Mail Order Pets, Inc.

This was made for my sister by my 6 year old cousin in Lahore, who was smitten when he saw her and now wants to marry her. He also write his dad's cell phone number on the back of this card so she could call him. He is the cutest little thing ever! One day, my mum was getting ready to go to a mehendi and he walked in the room and fell over. When asked what was wrong, he said 'Khala app itni achi lag raheen thin keh main beyhosh ho gaya!' :D

The death knell of childhood and the herald of adulthood is when you just stop running. Remember when you were young, you had such enthusiasm about things that you couldn't and wouldn't wait a second more than you had to to get to it. And you ran. Sometimes you ran just for the hell of it. You had nowhere you had to be in a hurry, you just wanted to run alongside the wind, and in your mind, you really were running as fast as the wind.

When you become and adult, there's a spirit-leadening surety you acquire that anything and everything worth anything will wait for you to reach it. The best we do is an odd half-trot. When was the last time you ran as hard as you could for no reason other than to feel like a kite with an endless string?

My cat, Sheru, has escaped to the feline harem known as the world outside as of last night. He's shown up after an entire weekend before though, panting and wide-eyed, so there's not an immediate cause for concern yet. Mostly, he finds his way back when he gets hungry enough, but I suspect the morons hammering away on reconstruction of the water tank upstairs might have scared him off. The search continues. More later.

Update: After several fruitless attempts to find one cat hiding somewhere in or about several hundred buildings, we gave up and settled back to wait for him to come home himself. Around midnight (now), he was spotted in a neighbour's garden by another neighbour and led us on a merry chase before allowing us to approach and grab him while rolling around one last time in the dirt. Cat's home, yay! :)

I have a whole new respect for anorexic people. I spent most of yesterday in the clutches of a very painful stomachache that would not go away despite my taking numerous pills of varying strengths. By two am this morning, a lightbulb was lit over my head as the first wave of nausea came through. Of course! That was why the pills didn't work, these weren't cramps, I'd just eaten something that my stomach violently disagreed with and apparent they were having one hell of a domestic squabble in there, while I lay on the floor trying to take my mind off the pain. First thought: must throw up. Second thought: how the hell? I recalled reading about anorexia and how the victims would induce vomiting by sticking a finger down their throat and viola, instant barfing session! However, being the antithesis of an anorexic, I wasn't quite so sure about that method being for me... Maybe if all else failed, but for now, there were tried and tested methods I could call upon.

First solution: Call upon a childhood companion of tummyaches: ENO. For those who have never heard of it, ENO is a frizzy powder you add to a glass of water and gulp down as fast as possible while ignoring the little fizzy explosions that would fly into your face as you drank. As a child, I would love it not just because I didn't know any other soft drinks with enough attitude to fly into my face as I drank them, but also because my mum would make it a sort of race, you have to finish the drink before the explosions die out! Turns out there was a small sachet of ENO lying around, of dubious expiry date, but it would do. I popped it in and discovered it was orange flavored as opposed to the standard lemony flavor it used to be ten years ago. Sacrifices must be made for the greater good, and so I shut my eyes and drank. Aaah, finished. I stood outside the kitchen, where I had set the empty glass down expectantly, happily awaiting the inevitable nausea. Two minutes ticked by, no activity within. Chalo, it'll probably take a couple of minutes to work, so let us sit down near the bathroom door and wait. Ten minutes tick by, then fifteen. This is not working! I have been let down by ENO! Time for plan B.

Second Solution: ENO, I have officially outgrown you, I mentally add as I snort contemptuously at the remaining sachets. Time for the backup plan: 7-up with salt. Usually good for burps but has possibilities for more serious repercussions, as I discovered one night when everyone was watching a Pakistan India cricket match and paying no attention to my bitching and moaning about my stomachache. 7-Up it is! Maybe dad stored some in the fridge. Indeed, he has! Add some salt, sit down, drink a couple of sips, wait. Nothing so far. Drink some more, wait. Still nothing. Lie down, read a book. Fifteen minutes later, still no action. This is getting ridiculous! Who knew someone who whines so much could have such a strong stomach? Muttering curses that make varying amounts of sense, I lie back down and continue reading. Damned stomachache will just have to take care of itself, because I'm done! Bah, humbug (It is Christmas day, after all).

