Thursday, March 31, 2005
Shadow-Cat
I'm horrible with titles.
Edit: Realized that the wires in the background looked horrible and removed them.
Misha
at Thursday, March 31, 2005
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Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Words Fail
Today I am dead-tired. The kind of tired that, if you should push it, will result in an instant yet long-lasting migraine. I shall brave the migraine impending, however, to relate why it is that I am so very weary today.
Seeing as how music has been good to me lately, I was today's target to be harassed, nay attacked, with bad music. First of all, I'm not one to judge, whatever you want to listen to, do so, that's what headphones are for, but why, in the name of all that is holy and pure, would you want to subject us all to your musical taste if it, by definition, includes trance/house/tribal music. I'm pretty to open to music, but if there are two things I refuse to be receptive to, it's trance, in all its glorious forms, and country music. Today, I was lucky enough to be attacked by both.
First off, as I was innocently listening to my car radio, I am confronted with Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven, a song that I enjoy. And what's more, my little sister, whose musical influences include Raghav and the Bombay Rockers, seems to be enjoying it as well. Hallelujah! Fast forward to a few hours later and on the way back home, I ask little sis to turn on the radio once again, little suspecting what lay just beyond the simple pressing of a button. All at once, I am confronted with a country western twang yowling "aiyand she's buuuuuyyyyinggg a staiiiyairwaayyyy to... heAA... vunnnn!". Alarmed and horrified, I wonder if FM89 has... oh, no they wouldn't, no one could be that cruel... but alas, it is true. Dolly Parton's version of Stairway to Heaven has found its way to the airwaves. I can honestly say that a plague of locusts would have been greeted with mithai and laddoos at this point, especially since the lady in question's vocal stylings seem to consist of an odd yipping sound as she cuts off a word in mid-syllable, only to pick it up and stretch it as much as humanly possible. Feebly accompanied by either a guitar that has been badly robbed of its innocence, or a banjo that sounds embarrassed to be accompanying her, Dolly Parton has single-handedly butchered a song I used to like. Now, like the tragic shell-shocked survivor of a war, I get heart palpitations everytime someone strums the opening chords to that song.
As if this wasn't enough, I come home to find that my brother, high priest of the temple of trance, has set up shop in my room and is listening to sound that are more commonly found in a fully-functioning industrial plant. Upon mocking this music, I am told to "show some respect, this is house, not trance!". There are very few things about which I could give less of a damn, among them are Ali Haider, but that's a different story. A full half hour later, I am finally successful in shoo-ing the high priest of trance out of my room and into his own room, from which promptly more industrial machinery sounds accompanied by odd lyrics is heard floating out (a sample of such lyrics, "something beautiful is happening inside of me"). Repect, indeed.
And so, it is now that I come before you, mildly traumatised, but alive and vow to throttle whoever that RJ was that would play such a cruel joke on an innocent woman turning to her car radio for some travelling music.
Misha
at Wednesday, March 30, 2005
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The Cat
Misha
at Wednesday, March 30, 2005
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Tuesday, March 29, 2005
Misha Works For A Living - Part 1
Today is a great day. I have begun my descent (why not ascent? Because it's my story) into adulthood, and all that it entails. The day started of great when, in a clumsy fashion that I am famous for, instead of renaming my Boss, who is on MSN for easy reference, as "Big Boss-Man" for fun, I opened up his window and wrote this phrase and pressed enter. Brilliant, I think to myself, you have called a shareef person "Big Boss-Man". He shall now think you are a screw up and immature and unworthy of employment and you shall have a black dhabba on your CV forever. Apparently, big boss is cooler than one would have thought, and takes it all in stride.
Next up, Big Boss-Man explains the whole setup, how to go about doing everything that needs doing and some standard answers to questions that will pop up now and again. "You sure you've got all that?" he concernedly asks before disappearing someone where MSN cannot follow. "Indeed I am." I state confidently, a few seconds before wondering who, besides stuff old British women use the phrase "indeed" anymore. Ah well, Big Boss-Man should realize that he has hired someone who,when tired, speaks before thinking and he should get used to it.
