ha ha ha ha ha, i just prank called my mother wooohoooo, I'm sat upstairs doing some trips work on the computer when a voice whispers ' pick up your mobile and ring your house number' which I did and my mum answered the phone:

mum: 'hello-assalamu allyku

me: heeeeeeeeelooooo (in a really growly voice)

mum: h.. h.. hello

me: heeeeeeeeellllllllooooooooooooooo (in an even more growly voice)

mum: HELLO said it really loud this time)

me: heeeeeeeeeeeeeeellllloooo cough cough cough (I said it even more growly that it made me cough)

mum: look I think you have wrong number, sorry, good bye'

and put the phone down, I'm thinking why did she apologies and she was even polite and said good bye looool

ok I'm gonna go down and growl hello to her and see if she realises it was me

that was funny, just told my day and he's laughing, ok I'm gonna go down and tell her now...

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah, I'm so annoyed, walahi I feel like just walking out of work and not looking back once, how is it that 1 human being can really get on my nerves to the extent that I wouldn't mind bashing his head continuously against a cactus.

anything I say he misunderstands and takes out of context, and he just called me abnormal which I'm usually fine with cause I know that but he called me it in Arabic which is soooo different, he meant that I'm clinically abnormal, talk about calling the kettle black, I swear some one keep the medical syringes away from me other wise I amy shove them where the sun don't shine.

oh Allah you are the wisest and greatest, please save me from the torment of my work place.

ok every one can agree that work can be stressful and that sometimes certain memebrs of the work force can be unbearable at times, bless them, any way i came across this:

Here is a stress management technique recommended in all the latest psychological texts:
Picture yourself near a stream.Birds are softly chirping in the crisp, cool, mountain air. No one knows your secret place. You are in total seclusion from that hectic place called "the world". The soothing sound of a gentle waterfall fills the air with a cascade of serenity. The water is clear.You can easily make out the face of the person you're holding under the water...
There now.....
feeling better?

i swear, its the best thing since sliced bread....

we humans are quite the funny race, you would think that the amount of mistakes we make we would have learnt by now, but no we still manage to keep making mistakes and they tend to be of the stupid kind, take me for example, I'm a walking mistake (not that my birth was a mistake or anything astaghfurallah) what I mean is that when I say or do something its usually by accident or just a mistake or cause I didn't think before I spoke an and then later sit down and thing 'god why did I say that' and most people can accept it as being a genuine stupidity on my part others just think WEIRDO.

take Istanbul for example, we had been eating meat of the chicken and sheep variety until it felt that we were a walking takeway seriously I had turned into a chicken shawerma, flower lady had turned into a donnor, am had turned into a kebab it was getting to much, so we decided to take every one to a fish restraunt, change of scenery and smell oh yeh and food variety as well although I still eat meat as I am no fish eater.

so we all climb the stair way to the end of time (loads of stair climbing in Istanbul) and park ourselves on the seats, and as usual when it comes to going anywhere us females always have to visit the toilet, its like its calling to us or something ' come to me, come to me, smell my freshly bleached floors, see how clean I am' lol, so anyway we usually have a conversation before we decide to hit the toilets and it usually goes something like this:

person 1:'ummmm so I wonder what the toilets are like'

person2: yeh, I actually really need to go, I've been holding it in since 3 minutes ago and if I don't go every 5 minutes, i cant bear to imagine what will happen to me'

person3: I know, I have the same problem, hey maybe we should unite a form a toilet visitor society?

person4: wow sounds good, I'm game for that.

me: mmmmmmmmm chai latte, cafe neeeeeeeroooo

person1: oh my god, a tough just occurred to me, what if its the old style toilets like you get in Muslim countries?

person2, 3, 4 (every 0ne): ooooooooh man, eeew

me: some one go investigate

ok so the conversation didn't go quite like that but I have an active imagination, but seriously though, we always have a mini dsicussion as to whether the toilets are the European style or the squatting on the floor and falling flat on your face style.

so a group of 4 decided to go up to the toilet, and the rest of stayed seating, the brothers were not aware of our conversation, they were sat directly opposite us, and although it was obvious that those sisters who left the table where heading towards the toilet, its not something that anyone would announce that is except me...

