Yesterday i cried

I cried because i couldnt understand why the Almighty would take pieces of my soul and scatter them across the globe.

I cried because i didnt know the next time i would have multiple pieces of my soul with me in the same place at the same time.

I cried and i cried and i cried. Till i looked like rudolph. Then i stopped.

I stopped and i thanked the Lord that i was born into this age of technology where i can see and hear the people i love whenever i want.
Its no substitute for the joy of physical presence, but its way better than a letter after months.

Its okay. We'll manage. We'll make the effort whenever life permits. We'll cross oceans and continents when we can. We are the lucky ones because we have people we want to do these things for.

And that's a gift from the universe.

Pieces of the soul

Today my teeny tiny little cousin usama told me the principle for remembering how to spell the word "pieces" and never get it wrong.

"No "e" before "i" unless after a "c" "

Talk about awesome. We all met after a super long time. He's nearly a doctor. Goodness gracious 😊 and mashaAllah.

Every day this week has been like coming home. That's apart from the actual physical "coming home"☺

Meeting the whole family.. again and again... all my dadis... my chachas and chachis  and cousins and nieces (just used the usama principle here) and nephews. The amazing hugs (am thinking siddo here 😊) and the warmth and the love and the joy. MashaAllah.

And then there are my friends. The ones that wake up by 10am and join me for breakfast.. the ones that are ever ready to share a cup of tea...  the ones that  try to meet up even though their schedules are as full if not fuller than mine... and the benaam crew.

I'd forgotten the joy of friends. Of the simple joy of sitting in a pebbled parking lot and just guzzling cup after cup of elaichi chai while doubling over with laughter over 20 year old jokes that no one else would get ( or want to get 😂) in a million years.

I remember it now 😊 its joyous.

The thing with life is this. We come into this world with a certain soul. It the definition of who we are. But no one is born complete. We're all born with some pieces (thank u usama 😊 again) missing.  We just don't know it!

So as we glide through life, ignorant to our own incompleteness.. we are suddenly jolted out of our automode existence by a few special souls that cross our path. These souls could be anyone... but its what they become that's important.

When we make friends (the broader classification encompasses everyone we love that touched our souls in any way.. including family and cousins and ppl we went to school with and people you flew on planes with and people you came across in foreign lands and people you met in grocery stores.. the opportunities are endless)... we begin a journey of discovery.

This journey can last a few minutes.. or a few decades. But its objective is single minded. We're looking for the missing fragments of our souls. Some cultures limit the span of this journey using the term soul mate and converting it into solely a romantic endeavor. But that's incorrect.

Everytime you come across a beautiful soul that speaks to you... a soul that you want to keep a piece of for yourself forever... you've found a missing piece of yours in that person. You've found a joy that will transcend time and space... that will transcend gender, societal norms, decades of low frequency interaction, age, .... everything that can place limits on a human connection. This joy will rise above all, and permeate your being... forever!

You will always be surrounded by it. For the joy of feeling complete, even if its one fragment at a time, can not be superceded. And that's what this life is all about... completing our souls and helping  those that complete ours in completing theirs... together... forever...
And then rising to greater heights of self-discovery and becoming the wonderful, loving, nurturing beings we were destined to be and spreading our combined joy to the world at large through all the good we can create together.

But the primary condition for this phenomenon to successfully complete itself is for there to be no judgement or material expectation on both sides. The completion of the souls requires open hearts, open minds, and an adherence to honesty and integrity forevermore.

It sounds cheesy and mushy... but its the honest truth. I've known this truth for a while but was never truly able to articulate it.

So to make a long story short... all you beautiful special souls that are a part of mine... know that I love you for what you have brought and are bringing into my life. Thank you for completing me... thank you for the laughter... thank you for the joy... thank you for keeping me grounded (thats stating what y'all do quite politely)... thank you for being cute cuddly fluffy little happy beings even when you're not 😊..
 
Thank you for being you and loving me in spite of not wanting to 😂 thank you FOR giving a .... ahem... caring. Thank you for the nights of loud music blaring bon jovi in our cars... thank you for the shared movies and the dialogues we couldnt get enough of... thank you for never finishing all of your main course... thank you for sharing dessert... thank you for staring at the sky, counting stars on cold winter nights... thank you for midnight bday wishes..  and sharing joyous wedding celebrations... thank you for 3am karahis... and 4 am study sessions.. thank you for listening and laughing.. and crying and symphathizing... thank you making me feel not-lonely or alone... thank you for the hugs... thank you for the calls...

