Coming home

Iss se pehlay ke wahan jaein tou ye dukh bhi na ho

Ye nishaani ke woh darvaza khula hai ab bhi

Aur uss sehn main har su yunhi pehlay ki tarha

Farsh'e naumee'diey deedar bicha hai, ab bhi. 

"It's a funny thing about comin' home. Looks the same, smells the same, feels the same. You'll realize what's changed is you."

Defeated

Jab baazi ishq ki baazi ho, jo chaho laga do, darr kaisa?

Gar jeet gaey tou kia kehna! Haray bhi tou bazi maat nahin.

When the game is that of love, go all in for what is there to be afraid of?

For if you win, you'll win it all, but even if you lose, there's no defeat. 

Mistakes

I'm not your first heartbreak, and you won't be mine, so we both know we will live. A broken heart keeps beating, strong and sure, despite the pain. Human beings have the capacity to live through greater losses than merely the death of Us. And I don't know, if I walk away, that you'll even be heartbroken. You are very self-contained, immensely resilient. I don't think you'll care enough. 

And that is the problem. 

I don't think you care enough to even fight if I walk away now. I don't think you care enough to fight for me if anyone else hurts me. Or maybe care is the wrong word. Perhaps it's just that this is who you are. You don't have the capacity to be moved beyond a certain mark, and you have full faith in my ability to fight for myself. Actually, you have full faith in my ability to fight for the both of us, whenever I'm needed to. You don't see that that is tiring for me. I will go to war for you, but then that is what I want from you, too. You don't see that every time you leave me to speak for myself, I see it as desertion. 

Aao ke karein bazm pe zar zakhm numaaya'n

Charcha hai bohat baysar'o samaan'iey dil ka

Come, let us bare our wounds to the world

There is much talk of the barrenness of my heart 

People

I have decided that the only way we can get rid of the hatred in the world now is to escalate physical human interactions between people of various backgrounds. It sounds simplistic, and in theory perhaps I always knew this. But the last two years has brought it into sharp focus for me.

In these two years, I have met a thousand different people, from all sorts of walks of life. I met, and fell absolutely in love with: Peruvians who mothered me; American Jews who  messaged me their support every time something went wrong back home and truly cared; Christian's from a variety of countries who are among the most pious people I know; Atheists who showered me with respect and were phenomenal friends; Indians who took me for ice cream when I was down, and stayed at the hospital with me over night when I burnt my hand, even with a final the next morning; Australians who became among my most valued friends.

People, whose backgrounds and religions I don't even know, who sent me boxes full of everything brand new that they thought I would need when I first came to the US, without ever meeting me, and drove many miles to come welcome me at the Boston airport; Chinese, Thai, Colombian, Vietnamese, Mexican, Canadian; People from Iceland, Russia, Greece, Chile, Venezuela, Argentina, South Korea, Italy, Guatemala, Kenya, and so many more.

I found that Latin American culture is very like my own in terms of gender roles, and that Jewish mothers are as involved in their kids' lives as Pakistani mothers, and every person I met was a Good Person.

I met an infinite combination of religion, country of origin, orientation, and socioeconomic background, and every single one of them was a Good Person.

More than the places I went, the food I ate or the adventures I experienced, I am thankful for these people that I met, for it has taken away any excuse for racism that I could ever have had in my life.

- Boston, 2015

No more forevers.

Forevers are for teenagers and first loves. Somedays come true with the second loves, or the third loves, but you've lost forever forever. 

Changes

In any relationship, it makes no sense to be scared of them finding someone else. If that is even a remote possibility, you shouldn't be with this person. Maybe we need to be more worried about them finding themselves, and whether we would be able to handle that and accept whoever they may become. Love is, perhaps, the ability to handle all the phases and transitions. 

Free

Have you ever felt free?

I have lived a beautiful, blessed life. I love my family and friends. I have done almost anything and everything I ever wanted to do. I was presented by great opportunities, and was supported by my family is taking up any that I wanted. I have never been oppressed, never been held back.

But have you ever felt free?

What does that even mean? Of course I was free. I chose my university, I chose what field I wanted to go into. I chose where I wanted to work. I chose whom I wanted to get engaged to. I was never bound in any way. I have always been free.

Just not like this. 

No, not like this. Not the way I feel right now.

I went to school, college, university. Had friends, lost friends, found love, found a job, got engaged, so on and so forth. Just your basic, amazing life. I was extremely happy, very very comfortable. I never wanted it to change. If it were up to me, I'd never have left. But due to one amazing person in my life, I did move, and my life, as I knew it, seemed to suddenly fall away. First came the homesickness, the longing for all that was familiar - and it's still here, because I don't think I'll ever let go of it completely; but then came this heady rush of freedom.

This freedom is not freedom from people, because it was never people that held me back. This freedom comes from within me. It is the realization that the world is huge, and I am infinitesimal. The understanding that what I considered my universe was but a tiny piece of the whole, and for once, the whole is within my reach.

