From the desk of the Amazing ‘Ainur…

Assalamualaikum w.b.t and kia ora…

I know I should do this last week…I meant to do this last week, but alas, I forgot…I let myself get

distracted…last week marked the 40^th anniversary of Israel’s ILLEGAL occupation of Palestinian lands (i.e.the West Bank, Arab East Jerusalem)…Israel began their military occupation of these lands in 1967…40 years have passed…still no sign that the Israeli government is ready to relinquish their (ILLEGAL) hold over Palestinian lands…for 40 years the Palestinians are forced to live as refugees inside their own land…for 40 years they are subjected to all sorts of indignities and are forced to endure endless oppression and humiliation…think Israel’s checkpoints, curfews, closures, raids, “security fence” a.k.a separation wall/ apartheid wall, collective punishments…so, this is me saying “No!” to Israel’s occupation of Palestinian lands…and “No!” to Israel’s apartheid…enough’s enough…this has been going on for far too long…when the Palestinians suffer, they make the Israelis suffer…the IDF then step up their offensive on the Palestinians…and the Palestinians retaliate by stepping up their offensive on the Israelis…and we all know what will happen next…violence begets more violence…nothing good is going to come out of this…this has got to stop…so I’m saying “NO!” to Israel’s ILLEGAL occupation of Palestinian lands…it’s time to end the occupation…

while I’m at it, I might as well say “NO!” to other things…I’m also saying “NO!” to the following things:

-fighting between Palestinian rival factions (come on, guys…this is counterproductive…do you seriously think that this fighting is going to bolster your cause?)

-fighting between Shias and Sunnis in Iraq (there are other ways to have fun, you know)

-fighting in the name of religion and God (you people ought to be ashamed of yourselves…you give religion and God a bad rep…I’ve got two words for you: DIVINE RETRIBUTION…be afraid…be very, very afraid…)

-ethnic cleansing and genocide (think Darfur…if we let this continue, we are going to have another “Rwanda” weighing on our conscience)

-anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and other forms of racism…and discrimination on the basis of religion, race, nationality, sex, etc…and incitement…(nothing can justify these things…it doesn’t matter if we think we are right and other people are wrong or mistaken or abnormal…there’s no excuse for treating people like worthless trash…)

-nuclear warfare and arms races (sometimes the more is not the merrier) and wars (we cannot do these things and call ourselves civilized people)

-ALL forms of terrorism…that includes state-sponsored terrorism…no more bombings, hijackings of plane, abductions, grisly beheadings, etc…the US government pledge to stop terrorism but they themselves participate in terrorism (I consider going into other people’s countries and bombing their towns and villages as terrorism…that, and supporting other state(s) to perpetrate acts of terror)…how’s that for irony?

-women looking like stick insects…this whole ‘size-zero’ thing is sickening…thin I can accept…but I draw the line at stick-thin…I don’t get why any woman would want to subject herself to regimented and torturous diet…I don’t see anything good about starving yourself to death…life’s too short for diets…and remember, moderation is the key…

-all Lindsay Lohans, Britney Spears, Paris Hiltons, Nicole Richies of the world…what’s so cute about acting dumb?…dumbness is not an attractive quality in any woman…or man, for that matter…dumb is not hot…there’s no cure for idiocy…the thing that I find very, very disturbing is the fact that there are girls out there who look up to and aspire to be like these IT girls…they drive on the wrong side of the highway, do drugs, drink like there’s no tomorrow, get photographed panty-less, go in and out of hospitals all the time, go in and out of rehab all the time…wow, I get it…they are real model citizens…

-activities that destroy our environment…I’ve jumped on the bandwagon…I’m going green too…like Al Gore and Leonardo DiCaprio, I couldn’t think of anyone else…seriously, we’ve got to start paying more attention to our environment…you hear? no more open burning, excessive consumption of energy, excessive emission of CFC and carbon dioxide, couldn’t think of anything else…the Earth, which is currently the only planet in which we could live in, can no longer tolerate us and our destructive ways…let’s all go green…

That’s about all I could think of…my brain’s shutting down from lack of sleep…or too much sleep, I forgot which…feel free to add to my list, though…if you guys are on your break, enjoy your break…be safe…take good care of yourself…if you don’t do it, no one will…and go out and be happy…happiness is key…gotta go…

‘ainur rahmah ellias

Assalamualaikum w.b.t and kia ora….

