From Lahore to New York via London

My time in New York is coming to an end. This blog is a summary of what the past month or so has been like for me.

Prelude:

I left Lahore on the morning of the 1st of August. The past couple of months before leaving were probably the hardest of my life. Milena's indecisiveness and her eventual rejection really did drive me over the edge. I wasn't in the best of places when I left Lahore, and no it wasn't the rejection that hurt, rather it was the manner in which that rejection came about that broke me into a million pieces.

As a matter of fact, I always knew somewhere in the depths of my heart that we were never going to work out. I knew it the moment I walked out of her home for the first time in December last year. I even told her that when we first met, I thought she was someone who was way out of my league and I would often remark during our conversations "dear God please make Milena choose me", to which her response would usually be along the lines of "why do you think I wouldn't choose you". Funny how horrifyingly accurate instinct can be.

I nevertheless for some reason wanted to give it a shot, and a shot I gave. I did everything imaginable to try and save what we had; wrote letters, poems, put up weird ass WhatsApp statuses. I begged her. I really did. All I got in response was an eerie silence. I guess I simply wasn't good enough for her.

A day or so after my sanity had been dealt the fatal blow, her brother called asking if I was upset. Don't get me wrong here, her brother is, on the face of it atleast, one of the best people I have EVER come across in my life. Now that all has been said and done, when I look back I could see how he had been trying to drop hints all this time and I being the stupid fool in love missed out on them. Perhaps her brother saw in me a version of his younger self and his first relationship, or perhaps he was acting in a purely Machiavellian fashion. God knows.

When I asked her brother why she had rejected me, the response I received is one that has given me insecurities for the rest of my life. First was that she wanted to marry someone who was more "mature"(whatever that means). Second was the fact that she found me to be "physically unattractive". Third , and I am paraphrasing here what he said, was that my family lacked the finesse to deal with people who had "executive level" relatives, and finally that my mother is a very blunt woman.

I don't consider any of these reasons worthy enough of being responded to except for the last point. Yes, my mother is a very blunt woman, and for good reason. On our very first meeting, Milena's mother talked about how she was planning on suing her brother-in-law(one of Milena's uncles) over a property dispute. My mother on the ride home said that there's no way in heaven that this was ever going to work out. You see, we too have a lot of disputes in our family. I personally hate all of my cousins. But never in a million years have we ever washed our dirty laundry in front of others, and never have we ever allowed our disputes to boil into the legal sphere. Never has my hatred for my cousins blinded me to the fact that blood is after all thicker than water. 

Anyways Milena & Co. are firmly in my past. I wish her the best of luck finding the man of her dreams. (I was that man for awhile but then I guess she probably woke up).

Lahore to London(08/01/2024):

Me, Faizan, and Nauman are part of a team that's doing research on the prevalence of RAS associated autoimmune leukoproliferative disease and current treatment strategies. To this end we received a grant from Imperial College London in March of 2024, and have been working our asses off since. 

Both Nauman and Faizan accompanied me to London where we discussed the preliminary results of our investigations and had the time of our lives. My only regret is that, I only got to spend something like two days with the boys before I had to leave London and catch a flight to NYC. But yeah for the 3 or so days that I was there with them we had A LOT of fun, the details of which I am not going to go into lol.

I have a few not so "executive level" friends and relatives who live there and it was nice reconnecting with them after ages. I met Saima(she and I used to be best friends growing up, she's a dentist now) after about 10 years and my God is she still fun to hang out with. In all these years she hasn't changed a bit and nor have I lol. We spent almost like half a day together. We went to the Hyde park and watched a sunset and pretended to be in love lol. After that we went to the Thorpe park (of all the places we could've gone to lol), and took rides on a carousel and a wheel lol. We even had cotton candy. We topped the night off with dinner at 1947. (btw Saima's married and her husband is a great photographer lol 😆😅. Iftikhar, you better not post those pictures anywhere lol)

My time in London was probably the best time of life so far. 

London to New York and Miss K.

I arrived in NYC on the morning of the 4th of August. As you'd probably be able to tell by now, I was feeling a lot better than before I had left. The first thing I did after coming to NYC was buying groceries for a week and settling into Bed Stuy.

I have had an amazing time at Tisch(the place I am doing my observership at) and have made a lot of new friends here. Last Friday, I was asked to give a lecture on Factor V Leiden mutation (I know it's not the sexiest thing in heme-onc but last week we saw a case of a woman(factor v Leiden +ve) with PE which ironically turned out to be an isolated PE without DVT; a double paradox I suppose (read up on Leiden Paradox if interested)). 

I have been going out on dates in NYC ever since I got here. Most of the women I have been out with gave off the same cunning I will lead you down the path of emotional investment and once I have you eating out of my hands I will pull the rug from under your feet vibes like Milena did. And then there was Miss K.

Ever since the whole Milena debacle I have time and again thought about where I went wrong. The one thing I have realized is that I didn't actually know what I was looking for in a wife. After a lot of soul searching, I do now. (This is going to be quite the psychology lecture so buckle up)

What a man looks for, either consciously, subconsciously or unconsciously when looking for a wife are the qualities and characteristics of his mother. The basis of this idea is that a male child's first love is his mother. Growing up he idealizes her and looks up to her. Every woman he meets thereafter he compares to her. The same fundamental principal applies to women (when they look for a husband, they are basically looking for a man with the qualities and characteristics of their fathers(provided that they come from stable households)) albeit their thought processes are way more complicated in this regard. (If by any chance you're interested in this topic read up a book called The Female Brain by Louann Brizendine).

My mother is a brutally honest person. Her honesty is often mistaken as bluntness. My mother is also someone who's very much a moderate; she's liberal enough to tolerate me being informal(in terms of my language, behavior, get up and overall demeanor) in front of her. She's conservative enough to give me a slap on the wrist and a good dressing down when I need it. She's someone who is a very moral person, the entirety of her morality is based on her faith as a Muslim. As such she sees much of the world in black and white; to her what's haram is haram because God said so, and no amount of anyone trying to justify it will ever make it right.