It is a beautiful feeling to be able to look at a map of the world and accept that there is no where in the God's world that I can't go, if I try hard enough. I hadn't looked at a map in forever. Why would I, I had no need of it, I wasn't going anywhere. Now when I look at it, I'm fascinated. There is just so much to see.

There is freedom in being able to talk to people from Australia on a boat in Key West. There is freedom in discussing God with a stranger on a bus. There is freedom in standing in the Atlantic ocean and feeling oh so small. There is freedom, and there is magic.

This freedom has a price, though, and the price is loneliness. I wouldn't want a lifetime of this, it would kill me, but for a while, a very little while, when the twinges of solitude are still bearable, this freedom is perfect.

"Now more than ever do I realize that I will never be content with a sedentary life, that I will always be haunted by thoughts of a sun-drenched elsewhere.”  ― Isabelle Eberhardt

This blog is my way of capturing what I'm feeling right now to savor it forever. I hope that someday, when I'm back home and at a different phase in my life, perhaps feeling bogged down by a thousand other things, I will be able to recall this feeling of freedom, and remember that it has to come from within. There will always be places to see, all you need is the desire to see them. 

Loving Faiz

This February 13th was the 103rd birthday of Faiz Ahmed Faiz, my answer to the question 'If you could choose anyone, dead or alive, who would you want to meet?'. It would be Faiz, always Faiz.

Why do I love this 103-year old dead person so much? There are a lot of poets in the world, why am I obsessed with his work? The work of Faiz has the power to move me like no other. His cynicism, his sarcasm and wit, his vulnerability, everything is reflected in his poetry. It makes me cry, and it makes me smile, and I cannot resist it. Ever since I stole my friend's copy of 'Nuskha'haey Wafa', almost ten years ago, I can flip it open at any given point in my life, and find something that makes me feel as if Faiz wrote it specially for me.

But even more than that, it is his passion that I aspire to. I love Faiz for his words, but I love him more because I know bits and pieces of his story. His poetry, which can be translated to mean what ever you want it to mean, was actually rooted in his love for his country. The lover Faiz talks about is my beloved Pakistan. I may not agree with the doctrine he followed, but I respect him for his bravery, and his suffering. He was sent to jail, and he was exiled, but his heart continued to ache for his country, and his love never dimmed. More than that, he never stopped fighting. He could never be suppressed. I love Faiz for his perseverance, his tenacity, for never giving up. Even his darkest poems end with the message of hope at the end. Understanding that this is beyond individuals, and that, even if the revolution doesn't end with us, we will have started the process of change, and the flames we light will be a beacon for generations to come.

I love Faiz and I am envious of him. I envy him, one activist to another, for having the sheer guts to take the stand  he did. I envy him for feeling so strongly about something that nothing else mattered. In today's age, with our vanilla lives, there is barely anything left that is worthy enough to stake ones life on. When Faiz says 'if no one else will, let us march to the gallows', I wish I had something or someone that meant enough to me to do that for.

I envy him because he found something that was worth living for, and worth dying for. I love him because he did.

Unhien ke Faiz se bazaar'e aql roshan hai
Jo gaa'h gaa'h junoo'n ikhtiar kartay rahay

...

Kis qad'r ho ga yahan meh'r o' wafa ka ma'tam
Hum teri yaad se jis roz utar jaein ge

Aaj ik aur baras beet gaya

“Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.” – Andre Gide

Here's to 2013, the year I embarked on two major voyages.

Here's to the old and the new; to all my loved ones who hold pieces of my soul; to new friendships and the stories we are creating. And here's to the future. May 2014 be even more beautiful than 2013, and may God safeguard us all from sorrows, hurt, and loss in this new year.

South Beach, Miami - Dec 2013

7/06/07

There are gifts of many treasures,
For both the young and old,
From the tiniest little trinkets,
To great boxes filled with gold.

But, put them all together,
And they could not stand in lieu,
Of the greatest gift of all,
The gift of knowing you

When your times are filled with troubles,
Sadness, grief, or even doubt,
When all those things you planned on,
Just aren't turning out.

Just turn and look behind you,
From the place at which you stand,
And look for me through the shadows
And reach out for my hand.

I will lift from you your burden,
And cry for you your tears,
Bear the pain of all your sorrows,
Though it may be for a thousand years.

For in the end I would be happy,
To have helped you start anew,
It's a small price to pay,
For the gift of knowing you.


Was it really?

Shaam Dhallay

Aaj tanhai kisi humdum'e deirien ki tarah

Karnay aai hai meri saaki qari shaam dhallay

Muntazir baithay hain hum dono ke mahtaab ubhray

Aur tera aks jhalaknay lagay har saaey ta'lay...

I played hundreds of games of solitaire, because I could not sleep. I could deal with the days. I could deal with the worries and the self doubt and the pity - I could survive the days. It's the nights that I couldn't get through. 

