The Magic Hour

The Husband Files: We're all a little Loony!

Me: I once dropped a baby cousin of mine while I was carrying her
Arfiman: *looks shocked*
Me: I didn't tell anyone though ...
Arfiman: Is that why she's a bit .... *makes a crazy face*
Me: NO! She's not like that *makes the same crazy face* She's like me!
Arfiman: So who dropped you?

Hitting you where it hurts ....

Normally I hate forwarded email. I automatically delete it without even glancing at the subject line. I opened one by mistake today.

A forward from a friend i haven't been in touch with for a long, long time. We live in the same city, yet the last time we exchanged words was at my wedding a year and a half ago. He did call a few times. I was too busy to pick up the phone. Before, we used to go on drives with music blaring and pig out on shawermas. we even went camping in Oman one Eid. Three days of washing bums with cold water and eating half cooked meat. Freezing in the night and deciding that it's better to sleep in one of the roomy Jeeps than in our sleeping bags. I was too busy to call him back. For the last one year and a half.

And today, I mistakenly open this email from him ...

Around the corner I have a friend,
In this great city that has no end,
Yet the days go by and weeks rush on,
And before I know it, a year is gone.
And I never see my old friends face,
For life is a swift and terrible race,
He knows I like him just as well,
As in the days when I rang his bell.
And he rang mine but we were younger then,
And now we are busy, tired men.
Tired of playing a foolish game.
Tired of trying to make a name.
"Tomorrow" I say! "I will call on Jim
Just to show that I'm thinking of him."
But tomorrow comes and tomorrow goes,
And distance between us grows and grows.
Around the corner, yet miles away,
"Here's a telegram sir," "Jim died today."
And that's what we get and deserve in the end.
Around the corner, a vanished friend.

Remember to always say what you mean.
If you love someone, tell them.
Don't be afraid to express yourself.
Reach out and tell someone what they mean to you.
Because when you decide that it is the right time it might be
too
late.

Seize the day. Never have regrets. And most importantly, stay close to your friends and family, for they have helped make you the person that you are today.

Fuck.

I am forced to introspect and I don't like what I see.

How many friendships do we let slip from between our fingers? How many joyous memories that we cherish, yet hide away in dusty boxes of 'not enough time' on the busy shelves of life?

How many bonds that we didn't let grow, how many laughs that we didn't laugh.

I will call him. Tomorrow.

Perspective

Muslims or Maniacs?

This post is in memory of the 14 girls who lost their lives four years ago in the horrific Mecca school fire incident of 11 March, 2002.

It wasn’t the fire that killed them, it was the misguided, misogynistic Mutawwas of Saudi that did. It was those fucking fundamentalist freaks that are the collective asshole of mankind.

Apparently, the girls’ school in Mecca caught fire. Eyewitnesses reported that several members of the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice (read Mutawwa) interfered with rescue efforts because the fleeing students were not wearing the proper public attire (abaya and sheyla) for women in Saudi, and because their male relatives were not there to receive them.

So this school burns and the girls burn inside it, and all the fucking Islamists care about is whether or not these girls are wearing proper clothes and whether their male mehram relatives are there or not. What a pretty, pretty picture that paints of Islam, doesn’t it?

Seriously, it’s when things like this happen that I truly feel disgusted and ashamed of my own religion.

It’s been 1400 bloody years. The middle ages are fucking gone. Why can’t these Islamists bloody keep up?

A report prepared by Mecca's Civil Defense Department about the rescue effort at the school noted that mutawwa'in were at the school's main gate and, "intentionally obstructed the efforts to evacuate the girls. This resulted in the increased number of casualties."

The religious police reportedly tried to block the entry of Civil Defense officers into the building. "We told them that the situation was dangerous and it was not the time to discuss religious issues, but they refused and started shouting at us," Arab News quoted Civil Defense officers as saying. "Whenever the girls got out through the main gate, these people forced them to return via another. Instead of extending a helping hand for the rescue work, they were using their hands to beat us," Civil Defense officers were quoted as saying.

The officers also said they saw three people beating girls who had evacuated the school without proper dress. In the end, the department’s officers had to use force to keep the commission’s members away from the area and help the girls get out of the building quickly.

"We told them that the situation was dangerous and it was not the time to discuss religious issues, but they refused and started shouting at us."

Saudi Interior Minister Prince Naif promised that the government would investigate the Makkah school fire tragedy earnestly to bring the culprits to account. He also said that the persons responsible for the incident would be asked to pay blood money to the families of the 14 girls who perished in the school disaster as well as compensations to the injured.

Do you really think that’s enough? Don’t scum like this deserve to be wiped off the face of planet earth, rather than being allowed to stay alive and then go on and spawn future generation of similar fucktards?

If you ask me, Bush should forget about Bin Laden and instead nuke the Mutawwas out.