At Last: Five minutes later, little brother walks in with a plate laden with Pizza Hut's super-aromatic Chicken Tikka Personal Pan Pizza and a Pepsi. As the pungent aroma fills the room, I think it is just not my day because the stomachache has not only tortured me the entire day, but also stopped me from having pizza. Suddenly, the lightbulb above my head that was dimmed due to lack of ideas is lit again! The pungent aroma is making me feel, not hungry... Nauseous! Hallelujah! Little brother is startled, possibly considering moving out permanently from this madhouse as his older sister jumps on him and demands to 'smell that pizza!'. He, of course, due to reflexes and many years of practice, is ready to defend his food. "I don't want to eat it, you ass! I just want to smell it!". Do you blame the boy for not buying that? Eventually, though, a large whiff of the pizza is achieved and it induces almost immediate strong nausea. It's a Christmas miracle, it is! One short but intense barfing session later, all is right with misha and her good friend, the tummy and it's off to sleep.

God, when I told you to make him go away because he makes me feel sick, I didn't mean him showing up should make me literally sick.

Just saying that is asking for trouble. Many of us would kill to hear it from the right person, but the truth is there is no such thing. If you allow yourself to actually believe it when a person says that to you, you're setting yourself up to eventually do or say something that will prove that statement false. And then you blame the well-intentioned person laden with warm-n-fuzzy feelings at the moment for saying it when it wasn't true.

For the past god knows how many years now, I'd been wanting to learn to drive. Not that I was tired of the bus-system (Queen of the Road!), but it's frustrating to have to beg people drive you places, especially when people have their own plans. And so, after much nagging, I finally signed up for a course in driving. Mum figured why not teach little sister to drive at the same time, despite her not being old enough for a learners permit.

So here we go. Picked up by auntie in an FX with several other girls on board as well, one of whom is behind the wheel. I figure the girl in the driver's seat is also from the institute, since she'll be driving us to our deserted practice grounds and the middle aged auntie in the back with me and sis is a senior supervisor or something. Ah well, sis and I squeeze in the back seat. Auntie in the passenger's side turns out to be the instructor. Chalo, it's good to know which one will be doing the actual teaching. A minute later, it's blatantly obvious the girl driving is not an instructor but also a girl in the middle of her first lesson. The obvious terror she's feeling at being asked to drive right out into main Seaview road in the middle of on her first lesson adds to my own as we face incoming traffic head on. She drives on, past barbeque tonight, past everything familiar and end up in Bahadurabad.

Some time later (It's hard to tell how much time has passed when you're flinching at each close encounter your car has with every large vehicle from Clifton to Tariq Road and watching your life flash before your eyes each time), the novice driver is dropped off at Tariq Road. "So which one of you will be next?", passenger seat lady inquires. I decide to face the fear head on. Okay, we're nice and snug in the driver's seat, what now? "Drive" "What, into the Tariq Road traffic, just like that?" "Yes, yes, go on, dear, we're running late". *gulp*

Eventually, though, except for passenger seat lady's hands doing most of the steering, with mine on the lower half of the steering wheel for decorative purposes, I'm comfortable driving in full on traffic on my first go. I pass places I didn't even know existed and stop in Azizabad, another place I had never heard of till this very moment, and a new student is picked up and I'm relegated to the back seat while another girl sitting quietly in the back is summoned to the driver's seat.

The new entry, a girl named Sana turns out to be much older than me, despite my first impression being, oh good, someone's my little sister's age for her to talk to. Turns out she also works at the same place my aunt does. My sister takes up my slack at flinching and frowning concernedly at every too-sharp turn and too enthusiastic acceleration, while I make conversation.

