Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in Zulfikar al-Amrikiy's LiveJournal:

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Friday, March 4th, 2005
5:22 pm	Everyone's doin' it.. I Am A: Neutral Evil Elf Mage Druid Alignment: Neutral Evil characters believe in Number One. Their personal gain takes precedance over all else, and they will work with whomever necessary and whatever institutions necessary to further their own goals. Race: Elves are the eldest of all races, although they are generally a bit smaller than humans. They are generally well-cultured, artistic, easy-going, and because of their long lives, unconcerned with day-to-day activities that other races frequently concern themselves with. Elves are, effectively, immortal, although they can be killed. After a thousand years or so, they simply pass on to the next plane of existance. Primary Class: Mages harness the magical energies for their own use. Spells, spell books, and long hours in the library are their loves. While often not physically strong, their mental talents can make up for this. Secondary Class: Druids are a special variety of Cleric who serves the Earth, and can call upon the power in the earth to accomplish their goals. They tend to be somewhat fanatical about defending natural settings. Deity: Velsharoon is the Neutral Evil god of necromancy, liches, and undeath. He is also known as the Vaunted, the Archmage of Necromancy, and the Lord of the Forgotten Crypt. His followers practice the necromantic arts, and raise the dead to do their bidding. His symbol is a crowned skull. Find out What D&D Character Are You?, courtesy ofNeppyMan (e-mail) Current Mood: hungry (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Wednesday, November 10th, 2004
3:14 pm	Hah. Your soul came from the Bowels of HELL! You're a demon preying on the mortals of Earth. BACK TO HELL WITH YOU! Where Did Your Soul Originate? brought to you by Quizilla As if there was any question! Current Mood: amused (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Monday, October 11th, 2004
9:18 pm	Enh. Motivation level flagging. My mother brought up something interesting on the phone tonight. I had myself so psyched over the summer about how intense this semester was gonna be that now, with the great life shift and subsequent rearrangement of my schedule, I feel bored. So very bored. I'm taking 19 units, but I feel like I have too much time. I work on the translations for my thesis, I do my readings for Tamil class, I work on my midterm for South Indian Religions, I write biweekly papers for Israeli Pop Culture class, I practice for Taiwanese class..Really, the only thing I still am working on getting started is my damn Islam in America paper (why are middle school teachers so hard to get a hold of?). So I do all these things, plus weeklyish volunteering at the Asian Art Museum and off-again-on-again auditing of an art history class, yet I still feel bored out of my skull. But the thing is, it's not bored like 'oh, now I have time to write/create webpages/paint/go hiking', it's bored like 'I'm gonna go to sleep.' So that's what it is. Current Mood: bored (Comment on this)
Sunday, September 28th, 2003
2:55 am	I am a pimp. So a bunch of the girls from my floor decided to go out partying. The first two parties we went to were busted by the cops almost as soon as we arrived (sigh) and then Thidamony's ahhhrse got grabbed at the one that we did find. So we walked around looking for entertainment for a while. Finally, another party was found but about half of us wanted to go back to the dorm. So we split and, as we were crossing the street on the last leg of our journey back to Stern, this guy came and asked, as was the mantra of all the guys we met that evening, if he could be the boyfriend of one of our group. I walked to pass him, gave my best clever grin and apologized, but /I/ was already the boyfriend of all of them. He was shocked for a moment, then arrived on the other side of the street. He shouted across, "You are a /pimp/! South SIDE!" It was so random, but it did wonders for my self-esteem. :D Current Mood: amused (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, September 23rd, 2003
11:08 pm	Earlier this evening when I was listening to some Viduthalai Geethangal, a girl came into my room and asked what kind of music I was listening to. She looked like she was North Indian. I told her 'Tamil music' and showed her the page with its cheery Sea Tigers in their camo boat. She looked kind of suprised and confused, then said that she thought it was something Indian. Then she left quickly. Now, up to this point, I had been figuring that she was kind of shocked at seeing the LTTE stuff..But I just now figured out what it probably was....The big Pakistani flag on my wall. :P (Comment on this)
Friday, September 19th, 2003
