Excess Baggage

I recently took a train to Taxila as part of a trip and brought a book along with myself to read during the journey. It's only when the train started to move did I realize that I wouldn't be reading the book at all.

Books are for the times I take the NJ transit to meet Afshan at Penn. Station or when I'm tired after having spent the day in Manhatten.

It is because traveling from New Jersey into the heart of New York does not amount to even half the fascination and beauty in traveling from Golra to Taxila.

For one, one can feel the scenery change every few minutes. The way people walk, the colors their homes are, the kinds of clothes they wear, the cleanliness they maintain, the pets they keep, every single detail made me feel like a child again. I found myself building on tales of their daily lives and their typical routines. Romantic does not necessarily mean the stuff Mills & Boons and Barbara Cartland became famous for (although I wonder why they did). Romantic is being able to follow the smallest movement or expression into the depths of an entire tale. Alhamdo lillah.

The most enjoyable part were the children. Jumping children to match the bounce of Pooh's best friend Tigger. Jumping at the sight of the passing train, jumping in their spot with an almost contagious excitement masha Allah. The older ones shyly waved back to passengers while most just jumped.

Each time I saw them jumping I tried to describe their emotions in a single phrase if not a word. I still cannot come up with one that does their exuberance justice.

Reading makes sense when changing cities even entire states in my situation do not offer any kind of variety. Even the landscape in Umreeka looks like it was engineered on an assembly line as compared to ours, subhan Allah. I did not realize I even kept a book until I found it in my bag on reaching home.

To Have And Have Not

Although this is the second trip that I've made since Ryzvan left it still feels so strangely hollow to travel without the SMSes. The are we there yet?s and the ding dongs that may not sound like much but amount to a lot.
Even stranger is stepping out and consciously not look for little somethings to take back that served as a reminder during the trip.

Bleah

I seriously doubt I'll ever look forward to packing or un-packing. For that to happen I'll need to not have traveled for at least three months at a stretch.

Al-Qalam

After a long time I found myself saving a clipping from a magazine. It's a typographic composition in Urdu script of, "Nastaleeq". It says in Persian, "Qalam goyad keh mann shah jahaanam," meaning, "The pen says, I am the ruler of my kingdom."

Deadlock

Oh please! What if they were just ominous of the modern homo sapien where one is trying to strangle the other and during the process the earth cracked open and swallowed them in whole? Valentine Schmalentine.

The Face of Terror

Police foil suicide attack at Islamabad airport, three wounded ISLAMABAD, Feb 6 (AFP) A suicide attacker opened fire at Islamabad’s International airport late Tuesday before blowing himself up with a hand grenade, and injuring at least three people, the interior minister said. The bomber headed towards the VIP section of the airport in a vehicle with two other men, and he began firing after security staff stopped it in the carpark outside, Interior Minister Aftab Sherpao said. “One of the men started firing at the security staff, injuring a member of the Airport Security Force, an elite police commando and a policeman,” Sherpao said. “They shot back at the attacker, then he tried to throw a grenade at them but when police retaliated, it fell from his hand and exploded and he died,” he said. “The suicide belt he was wearing did not explode, it was still intact.” Sherpao added. Police arrested the two other men in the car, and have cordoned off the airport over fears of further attacks, officials said. Information Minister Mohammad Ali Durrani clarified that he and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz had landed hours earlier at the nearby Chaklala Airbase following a trip to the Arabian Sea port of Gwadar, and were not at Islamabad airport at the time of the incident. (First Posted @ 21:54 PST Updated @ 23:30 PST)

Abdullah Saab, an ASF officer who was an eye-witness and also injured during the attempted attack described the suicide attacker as a, "Taliban type." Despite the seriousness of the situation I smiled at this simple man's (may Allah Reward him for being true to his duty) choice of words, a obvious result of hearing a term resound much too often in the air.

Reminds me of a cover of our school magazine, Nomad that my friend Nur designed. That particular issue was printed in the winter of 2001. Nur had created a simple collage of Afghani children, children with their large expressive eyes and equally blank faces. Children in bright colors, children in bandages. He had written the simple title of, "The Face of Terror" on the cover. Naturally the cover sparked outrage amongst our American faculty members when all it really did do was show a face of terror we were too willing to forget then, and now.

Tomato, Tomato, Let's Call The Whole Thing Off

A sure-short way to make me tune out a recipe or an entire cooking show for that matter, is mentioning tomato ketchup as part of the ingredients.