It’s a thought that fills me with unparalleled shame. As soon as it forms, I want to bury it. But as I sit with my friends, at home, at work, I feel the burden of existing as a radical act, as political praxis: The thought creeps back in. How do[Read More…]
Off the Board
My body is not the enemy
Content Warning: Mentions of disordered eating I started running competitively when I was eight years old. My earliest memory from that year is a race with my dad where I was kicking toward the finish, shouting, “I can’t feel my legs!” Let me tell you, as a runner who too[Read More…]
Remembering Ammi’s Saree
Content Warning: Mention of death and loss of a family member July 21, 2021, was the only day I ever wore my Nani’s (maternal grandmother’s) saree. After years of putting off the theme, my family finally committed to wearing sarees on Eid Al-Fitr. While one of my cousins bought hers[Read More…]
Reclaiming the value in being “undecided”
If you ask any of my friends at McGill, they would tell you that I have switched around my majors and minors eight times since the beginning of my degree. I started as an Environment & Development and International Development Studies (IDS) double major with a History minor. Throughout my[Read More…]
Loving my Black hair back
Last April, I attended a birthday party for a friend. Rather than looking back at the shared laughter and happiness of this gathering, I remember this night for a white person who, after complaining at length about their “difficult” straight hair, gestured toward me and my “easy” curls. Without my[Read More…]
Sarah Koenig is not perfect and neither is ‘Serial’
On Jan. 13, 1999, Hae Min Lee, a senior at Woodlawn High School in Baltimore, disappeared. On Feb. 9, 1999, her body was discovered in Baltimore’s Leakin Park, and on Feb. 25, 2000, her ex-boyfriend, Adnan Syed, was found guilty on charges of first-degree murder. Fifteen years later, Rabia Chaudry—an[Read More…]
Greek life, behind closed doors
“Welcome to the club. You’re, like, one of the few pretty girls at McGill. Use it wisely.” No, that’s not a quote from a Mean Girls production at McGill. That’s a genuine thought expressed to me by a sorority girl at my first—and only—frat party. Following that linguistic beauty and[Read More…]
Crossword crannying? A morning ritual, say
I began doing the New York Times Mini Crossword during the pandemic, and after a year of practice, I could proudly complete it in under a minute almost every time. It was a solitary experience, a permanent fixture in my routine where I could compete with myself from the comfort[Read More…]
Why everyone deserves therapy
Therapy. There, I said it. A word that, despite its immeasurable benefits, carries the heavy weight of unrelenting stigma everywhere it goes. In the industrialized world, 25 per cent of adults experience significant mental health problems each year that require intervention in the form of psychotherapy and/or medication. In particular,[Read More…]
Don’t publish—and flourish
When I looked down the barrel of the microscope, I could see everything. I saw exploding galaxies of green fluorescence, and a network of nebulas dotting a dark, surrounding infinity. I saw the edge of a coastline studded with city lights, and islands surrounded by swirling oceans, like I was[Read More…]
