its extremely difficult nonetheless!

GOD! i cant even put my thoughts together properly. m sure its total crap whatever ive written. but oh what the heck!

in all the colors of a rainbow...

2007-09-19T23:27:00.000+05:00

Its surprising how your mood affects the way you look at things.... at the world in general and your surroundings in particular.

"It's a beautiful world. bohat khoobsoorat"

I got to know you better...

2007-09-16T18:08:00.000+05:00

"I thought one day I'd forgive you,
Sadly, I got to know u BETTER"

[read this on gaping void today and it just is SO apt]

People like you are what make one lose faith in friendship... people like you who just wear a mask...and are horrible underneath. I hate you for what you did...hate you for what you turned into. Hate the way you hurt me. hate the way you abandoned. hate everything about you. EVERYTHING.

I thought you were different
I believed when you said you never would
I believed in YOU
I believed in FRIENDS

and i hate the fact that you chose not to walk with me
i hate the fact that you wouldnt be there on the most wonderful day of my life
i hate the fact that you chose to be YOU

in fact.... if thats what u really are, then i am GLAD that you aren't here anymore
..... but deep down inside, i believe you still were different.
you just don't know it!

"Belated Happy Birthday"

Again..

2007-09-14T14:55:00.000+05:00

It happened again.
once more the city was gripped by fear last night.
9 armed men first threw a hand grenade at a G-7 bus which set it on fire and then showered it with bullets.
It was all in FRONT OF THE UNIVERSITY OF KARACHi.
just a day after a clash between 2 students parties
and a couple of weeks after the death of student members of a student party by their rivals
and they say it wasnt 'targeted'
DUh!

the four years i have spent on campus have been full of fear and uncertainty... one day everything is all hunky dory, and the next thing you know is that students somewhere are hurling stones at each other and end up injured... or sometimes even lose their lives! All at a place where we are supposed to prepare ourselves to face the world... and to look in the eyes of life!

But then... this is what life outside the campus is all about.... fight to save yourself...fight to make yourself heard...fight! and bas... yehi hai.

A regular day at the KU campus is just like that of the city.... frantic.lazy...
you'll see people rushing to classes...or rushing away from them...you'll see people lazing near the canteens... people lounging in the lobby... people having fun... or them bitching about the endless miseries one has to go thru if one chose KU as their home for four years...

Isn't that what we all do? at all times.
complain.
bitch about things
bitch about people
bitch about circumstances
bitch about the ugliness of life
...all while sipping on iced tea...

and then we get up
and go back to the warmth of our cozy homes
and then bitch more
about maids
about service men who never turn up
about kids
about spouses
about noisy neighbors
about litter in the street

...and then we sleep

come back

2007-09-10T23:52:00.000+05:00

*hooot hooot*
Tee is thinking of giving some life to this poor place....it looks so sad and lonely...hmmmm...thinking.....
....still thinking....
Ok. so i think ive just lost it. no not my marbles. i think ive lost the 'blogger' in me! hah! sounds like ive lost my sould or something. nahi seriously. i just can't bring myself to it. ive been meaning to re-posses this place for some time but i just sit and stare at the screen...and sip pineapple juice. yeah m THAT boring. but its so ironic in a way. i used to blog abt nothing. i used to blog abt my dull boring life. and abt the dull boring people associated wid it :P and now that i HAVE a life, at least it looks like i'll have one soon [:p] i just dont get enuf time to sit and ramble for no one. but thats the point of rambling, isnt it? so i guess i'll just ramble.
ramble
ramble ramble.
m thinking of renaming this place....something on the more merrier tunes of...errrr....weddings... :P
or better yet.... something cheesier :p

yeah m insane

2007-02-01T20:24:00.000+05:00

I guess this blog needs to hibernate...for some time! So i'll see u all later.....when i feel like blogging again. but i lately i was having this feeling k its just such useless banter that i write here, what faida? and hence the break...well quite frankly, i wanted to delete it, but then....who knows when i might want to vent some pent up anger out? lol
take care...

FREEZE!

2007-01-08T16:08:00.000+05:00

woooooooosh! is it chillin' in khi or wot? i just realized today how REALLY COLD it was when i had to pull myself out of the warm comforter and drag myself out of the house at 8:45 am! yess THAT early! lolx.... all because classes started today and ladies and gentlemen, i can now proudly proclaim myself to be a Masters student!! yayyy! wOw. sounds so grand! nahi its not that i never believed myself to cum so far....its just that it seems to hav come abhi se! and today numerous ppl stopped me on my way 'aap first year ki ho?' and i felt like strangulating them how dare they take a FINAL year student as a FIRST year kid? arghh! kuch nahi dikhta logon ko! :@

Anyhow, I am glad we have some decnt teachers this year....all senior professors. one of our teachers has an experience of 45 whole years! amazing isnt it??

I had ice cream last night..... this huge cone with chocolate sauce and nuts in that chilling weather! brrrr...was amazing i tell ya! go have one urself if u havent done so yet! sardi ka maza hee ice cream kha ker aata hai na? wesey i basically had ice cream becauze m avoiding coffee for health reasons :P

of new year and beyond....

2007-01-04T21:49:00.000+05:00

* Be more organized
* Take driving seriously
* absolutely NO impulse buys. balkey lets give that a bit of a margin..
* and i need to learn to SAVE.
* and lesser crappy novels and more serious 'works'
* take my 'writings' more seriously
* maintain a record of which resolutions m keeping and how far..

and theres a looooooooong 5-page list on wot to buy, wot NOT to buy, wot to do and wot NOT to do..... pata nahi how many just remain on ppr...but i have one NEW resolution: i will try my best to keep all the resolutions =)

anyhow, Eid this year didnt feel like eid, neither did new year feel like new year. How was 2006 in one word? 'Frantic' is one word i wud pick to describe it. So many things, so many people, so many things happening....it doesnt feel like a year has passed abhi se. abhi to shuru hua tha. I still remember the y2k and the hype it created, the y2k bug, the fascination we had as kids over writing 2000 in our copies...... and how fascinating the 3 zeroes looked to us. and its SEVEN whole years since then. wOw. time does fly. and i still cant believe k i'll be starting my Masters classes from next week. whOa. remember the days we had colored cycles and color coded gardening tool sets in school? and those color pencil baskets? and the colorful aquarium?

anyways, wot are YOUr resolutions this year?

PS: thanx A LOT for all those who commented/emailed/scrapped/texted on my last post. thankU all..... =)

yunhi hota hai to akhir yun hota kyun hai...

2006-12-05T20:23:00.000+05:00

i always used to say k i cant accept death, despite the fact k i had never encountered the death of anyone close....but now that i have......its horrible. The man closest to me after my own father....left us [innalillah wa inna ilahi rajiun].....left us wondering wot happened. didnt even give us time to think, to act or do anything. left us just like that, no warning, nothing. never in my wildest imagination would i have thought k he'd go.......go forever, never to come back.

one day u see him all hale and hearty, enjoying his daughter's birthday party, hours later.....he's no more. Someone with such a dominating personality as him......someone with such a nature as him...cant be forgotten that easily. even in my own home, where ever i look i see traces of the one gone. half of my winter wardrobe, my cell, so much of my room decor are all testaments of the man that he was. just last sunday he gave us this huge pendulum wall clock, maybe he knew he'd be gone 4 days later and wanted us to remember him with the tan-tan of the clock every hour!

I have lost the man who solved the biggest crisis of my life, the man who made SOOO many things possible for all of us......God bless him!!!!

people just leave so silently na? at his house the other day, there was so much mayhem and all the time i felt like bas abhi he'll come thru the doors saying 'kahan ho bhui sab log? shor kis baat ka hai? chalo aao sab yahan mere saath betho' and then he'd say 'tooba chalo jaldi se le kar aao!' and i was expected to bring him water as soon as he got seated...thsi was wot happened hamesha. yesterday, dad was like 'beta ub kis k liye kheera (cucumber) kato gi?' and then he burst into tears..... HE used to love cucumber and no dinner was complete without it, and he loved the chai i made......

on my desk rests an old picture, me and his son at the age of two, on either of his shoulders.....

ajeeb si empty empty feeling horahi hai, as if i cant be happy again....atleast for a long time!

*please pray for the departed soul*

Dreams......

2006-11-26T11:52:00.000+05:00

Bad dreams can seriouslyyyyy ruin your day :'(
This really ajeeb sa dream made me soooooo down , and have been feeling down ever since. Plus, now it seems it wasnt even wrong; the dream i mean!
Chances are very bright k it was right. maybe a premonition?
:s

they say k u should think good and you'll have pleasant dreams. but the little something, the irky little bug that crawls into ur mind when u arent looking, and stays there and is very hard to pull out- it makes u have those nightmares, about losing things u just got, about horrible stuff, about ur worst fears that u dont even realize are there.......

......I guess its human nature to think of the horrible stuff before the good actually happens. And if the horrible stuff DOES happen then u go 'Dekha, kaha tha na maine!'

*sigh

that doesnt make any sense! :S

2006-11-24T15:07:00.000+05:00

Image credit: Post Secret

just posting it because its kinda sweet...and SO down-to-earth

2006-11-24T14:51:00.000+05:00

two down three more to go! a knot seems to untie after every paper! *sigh
aaj to bas hud hogai! WHY oh WHY cant teachers put themselves in our place and THINK? but hey, teachers cant think, can they? and we were always told 'teachers are sacred'. dunno where all the sacredness [is that a word?] went? How can u respect a person who cant even speak the language let alone TEACH! heck!
but anyways......its done with now. this course is jinxed m telling u. a teacher was assigned to it a WEEK before the examz!!! khairrrrrrr

whyyyyyyyy do we have examz anyway? i fail to see ANY point in rattafying the teacher-made notes, reproducing them with colored pens in the paper with bold decorative headlines, illustrations (!) and magnifying your writing so that a one page answer takes four sheets. yea m NOT kidding!!! landing in THIS place after having been thru the cambridge system is torture m telling ya!

haaye my fingers are aching badly.....i cant believe i filled up SOOO many sheets in just 3 hours!! =(

.......

2006-11-19T00:17:00.000+05:00

What do u call someone u befrended eons ago and have been thru every thick and thin wid them?

Gosh m feeling SO nostalgic aaj kal. She isnt even married yet; she very kindly reminded me k abhi there is more than a year. lol. And nooo, DONT u dare get any wrong ideas [:p] arghh...why do all good things happen when i have semester exams just round the corner? argh argh argh. i cant even be happy sahi se. ok ok so i AM being really happy but heck i cant even study sahi se. lol. yeah thats more like it.

sometimes i wish we could REALLy express how happy we are.....but instead tears are all that cum out making me look like a sentimental fool. lol....

