The life and times of two Indians in Pakistan

Don't Inshallah me please!

2012-01-14T21:54:00.002+05:00

We can not seem to decide which word we detest more -- fautgee (death) or Inshallah (God willing).

We’ve been bombed by both these words time and again and we’ve concluded that people who litter their conversations with these words -- irrespective of age, sex, colour, class, creed -- should be treated with sufficient suspect.

We’ve written about Inshallah before and that it does not always mean that things will get done asap. More often than not, the term is thrown to buy time, defer or indefinitely postpone things that can be taken care of in the here and now. Alternatively, the term can be employed beautifully to shirk responsibility or make an empty promise.

Fautgee, too, hardly ever means what it is supposed to. It does, however, seem to be the number 1 excuse for those unable to resist the urge to take off to their gaons without notice. Our help is currently away to her village because of a cousin’s newborn’s fautgee.

It is difficult to contest fautgees, but we have learnt to challenge Inshallahs that our thrown our way.

“Inshallah I will come tomorrow and finish the work,” said the carpenter. “Why not today?” I asked. “There has been a fautgee,” he answered. When I protested, he added, "Inshallah zindagee rahee to zaroor aaongaa!" We would have given him up for the dead had we not spotted him chit-chatting on our street some days later.

Our vet has taken us for a ride several times with his Inshallah-guaranteed and sometimes free-of-cost treatments for our rescues. We nearly had a heart attack when he presented a bill of several thousand rupees some months ago. While one of the kittens was returned to us in a worse state and with no conclusive diagnosis, the other had passed away.

We are still hoping that the Inshallah of our landlord, who was to get things fixed in our house months ago, materialises one day. Our youngish landlord’s disappearance has not been because of any fautgees, but he has been busy checking in and out of the hospital for the past three years or so – or at least since we’ve known him. The only time the doctors declare him fit is when it is time for him to collect the annual rent.

Now waiting for the pizza boy to deliver on someone’s dangerously deep-throated (and I’m sure said with a jerk of the head) Inshallah…

Khutba on the plane...

2012-01-10T20:30:00.000+05:00

The Pakistani pilot who flew me to Islamabad recently delivered a mini-khutba (sermon) on the plane. He urged passengers to pray for Pakistan and re-read the safar ki dua (prayer for travel) complete with a translation in Urdu.

"Sit back and enjoy the view. Few get to see the skies like this. This is also the best time to think about our country, its problems and make dua," the pilot began his sermon which lasted over 10 minutes.

"Pray for your loved ones. Pray for peace, prosperity and speedy justice in our country. Pray that Pakistan tides over its ‘bohrans’ (crises). Think about what role you can play to change Pakistan. Remember, change is just round the corner.

"Our children are getting 'A' grades, but are they also becoming good citizens? Teach your kids good manners. Teach them not to litter public spaces. Make sure they don't grow up and blame us for the mess they are in. Our country has everything -- its beauty is comparable to the best countries of the world. We should strive to make our country better..."

The khutba in English also lasted a good 10 minutes.

"We should stop blaming others for our problems. Traffic snarls are our doing. You cannot blame others…Keep the plane toilets clean. After using the toilet wipe the seat clean…Remember, you may want to use the toilet again...Thank you for flying with us. Do fly with us again. We are because of you. If you do not come to us, we will not be able to fly..."

I had a feeling the pilot would step out of the cockpit and take questions. But I guess he had to also make time for landing.

Love knows no borders...

2011-12-14T19:27:00.013+05:00

Pakistani artist Masooma married Sumedh, a Keralite (pic: Outlook)

I recently read Ilmana Fasih’s post on how difficult it is for her to get a visa to India and how her soul shudders with fear when she has to fill up the visa form. Ilmana is an (ex)-Indian married to a Pakistani.
The link to her post had been sent to us by a reader probably as proof of how difficult it is for Pakistanis (even ex-Indians) to get a visa to India. Much as I hate to say this, the reverse is equally true too.
Indo-Pak marriages can be tricky in more ways than one and I admire those who take the plunge despite the many odds. I find cold-blooded comments, aimed at Indians married in Pakistan or Pakistanis married in India, asking women to accept their “fate” because they “chose” to marry a Pakistani or an Indian -- cruel.

This is what a reader had to say after reading about Ilmana: When you make a choice to become part of a country that actively harms your motherland you should accept the consequences with good grace. Instead you are whining that you are not getting special treatment because you went to a fancy medical school in Delhi or your parents are big professors in Delhi and so on. You mean to say that you are more exempt from scrutiny than an ordinary ill-educated Pakistani laborer? Obviously you do. At least you picked a proper feudal country to give your allegiance to.”

A comment on 80-year-old Zainab, who had an unfortunate marriage in Pakistan and wanted to return to India after her divorce: She is western educated and intelligent. So political naivety is inexcusable... India and Pakistan are like matter and anti-matter. Pakistan's existence is based on negative identity of India's failure. India, of course, can deal with an ideological aberration like Pakistan and move on since 'political India' existed for 1000s of years. So by discarding Indian citizenship and adopting Pakistani citizenship Zainab rejected the idea of India. Since Pakistan is an exhaustive negation of the idea of India she definitely deserves what she got and the only thing we can say is hard luck!

Varun met Wasiqa on a US campus (pic: Outlook)

Shortly after the much-publicised Sania-Shoaib marriage, who by virtue of being a celeb-couple gets a multiple-entry visa to each other's country, I spoke to two Pakistanis who married Indians despite being very aware of the difficulties involved -- which perhaps Zainab and Ilmana could not foresee decades ago.

"Everyone in their right minds knows that an Indo-Pakistan marriage can be a logistical nightmare and wouldn't wish that for their child. It's a very strong political divide. Though for the couples concerned, the marriage and the move is a natural enough thing to do if you care for each other…for society at large it's an act of insanity," Sara (name changed) said.
Sara met her husband "whose parents are fairly liberal people with little information about or bias against Pakistanis" on a visit to India. Still it was not an easy decision. "My parents are originally from India, so it was too much of a reversal of history for them, that I would move back. They have 'explained away' India from their minds for psychological reasons and to hear of me moving back, of course, filled them with trepidation," she said.
Apart from Indian and Pakistani society not accepting such marriages and landlords refusing to rent out homes to such couples, it is always the wife who has to move to her spouse's country. "In all Indo-Pakistan marriages, the men, whether Indian or Pakistani, are the ones who have a harder time getting visas. So the women end up moving to the other country," she said.
However, having taken the plunge Sara sees her husband and herself as "cultural ambassadors". "Me marrying an Indian or him marrying a Pakistani is an act of courage and of huge historical relevance – much more important than any ministerial exchange, wouldn't you think?" she added.

Nida (name changed) who has made India her home, too, said: "I have set up my home and have great friends here. For three months at a time, I can forget that my status is temporary. But then at the end of three months, I have to pull out my ticket and passport and leave. On the other hand if I apply for a resident permit, I can't leave at all. Why should it have to be this or that?"
"I just want this (Indo-Pakistan relations) to become better. We function day-to-day with blinders on because it's too tough a situation to get bogged down by. But there has to be some letting go and relaxation," Nida said.

Cross-border marriages may be an act of insanity, still three cheers for those who are giving love a chance!

When Satan Bhagat lost to Pakistan...

2011-12-05T22:17:00.017+05:00

(L to R) Bhagat, Goswami, Hanif and Hamid

A few hours before Pakistani authors Mohammed Hanif and Mohsin Hamid were to meet India’s “hottest writer” Chetan Bhagat at Times Literary Festival in Mumbai, Bhagat cheekily tweeted: “Session will discuss ‘If Pakistan is beating us at literature’. Yeah right.”

I have never read Bhagat, nor do I intend to – but I do like Mohammed Hanif and Mohsin Hamid's books. While I have had the honour of meeting Hanif, who is so full of humility, I’m sure Hamid would much be the same -- unlike his Indian counterpart, who is so full of himself.

After checking Bhagat's timeline on Twitter for two days for first-hand updates on the litfest, I stumbled upon the coverage of the session here. Arnab Goswami, Times' Now's loud anchor who was apparently less loud that day, moderated the session by asking the two Pakistani writers whether the volatile political condition in their country had led to an explosion of creativity and if that spurred creativity.

Does chaos spur creativity
Hamid: Writing English fiction is far simpler in Pakistan but dangers of speech are everywhere. Ideas have power and sometimes they can be threatening. There are gradations of threat: you're in the realm of impropriety if you talk about drugs and sex, but you're still relatively safe; politics is a trickier territory; and religion, more dangerous.
Hanif: If there's an explosion in my city, (do I go to work with the feeling) 'Oh great, today I will write better...’? Journalists do get excited by these things. But a writer like any other citizen would want peace and quiet. As writers of (English) fiction, we do not face as many risks because people (who read it) usually think it's not about them at all!
Bhagat: A country like Pakistan that was seeing so much upheaval it was bound to produce more creative literature than relatively peaceful nations (such as Switzerland).

Explosion of creativity
Hamid: Since Pakistan has been in the news people are more interested in knowing about the country and the explosion, if any, has been in the attention it has been receiving rather than in creativity.
Hanif: A part of the reason why authors (not just in Pakistan) were getting attention was because the media had seen a large amount of growth. With 24-hour news channels and special feature supplements, authors do find themselves in the limelight in ways they never did before.
Bhagat: Pakistani authors are the flavour of the season in the West and should they hope to succeed (commercially) they must look at home. Be careful when you look at the West for validation. One of the reasons why the Indian publishing industry has grown the way it has is because publishers don't necessarily look at award-winning books all the time. Prizes are irrelevant. A publisher (today) looks at commerce.

Why authors write
Hamid: It's tricky not to play to the gallery.
Hanif: I wrote a book about a dictator who was dead and about whom no one -- not even his family -- cared. Asking me if I was playing to the gallery (would be ridiculous). I don't know if there is a gallery to begin with. I don't think there is a formula possible for these kinds of things. Writers don't talk about markets. I feel like I am in a boardroom!
Bhagat: To bring about social change. I write because things are so wrong here and story needs to be told.

The Pakistanis won hands down. No wonder Bhagat forgot to tweet about it.

PS: Read this on a friend's FB page:
Chetan Bhagat arrives at our table....at the Time Out Food Awards last night. I pertinently probe if the bad boys of Pakistan - Hanif and Hamid are emphatic backstage (they ripped him at the Times Literature Carnival). He forks his steam bass, chomping, 'I could have given it back to them, they are guests, they anyways come from an unfortunate place,' he quips. Those guys strutted around like pagan warlords to me, didn't seem pitiable. 'I think one of us might have to tweet,' I try to regain my composure. He scurries away, though not before spooning mud chocolate cake off my plate. Bitter, is he?

Jinnah returns to Pakistan...

2011-11-30T20:21:00.004+05:00

I am guilty of seeing these toons at least a year-and-a-half-late. Still, I think this is the best toon series I have set my eyes upon in Pakistan. I know little about the creator of Jay's Toons, Jahanzaib Haque, except for the obvious fact that he has a fantastic sense of humour and that he also makes time to edit The Express Tribune's web edition. For more of Jay's Toons click here.

Headturner in a headscarf…

2011-11-30T00:20:00.017+05:00

Mehmal Sarfraz

Mehmal Sarfraz is my reason to believe that hijab can be a liberating experience for women too!

We met Mehmal a few months after we moved to Pakistan. I liked the way she held her own in a roomful of men and didn’t keep pulling at her headscarf self-consciously.

The only time I have seen Mehmal without her trademark scarf is in a Facebook picture where she poses in a rainbow wig grinning ear-to-ear: “This is why I cover my head!”

When we were to meet Mehmal in Lahore, her hometown, I decided to carry my safed malmal ka dupatta along – just in case! Much like a famous Hermes scarf-wearer, my dupatta kept sliding off my head and I kept tugging at it as our very gracious hostess showed us her town.

By the time she dropped us back it was past midnight and as I tucked in I concluded that hijab need not be a restraining force.

The next day when Mehmal came to pick us up I did not bother with my dupatta. There was no point faking it. Also, by then, I was sure that she wouldn’t have been impressed this way or that.

