60 years of Israeli repression

The pictures in the newspapers everyday say it all. What, what is it that we can do to end this? While doing my Islamic studies assignment I read up a lot on different religions and I saw the true picture of a lot of them…its much worse than most of us believe! They really have a lot of nerve to accuse us of so much after the history and present that these people have had and are having. Hypocrisy, and nothing less.

I’ve been on the edge now for a long, long time. I’m so emotionally unstable that I lose it over the smallest things! It’s the workload, I’m sure of it. We’re all going crazy. I mean, how much do they expect us to do in a day? It feels like it’s been ages since my friends and I sat together for hours on end and did absolutely nothing but what we’re best at. Maybe next week will be better, because half of my worries should be over tomorrow, and the other half is just a single presentation. I guess I’ll live through it. But I hate giving presentations – I so suck at it! Hopefully people will fall asleep through the Biomass Strategy and I can read out a few lines and be over with it. What if somebody asks me what the biomass strategy actually is? Then I’ll be in trouble =D

I guess I haven’t written in some time and I’m so out of practice that this is coming out very weird! Apparently I write too passive as it is, according to my English teacher :(
And then when you ask him how it should be, you never get a satisfactory answer. I mean, didn’t I write passively last semester too? He didn’t point out anything then! I strongly doubt my writing style has flipped in two months. *hmph*

my outlook on politics

I cannot help being an optimist. One day I’m down in the dumps and the next day I’m bouncing like Tigger =P Suddenly, everything that I was worrying about has drifted away like a wispy cloud and faded away into memory. I feel as if I had only been under some delusion before and none of that is true or matters very much. It was hallucination on my part, and everything in the world is alright. =)

What's the point of thinking otherwise? You might as well be short-sighted and happy, then be scrutinizing and morbid. Haha..either you mask the delusion, or you let it empower you - I'd like to see which happens next!

With elections just around the corner, there's no telling what will happen to the situation in Pakistan. One wonders whether things will improve or only get worse after Feb. 18th. I think most of Pakistan is united on one front at least: no Q's this time. We need people who'll mind their p's and q's...(pun intended) - I beg your pardon, that was a very pathetic pun indeed =D
Anyway, as I was saying, Pakistan is sorely in need of new blood on the political front. Who wants to elect ppl who've already shown us what brilliant people they were? One of them is permanently out of the picture now, but her followers want vengeance and any one of them could prove just as bad, if not worse. Of course, her juvenile son is totally under the spotlight at the moment, with girls swooning over him left, right and center. Two days after her death, and I was already sick of the endless talk, and about hearing girls exclaim excitedly over the good-looking teenage hunk who was handed down an entire political party as part of his inheritance.
Then we've got the formidable (not!) lions of lahore on the other front - just as unsuccessful in their twice stint and possibly just as corrupt.
Add the so-called religious moulvis into the equation and you've got one big nasty unsolvable problem. Their sincerity is as unreal as the number i, and twice as annoying to deal with. (I think that's enough, my math analogies are becoming increasingly slap-on-the-forehead material =P)

The fact remains, that for us 18 and 19 year olds who would be able to vote for the first time next month, the situation is not only bleak, but highly disillusional. We wanted to vote for Imran Khan, no matter how few chances he had of winning, (we could have changed that after all), but his decision to boycott the elections means that we are now going to sit on top of our votes and not use our new-found right. Perhaps next time - if I'm still in this country by then.

Something's happened.

It's changed! I can feel the difference now.
Where previously there was innocence, there is either hardness or dislike, or nothing at all. There are no soft-spoken words with healing power, nor open welcoming arms. There is only hatred.

It's like there's come this breach in the middle. Not even that, not a breach exactly. But things gave changed. And not for the better, I’m sorry to say. I’m almost afraid to accept it. It’s sad how one small incident, one small thing can change everything, alter the course of your destiny, diverge your path. Yes, that’s it. Divergence. It’s like when a beam of light strikes against a shiny surface that’s suddenly come up and is strongly reflected into another direction, at a sharp angle. The ray is still straight, but at odds to how it was before.

The next question is – who is to blame? I feel now, sometimes, that it could not have been avoided. I had no choice; at that particular moment, I could have done no better. But why, why must it make things seem so different? I don’t understand it. I don’t want to think of the line of dominos that will keep on dropping now that I’ve flicked one of them. If the consequences are what I’m afraid of, the worst possible, how will I be able to bear it?

