Selamat Hari Raya!

I had two full days of celebrations, and then put a close to all of it for myself because of upcoming deadlines. I stayed in school late yesterday lest I came home to guests and couldn't get any sort of work done. It's been feeling like a never-ending marathon with Ramadhan and then the thesis and the cases and the learning issues. Exhausting is an understatement.

Raya was the same-old fun stuff (is that an oxymoron?); plus people once again asking when I'm going to be married. Dearies, if it was as easy as ticking a checkbox for you, I would do it just so you'd get off my back. I've been wondering what the threshold age is before they start realising maybe it's not quite so polite to be implying how terrible it is to be single in front of a single woman. All I can say is, thank God I am so much more self-possessed now than I was when I was younger.

Besides, I have never had reason to believe otherwise:

O Allah, when I lose hope because my plans have come to nothing, 
Help me remember that Your Love is always greater than my disappointments,
and Your Plans for my life are better than my dreams.

No, not now = Yes, but not yet

Have I mentioned how much I love PBL (i.e. Problem-Based Learning)? I may have alluded to it, or implied that it was fun. But I have to say it clearly: it is the safest, most enjoyable, and most conducive learning environment I have ever had the privilege to be part of.

Essentially, what we do is, a group of 10 of us, sit around a table and discuss a case. There is stimulus information (e.g. worksheets with details about a client) provided by the faculty and each session is usually accompanied by an external supervisor who stands by the periphery to watch and just kinda steers us back if we're veering a bit too off course. As a rule, they aren't supposed to talk much at all. Ultimately, on a given morning, we students kind of figure it out for ourselves. They throw problems at us, and then say, "Here, figure it out!"

I think it may come across as an exaggeration to say that the whole process is fun, but how else can I say it? We come up with ideas, share it with each other, respectfully criticize each other, occasionally laugh at our cluelessness and dig up information together. It is awesome. I wish every school experience I had based itself on PBL. It empowers the individual, encourages independence in learning and builds cooperation and collaboration amongst peers.

Ah, peers. An appropriate disclaimer here would be the fact that I think I have exceptional classmates who are all awesome and supportive and fun. And that, I suppose, is one of the major factors for fulfilling PBL sessions. It might not work with young students or persons with no desire for teamwork. When everybody treats everyone else with respect, or better yet, like a friend, it can only create a relaxed atmosphere. Honestly, our sessions can get so funny at times.

Today, we discussed whether we should allow a boy with ASD to join a CC robotics group: after nitpicking each other's arguments, we came up with two answers which we laughed over, because it was essentially the same thing -- "No, not now" and "Yes, but not yet". Ah well, it's not so funny now, but it was funny as frak to me this morning.

We only have four weeks left and all of this will come to an end -- it saddens me. I want my classmates now to be my future colleagues, can?



And how is it that 30 nights have passed by without my feeling like I've done anything? I feel weepy tonight.

ASD is such a fascinating condition. Only slightly more than a year ago, I had some reservations about working with these children; they're aloof, distant and very difficult. (During my first placement, I was on eggshells every time I saw this ASD kid; he looked ready to burst into tears at the slightest provocation!) Less worrisome to work with the other kids, right? Children with Down's for instance, are so warm and adorable, and hug you for no reason.

But now, I feel quite the opposite. I'd be quite psyched to be assigned an ASD kid! Yes, I do think ASD is still something complex and difficult, but my gosh, so interesting.

This morning, a guest lecturer told us of a 7-year-old boy who, in the space of about 15 minutes and while his mum chatted to the therapist, filled an entire whiteboard (a'la John Nash in Beautiful Mind) with the anatomy of the brain, accompanied with chemical equations and scientific labels. His favourite hobby was to read the Encyclopedia Britannica.

This brilliant boy however declared, "I don't need any friends, I don't need my family, I don't need anybody." And then later said, "The person who invented friendship must have been very intelligent." Underlining the fact, that really, the social world is something incomprehensible to their intellect.

Sheldon Cooper is so real, y'all. And so is Mr Spock, perhaps, haha.

oops, I've fallen for another drama

Apparently, I don't learn.

