The ceremony last night took place in our college’s auditorium. It was pretty informal gathering (or maybe they wanted it to be formal, but we the audience, didn’t let them). I clearly remember that two years back we gathered here, exactly in the same auditorium to select-cum-elect our original YearBook team. The major issue under discussion that day was that what kind of book should we come up. We were pretty adamant that  it should contain all the stuff which our batch shares. The people on the other side wanted to just limit it to the content which can be nicely, proudly, safely shown to one’s parents. As much as the latter idea sounds logical, I thought it was pretty dumb as we hardly did anything decent which was exciting enough to be added in the book…hehe. Kudos to the current team for finding the middle line and more or less incorporating all the stuff in such a subtle manner that I doubt any outsider can get the true scheme of things (unless your name is Waqsy).

I was sitting right in the second last row with a series of girls sitting behind me. You have to admit that you feel like pulling your hair when you go through what the girls really talk about.

gal 1: you didnt call me all this timeeee..
gal 2: you didnt call me tooo ..
gal 1: you didnt even mail meee..
gal 2: you didnt even scrap meee…
gal 1: you didnt even post meee ..

it was kinda cute at first, but later I just so had to go and get seated with my ever-so-trustful maulvi contingent which is more renowned for cracking psycho jokes in college than talking sense.

Anyways back to topic. They named the yearbook as MMI Memoirs. MMI stands for 2001 in Roman (in FAST-NU, you are known by the year you are enrolled). It was the idea of some lass and looks kinda kinky at first but the designers did a fantastic job in making it look like a book found from rubbles of ancient Roman ruins and all.

Overall I guess the delay turned out to be a blessing in disguise. As the batch reunion and then yearbook itself revived all the memories of our time in the university. It is sure fun to read for us and I am sure as more time passes by, the more nostalgic it’ll get.

And also I totally confess my inability here as I was part of the initial original team as the designer but due to my tableeghi activities and then later on shifting far off to Peshawar, limited my contribution to a couple of articles only. Infact, like a year back or so I thought there was no yearbook coming out. It was only one day, Omar Salman contacted me to write a report on Softec (Softec was a huge event we organized during our time, I was part of the executive committee). Without grasping the whole concept, I wrote him a long detailed boring report on the achievements of Softec crammed up with obnoxious stats. Long story short, he replied mentioning the fact that they don’t need a friggin CNN report on Softec but an insider view like what Softec was to us. Only then I got the idea (yea I am a bit slow).

Anyways, I came up with the article (page 1 & page 2). I tried to add a bit about each of our Softec team member but incase I missed anyone out or didn’t mention him/her in a justified manner (as there was one sweet frand of mine eating my head the other day) then apologies.

And yea don’t ask me why we named it a ‘Mega’ story.

PS: YAY, my bhabee got admission in a top business school in NY. Congratulations !! Good Luck in the future ..and make us proud !

It’s been burning hot in Lahore for the last couple of days or so. And ammi has been in contact with me like all the time, how are you? are you dehydrating? why dont you go over to some friend’s place? remain in some cool place etc? And when the temperature reached staggering 50 degree celsius, she was like ‘I think Muneeb you should simply get a break from job and come back home’.
It’s just incredible.

I for once am totally unable to comprehend that how can one put oneself so beneath the means and think as you think for your ownself. Maybe I am a tad too selfish but nothing beats the ‘mamta’. Her level of concern is on a different scale. And all this love is totally unconditional. All she wants is for her children to remain happy. No matter how much hardships, struggle, difficult times she has to go through. And these ain’t no flimsy filmy romantic love drama, it IS pure love.

Sometimes I feel pretty guilty. I am not returning her what she truly deserves from me. I feel so like a brat. Maybe it’s because of the distance but that’s more like an excuse than some substance as I see my siblings performing a great job in making her feel good everyday, even when they live miles away & have more responsibilities than I have. When I go off for tableegh, many times I have encountered people asking me when did the last time I gave a massage to my parents etc? I am stranded there, all embarassed. It’s just I think I am pretty lazy & take my parents for granted. I should be making a statement right now that I will be giving more time to my parents from now on than other crap hobbies I pursue.

But I do try to make my friends realize this. So many times when we had this love/arrange marriage discussion (As more than half of my friends are in some kinda pre/present/post relationship status..hehe) and I always tell them it’s not just about you all the time. Our families expect something from us. It’s true that its our life and we have to live with a certain woman after marriage but you cannot just ignore your parents’ wishes like that. I personally beleive in giving mom/dad a chance. Since the day I was born they had some dreams for me. And they know they can’t impose it on me that but it’s not the matter of should and should’nt. How can one ignore parents, who have done so much for you, over a freak sissy lass you met only weeks back? It’s just cruel and incomprehensible in my opinion.

People talk about true love. When they meet someone and get into this topsy turvy so-called love relation they think they just found the eternal love. And it gets even more ridiculous when they go all bullfight against their parents thinking themselves as some romeo-cum-superman when for crying out loud, they are not even able to comprehend the love which their mother has been giving them since the time when they didn’t know crap about the world. I don’t want to get melodramatic here but I am unable to understand how can someone talk about love when they think running away from your family with your freak lass is some sorta true win of their pathetic concept of love/care/kindness.

Confusing lust with love, idiocy at its best.