What's next? We start working. Three important rules: be courteous at all times, be as helpful as possible and end by asking customer to contact you again if they should need help doing anything.
After working for about an hour, a jubilant Misha says what is possibly the most stupid thing to come out of her mouth (or in this case, fingers, since we're typing) today, which is saying something: "Don't worry, I'll finish up all these e-mails before I stop working today." Six hours and about fifty e-mails later, Misha is wondering how to go about having a lobotomy to either remove the idiot part of her brain that makes her say such things or the part that realises what was said was stupid and makes her feel like an ass. A further two hours and a determined Misha, aided by a good deal of music and a trusty cook who rustles up "energy food" aka fettuccini, Misha has managed to complete a good chunk of work and prepares to retire.
Soon after, as she sits typing some more after typing all day, Misha wonders why it is that she is blogging about this when she is sick of typing. That is when she stops typing and clicks on "publish post".
Misha
at Tuesday, March 29, 2005
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Monday, March 28, 2005
Cliche-ridden imagery
The world plays a dirty, rotten trick on those who go about it with the secret to not giving a damn: it makes them older, supposedly wiser and unable to believe in boys that never grow up and heroes that can fly.
I miss my wings, where did they go?
Misha
at Monday, March 28, 2005
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Sunday, March 27, 2005
Employed!
Hurray, I'm emloyed! Hardly as glamorous as one would think and definitely sounds like a good deal of work, but if all goes well, as of the day after tomorrow, I should be employed by
TroyTec for handling customer support. Hardly the most ambitous of jobs, but it's a start to my plans for world domination, one Internet startup at a time.
Note: A special thank you to Suleman, who gave me a great link and ulimately helped me get my first job. :)
Misha
at Sunday, March 27, 2005
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Saturday, March 26, 2005
Groupwork
I used to think it was just me and my groups that were bad at getting organized, listening to leaders and following orders and unable to deal with some serious procrastination issues, but after watching an entire season of the Apprentice in a week, I've discovered it's not just us, pretty much everyone is really bad at teamwork and playing nice when shoved into a team where they just don't like the other members. A word of advice: don't choose friends as groupmates, unless you're really good friends because in the end, when the deadlines are up and the pressure is on, you're all going to be either yelling and blaming each other or trying to calm everyone down and mediate. Neither's a good position to be in, I can say from experience. If you're the one doing the snapping at everyone, you're not a "team payer" and the longer the bitchiness goes on, the less of a "team player" you are. If you're the mediator, you'll probably never look at someone you thought of as a friend/acquiantance the same way after having to calm them down and tell them to "play nice", much like having to deal with a couple of troublesome five year olds.
The best place to be, honestly, is a position I found myself in a good deal last semester: sitting in the corner, watching amusedly as others duke it out and still others try to restore the peace.
Misha
at Saturday, March 26, 2005
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Friday, March 25, 2005
"Dubba-pack"
I was just thinking about the last major natural high I was on the receiving end of. No, not chocolate-induced, but gadget-induced. The gadget in question was nothing special, just my new cell phone, a
Samsung C100, to be exact. This was a year ago and now it's that time of year again when I get to add to my secret collection of electronic goodies that I guard as zealously as Gollum guarded his ring.
Dubba-pack. Just that strange little lingual hybrid of a word is enough to inspire the familiar excitement. There's something almost holy about an unopened box with something in it just for you, even if it's not even gift-wrapped and you can clearly tell from the box what the contents must be. However, despite the lack of surprise, there is absolutely no lack of awe. Normally what happens is that I sit there for about ten minutes, just drinking in the box, with its shinier-than-humanly-possible, unsoiled exterior and the contents displayed enticingly on the outside, unable to bring myself to touch it. Next, I gently break open the seal. There, no longer "dubba-pack". Now once you get the contents out, be it a cell phone, camera or music player, it is awesomely exciting, because it's new, it's absolutely untouched by any other human hand (I realize someone must have touched it to manufacture the product and I choose to ignore it) and it's yours. Precioussss...
