Dear Diary,

A lot has happened.

For starters, Meghan Trainor's recent single is officially the best thing that has happened to me. I have the song on repeat, and can't stop rocking out to the beat! Every time my ears start hurting from listening to it with a such a loud volume, my head iterates this line from the lyrics:

NO NO NO!

I am not the only prodigy of my university, I learned today. Serendipity led me to someone's Facebook profile. And I shouted almost instinctively when I saw that person's cover photo. My senior, whom I've sent a friend request, lead his team of genii and secured the runner up's spot at a tech and design competition—I think—held at NED. That's right! NED! The best engineering university in the city!

I have begun my preparation for my next victory; hopefully, it'll be so. Participating in competitions has a thrill of its own. The moments when your name is called, and when you're handed that shiny trophy you've had your eye on throughout the entire award-distribution ceremony, until you're called on stage and then after, when it lies in your hands...

Are magical.

Can I repeat my success? I must!

I've been hanging out with my playlist and my laptop, blogging and listening to music; celebrating the end of our mid-term examinations. I think I did my best. What my answers are actually worth, is for the teachers to decide.

Since my blog is, like, my third diary, I don't hesitate to write here whatever I want. I know a classmate of mine disapproves of this; I saw her laughing at how ridiculous my personal posts sounded to her.

Well, I have this for you: I don't care a bit about what you think!

Even now, as I write, Meghan Trainor is singing inside my ears!

I've chosen to not abandon my degree program. I think I can get to the end. With arms and legs intact. If I can get through the mid-term, I know I'll survive in the future, too.

The hurdles in my journey as a writer/journalist have begun to uncomfortably rattle the jeep I'm driving. My proposals to well-known companies are being ignored, I still haven't caused the "stir" I was hoping to cause with this blog. No matter how hard I try, I can't imitate Perez Hilton. At times, I tell myself that this was all a big mistake; that this blog really was a mistake.

Something overwhelmingly optimistic inside my head tells me to not stop trying, no matter what.

I still don't know how I'll get my poems published. You just can't thrive as a writer in this...tabooed country. No one from here, succeeds here. Everybody who is anybody from Pakistan, is nowhere to be seen. They're all fulfilling their dreams abroad.

I guess I'll have to follow suit.

There is so much to be done! I have a whole literary legacy to start! But I am yet to decide how to break down the wall bricked in my path. What is even more frustrating and horrifying, is this realization: the wall is of my own making.

Am I not trying hard enough? This is probably it.


After an entire minute of jerking my head left and right to Meghan's "No".


Oops, got carried away. I think the song is so cute, and I think it's so sweet, as per the lyrics. But let me stop you there, before you speak, the song really is amazing. Give it a shot?

I better resume reading Glass Sword from where I left. There are more, waiting to be read.

Yours, truly.

—Samee