A Sincere Bond of ‘Divine Love’ or mere Obsession?

This struck me as extremely relevant.
A must-read.

Muslimah Poetess

Bismillaah…

It’s 2 in the noon and the sun is gloating its scintillating heat, burning skins of every being. 15 year old Hannan, daughter of Tamanna, enters home drowning in sweat and tears glistening in her gorgeous black eyes. She drops the bag on the living room floor, and runs towards her mother’s room for a warm embrace that would undoubtedly lighten the burden that she’s been nursing in her heart all these days.

All this while, Hannan thought she was old enough to manage her petty friendship issues, but today she needed counselling. Everyone does, and who better to run to than her mom, who was a Youth Counselor by profession and her personal mentor by choice. Tamanna’s eyes pop out of shock as she sees Hannan, run towards her distressed.
The girl dramatically begins, “Mom, Mahek has changed, she is no more like before! Our beautiful bond has…

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Triple Trouble

First and foremost.

As has now become traditional of A Million Reflections, a very belated Eid Mubarak, dear readers! May Allah accept all of our imperfect Ibaadah, and grant us long lives to see many, many more Eids to come. And let’s take a moment to remember those who may be in any kind of pain or difficulty, be it family, finance, studies, poverty … and offer a prayer. May we all be alleviated from our problems, big or small. I personally had a very busy and fun Eid with lots of family and kids running around everywhere. How was yours? 🙂

Secondly.

Happy Independence Day, dear Pakistanis! (okay, and Indians) Belated of course, in my signature style 😉 May we all be blessed with prosperity, unity, stability, unity, freedom from the shackles of corruption, and most importantly, lots of jalebi. 😀

And, now. Getting to the point.

I’ve been nominated for my first blog award! I can’t properly put into words how excited and grateful and flattered and indebted and fulfilled and awesome I felt. (okay you get it)

As is customary and familiar to you bloggers, I must now credit who nominated me for this award: the sassy, opinionated young Pakistani, whose ramblings all of us can related to. You can (must!) give her a read here: VDB Says. Oh, and you curious ones can trace the origins of the award here. The man’s name is Will Brooks, I believe.

The award’s called Shine-On.

I must now, for some strange reason, mention seven strange things about myself.

1. I routinely talk to myself.

I’m serious. I do it all the time. In the shower, while studying, as I’m making coffee, sitting in a doctor’s waiting room … anytime, anywhere. My family is quite used to it. I don’t think they even notice anymore. I guess it started during those ‘eureka’ moments of mine, I’d murmur something to myself. I now have fairly audible conversations with the multiple mes in my head without even realizing. Don’t let that scare you.

2. I am a thinkaholic.

I think way, waaay more than what’s good for me. In fact, I think more than I actually do anything. Physically I may be here, but mentally I am at least a few million miles away. There is no limitation to how deep and unending my thoughts can get.

3. I’m a geography person.

Call me weird,  but I love the subject. I think of life as an excitingly complex map taking me from point A to point  B. Stepping stones in the pond of time. Footsteps in the sands of eternity.

4. I’m a Pakistani with a severe identity conundrum.

I was born and raised in Abu Dhabi, the daughter of Karachiite parents. I currently reside in Riyadh, and speak English with the remains of a British accent. There are some things about Pakistani culture that will be forever alien to me, and certain aspects of life in the UAE which I hold very close to me. It’s ironic, really. If you ask me where I come from I’ll say Pakistan, but what I actually mean is that I have absolutely no idea. And I embrace that fact. It’s fun. Honestly. 😀

5. I like quotes.

Doesn’t it make you look a whole lot more intelligent and sophisticated? Proving that some famous great mind thinks like yours? On a more serious note, I feel that quotes can add weight and meaning to your otherwise weightless, meaningless words. And aren’t some famous words beautiful.

6. I’m currently going through a purple phase.

I love a different colour every once in a while and my wardrobe shows it. My clothes will tell you that, in the not so distant past, I’ve been through a white phase, a pink phase, a blue phase, and a yellow phase. Right now my entire life will tell you that I’m going through a purple phase: my bedroom wall, my handbag, shoes, earrings, everything. I’ve been in this phase since October 2012 and it’s shown no signs of fading yet. Purple FTW!

7. I’ve a slight OCD streak.

I need certain things to be immaculately organized at all times, and others which just irrationally irritate me to no end. All kitchen items fall under this category, as do books (sometimes). Clothes do not, unfortunately. As for stains (especially those on whitewashed walls) …they can drive me a tiny bit insane.

Now that I’m done being selfish, I will now nominate 15 awesome bloggers for this award. They come from all kinds of backgrounds, and are WordPressers, BlogSpotters and Tumbr-ers (yes, my tongue hurts while saying that, too.) Believe me that this list was far more difficult to compile than it looks.

I’ve tried my best to avoid cobweb blogs that haven’t been updated in months, which is sad as some of them were pretty commendable. So, dear bloggers, I know that I myself am guilty as charged, but … please be regular with your posts.

So without further ado -drumroll- I present to you:

The Syeda Sisters

Typwritten Notes

BacktoBase

Fajr

Burger Bachee

Fifty Words A Day

The Roadside Diary

Our Spiritual Heart

Lulu’s View

Deen Sisters

MyWordYouEar

Doodling Through Life

And three more to go. First cum, first served shall we say? Let’s see 😉

May you all be blessed.

