Minerva, don’t be a hero.

It was the summer surrounding my organic chemistry exam. The wooden desks that had already been graffiti-ed by many a frustrated student before me. My white DCW Karachi uniform was splattered at the pocket, where my many ink-pens had been sitting (I never liked dorky pencil/stationery cases) and my forehead was icky and sweaty. I … Continue reading »

I’m getting too old for this shit.

There was a time when I’d have a list. I’d have a list of people I was close to. A list of people – who were the ‘chosen ones’, the people who were game-changers. Their inputs mattered. If I didn’t get to speak to them through the day, it would feel like there was something … Continue reading »

A Morning in Mommytown.

Jibran wakes up at 6.30 a.m. He plays with my hands, gives me those giant smiles of his that make me forget just how crappy it is to wake up at 6.30 a.m. after dreaming of Italy and the French Riviera. And to know that you can’t possibly see the Riviera until the smiling little … Continue reading »

Best Twitter Bios. #truestory

The way social media is evolving is hardly something that can be ignored. To roughly quote Will Schuester from Glee, “Thanks to Tumblr, Facebook, Blogs and twitter, there’s just so much increased pressure for social judgments and evaluations”. If Facebook wasn’t enough to make sure we shared every detail from our lives, Twitter and Tumblr … Continue reading »

Toddler, tantrums and tolerance.

I love being a mom. And I can’t say that enough. I love it for the challenges it brings to me every day. I love it for the physical and emotional juggernaut it proves to be each day for me. I love it for the things it has given me. Pride, humility, pain, joy, hope, … Continue reading »

Girls don’t cry.

In the modern world that you and I know right now, being effeminate has become a slur. And not just for boys. We’ve got shops that sport the sign “Clothes for the Working Woman” in a so-called conservative country like Pakistan. Slacks are in, loafers are cool, no more teased-up hairdos, let the hair down, … Continue reading »

Protected: O ye who believe.

An Ode to Humsafar.

(We interrupt regular programming – actually, this IS the regular programming. I’ve been interrupting THAT for my fictional tales that seem to have taken over this poor blog.) While there have been absolutely brilliant blogs (read some of them here, here and here) and terribly true parodies (I’m sure you are all familiar with the … Continue reading »

Bruno Sahab. Ye kia baat hui?

(We interrupt our regular programming to bring you something that MUST go out of my head before I spontaneously combust.) Not only is Bruno Mars ruining every woman’s concept of a macho man, of a metrosexual man, of a normal man, he is also responsible for bringing ideas into girls’ heads that have no semblance … Continue reading »

Bonnet. Bees. Boo.

Bee Number One. Mourning what won’t return: Gone are the days when you could have just stared into space absentmindedly and chomped on something fatty and read a novel that would have invited you to explore the inner workings of a mind truly twisted. But that doesn’t happen now. As my friend Aneela Z says, … Continue reading »