.....sat down to write pata nahi kia and instead blogged abt pata nahi kia. hota hai....

mY best freNd's weDding

2006-11-15T15:48:00.000+05:00

a strange gloom has taken over me after the initial euphoria settled....... strange thoughts have inhabited my khaali dimagh since then. what will i do now? it would be SO different without 'her' around. who will i share my stupid fears with? who will listen me out no matter how unreasonable i may be? who will encourage me to move ahead? what will i DO without the person who made me move forward all these years????????
yes, my best frend's getting married, and moving out of the country, permanently...for ever...never to return!! haaye, kia hoga?
i was REALLy happy, infact happier than i have been in a looooooooooooooong time when i heard 'the news'. it all happened SO quickly, within a matter of weeks....and she's really happy mashaAllah...i am too but....i dunno, its SO strange. i still just cant imagine how things would be without her here. when someones been with u for such a long time, ten years almost, then they become a part of u....u may not talk to them every day and may not even meet em for months at a stretch....a part they are nonetheless. and now that part is going away, m kinda jealous of her 'man'. lol. he's a prize winner.....taking 'her' away without even knowing her pehley se.....and leaving us with nothing. and she'll be so so soooo far away.............

=)

2006-11-12T22:14:00.000+05:00

its always good to hav someone around on whom u can rely, bitch with, have fights wid, be as stupid as u can be.....and yet they'll love u all the same =)

m SO glad i have such people around me, it wudnt have been worth living without u guys.....and i mean it!

2006-10-31T13:19:00.000+05:00

You can't just walk out... ... ...
... ... ... not just like that!

:-)

2006-10-30T15:05:00.000+05:00

had a conversation- a looooong conversation- with a frend the other day and that got me thinking. He's one person who's been wid me for the past 21 years of my life, growing up together, learning things together, hating people, loving people, fighting and all that. being a cousin, it was not really possible to stop seeing each other even if had the stormiest of shouting matches over who had the best ball. [:P]

for me, he always was the brother i didnt have, the frend i wanted and the partner in crime. then he moved away, to a land far away [well, not far away, just a couple of hundred miles away in Islamabad :P]

and three years on, i found that i had lost the happy-go-lucky person we saw off the airport, and was replaced by a fat, dejected man with droopy forlorn looks. And whatever followed was enough to rattle ur bones and shatter ur trust in all things good. Then, being the muft-mushwara person that i am proud to be, i set out to bring back the frend i had. i wish i could advise my ownself that way :P

'I've lost hope in everything, people have so many expectations, my health is falling, i dont see any future for myself, i dont see myself ANYWHERE 2-3 years down the years' was his mantra.

Why do we lose hope in things? isn't that what life is all about? arent WE, the people, made to be tested? i believe k we cant ever be tested beyond what we can endure. All sticky spots come with a solution, even the darkets of spots [surf excel haina :P] that and a lot of other things, and i thought it all just washed over him like all my previous rantings.

He went back home yesterday, and i messaged to ask whether he got back in one piece. lol. and the reply came 'i've left behind a part of me- the dejected, depressed, disillusioned part of me- and i am a new person here'

dunno why, but that made my day!

Eid Hangover!

2006-10-29T00:04:00.000+05:00

seriously....its real bad this time!
sleeping is what all i have been doing today..........coz thats what i missed in the past 4-5 days. from chand raat onwards, sleep seemed to be a distant dream (literally). And imagine, getting bak to uni in such a state, and that too when examz are only a couple of weeks later, well, two to be exact :$
i can launch a tirade on how much work i have on my head, but it'll mean thinking abt it and i dnt want to do that right now.........run away from things is what i do best :D
Eid was the usual fun affair it always is.........we happen to be at the receiving end of guests the first day, rest of the 2 are 'going out' days so its pretty kewl. collecting eidi and looking ur eid best, i still sound like a kid, but heck i still AM a kid, a twenty-one year old but who cares? :D

so......whats the highest eidi score? oh and score reminds me......what a pathetic match we had wid SA :S

hmmmm........

Eid Mubarak!

2006-10-26T13:05:00.000+05:00

have a nice day all! =)

2006-10-22T20:14:00.000+05:00

its the twenty-eighth roza already! i cant believe it, i SO cant believe it. i mean i thor this ramadan wud be a hard and long one given the awful weather, but God, how wrong i was. it has been anything BUT long. the rozas did seem to be pretty tough especially on hot university days and with no electricity, and yet it seems ramadan JUST began. i mean i havent even had pheni ONCE the entire season!!! thats so not fair.....i means this is the ONLY time of the year when u can see stacks and stacks of phenis in the bakeris, wesey i have always wondered, how do they stack them in such an impeccable manner always and everywhere? khair, i didnt have them earlier on coz i was being picky abt *oily* food. but what the heck? cant u just indulge urself every once in a while? khair, the point being, i HAVENt had pheni this time and ramadan are *almost* over.

is it eid tomorrow in NWFP? dunno. the last i heard, the ruet-e-hilal comittee was having their 'ijlaas'. whats all the hoohaa every year abt NWFP being a day or 2 ahead of the rest of us? isnt it just fair for them to celebrate the start and end of the month in accordance to whenever they sight the moon? that doesnt make it obligatory on us to follow. anyway...

....the bazaars are finally brimming with human traffic. they should seriously have human traffic signals on busy thoroughfares like that of tariq road, bahadurabad etc. ppl just bump and push, bump and push, bump and push endlessly. and if u have been not-s0-intelligent enough to complete ur eid shopping before hand, than be my guest and endure/enjoy it all =D

now that ramadan are almost over, we'll all be going back to what we did. someone yesterday was telling me their plans for the eid day- a whole day of movies, partying/dancing, loud music etc etc. ironic isnt it? it's as if we are celebrating the end of a torture period that limits us from doing all that. where did the notion of 'ramadan is a training period for the rest of the year' go? hmmmm?? *wonders*

Tagged!

2006-10-21T13:37:00.000+05:00

Today

height: 2''1 [u expect me to be truthful? :P]
color: red
piercing: nose and ears
tattoos: yeah all over [:P]

Right Now

Time: 1:32 pm
Mood: mood-less [is that a mood?]
taste: none
the weather: pretty OK
bad habit: right now? none. otherwise obviously LOADS
current crush: none
biggest regret: i should have had more water at Sehri [:P]
Perfume(s): none
Thing I want to do: read that book i started last night and finish the two i started over the past month, and get done with the eid cleaning. AAAaaargh

Favourite

TV show: hmmmm....none
book: countless yaar. i recently read The Kite Runner and loved it, but i've loved LOADS of other books too.
non alcoholic drink: Frooto- the orange and mango mix flavor [:P]
milk drink: Lassi [=D]
brand: None
color: Red
emblem: none
perfume: Beyond Paradise by Estee Lauder
designer: none
Chocolate: SO MANyyyyyyy.......but i really like the Lindt milk chocolate, bounty, mars, kisses etc etc etc

Have I Ever

broken the law: buying pirated CDs and books?
misused credit card: No
skipped school: mmm...NO
fell asleep in the shower/bath: No
had children: Nope
been in love: Fools fall in love =D [in case u are wondering, m not one :P]
been hurt: who hasnt?

Random

have a job: No.
My CD player has what in it right now: A Quark Express CD which refuses to work
if I were a crayon, the color? rainbow
what makes me happy? ppl who dont lie make me happy along with a zillion other things.

When/What Was the Last

I got a real letter: a month back
got an email: everyday.
thing I purchased: cell phone card
TV program I watched: Bob the builder =P
movie I saw in the theaters: havent been there in a loooooooooooooooooooong time. i guess Jinnah was the last one i watched and that too coz my school took me there!
Hugged: sis
Place I was: Liaquat National
song heard: some Call song on TV
phone call: F
was depressed: not in a long time thankfully.

What Comes to Mind When I Hear

car: crash [yikes!]
murder: JonBenet [yeah was reading the Review]
cape: a pink one i had as a kid
cell: Dee's N70 [what a waste!]
fun: with F
shoe: black stilletos
crush: bug? EH for example?
music: LOUD
love: is for khuars :p
chalk: white

=)

Picture of Hope

2006-10-08T16:29:00.000+05:00

photo courtesy: Flickr

One year down the lane......and the analysts say it will take TWO generations for the affected areas to recover fully. reading and watching the accounts of the affected people in newspapers and on the television still bought tears to my eyes. They most certainly are moving ahead, what choice do they have? but what they went through is beyond what we can imagine.....
reports in Dawn, especially the one about those female students really touched me. Seeing your loved ones dying helplessly in front of u, ur life's savings, homes and everything being reduced to dust and rubble; HOW will they recover? and when????

and it makes u think of something else too......the fraility of life and the unpredictable nature of it. the castles we build and so carefully decorate can become dust and bricks in no time, the future we so carefully plan may not be there after a second, i might not be even able to click the 'publish' button here......thats how unpredictable it is!

....last year, this time around, we were busy planning better ways of generating more and more funds. most of the time was spent in PAF museum the earlier few days.....and God, the spirit was so heartening; young boys and girls.....working tirelessly with the blazing sun and roza. May we all get the reward for whatever little contributions we made.....and may those who were affected be fully recovered....and happy. Ameen.

2006-10-07T20:14:00.000+05:00

hmmmmm.........pkblogs isnt working here, and inblogs wasnt working too but it workied today so i 'saw' my blog after a looooong time. dunno why but i feel like quitting blogging and i decided to delete it, but then why delete it? i guess i'll let it be here and rant and rave occasionally......maybe its coz most of the old bloggers arent here on the blogosphere any more and maybe coz the initially 'shauk' has died down. pata nahi, and maybe its coz life is sooooo hectic these days, with ramadan and uni going on at fast forward....
......tomorrow is the first anniversary of the great earthquake which shook the mountains and lives alike. 8 of October!!! there've been alot of reports on the rehabilitation (sp?) work going on the affected areas and how ppl are going on with their life......but the thing which shook me the most was what dad told yesterday....being in the iron and steel business a dealer told him this so its first hand info; this certain NGO contacted the said dealers and told k we have such and such quality of steel sheets and so and so quantity, they wanted the quotation for price, in short, they wanted to SELL it off! get it? they wanted to SELL the sheets the got for the affected areas on subsidised rates.............what is the world coming to?????

