Of laziness? Of being 'social'? Of learning a different writing....?

So I haven't found it in me to blog for some reason. I want to say it's because my life has been fairly frazzled. But that can't be an excuse can it? After all, if I had a burning desire to think, write, share I would have made the time. But I have felt the urge so what the hell happened. I don't know. But I'm back. Perhaps because I'm in a different country - in Pakistan. The change of rhythm helps to want to connect. But alas the timing is bad because I see the battery about to die on me. So I chime in with a non-post of sorts. I could of course plug the machine in. But I don't. I guess I'm lazy.

I promise to myself that I won't be lazy tomorrow. I think laziness might explain why I haven't blogged.

No wait a minute. It's not lazy. Or it isn't just that.

I love the rhythm of my life. I love that I no longer bring work home with me except on very rare occasions - that's the one thing I don't miss about academia. Not in the least. I think I've cherished having time at the end of the day to give to my loved ones and to myself.

That perhaps is more of the reason why I haven't blogged. And I think I needed this time to get out of the habit of thinking to write - as I've done for over a decade while making my way through my thesis and my dissertation.

This post reads qualitatively different to me. It reads like I'm feeling my writing and that is what helps me to think. I like that. I like this freedom. Stay tuned!

Returning to 30-30

Greetings 30-30 readers!

It's been super quiet out here. Long story short, I finished my PhD and decided to take a hiatus from academia. Work now involves the research I did and love doing but in a different setting as an advisor. What has all this entailed and what am I up to? Well I plan to play catch-up and blog regularly from here on forwards. For now...just a quick hello to reconnect with you peeps. I'll be back in a day or two so do check back in. Here's to continuing the conversation....

Tuning back in

Good evening blogistan!

I know I've been hiding. I know I've been quiet. Some of it has been due to dealing with dissertation deposits and formatting. The other has had to do with just making several decisions and wanting a little down time. I've been thinking. But I haven't wanted to write. I want to change that starting with this blogpost but I must forewarn that things might be a little quiet on the blogging front for another couple of weeks. But I promise they won't be silent. I am craving writing - writing for fun, for exploring.

So hope all of you have been well. I have thoroughly enjoyed graduating, celebrating with my parents and loved ones, having more time for loved ones, and simply being.

More soon!

Basking in the light at the end of the tunnel

Yup, all done as of March 26. No longer dwelling in the abyss of ABDhood but officially PhD'd. The cherrie on top were that I awarded a pass with no distinction and that I don't have any revisions as such to complete - just a careful combing through of the text to ensure no awkwardness or errors persist through the multiple iterations out of which the final draft was born.

Color me relieved and excited to see what comes next.

A well-rested Dr. Bionic-Woman.

The coexistence of that which is bleak with that which is life itself...

If you click on the title of this post, you will find that it is linked to a piece on being in Pakistan from one of my most favorite people on the planet and a very dear friend - Naeem Inayatullah:

Some thoughts, not random but certainly not organized, that my readings of this piece triggered:

1. This might seem trivial but I do agree that with the exception of ice-cream, Pakistan really does have the most delectable tasting food and drink. It's a culinary haven.

2. Pointing to what amounts to a 'favorite' shouldn't negate the fact that this whole essay inspired me and provoked much thought in an emotional sense - much like a song that keeps building flawlessly to a crescendo that can only make you tear up and exist within a blankness that isn't empty but certainly feels that way perhaps because there is only room for feeling rather than thinking. Having said that, I do have a thought to which I am drawn and want to dwell and perhaps even savor and it is this: "On my return to Ithaca I feel empty; I wonder where the people are. I am jet-lagged, culture shocked and weather beaten. But I clutch at my disorientation with the desperation of someone who fears that Ithaca routines will leave him numbed."

The fear of being numbed. I think Naeem nails it here for all those of us who perhaps find ourselves at the margins of affiliations that don't normally go together - because society has been long used to drawing a sharper line demarcating inside and outside that it seems to have neglected to develop a vocabulary to accommodate, under one umbrella, or, in this case, one being, that which is traditionally separated. Hmm I think I might just have entered the social science-y domain by making a statement on behalf of a larger public - safety in generalizability. That's one of the things I hate most about the disciplines that fall within social science. So I'll speak for myself - although I harbor no delusions or carry the (Western) baggage of the dichotomy of individual/collective. I don't believe people are private individuals. Even the depths of our minds that we think elude all but us are a product of the ways in which we make sense of the world by interacting with it. So perhaps 'being' is a more precise word, yes? Because to me that implies interacting and being social. But I digress. Let me rephrase the statement about Naeem nailing it as one that applies solely to me as far as I know. Others who agree - or disagree - can speak for themselves.

