I am the master evil genius!

Thursday, February 24, 2005

~ gorpy's pick of the..er...week ~

(tan tan tan, gotta have theme music )

the newest mp3: Yes! Found it, finally (and obviously, Huma ki wajah se)!
Presenting King of Self, laydees and germs, home-cooked in Peshawar by messrs. Zeeshan and Sajid :D Punchy, funky, angrezi gaana, wot!

who am i? : Go look at Kay's blog! It's his pic-strip called 'Raw Life' (in 'links i hit'), some good photographs and funky taglines. Mina gives five stars (out of five, nach).

Here Lies Cheesoo: Funny, insightful, incisive; orange and white. This offbeat, intelligent journal is quite worth a looky. No stars only because I won't quantify cheesoo's charm :)

Black Sheep: Mina gives six stars. Some of the best writing I've read on a blog, even if it does come from a wannabe economist ;) Lutf aagaya. Crisp and emotive, pokerface's blog is a delight.

(apologies to people whose permission-to-link has not been acquired yet but hey, I love your stuff :D )

Mina at 9:58 AM

8 comments

Pearls Before Swine ~ www.comics.com

Mina at 9:37 AM

Wednesday, February 23, 2005

happy birthdaay aliiii

*balloons and car doors and chaman milkshakes and overly-huge movie posters* hahahah :)

Mina at 12:00 AM

Tuesday, February 22, 2005

in the moments i indulge the morbidity i always
carry, i always wonder: who
will come flying if i were dying? or ill, if i were
seriously ill, would that make anyone seriously rethink
their lives, and why should illness or death make us do that,
why can't we be smart enough asitis, and who will
leave flowers at my pink marble marker, or talk into
the air and hope i can hear it? there is never
plenty of time, i don't think there is, time is always watching
and waiting for you to stumble so it can
trample you. i wish i could trust more, wish that i could not be
so
garbled
and
taffystuck
that i could just once and for all jump happily and completely and not
panic and just for once
believe what i am told and
say shut up you paranoid fool to
the nagging peripheral clouds that mock me and say
'it's happened so many times, it could very well
happen again you better run before
you turn into her'
cusp, teetering on a cusp, 'tis is a mighty
uncomfortable
place for a person such as i, a rubberball person like me
bouncing crazily, mazily all over, blurred and flailing, spinning off the glass, always in

flight

when all i really truly want to do is
dig a hole to China and

be friends with a dragon, at least i'd have a neat charred
scar to show for all my singeing, look,
i've got battle scars, y'see, i have proof
i'm such a warrior

pah, let's just be pansies, sweetly pinkandyellow

Mina at 1:01 PM

5 comments

the best of the invigilations: calculus two!

"this function [at this point my eyes began to glaze over], f(x,y,z) 55x- 3y- {z sigma fx/sigma f} underoot one kabillion and forty-four, we have to recurrently linearize the dooby-doo-dads, right?"

*brief silence*

*blink*

'let me get the other TA, just a sec!' *bright smile*

"i have to go to the washroom."

"he has to go to the bathroom! can he?"
"there's only twenty minutes to go, tell him to hang on."

"there's only twenty minutes left, can you hold on?"
"uh...okayyy"

Mina at 12:18 PM

6 comments

the note, as it were, never comes on the day.

saad is, i think, one of the most joyous people i know. he's just sunny, always. even when he's grumpy, hasn't slept in seventy-two hours (so he claims, jhoota kahinka) and looks like a damp bird: he's sunny. saad is one of those people who are unabashedly themselves all the time, who like being them so much that they are free. so they'll sing indian songs in india in an indian department store with you when it comes onto the speaker system (i actually said 'SAAD!' and ran from one department to the other looking for him when 'saat samandar' came on, haha). they'll hang a rather big mike-from-monsters inc. from their bag. they'll tell you you look pudgy in a sweater you usually don't look pudgy in- because they will notice, and be ingenuous in a really funny, dodgy way and say it. i got off light; mariyah's had a dose ;) saad is like one of those comfy, lovable older cousins you have who you pester to take you out and buy you chaat and a balloon...and just when you thought he's all mature and responsible, he'll buy a green goo grenade from the guys who sell cool crap like that at intersections and keep almost-hitting you with it all the way home, and both of you will be busting your guts laughing, ainwee main. he's like that, saad with his little-boy hair and big smile...you're quite close to the older brother i don't have very many of. happy birthday babe, love you loads :)

