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.