The Most Interesting Phrases/Words from around the world

1.Hej!

 
The first time I heard the word ‘hej’, was from a Swedish podcast teaching Swedish language to English speakers. I couldn't quite put my finger on what exactly was wrong with it. It was a sound I quite frankly had heard before. It is almost like a normal hey but that's about it. The ‘j’ is somewhat pronounced as a ‘ye’ and making a sound with almost touching the center of your tongue on the top of your mouth. Trust me; it took me a while to pronounce.
So, what is this ‘Hej!’? Hej is hello in Swedish. “The urban legend goes that in the late 1960s many foreign tourists complained that Swedes lacked proper etiquette when it came to greetings and social interactions. And because of that, the country was perceived as less than polite. The national Tourist Board overlords decided to quickly rectify this situation and instructed all hospitality workers to show off their good manners by greeting all and any customers. And a helpful linguistic genius (:D) came up with the idea of promoting the use of ‘hej’” (http://blogs.transparent.com/swedish/hej-hej/)

Now don't get me wrong, but as people normally say that Swedish is a musical language (cause of the perfect ebb and flow when Swedish speak), the way and the more prolonged the word is, the more the meaning changes (that also took a while getting used to, Almost LOL at that). A standard Hej is just a hello which you can use to almost about anyone! Even to the old guy or couple, walking their walks in Swedish forests, or on a bus stop. It can also be uses in a shop, a kiosk, a cafe or even a Press Byrån (Swedish kiosk, found in every city and in town centers). Now, if you are in a kiosk and an attendant comes to great and says ‘Hej Hej’, don't get surprised or scared, that's just there way of saying they are glad and happy that they are serving you. Double ‘Hej’ is also used among friends or good acquaintances or people you have talked at least once, if you remember them though. If it is a little prolonged ‘Hej’, like ‘Heejj’, then it means the person is actually happy to see you again and thinks good about you or simply they are in their ‘happy morning’ mood. By “in their happy morning mood” I mean to say that Swedish people are sometimes considered reserved, even cold, and resort normally to just a ‘hej’ .

“It made perfect sense, “hej” is a simple word, and sounds almost the same in any language and anybody can pronounce it correctly. In no time it became the standard greeting in the tourist industry. And from there, it migrated to other walks of life. That’s the story was told to me by an official from the Stockholm Tourist Office”. (http://blogs.transparent.com/swedish/hej-hej/)

Anyways, if their ‘Hej’ is more prolonged, like ‘heeejjj’, with a nice smile, then you are lucky, because either they consider you a very good friend or they actually do fancy you ;). Here I would really should mention that, the actual word to say hello is ‘Tjena (pronounced as sheyna) which is often used with suffixes like ‘-San’ or ‘-re’ but I would like to believe it’s a bit more official hello. So the word ‘Hejsan!’ , would be the ‘polite’ version of ‘hej!’ that you say when you want to be just a little bit more ‘Formal’ and ‘proper’.

I couldn't get enough of ‘Hejs’ in Sweden making me say to almost every by-passer on the streets :p. I loved them so much. Though my ex would always say it three times, ‘Hej Hej Hej’ as if one wasn't enough.
No matter what, a ‘Hej’, long or short, once or many times, always use it with a smile as it is the Swedish way. Maybe that's why it’s one of my favorite most words.

The day of independence, 14th of August

Happy independence everyone!! Just a day away and I can't wait,why? Probably cause its been seven years and this is my first 14th august I will spend in Pakistan. So my question is, are we truly independent? Are we truly a nation Quaid envisioned in 1947? Maybe yes, probably it is.
But why do they block the roads and I see a big container on the road to Faisal town, on which I go every day to work? Maybe they don't want regular people to get mixed up with those going to Mr Tahir Ul Qadri's event. Maybe they don't want a traffic jam for people like me who just would like to follow my daily routine.
And why do they also block the turning right in front of Jinnah Hospital? Most probably they want the patients admitted to be safe inside and let them rest from a big number of visitors we normally find in our hospitals.
But then what serves the purpose of blocking telecom networks? I think it is because they don't want that the general public wastes their time by calling each other to discuss the daily situation of how the politics are shaping up.
Or why do they try to block all the fuel stations and supply of it? Hmmmm, maybe they want us to use the public transport more, oh but wait, most of the stations of even their esteemed metro was shutdown. Let's take our bicycles and be healthy again.
I personally think We should just get on with it and not worry, I am sure our government masters will take care of everything as they are quite capable and able to take care of everything. Isn't it "we" who put them up there in the first place with our votes? We should at least have some faith in them. Its just first year of their term.
But again I DO ask, are we truly independent? And why Imran Khan and Tahir ul Qadri are so pumped up with their agenda against them? Why is even Pak Army called up for this?
Are we, as a nation, truly independent?
Happy Independence day!