Thank you for sharing a piece of your soul that was also a piece of mine.... thank you for completing me.

Now all we have to do is quit being polite and just be honest and true to one another ... but thats never been an issue 😏 unfortunately lol...

Thank you all you silly people... I love you in my own wierd fars-like way... till when you reeeaaally piss me off 😇 heheheh..

Au revoir mon amis...

Chatkharays and chais

The joys of breakfast can not be beat. Especially a full on, greasy, spicy, yummy,  chatkharay daar breakfast.

In typical fashion, i reached out and jhanjhorofied me fwiend at 9am in the morning and asked the crucial one-word question "nashta..?"

An hour and a half later, we were happily seated surrounded by halwa puri, hari mirch qeema, parathas, chai and aaloo tarkari.. lets not forget the masala omelette 😊😊😊😊😊

Aaaaaaaaahhhh the joys of karachi.

Course that was not enough... then moi headed off to a family lunch encompassing biryanis and gajar ka halwas.

And the crowning glory to the day was Chotu Chaiwala with the Benaam Crew... loads of bun kababs, parathas, omelette, chais and loads of priceless laughter and joy...

😊 mashaAllah... may the lord have mercy on my tummy...

Hob nobbing in a gulshan

The title for this post is related directly to where i went to scrounge around for food yesterday.

The morning was sublime. It was quiet. The white noise of TV in the background. The freshly toasted toast with dhaniyay ki chutney and butter... a piping hot cup of tea. Dip dip.. yum yum..

I'm a tea dipper. I dip EVERYTHING in my tea. I believe that is the sole purpose of tea... to be dipped in by a myriad of foreign edible substances. :)

Then me and Sabir went off to khadda mkt to basarat. Then to phase 2 dha mkt to find hob nob patties. I got some lemon tarts for old times sake since uzmchi and mano were coming. We are the lemon tart crew :)

I suddenly remembered the gulshan kay samosas and decided to hop down and see the wares in the sweet shop. It was so sweeeeet :)
So i got big aaloo samosas.. small qeema and chicken samosas and some balushahi, kalakand, and pateesa. Just to taste.

Got home.. had some super yummy shalgham gosht and chawal. Then had a feast with everyone and piping hot tea :).

Post that i went into a minor food coma. And popped off to nap for a couple of hours. Post that it was wedding time. Pulled on my wedding day finery and played dress up in front of the mirror lol...

The wedding was at golf club. Golf clubs nice. Its remote and removed but it has character... a lovely drive in... beautiful lawns that held just a hint of fog... it was beautiful. And the bride was MashAllah looking very nice.. and more importantly happy :)

So me Mahira and deeno had a nice time sitting around appreciating other people's outfits and then we were off home.

A slow and sleepy day but still filled with flavors... :)

The tea ceremony

I have gone around complaining to anyone with two working ears (even some  not so working) about my 20 years old idea of opening a dhabba called Da Dhabba (mafia shtyle) and selling unda tamater and parathas 4-evah!! Oooh yeahhh!

BUT no one would listen to my trend-spotting genius and NOW every tom, doodles and freakin harry has a chai ka dhabba and is merrily frying up chicken achari parathas at the speed of.... well as fast as the hot oil will permit really ☺☺

So The Feasting Saga continues unabated.. thanks to FT and his unending foodie generosity and we trooped off to find the rip-off (of my supremely original idea from 20 years ago) chai ka dhabbas.

Got to the place and I'm looking around trying to figure out which is which... coz.. get this! ... there are no less than THREE chai ka dhabbas within a 500 yards radius from each other.

So there was The Chai Point, Chai Shai and Chai Wala... we opted for Chai Wala.. found a table and made a stand ☺

I liked the truck art tables and the truck art graffitti on the walls. I REALLY liked the chicken achar paratha that we kinda breathed in, we ate it so fast. Once it was gone, i had an epiphany and realized that I'd forgotten to capture it for posterity in my camera. So for the sake of Art! (Indeed!) We ordered ANOTHER one! Somehow our appetite was still roaring and before I could remember to snap anything, round 2 had also disappeared into the endless abyss of our tummies... yee haw! Heheheh...