Having known Mehmal for about four years, I am certain that a hijab/headscarf is not necessarily stifling. However, I am not so sure if a hijab/headscarf serves its other more popular and basic function – distracting the male gaze – just as well.

I think not – in Mehmal’s case, at least. Blame it on her beauty or her brains the scarf makes her more visible than many non-hijabi women and, if I may say so, a piece de resistance!

What say Mehmal?

Meet Marvi Jr...

2011-11-26T23:58:00.005+05:00

Sadaf Mujeeb may not have taken on a Zaid Hamid yet, but she could well be the next Marvi of Pakistan.

Sadaf is an atheist, an LGBT rights supporter and an animal rights activist who spent a fortnight before Eid gently convincing the faithful to “sponsor” an animal instead of “sacrificing” it. I watched her keep her cool on an animal rights page on Facebook where the faithful threatened to hand her over to the Taliban to be “sacrificed”.

This week Sadaf was busy taking up Rabia Saleem’s case. Rabia, an Ahmadi, was expelled from her university for allegedly tearing up an anti-Ahmadi poster.

“I called COMSATS university about six times to ask them why they hadn't taken any action against people putting up anti-Ahmadi posters around the university, and how what Rabia Saleem did was being considered as anything other than courage and integrity in the face of unrelenting, institution-sponsored bullying...” 20-something Sadaf wrote in an email.

Sadaf openly talks of her religious beliefs (or lack thereof) and is quite sure that "it is evidence of stupidity more than courage”.

“I have, like everyone else who's a minority in this country, faced discrimination based on my beliefs. But the resulting frustration and anger only encourages me to fight harder for all minority rights, which includes the freedom to express a religious opinion, freedom of sexual orientation, and basically the freedom to live without fear of persecution or rejection from the society as a whole,” she wrote.

However, she considers LGBT rights as her most “controversial fight” yet. “People especially get offended when there is any talk of reconciling ones faith, Islam, with ones identity as a homosexual, transgender or queer.

“It's sad that people fail to recognize religion as something that's personal, and always seem to feel the need to make it part of something that rules an entire nation irrespective of whether the citizens of that nation share those views or not.”

Sadaf has also rescued scores of animals from the streets of Karachi. But, for her, animals rights is not just for the four-legged. “I believe in fighting for animal rights, which includes humans as social animals (irrespective of race, religion, sexual orientation, gender or class), and non-human animals (irrespective of breed)”

This loss was a sure win...

2011-11-26T00:28:00.009+05:00

Ayesha and Salman's last picture together

I became aware of 23-year-old Salman Mehmood's existence on October 19, 2009. That was also the day he stopped being. Prominent Pakistani bloggers had been posting updates about Salman's condition, who was fighting it out at a Karachi hospital, and praying for a miracle.

Salman, a Thalassemia major and founder of Thalassemia.com.pk, blogged and tweeted about his condition to make sure no other patient suffered the way his family and he did. Salman had lost elder brother Nauman to Thalassemia, and Ayesha, his youngest sibling, was also living off blood transfusions.

I checked Salman’s blog "Salman Namah" and Twitter timeline shortly after his death. It was hard to believe that he had ceased to exist.

"Dear Diary: Well, right now my mom and sis are giving me ‘pittay’ that I’ll have 12 kids. Khair… I tweeted after three days. Feels weird, it’s like riding a bike after 10 years.

“Dear Diary: Umm hi again. I am very tired right now (it’s 11:23 pm). I have not been very fortunate with sleep this week. But that’s normal...Khair.”

I soon became addicted to Salman’s little sister Ayesha’s blog too – who decided to carry forward her brother’s mission. I recently learnt other details – such as their trip to Chennai in search of a cure shortly after Nauman’s death in 1999. After spending three months at Apollo Hospital the family returned empty-handed, but packed with information on Thalassemia, which was unavailable in Pakistan then.

In 2003, Salman decided to spread awareness about Thalassemia and launched www.thalassemia.com.pk even as he checked in and out of the hospital for “different problems”. Their father’s untimely demise hit them in 2007. However, the biggest blow was Salman’s eventual death due to meningitis.

“It was the biggest loss to our family. It was really hard to get back to life. But as his mission was to spread awareness I took up the responsibility and started managing the website. I also started arranging blood camps and free screening camps, started writing more blogs….” says Ayesha.

Ayesha manages www.iwritealot.com too, Salman’s last project to generate funds for needy patients. She has also started “Sponsor a child programme” and has sponsored five children in just a year.

Each year, 5,000 to 6,000 children are born with Thalassemia in Pakistan, yet there is no government-aided facility for such patients.

Bindiya chamkegi....

2011-11-23T21:22:00.007+05:00

I first met Marvi Sirmed -- a "Bindi wali Hindu" -- at a dinner in Islamabad three years ago. Apart from the fact that I loved her crisp cotton sari, her large round bindi and her shudh Hindi -- I also loved what she stood for -- PEACE. She wished for a truly secular Pakistan and debunked the two-nation theory.

I have spotted Marvi, a Muslim by birth, several times since. Always in her trademark sari and bindi. I am sure many mistake her to be Indian (read Hindu), even though Indians never step out in a sari in Pakistan (at least not in public spaces), let alone sport a bindi!

A few months ago, I saw Marvi being promoted from being "Indian" to "Indian agent" in a television show. I wasn't surprised at all. After all, my little-known and low-profile Pakistani Hindu neighbours are "Indians" too. I once raised the issue with one of the younger members of the family. "We've been living here for decades and everyone knows we are Pakistanis. Still they call us Indians, because we are Hindus!" he said. I felt sad for the boy.

I asked him if he would like to visit India. "Never," was his answer. "If we go to India Pakistanis call us Indian spies, and Indians call us Pakistani spies," he added.

Marvi, of course, is a bigger sinner. She has taken on the high and mighty because she believes in a Pakistan where Hindus and Christians enjoy the same rights as Muslims. For those of you who still haven't seen Pakistan's Jhansi ki Rani take on Zaid Hamid, famously famous for hating all things Indian and, more recently, for calling Marvi a bindi wali Hindu -- please do see this. Bindiya chamkegi!

Peace, not pieces...

2011-11-21T22:48:00.002+05:00

Shahvar Ali Khan is a “proud Lahori” who is “madly in love with Mumbai”. No Saazish, No Jung, his peace anthem, tells both mullahs and foreigners to stop messing in the region. The song also combines the voices of Mahatma Gandhi, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, Benazir Bhutto and Barack Obama to make an impassioned plea for peace.

“I am a born and bred proud Pakistani Lahori, who is unapologetically and madly in love with Bombay with no qualms in saying that again and again! Unlike my parents’ generation that was born in the midst of the partition hangover, my Pakistaniat (identity as a Pakistani) is beyond being just ‘anti-India’,” says Khan.

Khan released the song on the internet two years ago, but the video was shot only recently in India. “I always felt that the shooting of the music video in India would be a litmus test for peace. Lots of people questioned me as to why I was so gung ho on shooting a music video in India when Pakistan specialises in this sphere.”

Mullayae na kar tung

Oo guraya na kar tung

Meino rahen dae malang

Mein nach nach kai larni

Yae jang de nal jang

(Don’t bother me mullahs

Don’t bother me foreigners

Let me remain a free spirit

I will dance away

And fight your war)

The voice of Gandhi can be heard intoning “...in the midst of death life persists, in the midst of untruth truth persists, in the midst of darkness light persists” while Jinnah is heard saying: “Our object should be peace within and peace without. We want to live peacefully and maintain cordial friendly relations with our immediate neighbours...”

Milne do...

2011-11-21T20:35:00.003+05:00

Milne do, the ad campaign by Aman ki Asha, a peace initiative by Pakistan's Jung group and India's ToI. Couldn't agree more (and more).

Pakistan's bravest girl...

2011-11-20T19:46:00.004+05:00

Malala Yousufzai

One of the bravest girls in Pakistan, who as a 11-year-old wrote about the Taliban banning girls from going to school in the picturesque Swat Valley and missing watching her favourite Indian serial Raja Ki Ayegi Baraat on Star Plus, has been nominated for the International Children's Peace Prize.

Malala Yousufzai, now 13, was a victim of the ban imposed on girls' education by the Taliban in the troubled Swat Valley over two years ago. Malala wrote about her pain and anguish in a diary for BBC Urdu online.

In one of her very first diary pieces written on January 14, 2009 -- just a day ahead of the Taliban ban -- Malala wrote, "I may not go to school again...The principal announced the (winter) vacations but did not mention the date the school was to reopen. This was the first time this has happened."

Some of her pieces gave me goosebumps. "The night was filled with the noise of artillery fire and I woke up three times. But since there was no school I got up later at 10 am. Afterwards, my friend came over and we discussed our homework."

She mentioned Maulana Shah Dauran, the Taliban leader behind the ban on girls' education, once. "We discussed the rumours about the death of Maulana Shah Dauran, who used to give speeches on FM radio. He was the one who announced the ban on girls attending school."

Her diary entries included discussions with classmates about the Taliban, who then controlled large parts of the Swat valley and gunned down dozens of people who opposed them. In one entry she describes a "terrible dream" about military helicopters and the Taliban.

"Only 11 students attended the class out of 27....On my way from school to home I heard a man saying 'I will kill you'. I hastened my pace and after a while I looked back if the man was still coming behind me...But to my utter relief he was talking on his mobile and must have been threatening someone else over the phone," she wrote.

She also wrote about Maulana Fazlullah, the leader of the Taliban in Swat, who “cried” for a long time on his FM radio channel. “He was demanding an end to the military operation. He asked people not to migrate but instead return to their homes.”

In another entry, Malala rued that she did not like wearing the burqa. “There was a time when I used to like wearing the burqa but not anymore. I am fed up with this because it is a hindrance in walking.”

Pakistani text messages to go halal...

2011-11-20T13:12:00.003+05:00

Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) has directed cellular service providers to filter all text messages from tomorrow (November 21). The national telecom regulator has banned over a thousand English/Urdu words/phrases -- some quite innocuous -- with a promise to strike back with more!

By sheer coincidence I saw the list just as I had finished reading Karan Thapar's column on "Speaking English" in The Hindustan Times.

"First, consider how the English language has changed. When I was 10, rubber meant eraser, ass meant donkey, gay meant happy, straight was linear, cock was a rooster, pussy a cat, a prick was a jab, a poke a nudge and a screw was what a carpenter used. Oh yes, in case I forget, a tit was a response for a tat. Now, today, even if you're gay, you're unlikely to admit it whilst many more are pricks and don't know it. And very few use a rubber! We prefer to use pens or type," Thapar wrote.

I am not from the 1950s, but my **** word vocabulary is bad. For me, too, like Mr Thapar, the word "gay" still (also) means being happy. Not surprisingly, I was unfamiliar with 80 per cent of the words on the PTA list which made me sick and conclude like a lot of Pakistanis that PTA, the self-appointed guardian of linguistic purity, is a pervert.

In less than 24 hours the cellular service providers will start screening text messages, but there’s no stopping mobile phone users from thinking up ways to dodge PTA's banned word list. The list is being circulated amongst friends as “halal texting list” and the “pervert” creators have become a butt of jokes at parties. "Butt", incidentally, features on the banned word list.

Many have gone into overdrive thinking up alternatives for swear words suggesting memorising number of banned word and texting it; or “evolving” new “abuses”, “swear words”, “obscenities”; or sending “expletive filled text msgs every 10 minutes and wait(ing) for the networks to collapse”; or making “PTA” the new swear word!

“Everyone in Pakistan should start using PTA or the names of public figures as swear words and get them onto the PTA banned list,” reads a message on Twitter, where PTA's banned list has been trending all week.

The list has not only become a talking point in Pakistan, but also in India and across the world. Jemima Khan, former wife of politician Imran Khan tweeted: “I'm going to make sure I include 'monkey crotch' in every text to Pakistani friends from this day forth...” she tweeted. “Monkey crotch” is a banned word, just as Jesus Christ is.