HonorBound-An Epic mobile based RPG

Everyone can relate to browsing through Google play store looking for a soft game to pass there, some gamers like me might search specific games with particular interests like while going through one game and going further in through similar games or "more from developer" or "people also bought this" for countless hours and trying numerous games. Rarely people come across games that they haven't played before and it somehow gets over looked. that was the case with me for Honor bound. Honor bound is a mobile based RPG. It follows heavily on the game called " book of heroes" which I played almost more than year ago but stopped playing it as I didn't get hooked. So i had been searching the web for a similar kind of game that i might get hooked with and that's what it did.

Just like book of heroes, you choose a hero/faction to start the story. i started and tried the spirit hero that looks like a wolf with twin blades attached to its lower arms, why? cause it looks cool. Somehow i didn't play it long the first time and got logged out. After i bought my Asus Tab, I downloaded the game again and searched the web about different factions. the different factions was just a face value thing, all the heroes were similar even in their powers(though latest updates have changed that, more on it later). i came across one guy vying for the primal hero, the fairy, and the comment got me to pick her, which was "what more do you ask? a fairy with a dual green light-saber (star wars), enuff said"

So what do I love about this game? Well first its an RPG! Purely, though it has been meshed up with card building, dungeon crawling, PvP fighting and leveling your character up. Its the way all these aspects come together is quite nice. The visual are awesome, the colors, the glare, the beautifully designed scenes, though the enemies and your fighters are all based on different classes but they differ in aesthetic so beautifully that it is a pure eye candy. it is a turn based strategy RPG, and it does it quite well to use your skills and fighters at the appropriate times.

The story begins when u are woken up from your slumber and go through the tutorial, which it does fie as it introduces you to all the things necessary. you get to capture a fighter and go forth into the game world fighting off demons to save the world while chasing Naema, your arch-nemisis, who betrayed your kind and almost left you for dead. Slowly you get introduced to your researchers who help you research your level caps, energy meters to attributes of your fighters. you also get introduced to your Phasmer baron, which is one of your currency to level up different skills, attributes of your hero and fighters and also to fortify and evolve them. you are also given a lot of free runes to summon new heroes from the chests you win from the dungeons, which is quite nice. i iwll not go into detail with them as a lot of games do it and u can get basic info from other sites. though I would mention here,i found it quite fun to explore the woirld and capture heroes just to evolve them. in the very beginning of the game, the developers started different events to fight hordes of monsters other than regular story dungeons for great rewards, which put me off quite a bit. first, u have to have higher level of fighters even to make a dent, second IAP made it quite difficult. it took me a while to understand the benefits of getting event heroes so you could actually make a mark or beat the system.

therefore the recent event the Magma or Lava has been quite ffun which you fight Fire enemies and have to get ice fighters to overcome them. for that, eiother you do IAP or go to the ice-queen levels and capture those. which after a llot of grinding, i did capture 3 heroes, whioch was necessary as my level 70 "tree-ent" didnt make a dent to the firy bitches (you get upto 4 tree fighters as daily rewards, so u can evolve them to a green behemoth). finally i have 3 fighters from the ice region whic

h allowed me to fight the fiery enemies and win the marks.

people might talk about energy and how it hampers the play, but i think its a mobile game, meant for short bursts of play. though sometimes if u know what you are doing, you can play quite longer. there were times that one seating might last almost an hour. the reason behoind it is the regular events that they are having. you play a dungeon with designated energy and while it is refreshing, you dive right into the event and earn some goodies and climb up the ladder to claim prizes, then you fight random actual players. then you give yourself a rest and repeat the cycle. earlier, it takes circa 4:30 min to recharge each energy point, so 21 energy cap will take about an hour and a half out of which 10-15 min you spent on events and managing your game, so u just wait an hour and you are back in the game. a mobile game should be like this, 20 min play and an hour of wait to other stuff, we all do have other tasks in our lives to fulfill :p. personally i start reading comics and then dive back in.

you might wonder why i haven't talked much about IAP. well, frankly, i know it is tough to play without it, but till now i have been playing it without IAPs, it really needs some patience on your end.

it does have its occasional glitches and hiccups, but the developers are truly working on it to fix them. it is quite hard to keep introducing new things and new events and also work on the bugs while entertaining ppl.

I personally give it 5 stars as it has got me hooked.

I will keep editing this post as i think the game is still evolving, as the new guild system is being introduced, and also to keep coming and writing about the game i love and got hooked to after a very long time.

So it begins...

I got this idea of blogging from a very close friend of mine as in those I had too much time on my hands. He read a couple of prose I wrote and thought they were quite nice. Though those writings were just to test out my creative or rather more imaginative side of my personality, this is more of sharing my thoughts on different things as well as sharing the things I have seen or experienced in all my travels. In process, I hope to shed some light on all things human and show, even though we are divided, by country religion and regions, that we all are, and always were just human beings, no more, no less.
This reminds me of a Lithuanian grandma as she said (in Lithuanian) , "wouldn't it be much easier (not to mention, wonderful) if we all spoke the same language?"