Sonya Syed

I am so thankful to finally feel better, digestive system is all in its place but I had to make some hard core food choices. For some time I have to minimize my spice intake, deep fried items, chicken and coffee. I have switched to simple meals, fish, green tea, fruits and vegetables. I know this sound too good to be true but really if I can persevere on this diet plan I am sure I will continue to feel better. There are moments when big things hardly matter and at some instances slightest of mistakes could irritate you. The little stuff that annoys me most is when hand marks are printed on newly painted or clean walls. I always keep requesting people not to touch walls yet some of them hardly pay any heed to my humble pleadings. The only option that I’m left with is to repaint the entire walls; however, this is neither feasible nor an economical alternative. Lately I have been thinking to learn to paint walls myself or at least do retouching on walls because those marks ge...

It is such a relief to eventually clean up my wardrobe; I have been planning to take up this humongous task since months so when today I cleaned it all up the whole experience proved to be therapeutic. I was so attached to some of my clothing items that I have kept them since I was in Class tenth. Yeh I know its insane but it is true…   I don’t know whether there material was good or they looked good; nevertheless, I kept them with me all along. The amazing part is that I can still easily fit in most of my old clothes. Whether its cleaning the wardrobe or drawers filled with paperwork it is always a refreshing activity. If one has gone solo to do such tedious work then you should be prepared to endure the backaches, but all’s well that ends well. Annual budget is on its way in Pakistan and soon details of price hikes shall be revealed to public. I wonder what do they mean by budget? In common understanding budget is termed as a systematic plan for the expenditure of a ...

So the food, food and food is making a huge impact on me, other than feeling nauseous 24/7 I feel feverish and weak. If any one of you ever develop this sort of intense relationship with food then be careful it is your own digestive system that will pay the price. I had a lovely coincidental meeting with an old acquaintance of mine. We started our law internship almost together, when we met very briefly twice or thrice few years ago and whenever we met it had been a lovely experience. Then for years we lost touch; however, in last two weeks we accidentally met twice. Our first meeting was regarding law matters and then yesterday I saw her at the supermarket. In our first meeting we called it a pleasant surprise but when we met yesterday we were a bit confused. I told her that had she been some guy I would have called our meeting serendipity and that there has to be some connection; but alas!……. Anyways it is wonderful to meet people with whom you get along quite well. ...

There are times when I have the most interesting relationship with food, from the instances where I eat to live and other when I live to eat. These days latter situation is prevalent and I am going out of my way to eat all that I enjoy, some of which includes deep fried food, biryani and so on. The problem is that when I am having all those sort of food I eat believing that I have a tanker rather than a regular sized stomach and my main aim is to fill it to the fullest. Plus there isn’t any kind of exercise currently in my life, so I need all your prayers to come out of the my latest obsession with food. This is not the first time that I am facing such situation but it has been my pattern for quite some time. In my early childhood we didn’t have the kind of health awareness that today’s kids and parents have. I used to drink crate (with 24 bottles) of cola in just three days and my favourite chips were full of tartar. God knows what that crap had done to my system. The Gen...

I remembered seeing a TV play called “Lahasil” (Vain, Futile) and how much we all loved it. It was about the struggles and spiritual journey of a woman who changed her faith to Islam. The story, screenplay & actors were simply brilliant. However, for some reason today I find it all a bit in accurate. Not only in this play but in many other TV dramas, films, novels they show that the people who are deeply spiritual and have intense love and faith of God are always sick, broke and in misery. It somehow gives impression that to be near God one has to be in misery. It is always considered that the people who perform hard labor and live on streets sleep peacefully at night because they are not rich. Similarly you must have observed that in books, dramas & films the person who is rich is evil, he doesn’t have peace of mind or health. He only became rich because he cheated someone or smuggled illegal stuff and he has no feelings for others. So much so that this concept has ta...

Boredom is a peculiar phenomenon, you don’t understand its cause and you don’t know how to get over it. Since Saturday I was bored to the death, I went out in open air to breathe some fresh air of the sea and it was a pleasant experience. On our way home on Saturday suddenly it became dark and windy as if the sky was sharing my sentiments. I have tried to capture those moments.       In the pictures below where you see golden dots, this is actually the dust in the air and everything was covered with it.     Then again on Sunday same state took over me and once again I went for outing. However, this time instead of getting better I felt far more down and in the moment I realized that irrespective of where you run you cannot run away from yourself and your mind.       As long as we remain in the same mental-state no matter where we go; even the most beautiful place on the planet could only keep us...

Just had a very late lunch/ supper/ dinner and I have to say that life seems to be more meaningful after the meal. It is an enormous blessing to get food immediately as you need it. Think of it when you are hungry and there is nothing for you to eat, entire body becomes sluggish, sugar level goes down and there is no ability to think or to do whatsoever. It is strange that apparently minor things like a bar of fresh soap, a new shampoo which we take for granted means so much to us, just imagine living without them for a day. We have some kind of strange zoom lens fitted in our eyes which forgoes the immediate significant things available to us and only focus on the stuff that is out of our range.    For some reason I am struggling to write today probably the mind is working on so many different directions that to concentrate on one thing is hard. Or may be I have so much to say that expression is beyond my writing capacity. After a while I had some nice deep...

