Free

Have you ever felt free?

I have lived a beautiful, blessed life. I love my family and friends. I have done almost anything and everything I ever wanted to do. I was presented by great opportunities, and was supported by my family is taking up any that I wanted. I have never been oppressed, never been held back.

But have you ever felt free?

What does that even mean? Of course I was free. I chose my university, I chose what field I wanted to go into. I chose where I wanted to work. I chose whom I wanted to get engaged to. I was never bound in any way. I have always been free.

Just not like this. 

No, not like this. Not the way I feel right now.

I went to school, college, university. Had friends, lost friends, found love, found a job, got engaged, so on and so forth. Just your basic, amazing life. I was extremely happy, very very comfortable. I never wanted it to change. If it were up to me, I'd never have left. But due to one amazing person in my life, I did move, and my life, as I knew it, seemed to suddenly fall away. First came the homesickness, the longing for all that was familiar - and it's still here, because I don't think I'll ever let go of it completely; but then came this heady rush of freedom.

This freedom is not freedom from people, because it was never people that held me back. This freedom comes from within me. It is the realization that the world is huge, and I am infinitesimal. The understanding that what I considered my universe was but a tiny piece of the whole, and for once, the whole is within my reach.

It is a beautiful feeling to be able to look at a map of the world and accept that there is no where in God's world that I can't go, if I try hard enough. I hadn't looked at a map in forever. Why would I, I had no need of it, I wasn't going anywhere. Now when I look at it, I'm fascinated. There is just so much to see.

There is freedom in being able to talk to people from Australia on a boat in Key West. There is freedom in discussing God with a stranger on a bus. There is freedom in standing in the Atlantic ocean and feeling oh so small. There is freedom, and there is magic.

This freedom has a price, though, and the price is loneliness. I wouldn't want a lifetime of this, it would kill me, but for a while, a very little while, when the solitude is still bearable, this freedom is perfect.

"Now more than ever do I realize that I will never be content with a sedentary life, that I will always be haunted by thoughts of a sun-drenched elsewhere.”  ― Isabelle Eberhardt

This blog is my way of capturing what I'm feeling right now to savor it forever. I hope that someday, when I'm back home and at a different phase in my life, perhaps feeling bogged down by a thousand other things, I will be able to recall this feeling of freedom, and remember that it has to come from within. There will always be places to see, all you need is the desire to see them. 

How do you make sure your day goes well?

Start by having ice cream for breakfast. True story.

9:30 a.m.

Yesterday sucked so bad, I decided to take charge. So I am going to do everything possible to make sure today is better, and I started off having ice cream for breakfast. Soft-serve Belgian Chocolate. Just a single scoop, but it makes a huge difference I tell you!

Next: Update my blog from office. Oh yes, you heard me. Yesterday I spent FIVE HOURS absolutely free. I mean, office hours are 9:30 am to 5:30 pm, and honestly, I spent five hours in there doing absolutely nothing. And these people do not allow me to listen to music, or browse on the internet - EVERYTHING is blocked and there's a 60 minute 'entertainment/social networking' quota which expires in the first half of the day. Argh. I spent hours on wikipedia researching random comic characters. Like Calvin and Hobbes and Agnes.

I love Calvin and Hobbes. I printed out some good strips for my cubicle too. But more on that later..

2:04 p.m.

So I sat in my cubicle, alone and free, from 10:30 till 1:00 pm. I had completed the work assigned to me before time and no one was free to give me any more, even though I kept hounding them. I was sad and happy in equal measures, to be honest. I read my copy of Reader's Digest Asia twice. This is what I looked like:

I look like a weird gnome.

Yes, sad, I know.

Anyway, at 1:00 pm my supervisor called me in for a viva/oral test on financial concepts he had asked me to prepare over the weekend. I didn't eaxctly pass with flying colors but it wasnt so bad. He gave me a little more work which I finished by 1:30 pm and then I was off to lunch!

For lunch today I went to the company's cafe with a colleague. It was a pleasant hour or so - the food was okayish but the company was interesting. I did meet another colleague, so that puts the total number of people I know in my office at 9. Yaay. Really.

5:13 p.m.