I didn't mean to, I swear it was a mistake, I didn't mean to blurt it out, I was so worried about the state of the toilet and I was really desperate, so when I saw the girls coming down the stairs I shouted out:

'you guys went to the toilet? how was it?' and a second later I realised I had shouted it out infront of the brothers, and am bless her shouted back ' yeh it was great' loooooool, one of the brothers was like 'ooook, thank sfor letting us know'

I was sooo embarrassed, my face went like a complete tomato and I was in hysterical laughter, and most of the girls were alright with it but 1 or 2 were really shocked bless them.

but yeh, that me putting my foot in it again, I guess I haven't learnt yet, I pray to Allah to always help me and others to think before opening our mouths ameen.

Isn't it funny how un-expected things just happen and they always happen out of the blue, I swear that's the fun thing about most of the un-expected stuff, at the time its shock or horror but later its something that you can ponder over and have a good laugh like when we crossed over to the Asian side in Istanbul....

a little geography lesson, Istanbul has two sides the European side and the Asian side and they are separated by the bospherous and you can cross over by boat/ferry/dinghy/dolphin or you can cross by the big ginormous bridge which we decided to cross by, and it was nice, the day turned out to be lovely mashallah, the sun was shining every one was smiling, it was a lazy sunday day, we had just been to the park and had some shawerma sandwiches then some apple tea whilst listening to the shaikh and his lovely reminders, then we headed of to another well known park, and the first thing that struck us was the flowers they were every where in all colours so us Britain's just ran on to the grass and started to pose, out come the cameras and before the first flash security guy comes running over telling us to get of the grass and wouldn't let us take one picture, well... some of us managed to sneak a couple.

any way we prayed duhar and asr in the palace which was not open to the public but our driver bless him spoke to the cleaning lady who opened it especially for us and we prayed inside the palace how cool. so we get onto the coach and start descending down to the river side where there is this famous open cafe thing where ewe could drink a traditional hot drink called sehlab which I was going on about for the whole journey and so every one wante dto taste this drink to see whether it was worth me going on about, so were all sitting down on these massive stairs drinking hot sehlab and admiring the view of the bospherous and the other side of the river, and this Turkish man decides he wants to fish right were we where sitting, he takes out his fishing rod and plonks it into the water.

I'm sat down contemplating, thinking about life in general when I start to hear screaming and people pointing to the floor, so I look at what there pointing it and its a live fish bouncing on the floor right next to my feet wow how cool is that, I swear I didn't even think about what I was doing I bend down and pick it up and it slips out of my fingers, so I pick up again and cause its alive its shaking and moving and it wouldn't stay still so it kept escaping my fingers but I just kept on trying to hold it until finally I get a good grip and I'm smiling like anything and the Turkish guy comes over with his bucket and tells me to put his fish that he caught back into it which I did, all that time a certain AM was screaming at the top of her voice 'PUT IT BACK, PUT IT BACK, PUT IT BACK' over and over again llllllllooooool, I swear it was the funniest thing.

can I just ay that I had always wanted to hold a fish right out of water while it wasa alive, wow what an accomplishment, also when I put it back in the water I had fish scales all over my hand cooooooool.

ok round 2 of adventure in Istanbul;

well we had been traveling since 10:30 am so by the time we got to our hotel in Istanbul it was after 2am and I had given every one there room keys and was the last one to go up with my roomy whom I shall name Algeria, so me and Algeria take the lift to the 3rd floor dump our belongings in there and then I remembered that I needed to get something from some one else's room, so I nipped out for a second and got chatting with my commander in chief when Algeria makes an appearance saying she doesn want to be left alone which was fine... Except that when we both go back to our room it was locked (obviously), so this is how the conversation went with Algeria:

me: Algeria please tell me that you have the room key with you (I'm franticly searching her hands with my eyes)

Algeria: umm no sondes, don't you have it?

me: ummm no cause I left you in the room and so obviously left the key as well, aaaaaaaaaah man what we gonaa do

by the all this was happening at about 3am, so I'm standing there staring at Algeria whilst she's staring back at me, I then turn around to her and say:

me: ok luv your gonna have to go downstairs and get them to open the door for us, ok?