The conversation comes to an abrupt halt when the new novice manages to land one of the front wheels squarely in a gutter. Oddly, the novice lives ten feet away from where our car is now stuck, and still did not manage to remember there was an open manhole right in that spot. Eager to get home, I guess.

Ooh and on the way I see something I have not seen in a long time... The street sign which says 'Feroze Nana Street', which I always misread as 'Ferozi (colored) Nana street' and giggled about when I was younger.

Anyhow, getting back to the action, four young men are asked to pull the car out of the manhole, which they are nice enough to do with minimum staring and we are on our way after bidding adieu to the novice behind the wheel. Right after this the instructor summons my sister to drive us out and back to Clifton.

Turns out the passenger side brake for the instructor's been disabled by our unfortunate descent into the gutter and this is discovered only when my sister's driving nearly lands us face first into the side of a large van. ("Beta, brake karain, brake karain! BrakeBrakeBrakeBrakeBrake... Allah ka shukar hai!", the last bit when the car manages to miss the truck. So here we are, exhaling with relief when we notice we're in the middle of the road. On we go, with instructor aunty's nerves severely rattled.

To cut a long story short, it is discovered that the instructor's side of the brakes have failed and so my sister drives us back from the Gora Kabaristan to Clifton, keeping an ever cautious distance from all other vehicles (no small feat when it's rush hour) and a constant foot on the (only) brakes. Also, we get lost in our own backyard (terrible with directions, all of us) and finally arrive home from our four hour driving lesson.

At this rate, in a week you shall all see me prowling the streets of Karachi in my ride, hands defiantly on the upper half of the steering wheel.

In my dream I rummaged through the top of my closet to find something, removed some boxes and there it was, a tiny white bunny with its ears gone and two little spots of dried blood where its ears would begin on its head. It stared at me and I felt shame and revulsion at it and myself simultaneously. If it could speak, I thought, it would tell me I had, in the careless days of my childhood, left it there and forgotten it, and to survive, it had to chew its own ears off and eat them. And here I had the gall to be repulsed by it after I had made it this way?

I picked it up (so tiny, it fit into my cupped hands) and carried it down from the closet top. I took it to the vet and told her to put it to sleep so I could sleep again.

I reach out to you now because I feel you may be the one to understand this. I feel as if I have surrounded myself with strangers who were never cared for by myself and so do not care much for me. There are only so many times you can have the same conversations with the same people before you realise you can't anymore and that you are nearing the end of your rope. There are many flaws one can forgive oneself, such as laziness or greed or even deception, but the fatal flaw is to eternally want what you cannot have, ever.

I want to end the loneliness, but I find I cannot. I created it and I can end it, I argue. But, I argue back, it is the nature of the beast, made by the one who molded the beast. Soltitude, ingratitude, excessive attachment to this world and its goods, it is all the nature of me. I cannot change it, no more than I can change my own spirit.

Those I did not value have distanced themselves by now and those I valued care for themselves far too much to value me. This being said, I am reminded of the young boy who came to me everytime he felt alone and we whiled away the time alone together, our laughter drowning out the loneliness for a few hours. However, I drove him away, for I did feel I needed such a companion, but one who would speak of the moon and the stars and create new metaphors before my eyes. I wanted more that what I could have. I see these children worrying for the world and what is around them, and I want to be like them, but it is not my nature to prize that which is outside myself to what is inside myself.

The flies, I find myself envying them their peace of mind. They live for but one glorious flash in their own minds, one moment of hunger, lust, anger, joy and pain. A moment and it is all gone before they can reflect on it. To doom such a creature is to give it a mind, a spirit and then set before it boundaries that limit it's mind and its spirit. To this, add a near-century's worth of time to sit about and ponder its actions, struggle to define itself before it fades away. This is my plight. Now, as I sit alone in the semi-darkness, I suppress still the urge to throw open the door and fade into the night. They would never find me, nor any remains. Eventually, they would abandon the search and I would be left to the memory. Immortal, even as my remains rot in the gutters, I would run eternally in the minds and forbidden whispers of my grandchildren. They live on, whose bodies are never found, and I leave now to join them.

