Today was a friend's leaving do. She's going away to live in Egypt next week, so I won't be seeing her for a long time. Not that I used to see much of her before anyway. In fact, since we met about a year and a half ago, I don't think I've ever seen her since. And her phone wasn't working, and I don't have her email address, so I've had no contact with her since then. And yet, she's my friend. And I will always consider her to be my friend, because she's someone that I really like, I feel like I can be myself with her and because I just felt like I clicked with her. I like people like that.

I also met a load of new people. I'd heard of most of these new people from the net (from my mum's net-use) and it was nice to actually find out what they're really like.

And there were a load of people there that I know, including one whom I have not seen for years. Seriously, it's been like a decade. When I last saw her she was newly wed. Now, she has four kids. Some change, huh?

Bullets

I've been blogging in my head for two days now. I've mentally written really witty, intellectual, deep, complaining and uplifting blogposts. None of which i can recall now.

I've got back into my knitting, again, and I'm really happy with my progress. I'm making a pair of booties (actually, I've already made them) and a beanie hat for my cousin's baby who is due to arrive in this world sometime in October.

I'm nearly finished this years marathon annual clean - I've been working in two hour stints on-and-off for about a month now, so it's high time I finish up. I consider this my favour to my mum for doing hardly anything during exam and research time at uni. Can't wait till I'm finally done though.

I've started to go to Islamic study circles once a week in a mosque, but they've been cancelled for the next two weeks, so that's that.

I've started revising my Qur'an: 5 pages a few times a week. Usually done whilst sitting on the terrace working on my tan - I love to multitask! So far I've revised 30pages, which is pretty good, I think. I'll probably have to reduce it when I get to parts that I've forgotten more than where I am now, but that'll be ok.

I intend (hah!) to start my exercise routine tomorrow. It will go hand in hand with waking up early. Mmmmm, we'll have to see about that one.

With regards to the whole marriage thing, I found this on icanread.



And with that I've finally learnt how to link to another page and stick in an image. It was really hard, not. So now I feel a little bit stupid that I didn't do this before, but still glad that I finally got it done. ;)

The problem with wanting to get married.

Ooooooooohhhhhhh. Where do I start? With the bloke? With my parents? With me? With everyone else?

I’ll start with me. I guess I’m what everyone calls a hopeless romantic. I truly believe that there is someone out there for me, that Allah knows who he his and will guide us together at the right time. I trust in Allah to show me who the right person is, and to make it easy for me when it is the right person. I trust Him 100% in this. I’m not going to lie, there are a lot of things where I should trust Allah more, but marriage is not one of them, for two reasons:

1) I went on Hajj when I was 18 and one of the things I prayed for really hard was a good, righteous husband who would be the joy of my life and I the joy of his. I have asked, the answer comes from Allah.
2) There really isn’t anything I can do about it. It really is in the hands of Allah. There is NOTHING I can do that will directly make a difference to my getting married to the right person.

Ok, so in all honesty, that last one’s not entirely true. I could improve myself. I mean, really, right now, I wouldn’t want to marry me. I’m a mess. I need to get my act together, especially in Islamic terms. I need to bring myself closer to Allah. But then that’s something I need to do regardless of whether or not I want to get married.

The next problem is my parents. I’ve always assumed – and you know what they say: to assume is to make an ass out of u and me – that my parents and I are on the same page with regards to this. We’re not. My mum and I are in the same chapter, but I’m not sure my dad’s even in the same book! We need to talk. I need to know that I have their 100% support in whatever decision I make… whether they like or agree with my decision or not.

The bloke isn’t really a problem… I’m just leaving him to the All-Wise. I’m human and I can’t worry about something I have zero control over. Done.

Everybody else, however, is a problem. An entire post of a problem, but basically it can be summed up in one word: pressure. Having been engaged for six months before, I know what I’m talking about. People have no idea of how the Islamic marriage system works (it’s way more complicated than the western single-meet someone-date-get engaged-married system) and so you say ‘engaged’ they think ‘wedding’ and ‘ooh lets re-enact the Spanish Inquisition and ask a gazillion questions’. ‘Engaged’, to them, means you know exactly what you’re doing, you’re madly in love and all you can think of is the guy, wedding stuff and living happily ever after. It doesn’t. BELIEVE me, it doesn’t.

Hence I no longer want to use the word ‘engaged’. It’s misleading. So, consulting my thesaurus, I’ve decided to change the word, for Islamic purposes of course, either to: ‘unavailable’, or to: ‘reserved’.

Hopefully, I’ll get around to explaining the Islamic marriage system soon. I just have to start writing…

P.S. This is not an entirely new thing in my life - my concentration on it since I've finally finished uni is what's new. However, the reason that I haven’t written about this before and why I won’t be writing about all about my experiences in this journey is that it's intensely personal and involves discussing things that I feel that I can only talk about if I’m not being judged. And this is neither the format nor the place for that.

I want to get married.

A simple sentence, that, ‘I want to get married’. And oh so complicated, difficult and, well, scary. I feel like I’m ready for it now, really ready for it. I’ve done everything I wanted to do before I get married – and I’m so grateful to Allah that I’ve been able to do that, that I am able to say that I have. And now it’s time to move on to the next phase of my life.

I want to build a life with someone else… I want a partner to share life with… I want someone I can have a family with… I want someone to love… I want someone to love me (other than my family).

But I’m not desperate. This is still quite new to me, and I’m enjoying being right here, right now. It’s fun being in a new phase and being able to explore that.