Been quietly following the Kdrama, Gaksital. I have no coherent words as to how awesome it is. It's about 8 episodes to the end now and it still hasn't disappointed, and has delivered one awesome episode after another.

I have now completely confirmed my weakness for tortured heroes (as if it was ever in doubt?). All the K-dramas I consider good and are in my favourites list (i.e. Iljimae, Princess Man, City Hunter and now, Gaksital) involve a hero tortured to the edge of sanity and then becoming a masked vigilante to avenge against a corrupted government. Ah, I'm so predictable. But really, if Kdrama has a talent, it's torturing their characters. Also, the female lead is usually equally awesome and physically involved in the conspiracy in some way.

I actually started live-blogging while watching because it's that good. I was barely able to contain my fan squeeing. Gaksital is not only possibly becoming my favourite K-drama ever, but really one of my favourite heroes of all time, outside the K-drama sphere. I'll probably dedicate a separate post to the reasons for why and how Gaksital wins -- additionally, I will try to be as objective as possible -- when the whole drama wraps up. I have a feeling this might be one of those things I'll physically force on my friends to watch.




In the meantime, enjoy a SPOILER-filled MV of the OTP (of course there's one! a hero always gets one):

Also, there are gorgeous, gorgeous shots. And people are raving about this incredibly moving scene. Seriously this drama is so nuanced at times, it makes me gasp in awe.

I'm really, really, really, hoping that the ending meets the standard of the drama so far.

O Allah! I ask that You give me from Your Presence such mercy that with it You will guide my heart, regulate my affairs, and put order into my disorder. And that You will fill me with perfect faith, and bestow on my outer, good deeds, and You will render my deeds pure and sincere, and inspire me with a suitable way to gain Your Pleasure, and give us friends that will be familiar to me and protect me from all manner of evil.

O Allah! Even though my understanding is limited and my deeds are few, I bring to Your Door my (worldly and otherworldly needs) and ask that You meet them. I am in need of Your Mercy, and I present my state to You.

Power of fasting! 

I think I like these two (i.e. Sungha Jung and Megan Lee) all the more because they're obviously Big Bang fans. Sungha Jung even mentioned on a television interview that he looks up to G-Dragon as a composer/songwriter.

And Monster is really nice! It's quite noisy at first, if you're not into loud jarring music, but underneath that, there's a beautiful, sad melody. Personally, aside from a few of Big Bang's very early songs in their first albums or so, I can't say I find any of their songs boring. Yes, I know - my bias. I've been blinded by love and now lost all objectivity.

Sungha Jung's cover of Monster with Megan Lee:




And the original! (I love TOP's voiceovers, seriously. @.@)



---

Also recently finished a novel called The Little Women Letters by Gabrielle Donnelly, based on the much-loved Louisa M. Alcott's original Little Women: a descendant of the March sisters discovers letter correspondences between Jo, Meg and Amy in her house attic, and learns about love, life and family.

It's lovely domestic and optimistic fluff (and so unlike my normal inclinations for melodrama of epic proportions, it's refreshing). It left me grateful for knowing some awesome women in my life too.


Concord, October 1872


Dearest Bethie,


This is the last time I shall write to you from this home where we all once shared so much laughter and so many dreams, where I grew from a wild girl to a happy woman, where Meg was courted by John, and Amy made her mud pies and fretted about her nose, and you were our angel and still are. Dear, tonight my Professor returned from the West, and tomorrow, all in a day, I am to marry him, and move to Plumfield to start the school!


...


I think I shan't write to you again, Bethie. I'm leaving this home where for so long I have lived so quietly with mother and father and your memory, and going to a different place, to start a busy new life whose activities will leave me little time for writing letters to you. But don't think, dearie, that I've forgotten you or ever will, even for an hour. Death cannot part us, for our love can never die, and nor can my changing home, for I feel your presence always watching over me, and wherever I go, I know you are there. Dear, such an adventure as I am embarking on in my life with Fritz! But please know that, no matter what happens to me from now on, no matter what joys or sorrows befall, no matter where my life takes me, or how many years of it may be given to me to live, I will take you with me, in my heart, always.