9:26 pm	Pakistan Zindabad So I was walking and talking with my lit teacher after class (as usual) when I found myself at Telegraph Ave. We parted ways and I decided to get some pearl milk tea. Then I decided I should have some dinner..Something Pakistani, natch. I just got my P'stani flag and put it up on my wall all proud-like and had been exploring my M.A. Jinnah CD-ROM, so I was feeling very 'dil dil pakistan'. :) That and the fact that the national anthem (Qaumi Trana) had been on constant loop in my mind all through my lit class and I had been humming it the whole time. :P There's a place called 'Naan'n'Curry' that has a total Karachi vibe goin' on, so I went there. I ordered my biryani and settled in with my cup of milk tea (PMT=Paki Milk Tea?). Then, I heard a strain of music that was familiar..I listened in and discovered it to be the patriotic song 'Ae Hawa ke Rahio'! My heart was full of joy! Then, to make it better, whichever CD that was on ended and they put in Shehzad Roy's 'Rab Janay'! I wonder what the guy at the register thought when I suddenly broke out laughing at the first strains of Jinnah Karlo Gai Pyar. :P There I was, trying to conquor a huge plate of oily biryani, chugging endless mugs of milk tea and grooving to PakiPop. It was like heaven. :D Oh yeah, and I had to correct our lit teacher's Pakistani geography today. He was making a rough map of India (we all laughed at him; Shrenik was like, "/That's/ not India!!"), and was explaining the origin of the Mughal empire. He put Afghanistan with Indus Valley and Pakistan to its west. "Pakistan's not there!" I blurted frantically. "It's on the /other/ side of Afghanistan!!" Then he was pointing out the major centers of Mughal culture in Delhi and the Mumbai area and I suggested, "How about Hyderabad?" He looked forlorn for a minute, then admitted, "I'm not even going to /try/ to put that on the map." Ha! He may almost have a PhD in Sanskrit but I -- a lowly undergrad --trump his South Asian Islamic knowledge! :) Current Mood: amused (Comment on this)
Thursday, September 18th, 2003
1:45 am	Ooh. Looks like I'll be adding Yet Another Astrakhan Hat to my collection. But a real one this time! I hope I win (it's on Ebay), but I'm pretty willing to go up to any price... Not only is it a real astrakhan..It's a Jinnah-style black astrakhan. :D Oh, and the other good news is that I recieved Validation for my two pet theories in SAS. I explained both my Pakistani Cinema theory and the Tamil King/Sinhala King theory to our GSI for literature and he thought they were both worthy topics to be pursued. Yay! An almost-Doctorate in the field has deemed me worthy! On the other hand, I all but named my affiliations in class (and afterwards). He suggests that I go to the Cornell Sinhala Summerschool; I just might, if I end up not having an Assignment. I wonder if he's gonna reveal my dirty secret to Sujatha. :P Also....My roommate and I are fighting a guerilla war against eachother on the topic of her no-goodnik boyfriend. My father found out that this guy has been living with us and was livid. Hell, ever since the bum made a sexually harrassing comment to me, I've been livid. Oh God, it's like Kashmir or something. I want him to be (cough cough) liberated and she wants him to remain part of the Union Territories. I've already gone to the United Nations and the international law is on my side. I guess it's also sort of like the Indian Independance Struggled -- I'm going to legal recourse (what, you think I'd be Gandhi in this? ;)) while she's pursuing a program of civil disobediance. ('Nonviolence is for illiterates.' -Jinnah) We'll see. But he will be liberated. Or I'll give him a black eye and have my father (hmm..Pak Army!!) move in on the territory. Current Mood: discontent (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, September 17th, 2003
12:57 am	OH MY GOD!!!!!! Comrade Maik passed this on: The Naked Chef is really One Of Us!!!! Damn cool. ;) I want his shirt. Current Mood: ecstatic (Comment on this)
Monday, September 15th, 2003
1:13 am	Arrrrgh. I'm glad I'm not a international relations major. Arrrrgh. I got this book called 'Beyond the Tigers' about the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi and am about halfway through it. Here's an example of why international politics makes my reasonable brain parts catch on fire: According to the book, Mossad trained both the Sinhala and LTTE and Indian soldiers in the same camp at the same time in how to sabotage the efforts of the other groups. Of course, they were winking and slipping money into the pocket of Pakistan's covert intelligence agency, the ISI, while all this was going on. (And then recently the ISI was winking and slipping money into the pocket of al-Qaida, which was slipping airplanes into buildings in the USA, which was the one who originally slipped the money into Mossad's pockets..Aiyo..My head hurts already and I'm not even at my main point..) Oh, but don't forget that the LTTE (so they say) was more or less building rough 'alliances' with the Sikh Babbar Khalsa and various Dalit and Muslim