So now all u have to show for it is the picture of an empty table (quite apt!) And what the place looked like. The atmosphere was nice. It was a bit chilly. People from all areas and walks of life were there. Big cars, small cars... all squashed together, jostling to find parking.. the waiters running around with the parathas in straw chabas.. quaint, yummy, slightly reminescent of our Damascus days. 😊 fun.

At night we went to dadijans. Dania had cooked up a storm. Super yummy chicken handi and kashmiri chai. Met the Shah clan army and siddo and I hugged out in glee.

Then off to little mariam's mehndi. Met Javed uncle and aunty (khals in amsterdam with nasreen aunty). Mariam (MA) looked adorable and happy and her family was wonderful. The mehndi dinner rocked. They had gol gappas and chat, fresh jalebis being cooked right then and there and .. wait for it... BUN KABABS!! i was in desi food heaven. Mariam's friend Ainy had flown down from isloo. She's a pilot (MA). 😊 sky's the limit now literally 😊
It was a lovely time.
Thank u Allah mian... u made the world a nice place too...

Abu Jaan

I'm visiting abu.

I went to see nana first.

Then  baray nana.

The nani.

Then abu.

There are smiles in my heart.

He is in shade. Even in this realm the Almighty is bestowing his kindness.

A bird is chirping. There is a little kitten scampering about. Reminds me that abu is a cat person. There is a small breeze. The leaves rustle. *shhhhhh

The shadows move. An ambulance siren. The car horns, traffic, heaving masses of humanity in the distance....
But here right now.. its just me.. the chirping of the birds... the fluttering breeze and abu...

Your heir is here ☺... and I love u with every fragment of my soul and spirit. Always and forever...

The sweet fragrance of the rose petals i just scattered is wafting over from your eternal resting place.. its a fragrance indigenous to the roses here.. no where else in the world do they smell as sweet. Or maybe its because they are for you... so the Almighty imbued them with something special... just for you...

I don't feel alone. It's not as bad as it was when you first left. That was misery at its zenith. But I am your child. Your daughter and your son. Your everything. I rose above it... gathered the pieces, dusted myself off and strode forward into the unknown.

It wasn't easy. I cried. A lot. Every second of every day. Sometimes I thought I'd run out of tears. But you never really do. There are always more.
Then I became numb. To everything. Drowned out the world... my self... the tears stopped.
But I always remembered and I promise to never forget *pinkie swear :) ... and when "I" make a pinkie swear, I keep it!

I still need you. Sometimes I find myself at a cross roads trying to decipher the right path and I need you to center me. 

You are my compass.... for everything! Right and wrong... black and white... even the gray.. for love... for how to live... for how to love...
To love... without judgement.. without expectation... without wanting payback..  to love for the sake of loving... to love because you can't help but love... to love in small ways because grand gestures are overrated.. to love and come to the airport every single time just so you'd be the first face I'd see when I walked out with my eyes searching the crowd, yearning to see your face and feel safe again. Your love which couldn't be contained and encompassed the world... your heart which was endless and embraced everyone who wanted to be touched by your warmth...

Your loved flowed over me... night and day... in the way you ruffled my hair all the time... in the way you would hug me and kiss my forehead... the way I could fall asleep with my head on your chest with your heartbeat thrumming a lullaby to me.. your strength.. your ability to care... how you couldn't help but care.. how you would remember all the medicines nano needed to take on a daily basis and give them to her... how sometimes I think she loved you more than her own children *smile...

There is no you... physically... here with me... I wish u would ruffle my hair again and kiss my head... sometimes you do. You ruffle them from heaven... I physically feel it... and a smile breaks across my face... I have this overwhelming physical need to hug and soak in your warmth... thankfully the Shah clan has always been big on hugging and usually the hugging transcends gender barriers :) so i make do...

I hug the kiddy poos senseless till they scream in protest... its a different feeling.. I make THEM feel safe... they way you made ME  feel safe.. but I feel loved by them too...
I want to hug more... I figure now i'm old and over the hill some indiscriminate hugging is warranted. I'm looking for huggable... hug-worthy souls to dispense my special fars-ribcrusher  hugs to. Not everyone has the physical construct to survive those. Thankfully the kiddy poos do and siddo does :) it takes a strong human being to take one of my hugs and stay standing lol... siddo gives as good as she gets.. I love my family.

Thank you for them too... thank you for having me... thank you for loving me... thank you for being proud of me...  thank you for saying "I love you beta jaan" to me every chance you got so I have lost any shyness associated with expressing my love to everyone that incites that joy in my soul...