Misha
at Friday, March 25, 2005
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Coasting Time
It's post calculation of my grades so far that I have discovered that I have managed to fulfill my lifelong ambition: to coast along grade-wise and get a bunch of A's without actually putting in any real effort. Coasting, however, is not as satisfying by far as what I envisioned.
I need to get off my ass and find an internship, not just because having some cash would be nice or because I want to have a boss who tells me where to stick it, but because I have never worked a day in my life and to be able to say that when you're about to turn 22 is beyond a shame, it's a disgrace.
Misha
at Friday, March 25, 2005
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Thursday, March 24, 2005
Celebration!
a) No more calculus for this semester. Yes, that means no more weekly rants about calculus on thursdays!
b) New gadget just may be in the cards and those who know me know exactly how excited I get over new gadget ownership. :D
c) Editing seems to be going well and the teacher, a man who picks out inconsistincies in multi-million dollar budget advertisments, says so far, ours is "not bad". Coming from him, this is the equivalent of anyone else writing an ode to our movie clip.
d) I get to pick out inconsistencies in my university's "horror movie" project and get awarded marks for it! It's like being paid to be a bi-yach!
e) New commenting system! Haloscan zindabad and enetation, thou hath been discarded.
f) MSN's drawing tool brings out the child in me. Unfortunately, the child in me cannot draw.
Misha
at Thursday, March 24, 2005
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Wednesday, March 23, 2005
Better?
Inspired by
Sreedhar's post:
I'm wondering why it is I want more and more to be happy, or to percieve myself as happy until the next big shot with something faster, stronger, smaller, better arrives to make me feel inferior. True contentment is probably as simple as knowing the value of what you have when you have it, something that is so simple in theory but so impossibly difficult in execution that most of us will spend our lives trying to attain it and not succeed.
Misha
at Wednesday, March 23, 2005
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Self
Up until a certain age, lecturing, threatening and other similar tactics can work, and probably will work really well and help keep kids out of trouble. After a certain age, though, despite what people would tell you, a kid isn't going to listen to you at all, so save your breath and just hope you brought them up right. This is precisely what I keep telling people around me and nobody seems to get it: you cannot force someone to not do something they are hell-bent upon doing. If they're making a mistake, fine. If they're screwing up their lives forevermore, let them. In the end, they're the only ones that will be to blame for their own mistakes and hence, hopefully shall be wiser in the process.
Also, I have noticed how a lot of people, upon reaching old age and having watched friends and family and other confidants around them passing away, find loneliness and having to entertain yourself hard to deal with. Having learnt the art of relying only on yourself for entertainment and company, I find this plight difficult to relate to. I mean, I feel bad about it if you feel you can't deal with being alone for the first time in your life and old age is creeping on you, but I'm hard pressed to find some common ground with them.
It would be so much better if there wasn't the guilt of leaving behind someone already lonely and desperately depressed alone when you have to go off and make your way into the world, even if its just for the day.
Oh forget it, I don't know what I'm even talking about. Happy 23rd March, everyone.
PS: Yes, I've noticed that the commenting system seems to have vanished, but I'm guessing it's a glitch from enetation's side.
Misha
at Wednesday, March 23, 2005
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Tuesday, March 22, 2005
Aimless Musings
I cannot begin to imagine what life must be like for an unemployed person, even if the unemployment is self-imposed. Since I was five, I've had to wake up early, in most cases voluntarily, as on Sundays to catch the satisfying fat lump of newspapers that arrived with a dull thud as it smashed into my balcony doors. It's been three days now, of this routine that is semi-idyllic and lazy as hell and I'm tired of it already. Can't wait for Thursday, when I have to wake up at seven again and trudge off to class at eight in the morning again. Sometimes what we perceive as a pain in the ass is actually a semi-blessing.