So I was talking about the fear of being numbed. I went back to Pakistan after 2 years this past summer. Other than when we were waiting for our permanent resident paperwork to come through, I have never been away from Pakistan for this long ever since I moved to the US. The reasons for doing so are a bit personal. I have the reason that I gave to all and even me - and that was definitely part of it - I was working on my dissertation and wanted to wait till it was done. But there was a deeper reason that I've only recently recognized - I was running away from a vital part of me. I didn't know it at the time. But perhaps to grapple with it I needed to suppress it for a while. Of course none of this was conscious. But I can see it now from where I'm standing - primarily because it took confronting what I was running away from to return this August.

But back to the numbness of which Naeem is talking about in this piece. When I returned to Pakistan, after a week of reorienting myself to the frustrations and unease of loadshedding that makes one wonder if the concept of electricity is one that one ought to be amnesic about to cope with its frequent absence, nosy people who have no business butting in your business but do it anyway, getting used to the loss of privacy that follows with the nosiness so much so that what one ate for lunch suddenly becomes something that ought to be public knowledge in extensions of family that are so far removed that one rarely thinks about them, the carelessness with which time commitments are (mis)treated, the hovering around of domestic help that makes one oscillate between concerns about human rights and whether this might just be a form of slavery to relishing the fact that there are no clothes to be taken out of a dryer to be folded and put away in place. After getting back into the rhythm that was first nature to me it hit me. I miss being in Pakistan. Despite all of the things that get under my skin - and the above list is but a partial one - there is something about it that keeps me vibrant in a way that always feels new but is also familiar. As Naeem writes, "there are colors vibrant beyond any camera’s ability to capture" - so so true. In fact, along the same lines and extending what Naeem has captured so vividly, it's a rhythm of life that can't be explained until it beats in your heart.

Someone might say I'm romanticizing. Perhaps I am. But since when did romanticism become a four-letter word? What's the need to be ashamed of it? Why be embarrassed? After all, it is when we humans dream and act to make those dreams come true that we gain the opportunity to celebrate and enjoy our capacity to do wonderful things.

Being in Pakistan and getting reacquainted with the Pakistani in me (not that I'd lost it but perhaps its voice was being dulled - I think of it as the numbness to which Naeem alludes) inspires me beyond measure. It makes me feel. It gives me the space to think from my gut. I like how I think and how I write - which in my profession are both vitally important. I spent the last two years that I stayed away from Pakistan learning to think like an academic - well not so much think as make an attempt to think that way and perhaps fake it. I tried to play by the rules of the game. And Pakistan reminded me that I need to make the game mine to be happy playing it. That I came to the game in the first place because I could think of other ways to play it, of different moves that might make playing the game a much more enriching experience.

As I write this I'm getting lost. As I said above, lost in the emotions I feel but fail to perhaps articulate. Not out of fear but more so out of a consciousness of the seconds ticking away on the clock while knowing that there are things I need to tend to and so the luxury of thinking this through must wait.

But yes I know that it is this very fear of numbness that is very real for me once more. That is until I can find a way to play the game so that my rules apply as well.