I could thank you infinitely and never run out of things to thank you for. Thank you to the Almighty for gifting me you as my abu.

I hope you can hear these words... I love you abu.

Gluttony fest

I wish there was a politer classsification for what i have embarked on this week... but there just isn't!!

The Official Launch of the Gluttony Fest/Feast 2015 started yesterday upon awakening from my 5 hour nap. We had gotten home at Fajr. I went to sleep then. Woke up around 9am. And let the parathas begin... yee haw! Heheheh...

I know i will live to regret this week's indulgence. But you know what?! I DON'T GIVE A S#$&!!!! SO THERE!

After the awesome start, we went off for a  clan get together at zubchas. EVERYONE under one roof. Pure joy! Unadulterated... timeless... not a day has gone by... JOY!

May the Almighty keep us all in his divine protection.

There were samosas and jalaibees at this point with hot tea. I dont need to explain this stuff. U have to experience it through ur tastebuds. 

Then me fwiend FT came along and we swooshed off to Sattar Buksh Cafe and demolished the menu. I mean seriously!

De-mo-lished!

We started with chicken cheese samosas.. and our elaichi/mixed chai.. hot.. melty goodness with the spicy mint chutney... ooof! then we moved on to the bun kabab... super spicy.. extra chutney... yummy crunchy toasty melt-in-ur-mouth goodness..

The kachoris... there is a problem here. I was rendered momentarily speechless at this point. They were piping hot, fresh, and so so soft that
.....................
There was a moment of silence while we ripped em apart and scooped the spicy aaloo tarkari onto them and literally breathed them in...

FT got adventurous and ordered ANOTHER bun kabab.. a dumdaar one. I cudn't eat more than one bite. By this time we were on our 2nd cup of collective chai's.

And basically holding on to our expanding tummys like that would miraculously create space... coz u know.. there was a teeny tiny problem. WE STILL HADNT TRIED DESSERT!!

So we sat there quietly sipping our teas.. shuffling around slowly in our chairs trying to ease the pressure... and after about ten fifteen minutes we felt comfortable enough to proceed to the grand finale... FT went for the choclolate orange cake... which was nutty hot and delumpcious... and then we just leaned back in our chairs and stared at the carnage we had wrought!

The good news? NOT A SINGLE OUNCE OF COGNITIVE DISSONANCE!  Heheheh

It will take alot more to break us my friend. A whole lot MORE!!

Let the games begin.... 

Cheerios
Princess of the GemWorld

Its winter wonderland time

Today is another 12 Rabi ul awal. Tomorrow 3pm is 10yrs to the lunar calendar day that abu passed  away. Somehow the gregorian calendar takes precedence. I honor the lunar day, but mourn the solar day of 11th April 2006 far more. I gratefully have not lost a single memory of him to the passage of time... in part thanks to GemWorld.

After being lost at sea, and too ravaged by the waves to even acknowlwdge it.. I landed on an island... like an oasis in the vast wasteland of listless oceanic wonder... its neat... its got some new things to discover... its warm and welcoming and i suddenly remembered what it felt like to laugh and really mean it.    
I met me again :) the me from long ago... the one i used to like :) me was neat too. Me was all about me. I think thats what i liked about her. She had understood the truth of happiness beginning from within and she worked hard at the objective. Once the inner sanctum is overflowing with self generated euphoria, then and only then can u turn the focus outward.

Happy lies within not without.

There are little wisps of joy floating about the island too... they are like remnants of memories past and present... delicious moments of contained joy burst upon me every now and then brought upon by one wisp or the other... the joy emanates from a celebration of the self, derived from the expressions of the soul... my soul has found a voice again after being in silence for some time... the dam has burst and the deluge is unstoppable 😊 i harbour a certain sense of pity for the joyous wisps... poor little beings subjected to the full force of my reawakening. I wonder how resiliant they will be in the face of this torrential flood till the tide ebbs.

I will try to be kind.

Being kind is not a natural instinct. Being helpful is. But kindness and thoughtfulness are higher emotions. They carry greater baggage and responsibility. They intone a certain strength of character like what abu exhibited every single day of his life... they are reason everyone who knew him and was helped by him still remembers him with such regard. We reap the kindness of the Almighty due to the kindness paid out by our fathers in this world. I am continuously surprised and thankful each time i experience kindness from the harsh world... and i know exactly why its being sent my way. I miss him. I love him. Forever.

