Read somewhere on facebook:
A: I need an advice. I have been offered a PHD position at University of Kansas and I am kind of confused to decide, so I need help!!
J: Depends on your preferences. The option is worth considering...
What others say and I like.
Mostly an archive of internet articles I want in one place, with some of my writing and rumination sprinkled here and there.
Tuesday 29 October 2013
Monday 21 October 2013
Recommendation
4 out of 5 dentists recommend this WordPress.com site
Found this written on a graphic design blog :D these dentists - they'd recommend anything, but it has to be good!
Found this written on a graphic design blog :D these dentists - they'd recommend anything, but it has to be good!
Sunday 20 October 2013
Milk
Friend:
netherlands main har cheez processed lagti hai
milk has like 1 year expiry
me
hahahahahahaha
Friend:
so i started buying the more expensive one, which expires in 5 days
Saturday 19 October 2013
Contradictions
I am so so so tempted to make this a blog post, like others. With my commentary, arguments, step by step shredding it and taking it apart. But a part of me wants to just make it an overheard like thing - just the quotations. So you can see what I see. I know this is a failed experiment. Perhaps it's a bug in me, perhaps a feature? People usually don't see what I see. Not saying I am misunderstood or something :P Just saying, I see things other people don't.
P.S. I don't see dead people. And formatting (underline, italics, bold, parenthesis etc) are added by me. I don't actually remember exact words, so reproducing them from the memory.
A girl:
"I hate it when guys think that they have to protect the girls"
The next day, the same girl, while telling me tips of safe-living on campus:
"So we shouldn't travel alone, specially at night, and specially girls."
A girl:
"In Pakistan, people are not educated. They think chips (lays etc) are only to be consumed by individuals. They don't treat them as family snacks. We want to educate them, so buy the family packs, and the whole family would eat the chips with dips and sauces. Also, in Pakistan, guests would take offense if they're served chips. We want to educate them so they find it acceptable to serve chips to guests too."
"So you want to 'educate' them to eat junk food?"
"They already eat junk food! Are Samosay healthy? Pakoray healthy? Dahi Baray healthy?"
Can't resist the commentary. Basically, she wants (her organization wants, and she, like many other people, has to be good at what she does, so she has to buy the philosophy the organization sells) to change the culture of the people from unhealthy to another (more) unhealthy option, but one in which her company would make money. Why? Well, they're 'leaders who are working on exciting problems to change the world for the better'. For the stock owners.
When I went shopping with a bunch of Pakistani friends. It was one of the first shopping trips you make after going to a new country. The groceries are in the list too. I would look at every goddamn edible's label and make sure it was kosher. And there was another guy, who said something like, 'oh aap tou bari research kartay hain, main tou nahin karta itni' (Oh you do a lot of reasearch, I don't)
When I saw him shopping, he would look at the all the nutrients and macro nutrients and calories on every thing he got. Even the fruits he has been eating for years. And would calculate how many of those nutrients he was getting from other foods, then he would pick those.
This one may not sound ironic, well, because yo u have to know some information for something to sound ironic. I could just tell you, but it won't grounded in your knowledge base, so you won't protect it, and apply it to new information as you would what you now know, in fact, this would be new information to you too. Now, after this much BS, I don't feel like recalling the story here! Some other time.
There are so many more! Just wanted to get these off my chest. Don't even remember others. There are so many other stories I want to share, but they aren't ironic enough to be called Contradictions. But they will surely come on the blog.
P.S. I don't see dead people. And formatting (underline, italics, bold, parenthesis etc) are added by me. I don't actually remember exact words, so reproducing them from the memory.
A girl:
"I hate it when guys think that they have to protect the girls"
The next day, the same girl, while telling me tips of safe-living on campus:
"So we shouldn't travel alone, specially at night, and specially girls."