3. The Pakistan I see in the news while navigating my existence between New Jersey, New York, and DC frustrates me to no end. I don't deny its existence. But I do deny that it is all there is to Pakistan. To follow Naeem's thoughts, if the rubble of bomb blasts or the destruction on a street left by a rioting crowd make up Pakistan then so do a people whose conscience and hearts are alive. Who dream of a better future. Who try to inspire others to create this future. Who in their small ways also fill their present with vestiges of this utopia. That utopic present exists in the women of whom Naeem speaks. Someone like his cousin Miryam. I too see it all around me when I go. It is in the eyes of the Afghan refugee boy who creates fascinating products to sell on the street; all alone in the world his eyes are never sad but glimmer with hope and pride. I also see it in the architecture. The fountain known as 'do talwar' - two swords - that has been dedicated to those refugees who came to Pakistan in 1947 and gave up their all to make a dream a reality with a corporeal existence. In this sense, Pakistan is the conundrum Naeem captures in his story of his morning jog in Islamabad - one in which guards are deployed on streets but who suddenly also become part of your daily rhythm. If they are there because the law and order situation is horrendous, their presence is also very much a part of the vibrancy of Pakistan - the relationships one carves on a daily basis. Relationships that cement themselves with even a few brief, seemingly superficial encounters. I think back to my daily visits to the Avari Towers hotel in Karachi while I was there doing my field research. I'd go there to check my e-mail because they had high-speed wireless. The guard who would open the door for me on my way in and on my way out was a reminder of the dangers that lurk all over Karachi. Yet, in that brief encounter that occurred everyday, our 2 minutes conversation suddenly become a connection about our lives. And so I got to know all about the dreams he has for his family's future. I've never met them but I know them well. When I returned to Pakistan after 2 years this past summer, he recognized me instantly and inquired where I'd been all this time. And so it was like I'd never left or that the break hadn't been as long.

4. I'm relieved that for once someone trying to explain the normalcy of life in Pakistan didn't try to make it fit within the parameters of normalcy that might be used by the 'other' with whom one is trying to communicate. There was no reassurance, no defensiveness. Only an exploration of that which is quintessentially Pakistan - a normalcy that continue to evolve and exist alongside that which is bleak.

5. I miss the raw smells, the vibrant colors, and being part of the vitality of which Naeem speaks. I too am fearful and resistant of numbness. There are days I fight it well. Then there are days when perhaps I don't feel the need to fight it at all because something like the essay Naeem has written inspires me from within my gut and makes me feel like I don't have a long-distance relationship with my Pakistani-ness. On others, the distance is overwhelming. And I fear. And I contemplate. And I too clutch at the 'me' that sometimes feels lost and out of place in the fray that is my life in America. But, then again, my life in America is also very much a part of me. It inspires me - but in a characteristically different way. One whose heartbeat might be different but very much keeps the pulse running.

And on that note of a horrendously phrased metaphor, I sign off until next time.

Truck-Loads of Belated Wishes

In my MIA-ness tons of holidays passed us by. So, in that spirit, belated Happy Eid, Hanukkah, Christmas, and New Year. It's been eerily quiet here on this space - chalk it up to the holiday season and trying to dissertate. It might be a while before I begin to post again but I promise to be back later this month once I've circled my way back from the edge of the planet.

In the meantime, sending out wishes for a 2009 that brings happiness, joy, fulfillment, health, prosperity, and peace to all.

78% man? Really!

I was sent a link to this site called GenderAnalyzer by a friend. You type in the URL for a blog and the site determines whether the blog is being written by a man or a woman. My result? 76% man.

Plausible explanation other than being just plain wrong (and I say this because while Asad is a man he remains MIA on this blog) - perhaps if you claim to be 'bionic' it makes you a man or at least a manly woman.

I'd love to know how they came up with their analytical criteria. Well love might be too strong...let's just say I'm curious.

All I'm going to say is that I'm expecting my honorary penis in the mail in 4-5 business days!

Universal Children's Day & Faiz Ahmed Faiz's Death Anniversary

Although I knew it was Faiz's death anniversary today, I wasn't actually aware that Universal Children's Day is also being observed today.

Why is that important to me?

I'm reminded now of the first poem that I actually read by Faiz titled "Subh-e-Azadi" or "The Dawn of Freedom":

These tarnished rays, this night smudged light –
This is not that Dawn for which, ravished with freedom,
we had set out in sheer longing,
so sure that somewhere in its desert the sky harbored
a final haven for the stars, and we would find it. . . .

Now listen to the terrible rampant lie:
Light has forever been severed from the Dark;
Our feet, it is heard, are now one with their goal.
See our leaders polish their manner clean of suffering:
Indeed we must confess only to bliss;
we must surrender any utterance for the Beloved – all yearning is outlawed.

But the heart, the eye, the yet deeper heart –
Still ablaze for the Beloved, their turmoil shines.
In the lantern by the road the flame is stalled for news:
Did the morning breeze ever come? Where has it gone?
Night weighs us down, it still weighs us down.
Friends, come away from this false light. Come, we must search for that promised Dawn.

