Khalleji henna 2

Hello :D so heres my latest henna design, I did this in RAK UAE. And it was legit khaleeji henna, like the one I have been craving all along, I decided to go for it and get it all the way to my elbows, I mean why now? and It was fantastic, the salon was amazing it was actually closed but we called the lady and she sent two of her workers right away (it was 12 AM) and they came and each lady took a hand. I mean they are soooo talented I was sooo happy with the outcome of the henna and it wasnt expensive at all :) I am actually wishing I still had it till this day...so since I lost the picx from my camera with clearer photos here are some I took with my phone 

My new kaftan

Hello hello!! I hope all of you readers are doing WELL! I sure am...its been a while huh? yes I know I've been slacking. BUT, remember the last post I posted about putting up my picx of henna and stuff from uae the next day....well the next day came and when I went to go open up the photos my memory card decided it was a bad girl and deleted my precious photos :'( lucky for me I have others that I saved but I had amazing ones on there....does anyone know a way of getting those photos back? leat me know! 

anyways, I want to share with you my newest kaftan that I bought while in UAE....if you have been following me you will know my obsession with kaftans!

What do you guys think? 

XOXO-SL

Ramadan Kareem!

Ramadan kareem everyone!

 just a quick updates, I am currently in UAE spending ramadan with my family here! I spent most of my june thru july in Abu Dhabi where I was interning in an Engineering company. I bought soooo many items that I want to share with you guys, I also got the most AMZING henna yet! like the khaleeji ones that I ALWAYS wanted, I took photos and I will be posting them soon, I also have a new video!!! so ill be posting these things within the next few days (starting tonight) so stay tuned, I hope everyone is having a nice summer and Ramadan!

XOXO-SL

<3.

My spring semester is OVAAAA!!

and here I am, blogging about yet another end of a semester. Cant BELIEVE next semester will be the start of my FOURTH year in university!!!! its so unreal, like wow? Ive been in this uni for 4 years already? granted, if I was another major, Id be graduating after next year, and I don't know try to find a job, get married? (super smiles) seriously though...just like most Arab females my age range I CANT WAIT TO GET MARRIEDDDDD!!! and I wanna have babies and all that glamor of being a wife and a mother, its hard but It will be worth it and I think im pretty fit for the job :D Anyways, back to topic its 4 years but in engineering I still have (hopefully) 2 more years left, it will suck if I have to go an extra year like most engineers do (or even more...scarrrrryyy) 

Furthermore, My grandmother is coming to America this Friday!! yaaaaayyyyyyyyyy :D the last time she visited us at our house in America I was in 8th grade middle school which was my third year of middle school, now I'm going to my 4th year of uni, that like 8 school years WOOOOWW time really flies, I'm too excited for her <3

what are you guys' plans for the summer? I have TONS of things planned out, but ill keep that a secret for now since I don't want to embarrass myself in-case my plans do not go accordingly, ill let u guys know when I am definitely sure about something

Khaleeji Henna

Hi All, I hope everyone is ready for their final exams!!!!

So as most of you lovely ladies (that have been following me since day one) you already KNOW I have a serious obsession with Henna. IDK, it must be an Arab thing. When I went to Dubai, I was determined that this time I will be getting some khaleeji (the gulf arab countries)henna, as it seemed to have become my favorite design of henna. And to that I did, although I was not extremely impressed, the designs were nothing like Ive seen on the khaleeji girls...maybe cuz I had it done at a Lebanese hair salon by an indian girl?  and it should have been done somewhere in the heart of the gulf countries by an Emirati woman? I am not sure, what ever the case might be, I was not exactly ecstatic with the results. Though it want THAT bad, it was not as perfect as I intended it to be.

so there it is, what do you guys think? I mean I had to tell the lady to do something with the pinky since ive seen some nice khaleeji henna designs that were only on the pinky but it looked something different than what she did :( 

I would like to ask you, my lovely readers who are from the gulf, or is experience with such matter...WHERE CAN I get good khaleeji henna designs? 


(if you need to buy henna paste, I posted some sites below for you guys just click the picx below)


 

Sexism within Engineering classrooms....

Lets talk about things I hate strongly dislike; 

I really hate bugs and ugly insects, may God forgive me but I do hate them. 

I hate being disappointed.

I hate being sad/feeling guilty

I hate being sick 

I hate when ignorant close minded people try to make a legit argument with me even though what I say is irrelevant to them and will not change their view no matter what. 

Most importantly I hate racism, sexism etc

as you may already know, I am a muslim hijabi (scarfed) living in the most islamophobic country in the world-America...so as that life can already be difficult for many. But thankfully I have very thick skin and people usually change their minds ones they get to know me. 

I am also a civil and environmental engineering majored FEMALE. enough said. knowing that its 2012 and its been years since females have lost their lives and fought for just being heard, still nothing seems to have changed the mind of some males. all theyve learned to do was SAY they "accept, respect, cherish, value" females opinions. Nothing but talk. 

of course I said SOME men not all, as I am not trying to come off as a hypocrite talking about sexism towards females and being sexist toward males. 

