A long time ago, we used to be friends

Your mind does 1000km/h.

A flashback engulfs you.

Those random plans, movies, sheesha bars, dirty jokes, online conversations, passing notes in class and standing up for one another. And most of all, the times that they made you smile. Its all right there in front of you.

You want to smile.

Another wave of nostalgia hits you and all you feel is rage.

All you can remember how they stabbed you in the back.

And that smile never transfers from your brain to your lips.

Its just sad when people you know become people you knew. Its also more sad to see them everyday, walk past them and pretend that you never knew each other. When your acquaintances introduce you to your old friends, it hurts. Maybe not in the painful, self torture way. But it hurts.

To the boys of Sialkot..

Midway through their teenage years, Muneeb and Mughees were the unfortunate souls that were mercilessly beaten up publicly on the 15th of August by at least a dozen men. Their bodies, subjected to horrendous injuries, were then dragged across town. And at last they were hung, in the middle of the town for all to see. Their murderers showed not even a hint of remorse at the heinous crime they had just committed. 

Are we really that inhumane? I am extremely agonized, just by watching those clips on TV, I can’t even imagine what the people standing by were going through - Oh wait, they were all watching the show. It was like a circus is in town for one day only. They watched with eyes wide open and hearts tightly shut. Not only the town people watched, but the police also stood as mere bystanders and did not intervene.

Nobody deserves to die this death. Not even people who have done horrific crimes. We live in a civilized world and we cannot accept this. Our religion doesn’t teach us this; our culture doesn’t teach us this and most of all, humanity doesn’t teach us this! We are not a barbaric nation. I know I speak for the whole of my country. If we cannot be humane, the least we could do is be "good Muslims” and respect the holy month.

I am ashamed to be a part of such a brutal nation. I would be surprised if we ever get to see Mughees and Muneeb's case fought fairly and given justice. The culprits are still at large and the nation grieves over the continuous hardships it is facing. Hearing the minister's promises of hanging the culprits publicly sounds far-fetched. And who knows, the next time, everyone will be careful to avoid public places for beatings. We'll join face-book groups, click attending on the events of protests, tune in to watch the headlines every hour or so. And that's all we can do to show our support unless some official action isn't taken against those murderers.

These are one of the few cases that have come into the limelight, what about those we don’t even hear of. Can their families ever expect to be served justice? It’s already been more than a week now, so another week will pass by, then a month and then a year and then several years. Has this country ever served justice? Not in my 18 years. Then why will it now? We shall all sit and watch the show.. After all it’s every man for himself, isn’t it?

When I smile, tell me some bad news. Before I laugh and act like a fool.

I just got home after watching Peepli Live. Halfway through the movie I had the strangest feeling in my stomach. It was a feeling of remorse and a sudden guilt. The movie just brought up the thought of millions displaced (in my homeland) and the latter of the movie was spent in this feeling of shame eating me up from inside. Conscience-smitten I sat there watching how ironic the world is and the movie's climax didn’t help much.. 

The reason why this one certain movie made me feel this way was because the same situation is being played out in our country right now. I don't want to give out movie details, but this farmer, Natha, who states that he wants to commit suicide, is "supported" by a lot of people mainly for their personal agendas. All this chaos in his life, the sudden spotlight and influence of his statement leads him in this mess. After 3 months, when he's presumed to be dead, nobody cares about what happened to him. He was forced to think about suicide because the government had announced compensations for families whose members commit suicide. After his "death" the family is still living in the worst imaginable conditions and has not gotten a single penny of that compensation. Natha, was forgotten. By the media who made his life a circus, by the political leaders who gave his life so much importance and by the villagers, who told TV channels of his importance to them.

Isn’t this exactly what happens to victims in our society? This climax made me think of all those millions who have been affected. There will come a point where we all will forget about all those who have faced this calamity.