Mina at 7:56 AM

Monday, February 21, 2005

happy birthday saad! yayyy :D

Mina at 8:04 AM

Sunday, February 20, 2005

on mornings

it’s cold as december should have been, only it’s february. dawn is early these winter days, the birds wake with the sun and being to chirp with the throaty voice that follows deep sleep. i like waking people up just to hear that voice…’tis the only time in the entire day that you are unguarded, not thinking of the things the world puts inside your head.

on praying

i know why one folds their hands upon their breast when one prays. so that you can feel your heart beating in time to the words you whisper.

on ‘twenty love poems and a song of despair’

when you nikaalofy a faal, you read saadi, if i’m not wrong. in a small similar way, i think my neruda is my faal book. it has settled on the desk where the PC sits, and at intervals i pick it up and discover something new within its mere sixty-five pages, despite having read it time and time again. i don’t believe in faals and i don’t believe in that much randomness, but it’s a thought that amuses me. ah, silenciosa!

on the bachi

if it's possible, she grows sweeter by the day. i inhale her exhalations, hold her close enough to let her eyelashes graze my cheek. babbling purity in a pale green-and-blue ensemble with a monkey on her bum, emerson is right. babies turn grown people into babies.

on nana (as always)

went to pick sana up from khala's, and made mandatory detour to nana's room. he was just about to put the first bite of his dinner into his mouth when i hijacked it, remembering amma's story about the perfect niwala of aalu-gosht. never let a good moment to be spoilt pass you by, i say, and being fed the best boti by the man you love most in the entire world is something you can always hold close to your heart and sparkle with. nana-thing, you make my heart sing :))

on art

turner. i love turner. his opalescent light suffuses the canvas like it were from heaven...he takes industrial revolution london and turns it into magic...sometimes gentle, yellow light and sometimes clear and sharp, slicing through menacing, grimy shadow. i am fascinated- this is paint. just paint on canvas. and marvellous, breathtaking genius, but all the same: it is only paint. wow. turner doesn't insist on your attention like van gogh does, but i love him just as much for it...the quiet statement in his canvases captivate me. thank god for art, and music, and books.

Mina at 8:54 AM

17 comments

why you have old friends

aiyan says:
u do realize that if u were a guy who was as good at poetry n stuff

aiyan says:
ud be getting laid v often

aiyan says:
just a random thought

'ke khushi se mar na jate, agar aitebar hota.' says:
ahahahahahha

'ke khushi se mar na jate, agar aitebar hota.' says:
yeah

'ke khushi se mar na jate, agar aitebar hota.' says:
i'd be a ladies man, but im not the type

aiyan says:
no ud be a complete asshole

aiyan says:
yet a literate one..badass type

aiyan says:
who can write

aiyan says:
u wouldve gotten some everyday

aiyan says:
(Y)

'ke khushi se mar na jate, agar aitebar hota.' says:
ahahhaah

Mina at 6:40 AM

when was the last time you were completely happy? the happy that pulls stars through your skin and a bell in your laugh, the kind of happy that made you glide through your days with a big goofy grin on your content face?

when was that last time?

Mina at 6:18 AM

10 comments

Friday, February 18, 2005

because i have all the time in the world. mbwahaha.

1. What color is most reflective of you?
Red. Red can be anything: intense, playful, dark, bright...red is just goooood :D

2. How did you get the idea for your Blog name?
I had invented (or at least I thought I had, damn raisins and peanuts) the word, and after I made a blog I didn't know how to work and hence used up that name, I used 'gorpy' for this one. Quite glad I did too :)

3.What time were you born?
At 2 in the afternoon, on a Wednesday.

