WARNING: title statement loaded with heavy sarcasm.
It started with that stupid coldsore, which is clearly dying at this point... and then on Tuesday, I got a needle. Vaccination for tetanus and whooping cough and... whatever.
Oh, man, it was PAINFUL.
So there we were, loitering about like cattle for the slaughterhouse, and the charming boys in our class decided to make Star, Jane and I feel better by telling us medical horror stories, only to say we were getting this tiny leetle needle that was nothing in comparison. Psh.
But everyone was leaving looking okay, and even though I still had the skeevies, I thought I could man it up. I mean, when I was little, so long as there was a sticker promised at the end, I had no issues. Nothing. At. All.
In... year seven... it hurt, a bit, and I had the tearspricklinginmyeyes sensation, but I was over it quickly.
This time, the shot was uber painful. And I held it together for the most part, though I was ... nauseous... I watched this girl being made to lie down, take another shot with adrenaline, and then have all this equipment placed on her because she had an allergic reaction. Star and I were the last ones there, and then I just burst into tears.
But I managed to walk away, anyway, get to class, and make it all the way through school. Come home, my arm is still aching, so my mother makes me do nothing for the rest of the day. The next day, joy, oh joy, my arm hurts even more. Apparently this was how it was supposed to be - all the people in our year level were feeling it too. But on top of that, I had this massive headache.
At the end of the day, I 'lost' my locker keys. I had to stay back ot find them, and then, after waiting for this teacher in her excessively long phone conversation, she finally brings out the lost keys and lo and behold, there's mine. Thank God my mother loves me enough to pick me up that day.
At home, I go straight to bed in my uniform, and barely scrape it to iftar. I'm a zombie with a fever after that. Come today and my mother decides I'm incapable of fasting, I ditch school and go to the doctor's. I'm diagnosed with some kind of virus/infection. She says I just have to suck it up, if it's too bad I can have antibiotics.
But then, I'm sort of getting better, you know?
Come home, bludge away.
Star gets home from school and just brightens my day. I have 2 SACs next week - both really hard, the maths one even the smartest maths dude doesn't understand.
Just. Great.
(Course it's not Star's fault, she was just being the messenger.)
BUT. I'm going to have to suck it up. I've always spent time telling people there's nothing they can do, suck it up, and someone in the world always has it worse. So it's time I take my own advice. Besides, in my religion, getting sick is also a way of purifying yourself. I think, if you remain sincere, and really ask for it, your sins get uhm - expelled? - easier. Thank God. Literally.
Also, I have three new Lenka songs to listen to. I particularly like this one called 'Deep Blue', which is not an original of hers, but it sounds nice, and it's basically about how techonology is eating up our lives and how we, as humans, are having less to offer.
I've begun on my Lisa McMann story too, it involves the Russian Mafia and certain death for my protaganist :)
Fabulous.
And Eid, Eid is insha'allah on Tuesday! So. So. So excited. Despite the rest of the crepe-filled week that should follow. Whatever.
So in order to boost my spirits, and maybe yours, the song of today is Not Afraid to Stand Alone, by Native Deen. I love it - we used to have the album but we gave it to our cousins in Sri-Lanka, and, as young as they were, they ended up destroying it. Morons.
I don't really think on how insane my class can be, but they sure are.
Today, last period, we had Literature, but Mr A was at a meeting and because it's a yr 11 class, it doesn't get covered by a sub. So the yr 11's go home, and we have to stay 'cause we're in yr 10. It's happened before, nothing unusual.
So I was sitting there with Star, moping. SS and R were in front of us, playing two-square on the table with a tennis-ball-without-tennis (INSIDE JOKE :P - basically it didn't have the green fluff). I asked Jane what to do, and she told me to go through the back wall and make spelling corrections on all the posters and such. It's a VCAL classroom too you see, and that's a hands-on form of education, not 'academic', so to speak. So they have all these posters about their camping trips and work experiences and blah blah blah and they have TERRIBLE spelling and grammar. And she was just joking, but I went ahead and grabbed a pen and started going through them, correcting away.
What normal teenager corrects work for fun?
Then I got sick of it, and I sat down with the rest of the class (we usually have 9 in our class, but Mitch went home) and they were talking about I don't know what, and we just sat on the tables, kicked back, did nothing. Seriously. And Mr H (my favourite English teacher) comes in and gives us that stern look, and goes, 'what's going on guys?'
And SL is like, 'uh, class?'