Hello…the long-awaited winter break is finally here…I smell freedom…still have one more assignment to submit, though…next week…then I’m home free…the end of yet another trimester…that certainly makes for a good cause of celebration…I foresee hours of ‘HOUSE m.d.’ marathon and playing scrabble alone…yep…that’s my new obsession…playing scrabble alone…it’s fun…you should try it…that, and trying to set the record for personal best…it could be anything…how much mocha I drink in a day, how long I could go without talking (my personal best, minus sleeping time, is 8 hours), how many episodes of ‘HOUSE m.d.’ I could watch in one sitting, how much chocolate I could inhale in one sitting, etc…I like the idea of pushing limits…I try to do that whenever I can…you’d be surprised to discover just what you are capable of doing if you really give something, anything a go…

My personal best for how many episodes of ‘HOUSE m.d’ I could watch in one sitting is 15…I stopped only because I was sleepy…I was impressed with my own tenacity…I was very proud of my own “achievement”…God knows that that doesn’t happen often…. seriously, I’m hooked on the series…it’s really clever…you know what attracts me to the series in the first place?…i mean, aside from the obvious fact that it’s clever?…Dr. Gregory House, Head of the Department of Diagnostic Medicine at Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital…it’s not often that you get a main character who’s all screwed-up…that’s what or who House is…he’s a deeply-flawed character….he’s the kind of person you’d love to hate…but instead of hating him, you find yourself liking him…you like him for all the wrong reasons…I mean, he’s arrogant, narcissistic, abrasive, condescending, manipulative, sardonic (I’m running out of adjectives, here)…his behaviour borders on antisocial…he’s a doctor with no bedside manners…if that’s not enough, he also happens to be a drug addict…there’s a reason why his colleagues and patients call him a selfish jerk, a manipulative bastard and an ass…he has little to recommend him…but I like him anyway…he is the very definition of an anti-hero…but he is my hero…

I like him because he’s tenacious…he’s willing to do anything to save his patients… sure, he breaks laws, violates all ethical and moral codes known to mankind, manipulates people around him, doesn’t take “no” for an answer, browbeats people (he all but shoves his ideas down people’s throat)…but he gets things done…he does those things to save people…and he doesn’t do it to be thanked…he doesn’t do it to get approval…he does it because it’s his job…he does it because it’s right…he is also intelligent…and he knows it…and he lets other people know it too…this is a guy who knows that he’s good…and that other people think he’s good…self-doubt is not an issue for this guy…he doesn’t believe in humility, either…he won’t admit that he’s wrong (most of the time, anyway)…even when a treatment is not working, he will not say that he’s wrong…he’ll just say that he hasn’t found the right answer yet…but he will, eventually…clever…he doesn’t think that he’s capable of screwing up…I admire people like House…I also like the way he keeps pushing people’s limits…if one of his staff screws up, he torments them…he reminds them every chance he gets of their screw-ups…and his words sting…he makes their lives a living hell, basically…but he doesn’t do that to crush them…he doesn’t let things go because he wants them to face up to what they did…he wants them to feel bad because in their line of work, one tiny mistake could cost someone their life…he wants them to feel guilty because guilt keeps them on their toes… it keeps them from making the same mistake again…he pushes his team because he wants them to work hard to keep their job…he knows they’re good, that’s why he’s always pushing them to step up their game…he’s shrewd, that guy…he also doesn’t believe in grey areas and middle grounds…things are either black or white…there’s only ‘right’ and ‘wrong’, no ‘in-betweens’…it’s what you do and what you don’t do…if something is not right, then it’s wrong…did I mention that he’s brilliant?

House also happens to have an outrageous sense of humour…he’s hilarious…you cannot believe the things that come out of that guy’s mouth…he makes fun of absolutely everything and everyone…no one’s safe from him…not even Wilson, his bestest buddy…he says funny things, he does funny stuff…he’s funny…he’s a doctor and he avoids seeing patients like the plague…he usually eats lunch and watches tv in a coma patient’s room…he induces migraine headache in that coma patient so he could prove that the drug that could supposedly prevent migraine does not work…he covers his steak with lots of salad so that the cashier can’t see the steak (and can’t charge him for it)…he orders an MRI for the entire maternity ward just because he feels like it…he walks around in a wheelchair for a week just to get his parking space back…and how many doctors go around saying things like “Do I have to spell it out for you? Pheochromocytoma. Actually, I’m not sure how you spell it” or  “I was curious. Since I’m not a cat, that’s not dangerous” or “You know how they say, "you can’t live without love"? Well, oxygen is even more important” or "On average, drug addicts are stupid…. I believe drug addicts get sick. Actually, for some reason they tend to get sick more often than non-drug addicts”…I’m a sucker for people with a great, albeit warped, sense of humour…and then there’s the eyes…he’s got the most beautiful pair of eyes I’ve ever seen on any living man or woman…they’re blue!…did I mention that his eyes are beautiful?…

You know what? I actually don’t know what made me write this…an entire entry dedicated to this one man…a fictional man, to boot…wow…I actually wrote an entire entry about a man who doesn’t even exist…this is a personal best…actually, this proves what I’ve always known: I’m pathetic and I need to get a life in the worst way…I’d just hit ‘10’ on my freak-o-meter…I should probably take up a hobby (or multiple hobbies) or something…any suggestion? I really should stop…if I write some more, people would start questioning my mental health…I’m fine, really…just bored…and uninspired…and just a little homesick (even doctors can’t cure this one)…and infatuated with this really great guy, Gregory House…buhbye, now…

‘ainur rahmah ellias

-i miss my parents and brothers and sisters-