4.What song are you playing now, or wish you were playing?
In my head, 'Sunday Morning' by Maroon 5 and 'Fever' by Ray Charles...anyone who's ever sat in the same car as me will know my issue with entire songs at a stretch ;)

5. Has the death of a celebrity ever made you cry?
I cried a little when Princess Diana died, the casket with the envelope with 'Mummy' on it was just too much. How do you live without your mother?

6.What color of underwear are you wearing?
Red, nach.

7. Do you want a baby?
About a billion, please :D

8.What does your mom do for a living?
She used to be the administrator for a swanky hospital, but she isn't doing anything other than mothering and building the house these days.

9. What does your dad do for a living?
Abbu is the Chairman of the Pakistan Science Foundation, and loves his job, Mashallah. Goremunt Servunt.

10. What is your pet's name?
She was called Goldie, a yellow Labrador.

11. What color are your bedsheets?
Cream, with pink stripes and flowers and things, sweetly Victorian.

12. What are the last 4 digits of your cell phone number?
2790

13.What song are you playing now?
'Who put the bomp' by Barry Mann. Good old random head-radio.

14. What was the last concert you attended?
The 2005 Farewell Rock Tribute, man alive it was good :D

15. Who is with you?
Well, Atif is sitting on the PC on my left, if that counts. Otherwise my invisible friend Chintoo is, and a large pink elephant humming Irish drinking songs.

16. What was the last movie you saw?
Snippets of 'Daredevil' on Star Movies a few days ago

17. Who do you dislike most at this moment?
Probably the-girl-I-want-to-kill, but only because I always want to kill her....and her furry coat....

18. What food are you craving right now?
Strawberries....dark chocolate Toblerone, and waffles.

19. Did you dream last night?
No, too tired.

20.What was the last tv show you watched?
American Idol :D

21.What is your fave piece of jewelry?
Scusi, but I cannot play favourites with my babies...but if I really have to choose, then it'll be the gorgeous earrings Bari Ammi gave me when I turned twenty. I could wear those 24/7. Mmm.

22. What is to the left of you?
Lab 4 PC-numberless, and Atif working on it. And random pieces of paper, and my hand wearing Big.

23. What was the last thing you ate?
A fried egg on toast, cut into squares by mommy :D

24. Who is your best friend of the opposite sex?
If I name just one, the rest will beat me up *hehe*

25. Write a song lyric that's in your head:
'Toron in zanjeeron ko', from 'Pukar' by Call...alongwith other random bits from the song which are unintelligble to me, they just sound good hahaha

26. What song is that from?
Telly. And Call's album, I expect.

27. Where is your significant other right now?
Somewhere over the rainbow :P

28. What shampoo do you use?
A couple, these days Freeman's Curl Control and Head and Shoulders. Smells something fruity.

29. When was the last time you had a hair cut?
Gosh, I don't remember....six months, I'm quite sure, because it's time for a trim.

30. Are you taking any medications?
Nope, thankfully :)

31. Do you have a mental disease?
Typo-itis *grin*

32 . What shirt are you wearing?
A pale green button-down with one of my favourite sweaters on top.

33. What time is it?
9:35 a.m

34. What is your fave frozen treat?
Wild Strawberry ice-cream by Rocco, off the top of my head. Glop and cheesecake don't count 'cause you don't technically freeze them hehe

35. Whats your favorite shopping store?
Any bookstore, I'm not picky...and Al-Fatah, I love doing groceries :D

Mina at 9:13 AM

5 comments

One of the best essays I have read in a long while: Tamara Follini on Henry James and the Spaces of 'Silent-Speaking Words'. Yum!

