In the evening I finished the reading of a book. I had stopped reading that book some days back but just because I wanted to start this new book I bought , I found the necessity to read it till the end and finish it. For those who remember reading the name of 'Magnet People' in my blog, I would like to tell that it is the very book I have completed! I spent months with it. It was very small - 115 pages. I brought it this far. I read so many other things in the meanwhile.
The book I have bought is 'Rich Dad, Poor Dad' by Robert T. Kiyosaki. I came to know abut this book from an instructor at CL while in the Personality Development Program session. One of my classmates at CL has started reading it he is already impressed by it. The book teaches business and its related strategies and how money needs to be made and not earned. I understand that no person will get rich by reading such books, but I also understand that people who are rich know all these things and it is always good know all of it without getting rich! I accept my answer is not convincing. The book is supposed to be a 'must-read' and I will be reading it. Our life never becomes a perfect story if we read novels.
We finally got a light fixed on the wall behind my computer. I had always wanted it because the light from the one on the wall opposite to it directly pinches my eyes when the computer screen reflects it on them. With the new light on it seems as if something big has changed in this living room. We also got a similar new lamp fixed in one of the bedrooms. My brother sits there while studying and he wanted it.
From tomorrow start my brother's final examinations. It is his Arabic paper tomorrow and her went to bed just a few minutes back. The exam starts at 8 am and the examination is some college at Rethi Bowli. My father would be dropping him and he will come back home by himself. Its 5th tomorrow and on 6th is his birthday. He will be busy studying and won't have any celebration. I have to gift him something and I do not know what to give. I asked him if there is something specific he wants. He didn't say anything.
Since many days back I had been wanting to write something for Flowing Emotions. I have already mentioned about this in one of my recent posts. Today I also got a comment on Gridlocked asking telling me that a post on Flowing Emotions is awaited. It was like a motivation for me and I posted something a little while ago. The title is 'Nationalism and Patriotism and Dangerous Ideas'. This can be a provocative piece of writing but I mean to write it. I have been thinking about it for some time now.
My last post on Flowing Emotions was in January. I didn't write for more than two months for that blog. Today when I opened MS - Word, it was hard for me to find the right ideas to type. I didn't know what direction to take and what all to tell. I typed some things which I later deleted thinking that they would be more naive and silly. I also felt a few things as useless to be written and some things as subjective enough to be left behind.
I didn't really keep a track of what I was writing until I came to point where I thought I could end the post. And I did it. I wasn't satisfied with what all I had written but after reading it and editing it a little, I felt better and happy. I still search for some person who can help me learn how to write effective and how to keep on writing. I am also afraid that I am not growing much with my English skills. There is a lot more to be learned. I am not a writer yet! :D
Today I told my parents that I wrote about my mother calling my father as Mr. Bean. My mother after hearing it said that she didn't mean to call him Mr. Bean but she only meant my father was behaving like Mr. Bean. Father coolly said that was what reporting is all about - a thing compared to something is equivalent to that thing being called that something! He was in a casual mood and he didn't mind me writing about all of it the way I wrote it. He read nothing and I hope he never reads anything. My brother didn't like my idea of having all this on my blog.
Currently I am nervous about something. I spoke about it on phone wit a friend and he advised me what all he could think of. I needed it all. There is something very important for me that is to be done. I pity I can't write anything about it here. If I could, then perhaps it would have made me feel better. I always feel nice after letting my blog know how I am feeling about a particular thing or anything, mostly.
If I am able to do what I am thinking of, then my life will change forever. It can be good and it can be bad. But in any case it won't effect any person. Except me and maybe one more. If it is bad, then the person moved will be me alone. If it is good, it is going to be the best thing I can think of presently. I am sure anyone knowing me will get a clear hint of what I am saying here.
There is a blog I read regularly. It is written by the same person who left a comment on Gridlocked (I mention this just to tell who the person is). I can't write any names here. I found a good article on her blog and I feel like sharing it. I have taken her permission to publish it here and it is very much her intellectual property. I just share it here.