A girl:
"In Pakistan, people are not educated. They think chips (lays etc) are only to be consumed by individuals. They don't treat them as family snacks. We want to educate them, so buy the family packs, and the whole family would eat the chips with dips and sauces. Also, in Pakistan, guests would take offense if they're served chips. We want to educate them so they find it acceptable to serve chips to guests too."
"So you want to 'educate' them to eat junk food?"
"They already eat junk food! Are Samosay healthy? Pakoray healthy? Dahi Baray healthy?"
Can't resist the commentary. Basically, she wants (her organization wants, and she, like many other people, has to be good at what she does, so she has to buy the philosophy the organization sells) to change the culture of the people from unhealthy to another (more) unhealthy option, but one in which her company would make money. Why? Well, they're 'leaders who are working on exciting problems to change the world for the better'. For the stock owners.
When I went shopping with a bunch of Pakistani friends. It was one of the first shopping trips you make after going to a new country. The groceries are in the list too. I would look at every goddamn edible's label and make sure it was kosher. And there was another guy, who said something like, 'oh aap tou bari research kartay hain, main tou nahin karta itni' (Oh you do a lot of reasearch, I don't)
When I saw him shopping, he would look at the all the nutrients and macro nutrients and calories on every thing he got. Even the fruits he has been eating for years. And would calculate how many of those nutrients he was getting from other foods, then he would pick those.
This one may not sound ironic, well, because yo u have to know some information for something to sound ironic. I could just tell you, but it won't grounded in your knowledge base, so you won't protect it, and apply it to new information as you would what you now know, in fact, this would be new information to you too. Now, after this much BS, I don't feel like recalling the story here! Some other time.
There are so many more! Just wanted to get these off my chest. Don't even remember others. There are so many other stories I want to share, but they aren't ironic enough to be called Contradictions. But they will surely come on the blog.
The Good Stuff
As I mentioned in my earlier post, that I am planning to make a looong post about all the good stuff that happened since I came to US, here it is.
Though the tone of my writing, or my talking (or my walking!) these days wouldn't have a trace of happiness these days. I am very very stressed these days. My studies are so bad, that I might get thrown of the university, and thence out of the Fulbright program, and my lifelong dream is on the verge of shattering just like that. Note: if you have obvious advice, just shut up. So where was I? Yeah the good stuff. So, since I had to write it... hahahaha.. I like how it has gone 'I wanna share the good stuff that happened to me because the world is such a wonderful place' to 'since I had to write it' - anyway, so, I am writing it. I thought of making it reallly long, but now I will only just bullet it. There you go:
Mathew Wise
This was the salesman at the Best Buy mobile in Cameron Village. We had gone there around evening to ask him for mobile. They were about to close the shops, yet he took so much of his time to help us with the kind of mobile we needed, and the connection, etc etc. His job, you'd say. He later told us where we could find a vegetarian place to eat (we only needed a toiled to use, he suggested we go to a restaurant - and we wanted to go to a vegetarian one, so we could pretend we're gonna order something) - then he helped us find the direction of Mecca on multiple devices he had. Then he looked up sunset time for us. Then he looked up directions to the mosque for us (the last one without asking, also we were out of his shop, gone, also, he printed those, and gave them to our friends, to give them to us, when we really had planned or already had offered prayers on the roadside). He later stayed in touch on email giving suggestions on which mobile to buy, this was part of his job. But the help above was great.
Waleed Raza / Zohaib Qazi
Inkay baray main kia bataon? Yeh tou ab yaar he ban gaye hain. In kay baray main baad main likhon ga :D
Andrew Sleeth
This guy works in the Graduate Admissions Office. More on him later. Why? Cause I feel too lazy to write. Meh.
Rana Salman / Danish
Hahahahahaha...
Muhammad Shahid
Later Gator. Lazy Mazy. Hazy. Dazy. Crazy? Maybe.