It's a poem that haunts me - in a strangely optimistic way - and also inspires me. It makes me think about where Pakistan is today, of the promises of 1947, and perhaps the promises that we need to revisit and even revise today to get close to the dream that was and align it with reality.

I can't help but think about this poem in the context of Universal Children's Day. Ever since 2001 when the present war began in Afghanistan, every time I've gone back to Karachi I've met the same little boy on the same intersection - for those who are familiar it's the right turn on Khayaban-e-Shamsheer that heads towards Zamzama. Every year he has a new "scheme" to make money. He has no-one. He doesn't know where his parents are. He doesn't dream of seeing them again nor does he lament over that he might never see them again. Thousands of cars pass him by everyday without perhaps noticing him or dismissing him with the slight of hand - a gesture oft-used to shoo away beggars. Unlike others who sell flowers on the road or religious books or balloons, this kid markets his own creations. And when someone dismisses him he doesn't bat an eyelid and picks up where he left off. He chases cars. He dodges the cars as soon as the traffic light turns green - sometimes whizzing in between speeding cars one wonders how he's even alive. He refuses to accept charity. He wants to earn his way as best he can and as best he knows. He collects old school books that folks throw away to continue his education. He even looks out for the other refugee kids that beg at this traffic light. He loves to narrate stories. And in this nomadic existence, he's nurtured solid friendships - of which I'd like to think one is between him and me. He's a fighter, he has resilience, he has vision, and most of all he has faith not that things will be all right but that they're quite good as is.

I think about his face when I think about the millions of kids on streets worldwide. And I wonder when we will, to use Faiz, "search for that promised Dawn" when these kids have a better life to relish....

Yes We Did!

Behold the 44th President of the United States of America: President-Elect Barack Hussein Obama!

Color me elated and exhilarated. And currently battling the stupor and dragging-of-derriere that follows celebrating into the wee hours of the morning. More thoughts later...

Election Day 2008

I'd planned to write a longer post reflecting on my responses to the campaign and the upcoming election - but for now this short one because I'm off to vote and volunteer. If you are a US citizen and registered to vote, please do so.

And a shameless yet earnest plug for the candidate who has inspired the hearts and minds of millions: Please vote for Senator Barack Obama for the next US President.

More thoughts later....again please vote! Go Obama!

The Classic Dames Test

I'm not quite sure what to make of this...perhaps because I promised myself that this would be just a 5 minutes break from The Bane Of My Existence. I promise a "real" post later this week.

Your result for The Classic Dames Test...

Myrna Loy

You scored 26% grit, 43% wit, 10% flair, and 38% class!

You are loaded with a quirky kind of class that people find irresistable. Men turn and look at you admiringly as you walk down the street, and even your rivals have a grudging respect for you. You usually know the right thing to say, do and, of course, wear. You can take charge of a situation when things get out of hand, and you do it with great poise and chic. Your wit and sense of fun endear you to your partner and every other man in the room. Your screen partners include William Powell and Cary Grant. You're quite a catch...if you want to be caught.

Find out what kind of classic leading man you'd make by taking the
Classic Leading Man Test.

Take The Classic Dames Test at HelloQuizzy

No longer MIA...well kinda

Guess who's back?! I know it's been eerily quiet out here on 30-30. Long story short, I left for a vacation and decided to stay on hiatus from blogging and non-urgent e-mails. Just primarily for the sake of my sanity to be honest.

I'm back. The dissertation beast is awake so I might not be posting as regularly as I'd want to for the next couple of weeks. But yes I do want to write a couple of posts about being back in Pakistan after a long(?) gap of 2 1/2 years.

Anyhow, just wanted to shout out a hello to everyone. Hope you've all been doing well in all sorts of ways.

Despair not...

To all of you dissertators and anybody else struggling with anything for a while now...some words of inspiration and perhaps inspire your courage anew...it certainly helped me gather the determination I lost last week to finish:

"People usually fail when they are on the verge of success. So give as much care to the end as to the beginning."
– Lao-Tzu

Onwards and forwards!

A Quote This Tuesday Morning

"Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart. Who looks outside, dreams. Who looks inside, awakens."
– Carl Jung

As I've mentioned several times before on this blog, I subscribe to a service through which I get quotes in my e-mail everyday. I've shared some of the ones that have inspired me or that got me thinking. Here's another one.

