Prolific Immigrant

.1. The Time Traveller’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. Recommended by Katie (thank you) and a luxury to read. I can’t actually describe this book, per se, but rather merely communicate to you the feeling of gentleness into which you will fall almost instantly when you start reading.

.2. Struggling to Surrender by Jeffery Lang. This is an almost too-personal account of a man’s near thirty year spiritual journey. So far, it has managed to anger, challenge, and calm me, as well as dig at my curiosity. This is one of the most powerful books I have ever, ever, ever, ever read. Lang pulls no punches: “You cannot simply read the Qur’an, not if you take it seriously. You either have surrendered to it already or you fight it. It attacks tenaciously, directly, personally; it debates, criticizes, shames, and challenges. From the outset it draws the line of battle, and I was on the other side.”

Learn something new today, if you wish. This is one of the cooler things I’ve read in a long time. Best to print it out and give it the attention it deserves.

I’ve always received a slew of emails asking me for book recommendations and so I thought that for those interested, I would share the names of the ones through which I am currently flipping…

Beyond Marxian Nature Theory: Understanding and Contesting Japanese Social-Environmental Relations (1955-1985)
Al Vachon

In The Footsteps of The Prophet
Tariq Ramadan

Julia’s Chocolates
Cathy Lamb

My Happy Life
Lydia Millet

Le Petit Prince
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

The Book of Ruth
Jane Hamilton

The Dark Tower VII
Stephen King

The Heart of Islam
Seyyed Hossein Nasr

Yes, Yes, Cherries
Mary Otis

…must learn to weep.

I am so excited! And most of you will have trouble believing this.

But first, add to the original Rules of Life the following, please:
.1. Pursue knowledge. Always and forever.
.2. Never think that you are complete, or that you are good enough or that you can not be bettered.
&
.3. When you feel the need to compare yourself to someone, make certain that the person chosen is better than you; for to improve yourself, you must always aspire to those greater than you.

So…last week, I’m walking around the Crack section of a majour department store one of the foundations of CANADA that is now owned by Americans when a stunning pair of Crack caught my eye.

Imagine it: Wedge heels vertically striped with half a centimeter of taupe and then half a centimeter of candy apple red. Beautiful. But it gets better! They are an open-toed sides-open back-closed lacquered candy apple red. AND they had a little bow at the back of the shoe, right where the top of the lacquered red touches your skin.

Quite literally, I salivated.

The cost was normal; Crack does not come cheap, and this Crack was $138.

I walked away and came back and thought about it and tried them on and walked away again and played a little peekaboo with the Crack while no one was looking. I may have even winked a little wink and blown a little kiss Crack’s way, but no one can prove anything.

I decided not to purchase the Crack because I chose to pursue knowledge instead. Now, as you know, I’ve been getting to know Islam for the past little while and will continue to do so Inshallah for the rest of my life, knowing fully-well there will be ebbs and flows in the voracity of that pursuit.

The knowledge I chose to pursue, the cost of which was near $200, but the reprecussions of which will render me a smartie pantes? Your webMama will soon be the proud owner of :

.A. “What Happened to Poetry? ” A discourse on the disappearance of poetry by the director of the Zaytuna Institute in California, Shaykh Hamza Yusuf Hanson.

.B. “Foundations of Islam” Insightful, intellectual presentation about Islam made to non-Muslim educators. Topics include: How the Quran Was Revealed and Compiled Pillars of Practice, Articles of Faith, Concept of Ihsan, Signs of the Last Day and more.

.C. “Islam In America: A Panel Discussion”

.D. “A Return to the Spirit: Questions & Answers” This final work of the greatly revered Martin Lings opens with an insightful autobiographical account of his own interior journey, the finding of a spiritual master, and the conclusions he ultimately reached regarding the inner life and Islam. The 96-year-old author, a respected British scholar, recounts the lessons learned from his life including the answers to profound questions such as: How did I come to put First things First?, What is the Spiritual Significance of Tears and Laughter?, What is the Spiritual Significance of Civilization?, What is the Qur’anic Doctrine of the Afterlife?