I made a play list on youtube a week ago. I called it farsmusinglist 😊 i'm going to put every song i ever liked enough to sing to myself on it so when i get old i still remember them. Sometimes i want to share me with the world at large. But then i hold myself back... for the fear that instead of being able to appreciate my weirdness, i will in all probability be ridiculed for it. And rightfully so. I am a contradiction in terms. A living breathing oxymoron. An extremist that knows no middle ground... and i didnt know anyone who could swallow all of that and still be smiling 😊 i still carry hope for a miracle lol... there just may be weirder people than me in the world... hey! Anything's possible!

Hope springs eternal in the human breast.   The PIA plane is just beginning its descent towards khi. I can see the city of lights glimmering below... a vast heaving beast of human joys and sorrows.

A small smile starts curving across my lips 😊 what can i say?! It's good to be home.
Rabbi anzilni munzalam mubarakan wa anta khairul munzileen....

Contrast

There is a light and dark in each of us. We are genetically inclined towards one or the other - "Nature". How we choose the light over dark is defined by the restraint we are all taught to exercise, the values that are instilled in us - "Nurture".

But thats not enough. Choosing one over the other is a daily exercise. Each morning you wake up, the remnants of darkness will be simmering in the deepest recesses of your heart and the sparks of light will be lying in wait for you to choose them to put an end to the darkness... for the day at least. The next dawn, the battle ensues anew.

The trick is to recognize both for what they are..  You don't choose one over the other... you choose what kind of person you will end up being.

The Dark manifests differently in different people. It can demand blood in some or be as basic as lies and deceit in others. Yet at the core, it remains the essence of evil.. the devils pitchfork.. many names.. same end.

The Light is the call of the Almighty... Cautioning.. No!... Ordering restraint, control, fidelity, truth, honesty, fairness... All the things we know to be good & true in this world.

We are not perfect and we are prone to weakness. Each day we wake up and lose ourselves in the meaningless world surrounding us. Our choices are made unconsciously and without thought as are our mistakes. Yet through it all, we constantly hope for forgiveness. Through every lie we fabricate, every  deceit we breed, we carry the justification for our actions close to our teeny tiny dark little hearts, hoping that someone else can find the light that we find ourself incapable of harnessing on our own.

And sometimes there are forces externally that attack our light, like the evil eye... like black magic.. all of which are acknowledged to exist - But there is always hope in the great court of the Almighty. Where evil exists, so does the human resolve to defeat it.

All you have to do is remember one thing -
"No one has any power over me!"

No one can make you think or do anything that they want because you are stronger than them... their evil..

You are the greatest creation of the Almighty and you WILL NOT BOW DOWN before ANYTHING created by his hand. No evil, no envy, no devils followers can win as long as the belief and love of the Almighty burns in your heart.

Our desire to let go and dance in the wild can be fulfilled. The circumstances are all that you need to ensure that light prevails.
I miss me. Sometimes I feel a weight of a thousand untold stories in my heart but there are too many pieces and I think I've lost the plot. A million pieces of an unfinished tale...

I wonder how much time is left. I hope I leave happy beings behind...

Moonlight & waves

Here's what the Burj Khalifa looked like this morning ☺ Went to Fume in Dubai Marina today. It was super neat. The food was really nice. The weather outside was even nicer. Went for a post dinner walk. The wind had a nice coolness to it. It felt good. Took loads of pictures. Buildings mostly... lit up prettily. Reminded one of fairy lights. And then there was the moon :) playing hide n seek with the clouds. It had a rainbow halo around it. Somehow the camera was unable to capture its nooks and crannies .... they way it had back in khi on a particular night in DACC. I guess everything changes with time. Except me.
I'm still me surprisingly... tenaciously hanging on to what I have always been. Not moving forward but never moving back. Life has been kind. Its a sublime existence.
There are no words of wisdom spouting forth. I wouldnt recognize them anyway.

U just have to believe in a higher power and trust that all will be well all the time... and if it isnt... eventually the world rights itself. Theres nothing else to worry about..
Theres a carousel. It brings to mind all the carousels i've ever seen and have memories of. I've always felt the burden of perception weighing heavily on me. The ability to see the reality of ppl is a difficult one at best.... excruciating one at worst. 
But no complaints. Atleast there arent any surprises. U get what u expect, dust yourself off and move on.

Ice cream cones melting.... I fear time may be short...