He basically makes the same point of following intuition and doing what you really like to do in your professional career. He connects the dots of his life backward and beleives that most of the revolutionary work which Apple did has lot to do with Jobs making decisions on the basis of what he wanted to do rather than what others wanted from him. And he made it clear that it was’t a joyride at first as he had to go through a lot of struggle initially.

He also mentions the thing (which my so beautiful sister also raised here) that we shouldn’t be living a life which others want us to live. Our standards, priorities, ambitions , aims etc should not be based upon the society demands.

I just can’t agree more. In my life, I have experienced this first hand that whenever I broke the shangle of society and took the liberty of making decisions with no strings attached, new avenues have opened up for me. I’ve understood things in a totally unique perspective.

And I’ll broader the vision here that it’s not just what others think about you, it’s about everything the society/world preaches. The lust for money, fame and the materialistic aspect of life. People DO follow what they think, it’s just their thinking is biased in terms of the materialistic gains. Can we, for once, think outside the paradigm of having a hi-fi life style, a never ending lust for money and fame etc? It’s pretty difficult but I sincerely beleive that this where the true freedom of thinking is achieved.

One more interesting thing Jobs mentioned in the speech is the concept of death. People in today’s world hardly talk about death. Its like a taboo. So it’s kinda surprising that a person who day & night involved in planning of wordly life can churn out a few thoughts about death. He acknowledges death as source of motivation for this life where as I use at a source of motivation for after life. Not surprising as very few people in the world have a true beleive in the happenings of the after-life regardless from which religion (or anti-religion) they belong to. I’ll touch on it some other day.

PS: incase anyone who doesn’t know Steve Jobs, he is the CEO of Apple, the revolutionary company which changed the way people used PCs. Steve Jobs has been the brain behind Macintosh, Pixar Animations, iPod and soon-to-be-released iPhone. Wikipedia Entry

The session went ok. Unsurprisingly most of the questions posed by the students were very much the same which we used to have in our time. Most of them were concerned about what kind of company should they prefer once they graduate, when/how should they plan their Masters and other scholarship details.

Interestingly, it was pretty unanimously decided that the Masters degree is very much of a social requirement rather a true professional one. All of them were of the opinon that right now neither any university here in Pakistan provides the true environment to carry the research needed for Masters nor the industry considerably differs between a Bachelors or Masters when it comes to their salary structure. It’s just that the society holds a better repute for a Masters rather than a mere Bachelors. I had this feeling for quite sometime but it very much got solid.

The thing which really bugged me throughout the session that people (on & off the stage) were tying up their opinons/decision totally on the basis of what financial implications it has in future. All other factors like professional growth etc were given secondary importance. Though I don’t deny the importance of cool pay cheque at the end of the month but the crucial crucial factor that, what kind of job do you really want to do  & where your interest basically lies, was very much ignored.

They were ready to change their field (from computers to management to marketing to whatever), all on the basis of how financially it strives them. This was kinda disappointing to me that a fresh graduate entering in the industry has his total aspirations based majorly upon a mere salary he receives.

I might be wrong here but i absolutely beleive in pursuing a career which excites me. I didn’t get the chance to speak there but to me the utmost importance when choosing a job is to decide how much does it appeals one? The point that whether going 9am-5pm everyday for a certain kind of work interests you? It’s easy to denounce this but spending 1/3rd of your day (or sometimes even more in our industry) in an environment which you totally despise is no less than living in a torture cell. You might get a super cheque at the end of the month but under-estimating the value of a stable loving work environment is dreadful. If you want to be just another guy in the industry, then get a job which pays more but if you really want to excel in your field and pop out as a true class in your whole industry then you have to have a job which embodies your mind as well as heart. It might be a bit challenging at first. There might be times when you would be needing to sacrifice better financial opportunites but no pains, no gains. How can a person work dedicatedly to something which he doesn’t like, is way above me. People with jobs, which they don’t like, have a time-oriented approach while people with jobs, which they love, have work-oriented approach. The latter’s attitude is driven towards the quality and the excellence of the work, they are putting their sweat on, rather than just the money attributed to it.

One should look out in the market. See the kinds of job out there and then select the one which appeals him/her the most (although this step should had been taken even before Bachelors, in deciding what field you want to pursue but anyways). Naturally, its plausible to beleive that you won’t get that job straight away. You might be needing to work with smaller pay or in a team which you simply HATE but your vision is clear that what you plan to achieve then everything becomes pretty straight. You won’t be needing to ask whether one should prefer a bigger company or a smaller company? or should pursue Masters after 5 years or tommorrow? When you have your goal set, then things becomes crystal clear.

I have seen people who have job which they don’t like. I don’t know how they cope with those 8 hours on the trot, where their half-mind is lurking with the needles of the clock, waiting when time will be up and it’s over. And waking up every Monday with a Garfield face. Hardly an inspiring life, is it? I love this quote of Confucious, pretty much summarizes my point:

“Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.”

makes sense, eh ?

What do I plan to write is still unknown but I will very much hop around my personal day to day life (which you may have no interest in), my professional ramblings (which might get a bit geeky, as I belong to a Computer Science background) and religious concepts (which you may not agree with but who cares). I hope it turns out to be a pretty exciting ride.

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I will try to update the site as often as possible apart from those far and few days when I am on a religious adventure and don’t even have time to access internet. I certainly hope you play your part and honour me with your crappyness through comments.

So let us cut the red ribbon, as finally the cyberspace have something classy to be proud of.