From the daughter's heart

It is exactly 3 weeks since he opened his eyes to the angels of heaven. His last moment is still fresh in my mind. Just about the same time 3 weeks back, all the family members were sitting around him and praying the Quran. His eyes were half open staring at the wall in front of him. I lovingly called him "Papli" and got not response from him. The only indication that he was alive was the movement of his diaphragm. Time was ticking towards the night, and as much tired I was, there was no sleep in my eyes. I didn't want to lose sight of him. I just didn't want to! Suddenly, his eyes opened wide and he started breathing heavily, it felt like he was watching somebody up above. "The time has come" my cousin brother said.
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I had seen him deteriorate inch by inch in the past week. The last hug he gave me was on my anniversary day. He was already a little weak and was coping with a lot of pain. My sister and I had made plans for alternative treatment to give his body strength and immunity. We were planning a trip just after my anniversary to an Ayurveda place as well. But God had something different in mind. Like they say - Man proposes, God disposes!
The next day after my anniversary, he seemed completely zoned out. He had drifted into a sub-conscious mode and had completely stopped talking. His only response was through blinking his eyes. Mom looked strong on the outside, but I could see the turmoil in her eyes. The doctor visited us and after examining him said "Please inform everybody possible". Her estimate was that he would stretch it for a week max! Honestly, I do not have the words nor the courage to explain how the days have passed after that. All i knew was, my parents need me to be the strongest daughter ever; I was and I am! That one week we saw him cripple into a skeleton. From blinking eyes, to half open eyes staring into space. From frequent anxiety attacks to a motionless body. The Doc was right, he survived exactly a week after that.
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All through that week I was only praying to God to stop the torture and grant him relief and peace. But when my cousin uttered those words, I was not sure if I was prepared to handle that moment. For sometime, I moved away from the room. I made a list of people I had to immediately call once anything happened and gathered the courage by saying to myself "I need to see this through". I went back to his room and sat next to him. My elder aunt had taken him in her lap and had her palm on his chest. He kept breathing heavily and tears rolled down his eyes. I closed my eyes for a minute in prayer and when I opened, aunt said "I cant feel the heart beat".The entire room stood still. I looked at mom and saw here eyes fill up. I tried to see if his diaphragm was moving, no sign. Looked at his face, frozen. I shakingly held his wrist to feel the pulse, just one pulse and nothing. I stared at mom and said "No ma, nothing, I cant feel a thing". He was no more! He was my Dad.

Raksha bandhan Special

Today is Raksha bandhan/Rakhi which is a celebration of the unique relationship between brother and sister :) I do have 2 rakhi brothers whom i wish without fail on this day but haven't met for ages :(. Today, however, I started my day thinking, why rakhi was a celebration of a sis-bro relationship?? why can't it be between the same sex? I have an elder sister who is caring as hell and takes care of me and my parents, why can't i tie a rakhi to her? Good question, with no good answer!

As i am known for being a revolt and doing things my way (which is usually not what the society recommends) I choose to write this post today and dedicate it to my sister :) I surely don't praise her too often and a public display of my love in a forum like this is something I have never ever done :) So, here's my dedication to my darling sister who is miles away from me, but very close to my heart. 

A word of caution: this might get too senti to digest, so please read at your own risk :)

Dear Sister,

When I was born, I had no idea I had an elder sister who i had to match with. You gave me mixed feelings about being the "younger one". You were one hell of a competition to beat when it came to studies, and I had to always be OK with our school teachers calling me "Maryam"! Oh BTW, Mom still calls me Maryam when she is missing u too much :P 

You were the Tom and I was the Jerry! I do not remember a single day during my childhood where both of us have not fought. Our conversations would start and end in a fight, and we made no excuses for being as blunt to each other as possible. Thank God we didn't get physical! Nevertheless, I cherish every single fight cos that made us stronger ;) and then the unfortunate (read fortunate) happened - you left us to meet Uncle Sam!