2006-09-20T20:34:00.000+05:00

we had this hot shot lawyer over to lecture on media laws......
......'thankYou very much for blah blah blah'
....'my pleasure blah blah blah'
......i inched my chair forward to giv him more space to pass.....in doing so BANG goes the bottle of 7up in front of me on the GLASS table...OOOPsss.......i move to pic it up....BANG goes my neighbor's pepsi coz i hav just knocked it by my elbow.....and mind u...both of em were NOT empty!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
and what could they have possible damaged apart from scratching the table?? yes my teachers NOTES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

OH god.....couldnt i have been any clumsier???

Ramblings...

2006-09-14T20:24:00.000+05:00

I was watching this 'maynah' (dunno wat its called in english) bath in a puddle of water along the corridor in university.........and dunno why but i stood there for a whole minute to watvh this carefree creature, bathing and then flapping its wings to dry itself and all its feathers were upright and water sprayed from it......was such a nice sight, i wish i had a camera.....

The documentary 'Bringing radio back into style' is over and done with, FINALLY!

How, Oh God, HOW could u make someone as annoying as this elec course teacher????? She's getting on my nerves.......more by every passing day.

I wish people would stop bugging me abt things........and issues.

why isnt the invisibility cloak reallll?????????????

2006-09-10T12:01:00.000+05:00

its sunday AGAIn! God is it only me or are the weeks/months rushing by at light speed? before u knw it the week ends and starts and ends again!

next week means hectic routine because of the documentary which after much pleading and mazloom faces has been extended for this thursday.

any idea how i can remove the ads from my page and decrease the size of that image of my name in the sidebar???

2006-09-09T14:02:00.000+05:00

ufff home management is SUCH a chaotic work! there should definitely be courses onit....i mean mom has just been away for 2 days......and my nereves are already wrecked!
what to cook? what to buy? what to do? what not to do? theres just simply sooooooo much!

NOW i know what mothers feel like.....*sigh*

come baaaaaaaaaaaaaack!

2006-09-08T20:13:00.000+05:00

its raining again! i mean it has been raining since MORNING.......what the heck??!?
can't we have a few days of clear roads in karachi? God, this is the best punishment u cud have given us, seriously!

Remorse....how do i get rid of thou?

2006-09-05T20:18:00.000+05:00

Feeling helpless over what 'could' have been........over what never happened, over what was lost, over what was wished for but never had. Is it a state or a feeling? pata nahi.....

Could have written loads on it but m not a very expressive person, Absar has very beautifully written what i wud have wanted to say, but m not very good with words. Dunno what gave him the idea to tag me to write about.....about what he probably knows i must have felt, maybe.

*sigh*

2006-09-01T12:13:00.000+05:00

m SO happy...
no no m NOT insane....but still m HAPPY :-D

2006-08-30T22:32:00.000+05:00

sometimes...it just takes a confession to burst the bubble of ur inflated happiness, or is it the inflated bubble of happiness? whatever!

yesterday was wonderful.....but ended with a nightmarish confession by someone....i was So happy...and suddenly......crashed down to earth.......

i still dont understand why u did what u did? four years......its been four bloody years.....all just to hear u say what u said last night?? .......was acting all foolish but thanks to fem and Dee who helped me pull together.......i love you guys yaar, dunno what i'll do without u.......

m FINE....if u think i've broken or m all weak from inside u are WRONG! m back on my feet...yeah.....

.....just be happy.......and forget it! but u arent as bad as u think u are.....

m growing OLD!!!

2006-08-29T23:09:00.000+05:00

well yeah so m FINALLy 21 much to the satisfaction of everyone..........but i dont feel like being 21...i mean yaar 21 sounds SO budha! it sounds SO grown up! i remember my 18th birthday bash.....how can i be 21 so soooooon? i always loved telling people that yes now m 16, now 17, now 18, now 19...........but now i think men are right when they say that for women, age stops increasing after 19. Lolz......no m NOT one of those reema meera type age chupaofying people, but STILL! how can u grow up without feeling all grown up?

kher...wasnt expecting much this time.....but surprisingly this year was better than last few years! loved every moment of it....right frm 12 midnight to now (11:28 pm). m amazed at how many people remembered and cared to text/call/email/scrap/visit. Love u guys....thank U so much for making life worthwhile....dnt know what i'll do without u!

So far...H takes the prize for the best card.....its SO very nice, not the designing (although i simply adored it) but the words.....thank YOu so much yaaar.! !

more later =)

2006-08-28T22:24:00.000+05:00

sometimes...most of the times.....u make me realize that there is actually some good left in me when i think there isnt any......

rain time again!

2006-08-25T12:55:00.000+05:00

It's drizzling outside, and the weather is awesome, looks like it might rain anytime. AND i have to all the way to Baqai in the afternoon, i just hope it doesnt rain too heavily else i'll be stuck there!

On a different note, Humbridge is on a mission to make our lives as miserable as possible. First it was the audio documentary and now its the seminar tomorrow which is more like a detention for us; attendance for 2 weeks depends on ur attendance tomorrow, no food, drink, chewing gum, cigarettes for TWo whole hours, NO cell phones, NO sneaking out....the worst thing is that we dont even know who the speakers will be. Maybe its someone 'good' and he'll make our time more bearable.
back to the documentary; how in the world can u expect ur students to prepare a 'professional' documentary with a real scrip, sound editing and all WITHOUT knowing abt it all your own B***** self? *sigh*
its SO unfair......we have to bear it al for the sake of a piece of paper saying 'DEGREE' in bold type.

2006-08-24T16:37:00.000+05:00

From Post secret

Oh no, not again!

2006-08-17T23:26:00.000+05:00

Karachi was again hit by thunderstorms last nite and for the whole day today. Nature sure is taking out revenge for all the atrocities we do to her all year round.

THANKFULLY......power didnt go out for long, the phone's working and most importantly, the cable is working too. BUT from what i hear, the situation outside is horrible. people we need a proper boat network here in karachi, any takers?

Dad had to WALK home......miles just to get home....left his car in the office...oh god. Public transport has vanished, the roads are inundated, alot of cases of electrocution have been reported....*sigh*

Karachi is a mess!

The latest news is that tomorrow has been declared a holiday in view of the disaster....must be really serious na? God help us! Aameen!

Yeh Watan tumhara hai, tum ho paasban isske....

2006-08-15T17:47:00.000+05:00

...This mobilink Ad took the prize for the best Independence day Ads. :-)
and Images declared this song as the best milli naghma ever sung.......:-)

So...Independence Day came and went.....all i got to hear that day was how much traffic there was on the roads, and how the last nights rain had played havoc with all the under-construction/newly-constructed roads, and how the power outage lasted for hours after the rain, and how our PTCL number is dead since Sunday's rain, and how the flies have taken over this (decaying) city! *sigh*
to top it all off, this stupid RJ on Radio One insisted on questioning the very existence of this nation on the very eve of Independence Day. aaarghhhh....Some people!

The only good thing to come out of it was that this flag on the corner of our street looked fabulous- kudos to the person who thought of putting it up there! plus there were some really good shows like the one on the history of Pakistan Broadcasting and Pakistan Television. It was nice to see that things werent as rotten as they are now and the electronic media of this country has some potential- they just need to channel (no pun intended) it positively.

Khair...all in all, i missed the school assemblies where 14th of August meant a full fleged uniformed band marching on the tune of the anthem and the pin drop silence for 2 minutes and the hoisting of the flag and the genuine feeling of love for this motherland!

Of green color and the crescent...

2006-08-11T17:30:00.000+05:00

credit for this awesome pic goes to Illusionfs

So the Azadi fever is here....this is one month where most of us suddenly become as Pakistani as it could get...which is not a bad thing really! The road side flag, badge, jhandiyan and other Inden day knick knacks are back on their annual spots. Patriotic tunes are blaring on the decks on these stalls as well as on the radio stations doing special Indep day progs. All this takes me a few years back......

.......The year was 1995, I had the biggest flag in the school crowd. Man was I proud!

.......The year was 1997, the month was august......and the whole school was gripped by the Jashan-e-Azaadi fervour. the high point of it all was the final prize which went to the best tableu, skit, song, etc etc. Our class practised literally day in and day out for a tablue on one of Iqbal's poems....but in the end we lost to section 'B'. Arrghh

.........The year was 1998, the best performance award went to the junior section for an absolutely well-done performance on Junaid Jamshed's hit 'Molaa'. We lost again *sigh*

.......We finally one the award in O levels....the irony is that i forgot the song we performed on :S

I guess the josh kinda dies down with age. How could i forget that soooong? heck! i'll call up a few frends just to refresh it up. Khair, i have a few pics of those 14th of August functions from school.......can't believe we've grown up so much now. Oh and how can i forget going out with dad every year to see the 'lights'? and oohing and aaahing over Habib Bank Palaza, the Supereme Court building, the civic centre, the five star hotel....that was undoubtedly the best part of the day....going on the 'battiyan dekhne wali' excursion and ending it with a nice roadside dinner. *sigh*

do people still go out for such things? dunno....we grew out of the practice a couple of years back when the traffic grew too messy and there were security issues on the nation's birthday too.

PS: the font is green in honor of the day, the least i could do :-D

Rain rain go away.....

2006-08-08T16:39:00.000+05:00

Oh i cant believe its actually me-the-rain-lover saying this! but seriously, it just takes a strong rainy spell in Karachi to make any rain lover think otherwise.

The Nando's board near the underpass says: Why didnt the chicken cross the underpass? Bacoz it couldnt swim like a duck!

See, the underpass in our beloved 'rapidly developing' city is now a beautiful giant bathtub, filled to the brim with rain water.....the streets in Bath island and clifton and many other areas are now the beautiful lanes of Venice minus the charming boats. but seeing the current situation, it wont be long when we'll see people keeping boats for such seasons! woudlnt it be lovely rowing boats on IIC and getting off at that multinational bank where u work? :P maybe they'll have a five star ferry service for all those class concious people! lolz

oh and even the dreary old dull boring Karachi university is benifitting from the natural supply of water.....the corridor i have to walk thru every morning to get to my department has huge open spaces on either side of it.............but now...one of the sides has a wonderful view- that of a proper lake with natural growth on its edges and migratory birds!! yee haw! lovely isnt it?

oh and if u just are blind and cant see the rain for urself then u are sure to FEEL it by the dripping rain water in ur class rooms...kewl na?

*sigh*

pics from the sea...

2006-07-29T16:25:00.000+05:00

dunno who the guy is....but the ball surely is ours :-)

play ball.........
writing names on the sand and watching them being rubbed....yes i still havent grown up :-)

no pareshani when u have all the protective gear in ur swim suit ...lolz

haaye...so beautiful na?

In the city by the sea..

