NUMB!!!

I have been working and working and working. These past days have been interesting but interesting is a fleeting concept on its own. Day before yesterday, I flew for the first time in a helicopter. I saw my office building and my home from the air. I went to Balakot to see how the rescue operations were going. The field hospital setup by the Arabs is very efficient I must say and they have all the latest equipment. Since all the doctors and paramedical staff there were Arabs, I actually felt like I was back in KSA. The helicopter pilot was American and he as kind enough to take me to see Balakot. For once I was glad to see everything from the air. Even from that distance, the devastation is absolute. There is no other way about it. It’s like when you’re a kid and you play with your building blocks and if you don’t like what you build, you destroy it with one sweep of your hands. Everything goes to waste…that’s how it is looked…wasted!

Yesterday Sajeela called me to go shopping for Usman and Saba’s wedding present. We had been debating over what to get for Saba for a long time and we knew what she wanted. Jewelry!!! So we went and bought her this really nice kundan ka set. It’s funny really. I have bought so many wedding related things I really ought to become a wedding planner. I am living the life of a wedding planner, might as well make some money out of it as well.

Anyhoo, buying a present from Usman was not easy. Sajeela and I went everywhere we could think of. I went to Junaid Jamshed cuz I thought a nice khaddar stole would be nice but they had lousy stuff. Illusions, Haroon’s good stuff, nothing for Usman. So maybe I will just get him a perfume. During our shopping expedition, Sajeela and I kept on talking about how a few years from now Usman would be fat like any other businessman but Saba would still be skinny cuz she worries too much. I am so happy for both of them MashaAllah. It’s good to see that even in this day and age people still find happiness. My two good friends made for eachother, I guess in some cases there are happily ever afters.

I had to interview two ex-pats yesterday. The girl is a 24 year old civil engineer and the guy is a naval aviator. I thought it was so cute when I asked him how he decided to join the air force. He was like ‘I just loved Top Gun’. I think all of us loved Top Gun but how many actually get to live their dream.

Interviews done and over with, I came back, talked dogar sahib to let me go early and take the weekend off which should be off in the first place. I came home and talked to Iram about meeting up today for the rugby thing. Turned out she has an exam on Monday so now I have no one to go with. I missed Shan so much yesterday. I went up to the roof and stayed there till my fingers were numb and blue with cold and me, I think I have been blue and numb for a long time now. I need to be numb, there’s no other way to survive really.

I kept waking up through the night, looking at time and I didn’t relax till the sehri time passed. I tried sleeping in the morning but I couldn’t. So I spent the morning just roaming around, offered my Zuhr prayers and went to Sanny’s.

Sanny was rearranging the furniture in her room and putting up new blinds. So we arranged her room and then sat and talked. I like decorating rooms; I only don’t get a chance to do that very much.

I have been thinking. Do we somehow know what’s going to happen to us? Deep down inside, do we have an inkling of what the coming days store for us? I think we do. I listened to Sarah Mac’s ‘arms of the angel’ in college and it has meant so much to me. It hold true especially today and something inside me, tells me that it always will.

Spend all your time waiting
For that second chance
For a break that would make it okay
There's always one reason
To feel not good enough
And it's hard at the end of the day
I need some distraction
Oh beautiful release
Memory seeps from my veins
Let me be empty
And weightless and maybe
I'll find some peace tonight

In the arms of an angel
Fly away from here
From this dark cold hotel room
And the endlessness that you fear
You are pulled from the wreckage
Of your silent reverie
You're in the arms of the angel
May you find some comfort there

So tired of the straight line
And everywhere you turn
There's vultures and thieves at your back
And the storm keeps on twisting
You keep on building the lie
That you make up for all that you lack
It don't make no difference
Escaping one last time
It's easier to believe in this sweet madness oh
This glorious sadness that brings me to my knees

In the arms of an angel
Fly away from here
From this dark cold hotel room
And the endlessness that you fear
You are pulled from the wreckage
Of your silent reverie
You're in the arms of the angel
May you find some comfort there
You're in the arms of the angel
May you find some comfort here