Algeria: no sonde splease I cant go down by me-self you gotta come down with me,

me: HELL no- (can I just point out that Algeria was fully dressed whilst me, I had changed into my pink night gown and I was bear foot and my scarf did not match what I was wearing whatso ever and it wasn't pinned so it was wrapped around me in a weird way, I basically looked like a falaha which means a farmers wife that is an Arab farmers wife) Algeria I'm so not going down dressed like this.. no way

Algeria: oh please I'm scared

me: fine we will just sleep out side

Algeria no way:

me: thn go down and tell the dude downstairs

algeria: ok but you have to come down with me

me: fine

so were going down the stairs and I'm trying to be discreet and blend in with the wall paper and I kept hearing that damn mission impossible tune in my head, so we get to the level just before the reception, so I turn around to Algeria and tell her:

me: ok Algeria I will wait here, its gonna be cool cause I can see you from here and they cant see me so I don't need to make a fool of myself yeh?

Algeria: no sondes please please - (she's having a panic attack)

me: for the love of god.. fine lets get this over and done with, you so owe me after this..

I kept telling myself hey things could be a lot worse, I mean I could be in my under wear for one but why that would ever be the case god knows but I was trying to make the situation a lot better, so I meekly come down the stairs and theirs about 2 of them one at reception and the other just standing there, so I push Algeria forward and I'm conscious of the fact that there looking at my feet and I'm cursing under my breath and Algeria finally goes up to the desk and starts laughing and says:

Algeria: ha ha aha ha he ehe ehe hee hee we kinda he he he locked ourselves out ha ha ha

me: my god some one shoot me

the reception guy: hgdcndoijdn... he did not speak a word of English and we don't speak Turkish and at that point I had butted into the conversation and started to sign language our predicament..

the guys starts smiling and nodding his head so were like yeh he understands so we start going up the stairs and wait for him. a couple of minutes later he comes and he sees us standing there and were all smiling at each other and no one is making a move then I start making key movements and he's still standing there and it hits me the guys is holding no key in his hands he didn't understand aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah, so I start fidgeting with the door Handel and trying to explain to him and he finally gets it, frowns does sighing noises and I'm like yeh that's it where getting some where, so he goes down again and emerges minutes later with a bunch of keys and finally opens our door and take our original key, removes of the key ring and place sth ekey in my hand and mutters something in Turkish so I start pointing at Algeria and saying walahi it wasn't me it was her it was her not meeeeeeee, so he nods and leaves.

I turn around to algeriaand say you owe big time....

ok now that I have kinda recovered from my trip and that my anger has left me about coming into work, I guess that means I can blog about the actual trip, well alhamdullilah Istanbul as usual was lovely, the weather was brill apart from the day we went to bursa but otherwise really nice mashallah, I love Istanbul I can really see my-self living there, its an interesting city and the best thing about it I sthe mosques and the people are soooo nice mashallah I really could ramble about how much Istanbul is great but there is no comedy in that is there? and belief me a lot of weird and funny stuff happened on this trip it all started with heathrow......

I was wearing my blue jilbab thing that has buttons coming down it, I had my camera in one hand and my bag in the other, alhamdullilah checking in was no problem and I had already made sure that majority of the participants had checked in and made there way to the departure lounge, I had left behind my commander in charge to help a brother and his son check in ( they had arrived late) and decided that I would head towards departure to make sure every one was cool, so I'm lining up and then its my turn to go through the security thing and I always beep, doesn't matter if I take all my metal of I still manage to beep, my theory is that the doctor who did my appendix operation left his watch in me and that's why they always detect metal on me, so I'm getting ready to go through, I've already put my camera and my handbag into the moving machine x-ray thing and was just about to walk through the metal sensor when the lady standing at the side stops me and says:

lady: ' excuse me, can I ask that you remove your coat'

me: 'um no I'm not gonna do that'

and before she even gives me a chance to explain why ( reason I couldn't was cause I was wearing a body top and tight jeans and my coat was not a coat but a jilbab a religious clothing) she starts shouting 'SECURITY SECURITY SECURITY WE HAVE A SITUATATION' I swear it was like the films, every1 is looking at me and I'm standing there looking puzzled and getting extremely annoyed and still trying to explain why.

