Ten things I like about meetings:

1) I can later use the handouts/ print outs if I spill coffee in my car.

2) I get to oggle at the pretty young intern shadowing the boss.

3) I can ignore my wife’s calls and later tell her that I was in a meeting.


4) I lose my appetite after nibbling on those disgusting turkey or ham sandwiches and eat less on that day.

5) I can leave my desk early to go to the conference room.


6) I can leave the conference room early to get back to work.

7) I can return to my desk late, claiming I was in the conference room.


8) I can lose my concentration and still not miss anything important.

9) I can nod my head in agreement whenever the boss looks at me, to make him happy.


10) I find out that I'm not as dumb as some other people.

I WANT MY COFFEE !

Life has slowed down significantly since I moved from the city. I'm getting less used to seeing long lines. This morning on my way to work I stopped at Dunkin Donuts as usual. Surprisingly there was a long line of cars at the drive through. This was totally unexpected. I was getting late but I got in line anyway. Soon I realized that the line was not moving at all. There were people lined up, spending their precious morning minutes, putting themselves at risk for running late, for getting speeding tickets, for having accidents or for getting fired, just waiting for their cup of joe. Suddenly I realized the power of coffee. It started looking like a scene out of some Hollywood movie like Independence Day or Godzilla, in which aliens or terrorists or machines or some other evil of the kind would paralyze the whole country. Its terrifying how much control Dunkin Donuts has over our lives. After all America Runs on DD.

Holding on to the pieces

Today somebody I knew died. He was about a hundred years old. Like most people who die old, he also had to live to see his loved ones leave him one by one. I remember one of his sons saying once that its a curse to have a life that long. But now that he's gone it has made me think again about the reality of life and death. My father married his daughter 40 some years ago. That woman died many decades ago, in her youth. My dad remarried, outlived his second wife and then died as an old man a few weeks ago. After my father's death I feel like I'm incharge of playing his role. I want to step in so that nobody can say that my family has become dormant or has faded away after him. Isn't it silly? I'm his only son. In an attempt to hold whatever remains of the family together, I called the only surviving male member of my dad's generation, who is supposed to be the head of my paternal family. He's a cousin of my father and is an elderly man himself. I told him about my step grand dad's death. He was vacationing in the hills, trying to escpae from the extreme summer of the Punjab. He got very upset because he won't be able to reach in time for the funeral.
After I hung up, I started wondering why and when I had become so old fashioned. I had previously taken pride in being a non practicing Muslim and in discarding the traditions of the society. But when my dad died I found myself sitting in a corner of the masjid, reading the Quran for his soul. I even arranged his Chaliswan, in which a hundred or so people gathered 40 days after his death to read the Quran. Why does death revive tradition? Why do people like me also revert to tradition. I guess we're all looking for closures for our loved ones lives. We want the memories to be well tucked in before we move forward.

In the City of Blinding Lights

So, what do you think about New York? I remember what my impression about New York was when I had not been there yet. From what I saw in movies and books, I thought of it as being all concrete and steel, with no character. But it all changed when I actually started living there. I was in Brooklyn for a while. It was thousands of miles away and oceans apart from home, but still felt like home. I miss so much about it, like the Jamaican roti, the jerk chicken, the Kosher bakeries, the Chinese dry cleaners, the thin crust pizza, the B 46 bus, the sight of Afroamerican Hasidic Jews and of burka clad Pakistani women, the board walk at the Brighton beach, the African braiding hair salons, the Chinese nails places, the Caribbean Day Parade ... which is the most colorful display of any ethnic heritage, the Russian accent, the Kings Plaza (and the Marine Park), the noise, the hussle and bussle that never lets you be alone. Thank you Brooklyn, for everything. Thank you New York. I love you.

Pakistan

Hot, dusty, filthy, noisy, crowded, filled with arrogant and ignorant people, remote, undeveloped, uncivilized, it was home to me. There was warmth, love, frindships, companionships, hot home cooked food and everything else good in life there. I'm in North America now, a place where I've always wanted to be. Its cold here. There are theme parks here, and night life, and malls, and museums, and theaters, and cars, and freeways, and subways and everything else I could ever dream of. Its a big big place, with people from all over, all kinds ... white, black, yellow, brown, red. But the people I loved are not here, or the people I grew up with, or went to school with, or shared everything with. Some of them are here, but they're lost. Like I'm lost. Does anyone know how long it takes for this place to become home?

Day 1 ... of the rest of it.

So guys, what does a penguin do, when he's left alone, in a far off place, away from what used to be home, with no other penguin in sight?
Don't worry, I don't know the answer either. See, I'm not a real penguin or I won't be writing this. My mother had a way of narrating things very peculiar to her. She laughed at and enjoyed things nobody else would. I guess that much needed laughter helped her. She made it to the end. She lived for sixty years. Sixty long years, in which a weak but determined woman showed the kind of resilience that still amazes me. Many years ago when she was living in a Mediterrenean sea port, she gave bith to a son, me. She used to tell me that when i was little, she would dress me up in yellow clothes and put me in my yellow pram, and that I would then look like "Peter Penguin". After her death, I googled and found out that there actually is a long forgotten Disney character called Peter Penguin, who's most noteworthy characteristic is his libido. Perhaps she noted something else in that cartoon character too, which made it resemble her infant.
Its kinda late, more later.