2006-07-25T19:42:00.000+05:00

Samandar ki lehren...aur unka shor......ret aur ret mai chupi seepian......aur sahil per bikhre insaan...aur oont.....aur duur baadlon mai chupa sooraj......aur halki halki phuwar........

ufff m SO glad to be living in the city by the sea :-)

Had an awesome time at the beach party on Sunday......havent been so happy in AGES. Actually havent been to the sea in such a manner for a looooong time, i had even forgotten that camel rides could be SO much fun. and collecting shells and exclaiming with wonder at every unusual find....and writing names on the sand and watching them being erased by the vicious waves......i wish i could write all my sorrows on the sand, and watch them being washed away.....wiped clean!

and i wish i could write what i feel....on the rocks.....high up......so that u can know........coz i cant tell it otherwise.......

and m glad u are back....

...i wish Sunday could have lasted longer, it ended too soon.......but it was fun. i was hoping to write a long detailed post on how much fun the beach party was, how good the food and other arrangements were, how i sat on the sand and let the waves over myself, and how i loved the tikkas :-D..............but instead i ended up writing this boriat.....

koi baat nahi.....if u read this page then u know by now how bore i can be :-) nothing new

Back to school (uni)

2006-07-20T20:30:00.000+05:00

This past week has been the most exciting (vacations wise) so far and hopefully the excitement will continue for quite some time. but going to university amid all the eating-outs, daawats, picnics etc was....well....you can imagine how it was! i simply did NOT want to gooooooo....

woke up early today....yes as early as 8 am, excavated my bag from under a ton of laundry which i had been sorting, rummaged my drawers for a working pen....zipped up the bag then remembered that something known as a notebook is also needed *sigh*, searched for a reasonably clean notebook with free pages.....and searched for ID card under the clothes in my wardrobe, yes thats where it goes :P

Oh nowww where did i keep those white socks? where where? finally found them rolled up like a ball in one corner of the drawer, hurriedly fixed the hijab and practically ran out. Halt! forgot the cell........aaarghh ran in, stuffed the cell in the bag and OUT finally. reached the bus stop after a 2 minute walk (or run) then remembered another essential item had been forgotten. Ran back again........

Flagged the bus down, and got on panting and found an emtpy seat too. luckily!
but the next bus to the uni was not so good and my freshly *deodrized* and *showered* self would have been hard to distinguish in that sea of smelly, sweaty bodies, hanging on to dear life by a handle or anything to hold on to. but well......i reached the uni 10 mins before class and the familiar sight of all the buddies sitting in their usual spot on the corridor floor lifted the spirits up a BIT.

a very funny thing happened...we all saw in the timetable that some EH would be taking our electronic media course this sem, so from the list we singalled out a certain Mr. Ehsan ul Haq as the suspect. And the image of a elderly gentleman with greying hair was sketched onto our minds. So u can imagine the shock we got when a smart, young lady walked into the room....for the first 10 mins everyone was shifting uncomfortably at this strange *Ehsan ul Haq*, then the teacher sensed and kept on asking and confirming that this is the right class....then she told her name which also had the same initials....LOLZ. Some mix-up we had!

Naughty Rat!

2006-07-18T13:56:00.000+05:00

Ok so yes i WAS fuming over the roadside cloth verdors for selling the pirated version of my 1500 wala lawn suits for a measley 300 rupees but still that wasnt the reason i screamed. No not all, i screamed for a very different reason, and believe me the scream was loud enough to make people miles away to turn their heads...and laugh.

there I was.....walking in the congested space on the path from Rabi Centre towards the tariq road signal.....and if you know the place you'll recall a particularly congested spot near a bank with cheap cloth vendors on both sides and sweaty ladies haggling over a few rupees with the ever-so-stubborn pathans(no i am not a racist). This particular day was hot and i was feeling hotter because i had just seen one of the vendors proudly displaying the pirated version of Vaneeza V9 lawn, Gul Ahmed, Yasir Waheed and Mausumery....all within 300-400. Now tell me......wouldn't that make steam run out of your ears if you happen to be as particular about Lawn prints as i am???? :@
and there goes a loud aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhh! and i jumped, because a fat rat just ran past my foot and its rubbery body even touched me!!!!!!! but only moments later i realized what it was, it was a rat arrite, but it was a fake rubber replica with a string across its neck and was being operated by another roadside vendor who had a dozen similar ugly black rubber rats with shining red beads for eyes. Ufff.....i was so annoyed k i forgot all about the snikkering people around me and started scolding the man. 'Tameez nahi hai kia tumko?, beech sarak per kia zaroorat hai choohe dorane ki?' :@

Oh joy...

2006-07-16T14:37:00.000+05:00

Getting up bleary eyed from last nights nightmare.....groggy with a throbbing headache and bad digestion thanks to overeating (:P), it was nothing short of extereme happiness to see my name in print- yes and that too with a piece i had forgotten all about......yayyyyy!

Out of habit, i opened the sunday paper before breakfast, and again out of habit, i came to the Sunday Magazine at the end (because i like to read it bilkul aaram se), and i flipped pages...to see Benazir...and...OH! i couldnt reallly believe it...well for those of you who regularly get things printed it woudlnt be anything much....but OH what joy!!!

things like these convince you that there still are good things in the world and good people too...(like the editor who suddenly got up to print this bit).

:-)

2006-07-15T20:57:00.000+05:00

It's strange how one sentence triggers ur tears....and then you cant stop....because the sand castles u had built so carefully and so beautifully...have just been washed away...

Homeee

2006-07-12T20:20:00.000+05:00

The floor tiles were gleaming, the walls were spotless, the carpet looked brand new, and every piece of furniture in the room was sparklingly clean. No speck of dust was found even on close scrutiny. hmm....move ahead. Arghh this is the CLEANEST kitchen i have seen in ages! the fridge was sqeaky clean and shiny, the counters looked as if no one had used them ever.........move ahead move ahead. *sigh*
This all looks right out of a catalogue.....amazing!

But

It looks devoid of any life. The expression of the lady proudly showing us around her prized possessions immediately changed into a desolate one when my mother inquired about her family. Her husband doesnt live here, he lives in Saudia, earning. Her children are all away.....for studies.
*sigh* and the poor lady spends all her day, gardening and cooking, for whom god knows.

Back at home....

Scattered laundry greets me in my rooms, books on my bed, chocolate wrappers on my table, dishes on the kitchen counter, left over food begging for attention, myriads of jam jars, honey bottles, syrups, medicines on the dining table, clothes-hangars on the bathroom pegs, and dozens and dozens of peices of colored paper with abstract drawings by my lil sis stuck proudly on the fridge. This is home- and suddenly, I am in love with this messy, cluttered place, and i am proud to call it HOME! :-)

Book Mess

2006-07-11T13:52:00.000+05:00

dusting and rearranging, dusting and rearranging.......thats what I've been doing to my book shelf from the past 2 days. I took out ALL the books there were, dumped em on the floor, and dusted each and every book, front back, inside and all! and then i cleared up EVERY corner of my shelf....and thankfully now they are back in place :-D

yes you can say that i had nothing better to do on a beautiful monday.......but books are important, arent they? :-)

the blessed drop of water!

2006-07-06T22:25:00.000+05:00

Haaye the smell of geeli mitti- that heavenly scent!
and the sound of tap tap tap of rainwater on the window.....
and that reddish glow of the sky....and the way it changes colors....
and the freshly washed leaves....

Everything right now seems to be savoring the first few drops of drizzle of the season....the heat is also a bit less intense.....maybe the hot temper of the summer is cooling down....i wish.

Although it didnt rain....but the drizzle was enough to make us look longingly at the dark clouds....waiting for rain.

Heck, so what if half the city is undergoing construction...we REALLY do need some rain to cool off the tempers and relax the nerves of the frustrated Karachiites.....

Oh and DO check out the photos by Jamash on Metblogs.....the sky looks absolutely wonderful, the orange glow is just awesome...check it out!

Game time!

2006-07-05T13:32:00.000+05:00

All of a sudden our house has changed into some sort of a Karem (errr whats the spelling?!?) board club. What with the power outages and heat and sheer boredom, my cousin had this brilliant idea of installing a karem board in an airy spot and get going.......so now its like a mela all time. But for some reason i will never learn to play this game. my fingers start hurting, my nails break.......but i dont learn! arrghh
And every one, yes even my nano is soooo engrossed in the game all time k its hard making them get up for meals. Uff what an addiction......but at least it keeps the atmosphere cheery....even if theres an occasional fight over whether that move was a fluke or not. Lolz

Meeoww

2006-07-01T18:36:00.000+05:00

hahh...so i am back after a six day hiatus!
had soooo many ppl at my place, hurt my finger, had a painful visit to the dentist's, and cursed the cable wala throughout these six days.
khair anyway....
this cute little kitten is what m thinking abt day in and day out. for the very first time in my life have i been attracted to a kitten. It's white with two lil lite gray spots on its neck and it really looks very very innocent. and guess what? its even potty trained! lolz
i dunno how she came here....i saw her mother 4 days back...with three other kittens, but now they have left leaving the lil one behind. for the record, i DESPISE cats. so obviously i tried shooing it off and asked my brother for help when it didnt go. but this one is a really stubborn creature.
it started with me waking up one fine morning by constant mewing.....i woke up to find a cat's head near my CD rack which happens to be right in front of the window....i rubbed my eyes and looked harder...at first i thought i was dreaming but then i realized k heck its OUTSIDE not inside..lolz...then i dozed off again.
the pesky creature was shooed and booed but it refuses to budge. i have not let anyone feed it with anything lest it decides to make it her permanent abode. but *sigh* its NOT leaving...
last nite at dinner i told my mom casually that i *might* want to keep it as a pet, and uffff everyone started staring at me. Tee and a CAT??? is it a dream or what? lolz...
The most annoying part is that cat has decided to make its home right der my window!!!! and it keeps on mewing and i can even hear meoowww right now!! i really DO want to feed her something but i have NO idea what!?! plus.....i CANT tolerate being near cats....i cANT touch or go near them!!!
but this one is soooo cute....