It shall be here that this barely sorry tale ends. In the state of mind that I posses, to call you a friend would be an insult to the generosity you show by hearing me out, stranger, and I thank you for it. They cannot be lost, who were never found.

Yours Sincerely.

"I'm somebody now, Harry. Everybody likes me. Soon, millions of people will see me and they'll all like me. I'll tell them about you, and your father, how good he was to us. Remember? It's a reason to get up in the morning. It's a reason to lose weight, to fit in the red dress. It's a reason to smile. It makes tomorrow all right. What have I got Harry, hm? Why should I even make the bed, or wash the dishes? I do them, but why should I? I'm alone. Your father's gone, you're gone. I got no one to care for. What have I got, Harry? I'm lonely. I'm old." - Sara Goldfarb, Requiem for a dream.

I like to think that growing old is something everyone fears, not just me. I remember by old literature teacher, also a television star (so naturally I had never heard of him till my grandma's driver pointed him out and asked if it was really him) once told us that he would prefer to shoot his brains out when he was forty than go through old age. I recall being a bit shocked at that because at the time I though nobody could have it better than rich/famous people and being able to retire and rest on your laurels would be something you looked forward to. Imagine a 24/7 vacation. Forty is the real milestone. Up until that age, you can still convince yourself that you're only as old/young as you feel and try to ignore the fact that soon you'll be old, arthritic, toothless, incoherent and unable to control your bladder. What's worse is that your children will have moved out, be well into their lives and not need you anymore. The tedious of your existence would be broken by your children distractedly bringing their kids over on sundays to visit. Noisy brats, the lot of them, who have barely waited for your response to their customary salaams before running inside your room and turning on the TV. Your children, to be polite and respectful, will let you sit in on their conversations and everytime you assert a strong opinion, eyes will roll, glances will be exchanged with half smiles. Poor old man/woman, they'll be saying as their eyes meet. He/She still thinks we live in the forties/sixties/eighties/nineties when things were that simple. They're different now. We are different now. We know it all, and we allow you to sit here and bask in our wisdom and maybe you'll grab some crumbs and learn how the world works today.

Soon, though, the smug children watch their own children getting older and smarter and bolder. They don't hang on to their every word anymore. They roll their eyes (just like daddy) and smirk on the side of the face that the old man can't see. Times have changed and now the parents begin to get scared, really scared. They start to give sentimental speeches about family being the most important thing in the world and how God said that he (she?) who cares for his parents will go straight to heaven.

Old age is creeping up on you. Maybe you're the next Sara Goldfarb. Maybe I am.

Ever had that feeling when you suddenly realise you're surrounded by lovesick people? Everywhere you go there seems to be someone depressed about their love life. Why is it, then, that your own love life does not depress you? Is there something wrong with you, because make no mistake about it, your love life's not exactly a bed of roses (unintentional pun). Is it a bad sign when your own laidback-ness beings to worry you, except you're too laid back to worry about crap like that so you don't worry and cause yourself to get worried about the lack of being worried over something you shouldn't worry about?

"Nothing can compare

Acquaintances ask why I'm not on MSN anymore despite being 'connected' to the Internet pretty much 24/7. Truth is I'm sick of being messaged by everyone only when I can do something for them or they need a favour or some khwaar to check their damn results the next time I'm at the university. Apparently the concept of self help has not yet reached our shores. Here's a bit of unsolicited advice, but then I don't really solicit pleas for help either so I'm entitled to send some free advice out there: next time you all feel the urge to message me to ask me to do something, don't. None of you want to know what's up with me, really, and it's worse when you're ignored for ages and only summoned for small talk leading up to a favour request anyway. I do know that a good bunch of the people this is aimed at don't read my blog so that I may freely bitch about them, so here's a compromise: I'll come online sporadically and you will not message when I am online unless you have some genuine need for conversation with me. I know I may not be the most entertaining or even the most interesting, but I can try. I think I at least reserve the right to ask for the same courtesy aimed back at me.