Abrar Kureshy, a Pakistani blogger, commended PTA for its "hard work" and thanked it for including almost every "abuse/curse" word. Kureshy also had a suggestion: “You cannot teach ethics, people observe and learn by themselves. For this purpose, our so-called leaders should set the example.”

Filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy summed up the sentiment of most Pakistanis best. "#PTA have the filthiest minds - I mean disgusting freaks - they had 2 make up names 2 add to the list!”

Dog without borders...

2011-11-15T20:21:00.027+05:00

I am really intrigued by this female dog (at 6.52 in clip) who crisscrosses/d the India-Pakistan border near Pul Kanjri, a small village near Amritsar, for her lunches and dinners .

Sarah Singh has documented the dog in her award-winning film The Sky Below. Singh wrote about the dog in her blog too: "...got to the fencing that denotes the border area of the two Punjabs near Pul Kanjri, a small village about 20 km from Amritsar -- quite a lot of barbed wire that weaves in and out and circles around itself as it creates a barrier about 10 ft high and 5 ft thick -- with an electric current running through to fry those who test the division at night...

"I was there during the mid-day sun, and against this metallic web of lines, a black female dog edged her way through from one side to the other, negotiating the twists and turns of the barbed wire in a manner which suggested her familiarity with the routine. A deft approach by hungry dog in the rising heat."

When I heard about the dog I sent an email to Singh. "Yes, towards the end of the film there is a story which correlates to a dog crossing the border to be fed by security forces on both sides --- as luck would have it, I did get a chance to film a dog crossing through some barbed wire ---but the barbed wire is next to the border, not on it. It serves as an initial barrier," she wrote back.

Interestingly, this isn't the only story of a friendly dog caught between two unfriendly security posts. Pakistani writer Saadat Hasan Manto's The Dog of Tetwal is also about man's best friend who wagged his tail happily at both Indian and Pakistani soldiers but sadly "died a dog's death".

Mere desh ki mitti...

2011-11-14T22:56:00.007+05:00

Kanak Dixit (in blue) collecting mud for Barkat Singh

It is not rare to hear of old people craving for a fistful of mud from their native village. Today I met a gentleman who dug up a field to fulfil the wish of a 96-year-old man. What makes the incident even more endearing is that the old man is an Indian and he wished to hold earth from his native village in Pakistan and the person who helped out is Nepali!

I met Kanak Dixit, a man with many feathers in his cap, in Islamabad where he is on the last leg of his "The Great Nepal-India-Pakistan Spinal Beetle Drive".

The Beetle parked at the Wagah Border

Dixit, a person from Nepal (he prefers this as opposed to a Nepali), is driving though Nepal-India-Pakistan in his 1973 model Volkswagon Beetle to generate funds for his Spinal Injury Rehab Centre in Kathmandu. Dixit, himself a spinal injury survivor, embarked on this journey on November 4 and has driven through Lucknow, Delhi, Agra, New Delhi, Jalandhar and Amritsar. His last stop in Pakistan (after Lahore and Islamabad) is Peshawar.

When Dixit reached Amritsar yesterday his heart sank -- he had left all passports (also his wife's and son's who are travelling with him) at a roadside restaurant in Jalandhar. He took a U-turn and sped back to Jalandhar lucky to find his passports safe with the owner, Pahalwan Barkat Singh.

When 96-year-old Barkat Singh heard about Dixit's trip to Pakistan he told Dixit that he longed to hold mud from his village in Sialkot. Dixit took a detour and headed towards Sialkot to collect mud for the old Sardarji. The mud will now be delivered by Dixit's co-travellers on their return journey to Nepal.

Going vegan in Pakistan...

2011-11-12T20:06:00.003+05:00

For vegans it's a choice between French fries and French fries!

It is almost impossible to go vegan in Pakistan -- a country where one collects points for buying meat and more meat.

The 10 types of meats at dinner tables don't surprise me anymore. I also know too well that the section for vegans, if at all, may have a few greens thrown in with chunks of meat (palak-gosht). The dal may also be special -- because it has been cooked in meat.

It is not that I am a compulsive vegetarian -- I do like to eat meat once in a while -- but sometimes when I am in a mood to eat veggies I just don't know where to head. The options in Islamabad are almost always limited to khatte baingan with khatti daal or khatti daal with khatte baingan at Cafe Lazeez or more recently at Lahori Chatkhara.

Today I learnt of a Pakistani blogger who is vegan. Abdul Majeed is a medical student and it was such a pleasure reading his post.

"Folks, I confess to being a minority. No, I am not a non-Muslim, gay, lesbian, atheist or fat. I am a vegetarian. I have spent most of my life answering stupid questions like 'why aren't you eating anything beta, do you have a medical problem?'" Majeed posted on his blog "Courage to Differ".

Majeed confirmed my fears that there are no exclusive vegetarian restaurants in Lahore, Islamabad or Peshawar. "The maximum I can get at fast food restaurants are French fries," he wrote.

Majeed also mentioned a Facebook group dedicated to Pakistani vegetarians (has only 30 members!!!) -- which is also where I learnt a new conspiracy theory: being vegan = weak = Indian!!

Majeed quoted Maryam Arif, another Pakistani vegetarian: “Being vegetarian in Pakistan is highly suspect, Indian-like; even though most Indians I know ask for beef kebabs first thing they come to Lahore. Yet in our minds vegetarian = Hindu = Indian = weak. The popular thinking is that meat gives us an edge over them grass-eaters across the border. Carnivores are stronger and taller; even light-complexioned than herbivores. Isn’t that so? It has to be.”

The going has obviously not been easy for Majeed. "It is a bit like blasphemy to live in Lahore and not eat meat. Lahoris are often offended when you tell them you are a vegetarian. It is an insult to their intelligence. How can anyone voluntarily give up the meat delicacies that constitute our cuisine?"

"I have decided that enough is enough. I am out of the closet now. I am sick of your siri paye, qormas, seekh kabab, gurday kapooray..." Majeed added.

My feelings exactly.

Aloo Anday: satire at its best

2011-11-11T00:30:00.002+05:00

"Aloo Anday" -- the latest Pakistani song to have gone viral on the internet -- is a commentary on Pakistani politics and the Pakistani psyche. Beyghairat Brigade, the Lahore-based band, pokes fun at Ajmal Kasab, the lone surviving Mumbai attacker, being treated like a “hero” in his home country and slain Governor Salmaan Taseer’s assassin being treated like a “nawab”. The song’s video starts on an unassuming note with three boys in school uniforms complaining over their mother packing “Aloo Anday” for lunch, but in the following three minutes, the band takes on everyone from Sharif brothers of the PML-N to the “good-looking fundamentalist” Imran Khan.

Pakistan fashion's 'deepak'...

2011-11-10T23:25:00.010+05:00

Deepak Perwani

Deepak Perwani is one of Pakistan's top fashion designers. He studied fashion at New York and has been retailing his stuff for the past decade or so globally.

He wears a Ganesha tattoo on his right arm and an ayat around his neck. His fashion philosophy is much the same: "The Deepak Perwani man and woman have no fashion boundaries. They do not belong to a country or religion. They are the children of the global village."

DP's creations

Deepak is also Pakistan's cultural ambassador to China and Malaysia and has secured a place in the Guinness Book of World Records for designing the world's largest kurta.

I have no clue if Deepak is married or not, but some years ago he was looking for a nice Hindu bride. "Mathematical chance isn't on the side of a Sindhi Hindu looking for a suitable arranged match within the small community. The girl has to be imported..since I am doing too well here to be exported," Deepak told The Outlook magazine.

His mother Renu was planning to "parade him" in Bombay, Dubai and Hong Kong. "I would never accept a Muslim girl in my house. All my friends are Muslims and I know they are very beautiful people, cultured and nice. But a daughter-in-law is a different matter."

Deepak, according to Pakistani law, cannot marry a Muslim girl: "I'd have to convert. And I would never do that."

DP's premium Eid collection

Veni, Vidi, Visa...

2011-11-09T23:39:00.008+05:00

Once in a while people seek our help to get a visa to India. Sometimes it is difficult to ignore such requests because visa-seekers have been referred by senior colleagues or predecessor/s.

We entertained one of our first requests right after we moved here. The man was known to a colleague and needed a medical visa for his wife, an ex-Indian. The man walked into our house with six bottles of Coke and Sprite each. I ignored the bottles thinking it was summer and that he needed to quench his thirst on his way back to Lahore, his hometown.

He had just given his "interview" to the Bhais and didn't look very comfortable. He briefed his case quickly to my husband and was ready to leave -- minus the bottles. "These are for you sister!" he announced and walked out.

We were angry -- because we felt so bribed.

Months later he dropped by again this time with his wife to say his thank-yous. The husband and wife came in with several large plastic carry bags. The wife said I was like her "behan" and that she had shopped for me in India. We were horrified. We told them we could not accept the "gifts".

"Can't I give something to my sister?" she pleaded teary-eyed. We agreed to keep the "gifts" on the condition that the couple would never "shop" for us again. As we passed the plastic packets to our help we realised that she would not have to shop for soaps, toothpastes, shampoos, detergents etc etc for at least one full year!

Another visa-applicant, known to our predecessor, sent us a Rs 500 note to cover the charges we would have to incur when we couriered his passport back.

These, however, are simpletons who mean well. The smart ones, usually frequent travellers to India, make those smart calls to meet us requesting us to introduce them to officials in the high commission and once the introductions have been made they look through us. A colourful fashion designer of some repute had no memory of me when I bumped into him at a recent dinner.

And then there are those who remain friends till the time their visas are being granted -- once, twice... However, if their visa applications are rejected on some ground at a later date they not only snap ties but also make sure we get to hear an earful.

This, too, is Pakistan...

2011-11-09T18:51:00.004+05:00

Tapu Javeri, Pakistan's fashion photographer and Radio Jockey, shot this video earlier this year. "I Love Karachi & its people. Duck Sauce inspired me to make this video & its all about people of Karachi.....Thanks to all the lovely people of my city, without your support this project was impossible... ...Love, Peace, Happiness," says Javeri, who also features in the video.

The Bhai files...

2011-11-08T21:41:00.002+05:00

Tell me NOW!

With the Bhai brigade or their chamchas keeping a close tab on our visitors, especially the Pakistani variety, sometimes we get to hear strange accounts of what transpired between the two parties during the “interview” outside our gate.

The accounts of our friends almost always match centering on two questions: a) who are you; b) how do you know them? Aware of their no-panga policy our friends usually “cooperate” with the Bhais and are let off easily.

Sometimes the “interview” with the Bhais gets long and messy. A couple of years ago an ex-help got into trouble with the Bhais because he refused to “cooperate”. The help obviously had no clue about Bhaigiri.

“We are here to make sure they do not do anything wrong,” said one of the Bhais when our help sought their introduction. The help replied: “I am there to stop them from doing any wrong” – and that did him in. With time the help learnt to deal with the Bhais and we would often spot him chit-chatting with his new-found friends.

Some other helps have been more cautious. Some time ago, our maid asked me about a visitor. “Is she Pakistani or Indian?” My look must have said it all because she quickly added, “I asked because she spoke English differently.” Another time she was itching to know if our dinner guests would be Indian or Pakistani. Her explanation was obviously lame: “If they are Indian I would serve them in bowls!!??”

Occasionally accounts of the encounter with Bhais are exaggerated. I am told that for some it is a status symbol to be stopped and followed by Bhais. Some examples:

I said I knew his boss. He let me past.

He said sorry for stopping me.

He said salam to me.

Knows my dad/uncle/etc is a cop/politician/etc.

I sped away and he could never catch up.

I slipped someone else’s visiting card in his hand and fooled him.

Last month, I heard someone being slapped outside our gate after a heated argument. I could hear Bhai shouting. He wanted to see the man's (I wish I knew who it was) ID card. The man refused and Bhai started slapping him.

However, the saddest cases are when good friends are forced to sever ties because Bhaigiri is so disgusting.

Pakistan's party people....