And Mr H proceeds to ask us where our teacher is, what subject we're in, what we're studying, and we answer him. The classroom looks a mess, though we haven't done anything, and he just tells us to straighten things up, and he leaves.
Just like that. Nevermind giving us work or sending another teacher in. See how they trust us? ^^
So then, after staightening things out, we sit down, 'cause we don't know if he'll come back. And Shags gets up and decides to play teacher. It's so stupid, but he gets into it. He connects the wire from the TV to his 'laptop' (i.e. his diary that's brimming with excessive papers), and tries to imitate Mr A by pretending not to know how to use it. He then tells us that today we're watching Monsters Inc 3, which actually comes out tomorrow, but we're watching it today because he has an illegal copy. He sets a paper on the board, tells us to watch it, and says a magic screen will eventually appear. Then he sits right in front of it, so we can't see it. R 'sneaks up' to him (it was rather obvious) and throws a the tennis-ball-without-tennis at his head, and they run around the room for a bit. When the shows over, we're back to sitting, looking dull.
Then Star and I start talking, and we randomly decide to arm wrestle (btw, I bet Dory in bio! I'm awesome! They said my arms were too skinny to beat her, BUT I DID!), and everyone bets on Star, remember that I do taekwondo, and start betting on me. We were actually a draw - I had her bent to my side, but I couldn't push her hand down, and she couldn't push mine back. Afte a while, we were both aching, so we called a truce.
But then we started reminiscing over taekwondo, and we got up, trying to remember our self-defense moves, and I remembered one, but that was it. I demonstrated on her, and they wanted me to knock SS over, but he's a guy and I felt too awkward, so we sat down again. Then we started playing catch with the tennis-ball-without-tennis, all of the class spread around the room. And kept throwing it low, so the occasional teacher outside couldn't see it flying around.
And then, near the end of class, we were in a position with Shags in the corner lying down, everyone sprawled about everywhere, and Mr I walks in. And he's like, 'who's in charge guys?'
And SL is like, 'the guy on the floor.'
And he asks us again, and Shags eventually groans, gets up, and sits in the teacher's chair, then says, 'I am.'
And Mr I is like, 'Oh, now I see, I didn't realise before, when you were on the floor, but in that chair you look more authorative'.
And he asks us the same questions, what's up, what class this is, what're we studying. When we tell him it's Pride and Prejudice, he begins to say characters names, just like: 'Mr Darcy!' (class nods) 'Mr Wickham!' (class nods) 'Mrs Benett!' (class nods)
Then Shags stops him by saying, 'Sir, please don't, you're disrupting my class.'
And Mr I is like, 'Oh, I'm sorry, I was just trying to engage them. So who's proud and who's prejudiced in the book?'
'Mr Darcy's proud, and I donno what prejudice means,' Shags replies.
'Yes you do," Jane sighs, and when Shags continues to say he doesn't, she goes, 'You know, discriminating and stuff.'
And Shags says, 'Oh, yeah, Elizabeth's prejudiced!'
And Mr I is like, 'I love the way you teach! You know, saying you don't know what a word means, which prompts the class into answering!'
'And sometimes,' Shags says wisely, 'the students teach the teachers!'
And they just banter back and forth, playing along to this silly story, and the bell goes, and we all go home. But seriously, our class is so quiet and strange, and the teachers just never know what to do with us. Other classes in our year level, put them in the same position and they talk loudly, probably wag class altogether, annoy other classes, turn the room upside down, etc. We're just so... simple, I guess. I love our class, us eccentric brainiacs, the small number of us. I liked us last year too, though there was fourteen then.
Still.
Ok, I just felt like being sentimental.
Here's the song of the day, by one of my favourite groups, Outlandish. It's just about a girl called Aicha (that's ay-sha) :)
Ok, ok, let's go back to... Wednesday... oh yeah. Right. So afterschool, I went to the library to re-borrow Reckless (which was akldjflajfhakdsh AMAZING) 'cause it was overdue, and S was there, and he asked me to recommend him a book because I have good taste :D I'm so proud. I mean, yeah, my friends generally agree on my taste, but this is someone completely different, you know? Even more - a guy. I can barely talk to them.
So, I made him borrow Gone - Michael Grant's one, you know? Hope he likes it. All of a sudden, I don't want to disappoint anyone :/
Then... ok, so today. No, wait, let me go back. Wayy back.