so these butch woman and 1 man in security uniforms come marching out of no where heading towards my direction and I'm going 'oh boy why me?' one starts saying in a mechanical voice (at that point I had the urge to poke her to see if she was human) ' what's the problem' then I but in and say' um excuse me for religious reasons I cann... then was rudely interpreted by the lady who screamed security; ' this lady refuses to take her coat of' all eyes on me, so I decide to smile and again for the third time tried to explain myself ' look people, I really cant take this of, its not a coat its part of what I wear as a Muslim lady so please back of and find a solution with out me having to strip infront of 10,000 eyes thanks' so they stand there looking at me then my jilbab, then at me again and I swear I thought I saw a lighbulb flash at the top the security head cause she turns around to the lady and says what about the private room? I'm thinking god I knew I was gonna be interrogated and prodded by metal things, the lady says well its not appropriate but I guess this is an exception so she turns around to me and fakly smiles follow me mam, so i start skipping next to her until we get to a door that say private room (how original) she asks me to get in which I did and the starts shouting ' MARTHA MARTHA' I'm standing there thinking s**t who the hell is martha, then this lady walks in and she is supposed to be the chaperone, they tell me to remove my coat which I did muttering under my breath 'its a jilbab people JILBAB' they then take my jilbab out the room and I'm thinking hey come back, and unbelievably they put my jilbab through the sensor she then come back starts frisking me and then get to my feet and says 'please remove your boot' I'm like ok, take them of and then again they take my boots through the sensors and give them back to me.

and then whilst putting my jilbab and boots back on the lady who was rude to me says what badge is that? (I was wearing a Palestinian badge) so I'm thinking hmmmm is she Israeli well what the heck so I answered its a Palestinian badge, so she instantly smiles and says oh wow I work with a Palestinian guy and hes always talking about Palestine and he was telling me this blah blah blah, and then she says so your Muslim I'm like yep, she then starts asking me all these qs about Islam and woman and I thought wow dawah opportunity but I had 20 minutes to get to the boarding gate number so I'm answering her qs but moving rapidly to the door and she then smile and says well than you for enlightening me and I'm standing there thinking my god the things that happen subahannalah.

I've not blogged in some time, I was in Turkey for 10 days and came back yesterday, alhamdullilah it was lovely and I was intending on blogging about it to my hearts content but as soon as I reached England i.e London I get a phone call from work asking me, actually let me re-phrase that, not asking me but ordering me to come in to work as soon as I arrive in Manchester.

now I was in no mood to work, all I kept thinking about was my bed, I swear I was sooooo unbelievably tired and I'm one of those people who cant sleep on transport, and we hadn't slept the night before cause we had to be at the airport by 3.30 am so there was no pint in sleeping, and we didn't sleep much throughout the duration in Istanbul cause we where always out from morning up until about 9pm and then we would sit in the hotel lobby and drink apple tea till the early hours, so yeh I was tired and th elast thing on my mind was work.

my theory is that my manager wanted revenge, why? because he wasn't happy with me in going to Istanbul but I had already booked it from LAST YEAR that's 2005 and he had plenty of time to find some one to take my place, but the thing that really gets to me is that I was only taking 4 working days of, 4 DAYS!!! because one day was bank holiday Monday and the other day was good Friday so work was closed on those days but still he wasn't happy, so calling me on the day I get back from Istanbul and telling me to work was his way of revenge, evil evil evil evil.

I swear I walked into work with my luggage not just my holiday ones but also the bags under my eyes, and he didn't say a single thing to me - probably scared cause steam was coming out of my ears- although I wear hijab but still, and then an hour later he calls my room and askes me to come into his office, so I walk in and he says is any one at home? I replied I don't know seeing how I haven't been home yet, why do u ask? He says 'well I would like to drop your suit case of at your home so u don't have to carry it back'. Well what did I reply? I told him that I didn't want his help and that I didn't want him to do anything for me and yes I'm sure I would rather carry my suitcase even with my teeth so thank you but no'.