2011-11-08T12:24:00.014+05:00

A lot of us Indians continue to live with our many stereotypes of Pakistan and Pakistanis (Are women allowed to step out in Pakistan??!! Oh! You don't wear the burqa there??!!), much as Pakistanis continue to live with their many stereotypes of India and Indians (Are there mosques in India??!! What! Muslims are not treated unfairly??!!)

Here are a few pictures of Pakistan's party people from Daily Times' Sunday Magazine to show that there is life beyond burqas and beards. I must admit that some of the Page 3 pictures in the weekend magazines shook me too when we got here. But I learnt early that not all hijabis are jihadis and not all jihadis are hijabis!

Ali Zafar celebrating the success of his film.

Freiha Altaf (in yellow) is a Page 3 fave.

A birthday extravaganza.

The bold and beautiful at an event.

Halloween in Pakistan...

2011-11-03T11:18:00.004+05:00

Youngsters at a Halloween party in Peshawar (pic: Shabbir Imam)

Hush-hush Halloween parties have been a norm in Pakistan, but a big first was added two days ago when the event was celebrated in Peshawar -- where it feels like Halloween every other day.

More on Peshawar's Halloween night here:
http://tribune.com.pk/story/286418/halloween-celebrations-no-militants-involved-in-peshawars-night-of-horror/

Diwali in Peshawar...

2011-11-02T20:45:00.005+05:00

Temple in Peshawar (pics: Shabbir Imam)

Hindus celebrated Diwali at this historic 160-year-old temple at Peshawar in northwest Pakistan after it was reopened to the minority community after six decades on a court’s orders. Scores of Hindus, including women and children, visited the Goraknath Temple at Gor Khatri, which was reopened after Phoolwati, the daughter of the shrine’s cleric, petitioned the Peshawar High Court.

Phoolwati and her son Kaka Ram have claimed that the temple, which has been controlled in past decades by the police, Evacuee Property Trust Board and the provincial archaeology department, belongs to their family.

Though a two-judge bench of the High Court ruled last month that Phoolwati had failed to provide evidence of her family’s ownership of the temple, it directed authorities to reopen the shrine for religious purposes. The court observed that stopping religious activities at a place of worship was against all laws.

Kaka Ram said his father, Pandit Kamoram, had refused to move to India at the time of Partition in 1947 and decided to settle in Pakistan. The temple is small and surrounded by nine rooms on two sides. The white temple with three domes in the middle of an enclosure has two small rooms with statues of deities. Red, black and yellow pennants and flags have been hoisted over the temple.

Women get busy with food preparations

Two little girls pose inside the temple

Om Namh Shivay written in Urdu

Main bada hokar truck banoonga....

2011-10-31T18:50:00.007+05:00

A heavily embellished Pakistani truck

Rani Mukherji's free road show in Pakistan

We've survived quite a few lows on this side of the border thanks to the Pakistani sense of humour. This doesn't stop with the many Omar Sharif jokes (provokes actress Meera to prove that she is 20-something and Meera asks him to check library records for the same) or with the still hot-and-happening "Hum sab umeed sai hain" show on Geo TV (Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar's proposal to give India the Most Favoured Nation status because bags and cosmetics are cheaper there) or with the many trends on Twitter (Its Halloween all over the world; in Pakistan its just another scary day!)

There's much more humour on the road -- mostly on Pakistani trucks and rickshaws which is miles ahead of of our boring and overused Indian "buri nazar wale tera moonh kala". Today, I stumbled upon a Facebook group that is dedicated to listing truck and rickshaw poetry. Here are a few samplers which are quite a commentary on Pakistani society and also its politics.

Parhoge likhoge banoge vakeel
Jo jaahil rahe tou shayad vazeer

Jinay apni maa no satiay
Onay sari umar riksha he chalaiy

Bus-on main, coach-on main, wagon-on main
Bay hisoon ko hamsafar sath paiay
Jin ko mardaangi ka daawa tha
Un ko bhi ladies seat per paaiy

Driver ki zindagi ajab khel hai
Maut se bache to central jail hai

...and my personal favourite
Main bada hokar truck banoonga!

The extraordinary tradition of decorating trucks has its roots in the days of the Raj when craftsmen made glorious horse drawn carriages for the gentry. In the 1920s, the Kohistan Bus Company asked its master craftsman Ustad Elahi Bakhsh to decorate buses to attract passengers. Bukhsh employed artists from Chiniot in Punjab province whose ancestors had worked on palaces and temples dating back to the Mughal Empire, according to state-run APP agency.

This art is so Pakistani, that the freight trucks which are built by Ford, General Motors, Hino Pak are first retrofitted with very Pakistani style bodies and a special viewing deck at the top of driver's cab. The view deck is a multipurpose extra space -- used by cleaners to sleep at night and also to load extra luggage when needed. These truck bodies are then immaculately painted by street artists in brightly colored patterns.

Unfortunately, of late a lot of religious messages are being painted on the trucks. According to Jamal J. Elias, author of "On Wings of Diesel: Identity, Imagination and Truck Decoration in Pakistan", the colourful, hand-painted trucks in the last few years have been hijacked by religious groups trying to spread their beliefs.

"Traditionally, the decoration with religious significance is talismanic, in that it protects the truck, its content and the driver from misfortune. But in 2003, a religious Sunni group by the name of Tablighi Jama’at started shifting the syntax of truck decoration to advertise their particular message. This activist attitude is pushing other religious groups (Shiite and other Sunni groups) to respond, thus creating the concept of ‘missionary trucks’,” Elias wrote.

No wonder Rani Mukherji is still going strong on Pakistani roads!

Our special rescue: Cocoa

2011-10-29T20:41:00.007+05:00

Cocoa was born in our backyard to Chicklet, a seven-month-old stray kitten.

Cocoa's first picture

Like all kittens, he loved playing with his littermates.

Sometimes he perched on this window sill for a cat-nap.

When Cocoa was three months old he was poisoned. He lost his vision temporarily. And his motor coordination permanently. Cocoa could no longer walk. No longer meow. He was diagnosed with Cerebellar Hypoplasia or the Wobbly Walk Syndrome.

A year on, Cocoa has learnt to live with his disability beautifully. He no longer needs to be carried. He has fun wobbling around the house or observing our other cats play.

Cocoa wobbling in the greens

Our rescues and other stories (II)...

2011-10-29T20:06:00.001+05:00

This is Rocco. Left outside our house on June 26, 2011. The vet refused to board him because of the severity of his infections (scabies and fungal). When he failed to respond to treatment we even considered putting him down.

Rocco

Two months later we consulted a vet in India and also carried a bagful of medicines to Pakistan. Within a week Rocco was cured.

Four months later, Rocco is a beautiful dog who keeps an eye on not just our house but the entire street.

I found Rocket wagging her little tail outside our gate on April 13, 2011. She was an extremely friendly pup.

Rocket

We soon discovered she had contracted the deadly Parvo virus. The vet said her chances of survival were slim.

Rocket survived the Parvo to battle a severe fungal infection for four months.

Rocket is now cured. And best friends with all our cats.

Rocket with Chammak Challo

When my samosa-wallah got kidnapped...

2011-10-28T21:35:00.003+05:00

Bengali Bhai frying samosas (pic: Tribune.com)

When I heard about the kidnapping of Bengali Bhai, the famous samosa-wallah in my neighbourhood market, two insane thoughts struck me: a) finally someone known to me had been kidnapped; and b) the Taliban must be really short on money to kidnap a samosa-wallah!

Initial reports claimed that Bengali Bhai had been kidnapped by the Taliban -- the "bad" Taliban, if I may say so, because I often get to hear the distinction between the "good" and "bad" Taliban.

I have had the honour of speaking to Bengali Bhai, who crossed over from Bangladesh to Pakistan in 1971, on a couple of occasions. He would speak to me in accented Urdu, much like the way a Bengali would, till one day I told him that my husband could speak Bengali. He excitedly started speaking to me in Bengali but looked disappointed when I told him that my knowledge of Bengali began and ended with "bhalo".

Later, when I would queue at his shop to buy samosas he would make sure that I didn't have to wait much. He would hand me my packet of samosas with -- "bhalo"?

Last year when my father-in-law was in town he had a long conversation with Bengali Bhai, who talked about his business among other things. He said on an average day he sold samosas worth Rs 30,000. The business was brisk in the rainy and winter seasons and peaked during the holy month of Ramzan. He sent my father-in-law home with about a dozen freshly fried samosas.

Ten days after a ransom call for Rs 5 million was made to his wife, Bengali Bhai, who had been kept chained and blindfolded, was found by the police not from the "good" or "bad" Taliban but allegedly from friends of his nephew Afzal -- the mastermind behind the kidnapping.

A couple of days ago, after his shop reopened, I decided to go and buy samosas and also ask him -- "bhalo"? Bengali Bhai was missing from the shop and a relative was informing concerned customers that he was fine and resting at home. I also heard an oldish six-foot plus well-built man offering to be Bengali Bhai's bodyguard for free!

I hope to exchange "bhalos" with Bengali Bhai soon, but for now I am glad he is home and that neither the "good" nor the "bad" Taliban touched him.

Our favourite author...

2011-09-14T13:24:00.005+05:00

Mohammed Hanif: our favourite Pakistani writer

Tell acclaimed author Mohammed Hanif that some members of Pakistan's swish set have never read his books but make it a point to drop his name during conversations and he responds with a disarming, "At least they're talking about me."

This streak of sardonic humour was on display as Hanif, the author of the bestselling satire “A Case Of Exploding Mangoes”, launched his second book about the love life of a Dalit Christian woman to a hall packed with book lovers in Islamabad.

Hanif, a gifted storyteller, had the audience in splits with subplots from his life. “I had no understanding of what the country (Pakistan) was about till I met full-blown civilians after leaving the Pakistan Air Force,” he said at the release of “Our Lady of Alice Bhatti” at the SAFMA auditorium.

The story of Alice, who has a troubled past, is inspired by the life of a nurse who looked after Hanif’s mother 20 years ago. Alice is a woman condemned by caste who falls in love with a man who loves violence.

“When I started writing the book the protagonist had a different name. But she wouldn’t speak to me. So I decided to call her Alice,” he said.

During the interaction, Hanif offered glimpses into various facets of his life – his reasons for writing in English instead of Urdu, his time in the PAF, and the reaction of late military ruler Zia-ul-Haq’s son Ejaz to his first book – all told in his trademark self-deprecating style.

Hanif was a 16-year-old from the agricultural city of Okara in Punjab when he joined the air force. “Life in the cantonment was like living in a different world or a different planet.” He said the only things that bothered him then were “why do I have to get up at 5 am to parade with a rifle?” or “why do I have to wear the uniform?”

The author, who faced several questions on his first book based on Gen Zia-ul-Haq’s dictatorship and his death in a mysterious plane crash, said the former dictator’s son Ejaz-ul-Haq was not happy with his book.

“I never spoke to Ejaz-ul-Haq about the book but he told a journalist that he had not read the book while his wife had, and she thought it was full of filth. He (Ejaz) thought that I had been thrown out of the PAF by his father and sent a message to me through the journalist that had his father been alive, he would have seen to it that the book never got published or sold!”

Asked whether he chose to write novels in English rather than Urdu for political reasons, Hanif said the decision was a “literary and financial choice”, just like his decision to move to Britain for about a decade to earn a livelihood.

Hanif also read a satirical piece in Urdu that had the audience laughing out loud. In a mock letter addressed to the President of Pakistan when Nizam-e-Adl (a Shariah-based justice system) was introduced in the restive Swat valley, Hanif wrote that the residents of Defense Housing Authority in Karachi should not be deprived of the benefits of the system.

He pointed out that little boys from his residential area where picking up garbage, including immoral objects like empty liquor bottles. He said this would corrupt the young boys, just like selling roses to young couples walking hand-in-hand near Karachi’s sea front.

The satirical letter suggested that Pakistan’s nuclear scientist AQ Khan should be hired to block all plans by Hindus to travel to the moon. He said the best way to convince Khan to do the needful would be to gift him a 1000-acre plot in the defence housing scheme.

All fizz, no substance?