As for my mini-documentary, the editing is going somewhat on schedule. I'm convinced that post production, while not the most difficult job in the world, is most certainly one that is filled to the brim with 'khwaari' and requires a lot of patience and a steady hand. I've discovered that despite my natural inclination to go to sleep before midnight, the best time to do a spot of editing is after everyone else is asleep and nobody can disturb you, except the occasional idiot on a motorcycle minus the silencer outside.
Misha
at Tuesday, March 22, 2005
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Orbitz
Consumers finally win one! And it's about time, too. I wish similar action against a company could be carried out in Pakistan as well. Off the top of my head, I can think of about a dozen companies that deserve to lose a night's sleep over crappy treatment of customers.
Misha
at Tuesday, March 22, 2005
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Monday, March 21, 2005
Headaches & Video Games
God, I haven't had a PC-headache for so long, I'd almost forgotten the painful result of staring at a computer screen for twelve hours in one day. The dull throbbing is a welcome indicator, though, that I should get some damn sleep before proceeding to reimmerse myself in video games again. There's a soothing lack of reality involved in sniping at Nazi soldiers while singing old Seal songs out loud that's exactly what I need right now. I realize that I'm procrastinating because I have no hourlies this week, plus loads of holidays, but, as I said to my sense of responsibility as I joyfully tossed it out the window earlier this morning: "Who gives a shit?".
Song of the day: Oasis - Hindu Times
Misha
at Monday, March 21, 2005
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Sunday, March 20, 2005
The Whiny Post
Words imply impotence. As a last resort, when you can do absolutely nothing about anything, you sit down and write about it, even if it’s just to vent. When good people in a corrupt city can't do anything about some injustice, they write to Dawn and when I am frustrated, highly pissed off and on the verge of kicking a wall down, I write about things. That doesn't really work as well as it should, though, since I will not write any specifics about what's really the issue here. Suffice to say, strangers who read my blog, that I have faith that none of you will mention anything in here to me to my face, ever, even if by some off chance, we were to meet face to face, which is exactly what prompts me to be honest, something that is long overdue and sadly inconsequential in the grand scheme of things, but then again, aren't we all? My problem is that the one whole parent I have left is going to be residing at her dad's place for the next god knows how many months so as to be in a less stress-filled environment. Now when your mum's facing liver transplants and Hepatitis C, I know you've got to be either insanely self-centred or incredibly selfish to focus on how alone you shall feel by such an arrangement. Let's be realistic, I am really selfish, narcissistic, yadda-yadda-yadda, and I'm sure that's no surprise to anyone who actually knows me. BUT I do take offence to God or whoever's in charge up there because He (or possibly She) keeps hitting where it hurts. I have plenty of enemies, many acquaintances and various mosquitoes buzzing around right now. Make a couple of them leave me alone, I don't mind. Why the heck do you keep taking things I have so little of?
Misha
at Sunday, March 20, 2005
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Long Weekend!
Yay, long weekend and I plan to spend it solely editing our documentary project and playing video games until either I explode or the PC does. :)
Misha
at Sunday, March 20, 2005
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Thursday, March 17, 2005
Telenor Schmelenor
With the arrival of Telenor, said the masses (I among them), Mobilink, Ufone, Paktel, all these market-hogs would get a boot in the rear. They would then proceed to surrender before the superiority of Telenor, wake up, pack up and leave. Albeit highly exaggerated, I did have a lot of high hopes from the whole "Telenor Pakistan Aa Raha Hai" Scenario. Why? Telenor is supposed to bring us
3G Mobile Technology, the wave of the future. With its launch as of March 15th, the newest GSM operator has severely disappointed me, for the time being at least.
