What type of person do I want to become?

At this stage in my life, I have no idea where I'm heading. To be completely honest I have never wanted to take responsibility for my actions and always relied on mother to decide what to do for me. On that note, I would like to shower my mom with appraisal as I would not be where I am today if it wasn't for her support and constant nagging about my college applications. I would've wasted an entire year of my life doing nothing, which in this very competitive world would've been a disadvantage when getting a job. But I am to blame for my own lackings, and no matter how much someone's mother cares, it is his or her responsibility to take decisions seriously when it is regarding one's future, which I did not at all. My own brother, who is well-established in my own family's eyes, is a good role model to look upto and I - no matter how much I tell myself I don't - hate him for that as I feel the overbearing burden of keeping up with the expectations from my parents, even if they won't admit that.

So, as the title says, what do I want to become? There's one thing I want to do, and that's to help people. Now, you may think that is indeed a very 'noble' of me, but to be completely honest, I only want to help people because my idol helps people in his adventures. My idol is a fictional character from an anime called 'One Piece' and in short, he is a pirate who goes from island to island and ends up saving the island's peoples' problems he visits... with his fists. But that's not what I'm going to do, but I want to help people in some sort of way to prove to myself I care. I'm not impeccably selfish, but I feel like I don't care about the people around me as much as should. My friend, on the other hand, the one I made at uni, is a person who cares about other people when he doesn't have to. I am glad that I met him because, to be completely honest, his interactions with people even in chicken shops is something I learned as he didn't act cold when placing his order, he asked about her life, and she opened up to him about her whole life story. I felt annoyed at first because I was having a bad day, but then I realized that I would have never asked how she was doing, let alone be able to start a whole conversation. Having him around has really helped me dealing with some personal problems, as he is a genuinely down-to-earth guy that just wants the best for his friends, and I think that's the only thing that matters and am really happy that he is in my life (no homo XD).

So, back to my initial question, what do I want to become? Well, in terms of getting a job I still have no idea, but I really hope that my family's pride will not be shattered if I want to do a job that will help people around the world, even if it may have low pay. Coming from a South-East Asian family a 'socially acceptable' job has to be taken like being a banker, engineer, doctor etc. which I do not care for at all. I guess the point of writing all of this is to say that I don't want to become some corporate drone that works from 9 to 5, and with a promotion can afford a Rolex working over time so that he can show it off to friends and family. But when you spend so much time working, who will you show it off to? I would rather make aggressively medium money and spend it with my friends and most importantly family. Research even shows that people are tend to be more satisfied with their lives if they are around good friends and family.

Hopefully in the future I can be caring like my friends and be socially adept in awkward situations. I wish I had realized sooner, but there is so much you can do in your life, so I guess following your ambitions is the least anybody can try to achieve. I guess it would be better to be failing in doing the right thing then succeeding in doing the wrong.

At the end of the day, I may end up becoming a corporate sellout, funneling money directly or indirectly to the wealthiest people in the world, but there is enough wealth in this world to go around. I think, being part of the generation which has the responsibility to solve the energy crisis and promoting sustainable development, we should be worried about saving our lives and God forbid maybe our children's and grandchildren's. Money can't save the world, or buy freedom and peace. I recently heard a quote that had resonated with me and would like to end this post with it:

"When the last tree has been cut down, the last fish caught, the last river poisoned, only then will we realize that one cannot eat money."
-Cree Indian Proverb

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Hope you enjoyed this one, if you like what you see you know what to do! ;)

-Saquib

Am I a Good Man? - a short story

DISCLAIMER: THE CONTENT ON THIS BLOG ARE MY OWN CREATIONS AND THOUGHTS. I APOLOGISE, IF THE CONTENT OFFENDS ANYONE INTENTIONALLY OR UNINTENTIONALLY. This story does not reflect recent events and are a work of fiction. 

Am I a Good Man?