I guess he was feeling guilty but I don't care, I'm never gonna forget this, I cant believe he did that to me, he cam back from holiday and he took two days of to relax before having to come in and he makes me come in frustrating or what....

any way I will blog about my trip to Istanbul some time soon but at this moment in time I'm fuming and letting out my anger through this blog.

just before going to work, I had to meet a certain Bengali sis and get a cheque for the trips from her and also return her mobile phone as she has this habit of forgetting things, we agreed to meet outside lidl on Oxford road, so I started to make my way there and I get of the 142 bus, start rushing towards lidl and then I come across a cucumber it was just lying there all green and long, so I pick it up and start looking around and just as I was giving up any hope of finding somebody with a tesco bag (the cucumber was from tesco) I spotted a lady in the distant carrying a couple of tesco carrier bags, so I pick up my wet long black skirt and start running like a headless chicken down Oxford road shouting 'hey lady, excuse me, ladyyyyyy' and no response, so im still running, shouting and waving the cucumbe rin the air, and can I point out that a dozen heads are following my every action, pointing at me and laughing.

so I eventually catch up with her, tap her on the shoulder with the cucumber, she turns around looks me up and down, im panting like a dog and saying 'excuse me you forgot your cucumber', she looks at me smiles and says ' oh no your mistaken that's not mine' so what could I say, I turn around and I see some work men staring at me (they were watching my every move), they start clapping, well I did get the urge to bow down but decided not to.

I decided to retrace my steps and I found myself outside tesco, so I walk in with the cucumber, see the security guard standing at the door, gave him the cucumber and this is how the conversation went:

security guard: what's this

me: its a cucumber

security guard: I know its a cucumber, why are you giving it to me?

me: I found it outside your shop,

security guard: ok what do u want me to do with it?

me: I don't know, eat it

and then I walk out the shop.... thats my adventure of the day.

today a certain MD kidnapped my sallam badge, the history behind this sacred badge is one full of adventure and danger, well not really, basically I went to London with a Palestinian friend to march for ending the occupation in Iraq and Palestine, and whilst there I managed to stumble across a humble stall that was selling 'the badge' the amazing thing was that it was non-Muslims who where selling it and I just couldn't resist buying one, now unfortunately it did not occur to me to buy more, so I bought the one, and a certain MD saw it and each time she claps eyes on me its 'white aaaaaaaaafrican, please give it to me' and im like ; noooooo, well not until I've out worn it first'.

well that was sorted or so I thought, hmmmmm, today at the open circle, while talking on the mobile, and not concentrating on what's happening around me, 10 skinny fingers surrounded my badge and un pinned it and ran off with it, ohhh the horror, and I am such an idiot I continue to talk on the phone and smile at her and then it hits me, md has kidnapped my badge, so im shouting give it back md, and she's smiling and saying in a smeagle like tone no, and im not giving up, im still standing there 10 minutes later growling smeagle uh i mean md give me the badge, and she like my precious, and can I just note that the badge is no where to be seen, so I say to her md where is the badge? she looks at me, opens her jacket and it was pinned inside the jacket, now what it the use of that, how is the world supposed to see it pinned inside her jacket looool, but I gotta give her credit she gave it back to me without a ransom, although I did tell her that I will give it to her when I come back from Turkey so a promise is a promise.

ok i start in the name of Allah the most gracious most merciful

to be honest i never thought that i would become one of those 'bloggers' but hey wonders never ceaze to amaze, i was inspired by two wonderful people, and no im not being payed to say that about them, but yeh 2 wonderful people who have shown me the light (music in the background) of blogging, i guess there are advantages, its like a diary that every 1 can read, i never kept a diary when i was young, although saying that once i took an old school note book, scribbled out maths from the front and wrote 'my diary' underneath it, i kept it up for two days, it was mainly how i hated my primary school and the pricks that called themselves 'pupils' and there was one particular guy who did my head in and when he found out i was from a country in N Africa, he thought it would be funny to prance around the class room doing a zula type of dance and at thesame time a red indian wa wa wa wa kind of noise, i was not impressed so my two pages worth of diary entries where primarly about him.

that was a different era a long long time ago, inshallah like everything, i pray that this blog that i have started is for the sake of Allah swt, sum may snigger and snort but islam is comprehensive and that means that any action should be for the sake of Allah including blogging.

well that my 2 pence worth, i guess anything that not dull will be entered on to this blog.