2006-06-26T18:56:00.000+05:00

From Post Secret

2006-06-25T12:38:00.000+05:00

Isn't it reallllllyyyyyyyy hot these days? I mean really, i dunt remember it being this hot last year, its SO hot and humid k i feel like plunging into a tub full of ice.........ooper se damn the KESC! we had no electricity for 4 hrs yesterday and that too in the afternoon. My friend has just shifted to some far off area in Gulistan-e-Johar.......and according to her, there is no electricity connection there yet, despite the fact that there are huge palace like houses there, everyone pays 200 rupees per month and gets electricity from a kunda and they have all their airconditioners and everything working with that chori ki bijli.aargghh
and here we pay a hefty amount every month and yet get abysmal supply, its either no electricity or flutuating voltage which plays havoc with the ACs, fans, refrigerators etc. haaye

i woke up bleary eyed and with a splitting headache today.....later my mom told me k i had either been sobbing, or crying softly throughout the night! strange coz i have no memory of it at all....neither that of any horrible dream! but something is VERY wrong.........

yada yada

2006-06-24T12:58:00.000+05:00

Ok so i have nothing good to do...nothing interesting, i say that coz i do have a lot of work pending but ofcourse no taaqat of the enite world put together can make me work before the 11th hour!
my newsletter editor had been politely requesting me to send the photos for my article and i had been delaying it until she finally gave me a deadline. lolz

thats the way to get me working- especially yaar who likes to work in the holidays? uff wesey bhi these vacations have been sooooo soooo sooo hectic. yeah hectic vacations- ajeeb baat haina??

acha bas dont think k m lazy...i did alot of work in these vacations, i got my closet cleaned up! yayyy, believe me it was a herculean (sp?) task......getting all that mess arranged in stacked in neat piles and on the hangers....i had so much stuff stashed between my clothes k uff tauba. everything from old admit cards, A levels ki statement of entry(3 years old), uni ID cards, various reciepts, photos and CDs. uff yes it WAS messy......

i had something else on my mind before i started of with this mindless babble, i was wondering on online dostiyan, khair will keep it for some other time...

go off u are spared for now :-)
take a deep breath.........

books, books, books and more books...

2006-06-22T18:45:00.000+05:00

I bought quite a few books on my last day of semester examz....and i had quite few unread books from the last semester as well. So that leaves me with a total of 12 books to read this summer (or whatever is left of it!)

I finished Nadeem Aslam's Maps for lost lovers, Paulo Coelho's By the river Piedra I sat down and wept and Jhumpa Lahiri's Interpreter of Maladies.

The first one, Maps, was frustratingly annoying- yes that describes it. ok so i rank each book in two ways, was it able to grab my attention? yes it was, do i agree with the author?with the message? NO I DONT! why do most of the Paki authors ive read (in english) tend to downplay their religion, their society? Aslam has made that poor woman, Kaukab, sound like some religious lunatic. ok so there are people like her but any third person would get the impression that this is how an average paki is like, and this is how our religion is; mindless rules and regulations designed to bind you and nothing else. sad very sad.

The second one..I like this Brazilian writer, he writes very sensibly and i really liked this book. although i flipped the pages through all the serious stuff, but still i liked it.

The third one.....was a collection of short stories and the first story itself was heart wrenchingly beautiful, and so were many others. but at times i failed to see where the story was going and was left wondering by its end.

Now i have this Chicken Soup for the Unsinkable Soul- someone gave it to me for reading yesterday and it turns out to be right on time. I really needed this one.

Ahhh....

Quit blogging..

2006-06-20T21:01:00.000+05:00

Credit goes to gaping void

stop and go..

2006-06-19T12:12:00.000+05:00

Karachiites have a warped civic sense, no i havent just realized it now, i have known it for quite some time i just forget it.

we are all sooo caught up in our own little worlds we hardly bother to look around us. the age old assumption that Pakis are helpful people living in close knit communities is now lost within the fast paced life we are adopting, or have already adopted.

*sigh*

well it all comes down to myself again....i was coming back from somehwre near Dalmia road and the traffic was bumper to bumper on the road. i however was on foot and on the footpath but heck, the motorcylcle walas have encroached upon the foot paths of our city and seem to think it their supereme right to zoom on the footpaths. So what if the road is jammed? wait for ur turn na, whats the hurry? i was SOO annoyed that after muttering a few abuses (silently!) i decided to not to let them pass and walk dead centre on the foot path- and thats exactly what ive been doing for the last two days. the resulting scene is so hilarious....me in front and quite a lot of motorcylcle walas honking ferociously behind me, but eventually they give up and move to the road. i am not alone there warna wouldnt have dared to do so, i have my brothers with me and my sister too....so its kinda fun now. lolz :-)

2006-06-18T23:19:00.000+05:00

wave after wave
washes away the sandcastles
i wish they could do that
to memories.

A story...

2006-06-17T16:43:00.000+05:00

This is the story of two girls- two best friends.

She dosent remember her first day of school, probably coz she was two-and-a-half when she joined school and she left that school when she was 18! (yea i know thats TOO long), but she clearly remebers HER first day of school. it was the fall of '96. and she was a mean person, (still is) and SHE was a shy kid and yes fat too. and they never let go of any chance to make HER feel bad and out of place.....and SHE cried. who could have thought they'd become the best of friends in just a few months? SHE turned out to be the hardworker and got first position, and she wasnt that bad either. HER popularity grew.....SHE lost weight, became smart and she got jealous.
pata nahi when it happened....but soon they werent to be seen apart. SHE became the prefect and she was with her at all times. they fought, they cried, they laughed......

they fought over everything- a cornetto, the latest back street boys album, a spice girls poster, and yes guysss....

they cried- over silly indian movies, over crushes which changed every week, over ppl they thought they loved, over bad results, failed tests, and high achievements.

they laughed- over men, women, teachers, other people's follies, their own follies and gross jokes...

they loved- backstreet boys, hot samosas(mmm), canteen ki coffee (- in 3 paper glasses with colorful patterns on them), bunking classes (and hiding with the fear of being found out), going out, and the same guys!

they hated- their school*yikes*, oily rolls (aarrgh!), the chemistry teacher, the english teacher and that fat girl.

...........and they talked alot, but her mother says they didnt talk, they rambled coz it didnt make any sense to anyone else. well ok so they rambled....about songs, movies, boys, teachers, food, clothes....and sometimes books. they were obviously just like everyother teenager at that age....

....who would have imagined then that they'd become something like strangers who met accidentally on a road and stopped to say 'hi how do u do?'...
....they who were with each other over every lost boyfriend, every lost penny, every failed test, every family argument.....and deaths too??
..been 10 years since they met......

i realized today that i havent talked to my best friend in ages....i guess almost a month! and then i called her...but didnt have anything to talk about.....howz the day? howz the job? howz ur boss? howz ur mother doin now?.........is that it? i thought i could never run out of topics with that girl.....but i was wrong....my phone call ended within 6 mins with the news that she is fine, her mother is better, her job is hectic, her boss is fine and i am fine too, my papers were fine......why is everyone FINE? dammit! being fine has become a curse.........why is everyone so fine? why couldnt they be NOT fine so that we could have had something to talk about?????
*sigh*
thats what time does to you....

Got this in an email today:

2006-06-15T19:48:00.000+05:00

Read this and know the difference!

As she stood in front of her 5th grade class on the very first day of school, she told the children an untruth. Like most teachers, she looked at her students and said that she loved them all the same. However, that was impossible, because there in the front row, slumped in his seat, was a little boy named Teddy Stoddard.

Mrs. Thompson had watched Teddy the year before and noticed that he did not play well with the other children, that his clothes were messy and that he constantly needed a bath. In addition, Teddy could be unpleasant. It got to the point where Mrs. Thompson would Actually take delight in marking his papers with a broad red pen, making bold X's and then putting a big "F" at the top of his papers.

At the school where Mrs. Thompson taught, she was required to review each child's past records and she put Teddy's off until last. However, when she reviewed his file, she was in for a surprise.

Teddy's first grade teacher wrote, "Teddy is a bright child with a ready laugh. He does his work neatly and has good manners... he is a joy to be around.." His second grade teacher wrote, "Teddy is an excellent student, well liked by his classmates, but he is troubled because his mother has a terminal illness and life at home must be quite a struggle."

His third grade teacher wrote, "His mother's death has been hard on him. He tries to do his best, but his father doesn't show much interest, and his home life will soon affect him if some steps aren't taken." Teddy's fourth grade teacher wrote, "Teddy is withdrawn and doesn't show much interest in school. He doesn't have many friends and he sometimes sleeps in class."

By now, Mrs. Thompson realized the problem and she was ashamed of herself. She felt even worse when her students brought her Christmas presents wrapped in beautiful ribbons and bright paper, except for Teddy's. His present was clumsily wrapped in the heavy, brown paper that he got from a grocery bag. Mrs. Thompson took pains to open it in the middle of the other presents. Some of the children started to laugh when she found a rhinestone bracelet with some of the stones missing, and a bottle that was one-quarter full of perfume . But she stifled the children's laughter when she exclaimed how pretty the bracelet was, putting it on and dabbing some of the perfume on her wrist. Teddy Stoddard stayed after school that day just long enough to say, " Mrs.Thompson, today you smelled just like my Mom
used to."
After the children left, she cried for at least an hour. On that very day, she quit teaching reading, writing and arithmetic. Instead, she began to teach children. Mrs. Thompson paid particular attention to Teddy. As she
worked with him, his mind seemed to come alive. The more she encouraged him, the faster he responded. By the end of the year, Teddy had become one of the smartest children in the class and, despite her lie that she would
love all the children the same, Teddy became one of her "teacher's pets.."

A year later, she found a note under her door, from Teddy, telling her that she was the best teacher he ever had in his whole life.
Six years went by before she got another note from Teddy. He then wrote that he had finished high school, third in his class and she was still the best teacher he ever had in life.

Four years after that, she got another letter, saying that while things had been tough at times, he'd stayed in school, had stuck with it and would soon graduate from college with the highest of honors. He assured Mrs. Thompson that she was still the best and favorite teacher he had ever had in his whole life. Then four more years passed and yet another letter came. This time he explained that after he got his bachelor's degree, he decided to go a little further. The letter explained that she was still the best and favorite teacher he ever had. But now his name was a little
longer..... The letter was signed, Theodore F. Stoddard, MD.

The story does not end there. You see, there was yet another letter that spring. Teddy said he had met this girl and was going to be married. He explained that his father had died a couple of years ago and he was wondering if Mrs. Thompson might agree to sit at the wedding in the place that was usually reserved for the mother of the groom. Of course, Mrs. Thompson did. And guess what? She wore that bracelet, the one with several rhinestones missing. Moreover, she made sure she was wearing the perfume that Teddy remembered his mother wearing on their last Christmas together.

They hugged each other and Dr. Stoddard (Teddy) whispered in Mrs. Thompson's ear, "Thank you Mrs. Thompson for believing in me. Thank you so much for making me feel important and showing me that I could make a
difference."

Mrs. Thompson, with tears in her eyes, whispered back. She said, "Teddy, you have it all wrong. You were the one who taught me that I could make a difference. I didn't know how to teach until I met you."

(For those who don't know, Teddy Stoddard is the Doctor at Iowa Methodist in Des Moines that has the Stoddard Cancer Wing.)

of hospitals and flies.....