You leaving to US was a big change for all of us at home, it was silence in the house for weeks. Mom, dad and me would look at each other and just have tears in our eyes cos we were missing u so much! I never knew i would miss you cos I initially thought "Happa! good riddance". But I was so wrong! After the realisation had struck i jumped at every occasion to talk to u on the phone and guess what, FIGHT! I didn't know the feeling was mutual until i came to the US and spent time with you. It was the best time i ever had with you and from then on, we bonded like best friends! 

I must say you have flaws (lol)!You are stubborn, You are impossible, You are bossy and you are impatient. You are short tempered and you irritate me (sometimes)! But!!!  You are the best sister one can ever have! The most caring, protective, unconditionally loving and super fun sister I could have ever hoped for! 

So to wrap it all up without sounding like I am writing a Love letter on the Internet - Happy Raksha Bandhan dear Sis. i accept gifts in Cash (USD) and kind! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE :D

10

It was nice to see all the good responses I have gotten so far on my new year countdown blogs. Thanks guys for keeping me motivated :). Today I have numerous ideas on the 2 list. Some are mine, some are from my friends and some from the universe ;). So right now, the "dharm sankat" is, what the hell do I write about? Zimble. Everything!?! :P . So on popular demand, this list of 2 is actually a collection of 2 lists. Don’t worry about the math, just read on! :)

2 best films I saw in 2011: Out of the very few movies I saw this year, it is a difficult job to pick the best 2. Especially when you are a big Bollywood Fan and when Bollywood is hell bent on producing mind-blowingly awful movies. So, after a lot of scrutiny and deep thought, here are the 2 best movies I saw in 2011 - Kungfu Panda 2 - "Po" the Dragon warrior is simply the cutest, funniest, naughtiest, wittiest kung-Fu master I have ever seen in the movies :) he is totally adorable and all thanks to Po, the movie is on my top2 list ;). Second in line is Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara - Kabir, Arjun and Imran set out for a trip of a lifetime and discover themselves in the process. The movie has great locations, dialogues and songs. My favorite character in the movie- Imran Habib aka majnu  aka Farhan Akhtar:)

2 worst films I saw in 2011: Now that the best ones are out of the way, I think its far easier for me to pick the worst ones.  The movie which wins this gold medal is Dum Maaro Dum - I mean, why cant somebody please give Aby baby some shaving foam? And what exactly is Bipasha trying? Oh and why is Deepika even dancing on that song? Sorry, the most relevant question comes now - What is the movie about? This movie was such a Maar and no Dum!! The one with the Silver medal is Pirates of the Caribbean 4 actually I was going to say Transformers 3, but I think Penelope did a better job showing her pouted lips than  Rosie :) (pun intended). Can somebody please tell me why the pirates who are good at battling in the sea and conquering other ships go behind a goddam fountain of youth?? Seriously this movie was such a failure!

2 best reunions I had in 2011: I have had some very good reunions this year with some old friends, some of my cousins and some of my old colleagues. So the 2 get together' s I totally cherish are "The cousins day out" in Feb2011 - I think this was the best outing I have had with my cousins  Rashida and Mariya :). The second one is actually a small meet up with Rohini and Nivy :) We spent like 2 hours in Baskin Robins but had a great time playing around. Ro - please send me pictures :P

2 top achievements in 2011: This is slightly tough. You know how difficult it is for me to boast about myself right? That too publicly on the internet :P hehe. So getting rid of all my sharm and haya, these are the top 2 things I achieved this year. First, this is a joint achievement between my sister and me. Yep, you guessed it right - Mom and Dad's HAJ! We (Maryam and I) had a sense of satisfaction once they returned from Haj, a feeling of comfort that we could finally make this happen :).  The second one is on the lighter side. I did my first ever snorkeling in sea  during my trip to Andaman's. It was seriously an achievement as I was a little worried that I might drown and kill some fishes in the sea ;)

This is my 2's list for this year, and since I am running short of time, I will end my blabbering right here and welcome the last day of the year with this blog post :)

P.S. There are 10 types of people in the world: Those who understand binary, and those who don't

A dream come true

 They say dream hard, dream a lot, dream something which will wake u up and make u achieve it, dream something which will bring tears to your eyes when they come true.