It was a different kind of day for the man. Wiping the tear of his face as he had wept himself to sleep last night, he started to realize that today had to be treated like any other day, to get over his recent loss. He staggered out of bed and averted his eyes from the pictures of his young daughter and all the flowers and sweets that he had received in the past few days. Even though the man was always kept to himself, he had always cared about his daughter, and with her mother passing away from an illness a year ago, he had to be both parents to a lower-middle class family which he couldn’t afford. He had recently started to doubt himself: am I a good man? Recently he had started to feel as if his own doings had led to the ordeals he had been encountering. After the passing away of his wife, he became cold, and stopped talking to his neighbors, scolding his tenants for no good reason. He didn’t communicate with his daughter as much after that and he blames himself for her passing away, thinking that maybe it was the broken heart that took her away. But from now on he had decided that he would change his demeanor, and have a friendly attitude towards anybody he comes by. The man knew that he was trying to compensate, but even so he felt that – no matter how strange it may sound – his arrogant demeanor had led to a karmic retribution on his one and only loved one. And, so after dressing up for the office, he set out foot of his door to be a changed man.

The first thing he did after locking the door behind him was to pull up ahead of his tenants trying to desperately flee from his line of sight and give a big grin, and walked right past them without mentioning anything about the mold growing in their apartment. He had noticed that particular beggar in front of the bus stop, but in the mean streets of Islamabad nobody gave a damn about the thousands of peasants with their hands stretched out. This beggar had noticed this man didn’t pay for all this time, and in contrast had snickered that the beggar’s shortcomings in life. Not that he wasn’t grateful, but he didn’t like it one bit, as if it were some bad omen for a man to change so quickly.

The man gave the beggar 100 rupees, and stepped on to the bus with a big grin on his face. He felt that he was doing some good about his recent endeavor. The bus to work was a long one, and it stopped on the way to the inter-city bus station which was always jam-packed with people in this arid environment. The sweat trickling down his forehead was like the man’s conscience was being cleared. Then the man noticed a certain person sitting in front of him wearing a jacket of all things he could in this weather. He didn’t think much of it, but at the inter-city bus stop he paced frantically for the exit. As soon as the doors opened, he was out in a dash but had dropped some sort of device. The man, feeling as if this was another chance to redeem himself had without a second doubt picked up the device and walked out of the bus to follow the stranger.

*

The stranger sighed with a gasp of relief, it was finally over. He had decided that it was enough, and even if suffocating with this contraption stuck to his chest meant that he could be free, then so be it. He decided that he would leave the city, the closest bus stop being a two minute walk away. He knew what he was doing was unimaginably selfish, but he knew his young sister would want him to escape and live the rest of his life in peace and not for the remaining evening he had left in this world. The entrance to the station was only a few steps away, and with every step he was second guessing his decision whether to go through with his escape, which would inevitably lead to her death but even if he were to go through with their instructions, there was no guarantee that they would let her live regardless of his actions. Then, at the foot of the entrance to the station, someone poked him from behind, with his hands on his knees and panting furiously. “You dropped this!” he said gasping for breath. The stranger looked at the device, and he knew. Although he hadn’t lived for very long considering he only just became a teenager, he knew that this was fate, and he was absolutely certain now that he couldn’t abandon his sister. The boy replied, “yes thank you uncle for bringing this back to me”. The man asked him “son, are you crazy that you are wearing a jacket in this hot weather?” The boy smirked at the man and with a slight hint of anguish in his voice he responded “I think I am”.

*

The stranger darted of in another direction without another word, and the man lost sight of him in the hustle and bustle of the station. For a young boy with such a big belly he sure walked really fast. The man realized that the device he had picked up was a phone, as if it had been taken apart and put back together with additional circuitry sticking out from the sides. One thing that stood out was the beeping red light but the man didn’t care too much for that as he felt that he had done his good deed for the day, even if it meant being late for the office. So he waited for another 30 minutes to jump on the next bus to work in the congested streets of Islamabad.