I must be mad. I must be mad to care of it, but I do. I'm a fool for hope - I forever seek the light at the end of the tunnel, am forever certain of the dreamt-up fantasy as being my future. When will I learn to live in reality? When will I believe that whatever I am hoping for will not come to pass?

If it were possible to drown further in despair, I would. But I think I've exhausted it. I can no longer push myself. I don't want to dream any longer. I don't want to believe. The good will not come, the light will not come. Dreams will fall to the ground and shatter, be swallowed into the abyss and be engulfed by red-eyed fear - and they will not be fulfilled.

sunbathing...in rather different terms =P

I find the locations in GC highly inspiring. Without a doubt, it's an amazingly beautiful place! Sitting here in the sun in the Oval proves to be extremely enjoyable during the cold weather of January, provided the cold wind isn't dryly blasting across your face like it does nowadays.

I love the feeling of being in the Oval, like when these days it's dotted with small groups of ppl - in two's, three's or even a solitary figure - sitting and lounging around, working or just soaking up some sun. You only need to twist halfway backwards to see the main building and it's clock tower, and screw up your face at the unpleasant thought of it nearly being time for class. You walk into the main building off the road, pass by the Vice Chancellor's rooms and in the opening; scan the various people seated in the amphitheater for a familiar face; you reach the english department, climb the stairs up to the Central Library landing and reach the level of the trees, only to find two cute fluffy grey owls, perched next to each other on the same branch.

Of course, there's much more to see while traveling around the university, but I think this much is enough for now. While I try to move away to different locations, my mind incessantly prods me and nudges me back to my favorite haunt of the winter: the Oval.
The fact that these words are being put down while seated on one of the 'step' things that me and my four friends usually occupy is also very much the reason that I'm discoursing at length of this particular place. I can't help it; I love the sun! =) One element I cannot live without.
I look around and gaze at the goal towards the right of the ground and smile, thinking of Amoo and Yasmin lazily sprawled out in it, sleepy because of the sun's warmth, and covered from head to toe in dirt and grass =D

There are people from my class seated in places around me, as today is supposedly off but us goody-two-shoes kids have come to study anyway =P

My finals start the coming Friday and I'm not sure I'm totally prepared for them. (not surprised, huh?) The fact is, with not having enough gas at home to light a stove properly, let alone a heater, from 8:30a.m. to 11:30 at night, I do find it quite difficult to study in negative temperatures. I was thinking yesterday about how I used to complain in previous winters of the cold and willed it to be over as quickly as possible. That was surely a cinch! We had heaters then that could be turned on at will any time of the day or night and a geyser that never failed to turn on whenever we tried and hot water. This time, we have had much less; yesterday we had nothing. It was cold water from morning till end and bare hearths and empty fireplaces.

I hope I don't sound like I'm complaining =P But I do sound bitter, because that I am. There's not much exaggeration at least, that I can say.
I still have close to 45 min and I believe I should rest my pen for a while and peruse my notes. I do have exams coming after all.

I was crazy at college today!

I’m glad we started with Hamlet in World Literature class today. I’ll finally get the chance to read Shakespeare! Of course, at the moment we’re just doing it from the exam point of view, but after my finals I intend to get it a read it thru properly.

Its 2008!!! And also the first of Muharram today. The first day of our Islamic calendar.
They could think of no better way to end the previous year and start the new one than by the suicide blast on the Mall yesterday. I prefer not to think of it; I thought abt it incessantly all of yesterday, and it’s made me quite distressed.
Though, one thing that really cheered me up today happened right at the start of the day. In the dars-e-quran session, our lecturer talked about the message contained in Haj, of equality, applying to all mankind. The forceful way that he insisted that all of us are equal, none of us belongs to any sect whatsoever, each one of us is simply and truly a Muslim, and how the Quran names us as Muslims, so why should we take on any other name? I really can’t describe the way he delivers, his style of diction, the charisma…the most justice I can do to it is by stating that once or twice his speech actually moved me to tears. It was simply amazing.

I haven’t made my New Year resolutions yet. I have this mental list in my mind of all the things I have to do as soon as my semester break starts, and making up resolutions is definitely one of them.
I just need to get thru my finals somehow! That’s my resolution for the moment.

I can’t truly express myself today. There’s not enough feeling in what I’m writing. I’d better leave it for later. I’m off to a cyber-war! =P

of bad organizing, men's egos, and pantene!

