The 50 Dollar Piercing

We were standing in Sky Jewellers which if you haven't already guessed, is a gold shop. My mom wanted to buy rings for my cousins in Pakistan.

Basically, that is what she does. Which is buy Gold, wear Gold and gift Gold. In her mind, anything less is an insult to a lady's class.

Anyway, so we were standing there, looking at hundreds of rings when I heard a piercing scream on my right. It was a little girl whose ears were being pierced and she was bawling at the top of her voice.

When we exited after doing our business in the shop, my mom stopped the mother of that girl and gave her some sort of advice. Which is her other favourite hobby.

We are ultimate believers in helping others.

Abbu asks Amma, " What was it ? Were you asking her the price of piercing ?"

"No. I was telling her to give some Adol to the kid. "

I said, " Shit. We should have asked. "

On which my mom goes like, "Its free, Sumaica. They bought the gold tops so the piercing is free. "

And I burst out laughing in the middle of all these shopkeepers trying to figure out the reason for my insanity.

Than I went to tell my mom that I was laughing because I got my second piercing done for 150 QR which is basically 50 dollars. And at the time, I had thought that it was very cheap.

......

I Am The Stupid One

A few days ago, Moawiz had his Junior Variety Show in which he was a participant in three of the choirs. He came home and said, Apa, I am going to wear this Silver sparkly shirt with a Bow tie and it looks so cute on me. And I was smitten. My thoughts were like, dude, you know more about clothes than I do.

Which is hilarious considering I am a girl and you are 7.

Anyway, so there we were on the day, proudly sitting in the audience, looking at the program, trying to figure out which choir out of five were his, listed on the paper. Anyway, they came on stage. While everyone is figuring out their positions on the stage, my dear brother is more interested in where my mom is in the audience. His eyes dart here and there, left and right, a bewildered expression on his face, which showed where his interest really was.

My mom being the amazing impulsive person she is, gets up from her seat, starts waving crazily at him, shouting, Moawiz, I am right here. I duck down, thinking I do not know this woman, people.

Moawiz on the other hand has an opposite reaction. He breaks into a huge smile, gives a thumbs up to my mom and says something to his friend.

When the second poem of their's starts and they come on stage wearing silver sparkly shirts looking like escorts at a beauty pageant and I have had enough of the terrible fox dance by a bunch of 4th graders who were doing "thumkas" because that is OBVIOUSLY what a fox does. How stupid of me.

They start singing and I am looking at my youngest brother with an exasperated expression on my face who is making all the wrong hand gestures. The lines they are singing are " its a small world something something", and while everyone else has their arms wide open making a huge circle, Moawiz has his hands folded making a small circle with his hands. I was furious, to say the least.

The minute he comes off the stage, I start grilling him for detail, asking him what went wrong, and what the hell was he doing up there. He looks at me, long and hard, smirks, and says in a very annoyed voice which made me sound like the stupid one, Apa, the line was "its a SMALL world" So we were suppose to make smaller circles. Everyone else was making the wrong gestures instead of me.

I stood their dumbfounded. This is what the world has come to. I admit. I am stupid.

.......

Happy Birthday Minion !

Batman sign cake made by me. 

Today is my baby brothers birthday. He turned 7. He is probably the first kid who has marked his birthday on the calender,  a month ago and we were reminded everyday of it. I was told to buy presents for him and to act surprized. He wanted a Batman cake and I, honestly, was not sure whether the cake will end up like it or not. But surprisingly, it did.

I still remember the day he was born. We were in Jeddah, but my dad was in Riyadh, miles away and he had lost his job. And we all were in the middle of crises. When my dad came home after meeting my mom and the baby, he had already forgotten two of the names my mom had suggested for my baby brother. We ended up naming him Moawiz which people used to pronounce as Mouse. The same day my dad got an offer from Qatar. And our life turned around. Amma called him "The Passport of Qatar".

Moawiz, when he was about 3 years old.

Time has passed by like running water. One second we were fighting with each other over dressing him up in cute clothes and the next, he is choosing his own clothes. People always ask, who is he like the most ? I used to reply, me. But truth is, he has a bit of each of us in him. He can stand for hours looking at himself in the mirror, combing his hair like Huzaifa. He is never short of money and he stomps off in anger like Muaaz. And he eats exactly like me. He already is in love with books. He won't believe what anyone is saying till he has asked at least 3 people. He is the kid who gets smothered with love and kisses by strangers but when it comes to scolding, he gets scolded five times for a single misdeed. Even now life is moving on way too fast. Instead of taking on a bus's speed, it has taken an aeroplane's. He is already 7.

Whenever someone talks about him as a baby, he will go like, I know, I was such a cute baby and than Bhai Jaan stepped on me.This kid got published in a magazine couple of weeks ago and the story, ofcourse was about pirates. I always wake up to find him standing by my bedside, smiling creepily, to annoy me.

Happy B'day Kiddo ! You always ask me, who my favourite brother is. Truth is, you have made it impossible for me to choose. Just remember, always be the person you are today. This life is like the moon. It looks beautiful from the outside but when you go inside it, you see all the scars and failures etched into it. But you have to remember and hold on to that beauty and hope in order to turn those scars of failure into the marks of your success and happiness. After all even a diamond is a stone. So its all about how you look at things. You brought so much happiness in our lives that we never imagined. You truly were a shining star in those dark times. I wish you all the very best for your life.

First day of school.

I have no idea what he trying to do.

Reading Garfield like a boss. 

...SAP...