Quote of the Week

Nothing is a coincidence. Everything you’re experiencing is meant to happen exactly how it is happening. Embrace the lessons. Be grateful.

-BK Shivani

Ramadan Kareem!

This is the 9th time I’ll be celebrating this month-long holy event so somehow, I’ve quite adjusted to it already.

Ramadan occurs on the 9th month of the Islamic calendar when the crescent moon becomes visible and ends with the sighting of the new moon. It is believed to mark the time God revealed the Quran to the Prophet Muhammad.

If I’m not mistaken, I think Ramadan starts 11 days earlier each year, thus the change in the dates/months it is celebrated. (The first year I came here, if my memory serves me right, Ramadan started maybe late August thus ended around the third week of September.) So it can occur in both hot or cold seasons. The length of day varies and matters a lot since Muslims are fasting during this month. Fasting is one among the five pillars of Islam. (The other four include the testimony of faith, charity work, praying five times a day and the holy pilgrimage to Mecca).

We also have to keep in mind that when we speak of fasting, it doesn’t only mean fasting from food, it also includes abstaining from smoking, drinking, sexual intercourse, etc. As what I’ve seen here, they usually break the fast by eating dates and drinking water or laban (and some other drinks, I forgot how they’re called) right after sunset and then followed by a festive meal. It was a great shock for me the first time I’ve witnessed such until I eventually got used to it.

Anyhow, I just really wanted to wish all my Muslim friends a Happy Ramadan. I hope you don’t forget the true meaning of this holy month and put it in practice.

Ramadan Kareem!

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A Six-Word Story

Sometimes, we create our own heartbreaks.

A Six-Word Story

I’m probably meant to be alone.

A Six-Word Story

Missing someone who was never mine.

Quote of the Week

Accept what life offers you and try to drink from every cup. All wines should be tasted; some should only be sipped, but with others, drink the whole bottle.

-Paulo Coelho

How Evil Are You?

I chanced upon this earlier and it gave me a good laugh… seems true to me…

Photo source: Pinterest

I’m an Aquarian… 😀 How about you?

A Six-Word Story

Then you left me alone… again.

Quote of the Week

When a person tells you you hurt them, you don’t get to decide you didn’t.

-Louis C.K.

A Six-Word Story

Teach me how not to care.

Dance Dance Dance by Haruki Murakami

Book #16.

Our nameless narrator from A Wild Sheep Chase is back once again in this book as he starts to feel nostalgic about the Dolphin Hotel in Sapporo where seemingly good things happened to him. Something from within him strongly urged him to have a vacation and visit the place again. On this trip starts a series of strange events.

Interestingly, the characters have names now, except for the narrator. 🙂 Most of the characters have a mysterious side in them. Kiki, who just disappeared. Gotanda, our narrator’s former classmate whom I felt like hiding something since the beginning but was an interesting character for me. Yuki, a thirteen-year-old psychic. (I really liked Yuki and the narrator’s bantering. Pretty much a comedy!) Yumiyoshi, the receptionist in the new Dolphin Hotel. The Sheep Man. And several others.

Dance Dance Dance addressed a lot of themes such as aging, death (a very common theme in Murakami’s books), life’s meaning, illusion, reality, boredom, the importance of human connection, etc. These are themes more inclined to the heavy side but still there are also moments that will make you smile and laugh.

Typical of Murakami’s works as well are the loose ends that he leaves us with. And for me, I am still left contemplating about who the sixth skeleton is. That scene where he was driving in Hawaii with Yuki and he suddenly saw Kiki and he soon came running after her and was led to a room with six skeletons. I can account to five but who’s the sixth? Is it the Sheep Man because he’s gone from the mysterious room of the Dolphin Hotel? Or is it the narrator himself? Anyhow, it’s sort of a happy ending.

Murakami is such a brilliant writer that he always, always makes me doubt which of these things happened and which did not. In any case, this was another surreal ride but for the meantime, I will have to take a break before I start dreaming about the skeletons or the Sheep Man…

Quotable Quotes :

“People have their own reasons for dying. It might look simple, but it never is. It’s just like a root. What’s above ground is only a small part of it. But if you start pulling, it keeps coming and coming. The human mind dwells deep in darkness. Only the person himself knows the real reason, and maybe not even then.”

“People fall in love without reason, without even wanting to. You can’t predict it. That’s love.”

“Life is a lot more fragile than we think. So you should treat others in a way that leaves no regrets. Fairly, and if possible, sincerely.”

“Friends don’t need the intervention of a third party. Friendship’s a voluntary thing.”

“People leave traces of themselves where they feel most comfortable, most worthwhile.”

Rating ; 4/5 stars

Not Anymore

You do not matter

enough to me anymore

to still upset me.

Quote of the Week

The biggest coward is a man who awakens a woman’s love with no intention of loving her.

-Bob Marley