Mina at 1:06 AM

happy birthday salmaaannn you skinny monkeyyyy hahahaha

*balloons and confetti and eggs*

Mina at 12:00 AM

Thursday, February 17, 2005

"Quiero hacer contigo
lo que la primavera hace con los cerezos."

Mina at 8:13 PM

Wednesday, February 16, 2005

Sunday morning rain is falling
Steal some covers share some skin
Clouds are shrouding us in moments unforgettable
You twist to fit the mold that I am in

But things just get so crazy living life gets hard to do
And I would gladly hit the road get up and go if I knew
That someday it would lead me back to you
That someday it would lead me back to you

That may be all I need
In darkness (s)he is all I see
Come and rest your bones with me
Driving slow on Sunday morning
And I never want to leave

Fingers trace your every outline
Paint a picture with my hands
Back and forth we sway like branches in a storm
Change the weather still together when it ends

That may be all I need
In darkness (s)he is all I see
Come and rest your bones with me
Driving slow on Sunday morning
And I never want to leave

But things just get so crazy living life gets hard to do
Sunday morning rain is falling and I'm calling out to you
Singing someday it'll bring me back to you
Find a way to bring myself back home to you

And you may not know
That may be all I need
In darkness (s)he is all I see
Come and rest your bones with me
Driving slow on Sunday morning

Sunday Morning ~ Maroon 5

Mina at 7:11 PM

i have discovered the reason why falling asleep on amma on the couch is a) so easy and b) always a so much better kind of sleep.
one thing is that the positioning is perfect. just exactly right: my head, my leg, my arm fit seamlessly into her side. i think it's instinctive; i know how to attach myself against her without having to squirm or push or scoddle around. click. sit, snuggle, fit. even my glasses don't poke her, 'tis so whipsy-smooth. the second thing is her breathing. in, out, in, out- it's a rhythmic, soothing metronome, something to latch a subconscious self on. like waves on a beach, a dull roar you can send your breath back and forth upon. and then there're the obvious things: the way she smells, how she is just squishy enough, the sound her laugh makes inside her skin, how she doesn't ask a plethora of annoying questions when i don't feel like talking, how she lets me poke her and bite her and squeeze her arms hard enough for to prove to myself she is real and notleaving and also to sort of leave my print on her. mine. love is not a gentle little lullaby, love is a bite that leaves a purple tooth-mark and a slight ringingsinging somewhere behind your ribs. it's a good feeling to know i have someone i can impose myself upon forever- one person who will always be home for me, who will remember, who will let me bite and pull ugly faces and burrow into her, one person who will never tell me that she's too busy, that she doesn't have time, that she's in a hurry, that she isn't interested or doesn't care. i am always special, always loved, always safe. amma is the one place where i can truly belong.

Mina at 9:29 AM

Saturday, February 12, 2005

'asli, how come i've never seen you with your hair open? it's so pretty.'

she turns her clear green eyes up at me- i'm much taller than her- and chuckles.

'too much hassle! i will, sometime.'

'asli, open your hair!'

she doesn't look up from the piece of paper she is writing on, grimace-smiling at it in recognition of the demand. she reaches a pale lemon-sweatered arm up and pulls at her high ponytail. her thick, shiny, red-purple hair tumbles down, framing her milky, beautiful skin. the afternoon pours in through the windows, light glowing from behind the big bulletin boards behind her. she is a vision, haloed in a soft glow. i stand back and smile- this is how i will always remember asli savuran, who couldn't stop dancing, who was self-appointed people-counter for our buses, asli with her slightly husky, sudden laugh and small-person grace. asli, fellow figure-outer of techno hors d'oeuvres (and no plates) and overall sparky, spunky, bouncy little scrap of a punk girl :)

Mina at 7:33 PM

4 comments

madame butterfly

Mina at 7:09 PM

through the looking-glass

Mina at 7:07 PM

sometimes i quite
hate
you.

