Twilight

Oh no, don't be deceived, dear reader! This is not about Stephenie Meyer's 'Twilight' saga. Rather, it's about the subtle reflections of a silly girl from your backyard. 

  

Back home, dawn would usually be spent away snoring like the world depended on it. Like there was night, and then the sunlit morning without transition; like as if a curtain had simply been lifted. And even if one were to be awake then, the sodium-lamp flooded streets and roads would mask the beauty of the morning hour, leaving behind only a dark background highlighted by an orange glow. 

  

As I recently had the chance to experience, morning time is simply - breathtaking! 

Oh yeah, I'm sure you've heard of the 'effect' of sunrise and sunset on people, and many occult practices use the transformational power of nature at these times. But experiencing them first hand, especially by yourself, is an experience all it's own kind; no substitutes there! 

  

Sunset for me is a melancholy time. The time when light gives way to darkness. The orange halos situated a few metres apart along the road come to the rescue, to make us feel safe and cozy in our homes. But if you've had the experience of watching the sun set, especially on the beach, I'm sure most of you will agree about the droopy feeling . 

  

But twilight? It's different. 

There's positivity there; stars of beauty; galaxies of hope; and to complement it all, the deep, dark backdrop to stage it all. 

It was last week. I'd woken up pre-dawn as I'm wont to during university days nowadays. I usually just stay in the dining room aka 'my living room' and go about previous day's work (and yeah, coffee-drinking!). Outdoors is SO not where I can be found. 

But last week, something was different. It had rained the previous night and I had a sudden impulse to go check out how everything looked outside. Everyone was still asleep, so I opened the kitchen door ever so lightly (I tried to, at least!) and stepped on to the terrace. Ducking beneath the clothesline I made it to the gate, opened it, and sat on the steps; for, the sight was beautiful! Rain drops could be seen suspended on the leaves of shrubs in the faint orange of dimmed street lamps, some ready to drop by at the passage of the gentlest breeze. The mountains in the backdrop covered the setting moon and threw an ethereal white glow over the horizon. Crickets chirped incessantly and a line of ants marched past the last step.   

  

Everything was just so peaceful! I had the sudden urge to break into song, laughter, a fit of weeping; all at the same time. It began to feel like the aura of the place was tugging at me in different directions simultaneously, pulling me apart. The peace of the place was a total contrast to the turmoil within me. I had the urge to reach out, to speak to the twinkling stars, to write out my unspeakable and incoherent thoughts on the deep, dark, sky. I wanted to jump into the air and just float on the clouds moving over the distant mountains. I wanted to open up to the heavens, to throw myself onto my knees and scream my thoughts out and weep my sorrows away and confess confess confess. I wanted the moment to stretch on and on till time infinite. I wanted nothing but to stand there and talk to the sky, the stars, the galaxies, the aliens (if) far, far away. To become intertwined with the beauty of the cosmos. 

  

And then, I smiled. 

I couldn't own the moment; when you love something, you should be prepared to let it fly. I smiled not because I was rid of my 'head' buzzing with thoughts and memories and ideas and anger and love, but because I had finally found a companion, a silent listener, a vast yet lone world of advice and insight. I smiled and sat a little while longer on the steps, listening to the stars and watching their flickering, trying to absorb it all in. The 'azan' started and I felt a wave of peace wash over me. I felt comforted. I knew, somehow, however it may be, that everything will be alright. That someday, I will learn to be able to let fly all that I love; for love is not ownership, but experience and acceptance. That someday I will know the true meaning of feelings, and why some things happened that should never have. Why I slipped where I should have stayed firm. 

I let the muazzin and the stars fill up my extended bowl of belief. And that filled me with energy for the rest of the day. 

I let the stars talk and the deep, dark sky envelope me. 

I let the place be me, and me be it; symbiosis. 

  

I go to the porch pre-dawn every day now. 

I'm a worshipper. 

Sir Shabbir

It's been 2yrs since I've been taught in proper English by a teacher. The predominant medium of instruction in my university is Urdu, not to mention the frequent specks of Punjabi strewn about for humorous touch.  Language shouldn't be a barrier to learning, especially when one is taught in one's mother tongue. But as I've realized to great disappointment, that's not always true.