2006-06-13T20:33:00.000+05:00

Had a reporting excersise at one of the city's largest medical facilites today- Jinnah Hospital, that is.

I guess most of you like myself wouldnt have been there ever, neither do ofcourse you plan to go there in future. Ok so i didnt expect the place to win an award for spic and span floors, neat and clean rooms and educated peole, coz ofcourse we all know it caters to the masses and is a federally funded hospital with a vast majority being from the rural and hence illiterate class. and yet.........it all REALLY disappointed me- rather distressed me.

imagine peeking into a food container and finding hoards of flies inside....black little 'things' buzzing around as if its their permanent abode. and that food was being served to the patients!

imagine a donkey cart complete with the braying sounds of the animal.....roaming inside the premises....

imagine hundreds of families sitting there.....under the hot sun....waiting for a doctor to just have look at their patients.......a woman who came with her sister to the gynae ward gave a graphic description of the ICU in the ward.....insects on the suffereing patients, as if on dead bodies.....coakroaches within the ICU..........need i say more??

the doctors too are in a sorry state- beatings being a common practice by the relatives of any deceased person. why the heck do they expect the doctors to be a messiah to cure everything?? he/she afterall is not a miracle worker....but then they are poor ppl!!

on the other hand....the tales we got to know by talking to various people showed the lives we lead- the lives the masses lead. our teacher said he wanted us to look at the 'real' karachi.....the people on the other side of the divide, and yes we did. a girl of about 18 was there becus she had attempted to commit suicide by taking some insect killing poison, because she had had a fight with her sisters. and she was their......shouting her griviences against the doctors to anyone who wud listen. a woman in extereme labour pains was told to go back home coz there was no bed empty for her. ysterday a taxi driver died and the doctor was badly beaten, although according to the doctors he did everything that could be done for the poor person. human suffering stares u in the eyes once u go to such public sector places, whether its a school or a hospital. two MAJOR facilities are in such abysmal conditions, there are ofcourse a handful of fighting souls woring against the injustices but............but there has to be a major rebuilding of the basic infrastructure....to educate the masses and to keep them healthy. we cant expect uneducated, unhealthy, mentally disturbed and tortured people to do any good to this already brumbling nation. but hen again.......m not the only one saying this.......god knows how many people write and fight..........likin kia???

on a lighter note....it was truly hilarious to see a nurse (i guess she was a nurse) taking rounds of the hospital on her MOTORCYCLE!!! lolz yes she indeed was zooming around, we DO manage to smile in the midst of chaos, afterall we are karachi walas :-)

of dirty water and karachi....

2006-06-12T23:01:00.000+05:00

Karachi will never cease to surprise/annoy/excite you...
saw a strange thing today;

somewhere near Bahadurabad, there is a place with all roads broken and some sort of repair work has been going on there for ages...well so there's this part of the road where there was a puddle of very murky water...so?? there are LOADS of such puddles....well this one had a VERY dirty looking open sewage line nearby....AND quite close to was a little mound or heap of yellow 'things', and u know what they were?
none other than ur beloved MANGOES! yes.............lots and lots of them lying there on the road, IN the water and whats more appaling is the fact that two men were actually sitting and WASING them with THAT water.......

i dnt think i need to be more graphic....let ur imaginations run while and IMAGINE!! and this other man was neatly arranging them on his 'thela'.......

now i know what u'll be thinking when u think of buying mangoes next time :P
at least I am NOT buying em....coz i really m not crazy after them.....yes m not. so? cant a person not like mangoes??

the johari window....

2006-06-12T13:07:00.000+05:00

We studied the johari window in our first year at uni and now some genius came up with this idea....i sent the link to my own window to 8 of my frends and well, here are the results! some of the things are so hillarious they made me laugh hard....like the fact that people actually think i am clever and wise and intelligent. lolz

Arena

(known to self and others)

cheerful, happy, independent

Blind Spot

(known only to others)

able, accepting, adaptable, calm, caring, clever, confident, dependable, friendly, helpful, intelligent, kind, mature, observant, organised, relaxed, religious, sensible, trustworthy, warm, wise

Façade

(known only to self)

extroverted, sentimental, spontaneous

Unknown

(known to nobody)

bold, brave, complex, dignified, energetic, giving, idealistic, ingenious, introverted, knowledgeable, logical, loving, modest, nervous, patient, powerful, proud, quiet, reflective, responsive, searching, self-assertive, self-conscious, shy, silly, sympathetic, tense, witty

Dominant Traits

62% of people think that Tee Em is friendly

All Percentages

able (12%) accepting (12%) adaptable (12%) bold (0%) brave (0%) calm (12%) caring (25%) cheerful (12%) clever (50%) complex (0%) confident (25%) dependable (12%) dignified (0%) energetic (0%) extroverted (0%) friendly (62%) giving (0%) happy (25%) helpful (50%) idealistic (0%) independent (12%) ingenious (0%) intelligent (25%) introverted (0%) kind (25%) knowledgeable (0%) logical (0%) loving (0%) mature (12%) modest (0%) nervous (0%) observant (12%) organised (12%) patient (0%) powerful (0%) proud (0%) quiet (0%) reflective (0%) relaxed (12%) religious (25%) responsive (0%) searching (0%) self-assertive (0%) self-conscious (0%) sensible (37%) sentimental (0%) shy (0%) silly (0%) spontaneous (0%) sympathetic (0%) tense (0%) trustworthy (25%) warm (37%) wise (12%) witty (0%)

Created by the Interactive Johari Window on 12.6.2006, using data from 8 respondents.
You can make your own Johari Window, or view Tee Em's full data.

Slimy intruders...

2006-06-11T13:35:00.000+05:00

lizards on the floor are the grossest thing! eeewww

last nite saw me standing on the chair coz there was a very small slimy creature making its way into the lounge from outside...it wasnt even in! after much waaa and woooo and booo mommy dear was successful in convincing the ugly creature to stay out....

we are strange family, NO one , not even my brothers dare to attack an insect. dad has this philosophy that we shouldnt kill them and rather just show them away...even if they are a bunch of nosy ants trying to take a crumb of cake or anything. but of course i suspect that philosophy of dear dad has its roots in the fact that he too is repulsed by having to go near them.....so while we all huddle in one room....he gently coaxes the insects etc to 'please move out'

lolz

that reminds me of a really hilarious 'Rose is Rose' comic;

Jimbo: *while dancing and doing a jig*
'who's the man? i am THE man'
'who is the bravest? i am the bravest'
*and patting himself*
he has this look of smuggness which suggests he has done something great

Rose: 'So you finally managed to drive out the giant spider from the bath tub?'

Jimbo: 'No, but i told him to get out by tomorrow.....else....'

Rose: 'Else....?'

Jimbo: 'Else WE'll move out!'

hehehe

it's an emergency....

2006-06-10T20:16:00.000+05:00

the regular intervals in between the radio programs with the hosts saying, 'i think we have an emergency' are no longer funny. not that they were funny in the first place but heck its SO lame. couldnt the sunsilk ppl have a better ad? i mean the hair emergencies they come up with are so ridiculous......at least i am not the least bit inclined to go and try out their new 'breakthrough' range!

and on a slightly different note......how fine is it for the RJs to make the sunsilk hair emergencies sound like genuine emergency? the first time i listened to it i was really curious as to what emergency could it be? OK don't look at me that way, i know they succeeded in generating interest but yaar gets sooooo stupid after u've listened to their stupid 'hamein abhi abhi khabar mili hai k....' sveral times...
coming back to the point....this kind of reminds me of the advertorials and product placement in newspapers. i know its different but kinda related. all involve editorial or radio content in this case, to merge advertising content with the 'real' thing. i guess i'll come back to it later in another post....right now m TOOOOO annoyed over the gentle and gracious KESC ppl :@

operation clean sweep

2006-06-09T12:49:00.000+05:00

the end of examz mean that everyone around the house tries to hides in the best possible nook or corner out of my sight. lolz
thats because i have this over-enthusiastic knack for cleaning this and rearranging that or reorganizing this or disinfecting that. most of the ppl i know run away from such 'chores' but in our place its the other way round. my family gets tired of all my shouts and pleas to ' please pick up ur dirty laundry' 'organize ur bookshelves' etc etc
and all those who have brothers know very well how hard it is to make them clean up their rooms. *sigh* i feel like m waging a war against it all.
and that obviously means a totally different kind of shopping spree, one that ends up in bottles of scented tile cleaners, window cleaners, disinfectants etc.

oh and i bought quite a few books for the summer........right now m reading Maps for Lost Lovers by Nadeem Aslam. i borrowed it from a friend and have shamefully kept it on my shelf for MONTHS. now i think its time to get done with it so that i can borrow more books from her. :-D

PS: just because i couldnt get pirated versions of the books i wanted, i bought all originals *whew* and i am proudly declaring to anyone who cares to listen that i am fighting piracy and we all should do the same. (zara doosron ka bhi to kharcha ho na!)

Confessions of a shopaholic

2006-06-04T16:11:00.000+05:00

-theres no better feeling than to have a trolley full of stuff, even if its just groceries

-its better to pay more than to have to buy frm a smelly humid store

-Naheed has more variety than D-mart

-D-mart is more spacious

-trying new varieties is always exciting

-summer means a whole new set of scents

-along of lots of lawn and voile of course

oh btw, i went to D-mart today, but belive me despite all the hype, Naheed still gets more marks for vareity although this place is better to move around in :-)

babble babble

2006-06-03T12:46:00.000+05:00

randomness abounds....

i bought a new cell FINALLy! and a new connection too

i have to go and collect a certificate but m in no mood to do so

i was to go shopping with frends but i cancelled coz its too hot (now thats unusual)

i LOVE kesc

and i love PTA too for banning blogspot, afterall it was promoting hatred (if u miss the sarcasm then m sorry)

i have an assignment to submit and a ppr to give on 7th- yes even in vacatios, and no i didnt flunk last semester its a just a certificate course exam....

its nothing new...but m not in any mood to open the books and learn a language that refuses to come to me!!!

and go see this: http://sonic200.com/others/tuongphan.htm

its vacation tym!

2006-06-01T17:49:00.000+05:00

Done wid the fifth semester, 3 more to go :-)
These are the observations i made during the 15 day exam period (or was it less?):

- Never say 'abhi to bohat time hai'
- Never leave anything for the last moment, even if its just to sharpen (or "shoppen") a pencil
- Never sit close to a stupid person, not because they won't help u but becuz they keep bugging u during the ppr
- Go early and leave all ur etiquttes behind, fight for the best seat if u have to
- Sit near the door, windows don't open and fans don't work in the uni
- No one is ever too good to be caught cheating, be prepared to see even the best of people 'consulting' wid others
- Close ur eyes and ears to rest of the world or else u'll start hating everyone around u especially the invigilator who loves cracking lame jokes!