2009 Resolutions:

Last year I didn’t make any resolutions at the beginning of the year as I normally do, my thinking being that I rarely complete even half of them and well before six months are up I’ve abandoned them altogether, only to be faced with a sense of failure at the end of the year, when I’m writing the next lot. So 2008 was my resolution free year, and I found that I really missed the sense of direction I had in previous years simply from listing the things that are important to me. Come 2009, resolutions was back, but with a twist.
This year I decided to make my resolutions very simple and indefinite. I divided up the areas of my life I wanted to work on and then listed what was important in those areas, with just one word. The idea is that I’ll gain the sense of direction from having priorities, but without the predefined boundaries of set goals. This way I can update my resolutions each month, or according to the kind of progress I’m making with them. So here are my 2009 resolutions, with short explanations of each item or area:

Qur’an:
- Memorise
- Revise
- Ahkam

I want to learn the entire Qur’an, and I have no excuse really for not knowing more. Revision is obviously an important part of the learning process, and I need to really study the Ahkam, in order to recite it correctly.


Religion:
- Pray
- Read
- Apply


I need to really focus on my prayers – improving my concentration and sincerity as well as reciting longer surahs, and praying more voluntary prayers. Reading will help develop my concentration in prayer, as well as the fact that I have advanced enough in my religion to be able to read and understand more complex subjects. Application will, I believe, naturally follow on from this.

Health:
- Skincare routine
- Sunscreen
- TV
- Fiber
- Sleep

My body is a mess. I’m a wreck. Really, I am. I have awful skin, which I did not expect to have in my twenties, and no skincare routine whatsoever. And it’s not gonna get any better as I get older, because I don’t use sunscreen, so I’m gonna wind up with leathery, extra-wrinkled skin. Not nice. The TV fits in with the health thing because I can use my workout videos, etc, and so will get back to the whole exercise thing again (the gym didn’t work out). Fiber is important in any diet, and if I eat more of it, I’ll be eating less junk. I hope. And sleep is all-important – I need a routine to get my body clock back in order.

University:
- Work
- Attend
- Pass

this, I think is pretty obvious. I’m in my last year, I have a heap of research projects with my lecturers, tutors and myself rightly expecting a higher level of understanding and study. I also need to tighten up on attendance and, of course, pass.

Friends:
- Email
- Fone
- See

I’m a lousy friend. Really lousy. It’s not that I don’t think of my friends, that I don’t care about them, or that I’m so busy that I don’t have the time for them, because I do, but I’m just too darn lazy! So I’m gonna email the ones abroad, fone the ones here that I don’t see often, and meet up with my friends that live within my area.

Crafts:
- Knitting
- Crochet
- Other

I love the sense of accomplishment from making something and actually finishing it. I can’t count the number of projects I’ve started over the years, and I can’t think of one that I actually finished. I’ve been able to knit since I was 7 and able to crochet (basic crochet – nothing fancy) since I was about 12 or 13. I’ve never ever made anything with those skills. I’d also like to do more sketching, photography – I love landscape photography! – baking, and other stuff I haven’t even thought of yet.

Life:
- License
- Internet
- Work
- Writing
- Money
- Travel

This category consists of the things that will generally improve the quality of my life. I need to get my driving license so that I can drive places I need to go to. I need to start using the internet more to my advantage, that includes everything from online banking, to looking up stuff I’m interested in, to blogging. Work is a fairly obvious improvement, especially as I’m graduating this year. Initially I’ll carry on working in translation, expanding my work load (and therefore pay check ;-p) and developing my skills. I’d like to start working on some other projects in other areas, and just figure out what I want to do with my life, career-wise. I’d also like to look into writing more, with a view to getting something published. I don’t know if I’ve got what it takes for this, but the only way to find out is to try. And I need to sort out my money. I need to start saving money (I fancy myself a little nest egg), as well as spending it better and sort out my banking. Travel is something I love, and for me it doesn’t necessarily mean leaving the country, or even this city. There’s so much to see and experience right here, for free, or for very little money. Of course, that doesn’t mean that I don’t want to travel abroad, because I’d love to, but it’s not the only form of travel.

So there we have it: my resolutions for 2009. And the reason I’m only putting them in my blog now is that I’ve spent the last month testing them out to see if they’re any good, which they are.

Exam time again

It's that time of year again: the end of 1st semester exams. Whilst i'm obviously a dab hand at exams by now, i'm finding myself suffering from some exam anxiety. This is a whole, totally and completely new feeling for me. Normally i feel fine and my bowel does the whole stress thing - a perk, i felt, of having IBS: no need to worry, my gut does it for me! However, this time around has been somewhat different: my tummy is pain free, but i have headaches and i actually feel stress! I think it's because it's my last year at uni and i've just realised that i didn't do evertything i wanted to do these past few years, added to the fact that i have no idea as to what i actually want to do with my life. And i want to do well in my exams - i want to leave uni with a bang, not a pathetic whimper.
And so the panic sets in. On the plus side, i've started doing things i wasn't doing before and i have a potential job or two lined up for when i am finished uni. The things i'm doing now are:
Studying
Revising
Knitting
Memorising / Reading more Qur'an
Watching less TV
Eating better (more fiber, less crap)
Reading

One other thing i wanted to mention is that as i have been under some stress for a while now, due to other things that have been going on, i've lost some weight - about 3kgs (6lbs), and i feel way better for it. Now, don't get me wrong, my weight isn't a major problem, and some would even argue that i don't need to lose any weight, but this little bit has transformed my life. I have some problems with my insulin levels and this is helping me to feel oh so much better. Now i just have to keep it off.

According to 43things.com...

I took the 43 Things Personality Quiz and found out I'm a Traveling Self-Knowing Tree Hugger

I don't feel very self-knowing... but i guess that, compared to most people, i am well travelled. And i like to recycle and try to be eco-friendly, so maybe that makes me a tree hugger!