I used to love flying in planes as a kid, now I'm shit scared, a lot of it because my favourite show is NATGEO investigates air crashes and one silly tube rubbing seductively against another causes a crash landing. Ufff. During air turbulence I'm still liable to shed a few secret tears from the eye facing the plane window (I always book aisle seats, in case of crash I want them to see through shutters and save me FIRST).Contradictory to popular literary opinion I have never been imbued with the feeling of the immortality of youth post 12 years of age. It's a wonder living in the glamorous war zone that is Khi and that too on the Other Side of the Bridge I've turned out as well as I have. What I do like about airports though is walking out of the passenger lounge, I feel so charitable and magnanimous because I'm responsible for the 500 megawatt smile of face-of-person-who-has-come-to-pick-me. (Except when I was constantly making one day trips between Lhr and Khi at which point Munchie would not even bother to enter the premises on foot, just drive up, Jamila Bond 007 style and say "Get in already".)
I have started work and the first day I just faded away into an orange whimper because there was nothing to do. After my one hour orientation, I worked for a while in my boss's office and then gradually fell apart with boredom as time passed. I was arranged in various pieces on the sofa when accidentally (given how there was no coordination in my body from lethargy) I dropped crushed face powder on his mint new two seater. I jumped up, tried to brush it off but it GOT INGRAINED IN THE FABRIC. Horrified, I hopped madly to the bathroom, came back with fistfuls of leaking water, flung it on the sofa to no avail. Then I espied with my ittle wittle eye a water cooler on the table next to the two seater and doused the sofa with a whole glass of water, drank some, picked up my stuff and rushed to the computer lab with great poise (doing the I'm-doing-nothing-but-I'll-have-you-know-I'm-still-fantastic walk that I perfected at Unilever). I waited until I thought it had dried and then walked back to sit on my boss's seat (he was a in a meeting with the Sindh Minister for something) and practiced Swiveling as if it were an extreme sport. Doing nothing is more exhausting and draining than working. I was so bummed out, I didn't even have the energy to play with my new lappytoppy. But today has been good work and definitely new stuff learnt. I think it's because I had a fantastic Dunkin Donuts breakfast.
Khalas (for King: maternal aunts) create soothing gardens in life. For me Punjabi is a beautiful language because my childhood has been spent in drowsy laps of aunts (I have mashallah five khalas, wait I have to count again, yeah, six sisters including my mum) gathered for till-2 a.m-does-us-part conversations the conclave of sisters had every summer and winter vacations when they got together, sitting spaced around and on a double bed in the air conditioner/electric heater's temp pool distributing mismatched mugs of steaming milky tea and random snacks from nimko to rusks. The cadence of that language and the laughter of my aunts just grows most precious with age. It is such bullshit that memories only come in retrospect. I think that's why I'm addicted to tea, I rarely care if its Twinnings or Tapal (but I will not stand for the shit that is Yellow Label Lipton and 'tis true ever since our family has switched to Tapal, Lipton seems to be in trouble). So my little khala is here and she is neurotic. I think she may be in love (well at least I hope) and I wish she would hurry up ant tell me about him so I can investigate and see if he is Sahibay Jaidad (possessor of fortune etc) and can fund my further education.
I love Nat Geo. Ever since I've got a TV and cable in moi room, daddy likes to come and sprawl on the double bed to watch TV instead of watching it in the living room. I was watching some cheetah kills and Baba got so damn upset it wasn't even funny. He kept on watching with fascinated eyes and kept saying "woh dekho, yay us ko bhi kha gaya. He gets them every time!" and shaking his head and looking genuinely upset even while I insisted its not the same damn cheetah, these are different clips. In the end I just switched it to ARY ONE "the only bleeping South Asia channel" live in Beirut. That harassed guy was irritating me with his constant reiteration of ONLY CHANNEL rhetoric, but marketing whatever, so live and let live. Encounters with the wildlife are thus limited to being harassed by monkey-wallahs on the road, who desperately want their chained simians to do a "salam" for me. Talk about privatization of public gestures. And like fast food franchise clowns, these monkeys scare me. We had stopped for a snack on the wayside post-MI3 viewing at the Cineplex and this monkey came GAMBOLLING from afar. I interrupted Beeny's story with a gasp and immediately rolled up my window glass.
