Someone's Obsessed with my Blog

"Great minds discuss ideas. 

Average minds discuss events. 

Small minds discuss people." 

- Eleanor Roosevelt

Well, I am not categorizing my little mind into any one of the three categories mentioned by Roosevelt above but in general I don't like talking about people a lot. Or even if I do, I talk about ideas way too much out of proportion. ( yes, I talk a lot )... But there are sometimes when some exceptional people push me to talk about them. Either their being outstandingly praiseworthy or being someone really turning off, makes me express my views about them. 

But again, while praising someone, one can go on and on about it in front of anyone but saying something negative isn't a good thing no matter how bad the person you are talking about is. So, the one good way of venting out one's feelings I find is to just talk about the kind of people who turn you off.

Here is one kind that ruin my mood...

Anonymous Stalker!

Its kind of strange. I have never been stalked before, neither in reality nor on cyberspace ( in fact I don't really know if I have..) ... but strange it is that my poor, improperly attended to, unattractive, uncontroversial, mediocre blog is being stalked just too badly ... poor baby

Someone in 'Islamabad' (Feedjit isn't good at locating individuals precisely withing a state or a country) who uses Windows XP and browses the internet through Internet Explorer visited my blog 11 times in the past 10 hours!! The 'Karachi, Sindh' person using Google Chrome and Vista is me, ya. 

How weird it feels... Imagine someone anonymous who has nothing to do in the entire wide world but to visit your poor little blog no less than an hour later, again and again... weird, weird feeling it is, I tell you :s

Another kind that turns me off is that of :

Fallacious Arguers 

 And this interesting person comments too using snide remarks and fallacious arguments filled with intended sarcasm... But again, its not about one person.

The point is that well, I have always loved diversity. Having lived for more than ten years where you can find people from all around the world...Palestinians, Malaysians, Britishers, Egyptians, Indians, Mexicans, Australians, etc... I have always loved diversity from the bottom of my heart. The very sight of people dressed in different ways, the very sound in a quiet shopping store filled with a soft humming mixture of different languages has always made me feel like home because that's how I was brought up. But no matter how diversity-loving I become some things will never cease to turn me off. People such as stalkers, and fallacious arguers, not to mention blamers, sarcastic fighters... they just destroy what little bit peace we have on earth.

And btw, I am no angel. In fact everyone of us has bits of these unwanted kinds of people in them in varying degrees. Right after criticizing someone, or a certain kind of people, I look back at my own self in the mirror and try to see my own errors and try to live up to the species I am, Human.

Freedom of Speech?

I randomly found this piece of prose on Facebook as different people's statuses and couldn't agree with it more. Very succinctly put. Makes me wonder what is going on in the world.

When you attack black people, they call it ...

Racism

When you attack Jewish people, they call it...

 Antisemitism

When you attack women, they call it...

 Sexism

When you attack homosexuality, they call it...

 Intolerance

When you attack your country, they call it...

Treason

When you attack a religious sect, they call it...

 Hate Speech

But when they attack the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), they call it...

 FREEDOM OF SPEECH

Facing the Facebook Fiasco

What just happened, simply amazes me and makes me wonder if the our government will ever cease to surprise us with its ... well, I don't want to sound harsh!

I mean, one commoner such as me in Pakistan logs on to Facebook and finds that it has been BLOCKED (actually banned)! argh!

Yes, I know what has been going on, on Facebook for more than a week and what has been and is being done as retaliation to it but among all remedies such as boycotting Facebook for a day or for ever, protesting against what is happening, creating independent positive initiatives in the forms of 'events' and 'groups' by the users, blocking Facebook on a national level by the government seems to be not only useless but even counter-productive.

And the funniest in the saddest way ever is the fact that I can still access Facebook, yes, haha. See this ...

(It's 6 pm now, more than half an hour since Facebook had been blocked as you can see the sudden pause of posts from people in my NewsFeed except for me)

C'mon, even kids in junior school now know about Proxy sites! Too bad, those who have blocked Facebook do not have an updated list of proxy sites, with the help of which they could block back door entrances to Facebook as well... which in a way makes me less desperate and angry about the weird logic our government uses in situations such as these.

I am the victim emotional distress, and I am the one who has now been barred from expressing my feelings! So much for the 'freedom of speech' and justice!

*shuts her laptop tight and goes to the balcony to get some fresh air*

PS: Facebook right now feels very similar to what the streets of NewYork looked like in the movie 'I am Legend' - horrifyingly devoid of life!

