The International Who's Who

Quite an interesting site to have stumbled a short while ago:

http://www.worldwhoswho.com

Did an advanced search with nationality to "Pakistan" and had a nice read of the Who's-Who Pakistanis. While his band-member was there, Salman Ahmad seemed to be missing from the list. On further searches I found out why.

http://www.worldwhoswho.com/views/entry.html?id=sl748987&ssid=510124937&n=1

(Hint: read the first word under the name)

Student life - Original flavour

Okay. For sometime uptil this week, I was having the perfect student life. Assignments weren't a problem. Papers were easy to read through (relatively). And classes were making sense.

Right now, and since the past couple of days, I feel like the same ol' student again. Too many things to do. So little time. I start with one and lose the pencil. I switch to the other and feel like having tea. I have tea and realize its 2 am and I was supposed to go back to normal-human schedule today.

Is it the cold weather?

Is it the protein-rich (non-veg, non-salad) food (finally!)?


Procrastination avenue is here again. Whatever I'm doing, I seem to find some other (unacademic) material to view, read (eat?) that is so much more interesting. Have finished Scott Adams "God's Debris," half a dozen cricket articles, some politics, and half of "Confronting the Evidence: A call to reopen the 9-11 investigation" DVD this lady was giving outside the neo-con seminar (see "None" below) last week.

I say this all here to make an announcement: No more interesting unacademic material for the near future until the end of the term (except for Cricket results/bulletins. Matches against England are just too relevant to ignore).

Jazz concert Pop-ins and Friday dinners.

Finished a lecture and submitted an essay and my American buddy made me accompany him and another friend to this jazz/poetry thing they had in a nearby Univ. of London college. Supposed to be a flavour from the Beatnik era, something by Jack Kerouac. He merged poetry with jazz and the result (atleast the version I was fortunate enough to see for an hour about 50 years after he produced it) was very enjoyable. David Amram, composer who worked with Kerouac, was playing with his band.

The singer scat-ted some poetry in a song as well. Scatting (rapping ala Scatman) over Jazz was a unique experience.

Later on acquiesced to invitation for this dinner thing with classmates. Quite a nice crowd at the dinner table. Nice to get to know some of them better. The internationalizing of me? Why not?

Pleasant surprises.

In the weekly newspaper this week they had talked about the "Shaw Library," a place with arm chairs and books on general reading (stuff from Bertrand Russell, et al) where you could relax. Actually a student had complained to "Aunt Agony" about too many people sleeping there in the comfy armchairs, who had consoled him in her reply btw. So after an all-nighter it seemed a rather nice place to visit during the rather long 6-hour gap between 2 classes today.

Now, Shaw Library is also the venue for mid-day concerts at times. As I sunk into an arm chair and started reading various newly-filed reports on the test match result, I realized preparartions were under way for a Indian semi-classical concert. A trained Indian classical vocalist who is "also lecturer in economics at Oxford," supported by London-based band comprising a tabla player, a keyboardist and a violinst, sang 3 ghazals which were to be followed by a couple of "bhajans,".

The highlight, as in most concerts, was the part the audience could most relate to. As words and music of "Chithee Ayee Hai" echoed in the room filled with a mixed South Asian and Western audience, the latter with their eyes closed and heads nodding as if to fake understanding of the lyrics, the cloudy weather outside complemented the feel of the moment. Quite refreshing.

Class Art.

Its a term I first came up with while being a high on a coffee after feeling sleepy (a lethal combination for creativity, the sleep makes you not concentrate a lot on conforming to traditional boundaries in content and form of the expression, while the coffee-kick can make you believe that you really are doing something worthwhile and to carry on with it) in a lecture on transaction cost economics - ofcourse its relation to Information Systems (the coffee was bought and consumed in the mid-lecture 10-minute break). I graffiti-ed (scribbled, is a better term) on the paper coffee cup words and phrases that came to the mind within those few minutes. It was interesting to see the result later. From technical jargon being used in the class at that time, to current events (earthquake), to names or choruses of songs that were playing in my subconscious at that time.