Prior to publication of this volume, its distinguished author, Martin Lings, did in fact “return to the Spirit” on May 12th 2005. This has occasioned the addition to this work of an “In Memoriam” appendix. Readers will be treated to tributes that have arrived from the world over written by those who simply read and loved his work to those who knew him personally, some of whom were under his spiritual direction. These diverse accounts of this extraordinary man round out a profound image of his person. The book also includes a selection of previously unpublished photographs taken throughout his life.

A special “In Memoriam” section includes words from Shaykh Hamza Yusuf.

.E. “Purification of the Heart” 17 CD SET, The suffering of the world is spoken of in term of wars, starvation, hatred, competition, and the struggle of the survival of the fittest. Yet all the suffering of the world originates in the human heart. Every crime committed, every act of oppression, every callous cruelty, and every injustice to the self or others emanates from the hearts of men.

The soundest of hearts was the heart of the Messenger of Allah (pbuh) who, through his purity and singularity of intention, transformed the world. His teaching remains and the challenge is for each of us to take it and to transform our hearts with it, thereby, transforming the very world in which we live.

Courtesy of Alhambra Productions. Shurkan!

YAY!!!! I AM SO EXCITED, I AM NEARLY JUMPING OUT OF MY SKIN!!!!
YAY!!!! I AM GOING TO BE SUCH A SMARTIE PANTS!!!!
YAY!!!! ALHAMDULILAH!!!! YAY!!!!

But before I can be a smartie pants, I am going to go wear a little dress and pretty golden Crack and twirl around so that my dress can twirl really high and over objects.

This man, Imam Zaid Shakir, has a capcity to stir my heart. In light of what is happening across this world and what has been brought home to the likes of people I love (Tamara) in Virginia, I think the message in this video is timely.

It is a 28 minute speech and it might just touch your heart (please note he begins the lecture with a short few words in Arabic, less than a minute). I was listening to this on my iPod and I had to listen to it in short intervals because I found myself overwhelmed by his message.

If his words have spoken to you as they have to me, then take a little walk through his home on the interWeb and listen to other lectures and read some of his work (scroll down).

I would love to hear your thoughts on the lecture.

**Please note new Learn about Islam link on right hand side.

.1. How ridiculous this notion of Quebec as a ‘Nation’.

.2. I am very happy about Correa’s win.

& I’ve had a lot on my mind and hence the ‘no blog zone’ as of late; I promise to write something soon enough…

Thanks to Anjum for pointing the way to the incredible project titled PostSecret. I’ve just placed my order for the three books (two already published, one to be released in January 2007).

I’ve decided to buy a stack of postcards and send them into this thing; recommend you do the same. It’s cathartic to just think about what I’d write.

…, I do not intend to enter the fray of this debate. It is much beyond my humble abilities to understand the logic of the Pope. But I cannot overlook one passage, which concerns me too, as an Israeli living near the fault-line of this ‘war of civilizations’.”

For those of you familiar with Uri Avnery’s writing, it will come as no surprise that he provides the best response to the Pope’s recent quote (quote-unquote)** mistake.

Please take a moment to read the article.

**thanks, Espy.

.1. I finally got all of my Holiday cards out, and this year >> I had enough time to write special and unique notes in each and every one. I’ve been working on them for quite some time, so it was a great feeling to dump the last of them in the mail.

.2. Forgot to mention this. While in NYC, T, E & I were walking down the street discussing fortunes, futures and what-have-you. Then, suddenly, we found ourselves standing in front of a Tarot Card Reader’s shop and so – as fate had placed her before us – we had her read our cards.