The Saudi Gazette quoted witnesses as saying that the police - known as the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice - had stopped men who tried to help the girls and warned "it is a sinful to approach them".
The father of one of the dead girls said that the school watchman even refused to open the gates to let the girls out.
"Lives could have been saved had they not been stopped by members of the Commission for Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice," the Saudi Gazzette concluded.

My mind cannot grasp how anyone claiming to follow the word of Allah can possibly think that letting innocent schoolgirls die is preferable to them coming out with their heads uncovered.

Who knows how many vices we are promoting, how many people we are sending to their deaths by allowing ourselves to be herded into following somebody else’s interpretation of religion. An interpretation that doesn’t make any sense sometimes.

Cover your head. Don’t wear a skirt. Grow a beard. Trim your nails. Don’t befriend the opposite sex. Why? Why?!! Why THE FUCK ANY OF IT?

Whatever happened to any aspect of Islam that doesn’t boil down to sex and sexuality? Whatever happened to valuing life itself? Whatever happened to showing mercy and compassion helping those in need?

And that, my dears, is why I will never cover my head, why I will never give up my French manicures and why … when people tell me how a Muslimah should behave … I will ask them to shove it.

I am sure that the people responsible for the deaths of those schoolgirls have a special corner in hell reserved specially for them. And I am sure that they will have LOTS of company.

I just hope there’s a little broadcast system in heaven where everyone else can watch these self-righteous zealots rot in the misery of their misguided sense of virtue. :)

Too much to tell, not enough time to tell it in ...

The last few days have been such a whirlwind with lots of things happening all one after the other and not even enough time to think about it, let alone blog about it.

Survivors of Air Blue (as described in one of my previous posts) will be please to know that we hosted a fellow survivor on her trip to The Land Of Four H’s (one of these days, I will tell you the story behind the christening of Dubai as such).

N. spent a few days with us and even though we didn’t get to see her a lot – what with me leaving for work at 7 am (when N. was sleeping) and coming back at 5 (at which time N. would be out doing whatever Londoners do in Dubailand.

We did however have some good times. I particularly cherish the memory of late night channel-surfing and making fun of sad Paki people trying to be cool on TV. Y’know, the whole ‘Awh Mai Gawd’ and ‘Haaaow Waanderfuul’ lot with their contrived accents and their fashion sense so off it wasn’t ever on any radar.

When you live with a boy, you sometimes miss girly chats. Not to say that my experience of living with my boy has been anything less than wonderful, but somehow, you can’t get a boy to get into a excited repartee about puffball skirts and dhoti shalwars and how we thought in the 80s we would die before we wore them and yet, today we die to wear them. *sigh*

I am such a fashion victim. (Which reminds me, I have not had a manicure/pedicure for over two weeks now!!!!) Naked, naked nails. Bad. Bad. BAD.

So, while N. was still here, I came home one day from work and upon the ringing of the doorbell, opened to door to find … OHMIGOD .. bhayya and bhabhi.

They had stopped by. LOL. Jet-setting family we are: on the way back to karachi from their honeymoon in iran, they decided to stop by Dubai to pay us a visit. Tee hee.

So they spent a few days with us where I knew not head from tail. I think I didn’t even properly see Arfiman for two whole days. He evening Bhayya and Bhabhi arrived, I went out with them and came home really late to find Arfiman asleep. I kissed him g’night and tucked myself in. The next morning, I left for work before he even got up and I went out with Bhayya Bhabhi straight from work and returned at home to find Arfiman sleeping AGAIN. Again I went to work in the morning before he woke up and when I saw him that night, it was like we were on a date. LOL. He kept making eyes at me *blush*

So that’s that. Crazy days with out-of-towners. I didn’t get a chance to say bye to N., but hey, I hear she might be making a move here permanently, so Yay :)

This past weekend, Arfiman and I also attended our first church wedding and it was so, so beautiful. You can’t blame me for going all teary-eyed, but J. looked so gorgeous in her off-white gown and her mum was positively beaming. After a lovely ceremony at the Jebel Ali Church, and a very amusing and yet insightful few words from The Father (of the church, and not of the bride/groom), we went off to the reception at the villa of a friend of the couple’s in Barsha.

It was obvious that this ceremony had more to do with sharing your special day with special people instead of like the typical desi shaadi where the shaadi is an opportunity to show exactly how many people you know OF. So doesn’t matter whether you’ve not seen the person for ten years, the shaadi is your chance to invite them and see them. Bull crap.

J and L’s wedding was a lovely, private affair with about 50 or so people. The reception was an early dinner followed by dancing.

You think that’s a full weekend? Wait till you hear what comes next.

BIG NEWS.

Not really mine to tell, so I’ll tell it as best as I can without stealing somebody else’s thunder.

Somebody is gonna HAVE A BABY!

Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay.

Nine months of boated feet, stretch marks, raging hormones, clothes that don’t fit and ALWAYS being hungry. Un-uhn. The pitter patter of tiny feet and soft baby butt cheeks. Yum.