Today, I hate technology. Except the 'pod. Don't mess with the 'pod.

As should be obvious by now, I'm suffering from a severe case of blogger's block. Nothing really interesting seems to be happening around here lately, except for the good news that most likely only I care about, namely that I still have a half decent GPA, despite the math and physics fiascos. It's amazing how some courses can be sailed through with minimum effort and I could get a B or B+ for my trouble, while in others you work your ass off but get horrible grades.

Today was unofficially the last day of the university for this semester, not counting the Comprehensive exam later on this month. Today was also the submission of the Media Production project. Nearly three fourths of the class got their made by the assistant to the teacher, which pisses me off a great deal since only myself and two or three other kids did their own and it shows, but not in a good way. The guy's obviously a professional, otherwise he wouldn't have landed the job and when he works with a software the rest of us only learnt the basics of a month ago, he's going to produce some great effects. I don't know what pisses me off more, the fact that the assistant literally made the entire project for loads of people or that the teacher didn't notice the professional look and call them on it. That and I was one of the few people who had the possibility of an A in this course, but now, with the projects accounting for 80% of the grade, nearly everyone gets an A, thanks to projects they did not make. That deserves a rant, don't you think?

There's nothing new here. Although I have noticed that bloggers, as time goes on, become more and more self-obsessed. Not that I'm any better, but I enjoy being narcissistic. To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance, said a very wise man named Wilde.

It has come to my attention very recently that apparently I am an intimidating figure. My initial reaction: Get out! How intimidating can one possibly be when one can barely take the time out to hunt for something wrinkle-free to wear in the mornings?

On a completely unrelated note: at all costs, avoid watching Alexander. Watching Hopkins ramble on and on and watching supposed Greeks talking with broad Irish accents may be entertaining for the first ten minutes, but soon amusement gives way to boredom and contempt.

Currently on repeat: Green Day - Boulevard of Broken Dreams

The Peter Pan syndrome - ever since Barrie's famous book of the same name, Peter Pan was an idol for most boys who didn't want to grow up to responsibilities and have to face adult problems in the real world. A world where not everything could be fixed by the mother's kisses and where daddy's walking into a room did not make you feel like everything would now be alright.

I, however, would like to pay tribute to the less known (in fact, as far as I know, just invented) Wendy Syndrome. Wendy, the narrator of the story of Peter Pan, is taken to Neverland where, of her own good sense, chooses to leave Neverland for the real world. In other words: not to run and remain a child forever, but to face the world by leaving, albeit with a heavy heart, her wonderland behind and facing up to the difficult task of growing up and becoming an adult. Here's to the heroine and a syndrome worth spreading!

A friend recently asked me about my views on crying, which is probably what triggered this memory. That and academic hassles and disappointments.

When in the fifth grade at the school-we-do-not-name, I was Horrible at math. There's horrible and there's Horrible. I was the latter. Consistently flunked because I could not 'get it'. Everything has that 'Aha!' factor where it clicks with you and suddenly it makes sense; it's relevant to your world! Math was far from relevant, hence I was Horrible at it. Moving along, the particular memory was that my fifth grade teacher, Mrs. Khan [Khan - the Pakistani equivalent of Smith] was telling me off (as usual) for not having done my math homework and willfully disobeying her attempts to make me catch up by completing the previously incomplete work. That particular day she was greatly peeved, to put it mildly, and was on the process of taking the ruler to me. It was seeing that drastic action was needed, I burst into tears. I recall that at that age, (probably 10 or 11?) it was the absolute height of unfairness that I should be made to do math when I just couldn't. Being a brat back then as well, I could not understand how it was possible to be forced to do something you're obviously terrible at over and over, just so that you can fail over and over again. Out of sheer frustration and desperation (ruler's getting closer!), I cried. Not the bawling kind, mind you. Just the silent tears, which left even the teacher speechless. I was the dheet kid who was probably just stupid as well. And if it wasn't for that essay I'd written that she'd pinned up to the softboard, she probably would have dismissed me as easily as just another stupid kid and been nicer to me. She let me off that day, even comforted me. Oddly, till the seventh grade, I was all but flunking out of school. Instead of repeating the year, as a dumb/dheet kid ought to, my mum put me in a smaller school. Oddly, that first midterm, I finished my math paper first and got it graded right at that moment before me. Ninety-one percent. Not bad for a stupid kid. My theory is that I had a self constructed death wish in the former place and once I was out, I was free to do well, which is why we do not mention that first school's name. The point of the story was that this was the occasion that came to my mind since it was the only occasion where I had ever cried in public.