Being taught in Urdu while the textbooks followed and the notes to be written are in English is preposterous! The constant process of translation in the mind usually ends up in some fundamental part of the teacher's spoken sentence being skipped. No matter how hard I try to avoid it, something or the other of essence always goes missing and somehow it doesn't feel like I've actually understood much from the teacher's words. We speak in Urdu amongst family members and colleagues in university so it seems like anyone saying anything in Urdu has got to be talking informally. Since baba too speaks in English with us whenever describing anything of literary value, exposure to studies and all things related in Urdu has been zero.

But today for the subject ECD( Electronic Circuit Design ), we found that Sir Shabbir is going to teach us. We'd heard all sorts of comments about him: he was strict; tolerated no nonsense; taught in a way as to scare students away from Electronics; spoke in a way that was difficult to grasp…something of a learned tyrant.

All that turned out to be mere prejudice.

Just after our first class with him, I knew ECD had GOT to be one of my favourite courses! Sir taught in amazing English, and for the first time since A'levels I followed every word of a teacher. And not just that; he's one of the most proper and spontaneous teachers I've studied with. He kept the class in a highly interactive mood and was superb with the basics of the subject (though its true most of the class was just b-l-a-n-k to his questions which dug at square one of Electronics!) 

The first encounter whirled a jigsaw of memories from school in my mind and for a couple of minutes I was back in a different period of life. It thankfully didn't take long to recover from the memory-charm as Sir had started explaining some fundamental everyday Electronics jargon.

Though it's just the first week of semester, I know I'm going to have a great time with ECD. It's been some time since I felt so great with a subject and I'm hoping I won't be disappointed in my perception.

The Jealousy Factor

I'm not someone used to being jealous of people. I do of course become influenced or impressed, but jealousy is just not my response.

Or so I thought, until yesterday.

The credit for my dress designing and stitching goes completely to my maternal grandmother [ نانو ]. Mama doesn't usually bear the torture of sitting with a sewing machine, but something made her make me a dress this time, yesterday.

It was a pink-and-white printed cotton dress, and large scraps of the cloth as well as some of the adorning lace were left over by the end. Mama wrapped them up into a ball and placed them in a shopper in case she might need them later on. She then began clearing up the place ready to prepare dinner. After testing the dress for fitting, I logged onto Facebook to check out the social network updates. I expected mama to be in the kitchen, and so the gentle whirr of the sewing machine came as a surprise. I put it down to her mending something as an afterthought. No worries.

Absorbed in the World Wide Web I realized only after 20minutes that the whirring was still continuing!

I got up to check up on mama. And what did I see? Mama holding up a white frock with pleated neck; the same pink-and-white cotton highlighting the shoulder joints; the white embroidered lace encircling the hem. A pretty girl-ish frock. That might not have been much in itself had I not seen the huge loving smile on her face. I was shell-shocked. I mean, who was that little dress for? We don't have a little girl that age for miles in our extended family, so why the dress?

Before I could speak a word, mama asked me how did the frock look? I said hmm, good, but who WAS it for? So she told me; it was for the daughter of a classmate from Quran class. Wasn't it pretty? How should she join the bow? Like the traditional two-tier thing, or the simple kind? She kept asking me these questions in quick succession but they were entirely lost on me. Yes, I was furious in my mind. Jealous. Of the little girl.

And on top of the cloth-ey business, she also mentioned that the little girl was one pretty thing and was a 'girl' true to the bone. That she usually wore the pinks and purples meant for little girls; had straight hair she usually wore in two ponytails; had a sweet voice one just wanted to hear over and over again. I'm sure mama didn't mean to point out my own un-girl-iness, but I felt the contrast hard.

Really hard.

Why was I jealous? Maybe because it was MY mother making a dress for ANOTHER little 'girl'. Because it's ME who's going to a different country in a week's time. Because it's ME who wants MY own mother's FULL attention. Maybe this. Maybe that.

 

I know it's hardly the response to expect from a university student. I mean, نانو makes the girls in her area dresses all the time as gifts, and I haven't once felt like this.

But, this time…?

I'm ashamed. But… but…*another bout of uncontrollable jealousy*

Fruit Symbiosis?

I hate household work. I dislike cooking.

But this Ramadan, preparing the fruit salad [ فروٹ چاٹ  : ‘fruit cha-at’ in Urdu speak ] for Iftar has fallen to me.

Quiet grumbling, mild protestations on being assigned this task on a daily basis for a month…not a day or two, not a week, but a whole MONTH…it was outrageous! I'd rather be sitting and doing most ANYthing else than washing fruit, carefully drawing up the imaginary lines of fruit-latitude-and-longitude, then choosing the right knives for each step of the cutting process!