Nazrul Islam
One night I was coming home from Danish's place (at this time I used to call it Danish's place, now I call Rana's place, cause Danish hardly lives in it) and it was the middle of the night. 11 pm? Something like that. And I was bringing my laptop. And I was scared. So I hid it under my shawl and was very very aware of my surroundings. And while I was coming, on a road, I stopped to let a car pass. And the car driver stopped, and I looked at him, and he looked at him. And he had a beard and a cap, and presumably was wearing a kurta. This was my First encounter with someone looking like that in US! Can't tell you how happy I was to come across him. He stopped his car. I went up to him, introduced myself. He introduced himself. I got into the, dropped me home. I had nothing to offer him. We talked. He told me about the masjid, the people there, the work of dawat. I was so happy to meet him! He told me he could pick me up for fajr prayers and isha prayers. He still does. I met Muhammad Shahid (above) through him. I am really glad I ran to him! Boy! He was Nazrul Islam :)
Darryl
There's one bus that goes from my home to where my classes are, and back, and on Fridays goes to masjid. I was so happy to discover that! I board this bus, and the driver looks at me and says 'Assalam O Alykum' and I raise my eyebrow, say Walikum Salam... and I ask him, where did you learn that, and he says, Malcolm X. I was so happy! How wish everyone reads that book! Anyway. He remembers my name. He knows where I live, so when I forget to signal him to stop the bus, he stops it when it reaches my house, or asks me before where I wanna go. Sometimes, I am going on foot, and he knows where I am going, he honks at me, stops the bus at the next stop and waits for me to board it. Yeah, he's that nice! And he's that nice to a lot of people. He's just a great person!
Druman
My neighbour. When I went to ask him if I could use his internet and pay half the monthly bill for it, since I was new and needed time setting things up, he said I could use it for free.
David
Gave me a free bookshelf!
Birthday!
On my birthday night. First I was pissed at people's blindly following the new cool trend on being the first one to wish the birthday boy, by sending a text message at 12:01 am. They want to show they're being very mindful, and very caring. The idiots don't realize that at this time, in their time zone, it's not even my birthday yet! I am ten hours behind their time! So what they're essentially proving is that they're juts following habits, and not being considerate and mindful? hahaha... And since I am not the one who hides when he's pissed, what happened when it actually was 12:01 am, in my time zone? I was a lonely piece of shit! And I was sitting there, lying actually. Feeling it's a different night than any other, trying to convince myself it wasn't. Trying to pass the time without thinking much about it. And three four people show up at my house with balloons, and how I greet them when they haven't even knocked on my door: "Where the heck where you all!" - they come, we eat, and they tell we're going jet skiing the next day. They didn't even let me pay for it.
Though the tone of my writing, or my talking (or my walking!) these days wouldn't have a trace of happiness these days. I am very very stressed these days. My studies are so bad, that I might get thrown of the university, and thence out of the Fulbright program, and my lifelong dream is on the verge of shattering just like that. Note: if you have obvious advice, just shut up. So where was I? Yeah the good stuff. So, since I had to write it... hahahaha.. I like how it has gone 'I wanna share the good stuff that happened to me because the world is such a wonderful place' to 'since I had to write it' - anyway, so, I am writing it. I thought of making it reallly long, but now I will only just bullet it. There you go:
Mathew Wise
This was the salesman at the Best Buy mobile in Cameron Village. We had gone there around evening to ask him for mobile. They were about to close the shops, yet he took so much of his time to help us with the kind of mobile we needed, and the connection, etc etc. His job, you'd say. He later told us where we could find a vegetarian place to eat (we only needed a toiled to use, he suggested we go to a restaurant - and we wanted to go to a vegetarian one, so we could pretend we're gonna order something) - then he helped us find the direction of Mecca on multiple devices he had. Then he looked up sunset time for us. Then he looked up directions to the mosque for us (the last one without asking, also we were out of his shop, gone, also, he printed those, and gave them to our friends, to give them to us, when we really had planned or already had offered prayers on the roadside). He later stayed in touch on email giving suggestions on which mobile to buy, this was part of his job. But the help above was great.