So my sister has this Afghan friend, N, who has the typical sort of huge family, you know? A while back, her older sister, who was, you know, young and naive as such, and was manipulated by a family friend's uncle to run away with him. (WOW, she wasn't THAT young, but young as in early 20s, maybe 19, and the uncle was also youngish)
Anyway, he was already married, and it was such a huge scandal, her brothers were baying for blood, and it tore their family apart. N comes to class, see, my sister introduced her to it to help her get through. Anyway, apparently her mother would cry every night, her younger sister was silent for days, and it was just horrible.
Her sister wanted to come back, she couldn't take it, but due to stupid pride and honour issues, her brothers and father wouldn't allow her home. They threatened to kill.
You might actually hear these stories of horrible honour killings. Just so you know, it goes completely against Islam - it's completely forbidden. That's actually a pre-Islamic tribal practise. But the thing about this sister is that she was young, and the males in her family shouldn't be mad at her, they should be mad at the guy. She's young, vulnerable, she needs guidance, she has to be forgiven and taught well. But they won't have her back.
Can you believe it? She can't go home, she can't see her family, she can't leave this guy 'cause he's controlling and beating her, she's so alone.
But the guy, now he's gone to Taiwan, so N's sister can leave the house and stuff. And guess what? N got her to come to class!
Well, she was supposed to come to class with this lovely non-Muslim Serb friend. Seriously, this Serb chick - she lives far far away, but once a week at least, she comes over to this side, to that girl's 'house', and helps her cook and clean and all that. What a... selfless being.
But the friend couldn't make it, and N and her sister came late at the end of class.
Another thing, we had a new South African Muslim come to class too, and she's so nice, and South African. Awesome, no?
Yeah, and we were going to have an iftar with N and her sister, but then we invited Z as well, and the South African lady, and Sister N, and it was so lovely! We were rushing to get everything on the table, we all squashed together. My daddy went out, so it was just us girls. It was sort of awkward, at first, but then everything went on fine.
And N's sister is such a sweetheart! I can totally see why she was so easy manipulated! She just has this trusting, kind aura, and such a soft voice, and she was so helpful and stuff. I just can't see how her father can let her go.
And then, after iftar, Z, N, her sister, my sister and I, we hung around talking. It got to whether we want brother, 'cause other than N and stuff, none of us have brothers. And N's sister was saying how all their brothers are way too protective, it's horrible, but her younger brother, I, isn't. I is in my year level at school, and heck, he was in my French class for one year. My memory of him was him sitting next to me in French, backstabbing this girl in my class who was extremely overweight, with another guy (yeah, boys do it too). I didn't particularly like this girl, nothing to do with how she looks, but I don't participate in backstabbing like that either. But he turns around to me and says, 'don't tell her, ok?'
And T, who was his company, goes, 'Yeah, she's going to tell her.'
And I shrug at both of them and go, 'I'm not going to tell. I have better things to do.'
Other than that, he hangs around with a cocky set of boys in my school, the soccerplaying wogs, who just swagger around. I didn't hate him, I just didn't... think much of him.
But I heard some pretty amazing - and so sweet - stuff. Apparently, he sneaks to this sister's house all the time, without the other brothers or father knowing, does her washing for her, talks to her 'til 1am on the phone. When her TV is broken or something, he tries to buy one for her. He burns DVDs and is always checking up on her, you know, texting her like'are you ok? Did you get home fine? Lock the door, ok? Take care'. And yesterday, apparently, he was helping her around the house, and he's like he's going to tell the mother to buy her more stuff 'cause she doesn't have much. (Yeah, the mother knows about it, she can't let go of her daughter... just like it should be) But he just shows so much love, that... wow, I feel so judgemental.
Never, ever judge people.
And N told me that he says I'm really really really smart. I didn't even know he knew me, 'cause I'm sort of invisible. And I told her that, and she said he said I'm even smarter than my older sister, and we're like, 'how does he know her?!'
LoL.
And then after that, N and co went home, and I helped Z with her homework (argumentative essays rock!!) and we just chilled. We talked more about our embarrassing parents, and Z can do the funniest imitations :P
And now we're just sitting here.
And it was such a nice night. I wish Linch was here! I think we would have had so much fun!
My tummy hurts.
I finished my entry for the school competition. It's rather weird, I don't know if I will enter, but I think I might. I'd hate to think of the whatcouldhavebeen's in the future if I didn't, you know?