2011-08-10T04:59:00.000+05:00

Indian FM SM Krishna with Pakistan FM Hina Rabbani Khar

The media always loves a sexy, feel-good story, especially when it comes to something as stodgy, dull and routine as India-Pakistan talks. But even I was bemused by the media’s take on Pakistan Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar’s recent visit to India. I happened to be in New Delhi during her visit last month and witnessed first-hand the reportage of the trip to India by Pakistan’s youngest and first woman Foreign Minister.

There were the oohs and aahs about her stylish clothes, reams on her accessories (thanks to which I found out that the starting price of a Hermes Birkin bag of the sort favoured by Khar is $9,000) and much ado about her desire to open a “new era of bilateral cooperation”.

There was the breathless listing of brands and jewellery favoured by the 34-year-old Khar – including her Roberto Cavalli sunglasses and pearl necklaces. And then there were the headlines like Mumbai Mirror’s “Pak Bomb Lands in India”, which certainly wouldn’t have amused any self-respecting minister in town for talks on some very serious issues.

What the media, of course, glossed over was that little had changed despite a new face being ensconced in Pakistan’s Foreign Office. Within hours of landing in New Delhi, Khar met Kashmiri leaders like Ali Shah Geelani and Mirwaiz Umar Farooq to assure them of Pakistan’s political and moral support for their movement.

The talks between Khar and her Indian counterpart S M Krishna was followed by an anodyne statement listing all that had happened since the two countries resumed their peace talks in February after a hiatus of over two years. Except for a few small steps aimed at boosting travel and trade across the Line of Control in Jammu and Kashmir, the statement had nothing new to offer.Which didn’t exactly surprise me. What did surprise me, however, was the lack of meaningful analysis in the media about what role Khar could be expected to play in Pakistan’s Foreign Office and how much she could achieve, given the powerful army’s vice-like grip on foreign policy, especially on everything related to India and the US.

Some Pakistani analysts have even suggested that Khar was anointed as Foreign Minister simply because she would not go against the army’s line, unlike her predecessor Shah Mahmood Qureshi, who fell by the wayside because he refused to toe the General Headquarters’ line in efforts to resolve the Raymond Davis affair earlier this year.

Khar was thrust into electoral politics in 2003 simply because her father could not contest polls from his traditional constituency in the Punjab as he did not fulfil the mandatory condition of being a graduate. Formerly a part of military dictator Pervez Musharraf’s regime, Khar switched allegiance to the Pakistan People’s Party after the PML-Q did not give her a ticket for the 2008 polls.

Foreign Office insiders contend that it is Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir, who enjoys the confidence of the military, who is in the driving seat, and not Khar. All of which makes no difference to folks like a senior Indian journalist who gushed about how articulate Khar had been during her media interactions in India. Ah well.

The high flier...

2011-07-26T11:34:00.000+05:00

This is Rifat Haye. The Pakistani pilot who flew me from Islamabad to Lahore earlier this month.

It is always a pleasure to be flown by a woman. I have had the pleasure of being on an aircraft with an all-woman crew in India, but this was one woman I had to meet -- after all, she is one of the nine Pakistani pilots in service and perhaps the seniormost too.

After the very smooth landing I made my way to the cockpit hoping there would not be an overreaction because of my nationality.

Haye was a charmer. She spoke to me about her career spanning 20 years and also let me photograph her.

We've got hate mail!

2011-07-25T08:57:00.002+05:00

We often get hate mail. We've been called "dogs" and "pigs" several times in the past year. When we blogged about the Taseer sisters being our new poster girls earlier this year we got anonymous messages asking us to leave Pakistan!

And now an ardent Shahida Ahmed fan has called us "Indian bastard" suggesting that we go back to our "poverty stricken fucking country" and blog about that.

Shahida Ahmed is a topline restaurant owner who runs a commercial kitchen from our next door house. In India, we Indians would not have allowed this to happen at an urban address.

1 – 3 of 3

	You mother fucker! How dare you write such insulting posts time and time again about a hard working woman such as Shahida Ahmad! Rather than being a whiney bitch why don't you move out of the neighborhood! Better yet why don't you move back to India, "I am sure you can more than afford it" and I'm sure the cows and pigs residing all over India would make better neighbors for someone like you. You practically are one of them after all! By Anonymous on We are your mehman, Mrs Ahmed! on 7/24/11 Publish \| Spam \| Delete
	You Indian bastard, go back to your poverty stricken fucking country and blog about that! By Anonymous on Move them out Shahida Ahmed!! on 7/24/11 Publish \| Spam \| Delete
	Do you honestly have nothing better to do with your time other than crib and complain about her! Or am I sensing the green eyed monster of jealousy coming out! By Anonymous on Move them out Shahida Ahmed!! on 7/24/11

Our rescues and other stories….

2011-07-02T01:48:00.013+05:00

Our latest rescue has scabies

“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated” – a quote by Mahatma Gandhi (though not attributed to him) adorns the walls of the two vets we often visit with our 12 rescue cats and 2 dogs.

Having known both the vets for over three years, I can safely conclude that the poster means little to them or their well-heeled clientele who feel love only for purebreds. The passion that the vets reserve for purebreds is missing when they examine mongrels – even though the fee charged for both is the same! Pursuing the agenda of breed-worshippers obviously suits them.

Sometime last year I was happy to learn about a Facebook page, floated by two Karachi-based women (henceforth referred to as M&M), for the welfare of animals. I joined the group and like some others posted pictures of our rescues hoping to get them adopted. We never got lucky with adoptions; still I was pleased that M&M were putting in their two cents to create awareness about animal welfare.

Having rescued 12 cats and a pup our hands and home were too full (and pockets quite empty) to entertain the idea of adopting yet another severely infected pup found by our neighbour’s guard last week. Also, with the adoption rate of our rescues being zero we often worry about their fate when we eventually bid Khuda Hafiz to Pakistan.

However, we could not bring ourselves to ignore the two-month old itching and bleeding pup. A trip to the vet confirmed that the pup, just like the one we had rescued two months ago and still under medication, needed long-term treatment. We were also told to keep ourselves and our other rescues away from the pup -- diagnosed with scabies and a severe fungal infection.

We had spent several thousand rupees on the treatment of our first pup (with approximately the same symptoms and more) in the past two months, so on a friend’s suggestion we decided to contact M&M for help.

We were pleased with their instant response. They wanted numbers of Islamabad vets (even though the numbers existed on their website) so that they could get the pup picked up from our home. We were elated.

Two days later, the pup with scabies and fungal infection was still with us. We decided to send M&M a reminder. Their reply brought tears to our eyes. M&M said they would take care of the boarding/vaccination/medication/food costs of the pup (howsoever long that takes), pay a visit to the pup and help him get adopted.

On the fourth day, we were still waiting for M&M to speak to the vet. By now we were already paying for the pup’s daily visits to the vet. We sent another reminder asking M&M to let us know their decision “asap”.

M&M’s reply, 24-hours later, was a shocker. “This is to let you know ASAP that we cannot afford the treatment of the pup…”; asking us to look for another “sponsor”; and with no apologies whatsoever.

The pup’s getting better and is the newest addition to our family. We are glad we could help him before he was shot dead by civic authorities on some neighbour’s complaint. As for M&M, they are busy preaching animal welfare to their “fans” on Facebook!

UPDATE
The pup after six weeks of treatment. We call him Rocco.

Welcome to Peacenik Inc….

2011-06-23T21:36:00.005+05:00

Much like the dinner tables laden with the very predictable biryani-kebab fare, it is impossible not to bump into a Peacenik at Islamabad-dos.

In the past three years that I have been in Pakistan, I have seen them selling themselves to people-who-matter. I have seen them smiling their smiles before shoving their visiting cards (and in one instance photocopies of a newspaper clip with photo) and frothing peace lines. I have heard them recite beautiful couplets in Urdu (and sometimes in Hindi too) to prove their passion for peace.

Unfortunately, I have seen the same bunch – poets, writers, mediapersons, theatrepersons, lawyers, activists -- do a turnaround in a different setting. That hurts.

While I still see a ray of hope in old-school Peaceniks, usually retired famous-somebodies, I dread the young lot, mostly reigning media bombs who articulate all-things peace beautifully for effect; or worse the wannabes, ambitious little things trying to strike it big at Peacenik Inc – even if that means getting past the Bhai brigade.

Of late, several entries into Peacenik Inc have been via the virtual world (thank you Twitter!) – so there is no real need anymore to network for an invite.

For me, the real Peacenik is the old man who got us a box of walnuts from his village and quietly prayed for peace; or my little Pakistani Hindu friend, who naively believes that the ongoing Indo-Pak talks have a fairytale ending.

Move them out Shahida Ahmed!!

2011-06-17T13:10:00.004+05:00

I am sure Shahida Ahmed, the rich and famous owner of two topline restaurants -- Tiramisu and The Mango Tree -- would not want a bunch of uncouth baker boys as her next door neighbours. So why unleash them on us?

Under this tent mouth-watering dishes served at Shahida Ahmed's Tiramisu are cooked. The trash gets dumped on the tin roof.

Shahida Ahmed's boys bake her famous cakes here! I hope the wire mesh of the windows is not missing still.

The unkempt lawn of Shahida Ahmed's house.

The terrace where Shahida Ahmed's baker boys, cleaning boys and the lecherous chowkidaar Aslam while away their time.

Two cats feast on the left-overs that is thrown on the roof as a baker boy looks on. It is also a great spraying ground for cats who love to mark their territories.

Pakistani yogini...

2011-05-26T14:08:00.002+05:00

This is Aisha Chapra. A young Pakistani woman who is trying to bring peace in the life of woman prisoners in Karachi by teaching them yoga.

I have never met Aisha, only spoken to her on the phone and exchanged emails, but I am thoroughly impressed with her work.

It was Aisha’s idea to approach authorities to let her teach woman prisoners. Fortunately for her it was smooth sail and she is doing her bit to help them live. In the past two years, she has taught 30 to 40 prisoners in the age group of 20 to 40 and some prisoners’ children too.

It is optional for prisoners to join her class. She teaches these women for free, but their “warmth and genuine happiness recharges her battery”.

Chapra discovered yoga as she was trying to tide over a bad patch. She was, as she puts it, depressed, disoriented and directionless and it was yoga that gave her peace.

Her first class in prison wasn’t easy but her experience as a social worker helped her pull through. She had scores of women and children watching her, some ridiculing her and few participating. However, as the days passed, she became friends with the prisoners by listening to their stories and even massaging their sore muscles. “Soon I was their friend, listening to their woes and counseling them,” she says.

Chapra's stint at the jail has been a great lesson in life. “I get as much from them as I give them. I admire them for being strong and having faith, despite their circumstances.”

For Chapra, the connection with these women is special. “It is this desire to access freedom from within, to liberate in a way that inspires, moves and lifts me outside of myself. I know it is their strength, their incredible compassion that I feel at the end of the class.”

“Weeks and months have gone by and now these women and their children have become a part of my life. A part of the answer which I was so desperately searching for. And every week they give me something to smile about, a new story to share, and a new lesson to learn, while giving me a consistent dose of inspiration,” Aisha posted on her blog.

But women will always be women and they can't stop nagging Aisha about this: how do get rid of the flab on the stomach!!

Tapping our phones....

2011-05-25T18:55:00.008+05:00

It is obviously not a good feeling to know that someone is listening to your phone conversations, yet I have had my fun moments in Pakistan where our phones are routinely tapped.

Friends and family have learnt to say “namaste” to “bhais” tapping phones and often hold imaginary conversations with them. “Bhai please go easy on her….,” a friend acknowledged Bhai’s presence recently.

Another friend has named "phone-Bhai" – Kabeer.

“Is he good looking?” she joked one day. Since I said “yes”, she started talking to K-Bhai. “Kabeer, are you listening? Kabeer, I am willing to relocate. Kabeer, I am single and ready to mingle….” she guffawed.

However, we are not the only ones having fun. Bhais have their moments too. Once when I called my sister from my husband’s mobile phone I heard a man’s voice. “Who are you?” I asked. “You tell me who you are…” K-Bhai was flirting. I passed the phone to my husband.