Since yesterday, most people I meet seem to have but one topic worthy of discussion: have you bought a Telenor SIM yet? Rumors, most of them false, have taken over the public's imagination to cause an absolute uproar over Telenor. An acquaintance working at Telenor informed me that twenty-four hours after its launch, Telenor has ten thousand applications for SIMS and were now simply taking in filled applications and money and handing over preactivated SIMs to the eager public. However, when asked, nobody seems to be able to provide me with a single valid reason as to why I should abandon my current connection for Telenor?
To look at the billboards all over the Karachi skyline, one would wonder, what the heck is so special about Telenor anyway? Sure, it's a foreign brand, and hence, a big deal automatically. The billboards/advertisements invariably feature a fifty foot tall woman with her arms spread out, embracing the flowers falling from the heavens while various rural regulars such as an old farmer and his camel watch on in the background at this blessed, blessed person. A pretty good indicator of a company blowing smoke up your rear is when they show absolutely no substantial facts as to why you should opt for their product instead of their rivals'. I have searched far and wide for one advertisement that displayed Telenor's tariffs, rates, features,
anything of substance. I finally got this information from
their website and it wasn't too pretty. If you waltz in and announce your arrival without the slightest indication of what it is that should make us bow to you, you should at least have something worth bragging about. At the moment, Telenor is simply a GSM operator, one of the many, which would include the now GSM-Paktel as well as the giant Mobilink, and the once master of exclusivity, Ufone.
Since I'm short of time right now (on a break from Calculus class), I shall be very brief and just indicate a few areas of interest (for me at least). First of all, I must inform you, I'm a loyal Mobilink user, have been from the beginning, although their service as of late warrants no loyalty, but I'll admit I'd gladly change over if something of substance were being offered by someone else.
According to the
prepaid tariff information provided by the company, Telenor offers pretty much the same 2.5G technology as Ufone currently does and Mobilink should by now: MMS and GPRS. Even the rates are absolutely unremarkable. Ufone and Telenor, as of now, both charge Rs. 15 per Mb of data for GPRS, and Rs. 5 per outgoing MMS. Coming back to the regular services, Telenor offers Rs. 1.50 per outgoing SMS, which is pretty much what everyone else offers, while incoming are free of charge,
just like everyone else. Outgoing calls to other operators are Rs. 3.99 per minute with a prepaid Telenor connection while Mobilink announced this morning that they had reduced their outgoing call charges from Jazz connections to Rs. 3.50 per minute. Even including the fine print for mobilink's rates (connecting rates may cause a slight increase in the per minute cost of the first minute as the call connects), that still spells Mobilink-1, Telenor-0 to me.
So what's the big hullaballoo about, anyway? It will likely take around a year and a half for Telenor to set up the requisite infrastructure (maybe more time, maybe less, I'm certainly no technical expert), and till then, I'll stick with my own connection, thank you very much.
Misha
at Thursday, March 17, 2005
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Tuesday, March 15, 2005
Meet "Pon"
This Print of Pon in the DeviantShop
More prints of Pon
Pon (c): Jeff Thomas // Azuzephre
Misha
at Tuesday, March 15, 2005
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*honk*
Crossing the road used to be a bit of an ordeal for me, and still is for a few people I know who don't have to do it on a regular basis. I, however, have now mastered the whole process. The trick is to know just when to stop and when to go. If you're good at it, you'll be several yards away by the time a car whizzes by the very spot you were stationary in five seconds ago. If you're really good, you'll feel the slight pressure of the wind from a car that just scraped by your side and you're still alive.
The one thing that I stil haven't been able to master about crossing roads, though, through sheer distrust of the Human species as a whole, is the easiest trick of all for most people: having a car actually stop and the driver give you that vague "go on" signal. Most people would take the driver's word and start crossing before the car has even slowed down, much less come to a complete stop in the middle of the road. I can't bring myself to do that. My initial reaction is much like my reaction at those insistent "Win a FREE iPod" ads that keep popping into my inbox from time to time: "yeah RIGHT!".