I also think I'm going nuts. Some time this week, my sister and I were going to start praying taraweeh, and I turned around and shoved her, then started laughing manically. She tried to kick me, failed obviously, and we started running around like crazy, and my little sisters just stared. Then, at school on Friday, in bio, we had a sub. It was that awful art teacher I had semester 1, Mr B, you know? Anyway, he's such a drag, we had nothing to do, so Jess and I were being weird. I complained to Dory that I was bored. She told me to hit Jess. I hit her. She hit me back. I hit her again. She hit me again, and we started running around the room hitting each other, 'til we decided on a truce, and we hit Dory instead.
Then, we got bored again, so Jess and I decided to play tiggy. I got her. She tagged M, who was sitting behind us reading. She looked a little lost, but then she got E, and all us girls ran to the corner of the room, waiting for him to come get us. He was watering the plants though, and then Mr B decides to notice and tells us to go sit down.
The game couldn't die, though. After class, I reminded E he was still it. He got Jess, who got M, and I ran off to my lockers. M came to ours and got me, and I got S. He was confused, but he ran all the way to the other locker bay and got Jess, and they started a tiggy frenzy which she ditched with the Asian group.
At lunch, we were sitting around, and Jess joined Star and I, and I started again, tagging her. But there was no one else around to get, so when Dory's group came around, we tagged her. She got A, who was so lost, and we just spent the lunchtime running around this one area laughing like crazy.
At the end of lunch, Jess tagged another person in the Asian group, and once again we left it with them ^^
It felt like year 7 again :)
Anyway, last time I posted a song with no music, as in musical instruments. Here's another one, but it's wonderful, I tell you! Because you seriously cannot be sure that there isn't any instruments- it's so rich. Also, if you're worried that I'm attempting to convert you or something, I'm not, I'm just trying to get especially spiritual for this month, you know? And this song, it's more about love - hence the title of it - so if you don't wanna be brainwashed, this should be ok ^^ Plus, they actually sang this for that last FIFA World Cup, so you know, you can't expect it to be full on preaching. They didn't perform this on the main concert though, because, you know, religious dude next to Shakira, whose hips don't lie... well, it's not right, you know? :P
Ok I just have to make something clear about the last song I posted.
I mean, you may not have noticed, but I just feel a little uncertain and I'd rather correct it than forever doubt, you know? So there's one line in the song that says that our Prophet (SAW) is 'the best of mankind'. It sounds all nice, and I'm taking it in the sense that we are to strive to be like him.
But, that's it... right? D'accord? 'Cause you see, in our religion, we're not supposed to distuingish any prophet as being better than another. That's for God to do, you know? So even though Prophet Muhammad (SAW) may be the one's teachings we follow explicitly, we're not allowed to say he's better than Jesus or Moses or Noah or the rest of them.
Just making that clear ^^
Anyway, I had the most exhausting day yesterday. It was just like wake up go to school come home do maths homework help mother cook break fast finish maths homework go to taekwondo go to the mosque come back have a bath help Star with maths homework go to bed. In between, obviously, there was praying and reciting Qu'ran. I'm alive and in one piece, though, so all's good.
So TODAY, Star went home early, sick. I'm a leetle worreed. See, it was this sort of break down thing she's had before, but I don't think she went to the doctor. But it scares me. She just goes really pale, (and she's already pale) has trouble breathing, her stomach and head hurt, she sits really still without moving, and she says she can't see. I can only push her to go the doctor so far, you know? I hope she's ok :/
And I saw the most weirdest thing today! So it was raining, I was soaking as I trudged to the corner where my sister and I, and J and E meet after school, d'accord? And I saw this little doggie running around with apparently no owner.
Just so you know, I'm scared of dogs.
And this dog is just running around like nuts, and all of a sudden, it just dashes across the road... and it almost makes it but then a car just hits its back and I just totally freeze up and stare.
It yelps, jumps up, and runs back to our side of the road. Just like that. And it finds this kid from our school, and just follows him. I thought maybe he's the owner (though he looked a little uncomfortable), and it keeps following him down the street, and then it just... runs somewhere... and the boy takes off. Ditching it wherever it vanished to.
... Yeah that's it. But it was freaky o.O
I'm reading Reckless, by Cornelia Funke, and I'm loving it so far :D
And I love this song, the words are so nice. And it has no music besides the drums, but it still sounds good. There's no official video, so I've got one with lyrics though some are a bit off. Just a bit.
... (that's sort of an awkwardly bad place where it's stopped, but the song isn't wholly sad :/ )...
"I beg you; do not let a few people shape your view on an entire faith. Because what I've seen, and so many others... is beautiful."