Update (6:40 pm) : well, I didn't go to the balcony because it had a lock on it and i was too lazy to get the keys from downstairs but look what I found... The Express Tribune, a Pakistani publication, reports exactly the same thing that I talked about; proxy sites and how tech-savvy Pakistanis are still using Facebook making PTA's effort of blocking Facebook only a symbolic gesture. Here is the link to the article.

http://tribune.com.pk/story/14431/pakistanis-turn-to-proxy-sites-to-reach-facebook/

Cute Monsters in the Dark Corners of my Room!

She was walking down the dark alley lost in her own thoughts when she saw it. The very sight of it paralyzed her; her fear froze her. She couldn’t advance, she couldn’t retreat. It was as if one slight movement would set that dark vicious creature upon her. But nature had equipped her with defensive tools and she used it unconsciously – out came a glass-shattering shriek. The shriek, what a kind of one it was. It set the stray dogs in the neighbourhood barking in horror, the baby in the house next to the alley crying and one fine young man rescuing our princess from this creature. Our brave hero found the source of terror, gathered the courage to fight and not to ‘flight’ and gave it a go. And the dark creature was gone in one single stamp of his joggers. Well, it was small lizard right, in the middle of the path, so it just died in a blow.

There was another girl One fine day when she one was washing her eaten up dessert’s dish at five in the morning, she felt something jelly-like under her foot. She raised her foot to find an upside-down turned medium sized lizard lying there dead and all she felt like saying was ‘Ew’. Well, the lizard was dead right, nothing more to worry about, right. But then she thought what if it wasn’t dead, so she shook the mat a little and the lizard actually flipped back in the up-side-up position. So, the girl just left it there and went back to her room.

Well, actually this girl was me, yes, me. Oh please, don’t give me that disgusted look. Of course, I know lizards are dirty creatures but I think we see and touch far dirtier and germy things in our day! So what’s so horrible about poor lizzie baby? Are you scared? Ohh, Okay, THEN, I can’t help you sorry!

But hey may you can help yourself. Look at these pictures I have taken of my dear darlings. Well, I don’t really like them, but just because the cruel society discriminates and marginalizes them all the time, I feel pity for them and feel like speaking up for them as this society can really understand the tongues. So here we go: enjoy the photos! They are meant to show you the beautiful side of my loves. Well, yea, the beautiful side :P

This dear maiden was found right behind the door of the room behind mine, in which no one lives. So one day, when I went there to vacation for a while I found this really old, wrinkled lizard wasn't even moving when I was photographing it! Or may be it wasn't old, perhaps, it just sensed some how that taking photographs is not a mean or offending act as throwing chappals or screaming is, something people do when they spot her.

This dark and handsome fella is frowned upon the society because he is a 'naali ka keera' (Urdu for drain's insect) and he wonders quite often in solitude, what his fault is if his Creator has made him that way. He also takes pride in the fact that his race is one of the oldest on this planet and that the fact that they only had become 'naali kay keeras' After naalis came into existence. Before the humans came, his forefathers used to be happy living in the jungles with ants and their other, seemingly less repulsive-looking species of his race, such as the flying cockroach.

Err, this is just a fried fish's head. If you find this weird or scary or spooky or whatever, then you should get your head checked, seriously!

PS : pictures by the author

Dear Death Awaits Me

Imagine living in this world for ever, knowing you will never die. Not such a pleasant thought for me. For without death awaiting you, what good is life?

A kid is thrilled by the slightest of newness in his surroundings. A new kind of toy, a new book, a new place, a new feel… As this kid grows older he is less and less pleased. He gradually experiences it all. He masters his small irrational fears, doesn’t rejoice on his insignificant achievements, is hardly surprised by little discoveries… in short, he gets de-sensitized gradually, grows numb and number day by day…

Since I was a kid, I was never afraid of death. To me death has never meant the end of my soul or of my existence or the event of my dead body being eaten up by ants in my grave. It has meant totally something else. Death to me is the gate to eternity, the road to a long awaited event, a long pending meeting with my Creator, the hope of seeing Him and of course a lot more.

As the character of Achilles in the movie Troy said

“Everything is more beautiful because we're doomed. You will never be lovelier than you are now, and we will never be here again”

Personally speaking, I have since forever felt that I’d die very young. At 12 I felt I’d die by 16, at 16 I thought I wouldn’t live my 19^th year, and at 20 today I still feel I might live up to just 24 years of age. I don’t really know why but I have always felt this way… Yes, I might die young. How young, I don’t really know. But this whole expectation of dying tomorrow adds joy to each and every thing I experience today.