sometimes i can quite objectively
know exactly what to say and forever
never have to speak to you
again. i don't, of course,

because i love you all the same, but
i just don't
like
you

anymore. you've become
someone else and i don't
know you any more. i do,
but only because my
reading isn't bothered, isn't hindered
by what your skin wears. but not
because it's particularly of interest

or you want me around to see through youlike
a real friend would. i don't
really care much, any more. i don't really
care much about most folks, most
folks are not worth a body's bother and love and
private jokes. some are,

and 'some' is quite enough for destruction. i
don't mind destruction very badly, he always said that
i could never hope to write if i hadn't
ever been thrown to the concrete. skinned knees and
scabby elbows seem to really yank the
muse's chains, i agree, bruises and batters and breaks. some
bruises never go away, those ones are the flecks
in your irises.

but you, you're such a nasty
piece of work now. i quite particularly
dislike the nastiness, the devil-may-careness. you
and i are still so similar that i am very frankly quite aware
that i place around you certain....shall we say
ideals
that i choose for myself too, very much like
buying twos of everything, but now always a size
too big. it used to make me upset, such waste, but
drains were meant for a purpose and i know that my
love is quite akin to Thor's horn, even if it must be poured down
a drain so selfishly stony as yours. you were rather right,
you know. you can totally

love a person and not like them
too much. but since once you and i shared
so much over salt-patterns on the table, papercup tea and machine-baked
cake studded with bright green 'fruit', because you are still in some part of your indifferent self
the guffawing, bright pixie i once knew, i pray
for you, always. if you have forgotten how to love,
i will not, not in this lifetime at least. you think i'm a fool, don't you,
but quite frankly my darling- 'tis not an art, and when you turn away
i see a bigger fool. because love is so simple, loving
only needs a heart just big enough to fit one more person in. your space is
always there, but the only difference now is that
i don't mind empty places that much. anymore.

Mina at 1:47 AM

9 comments

play it, saad.

captain planet, he's a hero
gonna take pol-yoo-shun down to zero
he's our powers, magnified
and he's fightin' on the planet'sside

cap-tin pla-net, he's a he-ro
something something something
gonna help us
put asunder
BADGUYS! who like to
loot and plunder!

by your powers combined....i yam captain planet!

GOOO PLANET!

WE'RE THE PLANETEERS!
YOU CAN BE ONE TOO! 'CAUSE
SAVIN' OUR PLANET IS THE THINGTODO!
LOOTING AND POLOOTING IS-NOT-THE-WAY
HERE'S WHAT CAPTIN PLANIT
HAS-TO-SAY!

the powaahhh.....is youuuaahhhsss!!!

YAYYY!

Mina at 1:40 AM

4 comments

Wednesday, February 09, 2005

Happy Birthday Bhabhaaaaaa :D When I'm rich I'll buy you a jeep :D

Mina at 4:40 PM

Tuesday, February 08, 2005

Laydees and Germs, Presenting Mina F. Malik's Happy Place :D

Mina at 6:46 PM

5 comments

Study in Orange

Mina at 6:44 PM

My elf with the pixie eyelashes

Mina at 6:42 PM

Boys in action!

Mina at 6:32 PM

Mosa revving up :)

Mina at 6:30 PM

Striking a pose :)

Mina at 6:26 PM

Rainbow cutieee

Mina at 6:22 PM

The Basant fingers *lol*

Mina at 6:13 PM

6 comments

Humay on the building

Mina at 6:11 PM

Saturday, February 05, 2005

lets you and i,

tonight

follow a star, find a spider
laugh softly into the wind

tonight, will you

tell me a secret? a
whisper only mine,

if forever doesn't last
a memory might, if
always means notreally
we could live, only for
tonight

if my dice are cast
single, would you
have room for three?