SO I watched the MOOZ-LUM movie. J'adore it xD I wish it was longer, but seriously, it was so so so amazing! That was one of the nicest bits in it! My favourite though, is the bit where Iman screams out WE'RE NOT TERRORISTS!
*sniffs*
Ok, I didn't cry, you should know I never cry. But it was so sad and nice.
Uh, basic run down. Young Muslim boy, raised in religious family. His father is not the stereotype of horrible, dominating Muslim man, but he's religious, and expects his kids to be so - to the point where the boy has to wear the taqiyah (Muslim guy cap) to school. Anyway, so his father decides he wants to put the boy, oh, his name is Tariq, right? Ok, so he wants to put Tariq in an Islamic boy's boarding school, where he will learn to be a hafiz (memorising the entire Qu'ran) amongst normal subjects. His mother is opposed to think, in her words to the father; "You're just trying to create a carbon copy of yourself." She's not unreligious, she's just more lenient on her kids.
Over at the school, he expresses a sort of yearning to be like normal kids, you know, lots of us go through these phases. He meets this girl from a Catholic school nearby, and they date 'secretly'. Keep in mind, they're very young, so it's all innocent. Also, one night, Tariq and his roommate sneak out to go trick or treating in Halloween, because in our religion you don't do that.
Now, there's this awful teacher in the school, who is sort of the stereotype of horrible, dominating Muslim man. Anyway, he catched Tariq, and beats him up while asking him who went with him. Obviously, Tariq doesn't give that up, but eventually, time goes by, his reciting falters, his grades drop, and this horrible man continues to beat him, putting scars all down his back. He never tells anyone, although his roommate knows.
Time goes by, and he's entering Uni, and falls for all the temptations - i.e. alcohol, partying, girlfriends, etc etc. His father had requested a Muslim roommate for him, and he got Hamza, but he continues to ignore and avoid him. Because of the parents falling out, his younger sister Taqwa hadn't seen him in a while, so she pops up and hangs around. Hamza also has a 'wife' of sorts, I believe they're married young 'cause they don't want to do anything haraam, but they're still... uh, learning about each other. No, they're not an arranged couple, they're just taking things slow. Anyway, Taqwa befriends Iman, and stuff happens, and then 9/11 occurs, and you all know what happens then.
I'll stop there, but it's fantastic, I tell you. I've pretty much spoiled a lot of it, but it's still worth watching. Heck, I knew what was going to be in it before I watched it, so there.
Iman's my favourite character, just so you know x) And Taqwa is so like my character in Chipped, though less ... flighty. She just has the same bubblyish, almost annoying attitude ^^
Ok, other stuff for the weekend...? Um, oh, sister #3 fasted for the first time this weekend! She made it through the entire Saturday, though she does have a short fuse and got really mad once. But she's a little girl, so I think her fast is still accepted :) And my dad went to the iftar at the Turkish mosque, and brought home Turkish food... agh, I feel fat, but it was yum :)
Oh, speaking of mosques, a few days ago, an imam died leading the Fajr prayer. In the second rakah.
o.o
What a way to die - in Ramadan, in the middle of praying. Alhamdullilah.
Anyway, life goes on. Round 2 for song goes to Maher Zain, to this song I found recently called 'The Chosen One'. I love the video especially because it incorporates the teachings of our Prophet (SAW).
Anyway, I really can't.. I donno... I don't have much to write. Ramadan's going fine - the weather is especially nice.
I met my new French teacher on Monday. I think I weirded her out. We were writing out these identitycardparagraphthings, and one of the things we had to write was what we liked. I wrote les dinosaures. She gave me a sort of Look, and said tres interesantes. Hehe.
Speaking of dinosaurs, I finished 'The Lost World', and j'adore it. But I was reading reviews on GoodReads, and a lot of people rated it negatively. Why? It was awesome! SARAH HARDING FED DODGSON TO THE T-REX!
Oh, and S is back from her holiday, so that's all good.
That cat I was supposed to be getting? Well, I'm not getting it anymore, there were... complications. I knew it was too good to be true. But Star is still trying to get me one. If she does, I will obviously brag my butt off here, but until then... we'll see.
And, yeah, that's it. I was thinking, just for this month, I'll post Islamic music videos. First to go is Sami Yusuf, 'cause you know, I love him, and this was the first song I heard by him and I have fond memories ^^ Not to mention, as I have done so sixty billion times before, his voice is beautiful.