I spent the whole of last weekend with my parents. I got pampered and I pampered them. Mom was busy packing and I was busy executing her orders (hehe). Dad kept filling the house with savories, vegetables, eggs etc. for Zenab (she is going to be staying alone while they are out). I must tell you it was the funniest and most memorable weekend I have had. Oh btw, you must be thinking why I start about dreams when all I wanted to do was spend time with Mom and Dad? The actual dream was my parents’. They wanted to go on the pilgrimage that every Muslim longs to go on, the pilgrimage which has the most importance in any Muslim’s life. Yes, Mom and Dad were finally going for Haj!

When my sister and I started to work, our first and foremost goal was to get the family in good financial shape. Well we almost achieved that so we jumped to the next one and that was "Send Mom and Dad to Haj". We have been planning for this day for god-knows-how long. Beginning of this year, Maryam and I made up our mind that we will send Mom and Dad to Haj this year no matter what. The "no matter what" attitude really helped all the four of us to make it happen. There were a lot of people who had applied for Haj and we were just praying that our parent's application gets approved. It didn’t :(. But Mom didn’t lose hope, she went ahead and took all the possible recommendations to the Haj organizers and Mullahs and followed up every day to get their name approved. Fortunately (or unfortunate for somebody else) there was a cancellation and Mom and Dad got their approval! Hurray!!


After that Mom single handedly did most of the prep. From preparing a list of things needed to going for shopping and getting them :). She was motivated and enthusiastic, she was happy to see that she would be finally going for the trip she always dreamt of. Dad started his process of wrapping up work, so that there would be no unfinished business when he was out. Maryam and I were there to help wherever/whenever needed :) In fact, Mom and Dad were well prepared a month prior to their travel dates and the last few days before the trip were simply spent in spending time with each other and relaxing :)

Just the day before the travel, I felt anxious; I was worried about my parents having a safe trip. People who have been to Haj before have told loads of good and bad stories. They say going to Haj is life changing and I was hoping they would just be fine. This year they are expecting around 35 lakhs of people there, huge enough crowd to get lost and never be found :(. I am sure Mom and Dad are equally tensed. But they are being brave enough to make this trip.

On Monday Morning (Oct 3rd 2011) Mom and Dad woke up early, said their prayers and started getting ready for the long trip. They had to be in complete white from head to toe; White burkha, white chappal, white specs (the thread), white bag. It was an absolute overwhelming moment to see the dream come alive :). It surely brought tears of happiness in our eyes. Here's wishing them a successful and a life changing Haj!

Life.....

Today is my in-laws 39th wedding anniversary. 39! WOW! First, wishing them a great wedding anniversary and many more years of togetherness! We celebrated today by visiting an orphanage cum old age home 20 kms from Tambaram - New life Old Age Home. We started off early and drove on good and bad roads to reach the small place. We spent couple of hours there, went around the place, said hi to the welcoming inmates, ate lunch with them, heard a very nice old lady sing and came back. all in all, it was a great visit!
This place is owned by a couple who left their Govt Jobs and started "New Life" with a small hut. Today the place has around 64 kids and 60 Old men and women. Aunty (Owner) spoke to us about all the challenges they face in the day to day operations of the place and how they need to struggle to keep the place clean and livable. She had loads of stories and experiences they are going through to run this place. Few of the surprising things I heard were "There are so many people ready to donate, "money" is actually not a problem, "man power" is the problem. There is nobody who comes forward for voluntary service. Everybody needs salary. Lots of youngsters promise to come on weekends and teach the kids, but not many turn up! They tried recruiting MSW (Masters in Social Work) graduates and they demand 25K per month salary as a start!".
Well that's the "kadwa sach". WE have no time to spend on anything which can help the society! And NGO's like these just keep struggling without much support! I left the place with a heavy heart after looking at all the nice and cheerful oldies staying there. I have never understood how some son/daughter would have the heart to leave their old parents in a place like this. There are so many inmates who are from well to-do families and lived a very great life until they were suddenly thrown out of the house because they were of no "use" to the family. These so-called "families" don't even bother to visit them or ask about their health. That's worse than the kadwa sach I just spoke about!
Anyways, at the end of the day my in-laws were happy that they made a choice to help them and celebrate their anniversary by spending time with them :)