 

 

 

 

Ramadan Kareem!

With 17 days of Ramadan past us, I am well aware of the fact that my greeting is rather, ahem, early, but, nevertheless!

May the month shower its blessings, forgiveness, and mercy upon all of us, and may we all become, in whatever tiny way, better humans.

Try to make a change this month. Sure, a small one. But for the better. Maybe read Quran in the morning. Treat your friends and family better. Donate to a local masjid. Follow a Sunnah. Abstain from evil. And if you’re not Muslim, you’re still welcome to iftaar and to making new friends and learning a bit about other faiths and cultures. No one is excluded this month. You’re all guests of Allah.

Let’s not just starve ourselves this month. Let’s make a little investment too. Because you never know if you’ll be around to see next Ramadan. A petrifying thought.

If you’re short on inspiration, why not drop by here? There’s  also plenty of other ideas on Twitter, Facebook and the blogosphere, so pitch in the khair!

And may peace be with you all, assalamu alaykum!

Pakistani Summers

And so summer 2013 commences.

Hum Hain Pakistan

Pakistani summers? Haha, I’m sure the title makes you wonder, “What’s so special about Pakistani summers? Summers are the same everywhere! Hot.” But wait. Summers in Pakistan are different and special. Yes, special.

Contrary to popular belief, summer here is not just about scorching heat and countless hours of unplanned load shedding. There’s much more to it. It’s just about looking at the bigger picture. The bigger, brighter picture. For me, summer is like a festival. A festival of flavours. A festival of colours. A festival that many await.

It all begins when colourful billboards of lawn exhibitions make an appearance and women trade their high heels for comfortable joggers. You see them rushing in and out of shopping malls, loads of shopping bags clasped in their hands, beaming with pride.
If you ask a shopaholic like me, she would say that it gives her inner peace. And you bet…

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Thepublicblogger Awards – a Celebration of Community

Must read. I LOVE how this has been written. It feels extremely realistic and a phenomenal amount of effort’s been put in.

Embracing our Grandmothers

A touching, relatable insight. ♥
Very moving if you also feel the generation gap.

D-tales

I did not know my maternal grandmother well. Come to think of it, I did not know any of my grandparents well. Both my grandfathers died when I was young, and language barriers kept me from conversing with my paternal grandmother, even though she was present throughout most of my life.

My mother’s mother, Poh Poh as I would call her, came into my life in the early 90s. She followed the path set by my two uncles as they both brought their families to Canada from Hong Kong. Until that point, I had no relationship with Poh Poh, and not much of one there after.

Again, language barriers did not help. I with my broken Cantonese could barely string together a sentence and she could hardly speak a word of English. But language was not the sole barrier. She treated my brothers and I like someone else’s…

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As we go about our big lives, step back and appreciate the little things that it is made of. This is beautiful.

Introspections During Quiet Time

I truly enjoy the small things in life. The other day one of these things (I call them “little wins”) happened and it got me to thinking about the little wins that we all get and about what mine are specifically. So, these are just the little things that somehow can turn a bad day around on a dime:

• I can’t stress how excited I get when I grab a soda from one of the vending machines or coolers at a supermarket and I pop it open, only to find it is partially frozen! It’s like having built in ice cubes. I also love when a couple of pieces of ice come out when you are taking a drink and you have to crunch the ice as loud as possible. Why? because. That’s why!
• I enjoy playing basketball and making shots from half court is sweet but when I am…

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Return of the over-studying blogger.

I’m back.
Alive, yes. AS Level is FINALLY done and over with and A Million Reflections can be saved from extinction. I’m tempted to fire away with a juicy blog post, but will refrain from doing so, primarily for two reasons:
1. I love to hand-write my longer blog posts, that way I’m usually in a more creative state of mind and the post turns out to be more emotionally charged. (I sound like an old professor, but I’m something of a traditionalist when it comes to writing. Pardon me 😛 )
2. My space bar is broken and it’s a pain in the You Know What to type.

I’ll see you peeps very shortly, next up are an expose on the horrors of AS Level and the next of the Dulhan Series — I promise, this time!
Have a nice day and eat lots of peaches 😀
(Yes, I’m feeling a little weird)

WordPressing from the iPad 3.

You may know that it has always been my dream to blog on the move from a smartphone. This dream has now come true — only twice as thrilling as I imagined! WordPressing from an iPad as less fussier than a phone (the screen and keyboard are much more navigable, thank goodness) yet gives you the same thrill of mobility! I now relate to the iFrenzy of die-hard Apple lovers — this iPad 3 has me HOOKED! (though I do wish that Facebook worked). You’ll be seeing more of me later …. Till then I’m busy tweeting and reading PDFs 😀

Redone (again).

I am loving this new theme, Pilcrow! So much so that I’ve decided to turn A Million Reflections all dark, and, well, reflective, as the new header of Abu Dhabi’s night-time skyline aptly demonstrates. I hope you’ll enjoy opening your eyes (literally) to a darker but certainly not lacklustre A Million Reflections.

As for the next in the Dulhan Series … Chemistry and procrastination threaten to get in my way, but it will be published in all its bridal glory very soon!