Lists – Bilal Hafeez

My 5 Book Recommendations For the Summer

Summer is here, so it’s time to get some reading time in. Here are some recent books I’ve read, that I’d recommend adding to your list:

Working (Robert Caro, 2019) – Caro is one of the great reporters and biographers of our time. He wrote huge biographies on US President Lyndon Johnson and all-powerful NY urban developer Robert Moses. In this book, “Working”, Caro discusses the research and interviews he did for those biographies. And through them, you learn about Moses and Johnson and the impressive work ethic and humility of Caro.

8 Podcast Shows I’m Loving

As many of you know, I’m a fan of podcasts. I even have two of my own shows (Deep See and Macro Hive Conversations). So here are eight shows I’ve recently discovered that I’m loving:

The World Before and After COVID

I’ve been thinking a lot about how COVID will change the world. I put the following together in my research job at Macro Hive. BC is “before COVID” and AC is “after COVID” :

Bilal

What To Watch When You’re Stuck At Home

We’re getting closer and closer to a full country lockdown. That means more TV! There are some great shows to watch. You can start with some of my 2019 recommendations. But if that’s not enough, here are some new shows I’ve liked:

Recovering the Lost Art Of Chivalry (3 min read)

noun /ˈʃɪv.əl.ri/ 1) very polite, honest, and kind behaviour, especially by men towards women 2) the system of behaviour followed by knights in the medieval period of history, that put a high value on honour, kindness, and courage

Chivalry sounds so old-fashioned, but if any tradition needs to be revived perhaps it should be this one. What sparked my interest is a 10th-century book I stumbled across called “The Way Of Chivalry”.

Continue reading “Recovering the Lost Art Of Chivalry (3 min read)”

20 Life Tips For 2020

Welcome to 2020, and what better way to start the year than with helpful life tips. Rather than give my own, I’ve selected the 20 most popular recent ones from the Reddit LifeProTips discussion thread. Here they are:

My Favourite Books/Movies/TV Of 2019, What’s Yours?

The year is almost over, so it’s time to send my list of favourites for the year: books, TV, and movies. I’m sure I’ve missed much, so send me yours too! Here are my picks:

Who Is the Top Footballer In the World?

Apologies to American readers, I’m talking soccer, not American football! The question of who is the best footballer can break friendships and destroy families, but there are some objective ways of arriving at the answer.

9 TV Shows I’m Loving

I’ve just finished a great run of binge-watching TV. Here are my favourites:

Money Heist (Netflix) – excellent Spanish thriller, which centres around a seemingly perfect robbery of a printing press. As the robbery proceeds we get flashbacks and glimpses of the lives of each the robbers. Gripping, I’m addicted. By the way watched it with subtitles not the dubbed English voices

The Boys (Amazon) – I couldn’t stop watching the 8-part season (surely season 2 will follow). This subverts the superhero genre by showing them as sleazy, fragile and corrupt. The plot revolves a group of regular people trying to bring the superheroes down.

It’s My Blog’s 4th Birthday! Here Are the All-Time Most-Read Posts

Roughly four years ago, I posted my first blog. It was review of a book on “Raising Boys” by Phil Zimbardo. The punchline was that boys were suffering a crisis of masculinity as they withdraw into the world of video games. I followed that by a blog called “My Optimised Morning Routine“. This eclectic mix of topics with a focus on well-being has set the tone of my blogs ever since. It’s also resulted in spin-offs like my curated newsletters and podcasts.