- "To Orkut or not to Orkut, that is the question
- Scene 1 (on orkut)
Boy: hi, wanna be friends?
Girl: sure
Boy: so where do you live?
Girl: Chicago, how about you?
Boy: London
Girl: wow I’ve always wanted to go to London
Boy: oh really? you should visit then, I could show you around ☺. By the way is that your picture on the display?
Girl: yes it is, and is that you too?
Boy: wow you are pretty, do you have a boyfriend?
Girl (blushing and feeling happy): no I don’t.
(The chat pursues for a while and they end up exchanging chat ids)
Scene 2 (at a party, a guy walks up to a girl)
Boy: hi, are you enjoying the party?
Girl: naah I’m getting bored.
Boy: me too, so what do u do? Work or study or both?
Girl: I just finished my bachelors in -----, looking for a job, how about you?
Boy: I work at ------
Girl: Wow, that’s a great company to work for.
(the talk goes on for an hour and they end up exchanging phone numbers)
The two scenes have the same end, the boy and girl after a few interactions realize how irritating the other person is and they move on to the next person on orkut or another party or club .
My question is, aren’t the 2 situations alike. How different is orkut from a club? Yes you do not have people drinking or dancing on orkut, but every person is out there showing off his/her personal info. People put up their pics or videos for the whole world too see. Every person checking my profile knows how I look like (if I have my pic), what I do for a living, what I do for fun and what movies I like without even interacting with me. Isn’t that like giving away bits and pieces of yourself to everyone out there? Shouldn’t we be sharing those things with friends and people we are close to?
Girls like me, who’ve always believed that dating is wrong, talking to guy unnecessarily is wrong and hanging out in mixed gatherings is wrong do not think that doing the same online is wrong. And it is only because the other person cannot hear us or see us face to face.
Networks like orkut, facebook and hi5 are the biggest fitna these days because they lure people who are anti-dating. They make us feel that its ok to interact with guys as long as they can’t see us or hear us. I agree that watching someone or hearing their voice plays a major role in attraction, but according to me chatting with someone and finding out the other person’s thoughts and beliefs plays a bigger role in instigating attraction.
Here are some reasons why I believe chatting with someone online is worse than meeting someone (and when I mean meeting someone, I mean just meeting without getting intimate):
1) People can put on a different face on chat very easily. (We’ve heard of 60 yr old men pretending to be 20). You cant do that when you meet someone in person.
2) It is easier to lie online than it is in person. A person chatting can write with confidence that he has never dated any woman in past but would feel a little hesitant to lie about it face to face (although there are some people who have mastered the act of lying online and offline)
3) You can never judge a person’s character online. When you meet someone in person, you can assess the person’s character (in some way at least) by the way he/she looks at you, treats the waiter, walks and talks. Again you cannot be completely certain about a person’s character in just one meeting or a couple of meetings but you get a better picture of it.
4) People are more blunt and open online. For example an average decent guy wouldn’t really go up to a girl and talk to her for no reason but would not hesitate to do so online. The other example for this openness can be seen in scene 1 where a guy does not hesitate to comment ‘you are pretty’ the first time he chats with a girl.
The point I’m trying to make here is NOT that it is better to meet someone and date. I am trying to prove (mainly to myself) that chatting online is not as ‘ok’ as we have made it out to be. This blog maybe misunderstood or rather not understood at all by a lot of people who think differently than I, but I am sure there are one or two souls out there who will agree.
I will conclude with a hadith- The Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, is reported to have stated that “Whenever two strangers of the opposite gender are alone with each other, Satan becomes the third one between them.” (At-Tirmidhi)” I have always thought to myself ‘As long as I’m not physically alone with a guy, I am fine’, but now I realize that this hadith would also apply to being alone with a guy online.
Times have changed; technology has advanced, and unfortunately, so have our values. I feel like I have lost myself in the swarming online world…..I need to find a way back."
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