So there we are, me still safely at the side and the car, slowing down, but not quite at a standstill yet. The driver hesitates. He/she wants to drive without slowing down or stopping to allow me to cross, but is now honor-bound to prove to me that my distrust is unnecessary and he/she did plan to stop instead of run me over. In the end, the driver will actually come to a complete halt in the middle of a busy road, with several cars honking behind him/her. We have reached the proverbial stalemate. I'm wondering if I dare risk it to cross even now, lest the irate driver may decide to run me over for being such a distrustful ass. It is at this point that I give in and actually cross the road very quickly and embarassedly for having caused all the bother for the now half dozen cars in a line behind the benevolent soul that stopped.
Misha
at Tuesday, March 15, 2005
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Anybody have an aspirin?
Once every few weeks there comes along a situation that is so absurdly infuriating in its comeplete disregard for sense of any kind, common or uncommon, that it makes me want to pick a wall, any wall, and bash my own head in.
This fine afternoon, I am informed by a relative that her maasi has informed her, in a combination of a very thick accent and excitement, that according to the newspapers a baby was born in a village somewhere who is not 'sahi' and said child prodigy has proclaimed that this month is really unlucky and so all women with brothers should wear green bangles (chooriyaan). She then confides that she shall buy me some green bangles when she next goes out, "just in case" so that I needn't bother.
You heard it here first, let's all discard common sense, education and any form of intelligence and sit around a fire whilst the wise maasi gives birth to another urban legend that everyone will swear is true and nobody will know the origins of.
Note: To the friend who suggested I should write about Homo Sapiens, I hope you see why I'd rather talk about pigeons. :)
Misha
at Tuesday, March 15, 2005
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Sunday, March 13, 2005
For the Birds
After spending the day at the hospital (the first time ever, I might add), I've come to the conclusion that pidgeons aren't as useless as they seem at first. Their only purpose is to amuse and entertain people waiting outside the ICU.
In the early afternoon, I came across a male (I can only assume) pidgeon sitting on an air conditioner opposite where I was standing. This young bird was apparently trying several antics to get the attention of and lure hither a female (again, assuming) pigeon sitting one floor above him, everything but the head hidden by the AC. The first tactic: fluffing up his feathers. Apparently, size does not matter much to female pigeons, and, after about five "fluffings", the male discovered this as well and decided to switch to plan B: strutting. Now I've seen some serious strutting in my day, mostly by men who have flung their shirts off and have back hair enough to shame many a bhalu, but this pigeon meant business. Cooing seductively, green neck feathers shining in the afternoon sun, and gently bobbing his head back and forth in the special style that was imitated in many a nineties bollywood dance sequence ("Dil bolay Kuckoo Kuckoo!"). The female remained unimpressed, which was when the male decided to break out the heavy artillery. Abruptly stopping his strutting, throwing his head back and chest out, the male launched into the final maneuvre garunteed to make the knees of any feathered female weak, the one-leg stand. It would seem males can show their virility by standing on leg for extended periods of time, because after five minutes of the one leg stand, performed admirably by the male, the female flocked to the male's side and they began a beak to beak encounter, at which point I left them to their antics.
Worth a special mention was another, scrawnier male, attempting to enter some poor unsuspecting nurse's lounge. With the curtains open, the bird poked its head in a few times as I anticipated gleefully the bird's entering the nurse's lounge and the shrieks that inevitably follow any tiny animal's enterance into a room full of females, but he lost heart and flew away, a bit disturbed by the public displays of affection coming from the next ledge (male and female pigeon getting busy!).
Luckily, it all turned out okay and mum should be fine soon. :)
Misha
at Sunday, March 13, 2005
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Survivor Type
Due to a lack of anything to post about except stress and hospitals, I'll just put up a Stephen King short story that I enjoyed because it creeped me out. You gotta do what you can to survive, right?
Survivor Type by Stephen KingNote: Not for the faint of heart.