A Wonderful World - a short story

A Wonderful World

“It is a wonderful world”, she thought to herself. The lady sipping her drink with a lavish dress that made her sparkle like a ruby, her body slumped on the chair with her ever-lasting legs spread out in such a fashion that would make any man’s head spin if looked at the right angle. She was beautiful she thought, but tonight was the night that she felt more beautiful than ever. She felt complete than she did ever since her marriage with her husband. It wasn’t always like this. But marriage gets to even the best of us and it is all about how you handle it, and after all “familiarity breeds contempt”.

                                                            

The night had gone exactly as planned, the five star hotel had lived up to their expectations, and the husband had looked forward to treating his wife to a nice night out in the city, where there marriage was facing some problems a year before as the husband had failed to keep his carnal desires in check when it came to women other than his wife. His wife was torn apart, but they were over that now. Things were finally looking up for the couple. They proceeded to drink at the hotel bar to their heart’s content to celebrate this momentous occasion. Once they had one drink too many, both of them decided to turn in for the night and by the time they had reached the floor for their room they were devouring each other’s mouth and had to take a break for the husband to use the bathroom. That was when it happened. The husband leaving his phone on the dresser, had started ringing. The wife, trying to put on some more lavish lipstick to further accentuate her beauty for her lovely husband – or so she thought – looked at the phone to read a simple three word text “I love you”.

Fast-forwarding to the present, she pilfered a glance to her husband lying on the hotel bed, looking up at the ceiling with a resting, satisfied look on his face. Pondering about the marriage that had made her feel alive and also made her feel the loneliest person in the world, she felt that it had all come to a full circle tonight. The pain was gone for the first time in a long time she had left the embrace of her childhood, gone was the endearing heart burn that was her miscarriage and gone was a little piece of humanity that would haunt her for the rest of her life. But for this moment, for the few seconds of relief that she would be able to enjoy from the boredom that was her life, the excruciating struggle of her mundane lifestyle that had made her doubt her career choices and second-guessing the thought of having kids; all of those doubts, the dread was gone. She felt peace, but in a way that she never thought she would ever feel and in a very strange way she enjoyed it. The only problem was that the ringing in her ears wouldn’t stop, the constant ringing that felt like head was being ripped apart as if someone was tearing away her two cortexes like tearing paper. But she didn’t care, today was a great day in her mind and a day full of revelations that she thinks has helped her marriage beyond what she could’ve ever imagined. She gazed up to look at her reflection in the mirror of the dresser and couldn’t believe how happy she looked.

She put on some more red lipstick with frivolous look on her face and the reflection in the mirror gave a sinister smirk as she proceeded to remove the smudges of blood from her face. Her husband lay there smiling on the bed, as if he had been freed from the agony, with the blood slowly blotting his shirt that his wife had bought him for this occasion. The life in his eyes had gone but he died smiling.

The wife looked down at the gun that she had used. The smirk from her face disappeared as she had finally grasped with had happened in the last few moments, and suddenly the reflection of the person in the mirror had a look of despair on her face. There was a commotion outside as other people had stepped outside of their rooms and lifts of the hotel floor had started dinging at their floor. She drank the remaining vodka martini with a single gulp and started feeling drowsy as she took the ‘murder weapon’ in her hand once more. Her hands trembling, she put it upto her head, with a single tear slowly rolling down her cheek as she whimpered thinking about the false sense of justice she had felt. And never in a million years did she think that she would ever think that it was her time to say “it WAS a wonderful world”.

This was my first attempt at a short story, well a very short story. So, please if you like my content follow my blog and if you do not like what you see, please leave constructive criticism in the comments :).

-Saquib

Why I inspire to be like Luffy

This is a post I have really thought about and have edited considerably given the nature of the topic I'm about to discuss. The man I idolize is from a fictional world, but can his aspirations be a conduit for 'Wimpy Asians' like me to succeed in life? What does Luffy (loo-fi), the future Pirate King do so differently that makes me want to be like him? I don't want to delve into a deep psychoanalysis of my self or anything, but I think that the titular character from the show, 'One Piece' is just not another hero figure, but I think there is something more heartfelt about the character's story.