The Cricket Craze!

India is filled with Cricket fans! Instead of blood, cricket runs in the veins of Indians (that's the heights of fanaticism here). Last 6 weeks, most of the Indian youth (and the oldies) went through a lot of anxiety, restlessness and distraction. Thanks to the ICC Cricket World Cup 2011. From  Media to politics everybody understood only Cricket language. Cricket was not only in the air, but also in their dreams!
Don't get me wrong here, Iam not trying to spoil the feeling of victory by quoting the extent of madness, I am a cricket fan too, just the level of fanaticism is slightly low. In the Semi's - When Indian team won against the Pakistan team - I jumped and rejoiced too (If I knew to whistle, I would have done that too). I clapped with excitement when Dhoni hit his winning Sixer at the Finals against Sri lanka. MS Dhoni was criticised for many of his decisions: Remember the disappointment when Ashwin was replaced with Nehra in the Semi's? All of us thought that we are going to lose so bad just because of Nehra's bowling talent! And then, what a performance, Nehra was the best bowler in that match and all the critics had to shut their big mouths after an awesome win!
Anyways, I am not technically sound with Cricket so I would continue to write what I am probably good at (stories). To make my point (again), I completely enjoy cricket, I love watching it with friends and family and also enjoy screaming for every 4 or 6 our guys make, and sometimes also dance in front of the TV when India Wins! Don't believe me? Read on!
This craze about cricket was introduced to me by my dad! He used to play cricket every weekend with his group of friends. I was very small then when my dad used to regularly go every Sunday to have a piece of cricket! When we got Cable TV at home, my dad was super excited about all the lovely matches he can watch in Star Sports with english commentary (I somehow hated the the painful Hindi commentary on DD). From then on, any Cricket match, ODI or Test, we used to watch as a family in the house!
The four of us (My parents, sister and me) are a bunch of enthu-patani's! We would do extra preparation when there was an India match going to happen. School homework would be done at light speed. Mom will make special snacks and keep it ready. Dad will close shop and come home early just to make sure he doesn't miss 1 second of the action. Our home was located in a central location (Parrys) where there were very small houses and loud TV sets. When the match starts, we could not only hear our TV blowing full volume, but the neighbor's too! My dad would get so involved and emotional that he would pile up Rs.2 to Rs.5 coins on the TV set begging the batsman to hit a sixer! (All that money eventually went to the poor). My sister and I would get comfortable seats on the Divan (a kind of couch) and start cheering when the match starts. We would also pick Hindi songs to sing when a sixer or four was hit!
During a typical India match, if India is losing too many wickets, Dad would pile up more coins and start switching channels (the logic was, we can avoid the evil eye on our players :P when there is so much pressure on them) and when the neighbors start whistling or clapping, we would know India is playing well and switch back to the sports channel ;). During a nail biting situation, mom would close her eyes and do a silly trick asking "India jeetse ke nai???" (The silly trick is matching her hands with eyes closed and if the fingers match right, we will win ;)..).
Yesterday, I was not in the usual craziness avatar and was watching the match very calmly, hoping that Dhoni will see me and play calm ;). When the champs won the match, Mom called me and congratulated with so much cheer that I went down memory lane! It was surely a nostalgic moment for me!

Here's for the team who won it after 28 years! Go India Go!