I was the first in and this is what she said to me, The Creepy Card Lady With The Black Eyes And No Pupils:
- I was a leader.
- People are drawn to me.
- I will have a very long life.
- Am chaste (she used the ‘V’ word).
- I have been traveling too much & running away from something. What I need is to calm down and stop running. Instead, I must stay in one place long enough to work on my self and face whatever it is I am running from.
- I must let go of a man whom I have loved for the last three years.
- I will be with a man before November (she didn’t specify a year, and it’s obviously not November of 2005).
- I am not allowed to pursue him. Rather, he is the sort of man who has to come after me (otherwise, he will not appreciate yours truly). She kept repeating: “Let him come after you. This is very important!”
- Our relationship was going to be strong, intense and passionate from the get-go. This also means we will hit some rough patches at the beginning, but we will make it through them because we won’t be able to walk away from one another no matter how angry either of us may be.
- He will be older than me.
- He will be rich.
- With this man in my life, she saw much travel and a lot of palm trees.
- I will be married within two years’ time.

I wish I could tell you that this is nonsense, but she nailed a few things on the head
(hence why we called her ‘Creepy’)…and not just with me, but also with T & especially with E. It really was: The Creepy Card Lady With The Black Eyes And No Pupils.

And she was pregnant, and I’ve always believed that pregnancy brings on special powers (not the kind that come with a cape and really neat boots).

.3. Was watching people at the bus stop today and thought how like March of the Humans it all appeared. Odd, really. First bus arrived, was filled rather quickly and left approx half of the line behind.

All in line donned dark coloured jackets & even darker knit caps, but wore light coloured scarves. After the first bus left, they slowly shuffled forward, in one single polite line, and waited for the second bus to arrive. No one turned to speak to an other, no one smiled, no one listened to music; they all just stared straight ahead, waiting for the bus to arrive and whisk them off to their…life, I guess.

Although no such thing happened, I half expected a penguin to walk out and greet them. Maybe hand them a cola, or something.

.4. Recall above mentioned “single polite line”.

Right. Well, when the second bus arrived, it pulled up not as it should have, at the beginning of the line, but rather, somewhere in the middle of the line.

Polite no more! The people started shoving and hollering at one another. Elbows were flying, toques were being ripped off, gloves thrown in the air. Several eye-glasses were crushed as bus riders prepared to roll whoever cut in front of them.

All of this may not sound so odd to you, but the reality is that it was all very strange to watch: After all, there were only four people in line.

.5. I have cut all stimulants from my life because – as D has said – I am already over-stimulated enough.

No more caffeine of any sort (e.g. coffee, tea and chocolate). This is quite difficult because am a bona fide coffeeholic. I once drank at least 5 or 6 (ok. Perhaps more & this was only last week…) cups a day, but last Tuesday, I decided to cut this out cold turkey.

So far, so good.

My heart isn’t racing as much, and I am quite a bit more calm than before. Although my energy level remains the same, it is a different sort of energy (meaning: I can catch my breath regularly).

.6. I must buy another Jeanette Winterson book, and soon. I finished Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit a couple of weeks ago and am already having withdrawal from her stories.

.1. I pulled out all of my U2 CDs and loaded them into my iTunes. While doing this, I found that I had two copies of the Achtung Baby CD.

And then I remembered why.

I pulled out the inside covers and found a note in the proper one.

While in 4th year university, I was given this second copy of the CD from a boy whose initial I won’t even place on this blog. He was…a little agitated with me…and decided that:

“Maha:
Tracks 5, 6 and 11 should be your national anthem.”

Respectively, he’s talking about:
Whose Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses
So Cruel
&
Acrobat

My initial thought was: Can I have three anthems?
And then I contemplated: Should he have an ‘s’ at the end of ‘anthem’?

Today I’m thinking: He must have really disliked me.

Anyone want a used Achtung Baby CD? (Disgruntled Note included.)

.2. I’ve recently thought about Damiana and the 90 year old in Garcia Marquez’s Memories of My Melancholy Whores, and unlike my initial impression, I gotta tell ‘ya…I’m not all too pleased with either of these characters at the moment.

It really must have been my mood and the atmosphere, because now I think: Damiana’s an idiot for loving anyone for 20 weeks, let alone 20 years (!), who couldn’t love her back; and the 90 year old is just a coward.

Erm. I still do recommend you read the book. If not for anything, the writing is beautiful (or, I should write: the translation is beautiful).

.3. Remember the dudes who gave you my last musical recommendation?