Well, i always decide k bas this wud be the last time and next time i'll start preparing way ahead. likin i guess its just not in my 'system' to open the books until the eleventh hour. And the invigilator today was soo lame. he kept on cracking lame jokes and the class kept on laughing on them. the lamest one was when he said 'mur mur k na dekh!'
how cheap could he get?

khair...had fun today, despite the sizziling heat and so many goodbyes!

under construction!

2006-05-29T14:38:00.001+05:00

errrrr...yes this page is obviously under construction! i had this template sleeping in my template folder for a long time but i never really got to upload the image for it and all....and now that i have, there seem to be other *serious* issues with it!
*sigh*
maybe its taking its revenge on me for keeping it in the line for soo long. what do i do to get the side bar to act normally? it eiather comes before all the posts or after them! what the heck! i'll get it fixed after my examz................hopefully!

2006-05-29T14:38:00.000+05:00

Wooo Hoooooooooooooooooooooo!
yesssss blogspots un-banned (is there such a word?) again! and i seriously hope this time the ban has been lifted for good, i mean what the heck? they've made it a cat and mouse game. ban today, no ban tomorrow- what do they get playing with the 'feelings' of poor bloggers? *sniffles*
khair....now m suddenly in a mood to celebrate.....
erm...did someone mention Pak studies? uh-oh!
gotta run!

A collector's item.....

2006-05-26T20:54:00.000+05:00

uff this one merits to be collected, got this on orkut:

UR GOODS NAME PLZ
U MAKE A FRIENDSHIP WITH LIKE A NET FRIEND.. ;)

chitter chatter

2006-05-25T15:53:00.000+05:00

English, MC and Social sciences....thats three down and 3 more to go! atleast ive survived this far maybe i'll make it the end...who knows!

If i temporarily switch off my memory of the last two papers and the fact that i lost my cell. i can dance happily that i managed a 90 in my english exam! yayyy........*whew* that was better.

and for all those who dont like this templete then tolerate it until my examz get over :-D
and NO i will NOT change my templete just coz a few don't like it, i will change it because i WANT to change it. how was that? :P

2006-05-11T09:17:00.000+05:00

ufff...how i wish for these exams to get over!
A list of to-do things for the summer:
-internship
-getting along with the translation work i've agreed to do for someone really great
-making this blog more active
-shopping (heck! how could i not have mentioned this in number 1?)
-readingggggggggggggg! yes- loads of books
-and ofcourse, book shopping!
-movies- loads of em have been piling up
-arranging my photo collection
......................ofcourse i'll keep adding things even till the last day of my much-waited for vacation :-)
u get the idea, don't u?

2006-05-06T19:19:00.000+05:00

Block Spot has been banned again!
:@
So they wanted to make us happy for one day by celebrating the World Press Freedom day? or what?

2006-05-05T15:39:00.000+05:00

At uni:

shouting matches over the date-sheet,
trips through the *desert* to get a book photostated,
competing over who completes a page faster,
hurried glances at the latest issue of 'women's own',
stopping in the library for a few seconds to 'cool off',
imagining the end of days th the uni,
long walk at snail's pace to the gate,
cursing the empty shuttle-wala for not stopping,
cursing every car-wala who zoomed by,
balancing precariously on the last step of the bus,
cursing impatient people in the bus,
cursing teachers.....all of them!

at home:

sleeping at odd hours,
cursing KESC,
skipping food,
piling on snacks (and those unwanted pounds)
dreaming about free time and shopping and reading and movies,
shouting at everyone,
having a nervous breakdown

.....and procrastinating!

that's iddioddity!

its exam tym once more...

2006-05-04T19:20:00.000+05:00

yes its that tym of the year when finally realization hits that i HAVE to get through these papers so that i can sit with my buddies next semester :-)
...and so begins the not-so-serious preparation which usually consists of getting all the notes (i hate this word- notes) together and to make sure that i have all the lectures and to get the missing ones from here and there. examz also mean spending more time with the photocopy wala and pestering him to do my work first.....yes we have a lot of things to get photocopied before the pprs. oh u should come and see the human traffic at the various photocopy walas all over the university!
i remember last semester i needed to get something photocopied urgently and we went from one shop to another in arts and science depts but in the end we had to get it copied from outside the uni.
ahhh....and examz also mean late night sittings with a cup of coffee and my books. i treasure my textbooks u know, i hardly bother them during the rest of the term! :-)
i have ppl saying that during examz tesion se neend aur bhook dono urr jati hain likin with me its VERY different. i am sleepy at all times and i eat ALOT during examz!
17th May is the date.............................i hope i get thru this one else i'll miss all the fun we have in our class..heheh

THE BAN IS Up!

2006-05-03T16:11:00.000+05:00

woooohooooooooooooooooooooo!
it's over! the ban on blogspot is over! wOw....m soooo happy! m discovered it last night and wanted to post it right then but i guess there was too much traffic on blogger so i couldnt access it!
m SO very happy to have my blog back! and i hope many other dead blogs will come out of their hibernation :-)

back....

2006-04-29T14:25:00.000+05:00

i know this blog's been dead for ages now..............becuase of the darn ban on blogspot. :@
and i didnt see any point in continuing to blog when no one can access the blog, but here i am anyway after so many lost attempts at blogging on various other hosts. none is like blogger, serioulsy. or maybe we've gotten used to it....can be anything.

Karachi at nite.......

2006-02-28T12:37:00.000+05:00

2006-02-26T23:18:00.000+05:00

The shopaholic in me is a satisfied soul today! :-)
oh the pleasure of shopping combined with an excellent plate of chaat and a large glass of orange juice .............yum!! And coming home with atleast 4 large bags full of clothes etc never fails to lift my spirits up and make me feel like a queen!! shopping in my opinion is the best anti-depressant, for me atleast. i mean, i was soooo pareshan over the fact that uni's getting tougher by the day and i have so many assignments to work on plus m taking extra courses.........and then i went shopping today. Voila! all the troubles flushed down the drain and my system feels so charged up!! :-D

oh and guys i need your opinion over the standard of teaching in Pakistani universities. I mean what do u think is an ideal teacher? and are u satisfied with the teaching standard at ur uni?
its simple enuf, no? I'd really really appreciate it if u answer them, and err i'll need ur full name and ur uni's name. u can e-mail me at: liberation_20[at]yahoo[dot]com.
cheers!

2006-02-26T02:38:00.000+05:00

1- Golf club
2-mousque
3-the PSO building

Tageed by wild1 ond Saad...

2006-02-24T22:08:00.000+05:00

If I were a beginning, I would be: with no ending.
If I were a month, I would be: April.
If I were a time of day, I would be: Sunrise- the beautiful shades in the sky, the birdsongs, the fresh air, even the plants seem to be alive, and yes of course, the rest of the world is asleep :-)
If I were a planet, I would be: with no moons
If I were a season, I would be: Spring- oh the joy of it!
If I were a sea animal, I would be: a sea horse- they've always looked majestic to me for some reason.
If I were a direction, I would be: misleading.
If I were a piece of furniture, I would be: a book shelf.
If I were a sin, I would be: hypocrisy.
If I were a liquid, I would be: a deadly potion.
If I were a scare, I would be: a banshee.
If I were a gem, I would be: a diamond- beauty of a million years.
If I were a flower/plant, I would be: motia.
If I were a kind of weather, I would be: the kind of weather right after a rain.
If I were a musical instrument, I would be: a guitar with broken strings.
If I were an animal, I would be: a carnivorous.
If I were an emotion, I would be: joy.
If I were a vegetable, I would be: tomato- m still confused abt it being a fruit or a vege :P.
If I were a sound, I would be: A scream coupled with muffled sobs.
If I were an element, I would be: an indestructable metal.
If I were a car, I would be: a ford anglia (Mr. Wesley's).
If I were a song, I would be: an anti-love song.
If I were a food, I would be: chocolate (any doubts?).
If I were a place, I would be: an oasis.
If I were a material, I would be: raw silk.
If I were a taste, I would be: tangy.
If I were a scent, I would be: the sweetest of em all.
If I were a religion, I would be: Islam.
If I were a sentence, I would be: Why?
If I were a facial expression, I would be: expressionless.
If I were a subject in school, I would be: psychology.
If I were a shape, I would be: a circle-round and round with no beginning or an end.
If I were a color, I would be: purple.
If I were a thing, I would be: a book mark.
If I were a book, I would be: least philosophical and definitely NOT a romance novel.
If I were an artist, I would be: a portrait painter (with a caricature here and there).
If I were a collection of poems, I would be: fiery.
If I were a landmass, I would be: a mountain-looking down upon eveything.
If I were a watch, I would be: swatch.
If I were God, I would be: (I wouldnt be God).
If I were a vowel, I would be: U.
If I were a consonant, I would be: Y.
If I were a theory, I would be: na samajh mai aane wali.
If I were a famous person, I would be: putting some sense into other famous ppl.
If I were an electronic equipment, I would be: pata nahi! cant think of anything particular at the moment.
If I were sport, I would be: softball :P.
If I were a movie, I would be: You've got mail.
If I were a cartoon, I would be: Nemo.
If I were an explorer, I would be: on the Moon.
If I were a scientist, I would be: inventing a counter neuclear-bomb.
If I were a relation, I would be: a mother.
If I were a river, I would be: changing its course every now and then.
If I were intoxication, I would be: dunno- .
If I were alone, I would be: gone bonkers by now- m a social butterfly.
If I were a question, I would be: kyun? (why?)
If I were a habit, I would be: an addiction.
If I were in an atom, I would be: hain? probably without a neutron:P.
If I were you, I would be: NOT reading this.

:-)

From the Raj to the tower......

2006-02-23T22:56:00.000+05:00

I have become obsessed with awesome shots of my city lately......these being a testament to that obsession. Ofcourse these have been picked online and i definitely dnt claim them as my own but i really dont know who took them. whoever did, did a superb job!
the first of course is of the Frere hall (its an old pic), and then its the MCB tower. Both stand majestically on the grounds of Karachi, first one telling a tale of more than a hundred years...the British Raj and the second one aptly depicts modern Karachi. Nice choice of pics for a start, no?
Stay tuned for I have a wonderful collection waiting to be posted.

the city of lights!!