The Performing Arts Festival…well, yes…it was good. I didn’t get to see as much as I should have, but the little I did bespoke of the talent and the level of organization that our people possess and can impart. And yet, I pass by Gaddafi Stadium everyday, once in the morning and once in the late afternoon, and I shake my head at the organizers. They had the Alhamra center and halls decked out in ribbons and banners, and they took them off once the party was over. Why not from the main gate, too? They’ve left those pink, blue and black triangles on the outer façade to fade and become as bedraggled as they are now. So far, they’ve endured rain and cold wind, and the general dirt and pollution from the traffic that has become so commonplace and so much a part of Lahore’s landscape that we don’t even bother to mention it anymore. TAKE THEM OFF FOR CHRIST’S SAKE! IT LOOKS UGLY!!!

*sigh*

Why is it that most men have this huge, huge indeflatable ego? I really wonder why most of them think themselves to be just the very thing that women want, the hottest object there could possibly be. They think that wolf-whistling and shouting out dumbass comments while they whiz past on their motorbikes is really the way to address a girl crossing the street, who, frankly, doesn’t even give a damn whether they exist or not and even if she does hear them, just walks past unconcernedly, vaguely thinking that men really are one of the most detestable objects on this planet. Too true. You’d think they’d have a bit more pride, but really, they chase after girls all the while claiming that it’s just a bit of a sport, and yet, it’s not as if their intentions aren’t perfectly clear to the smarter half of the world’s population.

There’s this guy in my biotech class who really is in need of a hair wash. He’s supposedly styled it, with all that gel and those spikes, but I strongly believe I should offer him a bottle of shampoo one of these days. He looks plain filthy, no two words about it.

There isn’t any gas coming. And my room is freezing! And there’s something wrong with my jaw; it’s kinda hurting me.

P.S. - i saw today that there are white triangular ribbons as well...:P

social rant

Perhaps that is the beauty of mankind. The beauty of believing in what does not exist.

Typing while wearing gloves is a very tiring business indeed. But it does feel good, especially when one gets used to it. The only real problem is with the spacebar; I seem to press it at wrong intervals much more frequently.

There’s gas load shedding this year too. Like our government has been advertising on TV how they’ve set up this many new electricity and gas connections in rural areas; they’ve apparently exceeded they’re capacity, and now we’re forever short of it. The real thing is, I’m sure many villages were happier without electricity. Now the govt. first got them used to having it, and when we realize there isn’t enough to go around, you proceed with daily load shedding, with different intervals for different localities. And in summer, too. And the rurals are hit the worst. They’ve been going without electricity for 8-10 hours daily. Wasn’t it better to not give it to them in the first place if you’re just going to as good as take it back? I’m sure they deserve it just as much, but when you don’t have enough butter, spreading it thinner on more bread just doesn’t suffice. Gas, though, is something they really should be provided with. It’s a better alternative to coal (which causes pollution) and firewood (which leads to unchecked deforestation), and coz it’s really cold in winter! I don’t mind gas load shedding as much (as long as mom has cooked already) because that way I know poorer ppl might be getting the benefit of it. And there’s nobody who can feel the cold more than I can! (It’s this winter, actually, that’s killing me!).

I just shut off the heater.
It’s because I know that I’ve got so much that they haven’t. I’ve got fleece, and gloves. I’m in a strong, enclosed house with not a whisper of a draught from anywhere. I sit in my warm car, travel the 45 minutes to college in complete luxury and get off right in front of the gate. I don’t work all day or engage in hard labor of any sort. I’ve got enough food to eat. And I’m young and full of life…but whoever said ppl of the villages are tired of their life and existence? I think I kinda got confused in the middle. I started at one point and then went off tangent. Regardless! Im sure I can live through the cold…at home at least – it’s freezing in college and I’ve got reason to complain there!
But then, on to another point. A lot of poor ppl don’t have enough sense as well. Another fact. You’d think that with luxuries hard to come by, they’d be a bit more frugal, a bit more careful of resources and needs. But no! My own cleaning woman’s family tells of how they leave their water running and it doesn’t matter a bit. In fact, she went as far as to say that ‘jinne pani naal tusi kapre dhonde ho, onne de naal saada aik bacha mun dhunda hai’ *hmph* what can you do with people like that? There’s no knocking some sense into them. They don’t WANT to get educated. Some organizations have gone as far as paying kids for coming to school, and yet their parents still think it’s a waste; ‘what will they do with this education, how will it help them become better ppl or better earners, when they could be spending this time helping us out and contributing to the daily earnings for our 10-12-person-family’s bread?’
Yes, that is what they say. That is what they think.
The best invention, according to my cleaning woman’s family, is cable TV. They work in the morning, getting everything done as quickly as possible, so they can get home and watch movies. And then back to work the next day, cleaning up somebody else’s mess in somebody else’s house. Not just one house, though. They’ve all got to work at 2 or 3 to make ends meet. And their only occupation on getting home is to do their own chores around the house, or, the blissful television. For them, life is perfect. They do not want to increase their level of existence, their ‘quality of life’. That does not just mean to be rich and successful and equipped with the latest gadgets and a junkyard’s worth of possessions. It’s about being educated. Nothing more, nothing less. It’s education that makes all the difference.
The wb says that all the money they gave was spent on advertisement instead of the real work it was intended for. Daddy said so from the start. How pathetic is that? You think they’re all going straight, they’re the ones who seem to be making a difference, and then they goof up, and the entire façade crumbles and the stark interior is revealed. All the same. All corrupt to the core. All seduced by Man’s greatest desire: power. I know we can all sit comfortably in our homes and criticize leaders and rulers for getting greedy once they get the taste of power. But the real question is, if every one of us were in a similar situation, with temptation tantalizingly hanging before our very eyes, how many of us would be able to resist the greed and the lust for power? How many will actually be able to turn away from all that wealth and power and do what’s right, selflessly, for the people? That is a question every person must ask himself.



