High-Tech or High-Touch

Somebody said an interesting thing today.

"In today's world, our relationship needs to get high-touch, but instead they are getting only high-tech."

Rat Race - 2

A few months ago I did a small post on Rat Race (here). I came across this small movie which made waves in social media. I am sure you will enjoy.

https://youtu.be/e9dZQelULDk

On Today's Pakistani Women

At one point I stopped reading Pakistani newspapers as the standard of journalism was getting so gutted. But I have to acknowledge that Daily Dawn has made a comeback. Personally, I believe this is the only newspaper in Pakistan which comes near to the standard journalism. Following article from Rafia Zakaria is an interesting one. She compared the psych of pre-partition Indian women (taken from Ismat Chughtai's character) and evolving psyche of today's Pakistani society (portrayed in TV dramas).

"....These, however, are different sorts of women altogether from the Shama of Chughtai’s time. Instead of being rebels or presenting an alternative to the predominant mores of the moment, they represent regression. The women err and suffer and present cautionary tales of what happens to women who do not at all times worship traditional morality. 

Religion looms large and the woman’s weakness is often a failure to follow it in letter and spirit. The first wife who does not allow her husband to take a second wife is not a normal human being but deficient in her devotion, unable to adequately embrace the tenets of her faith and causing innumerable suffering to all others in her orbit....."

Link: https://www.dawn.com/news/1459274/propaganda-for-the-patriarchy

Escape Fire

Escape Fire is an interesting concept applicable to all walks of life - named after a wildfire at a Montana's Mann Gulch Wildfire Historic District on August 5, 1949.

During the fire, when the leader and oldest of all, 33 years old Wagner Dodge realized that they are about to succumb to fire as the fire is only less than a hundred yards behind, he took a match out and set fire to the grass just before the group. He created an "escape fire" to lie in so that the main fire would burn around him and his crew. His men didn't believe his trick, tried to escape and all get perished except him and 2 others.

The lesson learned from this escape fire is: "Many times in life you may have to create a fire around you to escape a bigger fire."

Lal Chand, sitare aur bachpan ki aik adat

Kal raat poora chand girhan tha... aur poora lal chand - lal aasman ke saath.

Aesa chand girhan main ne kabhi nahi dekha..

Aese main meri nazar aas paas ke sitaroN pe pari
- sitare yun ubhar aaye the jese chand ke dukh pe woh bhi ashkbaar hon

Aese main mujhe bachpan ki aik purani adat yaad aa gai..

Jab dadi kahani suna ker ghar ke aangan main hame sula deti - charon taraf andhera ho jaata to main chand sitaroN ko tikti baandh ker dekhta rehta aur kuch der baad yun mehsoos hota jese aas paas ka sara mahol dab gaya ho - aur main sitaron aur chand ki aagosh main khalaon main uth gaya hun.

Jab pehli baar disney gaya - aur phir Kennedy Space Center gaya 
- to bachpan ka woh nazara phir saamne aa gaya.

Aap bhi kabhi sitaroN ko, chand aur space ko aese dekhne ki koshish kijye..

- aap ko mehsoos ho ga, aap is kaainaat ka hissa hain - aur ye aik bohat hi khubsurat aehsaas hai

Any map will do

This is the story of a reconnaissance group of soldiers lost in the Alps on a training mission. It was winter, they had no maps, and they seemed hopelessly lost. They were preparing to die, when one soldier found a map crushed down at the bottom of his pack. With the map in hand, they regained their courage, bivouacked for the night, and proceeded out of the mountains the next day to rescue. Only when they were recuperating in the main camp did someone notice that the map they had been using wasn’t a map of the Alps at all; it was a map of the Pyrenees.

This is the story to point out that sensemaking is an act of its own, valuable in itself, and independent of any notion of reality. This story raises the remarkable idea that, when you are lost, any map will do.

(Story from the papers of Professor Karl E. Weick)

Jaun Elia ke 2 baRe shyr

1)  میرے مرنے سے کچھ نہیں ہوگا.....!!!

میرے ہونے سے کچھ ہوا ہے کیا     
   

2)  ایڪ ہی حادثہ تو ہے اور وہ یہ ڪہ آج تڪ

      بات نہــیــں ڪـہی گئی بات نہیں سنی گئی

جون_ایلیاء

Guman aur Galat-fehmi

Zindagi main main ne seekha hai ke - hamare ziyada ter rishte sirf is liye toot jaate hain kiun ke hum apne dil main koi guman paida ker lete hain.

Main ne bachpan ka aik dost sirf is liye kho diya tha, kiun ke woh mere purane cell number pe text kerta raha - aur main us ke purane number per. Dono ne aik dusre ke liye dil main aik guman paida ker liya.

Aakhir kaar - aik mushtarka 'forward group email' se phir baat hui - to muamla saaf huwa.

Gar dono main se koi aik - text message ka jawab na milne se - call ya email ker leta to ye badgumani kabhi paida na hoti - na rishte tootne ki nobat aati.