Five years ago when the earthquake happened.. The spirit of brotherhood came alive. Everyone worked so hard to send relief supplies to remote place. But what's happening in their lives now? Are they well settled? Has their life gone back to normal? Our efforts were well directed, but then how did those efforts end? We don’t care now about them do we..? Life went on after a few months of  help help and support we just stopped thinking about them. 

So now what bothers me is that now that we're facing the worst flood in the history of our country.. What will be our next action? Attending a few relief camp help outs, collecting the aid we get and sending them off? What else? What happens after all that is done? That thought never comes up. 

When we light a candle, it enlightens the whole room with its luminance. This candle keeps on burning until two things happen; you blow it out or it burns out completely on its own. Similarly, two things happen with our sudden brotherhood, love for our fellow countrymen and patriotism. Either, we blow it out or we don’t notice the flickering and the flame dies out. So putting this parallel to our awakening and helping out the flood victims, are they going to have the same fate as that of the earthquake victims? I really hope not but that’s where everything ends. Doesn’t it? We all go back to our lives, sit in theatres, watch movies, host grand dinners, have big weddings and just forget about everything else.

Am i really smarter than a fifth grader?

So my neighbor and i are pretty chill. He's the only kid my age in my building and the only one who can take my bullshit on the intercom. So basically, he's like my boi. Yes, boi because 'boy' doesnt sound the same. Oh yeah, this is Ali :)

A year or more ago came into my house a Playstation 2. My daddy very lovingly brought for my sister and  little did he know, my Chinese tv would never accept the Japanese leads to be plugged into it. Talk about economic-technological rivalry o_O

So my Playstation's dabba was finally opened and plugged onto his tv. (which btw, was Japanese. National solidarity much?  -__-  ) I failed at two player Need for Speed, Snowboarding and all these other weird games he had. And he opened the packet of games that my dad also brought for with it. And out of that came an "Are you smarter than a fifth grader?" cd. I challenged him to play, not thinking he'd ever be up for it, but just to hide my embarrassment of owning games like that. (technically if its my sister's, i dont own it right? =/ I hope not)

We played that game for almost 2 hours realizing that his 3As and my 2As and a B really dont matter when it comes to simple staments of true and false about "something carbondioxide something something"

At that point i understood, grades are not really everything in life. To study the text from every book related to your course seems stupid now. This genius neighbor, who gets an A in physics and chemistry couldn't figure out answers to questions about levers and the periodic table.. After getting about more than half of those questions wrong and making a fool out of ourselves, we decided that we really arent as smart as our grades may suggest.

What him, most of us stuck in this age and I are, is just a part of a mass produce of millions that this counrty, and many others are making. Being smart to pass really doesnt seem like a good idea now. Laughing continously on our stupidity reminded me of what 3 Idiots suggested, study to achieve excellence not to be successful. And yeah, we're all running after something that would come to us if we study to learn, rather than study to get those As. If a straight A kid in his 13th year of schooling cannot answer a fifth grade question, its just sad what we all are aiming at in life.

Peace.

A fragment..

So I've been wanting to do this for quite a while now. Get a place where I could really write as much as I want to and about what I want.. And finally I've run out of excuse to put before this. 

I'm your average 18 year old. With not so average dreams and aspirations. I'm loud, aggressive, crazy and mean. I have my days. I would scream, fight, throw my tantrums around and feel as if the worlds crashing around me. But then I'd have better days when i wake up on the right side of the bed and have a good hair day and life would seem perfect!

Oh and one more thing, (This could be taken as a warning, but I've been told that i can be too full of myself at times, so beware.)

I love me. I really do. The whole of my 5ft 3in, 60kg!

I'm a non-conformist. And a very proud one. I am all that I've been asked not to be. I cant follow rules so well. If my teachers are reading this, i never understood compliance and i doubt i ever will.

The reason for starting this blog is to see is it really a "jinn in my head" or there are others who think like me.. Its not common for me to come across people who think like i do and when i do come across more from my side of the universe i become curious to find out how many more of us there might be.. Then i also wonder, how many people are thinking like this? o_O

  

"So if you are out there... please you are not alone"