What does it mean to be a Liberal?

What does it mean to be Liberal? This question has been bugging me for a while now! Does it mean that you are pro-choice for everyone or you are just redrawing the line to when you can – at max – make those choices?
There is another dilemma; I am not sure how it connects to this, but let me spell it out here! If you do something in hiding, it is wrong – the very way in which that act is conducted means that it was something taboo, thus the hiding! Fair enough!
But apparently, things which are not wrong – from a normal, rational, liberal point of view – but are viewed wrong by the assholes that are the conservatives are also wrong and should not be acted upon in public!
So then where does it leave the space for the liberal person? Where is the space to do what you think is right and has no harm in it?
What is so wrong in going for a walk with a friend in a park?
What is so wrong in having lunch with a guy?
What is so wrong in trying to live an independent life?
What is so wrong with realizing that you don’t have the marriage gene?
What is so wrong for doing what you think is right?

My problem is you , woman!

Image via

Now, I know that the feminist out there would have my neck for this statement, but for the longest period of my life, I have simply shuddered to the idea of hanging out with women, girls, aunties – basically any form of the female species.

The reason were simple when I was a teenager: I was too much of a tom boy to hang out with a crowd, whose main concern was shoes, boys, shopping, clothes, boys, dieting, dieting, boys, shopping, jewelry, makeup, shopping, dieting, etc.

For me the topic of interest were politics, religion, international happenings, sports, actually participating in sports, books, etc. My favorite hangout was British Council. Guys, I found more or less, did offer me that variety of topics to talk to them about.

More importantly, the way I had lived my life (and still do) was more or less like a guy.. I am the oldest of my parent’s two daughter and in this regard, from an early age, I started sharing some of the responsibilities with my family. I would run errands. go to the shops, etc, things which girls hardly ever did. 

People, I am filing a Civil Lawsuit against KESC .. who is with me?

People, I have had enough! And I say this with complete seriousness! Because this time I really have had enough!

And let me unabbreviate the word KESC for the lucky people out there in the world who have had never had to suffer the wreath of Karachi Electric Supply Corporation – the K.E.S.C!

After suffering for .. let me count.. no .. actually let me restate myself … after enjoying electricity for a mere 4 hours in 24 hours, that too in bits and pieces as KESC played games with us. The games included giving us the hope that we finally have electricity before turning it off again within half an hour – a cruel joke my friends!

Of Asim Butt, Epiphanies, and being alone in this big wide world!

This would not have happened if this city wasn’t suffocating him!

This is what Arif Sahab said when the news of Asim Butt’s death reached him. It was still early morning, hardly 12 yet, and the news was received with shock!

Asim.....

It has been a while now, since Asim left his friends! I wasn’t one of them, but I had met him. Polite exchange of pleasantries had taken place between us whenever we met!

This is why it feels awkward for me to even try to say that last night somehow I understood what he did and why he did it! I understood somehow why he would have decided to take things in his own hands!

I wish I could say that the realization came to me in an epiphany, but it was instead a result of my own depressive phase that seems to have taken hold of me recently!

“Yes, my Privacy settings mean a lot to me!”

So yes, I am a private person, and I don’t like sharing a whole lot with the entire world! I have few friends in real life with whom I prefer to share a lot! And then there only one or two with whom I share everything!

And I think that holds true for most of us!

The same attitude is a practice of mine on FB as well! And therefore it is very difficult for me to explain to people when they come up to me and say, “Dude we can’t see that(insert whatever you like here) on your (FB) profile”!

Even my mother has complained to me about this.

But the fact of the matter remains, that I am a very private person, and I guard my privacy above everything else!

I have almost my entire family on FB, and then I have some of my most closest friends on it as well. And you can’t always expect your friends to say the most audience-appropriate thing, so yes a lot of things have to get censored! 

The Youth Parliament: Reviews on the First Impression!

Let me break the news people, although I have my doubts how many of you out there are actually reading it. But I have been selected as an MPA for Sindh Assembly for the Youth Parliament! And I have to tell you it was simply exciting.

I have always had an interest in Politics… I mean I come from a family in which for the longest of time we only had one picture in our house, and that too of Karl Marx. So I guess my political views are clear to you all now.

We went for the first ever session of the Youth Parliament completely unaware as to what was to be expected out of the whole program and what was to be expected out of us. Once there for the program on the 23rd of April 2011, due to began at 10:00 am and delayed for at least an hour, things started to look to me just as blurry as the state of our country at the moment.

The First Ever meeting of the Youth Parliament, Sindh Assembly

The itinerary for the day consisted of Elections, Oath taking ceremony, Cabinet Selection and Oath Taking and lunch! We had absolutely no idea about the elections or how the parties were to be formed, but it turned out that the campaign session for the election was in full swing all over Facebook to which I was completely oblivious. But i guess we are the youth who are all ready to bring a revolution about through the internet! 

A modern day love story – Part 2

Last Saturday, the second of my best friends – the first got married last year only – got engaged last Saturday, and it was story that truly made one believe in true love.

The two of them had been together for almost 10 years now, and to be honest, I never thought that they would work out.

After all, he is a Sunni belonging to a Memon family – who rarely marry out of their community, and the she is a Shia, belonging to

Her Happy Day!

Quetta. I won’t deny it, but we often spoke of them as a helpless couple, with absolouetly no future.

But alas, they proved us all wrong! And actually made it happen!

He fought his family all this time, and then even started standing on his own two feet, so that if and when the time comes, he would be able to support himself if such an occasion arose.

Really modern day Chivalry isn’t it?

She stood by him for all this time, and never once lost hope!

And the two of them together make me want to believe in love and relationships… which in itself is a great feat!

But there was no need for such! One day his father dropped by at the door of my friends house and asked her father for his daughter hand (my friend that is ).