Beeny: "You freak! What's wrong with you?"
M: "Look at that Monkey!! It's scrabbling over the car."
"So? It's not going to do anything"
"Rubbish. It wants to touch my privates"
"Jesus"
"I can see it in its eyes"
14 comments:
I feel different sorts of affinity for all the three languages i know but Punjabi to me means nostalgia and a sense of coming home. But well then, Urdu means home in a different way. ANyway. Nice post and interesting that our thought collided like that.
What would you rather have? the monkeys or the khusras?
haha good question ahmad..yaar is tapal really better then lipton cos ive been having lipton everyday twice a day...nat geo is cool...very relaxing...
turbulence over balochistan is some of the worst ive ever experienced..really scary...ive never felt more helpless.
LOL, talk about possible theories on the mentality of Pakistani primates. Talking about tea, though, Lipton is a definite no. Twinings, yes, but I hear at Unilever you get to as much as you want, so that's always a plus. Or was that Shell? Hmmm... And people actually come to pick you up at the airport? *sigh* I wish there was a Jamila Bond waiting for me. I usually have to lug all my stuff out the airport gates to grab a cab. (the guys inside actually wanna charge you TRIPLE what the normal rate is. Must think I'm a moron or something. :P)
Sabizak: Exactly, Punjabi is home, but if I had to go for a language I'd probably go for Urdu. I've only recently begun to realize how fantastic and how huge the expression scape for Urdu is. And imagine- this is after the language has been said to lose a large part of its vocab.
Ahmad: Khusras hands down. They are so entertaining, not only for all their weirdass prayers but also of the way men react to them.They completely freak out.I don't get it.Are they reminded of some shudder worth childhood obsession everytime they look at one?
Jarrar: I is-Swear to you Tapal is better than Lipton. Lipton is sinkwater comparatively, like the backwash of some garlic-eating monster (I really don't feel as strongly about it as it's coming across, I'm just needlessly graphic:P). Try it. I have to go to Balochistan on field work in the coming month for a few days.Last time I went was when I was 6 I think. Not looking forward to it.
Fabric: You do get as much tea as you want but the men who make it at the stall only make half a cup and you have to stay there and insist "aur!aur!aur!" before they get the hint.I usually had to put two tea bags in my cup to get the taste of tea.
AWWW, trust me, all my first year was like that.Only family to pick me up who got bored by the routine. I'm sure if you hired an escort, they'd pick you up and act really happy to see you.Or you could just stop going:P
We just freak out because they are gross and we don't want them touching us. I never, and i hope i am speaking for all straight men, ever have wanted to dress up as a woman or get sodomised so your theory of "childhood obsession" does not hold true. Being scared of monkeys though is irrational, the sweet little darling creatures that they are.
you're so right. Lipton is crap. Tapal is great. Brooke Bond Supreme (do they still make that stuff?) is so-so.
Ahmad: Touchy touchy. What will the ladies next door think?
Rabia: I never had Brooke Bond. I wonder what it tastes like. Write now I'm finishing Twinnings English Breakfast Tea. Yum Yum. If I was a care bear I'd had a tea bag on my tummy.
LOL, and what would happen every time you yelled, "Care Bear, stare!" In a horribly graphic version, scalding hot green tea would come shooting out and burning the bad guys down to the bone while torrents of blood poured out from whatever possible place it found. Sounds like a summer blockbuster to me. :P
*rofl*
That is the most hilarious image I've conjured up this week.Lol.I'd be the star care bear in V for Vendetta. (and in my previous comment it should be were instead of was.I'm too lazy to correct it)
Lipton absolutely sucks and i work for unilever. I was a 6 mug-fuls of tea everyday person and just because of the crappy tea we get at work, its gone down to the 3 mugs i have at home.
Tapal absolutely rocks but its sacrilege to say that at work. I'm still trying to build up the courage to sneak some tapal to work.
You interned at upl? when? where?
Sam: I interned last year in Marketing, in Beverages. It was supposed be a six week thing, I couldn't take it for more than four so I quit though I had a very nice boss. But the work was so deadening! I was just trying to see if I was making the right decision by going the development sector way:)
Post a Comment