My cousin told me about an upcoming horror movie by the name of "The Hills Have Eyes". I Googled it and discovered that it's a remake of the 1977 movie by the same name and the same producer, i.e. Wes Craven.
I'm looking forward to watching it when it releases on March 10, insha Allah. Although Wes Craven's known for making gory horror movies (Nightmares on Elm Street), his movies are still more tasteful and contain more of a plot than more recent film-makers' projects.
While reading the review of the remake I came across a phrase that proves to be extremely graphic.
The MPAA rating reads, "R for strong gruesome violence and terror throughout, and for language."
Terror throughout. Makes me think of people fainting in theaters from lack of oxygen since they had been screaming throughout, out of terror throughout.
Pretty Picture
A Feeble Attempt
SubhanAllah, the sky looks beautiful tonight. There is a full moon and it is completely surrounded by small fluffs of clouds that seem to have been a single body once, and like the surface of a marble cake-mix, sifted into smaller bits with a toothpick.
I took my camera and snapped lots of pictures, thinking the entire time of the day I spent with Afshan in New York City and that day the sky looked painted on. Truly, painted on with a fine brush. I could not shift my eyes from the end of the street at each avenue that showed a glimpse as if it were a view-finder that bore witness to a true work of art.
My favorite flower is the narcissus (nargis) and alhamdo lillah I was surrounded by them in my recent trip to Islamabad. Zairah told me to take pictures of them so she knew which flower I meant when I described them to her.
I took countless pictures and realized that not one could describe exactly the awe I felt on seeing them, nor capture its fragrance for me to bring home.
There is a limit to emotions captured in photography. Not even the greatest camera or photographer can replicate the majesty of Allah's creations in nature, or the awe that it evokes in His people.
Bon appetit!
There's something extremely disconcerting about having to hear the cook sneeze himself inside-out in the kitchen while preparing the next meal to be consumed by us.
To Thine Own Self Be True
Kundera's thoughts on betrayal, an act that could be committed to a person, an idea, a commitment or a resolution, but all resulting in the gradual loss of self and all that is true ("haq" in Urdu sounds better):
"But if we betray B., for whom we betrayed A., it does not necessarily follow that we have placated A. ... The first betrayal is irreparable. It calls forth a chain reaction of further betrayals, each of which takes us farther and farther away from the point of our original betrayal."
On Parades
"... behind Communism, Fascism, behind all occupations and invasions lurks a basic pervasive evil and that the image of that evil was a parade of people marching by with raised fists and shouting identical syllables in unison."
Quote taken from "The Unbearable Lightness of Being" a novel by Milan Kundera
Night Light
Can reading books truly be divided into daytime and night-time books?
Meaning, are there any books that I would rather stay up the entire night to read than take out time during the day for?
I think I would. Because this thought crossed my mind while reading "The Unbearable Lightness of Being" at two am: a book I have been unable to read during the day for lack of proper attention.
It's alhamdo lillah such a good feeling to have the quiet time to sit back and think over Kundera's ways of expressing common terms like parades, death, rebellion and sorts and give them the amount of reflection they deserve.
I doubt I would have pondered as much over this had it not been for the fact that I had been unable to finish this book for months when all it required was a night of my time.
In a Heartbeat
I wrote the word "Lima" in an email to Shanu and Halima came online.
I mentioned Zairah while chatting with Halima and Zairah came online.
It's turning out to be one of those days when I can't decide who I miss more and want to be with.
Dear Diary
I can't wait to see the day I become either one of the following:
Extreme Machines (F1 cars, eurofighter, stealth technology)
All things about cell phones, computer and consoles.
=p
How to be a Scholar
How to be a Scholar
by 'Abdul Muntaqim
think enough to know
know enough to think
after asking, listen
after listening, ask
do what you know
know what you do
know when you are wrong
& why you are right
forget not to forgive
upon forgetting, seek forgiveness
Wishlist
The ticklish exuberance on realizing I possess the exact amount of money required to buy a book I feel I must own to read and share, everytime: number one on my wishlist but an attainment that is not to be found on the likes of any search conducted by Froogle, or otherwise.
Prejudice
So there were two wallets to choose from. Identical wallets, except that one seemed more new than the other. Just a notch. The one that felt and looked less new had all the more character. It responded to my touch and its brilliant dark purple stood out against my hand.
Needless to say, I bought the wallet that promised character ahead and not the one that spoke of the assembly line it came from.
The Ones Who Do Not Count
BAGHDAD, Oct 22: Over 4,300 Iraqis, nearly 70 per cent of them civilians, were killed by insurgents in the first nine months of this year, an Interior Ministry official said on Saturday.However, NGOs put the figure at 25,000 or even more.
Figures on Iraqi casualties since the March 2003 US-led invasion have been unreliable and difficult to compile, partly because US-led forces say they do not count civilian deaths.—Reuters
Bacha Brigade
You know you've been around children for a long time when...