Preparing فروٹ چاٹ is just NOT what I do! And yet I landed up with the job. I'm trying to be a slightly <emphasis> 'good' girl these vacations around, trying my best to act as mama's telling me, with some variation of my own of course! [I can't tell you how difficult it is for me to follow anybody's instructions :/], so I zipped up my mouth trying to shut all the words of protest just bursting to be heard.

So on the first day of Ramadan, I took up the challenge; got the fruit, washed, dried, got cutting. The pile I'd made was off-putting from the outset but once the knife was in my hand, I told myself: no turning back now!

First came the pineapple [thankfully that was already peeled and sliced!] under my torture, followed by 3pears, 2apples and 2bananas. Mama intentionally kept popping into the kitchen to see if I needed help; and did I ask for it? Of course not! I was just being adamant in not letting on the fact that I was dreading the inspection that would come later, the verdict mama would give if she'd passed the  فروٹ چاٹ   or not; that I was clueless if the way I'd sliced up the pineapple, chopped the pear + apple, quartered the bananas was right or not. And of course I just couldn't let my ineptitude show…no way!

But I kept going; chopping; slicing; squeezing lemon and pouring the juice to keep the fruit from blackening. The rhythm of my own motion eventually made me forget about the previously insistent hunger pangs. It took me 45minutes to get the bowl filled. After making layer upon layer of fruit, I got the spatula, shut my eyes, placed my left hand on the bowl's edge and started mixing.

All through the process I would just dump the cut fruit into the bowl without looking at it, so I saw the end result only after everything was done. I'd been expecting it to look nothing short of a mess and had full plans to drop the knife, wash my hands, and disappear from the kitchen till Iftar immediately after completing the preparation.

But I didn't. Because, because, because…the  فروٹ چا  looked amazing! It's just vanity, I'm sure, but I stood for a full minute just looking at what I'd made. The poking red faces of the unpeeled apple, mixed in with the tropical feel of pineapple dotted about with the pleasant scented pear was just *awestruck!*.

I felt strangely proud of my work. I picked up the bowl with caution and placed it ever so carefully on the mat to ensure the beauties didn't fall out. And was I glad when it passed the look-test! The fruits somehow felt my own, like I could identify with them in a certain way. I munched and savoured the crunch like I'd never before, all the while thinking, 'Look! It's me who made this!'

It's been 18days now that I've been making the فروٹ چاٹ  every day. I now look out for fruit promotions in supermarket catalogues and keep the fruit supply for the next day in check. I mix-and-match the fruit combinations according to which ones are in greater quantity; rotate the pineapples everyday to maintain their freshness, check the bananas for softness to make sure they haven't become too mushy and place them on a soft sheet so they don't blacken.

All this from someone who doesn't like cooking. Not to say I've changed my outlook on cooking, or that I'm going to start with other dishes now...not at all! 

But the fruit salad? It's mine now. We're in symbiosis - for the rest of the month, at least.

Change-ing NEMO

Mama asked us to clean up the CD rack after Iftar yesterday. My parents were in the other room and my sister was going through the day's Tabloid! not even bothering to look up at our frequent exclamations.

It's been ages since we used the CD's in any way, and somehow the rack always seems to go ignored every spring cleaning season. Out comes CD after CD, of games we used to play and cartoons we used to watch. Then a couple of pre-download-era software ones. After we've strewn about almost a dozen over the floor, an un-interesting one comes up; no label, just the BENQ plain original. I discard it and move on, not realizing that my brother has inserted it into his laptop.

All of a sudden the sound of a familiar tune fills the air. I place it immediately as belonging to the animated cartoon 'Finding NEMO', one of the very first of its kind. I whirl around toward the source, and there it is, filling the screen in Wide Mode. I know I'm going to sound like some kind of a brag in explaining its sudden effect on me, or may be like someone eager simply to exaggerate. But the flood of thoughts and memories the very first scene, the very tune brought out in me was astounding..

I was transported back to schooldays, a time when things were diametrically different from what they're now…and yet eerily, just SO similar.

Different because now I'm with new people. It's good to experience change as change is what spells growth. But confronting a set of bogus ideas strong as walls erected in the middle of nowhere, just to trouble passersby, isn't always the most fulfilling experience on Earth. The people, the setting, the whole aura of my life in a new country is the total opposite of life in the UAE. But, I'm still the same person. I'm still the girl full of opinions, albeit nobody wants to hear them now. I've still got the passion for books, but there's nobody to discuss and fuss over silly lines now. I'm still the person who wants to be helpful and 'good', but nobody has time to pay attention, to say that word 'thanks' which has the power to make a bad day turn sunny.