Michael, who is a part of Petrol Bomb Samosa sent me an e-mail, thanking me for mentioning them (how kind!) and pointing me to their home on the interWeb (www.downdogrecords.com): Down Dog Records.

Go take a peek & make certain to listen to the mp3s; these guys are brilliant!

Support them by purchasing from them directly…

.4. The Philosopher Kings are finally working on new tunes (finally!).

In preparation for what will hopefully be an excellent new set from these masters, download The New Messiah (but not the live version). It’s good for nights like tonight, when the wind’s rattling your windows…

Am currently on a Gabriel Garcia Marquez bonanza. I am re-reading three of his works at the same time and wanted to share two things with you

The first is a short quote that is very poignant because I have always believed that nostalgia is one word for ‘bored with today’. It doesn’t mean that you are weeping or are sad for the past, but that you don’t believe – usually subconsciously – that your present is worth paying attention to. As soon as I realized that, I tried to get rid of the word ‘nostalgia’** from my own personal lexicon and tried to pay attention to details of right now. (**Another word I try to never use the active of is ‘regret’; that’s another blog entry saved for another rainy day.)

Naturally, it’s impossible not to rethink and review the past – be it for signs we missed or mere curiosity to understand a current situation – but the essence of nostalgia is usually rooted in some sort of melancholy, and so it is fitting that the title of Marquez’s work of art is Memories of my Melancholy Whores.

The quote is: ”The adolescents of my generation, greedy for life, forgot in body and soul about their hopes for the future until reality taught them that tomorrow was not what they had dreamed, and they discovered nostalgia”. (p. 38)

&

Yesterday morning while looking out through windows peeking at snow covered streets and yellow trees, I was drinking my morning coffee, listening to jazz and the following made me so sad I actually cried for both of them…

Damiana has served as the maid of the book’s main character for years; today he turns 90 …

“I could not resist the temptation to ask: Tell me something, Damiana: what do you recall? I wasn’t recalling anything, she said, but your question makes me remember. I felt a weight in my chest. I’ve never fallen in love, I told her. She replied without hesitation: I have. And she concluded, not interrupting her work: I cried over you for twenty-two years. My heart skipped a beat. Looking for a dignified way out, I said: We would have made a good team. Well, it’s wrong of you to say so now, she said, because you’re no good to me anymore even as a consolation. As she was leaving the house, she said in the most natural way: You won’t believe me but thanks be to God, I’m still a virgin.

A short while later I discovered that she had left vases filled with red roses all over the house, and a card on my pillow: I hope you reach a hunnert.” (p. 39 & 40)

I wish to close my eyes, sink in to a very thick, soft & warm chair while Gabriel Garcia Marquez reads his stories to me.

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Words & things

.1. Once again, I find myself seated at my second favorite Bridgehead location, the one in Westboro Village, down the street from both my father’s home as well as T & R’s little home. The best thing about Bridgehead is they have a ton of outlets (plug ins?) all over the shop so that you can plug in your laptop and type away.

Have made the mistake of forgetting my earphones, so can’t listen to what I have staring at me; Aerosmith’s Greatest Hits looks terribly disgruntled to be a mere table top piece at the moment, pissed that it has been trumped by some brilliant Indian remixes playing overhead.

.2. Have had another whirlwind day today, and my body’s actually aching but I can’t seem to commit myself to going home and doing nothing….Why? Because Dr. Phil would call me a loser.

.3. A few days back, I happened to stumble on to Dr. Phil, who I’ve always avoided listening to because every time I see him, his fat little fingers are judgmentally pointing at the person in front of him. As I was attempting to escape from the hell of his making, I accidentally hit the Guide button on my remote control rather than the Next button and so was left with enough time to hear him say: “You are a loser”.

I was seated in my apartment alone and feared that Dr. Phil was looking into my living room. Paralyzed, I was left looking over both my left and right shoulders to confirm that I was in fact alone (I was, damn it). Left with no choice, I had to confirm that the Dr. wasn’t speaking to me.

Dr. Phil said (and please pay close attention): “There are two kinds of people in this world, Tom. There are the winners and there are the losers. Do you know what separates a Winner from a Loser, Tom?”