A friend heard her phone-Bhai laughing really hard because she was trying to gently remind her young daughter that their phone was tapped!

I'd be lying if I'd say that tapping doesn't affect my conversations. Sometimes my talk tends to be coded because it feels odd to spell out everything. “Are the payments done?” I keep checking with my sister. My sister, too, quickly retorts with a “yes” or a “no” and blurts the amount – both foolishly thinking that we have outsmarted Bhai who has never heard of LIC!

Then there are times when I want people to take hints and codes to work --but no! My aunt loves breaking into a monologue about how unsafe Pakistan is and how she would like to have me back in India and I suddenly become hugely conscious of K-Bhai's presence. Or worse, her favourite query which makes me cringe --- how is your health NOW? She perhaps remembers my typhoid many years ago, but I would seriously love to know what Bhai makes of that.

Every so often I think that having heard all my friends’ and family’s collective problems K-Bhai should offer some solutions. Or at least tell us why a man with a Pashtu accent answers my husband’s number when I call or when my phone rings late into the night why is the display number mine!

It takes a while to get over K-Bhai, but I don't think I can ever check him out of my consciousness. Just one moment of regret though. I wish I hadn’t stopped myself from crying on my mother’s first death anniversary -- because I was so very conscious of K-Bhai!

Being Indian in Pakistan....

2011-04-27T13:58:00.009+05:00

It is not easy to ignore ordinary people's warmth in Pakistan and despite myself I have befriended plenty of locals -- cabbies, shopkeepers, little boys who play cricket in the neighbourhood and a little girl who races boys on her brother's bicycle.

My little Pakistani friends...

The talking point has almost always been our 11 cats and now a puppy, the newest addition to the family.

The little girl, who lives in our neighbour's servant quarter, shyly says "hello" to me when I go past her house. Her brother, who is just a year older, is sort of our official rescuer when our cats get stuck on a tree.

Bilal, an expert at climbing trees, with his pet

Some time ago, the little girl asked me if she could accompany me to the market. I said "yes" and on our way we chatted about her bicycle, which she hardly ever gets to ride now because her brother returns home late.

Since all our cats are rescues and, therefore, no fancy breeds, the older kids in the neighbourhood tell us to keep a "Persian" or a "Siamese". We let that pass because we have given up on people who think rescues are "junglies". Incidentally, all are cats are Pakistani rescues or "honorary Indians" as we jokingly call them. The cabbies, too, always stop to inquire about our pets' health.

Our Indianness has never been an issue with anyone.

So I was rather surprised when I walked into a shop in the neighbourhood market to buy cat food. The shopkeeper, a very friendly chap, passed me a tin of expired cat food. I told him that I could not feed my cats expired food and he should get rid of it.

"These are Pakistani cats.....they can eat everything....they will not die," he joked for the hundredth time and reached for the cans that he stocks especially for me.

Suddenly I heard the "I" word from behind me. "Arrey yeh kahan kee hain pehley yeh to pata karo... (first find out where is she from)..."

"Yeh Indian hai bhai INDIAN..." someone was saying very accusingly from behind.

I turned and saw a well-built man looking down at me. I had never seen him before, but obviously he knew who I was. Others at the shop also started scanning me. I looked at the shopkepeer and then at his boys, they were all avoiding eye contact. I paid my bill and exited.

The incident left a bad taste in my mouth. It haunted me for quite a while. I was mad at myself for not checkmating that man. I was also mad at the shopkeeper for not speaking up.

I decided not go to his shop again.

However, two days later, I was there again because he is the only one in the neighbourhood who stocks cat food. The shopkeeper was around, but he did not talk to me much. I, too, did not make an attempt to speak.

The day after I was at the shop again. I asked one of his boys to give me something. The shopkeeper was busy with another customer. I saw him signalling at me from a far corner. I ignored him.

Then he came near where I was standing and passed me the expired cat food can again. "Yeh hamari Pakistani billiyan hain....yeh nahin marti...inhain aap yeh expired food hi khilayeye (These are Pakistani cats..they will not die if you feed them expired food..." he guffawed.

"Feed this to your dog too!"

I laughed and retorted: "Doctor ke paas aap lejayenge (will you take the dog to the vet then?)"

"Which doctor do you go to?" he asked, ignoring other customers. I told him.

"I am going to feed these expired cans to OUR Pakistani cats....for FREE," he laughed some more.

It was obvious that he was going the extra mile to make up for that day. "I am going to order more cat food for you tomorrow! Is that okay?" he asked.

Long after I returned home, I was still smiling.

Bhai, bhai na raha.....

2011-04-11T13:56:00.024+05:00

There is nothing official about this Bhai – therefore he is more officious than the official Bhai-brigade and my personal favourite!!!!

In the near three years we have spent in our present house, Aslam Bhai has clocked over 20,000 hours keeping an eye on us in his unofficial capacity as Tommy (apologies to all Tommies, you know that I love you all more than most humans!).

This Bhai is a chowkidaar at a bakery-cum-kitchen which is being illegally run from the dirtiest address in a residential sector of Islamabad (Thank you Tiramisu!!) He was roped in by the official Bhai brigade and he takes this job very, very seriously!

Aslam Bhai

The bakery-cum-kitchen also houses about a dozen baker boys, all of whom will be missed much when I am back, but Aslam Bhai is a cut above the rest because of his excessively uncultured ways and his passion and dedication to keep an unfriendly eye on his friendly neighbours from an "enemy" country.

Aslam Bhai seems to be getting better with his unfriendly acts by the day. This winter he acquired a new quilt which has "ARE YOU THINKING OF ME, DARLING?" written in bold and is always hung on the terrace wall facing our house.

...and his quilt!

Aslam Bhai, can I return the favour by dedicating this song to you from our hugely popular Bollywood?

The clash…

2011-03-29T01:32:00.002+05:00

I have never been a big fan of cricket, but with seemingly everyone in India and Pakistan eating and sleeping cricket over the impending clash at Mohali on March 30, I surprised myself by wearing my India-inscribed T-shirt to a friendly India-Pakistan match at an Islamabad stadium on Sunday.

I enjoyed the looks that came my way for flaunting my Indian credentials – first, of course, by the esteemed Bhai brigade – and then the TV camera crews, who far outnumbered the cheerleaders. On another occasion, I would have attributed their full attendance to the sumptuous lunch that was to follow the match; but in this case the tempestuous assignment at hand was certainly equally mouth-watering.

When the Indian High Commission arranged the friendly cricket match with the Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry, it had no idea it would become the cynosure of all eyes because of the build-up for the India-Pakistan semi-final in the World Cup.

Suddenly it was all important to win.

While the Indian team waited and waited (and waited) for the Pakistani team’s arrival, some of India’s finest and yet not-so-young officers practised on the ground under the majestic Margalla hills.

Two hours later, the Pakistani side had an easy win with its youngish and very much-in shape team (apparently comprising professional players roped in by the Chamber of Commerce and Industry). Cameras rolled in and there was a lot of sloganeering for the sake of the burping TV crews who had seen the Pakistani team win between hurried bites of kebabs and biryani. All Pakistanis on the ground were in celebration mode and did their best to rub in their win.

I recently read a compilation of comments by a Pakistani blogger on how Indians were conspiring to win: a) Indians are good at black magic; just see how their Pundits put an amulet under the Mohali pitch; b) The Mohali pitch has been developed to assist the Indian players; c) Pakistanis will lose the match because they know Indian crowd will beat the hell out of our players if they win the game; d) RAW conspiring to use Indian bookies to bring down Pakistani team.

And they say the game of cricket is a winner!

Ode to a pressure cooker

2011-03-15T20:28:00.002+05:00

When my wife and I moved to Pakistan over three years ago, we decided to do so with the bare essentials in order to travel light. Within weeks, we were up against the challenge of stocking up our new kitchen, not only to take care of the routine cooking but also to host get-togethers for new friends and acquaintances.

So my wife did the rounds of shops in Aabpara and Blue Area, buying dinner sets, cups and saucers and serving and cooking dishes. Yasmin, our first maid in Pakistan, took care of the cooking and I rarely ventured into the kitchen as work in those tumultuous days of late 2007 and early 2008 kept me busy round the clock.

When I did decide to make a comeback to cooking, something I enjoy a lot, I found I was hamstrung – our new kitchen was missing a pressure cooker, an essential item in almost all Indian homes.

No problem, said our domestic help, you can buy a pressure cooker in the local markets. So off went my wife to the ‘bartan’ stores in the bustling Aabpara market near the Lal Masjid and returned with a pressure cooker.

The three-eyed monster

For those of you who have never used a Pakistani pressure cooker, here’s a description: It’s larger than its Indian counterpart, has a whistle that never blows and in most instances, it’s totally rubbish. Sorry, but there’s no other way to describe it.

The dal prepared in the cooker emerged as a lumpy, jelly-like mass that tasted gruesome. Vegetables cooked in it looked and tasted no better.

Within weeks of the arrival of the cooker – which resembled an ominous three-eyed monster – I was interrupted while filing a report by a loud bang that seemed to come from the direction of the kitchen. My wife and I walked into the kitchen to find Yasmin cowering in a corner, the contents of the cooker spattered all over the walls and the ceiling.

That initial “blast” was followed in rapid succession by two more. Such a desperate situation called for desperate measures. I decided I would have to ask someone visiting India to get me a pressure cooker. An opportunity presented itself soon enough when an acquaintance – a lady of Indian origin married to a Pakistani – sought my help to get a visa to visit her folks in Mumbai.

This was well before the Mumbai attacks and the visa was issued to the lady after I made calls to a few diplomats. The lady got in touch to thank me and asked if she could get me anything back from India.

Our trusted Hawkins

“Yes, you can – a pressure cooker,” I replied. She gamely agreed and a colleague in Mumbai bought and passed on a Hawkins pressure cooker to her, which she carried back to Islamabad. And that was a very happy ending to our misadventures in cooking.

Happy first birthday to us!

2011-02-12T14:02:00.005+05:00

We’ve been around for a year now enjoying writing about our life and times in Pakistan. It has been a smooth run mostly, except for the occasional hate comments asking us to leave Pakistan (we’ve just deleted a couple of hate messages which came our way following our last post on the Taseer girls).

We’ve also had a bit of trouble accessing our blog from our IP address since December. Hence we’ve had to host the blog at wordpress as well.

The past year was fairly eventful – especially our adventures with Bhais -- and the New Year also began on a rather promising note with both of us surviving a robbery bid thanks to the internal security net of our feline brigade!

Thank you all for reading and stay tuned for more -- Inshallah!

My new poster girls…

2011-02-08T14:12:00.000+05:00

Sara Taseer (rear) with her late father Salmaan Taseer (right). Pic by Sara.

I have become a fan of sorts of assassinated Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer’s two daughters – Sara and Shehrbano.

I enjoyed reading Salmaan Taseer’s well-composed and tongue-in-cheek tweets and that was my window to the man who liked swimming against the tide; but in his death I have learnt more about him than in his life - thanks to Sara and Shehrbano.

I often spotted Sara, Salman’s jewellery designer daughter on Twitter, and on one occasion when she tweeted “wish me luck” - I did - and was surprised with her quick “thank you!”

I knew little of Shehrbano, Salmaan’s journalist daughter, till I read this tweet “a light has gone out in our home today”, a day or two after 27 bullets were pumped into Salmaan Taseer by his own security guard for opposing the blasphemy law of Pakistan.

“Thank you to each and every single person who sent messages of condolence. This is more than just a personal loss; it is a great loss for Pakistan,” Shehrbano tweeted.

Days later, I saw her on NDTV with Barkha Dutt. Shehrbano made an impact and held her own, making Barkha seem very repetitive and silly. Sara, too, was very articulate and composed in her interviews, emphatically putting forth her father’s point of view on the blasphemy law.

I have been hooked to the girls’ tweets ever since, going back and forth often, their pain always hitting me with the same intensity.

“Today I wait for the morning knock on my door saying sahib is calling you. I'm in bed still. No one calls,” tweeted Sara, who loved having “nihari” with father on Sunday mornings when she was in Lahore.