At night, when the world is quite, silence pushes you to remember and analyze and think and question. The feeling of loss is intensified by solitude. In the dark, my present melts away to leave only static, and pieces of the past. The future mocks me. I am not so sure of myself in this dark, not as certain of my fate. I miss you.    

Loneliness, like a companion of old

Visits me, as the sun sets, to pour my wine; 

We sit together, waiting for the moon to rise 
And for your image to reflect in every shadow

                                                                                                                             Faiz Ahmed Faiz

Infinite.

For ever and ever, we say when we're young, or in our prayers. Twice we say it. Old One, do we not? For ever and ever... so that a thing may be for ever, a life or a love or a quest, and yet begin again, and be for ever just as before. And any ending that may seem to come is not an ending but an illusion. For Time does not die, Time has neither beginning nor an end, and so nothing can end or die that has once had a place in Time.

- Susan Cooper

Youth

Catching your eye, falling in love,

Holding your heart, moving apart;

Violins for love, soft and blue

Drums of loss, loud but true

Questions, hope, regrets and mistakes

The willingness to put it all at stake

Over and over and over again.

MT - Nov 2013

Aao ke karein bazm pe zar zakhm numaaya'n

Charcha hai bohat baysar'o samaan'iey dil ka

My favorite time to blog...

... is right before an exam or a test.

Loneliness petrifies me

 

Jab teri samander aankh'on main

Iss shaam ka sooraj doobay ga

Sukh so'ein ge ghar darr waalay

Aur raahi apni rah le ga

Aur raahi apni raah le ga...

Questions and Answers

These two years could be very good for me.

For the last twenty-four years I've loved at home: close to all the people I love, surrounded by my family, supported by my friends. I have lived a very busy, full and amazingly satisfying life, accomplishing a lot. But the journey has not been mine alone. In fact, I'm almost unapologetically dependent on my support group, nearly bordering on neediness. Does it help that I recognize it? Maybe. Maybe not.

When mom pushed me to apply for the Fulbright she wanted me to get an opportunity to 'see the world': see places I may never be able to see otherwise, experience the life I will not be able to experience once 'real life', with all its complications and restrains, started - job, marriage, babies, all that jazz. If it were up to me, I would probably never have applied, which just highlights how complacent I was, cosy in my comfort zone.  

Now that I'm out of my own little ecosystem, though, it's not just the world that I'm seeing, but myself too. It's a brand new start, a completely different dynamic, light years away from my real life. Sometimes I feel like a silent spectator, watching myself navigate through this strange and unfamiliar world. I'm free of my past and no one, including myself, knows the future. All I have to account for is my present. I can see myself act and react, and watch as I form tremulous new relationships and establish links with people I could never have imagined meeting. My every action can be, and is, questioned by these strangerfriends who are just getting to know who I am. And sometimes this leads to me questioning myself.

Have you ever wondered:

Why you are who you are

Why you do what you do

Who you want to be

What you want to do

Where you want to go

How can you get there

I wonder every day, and every day I find new answers.

It's a painful process. It's absolutely wonderful.

How much is too much?

What will yours read?

Do practical things if you want your tombstone to read

"They were practical."

Do what makes sense if you think it should say

"Their life made sense."

Do what the world wants if you believe in the epitaph

"They did what the world wanted them to do."

But if you want it to read

"They lived every second they were given 
and touched the sky every chance they had, 
they burned and blazed in all the colours the eye can see 
and left a hole shaped like them in the world 
when they left."

Then do something else.


From Iwrotethisforyou: http://www.iwrotethisforyou.me/2012/11/the-words-on-tombstone.html

Things I've learnt from life so far (2)

57. The people who will leave will do so, regardless of whatever you do to try to hold them to you. You can only delay the inevitable.
58. You cannot change anyone’s nature.
59. There is no such thing as ‘forever’. Nothing is ‘forever’.
60. 90% guys will be exactly like their fathers.
61. Some people will pity you for wanting to get married and have babies. Some people will pity you for not wanting to get married and have babies.
62. Staying happy is something you have to constantly work to achieve.
63. When you obsess and worry over one thing possibly going wrong, something absolutely unexpected probably will.
64. In hindsight, you will always be "better off now" and things will have always "turned out for the best".
65. A broken heart mends faster than you ever think it could.
66. Nothing stops hair fall.
67. The HR people will always be nice, even when there's no chance in hell of you ever getting that job.
68. Guys make better friends than girls, most of the time.
69. There will always be someone prettier.
70. Every once in a while, you need time away from every single person you know, to be able to make some sense of life.
71. The world is so, so big. We really don't matter.
72. You need to BE someone to know what they feel. No other way. 
73. Joy and Misery are equally beautiful.
74. The best way is to ask "what impact will this have five years from now".
75. Accountants have a million methods to con you into believing what they want you to believe.
76.

Work in progress

(part 1: http://aforml.blogspot.com/2010/05/what-ive-learnt-from-life-so-far.html)