Anyways, today, I was at it again. Not the coffee cups, but class art. The professor gave interesting examples in the lecture, and atleast in 3 instances I saw a student go out the lecture theatre right after an example. It might have been a co-incidence, but it certainly seemed that these people were taking offense to the examples - the guy in the second row walking out when drunk tourists not knowing how to get tube tickets were mentioned, another walking out when the instructor mentioned smart-bombing the alleged hub of all spam activity, in Florida, as a way to eliminate spam.

Hopefully there shall be more episodes of Class Art as we progress through the course.

None

Yes, that's what it says under "Government type" in the CIA World Factbook entry for Iraq.

This was pointed out by Dr Anne Norton from University of Pennsylvania who along with Dr Stefan Halper from Cambridge University gave an informative lecture on "Neo-conservatives and the Origins of the American Empire."

Again, if only all world was contained within boundaries of educational institutions.

Iraq Metro

An anagram of my name!

A very interesting (instant) survey

In the middle of our Systems Development lecture today, the instructor trying to explain the meaning of "Equivocality", as opposed to uncertainty (where addressing uncertainty would involve a simple question/answer approach and equivocality would require a more interactive process of discussion/debate) asked "Raise your hands those who think Bush and Blair were right in attacking Iraq."

Not a single hand in a class with a total strength of 147 and 41 nationalities went up.

To ensure we weren't sleeping he asked "How many think they were wrong?"

Hands up everywhere.

Then he asked how many "don't care"?

Again no hands.

If only the world were a big lecture theatre.

Kadee aao na Multan (2)

Day 5. Result: Pakistan won by 22 runs.

Finally a news to smile about. Let's read the papers. Bring on the Evening Standard.

Wah jee wah!

Kadee aao na multan...

Let us be able to say the above to other international cricket teams in the near future.
Status as of now(Stumps - Day 2): Pak 274 all out. Eng: 253/3.

Come on boys. We can still do it.

Great Dover Street Residence

Congratulations to me! I am now a resident in the LSE Great Dover Street Residence. The Almighty has been really kind and I guess this is His way of bestowing a "gift" for the fasting (read more under "Happy Eid" below). I couldn't have asked for a better eid gift.

Internet connection. Huge study table. In-room phone. Electrical sockets everywhere, fridge, kitchen opposite the door.

Nice group of flatmates too.

Regards,
Omer.

Powerful women and short hair.

Dr. Maleeha Lodhi gave a lecture today. Impressive. Don't get me wrong. I normally have no sympathies for conformists, especially rational people with an education and career that is supposed to make them even more rational singing praises of military rulers. But that was not the topic of the debate. It was about "Peace in South Asia" and it was good to see someone represent your country, your history, your feelings - not to forget to mention the categorical rebuttals to 'neighborly questions' - so well. Plus better have her represent the country in a foreign land than another ex-general. So what if the critics have lost one from their rank. By the looks of it, they must be getting dozens joining them every day.

Interesting to note that most women in positions of power have short hair. Especially 'boy-cut' but generally some type of short hair. Let's see now. Maleeha Lodhi, Condeleeza Rice, Hillary Clinton, Cristina Rocca, Lady Diana(!), Musharraf Hai, Oprah(!), Madeline Albright. I don't want to make any early conclusions now and feel free to mention any counter-examples in the comments.

Happy Eid

As the clock in the lecture hall struck 32 minutes past the hour of five, five guys in the first row each opened bottles of mineral water/soft drinks and took a sip. Thus ended the last day of Ramadan - the Muslim month of fasting - at LSE. There was a 10-minute break in the 2-hour class where some of them rushed to the prayer hall to offer the evening prayer. Had I been in any of the former places I have had the fortune of spending earlier Ramadans, classes would have finished hours ago and a table-ful of delicacies would have been laid out.

This has been my first "full" Ramadan in a non-muslim country. I shall admit that it has definitely not been easy. It can really be tiring and demanding, especially when in a big metropolis in the West you have to run to catch that bus in the stop or go hurry up and down the elevators in a metro station in order to get to your class in time. You really do need energy to keep you going all day (and tea/coffee to keep you awake on long days).

Happy Eid to all of you. And what does Eid mean, you ask? It means waking up early catching the tube to the station nearest to London central mosque and then head off classes at 9.
Salute to the folks who have been doing this every year all their lives.