“He runs in my veins, in my blood, my genetic memory & DNA. I can never lose him," read another tweet by Sara.

I always remember a line from an Op-Ed piece Shehrbano wrote for the New York Times - “we buried a heroic man, not the courage he inspired in others” - when I see the girls posting their father’s favourite quotes, “…who will guard the guards?” and “you live life once, you live it by your principles and you live it courageously- that’s what it's about", or crusading against their father’s murderer’s supporters who showered rose petals on the killer.

A couple of days ago, Sara tweeted that she was sent a poster of her father’s murderer. “Was sent poster of murderer Q declaring the 26-year-old ‘the Prophet's policeman’. Hmmm...Could the Prophet (PBUH) really trust this man?” she posted, even though the girls have been getting their share of threats for speaking out.

In another one Sara wrote: “Sometimes pple say such sick things. I wonder if they ever learnt anything. Parents school society any input of civility?”

Of course, I am not the only one who is a fan of the girls. Their list of followers has swelled in the past month or so. Almost all of Pakistan’s Twitterati have been one with them in their sorrow, except perhaps Fatima Bhutto, the author-journalist niece of slain former Pakistan premier Benazir Bhutto, whose own father was ironically shot dead when she was in her teens.

On January 4, when everyone expressed shock at Salmaan’s brutal killing, Fatima posted: “2,043 Pakistanis, mainly civilians, killed by drone attacks in the last 5 years. 2010 deadliest year according to Conflict Monitoring Centre.”

Move on Fatima Bhutto. And three cheers for the Taseer girls!

The Indian Tricolour flying high in Islamabad....

2011-02-04T15:56:00.004+05:00

Pakistan in Tees....(continued)

2010-12-19T19:45:00.001+05:00

And here are my personal favourites. Photo and caption courtesy www.uth-oye.com.

Dude! Where’s My Country?!
Ashton just lost his car. This poor guy lost a whole country to mediocre half-wits. Imagine his plight.

Man on the Moon:
Our version of history would’ve read something like this: “One small step for man, One giant leap for ……Holy @#$%! What the hell is that?!”

Devolution
Charles Darwin first recorded the appearance of these strange seemingly human creatures in the Galapagos Islands, but they bribed him into leaving them undocumented. They look and feel just like real human beings, but they have no heart. Or a soul. Or a conscience. Or a sense of humor.

My Fair Ladies…

2010-12-17T14:31:00.001+05:00

As I was cleaning my fairly messy cupboard the other day, I stumbled upon a piece of evidence which reminded me of my rather special membership to an exclusive woman’s domain. Almost immediately, it also dawned on me that I had been booted out of the exclusive domain by My Fair Ladies – who were anything but fair or fair to begin with.

Not that I chose to be a member. My Fair Ladies invited me to bridge the great “Them” and “Us” divide. I did and hated every minute of it. I know I wasn’t the only one hating it, there were others like me too, but, of course, they were more “Them” than “Us” so they put their plastic-wares to optimum use.

I sat through the ceremonies month after month, almost always reminded of my lessons in the sociological concept of power – as opposed to physical or political power. I marvelled at the way My Fair Ladies maintained the “Them” and “Us” divide and at times shuddered at the muscle of proxy hierarchies.

I was too caught up with life to notice that I hadn’t been with My Fair Ladies the past few months. Now that I have, I am happy that I am done with my lessons in herringbone weaves and semi-precious wares – literally and metaphorically.

Thank you My Fair Ladies for letting me be!

Pakistan in six Tees....

2010-12-06T22:02:00.000+05:00

Say it again, Sam!

2010-12-01T12:58:00.007+05:00

Sam

Some people just happen in your life – and Sam is one of them. Even though we’ve never met (unlikely that we ever will) and have spoken on the phone for all of 180 seconds only once, Sam has become my anchor of sorts on this side of the Indus.

I had no clue about Sam’s existence till someone completely unknown to me inboxed me her number with this message: “If you really want your cats adopted -- contact Sam.”

I did.

Within hours Sam was texting numbers of friends who could help. I was touched. I corresponded with the few animal lovers she had lined up. Sadly, almost all, felt love only for the pure breeds.

Sam and I connected on Facebook and I was surprised to see my cat picture as her display picture. From her Facebook profile, Sam seemed like a bubbly girl who packed a lot in this lifetime – sang, wrote, acted, modelled, was a human and animal rights activist and a media person. In between she also made time to cuddle her feline friends -- 17 at last count!

Three weeks later, none of my cats were adopted. The lone woman, who showed up at my house to take a kitten for her son, was chased away by my personal Pakistani bodyguard aka Bond Bhai. I gave up. Not Sam. She decided to take charge and posted about my cats in virtual hangouts I hadn’t heard of and kept the fire burning.

While I would get angry with smart alecs who wanted to know the breed of my cats, (all rescues, like Sam’s, and hence not the favoured Persian, Siamese or Burmese breeds), Sam smartly placed them as Abyssinians – confusing animal lovers who reserve their love only for the right breeds.

Somewhere along the way I learnt Sam’s full name. On request, she posted me a link to her music video and it suddenly dawned on me that Sam was a celeb or sorts. Then came another link to another music video and she also let me access her pictures on Facebook – mostly stills from her modeling assignments. I learnt that she did a lot of live performances, besides acting on stage and TV. I also learnt that she liked John Abraham. Not for his looks, but because he seemed to have a good heart!

When I was off to India to see my ailing father in October, I asked Sam if I could get her anything from there. “Get me an Indian film connection!” she joked. Sam’s ultimate aim is to be “a famous singer and film star”.

Sam has been selflessly networking for the past few months to get my cats adopted even as she has 17 of her own to give away. On top of that when she lines up someone, I shamelessly crib about the prospective adopter's profile (just can’t bring myself to trust any with my feline friends) and threaten to leave all my cats (11 at last count!) with her.

On one occasion, perhaps gauging my depression, she suggested that in the worst case she would take in all my cats. I know that 17 plus 11 adds up to 28, but then what could be a more perfect arrangement for my cats? Of course, I will be in trouble if Bollywood discovers Sam’s talent, but then Sam is Sam and I am certain she will make sure her 28 cats are comfortable before she crosses over.

Visa-less in Pakistan…

2010-11-17T15:27:00.005+05:00

The past few months have not been easy for us with my father being unwell, the authorities taking over three months to renew our visas and, of course, the pain of losing three of our feline friends.

My father fell ill towards the end of August. I was unable to travel because our visas had expired. Like always, we had applied for an extension well ahead of time but the authorities were in no hurry to stamp our passports. Week after week, I hoped to get out, my husband even put in a word with people-who-matter on both sides of the border, yet the extensions were nowhere in sight.

In the middle of September my father was hospitalised. I was given the option of flying out and then re-applying for a visa from India. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to do that. What if I was denied a visa to Pakistan? Fortunately, my father got better and I postponed my trip by a week, in the hope that the visas will come through by then.

We finally got our passports back in mid-October, well over three months after we had applied, and I took the first flight to India. I froze when I learnt details of how ill my father had been. He had been hospitalized not for a routine “check up”, as I had been made to believe, but because he had had two heart attacks!

I am just back after spending three weeks with him. I am happy that he is up and about again, and I hope this time we run out on our term before our visas run out on us.

Bhai is King!

2010-10-04T23:59:00.009+05:00

I am Itty

Dear Bhai,

I am Itty, a four-month-old kitten.

I was poisoned three weeks ago along with my litter-mate and some other cats. While my litter-mate and the other cats died of poisoning – I lived. I showed up at an Indian’s gate, where I used to stop for food, they rushed me to the vet and I got saved.

Ever since I have been living with the Indians, outside whose house you sit under a tree all the time. You wouldn’t have noticed my dear late litter-mate and I using the same tree as a scratchpost – would you?

After I got well they decided to get me adopted, as they already have a lot of cats to fend for. Several attempts to find a nice home backfired, because they wanted to be sure that I’d be safe and happy.

Today they got lucky. They got a call from a lady who wanted to take in a kitten for her little son. Although, like everyone else, she too was breed conscious and was interested in a Siamese/Persian kitten, when she saw my picture she decided on me.

My Indian friends sat with me for an hour before my departure, played with me and were feeling sad that they would have to let go of me. I, too, was sad. I liked being with them.

The lady came in with her little son and I hid under the sofa. I didn’t want to go. I was too scared. But the Indians assured me that I would be fine and packed me off with my favourite toys. They also alerted the lady that she would be stopped by you for a routine check. The lady seemed fine with it.

As I sat in the car, I noticed that you were glaring at me and the lady. Then you got onto your noisy motorcycle, followed the car, stopped us a few yards ahead and frightened the lady with your “inquisition”.

The lady asked the driver to take a U-turn. As she left me back at the Indians' gate she said: “with so much investigation I don’t think I want your cat” and vanished.

You looked on smilingly.

Bhai, in your never-ending quest to harass Indians, you missed the finer point. The Indians were only trying to help a Pakistani cat find a nice home!

Never mind Bhai, may you live long and peacefully. As for me, I am around till the next person decides to poison me.

Love,

Itty

PS: Pakistan today celebrated World Animal's Day!

Will miss you Chicklet...

2010-09-25T13:08:00.009+05:00

In my three-year stay in Pakistan, which hopefully draws to a close soon, I had never felt so helpless and miserable as when I saw my ten-month-old cat Chicklet, and two other kittens, poisoned to death last week.

I was poisoned to death. I was only
three-months-old

My husband and I had rescued Chicklet and his litter-mates from our neighbour’s washing machine last winter. Chicklet and his litter-mates were like little fur balls and we had to resist the temptation of adopting them because we already had six very territory-conscious indoor cats to take care of.

Yet soon enough Chicklet and his sister were in our backyard, the sister taking the lead and the brother following suit, and before we knew it they were ours. We were feeding them, rushing them to the vet, or saving them from stray Toms at 3 am!

Chicklet had a knack of getting himself into trouble and we had to go around requesting neighbours to let us into their houses and get him down their roofs or out of their backyards. He would be happy to see us rescue him, rub his chin against walls and roll on the ground non-stop as if saying his “thank yous”.

This summer we got worried when Chicklet went missing for several hours. We were on our roof calling out for him; checking other rooftops and backyards for clues. We’d just given up our massive search when Chicklet obliged us by alighting from under the overhead tank of our Indonesian neighbour.

We threw food to him and then went begging to the neighbours’ to let us in. Chicklet saw me making my way up the ladder and launched his major “thank you act”; he rolled on the ground, rubbed hard against my legs and made me run all over the roof before letting me catch him.

Happy to be back in our backyard, he perched himself on his favourite place, the kitchen window sill, rubbing his cheeks against the iron grill and purring hard.

Chicklet grew up to be a big and healthy cat. He no longer had to be rescued from rooftops; but he still loved playing his little games with us – “I spy” by showing up at all windows and doors of our house and announcing his arrival with grand meows or turning up in our lawn and then wanting to be let inside the house to cross over to the backyard.

Chicklet showed symptoms of food poisoning on early September 14 (around 3.30 am). We were to take him to the vet in the morning, but Chicklet didn’t wait for us. We looked around for him on all rooftops, backyards, our street, but there was no trace of him. We hoped and prayed that he would return and announce his arrival with his grand meows once again. But that was not to be.

On September 16, around 5 pm, as I stepped out on our terrace to call out for him yet again I saw him lying dead on our Indonesian neighbour’s roof, on the same spot from where I’d rescued him in summer, with half a dozen crows and hordes of flies feasting on him. We got him down and gave him a burial.

If Chicklet’s death was not a blow enough for us, we saw two other kittens, who would stop by for food, poisoned. While the male died, the female has made it.

We were just getting over the two deaths post-Eid, when last Saturday, I noticed Chicklet’s sister and her three kittens, who were born in our backyard, showing similar symptoms.

Sadly the weakest in the litter could not make it. We used to jokingly call him “Wheezer”, because last month he had been treated for wheezing. Wheezer died a very painful death. His litter-mate, the friendliest kitten I have known, is still at the vet’s fighting it out.