Is bhagti zindagi main halaat ye ho gaye hain ke:

"Glance at the screen, if it does not feel right, swipe right and move on"

Apne hisse ki shamaa

Chahe aap ka hamsafar aap ko choR  jaaye
mehboob daage-mafarqat de jaaye
aulad aankhain pher le
jism koi bimari pakaR le
naukri chali jaye
zindagi bhar ki jama punji loot jaaye

magar - 
agar aap ne kahin kisi ke liye koi aik choti si shama jalayi hai - to yaqeen kijye - maut ke aakhri lamhe, aankain munddte huwe ye bhi bohat hai 

aap ki zindagi raayegaaN nahi gai - ke - insaniyat ke safar me aap ne apne Dhona Dho liya - apna kirdar nibha gaye

Baqol faraz:

shikva-e-zulmat-e-shab se to kahiN behtar tha

apne   hisse  kī   koī   shamaa     jalaate   jaate

Agree?

Happy New Year

کافی کا پہلا گھونٹ،
الوداعی بوسہ،
  محبوب کا اولین لمس، 
سردی کی بارش۔۔۔
 بے ساختہ انبساط
 انسانی ضرورت ہے،
 عیاشی نہیں۔

First sip of coffee
Goodbye kiss
Earliest savor of beloved
Winter's drizzle
Instant happiness
are human needs
not luxuries

After movie zero

My daughter is a Shah Rukh Khan fan. No wonder, I had to take her to SRK's movie on an opening day. After the movie, she asked:

"Is it true that if you break someone's heart, you lose your magic?"

"Beta! losing someone's trust is worse than losing the magic."

A quote

I found the following quote very interesting, actually, the other version is better

.

Another version: If you seduce her mind, her body will follow.

What you would have done?

I think this is the highest test of human integrity. After reading the following story, I asked myself, what I would have done? I don't know the answer.

 (And if I don't know the answer, I failed the test!)

A New York subway rider might have earned himself a spot for life on Santa's "nice" list after he turned in a purse with $10,000 cash he found on a train platform.

Link: https://www.cnn.com/2018/12/22/us/cash-subway-found-purse/index.html

A Diary from Haj

(Posted as shared)

"It is strange to see women totally covered sleeping in the mosque.
On the side note, the electricity bill of this place should be in millions at least. 
Only animals you will see are cats & pigeons.

It is weird to be stared at by men.
No one looks at you in the west.

In 2009, you were not allowed to take camera phone inside. Now as everyone has a smartphone, the authority cannot do much. The amount of selfies taken with Kaaba in the background is mind-boggling. People making videos while doing tawaaf is distasteful. I have even seen people Skype while doing tawaaf. I may sound ancient but C'mon people. It is just not right. 

As many men have their shoulders uncovered, it is rather cringe-worthy to see human flaws. Hair like a bear, moles & skin tags. Some men have their belly bare which is very unsightly. Quite unattractive. Such big wobbly bellies. 

The cloth of Kaaba is very fragrant. Very soft.

People bring food and give it to other people. Anything from tea to candy to dates etc etc. My sister in law actually thought that people are selling it. It is 3.16 am. People are giving away tea and snacks. Isn't it great? Free food.

There are ababeel like birds at Fajr time.

There is no overweight Malaysian or Indonesian woman and no underweight Arab woman that I have seen:-) I can see women with water bottles on the top of their heads just like a gaon ki aurat with matka on her head. It is very amusing to see that. Some Arab woman from a gaon of Egypt may be.

Egyptians make the largest proportion of visitors to Makkah followed by Pakistan & Indonesia. "

Trajectory

As I have lived more than half of my life, and as I try to connect the dots of various episodes, I am learning that sometimes minor incidents in our lives set a trajectory of more significant future events. We meet someone accidentally, see a billboard, read a mindless article, travel somewhere for no reason, or even make a wrong turn on a highway. Minor events and daily occurrences sometimes set a trajectory to a more immense horizon. I think I blogged the quote from Steve Jobs before:

“You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something – your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. Because believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart even when it leads you off the well worn path; and that will make all the difference.”

*

On "Good Anger"

Following has been described frequently in sufi literature:

"Gussa aag ki ruhani shakal hai. Agar qaboo main rahe to chulhe pe tuaam ka baais banti hai - aur be-qaboo ho jaaye to ghar jhulas deti hai".

(Anger is a spiritual form of fire. If stays in control, it prepares a feast - and if gets out of control, can gut the whole house.)

Over the years, I learned that actually, the post-anger phase is more beneficial! After a bout of (hopefully controlled) anger as the waves of emotions defervescence - answers to many unresolved queries hit the mind.

On "Reading Books"

I read this quote somewhere on net, and loved it:

"I don’t read books to learn from them. I read them to experience them, and to learn about myself through those experiences."

That's how books should be read.

Trump (aur hum)

I am not a big fan of Donald Trump for many obvious reasons.

Magar kabhi kabhi sochta hun: Hum sab ke andar aik Trump rehta hai jo hasbe zaroorat bahir aata rehta hai

(But sometimes I think: We all have a kind of Trump inside us, which we use as needed).

Marriage and Adat

One of my friends constantly "bitch" about his married life. One day in frustration, I said" "Than why don't you leave her."  There was a pause of few minutes on text, and then he replied: "Shayed mujhe uski adat ho gai hai," followed by this famous lyrics of a legendary musical dramatist Alan Jay Lerner.

Damn, damn, damn, damn
I've grown accustomed to her face

She almost makes the day begin
I've grown accustomed to the tune
She whistles night and noon
Her smiles, her frowns
Her ups, her downs

Are second nature to me now
Like breathing out and breathing in
I was serenely independent and content before we met
Surely I could always be that way again

And yet
I've grown accustomed to her looks
Accustomed to her voice
Accustomed to her face

Youtube link:  https://youtu.be/IewpDlwamF0