What a day it is when you didn’t do anything significant, when its all same old same old. From the worldly perspective it is considered a boring dull day but from the metaphysical view it is termed as a peaceful day. So today I don’t have any endeavor to talk about except the interview of our respected Prime Minister which he gave to CNN recently. My goodness it was as embarrassing as it could be possible. This is really how the world perceives us a nation, a bunch of dumb slaves. While I was a child I always felt proud of my roots to this country, whenever there was celebration of our independence day I felt myself imbibed in pride. Nevertheless, as I grew up, the illusion or dream state began to shatter piece by piece. The tragedy is that this country has immense potential some of the most astounding natural resources as well as human resources. Every field of work is rich with talented people but it hurts to witness that there is nobody until now who has the capability to uti...

Unexpected twist and turn in life at times make it difficult to focus on anything so it is wise to withdraw, and return only when the senses are stabilized. Past few weeks my mind has been engrossed in various activities so I was unable to concentrate on anything else. Now finally when calmness is returning I am able to return to the usual environ. I would like to add that there is nothing to worry about me or the people around me, its all good by the Grace of God. I thank for your concern and for constantly sending me your emails and messages to return to the blog- It is so wonderful to be missed. I do understand desire to communicate and I do understand how much it means to all. Yet I have to say that sometimes my immediate commitments, my family, work takes up most of my time and attention. It does become physically impossible to attend to all, instantly. I feel responsible towards the Blog posts and maintaining the connection but at times by staying away, I merely seek t...

Many apologies for not being able to write regularly but InshaAllah will get back to you all very soon.  I hope you all understand.. Take Care until next time... Sonya. (Day 303)

What a day I had it was traveling and more traveling but it is great that some really important work has been taken care of. When I came home I thought I couldn’t move but here I am all set to chat with you all. First and foremost I thank you all on the blog and on facebook for giving your warm responses on the birthday pictures. There have been some challenging moments when my gratitude was put to test, however; at the end of it all finally it seems life is making some sense. Throughout my life I have adhered to praying and saying Thank You God routinely, probably because that was the way I was brought up. Like many others I too followed the same method, yet I always failed to comprehend the true essence of prayers or the power of gratitude. We practice gratitude but we hardly ever mean it, when we get something we desire we thank for it then few hours into it and we begin to take everything for granted. Or in most cases we only opt for gratitude when we get huge achi...

These days everyone is either remaking classic films or releasing part 2 of some movie, like Don 2 or Dhoom 2, unconcerned of the fact that anybody saw or liked the first part they are making the second one. So I thought it appropriate to add number two with title. Yesterday I missed out my precious observations about few more of the facebook profiles. This lack is also felt by one of the blog’s reader Naved who correctly pointed out this for me.  So this is my sequel to yesterday’ post Facebook Profile where I gave my candid personal take on the fact that Facebook profile/timeline could give us a pointer about the personal/ emotional state and current life of any individual. I have been asked to throw some light on people whose profiles have mostly the pictures of mountains, desserts, oceans, or fruits or cartoon characters. Well, people who use pictures of natural environment or fruits are definitely close to Nature, some of them might have some spiritual inkling in...

God has been extremely Gracious to me and today our blog has completed 300 days. There is something amazing about having zero after numbers, the more the merrier. For a while now I have been observing this and almost every time it proves correct. We all aware of the Facebook and the profile pictures that people upload (now the name profile is changed to timeline) . I have seen that whatever kind of pictures people put on their profile is the reflection of their personality, current life and also their emotional state. Recently I have uploaded the picture of my Dad with me and that was exactly what I was going through. I was thinking about my late father and I was in a state of nostalgia and my timeline showed that. You see, all of the young mothers put the photograph of their little children. Why because their life is surrounded by their young ones – at this stage little children takes up almost their entire day, making motherhood an overwhelming experience.   ...

I always wondered from the days of my childhood as to why do we celebrate Labor Day, there had been brief discussions and all of them gave me incomplete overview. So I finally decided to look as to why we in Pakistan celebrate something which happened in 1800’s in the United States. During 18 th century American workers toiled continuously for 12 hours seven days a week to earn basic living. The working conditions of those laborers were not only unsafe but they had no access to fresh air, sanitary facilities. 5 or 6 year old children labored like adults within same time frame in factories, mills and they were paid half as to what the older workers earned. It was the time when Industrial Revolution was gaining momentum so the labor unions became visible, these unions demanded fair wages, safe working conditions, holidays and so on. After protests and some legislation Labor Day got recognized to commemorate efforts of all those workers. Socialist and communists also celeb...

I planned to write today’s post earlier but for one reason or the other it got delayed. By twelve at night sleeps tend to raid the senses and thoughts become incoherent, it gets difficult to express and the keys in front are blurred. Nevertheless, if a commitment is made then it should be fulfilled. Yesterday I had an invitation from a dear friend of mine Sadia who invited me to her son Mustafa’s fifth birthday on 5 th May. I’m not good at remembering birthdays but I was sure that Mustafa was born in November; of course I didn’t recollect the exact date. Today when my friend called me I confirmed her son’s date of birth and to my surprise I was correct it was in November and not in May. Then the obvious question was as to why are we celebrating Mustafa’s birthday on 5 th May. She replied to my desperate query by saying that, “ I had a huge debate with Mustafa and strangely enough he has decided to celebrate his birthday in May and I just couldn’t convince him otherwise.” ...