groups.. Which is funny, since a section of the Ummah of Eelam complain about not liking the Tigers.. And the Sikhs formed a major part of the Indian Peace Keeping Force that did all the burning, pillaging and raping that triggered the damn assassination. Don't forget that Sri Lanka generally gets along very well with Pakistan and the Muslim community at large.. And then Yasir Arafat, Der Jowlmeister himself, calls up Rajiv a few days before his death and warns him of an immanent assassination attempt.. And that Ukranian explosives were delivered to the Tigers after the job was done.. And that KP (not me; the Tigers weapons procurement dude) was in Cyprus negotiating with some Greek ships at the time.. My head hurts. That whole 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' aphorism can go f..... itself. Current Mood: confused (Comment on this)
Saturday, September 13th, 2003
8:19 pm	Ohmigod. I just figured out why all Pakistani movies (from the 70s-80s era, at least) have the same plotline! And it has to do with Jinnah! I was (still am, really) pondering the tragic love triangle of Sarojini Naidu-Jinnah-Ruttenbai. It really would make a wonderful historical fiction piece. Then it occured to me -- this paradigm is the very same as found in Pakistani movies! (I'll use 'Dewarain' as my example, because it's really eerie how that movie especially has these elements) Here you have the excellent, upstanding, moral hero (Jinnah/Salman). You also have the fervently devoted, sweet, moral heroine (Ruttenbai/Afrin). You have the 'outsider' woman passionately lusting after the hero (Sarojini Naidu/Julie Gonzalez). Of course, the hero is too pure and upright to fall for her wiles (no matter how wily; I mean, the 'Can't rest, can't sleep..' scene from Dewarain.../Damn/. If a hardened anti-romanticist like me wanted a piece of that, I can't imagine how it would bee for poor, on-the-lam, near-hopeless Salman! ;)). She ends up sacrificing of herself (Julie turns traitor to the mafia and is killed in the Ubiquitous Shootout protecting Afrin and Salman; Sarojini didn't give up her life, but she defended them with her infamous pen). Oh, and I forgot the villain that the femme fatale is in with (Gandhi/Xiang). Though as far as I know Gandhi wasn't literally in bed with Naidu. As far as I know. Weird. But true! Current Mood: aggravated (Comment on this)
2:50 am	Oh, I forgot -- I think I gave myself away in Literature class today. We were talking about the many uses of religion (capitalist, sexual, military..) and someone asked about Sri Lanka. The teacher replied that the majority Sinhalese are Buddhist and the minority Tamils are predominantly Saiva Hindus. Fair enough. He also mentioned that they fight a lot. A guy in the back said, "Hindus and Muslims I can see fighting, but Hindus and Buddhists..?" So, of course, I offered my thoughts (accompanied with many hand gestures and, if I'm not mistaken, a sudden red flush to my cheeks and forehead). "If you want to call them Buddhists at all! Their idea of Buddhism is that the Buddha granted them the island to be an 'island of the faith' or 'lamp of faith' and that therefore all non-Buddhists must be killed or driven out!" Also, though the teacher was the only one who saw it, I was grimacing and snorting a lot while the discussion was drifting over topics of the RSS and BJP (boo, hiss). Sure, he knows I'm a Tamil student (and even apologized for his lack of knowledge in the Tamil classics and promised to do his best to bring in another Dravida-focused GSI for a guest lecture) but I've never really hinted (hinted like a steamroller!) at my politics before. Ah well. What does he expect from a Tamil student? (1 Comment |Comment on this)
2:09 am	Ae Quaid-e-Azam... September 11th was the 54th anniversary of the death of the Quaid-e-Azam, Muhammad Ali Jinnah. I took the opportunity to get some books on the father of Pakistan, and one is really standing out to me. It's _Jinnah and his Times_, a hefty (900+ pages w/ footnotes) volume that covers not only Jinnah's political career but also his personal life. Here's some fun MAJ facts for you, kids! * 'Jinnah' is alternately given as Gujerati for 'slender' or 'delicate' or Arabic for 'feathers'. Both pretty much suit the slim, impeccably-dressed fellow. * He once asked a Parsi fellow whose family he spent a lot of time with, "How do you feel about inter-religious marriages?" The Parsi went on a whole shpiel about how he thought they would work well towards integration of Indian society as a whole. "Good," replied Jinnah, "Then I'd like to marry your daughter." And, despite her father's attempts, Rutenbai ended up sneaking out of her house and "kidnapping" (in her own words!) Jinnah for an elopement. Awww.. * He rocked a monocle. How cool is that! Dude, I want a monocle now. * His motto for achieving anything: "Work, Work and More Work!" * Architect Yahya Merchant designed a special kind of arch for the Jinnah Mausoleum to echo the slim elegance of the Dearly Departed within. It didn't get opened until 1971 due to Fatima Jinnah (his sister and lifelong companion) nixing all the Jinnah Mausoleum plans made by other national leaders to bring status to themselves. Here's another goal to add to my list: go to Karachi and place flowers at his memorial someday. And to go to the museum of Jinnahphenalia. :D Current Mood: melancholy (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, August 28th, 2003