2006-02-21T23:55:00.000+05:00

Got these amazing amazing photos from Metblogs. Uff Karachi sure is beautiful from high up :-)
The first one was taken from MCB tower and IIC looks breathtaking at night!
U can see regent plaza in the second one and ofcourse the Sea Breaze Plaza. As a child i was always afraid of this building falling down with wind pressure! for some reason it appeared very 'thin' to me. not in proportion with its hight. But it sure didnt fall down :-)
Sharah-e-Faisal looks so neat, no? wesey bhi its one of the cleanest roads here.
that reminds me, has anyone seen those 'mechanized sweepers' in operation yet?? i really want to see that machine on the roads, but i have they'll only be working on major roads. what abt the narrower more dirty roads? i hope they figure something out for them too!
Oh and talking of major roads, has anyone been to IIC after the traffic route change thing? thank god m not working there anymore, God knows what would have happened to me if i had to walk to the office all the way frm Shaheen complex! Dad says theres a real chaos situation on MA Jinnah road now that all the bus load has been shifted there! what a sensible move!!
do i sound too much like a 'Good evening Karachi' show on some local FM channel?
speaking of FM channel, did u they 'narrowcast' their shows?? uh-ohhh
sorry.............m going overboard now!! :P
yikes!
better post it before i babble too much and u guys woe never to come back here again!
ahhhhhhhhhhhh
thats was all for today folks!
cheerio!

2006-02-21T01:57:00.000+05:00

THIS IS SOOOOOOOOO NOT FAIR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
i did that whole long tag AND my PC freaked out! GOD! the screen just went blank without any notice!!!!!!!!!! OH GOD!!!
i was done with the tag i had my pointer on 'publish post'. damnit!!!
:@

2006-02-18T23:04:00.000+05:00

So, i finally watched 'The chronicles of Narnia'.
its such a wonderfully magnificient movie, truly magical! maybe so because i watched it on excellent DVD print :-) likin it still was very nice.
its a nice story......beautiful infact. My brother said that u wouldnt like it because u havent read the book, but i still liked it very much.

2006-02-15T19:31:00.000+05:00

i saw the funniest (well not exactly THE funniest) thing today on my way back home frm uni.
there's this Telenor office near Gulshan chowrangi......
.........and they'r being very clever!
u must have heard how Telenor offices were burnt down in Lahore yesterday?? and obviously they didnt want anymore damage done to their place so the spokeperson formally said that we condemn the publication of cartoons in Norway and we have nothing to do with it. why are we being stoned and blah blah blah.
So, yesterday the one on University road was all covered up with tents and surrounded by security guards, but this one here at Gulshan Chowrangi is being very very clever. guess what they did?
they've taken out Telenor signs from all over the place including the main signboard. then they covered the borad and their windows with huge white banners with La ilaha illallah....
they've covered their whole office with the Kalimah! See who dares to stone it or set it to fire now??
clever, no?

PS: i really wanted to take a snap of the place but considering that i was in a bus, it was next to impossible. maybe i would take a photo later and post it here!!

2006-02-14T22:30:00.000+05:00

So, the Muslim world is again under fire for violent protests, especially here in Pakistan where two people were killed and many injured during a protest strike called by some little known religious party.
m really surprised at the power of that 'little known' religious party to organise such a pre-planned, well-thought of violence plan in the city. Had these people been so organized there would have been a Islamic Revolution here, who knows?
i mean burning down major buildings of the city is no easy task. it needs proper planning, thinking and most of all resources. sure these people are fuelled by passion, but to this extent? i certainly doubt it!
u know what m gonna say, no?
who gets all the blame for whatever happened in Lahore and Islamabad today? Muslims!
who gets to be looked down upon by the high and mighty? Muslims!
who gets all the 'these are all useless fanatic, terrorist, fundos' label? Muslims!

then didnt they know better than not to do such a thing and face the wrath of all and sundry?

who gets to benefit from all the Muslim bashing?
then isnt it fitting for them to organise such a violent strike, put the blame on the powerless souls who called for the strike, and sit back and enjoy?

maybe.....

tagged by Asma :-)

2006-02-13T22:25:00.000+05:00

Four Movies/Drama Serials I Could Watch Over and Over

Tanhayaan (drama)
you've got mail
before sunset
Madagaskar :-)

Four Places I Have Lived

karachi
karachi
karachi
and still in karachi :-)

Four TV Shows I Love To Watch

four?? i dnt watch TV shows let alone name four of them!! :S

Four Places I Have Been On Vacations

Lahore
Islamabad (it was more of a stopover)
Murree (DUh!!)
and the other regulars.....the notheren areas!

Four Websites I Visit Daily Whenever I Come Online

Gmail
Blogs (metblog included)
google (i've always have something or the other to search for)
BBC

Four Favorite Foods

most of the desi style chinese stuff
pizza
is chocolate a food?
and Daal chawal with acha and chutney (yes I am a verrrrryyyyyyy desi person)

Four Places I Would Rather Be Right Now

somewhere cooler, where one would never have to switch on the air-conditioning :S
on a plane to somewhere exotic
out with friends
in the bed! (m soooooo sleepy)

Four People I Tag Next
Saad
Wild1
Absar
Irtiqa

(sorry guys, but couldnt think of anyone else:P)

Freedom of expression, anyone?

2006-02-12T22:56:00.000+05:00

and while you are at it, read this one too...

"we DONT want ur warped sense of humor"

2006-02-12T00:39:00.000+05:00

We went to a protest demonstration today.
It was organized by the IBA students mainly but had students from various other institutes as well. It went well, really well. We gathered at the press club at 4:00 and were free by 5:00. And it got impressive press coverage too. So, u might see me in tomorrow’s paper :P
It was supposed to be a silent protest and almost everyone had placards with really kewl slogans, but later on student got really hyped up and decided to chant slogans. So we ended up chanting: “Respect for our religion, respect for our Prophet”, “Freedom of expression is NOT the answer”, and finally, “naara-e-takbir, Allah O Akbar”!
I really really felt good, like actually doing something, even if it meant standing on a road for half an hour and chanting a few slogans.
Several proposals were made, the economic boycott being one of them.
So, no Nestle, no Telenor, no Arla products, no Danish products!

2006-02-08T23:57:00.000+05:00

u know u r damn bzy:

-when ur side table is piling up with un-finished books and you'er running out of book marks.
-when u forget to call up ur best friend for a whole week.
-when u only wake up after hitting the snooze button 10 times.
-when u only eat or drink something AFTER coming home frm uni.
-AND when u keep on getting sarcastic text msgs about ur busy-ness frm frends and yet u dont have time to reply them!!!

ufffffffffffffffff................and yet ppl make outrageous demands for ur time! aarghhh

"Cartoon clash of civilization"

2006-02-04T22:12:00.000+05:00

i really liked Bina Shah's article on the cartoon controversy here.

i myself have been quite disturbed over the whole episode having now seen the caricatures, though i admit i really shouldnt have seen them considering that it made my blood boil! so much for freedom of expression! what about hurting the sentiments of millions of muslims all over the globe?? then they should have freedom of expression to express their anger in whatever way they choose to. No?
i dunno, I am confused...... is it really a question of freedom of expression?

and yes i do think the best way to show anger is an economic boycott of those countries. Saudi Arab is right in boycotting Danish goods, we should follow suit. because as Bina says in her article, in todays capitalist world the only way to crumple the enemy is an economic boycott.

Then what am I doing here????

2006-02-04T17:55:00.000+05:00

You Belong in London

A little old fashioned, and a little modern.
A little traditional, and a little bit punk rock.
A unique woman like you needs a city that offers everything.
No wonder you and London will get along so well.

What City Do You Belong In?

2006-01-31T22:21:00.000+05:00

soo....i finally went to see the much talked abt KPT fountain!
the pics very blurry because i took it from quite a distance and i had to zoom ALOT! but it proves i went anyway :P
the sight of it at night is spectacular....but the beach park disappointed me. i was expecting it to be something really very nice considering the hype abt it, but it disappointed me :S
its just a well lit stretch of grass....quite a few benches, and a couple of fountains. perhaps the trees will grow in a few years time. oh and you can see the sea frm there at nite, thats so dumb.
its not to say that its worthless, Karachi-walaz will surely appreciate the endeavour.....

2006-01-29T02:49:00.000+05:00

The walk from the uni gate to my department is such a long and tiring one especially if I have a class to attend in 10 mins. I was in such a jaldi yesterday to make it to the class on time that I broke all past records in completed the ‘journey’ in 5 mins! Anyway I caught some very interesting snippets of conversation from here and there on my way. I know it’s very bad to listen to other ppl’s conversation but sometimes you can’t help but listen.
A: bas neeche aajao ub tum apne khayalat se! mil jayega koi na koi
B: likin agar kisi ki ankhon mai pehle hee koi Shahrukh Khan basa hua ho to?
A: tauba hai! Kaha na k khuabon ki dunya se bahar aao!
B: haan tum nahi samjhogi, tum to pehle se hee ‘book’ ho na!
A: iss se kuch nahi hota, tum wesey bhi sirf ik din k liye ayee ho uni!
B: *sigh*

And I moved on…

On our way back, H and I were in quite a hurry and weren’t talking much, mainly because the girls behing us were doing all the talking!
A random snippet from there: aakhir bana liya na rubberband se husband!

*what da heck?*
why, oh why do ppl have just ONE topic of conversation? Is it the Starplus/Bollywood influence bearing its fruits?

2006-01-29T02:28:00.000+05:00

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

2006-01-27T08:38:00.000+05:00

You Were Nice This Year

You Were 40% Naughty, 60% Nice
Okay, so you weren't *entirely* nice this yearBut Santa doesn't expect a modern girl to be perfectYou were good enough - and you'll be rewarded for it

How Naughty (Or Nice) Were You This Year?

2006-01-24T23:59:00.000+05:00

occasionally i blog here too: http://pakbookbloggers.blogspot.com
and plzzzz all the sleeping team members, i want you to wake up, what are u waiting for bhai? get up and get going!
no need to have a formal post, just ramble on. it wont kill you!

on a different note; i tried uni's icky coffee today- just alot of hot brown murky water! my advice- STAY AWAY!

and pray for me! m such a coward when it comes to public speaking, i just cant string two decent sentences together when it comes to opening my mouth in front of a group of ppl, even if i happen to know them all. informal socializing jitni chaho kerwalo, but the formal one isnt my cup o tea! i made such a dodo outa myself in class today; and all i had to do was read ONE sentence from the book, FROM my seat! dont laugh!!! thats rude :P
i spent 16 years of my life in the same school, i knew most of the ppl there, but still all i went on stage was to hoist the flag! i became a prefect on the condition that no one will EVER call me on stage for anything; not even if its just to announce a lost sock!!