With love, dearest Bethie, from
Jo.


And this from the 1994 movie adaptation with the star-studded cast (I don't know why I don't have this movie in DVD already; I should): where Laurie proposed to Jo, only to be horrifyingly friend-zoned. The first time I watched this, I remember thinking, "God, Jo! You can't reject Christian Bale!!!!!" And besides, he's going to be Batman! Except well, even I didn't know that before, haha.

I am a fan of this intelligent, eloquent, big-hearted, passionate and gorgeous lady, Myriam Francois Cerrah, whose blog now sits on my favourites bar. Hurray for inspiring women as role models.






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Unrelated but, I noticed the date -- Happy Birthday, Harry Potter! Hah. :D I believe he's supposed to be 32 years old today?

I have been imbued with some strange positive vibe tonight, despite the fact that my first thesis draft is due in a few days and I am of course nowhere near done. I'm not complaining; just hoping this lasts.

It would be awesome if this blessed month reflected on my academic work.

Hate no one, no matter how much they've wronged you.
Live humbly, no matter how wealthy you've become.
Think positively, no matter how hard life is.
Give much, even if you've been given little.
Keep in touch, with the ones who have forgotten you, and
Do not stop praying for the best for those you love.

- Sayidina Ali B. Abi Talib r.a.

I picked this book up at NLB yesterday.

It highlights what seems intuitive to a lot of us: that promiscuity and unusual or different (read: perverted and unnatural) sexual behaviour is bad; but this doctor proves that it's medically so. Because liberal persons and groups will just scoff at you if you speak of anything to do with morality and God forbid, religion, they need a doctor to show them some hard facts. This is a brave lady who seems to really care abut the welfare and health of young people, especially young women, her personal ideologies and beliefs aside (I don't even know what these are).

It's a compelling view: that promiscuity isn't condemned as much as drug use, alcohol, or smoking when it appears equally dangerous. It's not even a moral stance, people! It's about your health! But people and institutions of authority are pretending these facts don't exist and celebrate Hollywood-style sexual liberation-ism, because, Grossman opined, they are pushing a political/social agenda (or in my opinion, they insist on being Godless and self-destructive, come what may). 

Alhamdulillah, all of the above is forbidden in Islam. Seriously, women, trust God to protect you, not misleading feminists.

Ramadhan Mubarak! Time must be especially managed and spent wisely now.

Insya Allah, we will all see him after this world. :')

This is an awesomely succinct summary of why the niqab shouldn't be banned! :) I'm not a fan of it either, and a Muslim woman I am too (for I believe that all that is stipulated by God is everything covered but the face and hands) -- but ultimately, niqab is a choice that harms no one. And in my personal view, is just an excuse to attack my faith as a whole.



This dude has this perpetual, exasperated I-can't-believe-I-even-have-to-explain-such-a-simple-thing expression on his face; so amusing.

No matter where God planted you it is your task to expose yourself to the light.

:)

from Why the trees lean in

Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be,
and whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.

- Desiderate the Desired Things

Our first proper meet-up for the year! I thought it deserved a special post.

Who knows when we'll meet up next. :P

Thought for the day:

God is Kind, but God is also Wise.


Happy Nisfu Syaaban. <3

"I missed you," I said, pulling Dov down to sit next to me on the edge of the bed. I wanted so much to take his hand into mine, to kiss his cheek, to hug him and hold him. Instead I just stared at the tangle of uncombed hair at the back of his head, I wished he would look at me, but I knew he couldn't. Not when he was like this. Just sitting beside me without shrieking, for this precious moment, was the greatest gift Dov could give me. I knew it took every ounce of his energy and concentration to do it. "I love you," I said quietly, getting up as slowly as I could.


"How about some pajamas?" I asked, rummaging through his dresser drawers. I tried to help him put them on but whenever I touched him he doubled over, laughing hysterically. He could not stop. "Was everything okay while I was away?" I asked, trying to ignore his behaviour and my despair. "C'mon, let's get these on." I was on the verge of tears. Dov couldn't stop laughing; he laughed until he was screaming.