Friends are the glow-lights on the backdrop of life; connecting the dots completes a picture, lays down a path of companionship and manifests an idea. It seemed so simple before…just talk to the person next-seat, exchange the usual questions peppered with huge smiles and lo! you got yourself somebody to talk to, at least. Not so anymore. Think about this, consider that, oho! so-and-so is from that city, I should be careful what to say in front of them!

University has ceased to feel like the 'second home' we're taught institutions -> schools are. Everything seems just so fabricated, all the smiles concealing vitriol and hollow competitiveness behind them. Each look received is calculating; juicing; storing the gossip to be told later. It's much too much sometimes, and I fear turning into the sissy who's always moaning and complaining.

Change spells growth, yes, but it doesn’t always come easy.

Watching NEMO after a long time yesterday acted as an eye-opener for me. The tiny clown fish seemed to be saying to me: it's time to wake out of this gloominess, Alishba, and embrace the beauty within and without. That though some things may seem to be REALLY difficult, nothing is too difficult to endure because God burdens us only with what we can handle, never exceeding the crucial 'tipping point'.

God's symbols are strange sometimes. It's funny to think how much seeing the tiny clown fish again after a long time evoked in me; all I haven’t been able to understand in the past 2yrs conveyed in mere minutes.

So I've decided. I'm going to look for the silver lining beneath the clouds of my new skies. Moaning and complaining all the time is simply not giving life, this single chance we have, it's proper due.

The clown fish has given me a new lease on many things.

I'm beginning to smile already.

I will conquer; my life is my own to live, and who other than me to enjoy it?

“Change is inevitable, growth is intentional "

                                                                               -        Glenda Cloud

On Ramadan And Coffee

Coffee. The rich aroma, the bitter taste sweet to the tongue. The act of mapping out the procedure, the memory of savouring  the flavour. Closely monitoring the water temperature to make it 'just right' for the delicate coffee granules [instant, of course!]. Taking a sip and just relishing the ‘feel’…oh! *tickling taste buds*.

I'm the only coffee-drinker in the family, and my parents can't for the life of them figure why the taste for such a bitter liquid? Baba's always like, 'Alishba, fresh, plain boiled milk is good for kids, coffee is not!' and trying to convince me out of it every time he sees me with a cuppa. Mama's divided, which helps out sometimes. But when have I listened to what's being told me before? So ergo, coffee time!

Sehri is a hectic time. Mama's voice is the only sound to be heard above our varied frequency *snores*.

* 'Wake up, hurry!' 'Have you even LOOKED at the time? It's about to be Fajr!' [umm, closed eyes and snoring mouths don't really register time, do they?]

'This is the LAST <emphasis> time I'm calling you guys! I'm not coming in again!' [1min later, back to the * ]. 

Loop till one of us heads groggily to the bathroom - and you get a picture of our too-early-in-the-morning meal.

Figuring in milk, let alone coffee, is a job in itself considering the short span of time before Fajr. But na-an, Mama's watching, NO-ONE dare skip their milk. No amount of reasoning, excusing, coercing works where 'milk' is concerned. So yes, be the nice kids and drink it up in three gulps 'شا باش !'.

Mama kept strict tabs on my coffee consumption during school days. But since I've gone to university, to her remorse she can do this only in the abstract sense, from a distance of many miles. Any Skype conversation usually raises the question, 'Just one cup a day, half teaspoon, right Alishba?'; and taking note of this particular question, 'Oh mama, there's a problem with the internet connection right now, WHAT did you ask again? Too much static, ugh!' is roughly my reply.

Now I've come up to 2 cups daily. And I've simply GOT to have at least one a day. Otherwise, it feels horrible, like something important is 'missing', a stimulation my taste buds are craving...but where is it? Maybe this is what it feels like to be 'addicted'? Get me my cuppa!

Now the magic formula: milk + coffee = latte. Not really coffee, the die-hard fan might say. Plus I use the instant variety, the silly ol' saucepan in the kitchen with a lid, and the connoisseur is justified in wrinkling up his nose. It’s a good thing mama's neither, so now I've discovered an, umm, trick, you might say.*shhh* I now simply microwave the off-course-boiled milk, and spoon in some instant. There's simply no time to go through the 'real' process, no time to take the first sip and savour the taste as the liquid sloshes around in my mouth. No time to frother the milk to be added, no time to take out my special cup + saucer. Rush it up, gulp it down. Hardly a satiating experience. But it's still coffee, isn't it? And just knowing I've had it is a wonderful feeling by itself. And given it's Ramadan and Sehri time, and throwing in the watchful gaze of mama, I guess it's worth it.

