Thursday, October 26, 2006

a miracle on 26th

once upon a time
there was a little dream.
all its life it had only one wish-

to grow up to become reality.
the other little dreams made fun of him-
asking him why he didn’t want
to become a big dream
and be inspirational instead of
becoming something as harsh as reality.
The little dream didn’t care-

he was fascinated by the idea
of becoming reality one day
and he made up his mind to work extra hard.
as time went by, the little dream grew up,
learning the ways of reality.
He realized that to become reality,
and especially a reality that one liked being,
one must first be a big dream
because only people with big dreams can be real
in the truest sense of the word.


And that is how the dream
become a reality.

~happy birthday mano~loveyoujamillions~

Sunday, October 22, 2006

pause. play!

Usually when someone asks me what I do, there is this momentary pause before I answer- a pause only I am aware of. It's that slight hesitance that even years of working and teaching haven't resolved. That slight pause holds so much. The fear that one day I'll be found out- that I'm not really a designer or a teacher- that I have merely been lucky enough to bluff people so far. It also holds a slight unsurity as to whether I have even earned these titles or not. DoI design well? Does my teaching impact? The pause weighs heavy with these questions that only I can hear- maybe because the quest to be better is also mine alone.

It's only when I'm in the midst of the action, holding a crit in class, designing my heart out on something I truly enjoy, that all the pauses disappear, replaced with the passion of believing in what I do, that it makes some little change somewhere, and I realize that there's nothing else I would rather be doing in my life than teaching and designing.

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

blogthoughtoftheday

Smack in the middle of life, when you are living it, breathing it, cursing it, loving it, it looks like such a mess. A random series of disconnected events that go on urging your life forward as if based solely on whirlwind- choices and spur-of-the-moment decisions you can't help but make in the thick of things, and you wonder if you will ever have control over what is your destiny.

But when you look back at the life you have lived, it looks like such a seamless plot- of things having happened according to some really well-planned Great Cosmic Agenda and somehow it's all...perfect. *Click. Click.*

Thursday, October 12, 2006

friday the 13th!!

Sunday, October 08, 2006

stayin' alive

Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

CHAL is a network of non-profit organisations, and individuals committed
to serve the disabled by establishing remote rehab centres near their homes.

CHAL collaborates with professionally managed entities
to synergize resources, avoiding duplication and overlap.

CHAL’s first partners are Murshid Hospital & Health Care Centre and
Pakistan Institute of Prosthetic & Orthotic Sciences (PIPOS).

CHAL’s supporters include corporate entities, international donors, and philanthropists.
CHAL’s target is to raise Rs 100 million this year. We are at the halfway mark.

contact: chal.khi@gmail.com
visit
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/chal

If someone were to ask me what I did to commemorate the tragedy of October 8, I would have to say nothing. It was a Sunday. I woke up late, having had a long work week and I watched a movie with k before some friends came over for a very impromptu iftar plan.

I do however remember last year and how I felt for weeks, maybe months afterwards. Alive. Alert. In control. Galvanized into action. Filled with ideas. I remember going to the PAF base with anything I could find- to be a part of the help. I remember driving alongside other cars with people wearing that same expression of intent, of purpose. I remember the lines of motorcycles, cars, vans filled with whatever was within their means all congregating at locations to help. I remember the weeks afterwards spent setting up collections, loading vans and then moving onto longer term plans. I remember thinking to myself, Wow I'm a part of something here. That feeling of unity is one that I don't recall feeling ever before.

My mother used to tell us stories of the '71 war. Of how she and her friends, in their twenties were so caught up in the whole feeling of patriotism that they would have done anything for their country. That, at that moment, all that mattered was that in some way, they had a purpose. As aides, as helpers, as anything. They wanted to be a part of it in any way they could. I always listened to those stories, fascinated. Frankly speaking, it all sounded very novel-romantic. Very Danielle Steelsish. Wars. Commitment. Sacrifice. But in the safe cocoon of my reality today, it was hard to imagine feeling that incredibly passionately, to have reaction pulled out of your gut withhout a moment of thought. Until last year when, as October 8 went down in history, I felt something in us shift, awaken, rising to some call beyond that of mere duty. And that's all it took to make me realize that, when we need to be, we can be so alive.

Friday, October 06, 2006

because i didn't
listen to that voice in my head,
i am in trouble again.