Then suddenly, just as inexplicably, he began sobbing uncontrollably, a deep, mournful, despairing kind of crying. Huge tears rolled down his cheeks. I stared at him in utter grief, unable to know what was going on in his mind and heart. Finally, I just hugged him tightly, locking my arms around him and rocking us both, brushing away my owns tears on my sleeve.


I didn't really believe in praying. But that didn't stop me from doing it. In fact, I prayed all the time. And not just for Dov but for all the children in the world who suffered from autism. They all deserved a miracle.


But I wanted a modern miracle. The old-fashioned miracle where one person at a time was saved just wasn't acceptable anymore. No, modern miracles were much bigger than that: They had to be reproducible; they required clinical trials and publication in peer reviewed journals. Modern miracles were for the masses, not just one individual. That's why we started CAN (Cure Autism Now). What good was a miracle, after all, if it saved only one little boy? No, I never prayed just for Dov -- until now.


I felt defeated, destroyed, inadequate, broken down. I would accept any kind of miracle right now, even the senseless, one-in-a-million, unreproducible kind that cured only one person. I was too devastated to be altruistic any longer. I just wanted God to fix Dov - to save him, to cure him, to help him get better - because this was no way to live.


And then Dov started communicating with an alphabet board, and they discovered he had an intelligent and intact mind beyond their imagining.





Miracles, I was learning, not only brought joy but by their very definition must shatter your world, casting everything you thought you knew to the four winds.

- Strange Son, by Portia Iversen

I am totally going to rave about this book to my classmates. Already started today. It is overwhelming to contemplate the possibility that the low-functioning autistics we've come across actually have complete minds that feel and think like any other. The only reason this isn't in out textbooks, I feel, though I've yet to dig up more on this, is that there is a lack of EBP (i.e. evidence-based practice) and they just haven't distilled the intervention procedure to be scientifically acceptable (and with concrete valid theories etc).

That's the problem with science. It takes itself far too seriously and blinds itself to wondrous possibilities.

VULTURIUS
Halt, who goes there?

TURKEYIUS
It is I. I have observed you now of late
Thou hast the look
Of a depressed bird. 
Share your worries with
A friend that loves you.

VULTURIUS
Oh, Turkeyius.
Vexed I am 
By the words of a matchmaker.
He spoke of turnips and blond hair...

TURKEYIUS
A matchmaker!
Oh worry not, my sister.
He speaks of nothing but lies.
'Open your heart', he tells me
'Love might strikest unknowingly
Like lightning'.
I think it's bullcrap.
Pardon my language.

Poem 8 by Tito Mukhopadhyay (An excerpt from Portia Iversen's Strange Son)

In a place called Somewhere there lived happiness
Somewhere was a place of Paradise
But one day from Nowhere
Came Sorrow from the place called Nowhere
Happiness asked Sorrow to leave
The place called Somewhere
Sorrow went back to Nowhere
And then occupied the hearts of people
Who are kind and compassionate
As they never refused anybody a place to stay
So if you feel the pain
Which a person who lost his mind bears
If your heart aches when you see a tear in someone's eyes
If you are ready to accept such a person and help him
You can be sure
You have sheltered Sorrow in your heart.


This made me cry, and all the more because Tito is severely autistic (i.e. negligible speech, no control over behaviour, arm flapping etc) and who could ever dream such a mind existed under the autistic shell. How can it be true that autistic persons know no empathy and lack theory of mind when this poem exists??? I am boggled.

Have a look at Tito on a documentary. I've yet to finish the book, but I am getting increasingly fascinated.

Danger, danger da yo! especially when I desperately need to be practical and on-task. And likely the reason I always go for epic-level stories.

Many INFPs depend on and come to expect a certain level of emotional intensity. For better or worse, they feel they are not fully alive without a stiff emotional cocktail in hand. They may seek out, even if largely unconsciously, experiences that arouse or intensify feelings of passion or inspiration. They may turn to drugs, relationships, novels, poetry, music, or movies–whatever it takes to jump-start their emotions and achieve their desired level of intensity.When feeling inspired, INFPs may disappear for hours on end, immersing themselves in painting, poetry, music, and the like.

personality junkie