So till the ‘hurrah’ formula becomes obsolete and is succeeded by an upgrade, this is the way I can sneak my 'addiction' in. And as waking up earlier is the precursor to a formula upgrade, and so not an option for a sleeper like me, you can rest assured mama, I'll still be having that full cup of milk.

Maybe now you can figure the odd combination of Ramadan and pre-dawn coffee?

coffee beans...my lifeline!

Shattering Entropy

Monday, 16th August. The summer vacations are in full swing. The day was sunny and hot. Isn't that just how all stories start, with a normal day, normal routine, and normal people? Annoying as it may be, there's a reason for this clichéd opening …because nothing, absolutely nothing, can prepare one for the impact of shocks one always assumed to be unsusceptible to.

All through life, one hears about death, sickness, disease. Even though we know it's bound to strike each one of us some time or the other, one can’t help but take the mentions as abstract, as something to happen far off in the future. And as we're instructed to live the present moment because that is what will determine the 'past moment' and lay the foundation for the 'future moment', we just dismiss the notion of ill-fate despite the very real thing that it is.

How many times have we heard about keeping our cholesterol levels in check for cardiac health? Oh-ho, beyond counting! In fact, today's newspaper had a whole article on it!

 And yeh, we pay attention to this because who doesn't want a slim waistline?

Hmm, so what about blood glucose levels? Antioxidant levels? Calcium levels? Most of will answer this with a 'many times'. But since these do not directly affect our 'looks' in the immediate, we tend to turn on mode: IGNORE.

But why am I giving this boring lecture after mentioning a date and the overly used 'normal' opening lines?

Science has given us many reasons for everything from health to 'space', from the mind-boggling concept of bent-time to cloud computing. I know low cholesterol levels are good, that HDL fats are better than LDL's, that green tea has a lot of antioxidants and so promotes fresh skin and a healthy heart. You know them too. Maybe you apply them too. So does my father.

Good cholesterol levels, a healthy blood glucose level. Green tea twice a day, low fat diet. Balanced protein, fresh vegetables. And to complete the 'healthy' picture, some added herbal precautions thrown in too. And yet, my father, a seemingly 'normal' person, on the 'normal' day of 16th August, had a heart attack.

Nothing could have prepared us for such a shocker! I mean, how could MY father have a heart attack? My father, who's a pillar of strength for us? Who's a robust man with a lot of life in him? MY father, who's so energetic and bustling, and only the night before was telling us a fun tale from university life?

Hundreds of people have cardiac arrest everyday, but how COULD my father be one of them?

The truth is, parents are the persons we look up to for guidance even though we'd like to think of ourselves as completely independent individuals. But though we may not spell out our troubles to them, they always sense the something that's wrong, the something that's bugging us to no end. They’re the guiding lights of our lives, the constant pillars in the wild weathers of this world, the solid foundations of our emotions. So when tremors begin to rise in them, it's enough to turn our worlds topsy-turvy. We no longer feel safe, begin to feel our sanctuary evaporating. We feel derived of the consolation only parents can give, that 'everything will be okey, we'll always be there for you!'

That word 'always' is what sets us at ease. What gives us the notion of immortality, of the state of no-change. The sense that things will not tend toward greater randomness, toward greater entropy against the laws of physics. That somehow, the healing touch of our parents will always remain with us in person.

Science does not provide all the answers. Why did baba have an arrest despite the all-clear tests? The doctors were baffled as we didn't even have a history of cardiac issues in our family. They factored maybe stress was responsible for the oncoming. But we'll never know. Perhaps it was a wake-up call from God to warn baba to slow down, to take things in his stride and leave some things to the Creator. Baba has undergone a successful angioplasty and the doctors say he can resume life after a few weeks' rest. For this, I'm incredibly thankful to science; it has provided baba with a new lease on life. Science has served as the matrix upon which prayers have worked.

I pray, especially since the Holy Month is here, that the flame that is my father's life always remains burning and doesn't so much as dim. I pray, God forgives each and every one of our fathers, and lets their light always illuminate the shadowy paths of mortal life.