I did some work until 3:45 pm, and then we closed everything to go to the head office where there was a birthday celebration for someone in the department. Sadly, I was unable to eat anything there except a tiny slice of cake because of the lunch I had had. But it was still interesting because I got introduced to the whole Finance department! And the Head Office is cooler than our branch.

We came back around 4:30 p.m., I wrapped up the work I had been doing and closed shop. That was it. For the day. Would you believe I'm being paid to spend days like this? Maybe they're pranking me or something.

How long do you think I'll last? My mum has her money on six months.
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By the way, this is so cute: http://bluecentric.com/?p=26948

Lessons

I'm a list maker. I make lists when I'm confused, and need to plan something out. I make them when I'm happy, and I make them when I'm sad or angry. I also make them when I'm bored: in the loo and during the Operational Management class. These lists can be about anything and everything.

This is one I started quite some time back, and I like to add to it every once in a while. It is list of things I've learnt from life thus far. Bear with the cynicism. I started it when I was going through a really rough patch, and it shows. =)

1. “Some day” never comes.
2. You ALWAYS have a choice. When you let others make decisions to govern your life, you’re CHOOSING to give them that control.
3. You’re the one responsible for your life. It’s never anyone else’s fault, but yours.
4. The only difference between a “good life” and a “horrible life” is that of perspective.
5. No one is as happy as they seem to you.
6. It’s easier to pretend to be happy than to explain why you’re not.
7. There will always be politics. The only way out of it is to keep at a distance. From everybody.
8. Relationships are very, very difficult.
9. Very few people ever take you at face value.
10. Over-thinking and second guessing makes for a sad life.
11. The best thing to do when you’re sad is to imagine all the ways it could have been worse.
12. When you realize it’s going nowhere, cut your losses.
13. You’ll look good only when you believe you look good.
14. Confident bull-shit gets you places.
15. The best answer to everything life throws at you is “mujhe farq nai parta”. It’s no fun trying to needle someone who just doesn’t care.
16. You can be whoever you want to be, at any given time.
17. Absolute strangers are the best confidantes.
18. The saddest thing in the world is to not belong.
19. The best thing in the world is to belong.
20. Sometimes cakes don’t rise. It’s not your fault. Throw out the mess and try it again.
21. It’s stupid to depend on any one for the long haul.
22. The world doesn’t like you if you’re too in control. Fall apart once in a while to let people feel useful.
23. A clean break hurts least.
24. Most guys dislike smart, confident, straight-forward women. Most guys like slightly silly, damsel-in-distress types.
25. Brash confrontations never get you anywhere.
26. Things always look better the next morning. ALWAYS.
27. When you’re pissed, DO NOT TEXT. It may be saved and used against you.
28. Sometimes you’ve got to pretend you understood the dirty joke. Sometimes you have to pretend you didn’t.
29. You grow up and grow apart. That’s just how it is.
30. No use depending on promises. They can always say “we were wrong” or “we made a mistake” and take it all back, anyway.
31. You’re as young as you act.
32. Boys have more fun.
33. There will ALWAYS be someone who dislikes you intensely. No getting away from it.

Okay, the post is too long! I'll continue with a part two!

A Rich Man's World

I'm a very messy person. And it's not really laziness, I just don't think cleaning is a very productive activity. I mean, I will [happily] cook for fifty, just don't ask me to clean up -before or after! Of course that doesn't endear yours truly to mum too much, but for the most part, I'm allowed to wallow in my mess as long as I keep it to my room. 

Which, by the way, is totally acceptable to me =D

My Red Goluck. I love red.

Think of my room as a relief in multiple mediums. There are heaps of clothes, heaps of books, heaps of cosmetics, heaps of jewellery, and so on. But it is organized chaos, for the heaps are divided into sub heaps: a heap of clean clothes, a heap of dirty clothes, a heap of winter clothes to be folded and packed for the season, a heap of winter clothes to be sent to the dry cleaner, a heap of clothes to be ironed and hung... You get my point?

So anyway, onto my actual story. This story begins with the heap of old, but well-loved, books in the north-east corner of my room, where I also 'kept' my old goluck. A goluck is an earthenware round money bank. I had had this one for ages, and it had been quite some time since I had last put any money into it. It was just there. 



