Why Yes I do, you handsome devil you :)

Ramadan Schedule!

So Ramadan was around the corner, people were talking about it. In particular, one of my friends Waqas, told me, "Saad, is dafa Ramadan ki tayyari karni hai!" (Saad, this time around we have to get ready for Ramadan). Also, one day, while reading from a book, I stumbled upon a hadith that talked about Ramadan's blessings. So, all this is to say, that this Ramadan didn't catch me by surprise.


Anyway, when on Friday night, it was finally annouced that Ramadan crescent has been sighted, and I reached home after taraveeh, I sat with my sister and tried to come up with a Plan for this month. This was more of a schedule of important things, guidelines that I Needed to follow. So I wrote it down, and got my sister to sign it under the heading of 'Enforcer'. Haha... This was the plan:

1. No computer usage after coming home from work. As in no computer after 5 pm. Period. 
2. Meditation after Isha. 
3. Recitation after Fajr.
4. No fried stuff in aftaar. 
5. No coffee or tea. 
6. Workout after Maghrib. 

Well, it went great. Some things I implemented with great success, and some things I wasn't as successful. Needless to say, it felt great. The first week felt great. There were some issues, of course. Firstly, the shape that I am usually in isn't much kind to offering taraveeh. So I got a bad backache. Secondly, I got crotch itch. This wasnt a good experience really. I have the memories a bit hazy about which happened when, but they all happened in the first week. There was one good news in the first week too! Wahaj's visa got processed and he was said to leave on the second Tuesday of Ramadan. So he gave an Aftaar party on the Saturday before it. And I met all my friends. And while my shape had gotten pathetically worse over the last two years, I was very impressed to see that guys especially Hamza Javed and Danish Zafar were doing really good. They were working out regularly, and eating very disciplined protien based diets. I got a lot of inspiration and a lot of tips too!

So I was set that I would workout too! Just fifteen minutes. That's all. So I googled '15 minute men's home workout' and something came up. It was basically five exercises, done in a circuit of five minute.

So far it's been going great. I am sticking with it up till now, and I feel stronger now too. I complete this within time, as opposed to the first week, when it took me 20-25 minutes to do a 15 minute workout. I still pant like a horse, but I guess that's gonna stay for a while. 

So that's it for now... I am gonna plan a new schedule for normal days, which I will stick to too. And I am loving this thing. Usually, whenever I have gone healthy in the past, I have always given it my best shot. Done it with full focus. Lost a great many pounds. But that's what my aim is not. Now, I just have to do it a little. So little that it's easily managed with work and life, and so much that it's effective in the long run. I don't want to be 'jock' or the person whose only thing that he does is lose weight. I don't want to be just losing weight! In fact, I don't want to do that. This is not a temporary thing. It's gonna stay. Fifteen minutes? I can manage that. Let's see.

What Pakistanis miss the most

So, One of my friends, Wajahat* (bhai hamaray hee halkay k aik Rat hain yeh!) has gotten into graduate program. He is going to Greece/Germany/etc (note to self: put program details here!) for two years. He is a good friend, and of the only two that I meet often. And I am sort of feeling emotional that he's going. So while during one such emotional chat with him, he shared this wonderful piece of chat that he had with his sister:

Sister: sab sey ziyada kis ki yaad aayi gi?
Wajahat: hmmm...muslim shower...

*names have been changed to protect the identity of the people.**
**actually they're just changed to sound mysterious, that's all.

Soul

You don't have a Soul. You are a Soul. You have a body.

— C.S. Lewis

Quote, Unquote

This time, like all times, is a very good one, if we but know what to do with it.

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

نفل حج

Owning Property

The tenant pondered. "Funny thing how it is. If a man owns a little property, that property is him, it's part of him, and it's like him. If he owns property only so he can walk on it and handle it and be sad when it isn't doing well, and feel fine when the rain falls on it, that property is him, and some way he's bigger because he owns it. Even if he isn't successful he's big with his property. That is so."

And the tenant pondered more. "But let a man get property he doesn't see, or can't take time to get his fingers in, or can't be there to walk on it—why, then the property is the man. He can't do what he wants, he can't think what he wants. The property is the man, stronger than he is. And he is small, not big. Only his possessions are big—and he's the servant of his property. That is so, too."

— Steinbeck, John. Grapes of Wrath. 1939.