Camera pans to Tom, who is staring at his savior and in a state of near hysteria. Tom is going to cry because Dr. Phil just called him a Loser (the only thing missing was for Dr. Phil to make the gigantic ‘L’ sign on his forehead and in tandem point at Tom, and then break into his own rendition of “Show me the money!”) on national television.

Dr. Phil continued to wag his fat finger at Tom and finally said: “Winners DO, Tom.”

Tom fell to the floor, started wailing and slobbering while the camera panned over the audience who was all nodding in agreement, silently judging Tom the Loser.

Note to you: Tom did no such thing.

Note to you 2: Wouldn’t you want to break Dr. Phil’s finger if he did that to you? Mind you, if you’re psychotic enough to go on his show and air your dirty laundry, you may just be a Loser.

And the moral of this particular Random Note is that you should DO or else you’re a Loser, and so I have been DOING all over the place.

.4. There are those of us who DO and remain to be Losers; The woman who was doing all of Congress and then blogging about it, is one such prime example (her name escapes me, and I am not interested in getting sued).

.5. This morning, I was asked what sport I would like to take up, given the choice of all sports. I chose surfing because I am drawn to the water and there’s something about the culture of surfing that puts me at ease and makes me happy. Frankly, I haven’t met a surfer I didn’t love.

Point Break taught me that.

What’s the problem with this choice? I live in Ottawa and the only surfers I know don’t live in Ottawa. Besides, there are no ‘Learn How to Surf in the Privacy of Your Own Living Room’ videos.

Sometimes, it’s hard to have this kind of imagination.

.6. I have always been drawn to the cello and have been flirting with the idea of taking cello lessons.

To escape the title of Loser from Dr. Phil, I am going to do my dandiest to start cello lessons in January.

Note to self: Shall become a brilliant cellist who wears killer heels as she plays the cello (because the cello was made to accentuate a woman’s heels) and Tamer Hagras will not be able to live without me, and so will call my father and 2ukhtubni. I will only be allowed to play cello for him. In heels.

.8. Immediately after I left you yesterday, I dropped into the fiction section of Chapter’s to see if they carried any of Winterson’s books (that I didn’t hold). Considering that I still had Lighthouse Keeping unopened, I wasn’t certain that I wanted to purchase another, but I did, because I am some kind of book monster at heart.

I picked her up and went down to the counter, and noticed two guys in red shirts giving people massages. Note: This is Chapter’s, not a spa.

When I was up to pay for Winterson, I asked the girl at the cash what was happening, and her response was: “They work here”, which struck me as odd, because they were massaging people…neither reading to them, nor dog-earing their books.

Needless to say, one of the young men giving the massage noticed the look of confusion on my face and asked if I wanted a massage (a sure-fire way to remove said look of confusion, no doubt).

I declined and asked him what he was doing and why, when I noticed what was written on the back of his t-shirt.

They were the Extreme Kindness crew, and a couple of years back these boys traveled all across Canada and committed random acts of kindness (my favorite being their random act of kindness in Montreal, because they all have Enrique Iglesias bodies). Their thing is to pay it forward, to make someone’s day, causing a chain reaction of random acts of kindness.

They’re brilliant. And they’re super hot and I can guarantee that they wouldn’t get away with half of what they did if they didn’t look like rock stars and/or extreme athletes. Check out their site (which needs to be updated severely) and read about them, they’ve got something good to say and something each of us should carry with us daily.

I chatted with Val, who told me I had a dynamic personality. That was his random act of kindness for Saturday.

Note to Val: Start that blog, already. I’ll link to you.

If you are a senior executive at Tim Horton’s, contact these boys and do a commercial with them; they represent what we hope is the Canadian spirit, and their little videos show us just how happy they are to be Canadian.

But if you are Tim Horton’s, keep your involvement in their affairs minimal and keep your grubby corporate hands in your own pockets; these boys do good, and should be left to do their own thing…with maximum sponsorship and minimal infringement and coercion from a corporation.