Misha
at Sunday, March 13, 2005
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We are family
I'm convinced that when a kid is about to be born, God must pick out a bunch of people who embody every possible trait that gets on the kid's nerves, and then send the kid into that family. "Family" refers to people you can love without even really liking who they are as people. My own siblings, for example, are so different from me in every way that I cannot imagine even knowing them if I were not related to them. My mother can be overbearing and constantly shove me into situations I don't want to be in, but without her, life would be a major mess and I know it. My dad, well, he's made me strong, stronger than any child should have to be. My aunt may scare easily and get mildly hysterical in emergencies, but she can do what needs to be done.
Outside immediate family, thank God for relatives who realise the importance of laughter and for once, I'm glad half the family consists of doctors. At last count, my mum had about twelve doctors hovering around, all relatives with different specialties from surgery to dentistry to psychiatry.
Misha
at Sunday, March 13, 2005
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Friday, March 11, 2005
.
I've lost count of the number of times I have logged in here and thought I had something to say, then clicked on 'sign out' instead. After much internal struggle with my rigid sense of privacy and desire to just get it out, I have decided to blog about my mum being in the ICU. No, save the sad/pitying looks, thank you very much. And no, I don't particularly want to talk about it. Suffice to say, I'd like to ask whoever reads this to please say a prayer for her and her speedy recovery.
Misha
at Friday, March 11, 2005
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Charming
Banks are a class act, truly. I hope I never have to be the one to call someone's home two days after a customer has died to ask when the family plans to pay them back their money.
Misha
at Friday, March 11, 2005
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Infinite
So here goes another Calculus rant. You're probably thinking, is it thursday already? Indeed it is (may be friday by the time this is posted) but this time instead of venting/ranting, I'd like to clarify something: I do not hate maths as much as I profess. As far as I'm concerned, there's actually great beauty to be found in mathematics. The first time I was enraptured by numbers was when I was informed that between two seemingly consecutive whole numbers, such as 1 and 2, there is an infinite number of values. How mind-boggling is that? I mean, I was awed by the thought of the limitlessness of space but to think that between something as close as a couple of numbers there is an infinite number of numbers hidden just hit me so much harder. Another example: you can take any number, say "2" and continue to divide it into half for all your lifetime and still keep going. Infinity: such a beautiful concept.
Then, however, as with all subjects I enjoyed reading up on in my spare time, I had to practice it, had to learn formulae, had to pass exams in which numbers stared tauntingly back at me. Compulsion is the death of passion, I have learned, and so died my passion for maths.
Misha
at Friday, March 11, 2005
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Wednesday, March 09, 2005
Oldies
Misha
at Wednesday, March 09, 2005
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Monday, March 07, 2005
Say hello
Say hello to my new pseudonym, Mr. Zafar Hussain, awarded by someone at
the Friday Times in response to my request for semi-anonymity when publishing the Campus Survival Skills posts as an article. Yay!
And a special thanks to
Huma for informing me about it. :)
Misha
at Monday, March 07, 2005
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Sunday, March 06, 2005
Sunday Morning.
At eight a.m. on a sunday morning, the only happy faces you see are the ones on the billboards. Also, the last thing you want to see when you arrive against all rational advice early sunday morning for a make-up class is that both campuses' gates are sealed shut and there seems to be no sign of life within. At that hour, though, there's nothing for it but to try and justify the reluctant waking up early and stick around till some other fellow-khwaar people show up. Until then, the neighbouring school's guards (industrious lot they are, too, up and about by seven A.M, even on a sunday) kept scouting around my car, perhaps suspecting I was one of those 'khatoon' car bombers there were reports about in the news. They may be good guards, but they're not too good at detective work, I can tell you.
So here I am, taking out the repressed anger on flocks of crows that seemes to enjoy prancing within five feet of where I am when someone shows up. Then another. And another. And then another, until we're a group of about nine people standing square between the two campuses, cursing the powers that be.