The most important thing that makes me feel that he is different from the stereotypical heroes from cartoons and all that is the fact that he doesn't say much. Luffy is probably the only character in the show, if you think about it carefully, isn't really known for being smart. He barely has any common sense, and unsurprisingly being a pirate he lacks manners, which is from the fact that his guardian had left him to be brought up by a pack of thieves in the middle of a forest! Apart from that, Luffy has had no formal education, and the fact he understands what he does is kind of surprising to say the least. But his unique quality springs from his simple but very relatable quotes in context of the moment. To be honest, the most amazing thing about this protagonist is the fact that his actions literally speak louder than words in the sense that although being the main character of this vastly expansive world 'One Piece' is set in and thus may not get enough "screen time" due to the many subplots that into the overall story arc, his impact on the story is widely received with awe as his actions are somewhat unpredictable.

Even Luffy (as awesome as he his) had a role model who initially sparked his interest in becoming a pirate, the warmhearted 'Shanks'. When this pirate was visiting Luffy's hometown when he was young, the boy had interacted with Shanks and became quick friends with the humble person that he is. One day, a bandit had entered the pub that the captain's crew had usually had sake (japanese beer) in and made a fool out of the kindhearted pirate by spilling sake and embarrassing him in front of his crew without knowing that the bandit was infinitely inferior to that of Shank's crew. The bandit soon left, and the captain and his crew laughed it off which had left Luffy enraged that Shank's did not fight back. Shank's simply replied "he just spilt a little sake". This led to Luffy confronting the leader of the bandit to protect Shank's honor at a later time, who kidnapped the little boy to drown him in front of the whole town to see. The reason I am saying all of this is because of the quote that had inspired Luffy to become a man like Shanks when Shanks had confronted the bandit, "You can spill drinks on me, even spit on me. I'll just laugh about it. But If you dare to hurt my friends... I WON'T FORGIVE YOU!". From that moment on Luffy had learnt what it means to be a man, to protect your friends and their honor rather than your own.

One of the many anecdotes from the manga would give you an idea about the type of person Luffy aspires to be, but in the end the author also highlights the fact that Luffy is a pirate, and thus being a hero is not his 'piece of cake'. No matter how dumb the meat loving pirate is, he will always have a special place in my heart as the anime had really instigated my own downfalls when it had come to friendships and all that, when I realized that I had not become friends with the right people at school; people who genuinely might have not wanted the best for me.

Quintessentially the main thing I wanted to say was that Luffy is a person who does what he loves, and loves the way he does it. That may sound very stupid, but from all the real world people like linguists who are congratulated like my friend who idolizes 'Noam Chomsky' or another more cynical friend who actually praises Donald Trumps best moments, these are the people I don't really see taking the world by storm. People like these... they are but words and no action, no matter how much dilly-dallying one does will not justify a certain politicians rude and consistently inconsistent statements. A man like Luffy may not exist in our universe, I do understand that, but the basic spirit of a man's dreams will always be the same - same fiction or non-fiction. All these politicians, journalists, lawyers and even what I could become - an economist - just talk (a lot). In my mind, real people just go and change the world without hesitating, something I wish I can do.

I am not undermining the use of language to make a difference, but in my perspective I have learnt a lot about life lessons and unwavering conviction from a man who is possibly 'below average' in a fictional world than I have from people in the real world. Our world breeds contempt, hatred and jealousy but in a manga for kids I have understood about loss, pain, and sorrow than I ever would from a real life story. The story of a 19-year old teenager who knew no better is probably the best story I have ever read and am forever grateful to have stumbled upon it. In my earlier post I had mentioned about becoming Pirate King as my dream, and no matter how stupid it may sound, it seems possible week by week as the story progresses because at the end of the day your idol is supposed to make you feel like you can do anything. And if Luffy can become Pirate King, then so can I!

