The Human Owls : Late Nights and Waste Nights
by Nisaar Y. Nadiadwala on Sunday, December 11, 2011 at 1:55pm
In the late eightees where life was minus youtube, face book and Dish anteena, my editor asked me to do a write up on Mumbai at midnight. He suggested that I travel across Mumbai and observe Mumbai. I was asked to interview Taxi drivers and talk to late night train travelers and silently observe things happening on sea beaches and empty roads. I experienced a different Mumbai at night.
The decent executive at day time was a drunk beast at midnight as he was being dragged by his friends. The obscenely dressed young daughters of rich were screaming and joking out side a discotheque. The taxi driver has unending stories of call girls and prostitutes. The people in the last local at 1 am were half drunk labourers and tired last shfit waiters striving to keep their open. Enuchs scoffing money from train travellers and mishceivous yuong men from slum screaming and cracking vulgar jokes in a loud voice were regular commuters.
Due to my stretched work assignments, for past few months I am experiencing Mumbai at late nights again, this time observing Mumbai from Islamic glasses and weighing my observations on shariah scales. At around 1 am last local from Mumbai central, large number of burkha clad middle class females with jewellary hanging on their ears and necks and little kids hanging on their arms, is a regular scene They are returning from marraige parties. They are in large numbers..specially on weekends.
While passinng from Reay road I see young marathi boys studying under street lights preparing for medical and engineering entrance exams and when I alight at Jogeshwari young Muslimms are zooming their motor cycles on empty roads. The Haji Ali juice center have large number of upper crust of Muslim community sipping expensive juice at 1 am ! The cafetarias of Gujrati and Marathi localities are shut down by 11 pm where as the cafetarias in Muslimm localities have their peak business at this hour.
There is another batch of our community remaining busy at late nights. Last weekend I logged into my face book account and scrolled down the list of my five thousand readers list. It was 2 am. It was a surprise inspection by me, considering that I take my facebook friends' list as my class room so I also take it as a duty to see their whereabouts. I noted that most of the names had a green light indicating that they were awake. Let me tell you that most of my readers on friends list are from Indian subcontinent so my fear of many of you remaining awake till late nights is a real one. I have no right to question any of you " Hey what are you doing at this hour?" But I have a right to caution you . Late nights , sitting before a bright screen in the dark for long hours may be tolerated byy our eyes for some extent but in near future when you will entering your forties, your health can rebel and cause you un ending problems some of which may accompany you till your grave.
If you study the life style of sahaba they remianed awake late nights during the nights of Ramadhan, but for the rest of the time they slept early n woke up at early hours and did Qur'anic study or tahajjud, wheeras many of my notable and loving and affectionate readers remain awake late (my good assumption says they study Islamic talks on you tube ) but by the time it is the last hour of night they are exhausted and their eyes are sleepy. Among the good habits of Prophet peace be upon him is: he disliked talking after Isha,, quite contrary to this sunnah most of us talk, chat, gossip after Isha. NO wonder our productivity has gone down...
Author : Nisaar Nadiadwala speaks and writes on Islam and Muslims. He can be reached at nisaar_yusuf@yahoo.com
Taken from
by Nisaar Y. Nadiadwala on Sunday, December 11, 2011 at 1:55pm
In the late eightees where life was minus youtube, face book and Dish anteena, my editor asked me to do a write up on Mumbai at midnight. He suggested that I travel across Mumbai and observe Mumbai. I was asked to interview Taxi drivers and talk to late night train travelers and silently observe things happening on sea beaches and empty roads. I experienced a different Mumbai at night.
The decent executive at day time was a drunk beast at midnight as he was being dragged by his friends. The obscenely dressed young daughters of rich were screaming and joking out side a discotheque. The taxi driver has unending stories of call girls and prostitutes. The people in the last local at 1 am were half drunk labourers and tired last shfit waiters striving to keep their open. Enuchs scoffing money from train travellers and mishceivous yuong men from slum screaming and cracking vulgar jokes in a loud voice were regular commuters.
Due to my stretched work assignments, for past few months I am experiencing Mumbai at late nights again, this time observing Mumbai from Islamic glasses and weighing my observations on shariah scales. At around 1 am last local from Mumbai central, large number of burkha clad middle class females with jewellary hanging on their ears and necks and little kids hanging on their arms, is a regular scene They are returning from marraige parties. They are in large numbers..specially on weekends.
While passinng from Reay road I see young marathi boys studying under street lights preparing for medical and engineering entrance exams and when I alight at Jogeshwari young Muslimms are zooming their motor cycles on empty roads. The Haji Ali juice center have large number of upper crust of Muslim community sipping expensive juice at 1 am ! The cafetarias of Gujrati and Marathi localities are shut down by 11 pm where as the cafetarias in Muslimm localities have their peak business at this hour.
There is another batch of our community remaining busy at late nights. Last weekend I logged into my face book account and scrolled down the list of my five thousand readers list. It was 2 am. It was a surprise inspection by me, considering that I take my facebook friends' list as my class room so I also take it as a duty to see their whereabouts. I noted that most of the names had a green light indicating that they were awake. Let me tell you that most of my readers on friends list are from Indian subcontinent so my fear of many of you remaining awake till late nights is a real one. I have no right to question any of you " Hey what are you doing at this hour?" But I have a right to caution you . Late nights , sitting before a bright screen in the dark for long hours may be tolerated byy our eyes for some extent but in near future when you will entering your forties, your health can rebel and cause you un ending problems some of which may accompany you till your grave.
If you study the life style of sahaba they remianed awake late nights during the nights of Ramadhan, but for the rest of the time they slept early n woke up at early hours and did Qur'anic study or tahajjud, wheeras many of my notable and loving and affectionate readers remain awake late (my good assumption says they study Islamic talks on you tube ) but by the time it is the last hour of night they are exhausted and their eyes are sleepy. Among the good habits of Prophet peace be upon him is: he disliked talking after Isha,, quite contrary to this sunnah most of us talk, chat, gossip after Isha. NO wonder our productivity has gone down...
Author : Nisaar Nadiadwala speaks and writes on Islam and Muslims. He can be reached at nisaar_yusuf@yahoo.com
Taken from
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