By nine o'clock, someone finally has the sense to attempt jumping over the main gate and fetching the guard by creating a good old racket inside the university premesis. Eventually, the guard appears, shows us a signed form stating that our class has been moved up to ten A.M, but lets us in anyway (bless you!).
What follows is the equivalent of that dream you have where you have the house to yourself and you do everything you've always wanted to do but never could because of the threat of a lurking teacher, coordinator, or even bashfulness. Hence began the gentle climbing of ledges and trees while I stand below and watch the show. Sadly, ten minutes later, and before and real damage can be done, the teacher shows up and ushers everyone into a classroom.
There's such an interesting lawless vibe that develops on sundays in a university, when there are no actual grown-ups around who wield any sort of authority and few students around to witness any acts of vandalism, threats to hang teachers upside down from trees and the law of the jungle reins supreme.
I still hate sunday classes, though.
Misha
at Sunday, March 06, 2005
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Saturday, March 05, 2005
Zen
There is a certain Zen-like state when you're working on a repetitive task. Today, I saw how filthy my trusty old keyboard's keys were and decided to clean them, one by one. As I used a pen to fashion a simple lever mechanism to flick each key off its stand and then rubbed it shiny-clean, the simple repetive nature of my task led my mind to wander and, for the first time in a while, just aimlessly drift from thought to thought. Definitely theraputic. No wonder so many people like cleaning things till they can see their faces in them.
Misha
at Saturday, March 05, 2005
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Thursday, March 03, 2005
The Calculus Chronicles Continue
If true wisdom is knowing that you know nothing at all, I am the very embodiment of wisdom in my calculus hourly. How is it then, that I am flunking?
True panic is when you are sitting in a zealously invigilated exam hall and the teacher seems to have confused your math paper with a Latin paper because none of it makes any sense whatsoever. Your brain has shut down, refused outright to process any of the symbols and so you're on your own. Normally, I have a proud tradition of being full of it during exams and being able to spin a tale that would get me at least half marks per question, be it because the teacher's mildly gullible and falls for it, or for originality, but with maths, you just can't fake it, especially when your teacher works on a binary system (Correct/Incorrect, nothing in between).
Of course, one math-based course isn't enough for these sadists. Just when you're sighing with relief at scraping through Calculus 1, you're bombarded with Calculus 2, Linear Algebra & Differential Equations, Numerical Analysis and Operations Research (which sounds very outdoorsy, but is a sneakily disguised version of 'dheet' math aka maths in which you keep applying one formula like a mule until eventually the sum gives in and produces an answer).
Misha
at Thursday, March 03, 2005
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Wednesday, March 02, 2005
indifferent
The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference.
The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference.
The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference.
And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference.
Someone said indifference is the strongest force in the universe and they were right. Indifference makes everything it touches meaningless, love and hate don't stand a chance against it. Someone else said that too.
Me, I revel in indifference. It's my superpower.
Misha
at Wednesday, March 02, 2005
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sit back and watch
To be relegated a backseat in your own life, to watch your life happening around you regardless of whether you like it or not, is pretty pathetic. At this point though, I'm not sure I care enough to get up and grab the reins again. Too much work and with too little variation in the established routine.
On a completely irrelevant and unrelated note, I have seen two white rabbits in one of the mini-gardens downstairs that appear at around ten in the evening and disappear at around midnight. I dont know who they belong to or where they came from but I'm damn well going to catch them one of these days. If you happen to see a crazy woman chasing rabbits at eleven pm some night, please don't be alarmed.
How can one be listless and stir crazy while wandering around all around Clifton?
Misha
at Wednesday, March 02, 2005
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Tuesday, March 01, 2005
Birthday Alarms
A good friend's birthday's really close, which made me wonder is all these 'Birthday Alarm' services aren't missing the whole point of a birthday. Isn't the fact that you remembered supposed to mean something, rather than being automatically informed everytime a friend's birthday/anniversary is coming up and mechanically wishing them?
Misha
at Tuesday, March 01, 2005
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