What struck me about this is in the context of experiences I've had over the last couple of years in particular. And as I look back retrospectively, I can't help but nod my head vigorously. I've noticed that I'm happiest and most fulfilled when I actually have the courage to listen to what my heart tells me to do. Otherwise I feel stuck and stagnant. Surprisingly, that gets more difficult as we get older - or so it seems. I know that I think more about what I have to do or what I'm expected to do then what I want to do. Luckily there isn't always a conflict between the two. But when there is, that's when things get hairy, yes? I don't mean "listening to the heart" in an hedonistic, completely ruled by the id kind of way. But I'm a big believer - or rather have become since I was about 27/28 - that our hearts and guts know what's best for us instantaneously. It takes a while for our minds to catch up to it. That's been my experience at least.

Your thoughts?

2 dissertating challenges

Since I'm still here :-), I wanted to share 2 more thoughts. The first is an overall challenge while dissertating. The second thought is specific to my empirical chapters but one can conceivably extend it to the rest of the dissertating experience.

1. The hardest thing, time and again, heck I'd say day in and day out is the ABCD rule. That is, Apply Butt to Chair and Dissertate. Even when there is momentum. Even when you finish a chapter. Even after a particularly good writing day. It takes every ounce of strength and willpower to sit down in front of your laptop/computer/what have you each time and click on that icon on the desktop that represents the document you're currently working on. I think the clicking of the document is very tough. Those seconds between moving your finger over the trackpad to the click to the opening of an in-progress document - worse still if you're starting a new document - that's just when I end up feeling the urge to flight. Once it's open I think I breathe more easy and feel like I can tackle this. A productive morning doesn't automatically translate into the desire to sit down and continue the same rhythm in the afternoon. I wonder why that is. I suspect because it's intimidating to stare at a blank screen not knowing how much you'll write today or if you'll write anything that's usable. The latter is the most difficult - when you know you're putting in the time and the output, although helpful in working through an argument, isn't going to end up in the category of "finished dissertation pages" can be rather frustrating. Personally, I need pin drop silence to write and process. So it means being sort of a recluse. Hmm not just sort of. Not that I have trouble being myself and I cherish my "me-time" I do crave social interactions. That I currently seem to be starving myself on that front might be why I'm feeling so worn out. But I also know that I have to be strong through this or it isn't getting done - not just by the deadline I have in mind but not at all. And I'll be damned if I have this stretch out a few months longer because I just don't have the mental or emotional energy to continue feeling as stagnant as dissertating can feel. [Nopes I'm not bitter but I am restless.]

2. I'm currently writing a chapter that is based on original field research. I have a lot more interviews than I can conceivably include. I've made peace with that. Of the ones I thought I'd include until last week, well let's just say it would be overkill if I included all of them. I've noticed that, on average, the analysis of each interview is ranging about 20 pages. If I include all 11, well you do the math. So I'm working on cutting down the number. And it's almost like asking a parent of more than one kid who their favorite child is. I have no magical formula how to decide which ones to include and which to exclude. It's not just about page length. I suspect they get redundant real quickly in terms of the overall argument. The minute details are fun but not critical to moving the argument along. To be honest, the practical side of me concurs with a serious editing of that list of 11 - because having fewer to analyze means the deadline becomes attainable. In this worn out state, that consideration is part of the calculation. Of course then I end up feeling guilty. So I review my analysis again and it also makes intellectual sense. The challenge here is not about overcoming the guilt - or at least it's not what I'm focusing on. I have figured out what to do, more or less, for this current chapter. It might mean ignoring 2 interviews that I was really excited about but could well be a stand-alone chapter on a sub-topic within the dissertation in terms of the empirical sites I'm looking at. That the interviews of these individuals are of retired military officers and I'd planned for 'the military' to be a separate chapter in my dissertation but dropped the idea since I didn't have enough interviews to do that because of access issues [long story that I really don't feel like revisiting right now]. However, I could change these into a spin-off piece in the form of a journal article so it's not like I won't work on them ever. Nonetheless, what's difficult is that you do so much work and so little makes it to the dissertation project that it feels akin to a major letdown. Again I understand that it's not like I could have found a magic shortcut along the way and what feels like meandering is just part of the process and how it works. Still, that it never figures in can be heart-breaking and gut-wrenching.