I do believe that there are somethings men are better at that women- (ie hunting a woolly mammoth) but at the same time there are somethings females are better at than the male race. However, even-though this is whith most it doesn't happen with ALL. these "stereotypes" varry depending on the individual. 

Almost ALL the males ive had classes with (all my engineering classes) have "looked" down on us females, and always ALWAYS expected us to do worse because we are "stupider"...that is until the marks come out and those few males that get pissed and angry and swear its unfair all because A GIRL  did better than him. 

I had many incidence like this, just recently after I got a lab-report back (which I worked extremely hard on) a male friend of mine was so eager to know what my grade was (they're always eager to know your grades in order to compare your stupidity with their "bad luck") and after he saw my grade and lab which was way more done than his, all he said with an angry tone was that "the grader likes girls"    WHAT?!?!, are u serious? so if im a female and I do better than a male its because the professor  or grader likes girls more, yet if you do better its because your smarter? get out of here!

it really such a sucky feeling when people dont even LISTEN to your opinion, for example if a guy asks a question and you have an answer and his friend doesn't and no matter how much YOU explain it they will assume your wrong and not take you seriously. or if your having an argument with a male and HE IS wrong and your not the others males will believe his argument over yours. for example I was having an argument about Islam to this other Muslim male which happens to be in engineering classes, clearly what he was stating was WRONG. yet somehow, the listeners (also 2 males) believe him over me and they just wanted to end the argument saying its okay and they were laughing and not taking me seriously I even caught one of the males winking at this muslim to stop just so the argument would stop, and of course being the strong female that I am I made sure I called him out saying that I saw his winking. we ended the argument by saying we will ask the sheikh on the Thursday night lecture held in our university. I made sure to let him know that I WILL NOT forget about it and we will ask it in front of everyone including the majority of male muslims there. later on that night after a few hours he texted me with "you were right, I asked my sister and she was actually married before he saw her hair I just got confused" so no need to embarrass him on Thursday. I appreciate his honesty but I do not appreciate that he made me look like an idiot in fornt of the non-Mulsim males and did not appreciate that he did not go out of his way to make sure they get the right truthful answer to their question rather than believing a lie...which is very serious when it comes to Islam. 

I can go on for hours about the events that I have encounter being a female in engineering not to mention the professors and staff. this makes me so angry but motivates me more to work harder so they can be even angrier that me "just a female" is getting higher grades than them ;)

xoxo-SL

my addiction to a book....(A Thousand Splendid Suns review)

When I was in senior year of high school, one of my most looked up to teachers had said to me "You should read A Thousand Splendid Suns". I was extremely happy that SHE the beautiful blond haired, intelligent, bitchy and lets face it-hot English teacher had suggested this to ME out of all students (she saw how much I enjoyed The Kite Runner- Also by the same author). "It is in my top 10 Favorite books, defiantly in the top 3" she continued. That last sentence was all she needed to convince me that I MUST read this book. 

3 years later I found myself in a book store inside a shopping mall in Dubai, U.A.E , as I was walking to the register to pay, "That book" jumped out at me- not literately but you know what I mean....and I just HAD to get it.  I started reading another book and was too lazy to start reading this book...I came back to the US and not till this month that I have decided to start it....and let me tell you I HAVE NEVER read a book faster in my life. I have managed to finish all 448 pages within 4 days. Not just ANY 4 days, actually it was in the week where I had nothing but engineering exams (the week before spring break). How did I do it? I have no idea.

I would stay up later at night (as I was up late anyways to study) just to read it, until my brain can no longer focus that is. I would wake up earlier than I had to and read it. I would read it at work at the office and get annoyed when a client comes by. I was too excited to go to English class since its soooo pointless (and ironically filled with all engineering majored student) just so that I could read during our 50 min. Usually, its 50 min of my life wasted listening to pointless crap, more like hearing pointless crap not listening. I would also walk from class to class my head down reading, friends and strangers poked fun of me of course but I could careless about them, I was too busy trying to figure out Laila's next move in the book. 

 It was just.......uhh! no words can explain how Amazing this book is. I cant get over it....its sooooooooooooo WONDERFUL, CRAZY, SAD, CAPTURING, EMOTIONAL, SPECTACULAR, and most of all ADDICTIVE. I can go on forever about it, but I defiantly suggest it to all of you out there.

Khaled Hosseini is a genius....I cant wait till he comes out with more and more books! im getting excited just thinking about it. 

WARNING: (if you read this book)

• You willl cry like a baby.
• You will laugh. 
• You will smile.
• You will get extremely angry at times- sometimes even at the author of the book.
• You will think about the characters everywhere you go. 

Unless you are a cold-hearted bitch with an ice cube in the place of your heart. You might want to consider the warnings above ;)

hope all of you are doing well!
 

xoxo-SL