Five years ago, I wouldn't have thought it possible to 'grow out of' people. It was a term applied to clothes, shoes and bicycles, but not to people. I mean, people grow right along with you, right? Maybe not in the exact same way, but they do grow and so you can't outgrow them. Turns out just being fond of someone isn't enough anymore. What do you do when you suddenly realise, mid-sip, that you're all sitting around staring at the table and at the TV up in the corner of the room, but have utterly nothing left to say to each other? What does Miss Manners say about a situation like that? Do you politely walk out and not so politely avoid them? Or do you just cheerily try to start up some sort of conversation again and ignore the whole situation?

A car ride today was a perfect metaphor for our relationship. I had my headphones on, which he could not see. He kept talking and gesturing, pointing our various things, not realizing I could not hear a word. I did not care for anything he had to say, and so I just nodded along to the music, which he took to be affirmation of whatever he was talking about. The authoritan bull that so infuriates me was being thrown towards me in spadefulls. I was oblivious. I did not want to meet his eyes anymore, so I looked out the window the entire way. It was only when the car stopped and I began to exit that I noticed the little hard lines had appeared on my forehead unconsciously, and had now evaporated as I found myself out of his company. This is how music saves my life, one day at a time.

Introspection aimed inward has fished up a new theory: not trying too hard and achieving average grades may be a means to avoid failing despite trying hard to pass. Trying really hard to do something and, in the end, failing despite putting in a pretty decent effort by your own standards hurts. Quite a bit.

Actually, it makes perfect sense to be your own confidante. You know you'll never let yourself down. And even if you did, you know that you would understand. When you're the only one that knows why you're smirking at certain things, it's easy to see the argument for talking to yourself. You would never ask stupid questions of yourself or ask yourself, 'what the hell was that all about?' because you know. You'd never have to explain yourself or put anything in words at all if you didn't want to. You already know what happened to you today and exactly how you felt. If it makes it any clearer to talk to yourself about it, go ahead. You won't judge yourself either. Like you tell yourself, it's all good.

"The young are such wonderful fools".

The older you get, the better off you'll all be when you realise that all these things you fondly make jubilant and furious noise about will eventually cease to matter. All that matters is compromise and how to give in to the ones that truly affect you the least. Eventually, unless you're really lucky, in which case I hate you, your life will become a large room with the oxygen slowly running out while you have the dim realization (much like a rabbit does, I assume) that something is wrong but refuse to let yourself accept what it is because that would mean spending your hours concentrating on breathing as slowly and as little as possible instead of distracting yourself with the shiny rattle in the corner. Same room, different people.

Now for the all too predictable question to myself: what brought this on? Answer: the realization that no matter how I struggle, I shall eventually have to get married. No matter how much I try to avoid it, I shall have to face the fact that since all the men I meet are either inferior to me or superior, I shall either live in depression over having married a baboon or loathe myself for having married someone inherently smarter than myself. External contempt or internal contempt isn't much of a choice when you really think about it. Either way, this story ends with the walls closing in and helpless last looks at the locked door.