The engagement was a great affair, and the wedding is due September. And I only have the best wishes for the two of them.

May they have a great blessed life!

A modern day love story!

Did anyone see that movie Love ajj kal? Well consider this post a sequel to that movie. This is not my story, but was shared with my

Love Ajj Kal Source: 3.bp.blogspot.com

by a friend, and happens to be the love story of his brother.. well a pretty unsuccessful love story!

And this is how it goes….

They met online, and talks between them come closer and closer, until love had taken over both of them. The distance melted away, and they started to make their visits frequent….He lived in Karachi, She was in Islamabad!

The love affair lasted for around 8 years. I am not too big on the details.. but I guess that like every relationship, they must have had their ups and down!

But alas! This was not to be! The girl was diagnosed with cancer! And is now counting her final days! The guy at this point decided that he wanted to marry her!

But the girl refused! Probably not wanting to tie the guy down!

Now till this point the story is great!

Here is the modern, insensitive twist!

The guy is getting married in this September to some other girl! He has not met her, but was chosen for him by his family!

“Is life really that complicated as we make it out to be?”

“Is life really that complicated as we make it out to be?”

That was the question asked to me by a friend of mine. I really didn’t have an answer to this question, although it did make me remeber something a school friend of mine once remarked.

She said, “I feel like nowadays me get ourselves bothered with far too many things.. relationships, boyfriends ( you people remember high school), while I look at these other girl (the nerds) and I really feel that the options that they have chosen for themselves tends to leave them more at peace.”

Welcome Folks to Modern Life! Source: dinmerican.wordpress.com

But you see, I believe that the modern world has got complicated.In the modern world, you are required to think on your toes, come up with solutions right there and then!

Things are far too complicated everything is multi-layered, and then you are always connected, meaning that you never have space or even a minute to yourself, to just think or run away. You are expected to be connected all the time!

I remember once how a teacher of mine had commented when we told him that a particular student couldn’t be reached in the short time about the extra class, since she wasn’t a regular email checker or had a phone.

Retelling the tale of my Friend!

A friend of mine retold an interesting set of events that happened to him just the other day. I have decided – and let him know – that I would be retelling this story. Therefore people, here is what happened to him the other day.

Yesterday that is on 7^th April 2011, my friend was taking pictures of a park near his house, which is in the area of Garden. His bike was parked outside, and this photography session was in line with his thesis topic.

As per the current trend, the park has been hijacked by a certain political party – let’s just call them the Sathi group – and within seconds, they were behind my friend, and had pinned a gun to this back, and their main concern was simply, “to which party did he belong to”.

From there he was taken to the Union Council of that area that apparently falls under 167 or something – and taken in a room, which was lined with weapons. My friend was able to get out of this mess by using his cunningness, and the contacts and help of some friends. Still they refused to return his memory card, even after they broke it, reason being that they wanted to make sure that he didn’t take any wrong pictures.

Another attack on a sane voice!

Things are shaping out to be exactly like they had been predicted. All the sane voices in the country now are being threatened to be silenced forever, or to take a different stance!

News is coming in that the Minority Minister has been attacked. His opinions have been a very small silver lining that has been coming out of the Margalla Hills where the government has decided to speak as little as possible so as not to ignite the religious bloc, that – as it is becoming more and more apparent since the death of Salman Taseer – comprises of more than half of this countries population!

This is not the end of it! Sherry Rahman who presented the bill for the repealing of the bill have been scared into a corner, while the article today byAbbas Ather shows the courage of a man despite all that is surrounding him! It is now in these bits of courage and protest that all of us can find encouragement for our own scared souls!

A friend of mine recently exclaimed to me that how they talk all the time that Pakistan is going to the dogs! He lives in London, so he can give this statement without ever worrying of what impact it can have for all of us sitting out here, living within this country!

I guess we need to make ourselves contend with whatever we can get!

 

Related Articles

• Pakistan elite silent after Taseer assassination (cnn.com)

Are we doing the right thing? Notes inspired by a Relief Camp Visit

The hollowed walls of a school to be have now been converted to a make shift relief camp. The media would have screamed about the incompetency of such a place, which neither has no electricity, no gas, no running water, and no sanitary arrangements. They would have you believe that they are being treated worse than animals and that the government has proved to be completely incompetent in making their stay enjoyable.

But lets be honest to ourselves, they really didn’t live in a house that had electricity, gas or running water, their lives were just as much hard, if not more than what the images are showing now. The only true thing that we can mourn about is the lose of their homes where they must have made several memories, the loss of their crops on which they must have worked everyday from twilight to dusk, the landscape of their villages that must have changed forever. Anything more than that is simply an exaggeration of the their condition based on our standards.

Yesterday, in the hollowed halls of that school, the spirit slowly faded down as a sudden realization dawned on me that maybe we are not doing anything good for them. Our efforts have been simply to enforce further the idea within them that they have nothing, while we are the blessed one. Our efforts are simply making life easy for just a moment, when in reality, in a few months after they return to their homes we would forget about them and they would know that their lives have nothing.

The spirit vanished as the smells of nausea, disgust, took over me, the spirit vanished after seeing the yet-not-functional bathrooms covered with human discharge. I wanted to throw up, or at least run away. So I diverted my attention to something else. I, for that brief moment of visit, became their official entertainer. Seeing a camera around my neck, the kids decided to pose one after the other. They touched my lens, they made me take their pictures, and then saw the results, only to bring back their friends and showing them their images to their jealous friends. It was a welcome distraction!

Here are the faces of the Flood!

A boy with a bump on his head

The girl who loved to have her pictures taken

A girl from the camp

I loved his smile

The girl who loved to have her pictures taken

Boy from the camp

To see the full stream of pistures, please see my Flickr Page.