11:05 pm	Attack of the Killer R5A Thesis!!! Maria (jumping suddenly off the bed): Houston, we have a thesis! Georgia: You know, I don't think replacing 'problem' with 'thesis' is a good idea.. Maria: Oh, wouldn't that be /nice/... (Comment on this)
10:21 pm	Oh, happiness! You know how they always say that when you go away to college that you'll meet people just like you? It's true, even for me! In the span of the time between Tamil class this morning and about an hour ago, I've found /two/ people who share the same views as me. Now, this may not be such a strange thing if I were a Democrat or a Green or a Hippy or whatever... But as an Eelamist? ;) (It also helps that there was adobo in the DC for dinner and that I found the library section on Muhammad Ali Jinnah) Current Mood: excited (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, August 21st, 2003
1:04 am	Quote of the day: "That was the most dangerous safety tour I've ever been on." -Jennifer from Floor One (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Tuesday, August 12th, 2003
7:04 pm	kapra, kapra aur kapra! Most of the time when I look at clothing, I scoff and say, 'I could make that myself for a fraction of the cost!' Well, I've finally found something for which that is catagorically not true! I ordered a shalwar kameez a week or two ago from Priyanka's in Mumbai. It was on sale -- about $30. Well, I received the finished product and..Heck, I couldn't even buy the fabric for $30, much less a custom-made 3-piece outfit of this quality! :P And they did do a very good job of tailoring (all the while clear across the globe), so it fits very nicely. So I'm happy (and ready to go shopping again!!), and my mother's happy (and keeping a close eye on her credit card!!), and even my father was impressed, so it's all good. Current Mood: happy (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, August 7th, 2003
11:47 pm	New favorite song: 'Ndiyo Mzee' by Professor Jay. From Tamil Nadu to Tanzania, some things just don't change! Reduce taxes -- ndiyo, mzee. Greater freedoms -- ndiyo, mzee. Better economy -- ndiyo, mzee. Domestic security from dem dirty A-rabs -- ndiyo, tumbili. ;) Oh, and I know who my roommate is gonna be. From New Jersey, land of voting dead Republicans, Mafiosi and more South Asians than you can shake a stick at. And home of the Ilankai Tamil Sangam, which now has the fabulous 'Pirabakaran' series. Arr, I feel like those reality TV fiends who go through withdrawl waiting for the next installment. It's really a great series. Eelam history, pullling no punches, breakin' it down old-skool. Required reading! As soon as it gets entered onto the company website, I'm going to have a map to advertise. If you want a genuine piece of Red Commie Chinese Hegemon kitsch... That's all. Current Mood: grooovy (Comment on this)
Sunday, August 3rd, 2003
8:48 pm	The SEX Post! Now that I've suckered you into reading this, you dirty beasts.. What is it with this whole Tantric Sex fad? Grr. These mushy sex gurus who talk about uniting with the universe and all that yatta yatta yatta pseudo-spiritual mumbomajumbo and those who follow them are MISSING THE POINT. Sex is not an end unto itself for the yogin. It is a tool -- not of procreation but of liberation. Yes, and there even comes a point where that tool is useless -- like feeding a teenager mashed carrots to fill their every nutritional need! And just for fun (and because I'm unaccoutably tired and have lost my will to write), here are some thoughts from Paampaattichchittar: They will compare the bare and desiccated skin of those round breasts to the Mount Meru And you, o dancing snake, are sure that they will perish -- those who fell into the well of a stinking cunt (Zvelebil, _The Poets of the Powers_ pp 24) Take that, fishwife! Current Mood: drained (Comment on this)
Tuesday, July 29th, 2003
12:20 am	I really wish Sarakhs would get around to putting up their website. Grr. My super-incomplete Maaveerar Pukazh in English. The best picture ever! And it's from a Japanese children's book! Current Mood: recumbent (Comment on this)
Friday, July 25th, 2003
7:44 pm	Black July -- then and now It is blowing upon us, brother -- the sweet breeze of freedom! The Tigers have welcomed it into our midst -- raise high their noble flag! Our new battlefield -- a flourishing Eelam! Our new battlefield -- a flourishing Eelam! Claim it! (free translation of Kasi Ananthan's 'Visuthadaa, Thambi', excerpt) Current Mood: hungry (Comment on this)