Waleed Raza / Zohaib Qazi
Inkay baray main kia bataon? Yeh tou ab yaar he ban gaye hain. In kay baray main baad main likhon ga :D
Andrew Sleeth
This guy works in the Graduate Admissions Office. More on him later. Why? Cause I feel too lazy to write. Meh.
Rana Salman / Danish
Hahahahahaha...
Muhammad Shahid
Later Gator. Lazy Mazy. Hazy. Dazy. Crazy? Maybe.
Nazrul Islam
One night I was coming home from Danish's place (at this time I used to call it Danish's place, now I call Rana's place, cause Danish hardly lives in it) and it was the middle of the night. 11 pm? Something like that. And I was bringing my laptop. And I was scared. So I hid it under my shawl and was very very aware of my surroundings. And while I was coming, on a road, I stopped to let a car pass. And the car driver stopped, and I looked at him, and he looked at him. And he had a beard and a cap, and presumably was wearing a kurta. This was my First encounter with someone looking like that in US! Can't tell you how happy I was to come across him. He stopped his car. I went up to him, introduced myself. He introduced himself. I got into the, dropped me home. I had nothing to offer him. We talked. He told me about the masjid, the people there, the work of dawat. I was so happy to meet him! He told me he could pick me up for fajr prayers and isha prayers. He still does. I met Muhammad Shahid (above) through him. I am really glad I ran to him! Boy! He was Nazrul Islam :)
Darryl
There's one bus that goes from my home to where my classes are, and back, and on Fridays goes to masjid. I was so happy to discover that! I board this bus, and the driver looks at me and says 'Assalam O Alykum' and I raise my eyebrow, say Walikum Salam... and I ask him, where did you learn that, and he says, Malcolm X. I was so happy! How wish everyone reads that book! Anyway. He remembers my name. He knows where I live, so when I forget to signal him to stop the bus, he stops it when it reaches my house, or asks me before where I wanna go. Sometimes, I am going on foot, and he knows where I am going, he honks at me, stops the bus at the next stop and waits for me to board it. Yeah, he's that nice! And he's that nice to a lot of people. He's just a great person!
Druman
My neighbour. When I went to ask him if I could use his internet and pay half the monthly bill for it, since I was new and needed time setting things up, he said I could use it for free.
David
Gave me a free bookshelf!
Birthday!
On my birthday night. First I was pissed at people's blindly following the new cool trend on being the first one to wish the birthday boy, by sending a text message at 12:01 am. They want to show they're being very mindful, and very caring. The idiots don't realize that at this time, in their time zone, it's not even my birthday yet! I am ten hours behind their time! So what they're essentially proving is that they're juts following habits, and not being considerate and mindful? hahaha... And since I am not the one who hides when he's pissed, what happened when it actually was 12:01 am, in my time zone? I was a lonely piece of shit! And I was sitting there, lying actually. Feeling it's a different night than any other, trying to convince myself it wasn't. Trying to pass the time without thinking much about it. And three four people show up at my house with balloons, and how I greet them when they haven't even knocked on my door: "Where the heck where you all!" - they come, we eat, and they tell we're going jet skiing the next day. They didn't even let me pay for it.
Wednesday 16 October 2013
Chicken are decent people
Here's another question I have. How come when it's us, it's an abortion, and when it's a chicken, it's an omelet? Are we so much better than chickens all of a sudden? When did this happen; that we passed chickens in goodness? Name six ways we're better than chickens... See, nobody can do it! You know why? 'Cause chickens are decent people. You don't see chickens hanging around in drug gangs, do you? No. You don't see a chicken strapping some guy to a chair and hooking up his nuts to a car battery, do you? When's the last chicken you heard about came home from work and beat the shit out of his hen, huh? Doesn't happen... 'cause chickens are decent people.
— George Carlin
Tuesday 15 October 2013
Monday 14 October 2013
Bad Habits
I know bad habits wait on us forever. They don't ever go away. They will always be there, just around the corner, lurking and looking for an opening. If you're addicted to food or alcohol or cigarettes or even the wrong person in your life, if you've got a bad habit of any kind, I don't think it just "disappears." If you stop setting goals for your future, if you start living in the moment again, that's when those bad haits will push their way back into your life.