Same to the ‘I Am Canadian’ crew; These boys are the Canadian dream come true.

I have decided to link to them, because they’re on the right side.

.1. Had an unexpected and (as always) wonderful evening with Heidi last night, which no matter what the topic always found itself back to Heidi banging her fists down on the kitchen table and saying “I hate the patriarchy”, while smiling that devastating smile of hers.

.2. Unfortunately, the rest of my evening…well, more like from 2:00 a.m. until 10:00 a.m….took a turn for the worse. I have not had any sleep because of certain circumstances that were completely beyond my control and am physically exhausted. Although all is well now and everyone home and safe, I still can’t seem to sleep, not even by force, and so have decided to simply spend some time writing and searching for that silver cloud.

.3. See: Am delusional due to the exhaustion. I called it the silver cloud rather than the silver lining.

.4. And I found that silver ‘cloud’ (because it really is so much larger than mere lining) in my Yahoo! e-mail account only moments ago.

.5. My friend A is leaving for London, England and I am convinced that this is yet another sign for me to go back there again and visit; even if it is for a short weekend trip to hang out with Hannah. I envy that he is going and I must remember to keep my eyes peeled for tickets.

.6. Speaking of eyes, my eyes currently look as though someone took a tub of black Indian ink and poured it into my pupils. This morning I had my yearly eye exam and my Doctor dilated my pupils.

Now I can’t see because it’s too sunny. I am squinting and I am only allowed to work on the computer or read without my glasses on (for at least a few more hours, anyway).

.7. I want to share with you one of the multitude of brilliant passages from Jeanette Winterson’s The Passion. This is one of the two main characters speaking about war and women, it is the Frenchman named Henri:

When we came here, we came from our mothers and sweethearts. We were still used to our mothers with their work-hard arms that could clout the strongest of us and leave our ears ringing. And we courted our sweethearts in the country way. Slow, with the fields that ripen at harvest. Fierce, with the sows that rut the earth. Here, without women, with only our imaginations and a handful of whores, we can’t remember what it is about women that can turn a man through passion into something holy. Bible words again, but I am thinking of my father who shaded his eyes on those sunburnt evenings and learnt to take his time with my mother. I am thinking of my mother with her noisy heart and of all the women waiting in the fields for the men who drowned yesterday and all the mothers’ sons who have taken their place.
We never think of them here. We think of their bodies and now and then we talk about home but we don’t think of them as they are; the most solid, the best loved, the well known.
They go on. Whatever we do or undo, they go on.
-The Passion, Jeanette Winterson, p. 29.

.9. I have been searching for an inspired character to place into a book I started to write in August of last year, and I think that, perhaps, that character may be Tamer Hagras. Am still undecided, but when he comes to 2ukhtubni, we’ll mull it over casually and I’ll let him decide.

.1. These are my second set of Random Personal Notes today…and that’s because it’s just one of those days. It may not happen again for a while, so enjoy it.

.2. I am reading Jeanette Winterson’s The Passion (unrelated to The Christ), and so because it is centered around the time and reign of Napoleon Bonaparte, today’s lunch hour took me for a spin on Napoleon’s life and quotes. Surprisingly, I found that it was he (and not Cummings, as I had originally thought) that said the brilliant: “Fortune is like a woman – if you miss her today, think not to find her tomorrow.”

Note to self: Perhaps it is the short men to whom I should be paying more attention.

Note to self 2: Short men it is, for after all, they do possess the excellent dancing height for a partner, when am not in heels.

Q for you: Do you think Napoleon knew how to do a jig?

.3. I think that a part of me has to always be tortured to a certain degree in order to peek my interest with regards to the situation (any situation) at hand.

Note to you: Am not even goth (am almost always in white).

.4. I have discovered the anklette. Unlike the Rockette, they don’t dance…but are most definitely a brilliant make of nylon. When next you see me and am in heels, look for them at my ankles.

.5. I spoke with Holt Renfrew’s Office of Executive Experience this morning, and am to receive word of how they plan on resolving my six month wait without the black shoe. Will update you asap (because I know you’ve been waiting with baited breath since early this morning).