If you’re fucking competent enough to type my fucking name properly in the “TO” line of the fucking e-mail, why the fuck can’t you get my name right in the fucking documentation. What the fuck is wrong with you, fucking pieces of shit, when you type “Naoman Ali (noaman.ali[at]utoronto.ca)” or better yet, “Nouman Ali (noaman.ali[at]utoronto.ca)” — how the fuck does that enter your numbnut mind, fuckheads. It’s right there! I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a Nouman Ali wondering why the fuck people are sending him messages for the President of ASSU — only, you never get my fucking e-mail address wrong. Can’t you fucking cross reference, or are you trying to teach me how to spell my fucking name just because you came across some dickwad who spells it differently. You don’t type “Pakka Sinarvo (pekka.sinervo[at]utoronto.ca)” so why can’t you have the fucking decency to take the fucking time out to spell my name right, AT LEAST ONCE, especially since my fucking name is right there in the fucking e-mail address that you had to type out to send me the fucking message in the first place, you fuckwad pieces of shit. It’s bad enough that you can’t pronounce it and try to say it as quickly as you can — at least spell it right, you fucktards. You’re supposed to be the fucking “great minds” that are part of this fucking university, fucking fuckers — get this right. It’s not like you did it once, you keep doing it again and again, fuckers. Fuck.

(Not accepting comments in case some asswipe wants to make a witty comment involving the misspelling of my name.)

Edit: accepting comments now. If you make a joke about my name I’m going to break your fucking legs and ban you, not necessarily in that order.

Taken in the lobby of Sidney Smith, June 13 (Brazil vs. Croatia):

I think it’s fantastic that all these people (often including myself) can gather to watch the matches and cheer and (in my case) relate football to colonialism.

Having said that, according to Wikipedia, a key component of fire safety is:

Not exceeding the maximum occupancy listing for any part of the building (Making sure that an area isn’t so full of people that they can’t all get out quickly in an emergency).

I’m not entirely sure if that area classifies. I mean, it’s really not hard to leave the building from Sidney Smith lobby, unless you’re a total dunce cap and forgot how you entered (knowing some of the purportedly “great” minds on campus, I wouldn’t be surprised). Maybe stampeding — considering how the University treats us like cattle (again, I wouldn’t be surprised).

I asked the Dean and co., one week ago, if they could look into getting football matches streamed into the useless screens in the Sidney Smith wraparound (study space) for the crowd to diffuse a bit — no response as of yet. I think they’ll eventually get back to me — and only if I persist — on July 10.

Any academic who writes or lectures on colonialism or the colonial experience will quote, cite or otherwise refer to Joseph Conrad (particularly the Heart of Darkness), often directly, at least once, and usually twice or more in his or her output (i.e., writings, lectures, etc.).

I am currently carrying out a massive research project to try and prove this thesis. (Well, no, not really.)

Police and thieves in the streets
(Oh yeah!)
Scaring the nation with their guns and ammunition

Sometimes it’s not easy to know who to be scared of — and I guess that’s the point.

Paranoia strikes deep
Into your life it will creep
It starts when you’re always afraid
You step out of line, the man come and take you away

On the one hand, if it’s all true, then we (us, them, the other, those of Muslim extraction) can easily be the victims of terrorism when, say, we ride on the TTC, or go to visit the CN Tower, or do whatever it is we do. Just like you (us, them).

We can also be the victims of misguided zeal in showing the world (Bush?) that terrorists (them, the other) do exist here — when they really don’t. We might be the ones who get arrested and charged as terrorists for walking down beaches, or playing paintball with friends, or discussing Islam. For the glory of the alphabet soup agencies and their projects — Project Thread(bare?) and the like.

And then we (us, them, the other) might also be the ones who blow you up. For no good reason, of course. Because everything we do is entirely irrational and backward. Because evil exists. In this world, in our (your?) country. Hide your (our?) children, lock our (your?) doors, buy everyone a cellphone to keep in touch at all times — the newest, the latest, the greatest: family plan, weekends free and weekdays at a great price, text messaging, mp3s, on your cell phone! — protect our (your?) freedoms by restricting yours (ours?) here and abroad! Thank you for civilizing me, again and again and again.

Blow up, blown up, blown out of proportion.

And I hope to the gods, the god damned and everything in between that it’s the latter, in whole or at least in part.

Recently, I’ve been forcing myself to sketch people on the subway. (Forcing myself by not taking along my iPod or a book to read.)

Perhaps entirely unethically I don’t ask the people I’m drawing if I can draw them. Mostly, I suppose, they don’t know that I am drawing them.

Tonight, as I was coming home from campus, I was sketching this gentleman (the one on the right – 6/4/06). I suppose he rather quickly realized that I was sketching him — he even cooperated by holding position. He got off at Victoria Park station and as he was leaving (I was sitting right beside the door) he said, “Thank you.”

I was kind of embarassed, I just smiled back at him and showed the sketch to him. He smiled back and showed that he was pleased and then got off the train as the doors closed. I guess I should’ve said “Thank you,” but I was too flustered and embarassed to say anything.

But that was nice.

I suppose it may seem like my subjects are typically geriatric males. This isn’t the case, it just that they happen to sit in opportune places and/or there’s something in their faces — character — that makes me want to draw them. Most young people have these plain, bubble gum faces without any “character” — lines, for instance, their faces are rather smooth.

Having said that I do think it’s necessary that I draw all types of people.

On my way to campus today I stopped by the Coles bookstore in Scarborough Town Centre (as I often do, to read comics). There was a “meet the author” table set up in front. The author, Cecil Leslie, was standing behind the table with two stacks of his two books, business cards and bookmarks. After I finished reading the comics I went and spoke to him for a while about his novels.

Decadence is an updated, Toronto-fied version of Pygmalion or My Fair Lady, he said. And Water Colours is a Toronto-fied version of Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (West Indian man, East Asian woman).

I noticed that the novels were publsihed by “Xlibris” — a self-publishing company. So after I got home tonight I looked up his novels on the web site (follow links above). I read some of the excerpts from his novels.

His writing isn’t exactly the greatest I’ve ever seen. In fact, it’s really … er … not good at all. (In his defense, it appears he started writing Water Colours as a film script … that’s pretty much how it reads….)

All the same, I have to admire the man for pursuing this line and wish him the best of luck. I just hope for his sake that he doesn’t quite his day-job as a technical support analyst for TIFF.