Phillips, Bill. Body for Life: 12 Weeks to Mental and Physical Strength. HarperCollins, 1999. (ISBN 0-06-019339-5)
Saturday 12 October 2013
The case of good stories
Since I have come to US, all that I have ever wanted to talk about it is negative stuff. Why is that? I don't know. I haven't been really happy since I came here. I wasn't happy in Karachi either though. I was miserable there. Though I have had my moments of misery here as well, but at least I am doing one thing that I like, and when I was in Karachi, perhaps I wasn't doing anything that I like.
And so, to counter all that negative talk, I made a list of all the positive stuff that I wanted to talk. All the great great things that happened to me. And the since became so long, that I kept waiting for a good chunk of time to write it. And in that time, I also had to be happy, so it actually shows that good things happened. If you write about good things when you're in a shitty mood, then you just make it look shitty, as you will soon know.
Now - an hour or more ago - I tried to sleep. I am So cranky. Just dying with sleep. But can't fall asleep. This is my curse. No matter how sleepy or tired I am, I can't fall asleep unless I am happy. And I had called my mother earlier to talk to her. And she said she keeps wanting to talk but worries that she might disturb me (this she thinks when here I am on fall break; this she worries when I am sleeping in on a Sunday evening till 3 pm) so I told her to feel free to call me up anytime, and don't think about waking me up. And we settled that she would call me at 9 am (My time). And I went to bed, to sleep, but couldn't. Then after trying, I came online, more miserable than before. And like I said, wasn't ready to start on that blog post yet. So I kept wasting some time online. Started looking for a nice, clean calendar app that I can use to log all my workouts in a nice way, instead of blogging about them like a loser. Who the hell blogs their workouts? (I know, blogging about workouts is not that bad, specially if you're excited about the plan you're following, your fitness journey, and what not, but now I just am in a mood when anything in the world just looks lame and stupid)
And what happens? She calls. And she has asked my grumpy sister to make the skype call, who couldn't help but use her natural gift, pissed me off even more. I just told them to call me at nine am, though I am awake now. I told them I was about to sleep. Bye bye.
Where's my post about 'happy' things? Heck if I know about it.
And so, to counter all that negative talk, I made a list of all the positive stuff that I wanted to talk. All the great great things that happened to me. And the since became so long, that I kept waiting for a good chunk of time to write it. And in that time, I also had to be happy, so it actually shows that good things happened. If you write about good things when you're in a shitty mood, then you just make it look shitty, as you will soon know.
Now - an hour or more ago - I tried to sleep. I am So cranky. Just dying with sleep. But can't fall asleep. This is my curse. No matter how sleepy or tired I am, I can't fall asleep unless I am happy. And I had called my mother earlier to talk to her. And she said she keeps wanting to talk but worries that she might disturb me (this she thinks when here I am on fall break; this she worries when I am sleeping in on a Sunday evening till 3 pm) so I told her to feel free to call me up anytime, and don't think about waking me up. And we settled that she would call me at 9 am (My time). And I went to bed, to sleep, but couldn't. Then after trying, I came online, more miserable than before. And like I said, wasn't ready to start on that blog post yet. So I kept wasting some time online. Started looking for a nice, clean calendar app that I can use to log all my workouts in a nice way, instead of blogging about them like a loser. Who the hell blogs their workouts? (I know, blogging about workouts is not that bad, specially if you're excited about the plan you're following, your fitness journey, and what not, but now I just am in a mood when anything in the world just looks lame and stupid)
And what happens? She calls. And she has asked my grumpy sister to make the skype call, who couldn't help but use her natural gift, pissed me off even more. I just told them to call me at nine am, though I am awake now. I told them I was about to sleep. Bye bye.
Where's my post about 'happy' things? Heck if I know about it.