Enough ranting/blogging, now I must open the file for chapter 5. Wish me luck!

Update: yesterday + dissertating

So I did manage to get some work done. I didn't spend a lot of time and remained rather frazzled but I got out a draft of one of the interviews I'm analyzing - excerpts and discussion included. Not entirely bad.

Still, it remains rather Herculean as a challenge in terms of the timeline I'm looking at. And for various reasons I h-a-v-e to stick to those deadlines and somehow make it all happen.

Feeling rather un-bionic

So I guess I ended up jinxing it. Or I'm just plain tired and am looking for a more meaningful excuse than being unable to work.

I've been working hard so I don't feel guilty about not having clocked a single minute on my dissertation thus far today. But I am feeling anxious - and that's making the "I don't want to write" feeling worse.

On days like these I wonder why I was drawn to all of this because I enjoy thinking and writing. I don't enjoy it all the time.

Or perhaps this is how I get when I'm starting to work on a chapter because it all seems fuzzy.

Lots of possible be-'causes' I guess...I just wish I could work. I could take a mental health day but I don't really feel like taking time off because I wish I could just work. Hmm perhaps just wishing it will make it happen, yes?

Well I guess I still have the day left...I could give it a shot. I think I'm really worn out though because I've been at it rather maniacally - at this point I'm literally dreaming my dissertation or to-do list connected to the dissertation. So I wake up already exhausted to be honest.

Hmm I can't even seem to write a straight rant. I'll let you know tomorrow if I was able to work.

Did it! And doing it...

'It' being the chapter I was running late on that I blogged about in my previous post.

I also mentioned a significant accomplishment coming up earlier here. Well I've completed 4 chapters, have 3 more to edit and 1 to write from scratch. Of the "3 more" to edit, 2 of the 3 are in more decent shape. So really 1 is kind of going to be written from scratch more or less. Also, of these 3, there's one set of interviews that I've never really incorporated in my analysis in any systematic way so that means quite a bit of work.

So if I'm MIA you know where I am. Please send me good vibes so that I can finish these drafts by the date I have planned. [Nopes not divulging because whenever I do I think I tend to jinx it myself.]

A very dear friend and colleague who also posts his comments on this blog as "anonymous" wrote to me that once there are 3 chapters in the box you know it's getting done. From his mouth (technically, typeface) to God's ears as well as my fingers. [Thanks "anonymous".]

Okay gotta go put my dissertating shoes on and get to it!

Another day, another missed deadline

So the chapter I would have been ecstatic to finish yesterday is going to eat up all of today and, yes let's be realistic, a decent chunk of tomorrow unless I truly develop some bionic dissertating skills that I currently lack.

No I'm holding the perfectionism at bay so that's not it. Perhaps I'm just too optimistic with my estimations of how long it'll take me to finish something just because I'm so eager to no longer be dissertating. And in that eagerness I forget to allow myself the bad day where I don't want to dissertate because my brain no longer wants to process this darn thing or because I have the flu or because we have guests or just like that. Or maybe the estimation is realistic at the time but as I write those what happens is that new ideas (I used to call them green points aka my own little flashes of intellectual wonder - or so I like to think - but on the days they end up making me spend more time writing I'm less than fond of them while I also love them...sigh...ambivalence) pop into my head and I know they'd improve the argument and make it more substantive.

Either way you look at it, for better or worse, it's taking me longer than I had hoped to finish this chapter. That I'm working to a deadline (nopes I refuse to share it with the blogosphere right now because I don't want to jinx it) makes me anxious when things take extra days. It's a self-enforced deadline and it's connected to being able to take a vacation - so it is hard and fast in that I really deserve the latter and am craving it.

So back to the proverbial drawing board. Coz it ain't getting done by me blogging away :-). I'll be back!

Another chapter sent

Yay me! I submitted the aforementioned methodology chapter to my chair day before yesterday and I swear it feels pretty darn good. More so because that's the chapter that sets the stage for me to be me without continuously having to justify the rationale for the project - from this point on I get to do the project which is liberating.

As far as completion is concerned, I'm coming up on a significant milestone...although not THE milestone but a pretty good one. Stay tuned for details shortly.