She doesn't look so evil right now, but she is, I promise!



Well, one day, I notice that it has been broken open. Probably the handiwork of the Snowball The Evil. Of course I don't pick it up or anything. That wouldn't be like me. It just sat there for days, broken bits of pottery all around it.

Until the day I decided to take photos of it.

Now I've had a tough couple of months financially, and I've been perpetually whining about it. My dad decided we didn't know enough about money management, and imposed a strict budget. And i don't mean pocket money, i mean an honest to goodness budget. We have to manage ALL our expenses. Clothes, shoes, cosmetics, everything. Scary, isn't it? So yeah, I was having a little trouble.

While taking these photographs, I got thinking, though. This goluck has been lying, open, in my room for days. I could see the money inside. There had to be at least a few hundred. And i had not bothered to check it out, even while i was cribbing about lack of funds all the time!

I was being so ungrateful! I created a cash crisis for myself, and was so down about it, when, to be honest, had it actually been that bad, would i not have used the money that was lying right there in my room? What needs of mine were not being fulfilled? I was being dishonest to myself!

I dumped the goluck's contents into a bag and handed them over to Akash. He's a little [six-ish, I would say] boy from a family of eleven siblings, who live in the small christian colony near our house. He comes (uncalled!) every morning to ask for odd jobs, and usually spends the morning at our house. Whatever you ask him to do, he does it conscientiously. He sells boiled eggs at the bazaar every evening too. He's trying to collect enough money to get new clothes for his uncles wedding in May. My mum is playing bank, and he brings her all his money to keep safe. It's been at least two months, and he hasn't spent a single rupee.

He's the one who should be whining, not me. But he isn't. This little kid is just trying to make ends meet, and he's doing it honestly too. His "goal" isn't so big, at least it wouldn't be to any of us. But it's pretty difficult for him, what with his family barely getting enough to eat even with two working parents.

Makes you think, doesn't it?  

FYP-ing all over the city!

FYP stands for Final Year Project, which actually happens to be the 3 credit hour project we are required to do in our last semester, and without which our degree is incomplete!  The FYP is supposed to "have greater scope than a mere semester project", which means a lot more work needs to go into it. Unfortunately, since a semester is all we have to do it in, this just means we're going nuts over it now!  



Our FYP is about leadership. The formal title is "Developing the next generation of Pakistani business leaders: Case studies and documentary". The idea behind the project is the need for authentic case studies representing the Pakistani business community, in terms of leadership development, emergence, and individual personalities, which would inspire and encourage the next generation to come forward as business leaders.

We propose to research successful Pakistani business leaders, to illuminate their struggles, triumphs and journeys, and present case studies on them. A short documentary with interview excerpts is also one of the deliverables.

What it means is that at the moment, we are going through the absolutely horrible process of trying to get appointments with the clanking top brass of the business community. And as most Pakistani's would be able to guess, the Hashwani's and the Saifullah's and the Mansha's of this world do not give appointments easily! So we spend every other day tramping all over the city, visiting the residences and offices of the people on our list, trying to beg our way in! The idea is, if we wait outside long enough, they have to emerge some time, don't they? =D And because we're a group of five pretty [we like to think so ;)] girls, we're hoping nobody will sic their guards on us!

There is a fun side to the FYP though. Dressing up, driving around, eating a lot, and sleepovers!! We make ever khwari trip an occassion! We listen to music, gossip, make time to stop for lunch or snacks in between appointments, and laugh a lot.



At Savour for lunch

Last thursday, we had the first FYP sleepover at my place. We spent the night working on the literature review for our project, but the serious work was heavily dosed with random crazy moments. We danced, took weird pictures, gave each other henna tattoos [read tramp-stamps =p], and slept for barely two hours, before waking up at 7 am to get ready for our first interview appointment at 10 am!

No matter how strenuos this routine feels right now, I know we're going to miss this time where our biggest worry is what Dr. Sadia [our supervisor]  will say about the latest submission. Soon, our lives will consist of job hunts, weddings, office politics, in-laws... and we'll miss this camaraderie, these friendships, this laughter.