-->Please excuse grammatical errors and mistakes, I stayed up at 3 AM to write this even though my university assignment deadline is only a very few days away which should be spent more productively! But as always, please do leave a comment on what you think about whatever I rambled on about and share this article if you liked it. Also, please follow my blog if you would like more!

-Saquib

My very stupid dream

THOSE OF YOU THAT DON'T WATCH ANIME OR THINK IT'S FOR KIDS PLEASE SHY AWAY FROM THIS ARTICLE

The epitome of my life was probably the year 2015. It was probably the year with great ups and downs; an emotional roller coaster if you will. But it goes without saying that the 'ups' were definitely much more favorable than the downs, but this post is not about that. This post is about my dream, my dream of becoming the Pirate King! Yes, pirate king! I never have told this to anybody except a few friends whom I deem to brothers but even they could not take me seriously and laughed it off and now I will be sharing my ambition with the rest of the world. Truth be told I didn't take it seriously until I pondered what it really means to be King of the Pirates, as there are still mysteries surrounding the moniker and how to become it in the show. If you have read up until this point and have not been discouraged by the ridiculous amount of 'jargon' terms in this post, I will try to make it as easy to understand as possible but without reading and staying up-to date with the manga, or Japanese comic book "One Piece" (which has been adapted to a very successful ongoing animated series), the rest of the article maybe hard to follow.

The story mainly follows a teenager, Monkey D. Luffy who wants to be Pirate King, which had been done 20 years or so prior to the storyline which was an unprecedented achievement by the likes of the very enigmatic pirate Gol D. Roger.  Now, the full details of his exploits have not been revealed in the story so far, but from what we have seen in flashbacks, he seemed to be a very awesome guy in short. But the type of person that the Pirate King was is not who I want to become, but the type of person that the Luffy perceives the Pirate King to be, and his conviction to hold that title, is what had me hooked to the show from the very start. Granted, the first few episodes were not so entertaining, but the reason I keep on watching every Sunday morning is not just for the engaging storyline and amazing action sequences, but because of the main character's conviction to, and to quote "I don't wanna conquer anything! It's just that the person with most freedom on the sea, is the Pirate King!".

The reason for saying all this is because in real life, I really didn't have an idol to look upto, but when I started watching the show I became inspired by Luffy's drive and his 'never give up atittude'. I was going through a tough time in 2014, of which I do not want to share with the rest of the world at the moment, but watching Luffy's adventure and his inspirational quotes, although they may not seem so 'classy' or thought provoking, had helped me battle my greatest fears and given me e bit of self-confidence in myself and restored faith in myself and in my abilities. The main thing I wanted to say was that to be honest anyone can aspire to become Pirate King, since the world of One Piece does not apply to our world and there is no title such as the 'Pirate King', if we aspire to become the Pirate King we may be able to become more proud of ourselves and whatever we deem fit a Pirate King should be in our eyes. When I was going through this tough time that I had mentioned I kept my held high because of Luffy's determination, willpower, and spirit and the anime had reminded me about some very important things about friendship and loyalty, in addition to a lot of other important life lessons that we know about but seeing it unravel in our own eyes in the form of a story that we really understand the drudging hardships of life in general and that we must, no matter what, always hold our head held high to see past it. This is what Luffy has taught me and I hope will continue to teach me so that I can become a Pirate King in a sentimental way. Since I am in the first year in university and have not decided a career path, 'Pirate King' does seem to be a more fulfilling way to go.

That's about it from me from my end. If you have managed to read all this please do leave a comment about my thoughts, I will try to reply as soon as possible. And I know that you may hear this often, but please follow my blog as I intend to post more in the future and if you haven't guessed already, I love anime (!) so I will try to posts related to my favorite shows.

-Saquib