P.S. – I refuse to use the word maid as some people insist. ‘Cleaning woman’ may sound weird; perhaps rough and uncouth even, but that’s what I’ve always said and there’s nothing I can do about it.

heads that are too big for pink headbands with a butterfly on em

My first piece of writing was done online, so the formatting was really bad. I’m going crazy these days, what with the term papers that I’m writing and all the formatting I have to do at top speed because I’ve reached nearly all of my deadlines.

For the first time last night, while working on the computer, I kept on nodding off…strange it was, coz I’ve never been half-asleep while using the pc before! I was writing out a critical analysis of one of Lewis Carroll’s books, and suddenly I sit up and notice that the last line I typed had nothing to do with my essay..lol..

It’s rather common though, when reading or studying, that you just doze off and when you come to again, you’ve got a line in your mind that’s not what you just read! It’s a rather interesting occurrence, I must say. =)

The bad thing is, one of them was due today and I couldn't submit it coz i wasnt able to get it printed!

*sigh* All I've been doing is obsessing over my dumb assignments...I wish I could leave all this and do more important things. Which reminds me, I started The Brothers Karamazof by Dostoevsky today. Dad was going to pick me up a little late, so I sat on a bench in the sun and read. It felt so good! But eventually it got a little too warm, and i had to get up from there. Nevertheless, it was one of those few luxurious moments in life that make you feel like a million dollars =)

For now, I must depart. My internet is going a-waste =P

to begin a beginning, i must begin

aaaaah...'new post' it says to me..! its nice to be on something different and new and...clean! i haven't wiped my old slate clean yet...but i will soon...but in the meantime..ive started scrawling on another one.

like those 'takhtis' that my cousins used to use in ryk when they were in school..how i would sit by my cousin and watch him write on it painstakingly using a 'qalam' and fresh ink...the ways he would shape letters of the urdu alphabet..and how i begged to use it too..of course, i dont think i could quite write urdu then - speaking it was enough of a chore! but id tried to copy his letters in my horrible handwriting...that is, IF he let me try using it at all!

*sigh* those were the good ol' days weren't they??

im sitting here at the moment, searching on information for my environmental science term paper..on Gaia's Hypothesis.
right before my teacher told me what topic i'd be doing, i had this strange idea that this is what i'll get..it was so weird! sthing like a sixth sense, i suppose. haha..tho i was glad she gave it to me, i wanted to do it on this anyway. ive read up on it and i dont understand much of it anyway...so cheers! :P
oh and ive just read that it's pronounced 'gay-a' not 'gy-a'...like i thought..!

i reached 4o minutes late for my class today because there was some strike or the other going on around mall road, and the traffic was stuck really bad! of course, the mall is just the place to be these days, you know! after all, it's got 3 universities and 1 college practically right next to each other, and all of them are (rather luckily i must say) surrounded by the high court and smaller courts and lawyers offices! every strike starts from here now because our country's lawyers have suddenly become very active. one day when i was on my way to college, there was a whole procession going in the opposite direction...cars and vans decked out with banners and all of them filled with joyous people holding flags and proclaiming their undying love for monis elahi. i even got a glimpse of the doofus - believe me, he looks just as much of a doofus in real life as in all the pictures of him around the city. though, i must say, the huge one of him on the road leading to aimc, its rather flattering now with the red paint splashed all over it - he looks rather handsome for it!