- you pick up every coin, pin or small object in the fear that someone might swallow it.
- you cannot hand over a pack of juice without shaking it, inserting the straw, twisting the top of the straw and taking the first sip to ensure no spilling
- you play peekaboo with anyone over a column, pillar or corner (this does not apply to me since I do this with or without children anyway)
- you break off into baby language at any sight that pleases the eye
- any amount of convincing to anyone is accompanied by a song-and-dance routine
- your bag contains at least 2 bibs, a pack of Wet Ones, a packet of Oreos, 3 Spongebob (boo-boo) bandaids, a book and crayons everywhere.
Why no paper for coloring / drawing? The entire world is a canvas. - the only kind of bananas you find to put in the fruit chaat for iftaar are the Gerber's Banana Creamed Pie
The only miserable element to this blessed feeling? - you find yourself singing along to Barney's songs
The Return
I can't help but keep thinking of Abdal Bhai. How he traveled across from Canada to Karachi when he heard of Khalu's deteriorating health.
How he reached home five minutes after Khalu passed away.
Just five minutes. How long it must be for both Khalu and Abdal Bhai. Or how short.
The eyes are a window to the soul. But once the eyes close forever, nothing remains. Just a physical monument of the body that contained the soul so loved and so cherished that life without it seems un-imaginable.
I was telling Ryz as well, about how I used to see Allah's Will at the cancer hospice in giving so many patients life enough to see their relatives who had set out to meet them one last time.
To us, it seems as if Abdal Bhai reached too late. In reality, he came just when he was supposed to.
The last couple of months I have seen my parents grow old so much that they have become delightfully childish. Even today, when I saw Sehyr give Ami a "new hairdo" with her make-believe hair-dryer and seeing Ami look masha Allah so beautiful and full of life, I squeezed my eyes shut for just a bit longer than I usually do, in a feeble attempt to capture the moment and hug it close to me for the life that Allah has planned for me. So many moments like these, that "will be lost in time, like tears in the rain." An offhand sentence in my 11th grade yearbook autograph by a friend that stuck to me like a post-it I can't lose.
Everytime I injure myself and I call out to Allah, my first concern is that I cannot tell Ami about it because I know I won't be able to see her upset, and so I try to dress my wound myself without her knowing it.
Which makes me think if I were to die before my parents, I would not like either one of them to be around me, since they would not be able to bear the sight.
I pray that I am always there with them, and Allah Shows me the way such that I can be there for them when they need me the most and when they need me the least, for being with them until the very end seems to me right now, the only way I will fully be able to comprehend His Will.
Reading over, I pray for the best and the ability to recognise His prescribed path, Ameen.
Subhan Allah, Alhamdo lillah, La ilaha illa-llah, Allahu Akbar.
"Be sure we shall test you with something of fear and hunger, some loss in goods or lives or the fruits (of your toil), but give glad tidings to those who patiently persevere,
Who say, when afflicted with calamity: "To Allah We belong, and to Him is our return":-
They are those on whom (Descend) blessings from Allah, and Mercy, and they are the ones that receive guidance. "
The Noble Quran
Surah Al-Baqara (The Cow)
Where the Heart Is
I want to come home.
I don't want to come back to anything, or anyone.
I just want to be home.
It means so much that I can't restrict it to any one person or activity.
I think at some point, being at home becomes synonymous to being at peace.
Home.
Insha Allah.
Body and Soul
"A long time ago, man would listen in amazement to the sound of regular beats in his chest, never suspecting what they were. He was unable to identify himself with so alien and unfamiliar an object as the body. The body was a cage, and inside that cage was something which looked, listened, feared, thought, and marvelled; that something, that remainder left over after the body had been accounted for, was the soul.
Today, of course, the body is no longer unfamiliar: we know that the beating in our chest is the heart and that the nose is the nozzle of a hose sticking out of the body to take oxygen to the lungs. The face is nothing but an instrument panel registering all body mechanisms: digestion, sight, hearing, respiration, thought.
Ever since man has learned to give each part of the body a name, the body has given him less trouble. He has also learned that the soul is nothing more than the grey matter of the brain in action. The old duality of body and soul has become shrouded in a scientific terminology, and we can laugh at it as merely an obsolete prejudice.
But just make someone who has fallen in love listen to his stomach rumble, and the unity of body and soul, that lyrical illusion of the age of science, instantly fades away."
Older.
The probability of Meher's impromptu decision to spit milk is entirely dependant on the time(s) of day I change my clothes and pick her up.
Farq Saaf Zaahir Hai
The only difference between the "Amyn Pirani thing" and the "Lima thing" is that Lima is liked.
Which makes me wonder as to what exactly I did wrong. How long I had been doing it for and how much.