Mina at 11:28 AM

9 comments

Friday, February 04, 2005

What a wonderful, I say. YAY! The Slam went so well- people who were reading went twice, or thrice, people stood up for the first time, people who came to listen want to come back so they can stand up themselves, last night's works ranged from angst to ballads, ghazal to song lyrics.....asbolutely wonderful! Sab chaa gaye, sub kuch dasti hogaya, I'm so pleased :D I am, however, NOT lugging carpets all over campus next time! And Wendy- no paparazzi- yet ;)

Mina at 10:56 AM

Thursday, February 03, 2005

ten minutes to class, and there are several things in my head:

i love sana's clothes, more than mine, sometimes.

i'm reading a poem in front of people for the second time in my life. so far, amazingly enough, i'm not nervous.

i love bari ammi.

there are priorities, and then there are people who are above all priorities; the ones for whom you'd drop everything and run. having those kind of people is essential: reminds you that you are human, and that you need to love some people that much.

group work can be such a trial.

i want daaniyah to fall asleep in my arms again.

my taya was wearing an orange sweater today, he looked so cute :)

three minutes to class, shake a leg, girl!

yay :)

Mina at 10:04 AM

Wednesday, February 02, 2005

listening to sana riaz sing ghalib today was like....was like....standing on the moor, but wearing red. and blowing kisses into the wind. absolutely mind-swoggling, beautifully sung verse.

irshad:

ye na thee hamaaree qismat ke wisaal-e-yaar hota
agar aur jeete rehte yahee intezaar hota

tere waade par jiye ham to ye jaan jhoot jaanaa
ke khushee se mar na jaate agar 'eitabaar hota

teree naazukee se jaana ki bandha tha 'ehed_booda
kabhi to na torr sakta agar oostuwaar hota

koi mere dil se pooche tere teer-e-neemkash ko
ye khalish kahaan se hotee jo jigar ke paar hota

ye kahaan ki dostee hai ke bane hain dost naaseh
koi chaarasaaz hota, koee ghamguzaar hota

rag-e-sang se tapakta wo lahoo ki fir na thamta
jise gham samajh rahe ho, ye agar sharaar hota

gham agarche jaan_gulis hai, pe kahaan bachain ke dil hai
gham-e-ishq gar na hota, gham-e-rozgaar hota

kahoon kis se main ke kya hai, shab-e-gham buree bala hai
mujhe kya bura tha marna? agar ek baar hota

hue mar ke ham jo ruswa, huey kyun na gharq-e-dariya
na kabhee janaaza uthata, na kaheen mazaar hota

kaun dekh sakta ki yagaana hai wo yaktaa
jo dooee ki boo bhee hotee to kaheen do chaar hota

ye masaail-e-tasawwuf, ye tera bayaan Ghalib!
tujhe ham walee samajhate, jo na baada_khwaar hota

wah, bhai. wah. lutff aagaya aaj. 'kya kehne hain?' as nana would say.

Mina at 9:02 PM

she puts her shawl on her head, white with a red and black, indistinct patterned border an inch wide.

she puts her shawl on her head, and suddenly she is a princess- a Rajasthani rani sitting in a balcony on a takht, in a white gharara, playing a taanpura. regal royal woman sweeping out of a room, tilting her head graciously at people bowing low. smiling gently, laughing tinkly, throaty. wearing heavy rings, an antique kundan tika on her forehead- all it took was one movement of an arm, and she is beautiful; so elegant and regal i want to photograph her, paint her, capture the strange magic that fell out of the air and has settled itself around her; a glowing aura of loveliness.

the azaan ends, and she pulls the shawl off. and now she's just a girl, wearing an unspecial, stripey turtlenecked sweater, her hair in a regular old low ponytail. nothing new, nothing rare. just another girl- but i know, a secret not even she does.

Mina at 2:55 PM

6 comments

You speak eloquently and have seemingly read every
book ever published. You are a fountain of
endless (sometimes useless) knowledge, and
never fail to impress at a party.What people love: You can answer almost any
question people ask, and have thus been
nicknamed Jeeves.What people hate: You constantly correct their
grammar and insult their paperbacks.

What Kind of Elitist Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

KOI SHAK? mbwuhuhuahahahaaaaa

Mina at 2:45 PM