Chicklet and the two kittens didn’t deserve to go the way they did, at least not in an Islamic Republic, because the Prophet is said to have liked cats and kept one too.

We are your mehman, Mrs Ahmed!

2010-08-09T10:58:00.004+05:00

Mrs Ahmed is Pakistan's top chef (photo courtesy: Newsline)

We have a queer mix of neighbours. A kind German diplomat who was quick to act on our complaint and advised his newest guard not to peer into our house “because we don’t want trouble Mohammed”; an elderly Pakistani-American economist who spends most of her time in the US and is friends with “Prime Minister Manmohan Singh”; and a bunch of baker boys who have, most unfortunately, been bestowed a bake-in, sleep-in status on our street by their “madam” – a top chef of Pakistan.

When we moved into this neighbourhood about two years ago, I remembered staring at the ugly, unkempt house of “madam”. Our landlord was quick to tell us that the house was unoccupied. We believed him.

As I settled in, I noticed that someone loved baking in that house and baked 24/7. Cakes. Bread. Everything. And when that someone was not baking in the front of the house, he/she would be cooking/barbecuing in the backyard.

The constant smell of fish and prawns and the cling-clang of utensils gave me a headache. I decided that a middle-class housewife was trying to make a living by catering for private parties. I just so wished that she would make it big and move out of the residential area. Or till such time, at least move her army of bakers and cooks to another address.

Months later as I was leisurely scanning the Sunday papers, I read about my “middle-class housewife”. She was Shahida Ahmed, a star chef, who ran one of the most expensive restaurants in Islamabad.

Newsline, a monthly magazine, praised Ahmed’s “lobster with garlic and lemon, stuffed with fresh asparagus and fresh mushrooms, Thai fish tucked in herbs and chilli sauce, seafood ravioli with chilly crab sauce, Mediterranean chicken with olives, feta cheese and basil and Arabian salad platters”.

More recently, the newly-launched daily The Express Tribune wrote: “Shahida Ahmed, the owner of Tiramisu, has been in the catering business for the past 20 years…”

“....I baked a four-tier birthday cake (which was sold) for Rs 65,000,” Ahmed told the daily, adding that she supplied accessories for themed birthday parties and charged up to Rs 500 for a goodie bag.

I am sure if Ahmed was in India she wouldn’t have been allowed to run a bakery/kitchen in a residential area. Sadly our Pakistani neighbours have been indifferent; so have our neighbours from the diplomatic corps.

Mrs Ahmed, we wish you well in life, but could you please move your kitchen and your kitchen boys, especially your super courteous chowkidaar, to another address? I am sure you can more than afford it.

I am a kaafir...

2010-08-06T19:47:00.007+05:00

We have a Pakistani Hindu family living in our neighbourhood. The first time I heard about them was when they refused to let out their servant quarter to someone I had known. “Woh log bhi aapke India sai hain,” I was told.

It was unusual for us not to know an Indian family living on the same street as us. Even then I checked with the small Indian community in Islamabad, but nobody seemed to have a clue.

Few weeks later, I learnt that the “Indian” family owned a handicraft shop in an upscale Isloo market. Everything fell into place. Our neighbours were Hindus from Sindh who owned one of the biggest handicraft shops in the federal capital and that the locals referred to them as “Indians”.

Once I was giving my address to a shopkeeper, who knew I was Indian. He heard me out and said, “Ek aur Indian ka ghar bhi toh hai wahan…” I told the shopkeeper that he got the address right but the family he was referring to was not “Indian”. “Par woh Hindu hain na…,” he tailed.

I was reminded of the shopkeeper’s remark when a young Hindu man’s coffin was marked “kaafir” (infidel) in black and then highlighted with red.

Prem Chand was among the 152 people killed when an airliner crashed into the majestic Margalla Hills last week. Prem Chand, 25, was a bright spark and was a member of the Youth Parliament. He was flying along with five other parliamentarians to Islamabad to attend a session.

I was struck when Pakistanis expressed disgust and said the way Prem Chand’s coffin was treated was a “national disgrace” and some even apologized to the minority Hindu community. Prem Chand’s friends were quick to remove the marking before his relatives saw the coffin and wrote “We love you – from the Youth Parliament” over the word "kaafir".

I was touched to see Pakistanis floating a page in Prem Chand's memory and a member suggesting that a “kaafir day” be celebrated in Pakistan to stop “such acts of religious bigotry”.

Prem Chand described himself as a social worker. His last status update on Facebook made me shiver: “Comments can make a person and comments can break a person. So be careful and ethical while giving comments for someone.”

Pakistanis on Indians…

2010-07-27T17:14:00.005+05:00

Have you met Shahrukh Khan? Isn’t he cute?
(If the questioner is older, substitute SRK with Amitabh Bachchan.)

You don’t watch StarPlus?!! (read saas-bahu sagas)

We love going to India. Great place to shop.

You mean you haven’t been to the massage/spa centres down south yet?

We speak the same language, share the same history, it’s our governments who do not want us to interact. I hope things change for the better…

You are our “mehman”…hope you are enjoying your stay.

You don’t drink?

Overheard: Are there mosques in India?

You don’t look Muslim. Did you marry and become Muslim? That's the trend there – right?

We feel bad for the Muslims in India. Look at Gujarat…

You mean Muslims are not treated unfairly in your country?

When India-Pakistan talks were suspended in the wake of the Mumbai attacks: Why don’t you want to talk to us? You’ve just seen one Mumbai. We see Mumbais every day.

We wish Indian media would stop perpetuating stereotypes about Pakistan and its people.

Why are you stealing our water?

Of course, you are creating trouble in Balochistan!

And the latest addition: Walk like an Egyptian, eat like an American, shoot like an Afghan, plot like a Paki – but think like an Indian (courtesy Wajahat S Khan)

Indians on Pakistanis…

2010-07-24T19:23:00.004+05:00

Sometimes it is difficult to explain to fellow citizens, who know little about Pakistan, what I/we are doing on the other side of Indus.

Here are some of their reactions:

You mean you didn’t marry there?
So this is like a punishment posting… Oh my God! How long before you get out?
After being briefed about the nature of the posting and that it is not quite a punishment: But what exactly do you do there?
Have you met the Taliban? Has your neighbourhood been bombed?
Do you know where Dawood Ibrahim is?
Do you wear the burqa there? Are women allowed to step out? What language do you speak?
We’ve heard that Indians have shadows? Is that right? Do they trouble you?
If you invite friends/relatives to Pakistan: Are you crazy? Do you want us killed?
You must be getting awfully bored there.
The food must be awesome! Right?
Pakistanis are a very hospitable people.
Shopkeepers give away things for free to their Indian ‘mehman’
Will I be in trouble if we connect on Facebook/phone/stay in touch?
You better return fast. I will pray for you.
…………….

This is why, when in India, I usually do not give away our current location to strangers because it is quite cumbersome to answer the same questions over and over again.

I was at an eye specialist’s in Delhi and he was annoyingly gregarious. He asked me to return in two weeks for a follow-up. I told him I couldn’t because I didn’t live in that city. The doctor was not in a mood to give up: “Where?” I surprised myself by saying “South Africa”.

Another time I had a nagging co-passenger in transit. “So you belong here?” he asked. I said, “No”. He pressed, “Oh so you must be from…” I walked off to get myself a cup of coffee.

Of course, with friends and relatives I am more than patient because I seriously want to dispel the many myths we have about each other’s countries. I also humour them with stories from Pakistan. Like the ones about our tails.

And yes, it feels rather strange not to have “Daku Bhai” tailing us or that I can just pick up the phone and whine about anything under the sun without having to worry about another Bhai trying to decode my conversation.

PS: Coming up next – Pakistanis on Indians

The ‘F’ word…

2010-07-23T01:43:00.001+05:00

“Fautgee ho gayee hai. Ghar jaana hai,” our driver told us barely a month after we’d arrived in Islamabad. I wasn’t familiar with the word. So I asked, “Matlab?”

The driver’s cousin sister had passed away and he had to rush home. We let him take a week off and also gave him some advance.

A few days later, I spotted our gardener who hadn’t shown up for over a week pulling out weeds in the lawn. “What happened?” I asked him.

“…fautgee ho gayee thee,” he explained. I shut up.

Our domestic help, too, decided to rush home during her children’s winter break because of a sudden “fautgee” in the family.

The driver no longer works for us, and we’re on to our fourth gardener since. We’ve had to sack three because there were too many “fautgees” in their families, sometimes the same people dying all over again.

“Didn’t your nani die some time ago?” I asked one of our gardeners once. “No that was my nani’s sister. This time it is my nani,” he informed rubbing one of his eyes.

The word “fautgee” has been thrown at me so many times that for me, the one and only thing it can mean is that the help is disappearing for an indefinite period.

Earlier this month, our brand new maid Delphin walked into my room all tears. “Mere behnoi ki death ho gayee hai. Das din ki chutti chahiye….”

The word “death” hit me and my husband. “Please go,” I said trying to console her. My husband even offered to loan her money to facilitate her trip to Karachi.

“I wanted to leave for Karachi right now but my husband Adnan says you should take the train tomorrow,” she wailed.

Few minutes later I stepped out into the lawn and heard peals of laughter from her quarters. Delphin was getting set for her 10-day break in Karachi….

When she returned, the family was in celebration mode. “There’s too much noise from your quarters….” I told her two days later.

Sensing that I was perhaps surprised by the mirth and joy in the wake of a death in her family, Delphin said: “Well, my sister wasn’t too distressed by the death of my brother-in-law. My sister was fed up. Uski taang bhi nahin thi; aankh bhi nahin thi…..”

No escape…

2010-07-22T12:25:00.003+05:00

A Pakistani advertisement for a fairness cream

In the two years that I have been in Islamabad I have figured that there is no escaping the beautiful portly women who run beauty salons, boutiques and fitness centres.

Last week I was handed a “pink slip”, perhaps for the twentieth time in twenty months, by yet another woman who promised the moon to me at her salon, even though I have no desire of being there just yet.

I flashed my make up-less smile at my savior, my liberator, my nurturer trying to tell her that she was wasting her beautiful pink visiting card on me. But my savior persisted. “I’ll give you a 15 per cent discount!” I gave up and let her indulge me.

She quickly checked me out disapproving of everything that she saw of me. “You need to colour your hair,” she announced. “It’s important to look glamourous. Otherwise your husband will eye other women.”

I smiled at the thought of my husband with four wives. Poor him, I said to myself. Imagine how my un-coloured hair could change his fate.

“But my husband hates coloured hair,” I argued. “Wait till he sees the colouring,” she gleamed.

My saviour also advised me that I should not neglect my feet and hands and should keep my nails painted at all times. “You should take care of what God has given you,” she said. But isn’t painting nails un-Islamic? I teased her. She told me a fresh coat could be applied after performing ablutions. Five times a day? I rechecked. “It just takes a couple of minutes,” she retorted.

Before parting she told me the economics of a minor makeover – just about the same as I would spend on four paperbacks. “This is expensive!” I told her. “You have a lot at stake too,” pat came the reply.

On stake is my marriage – never mind that my husband prefers my make-up less natural, un-coloured hair look. I am sure there are many others like him too.

This, of course, wasn’t my first encounter with “evil” influences. I have had other rich wives of the famous go into the whys and hows of being “tip-top”. The arguments, which sound like folklore, unfortunately run through our subcontinent. Almost always the bottomline is: the going is good for women who look good and who dress good.

I dread to think about how many nice and normal women fall for this trap. It’s so easy to make women insecure and waste resources, including precious time, at these salons – little realizing that hair colour cannot change the DNA of a man who is looking for a fling, an affair, or another wife.

If beauty salon owners weren’t enough to ruin my stay in Islamabad, I’ve had women cornering me on another equally dreadful query: where do you shop for clothes? Before I can even attempt an answer they vomit a list of places to shop at. I politely nod my head and try and look guilty when I hear the “Oh! You haven’t been there? Oh! You’ve never heard of that?”

I also bump into wannabe designers who dismiss my sartorial sense with practiced ease. “This is out,” a fashion-savvy wife told me recently. How can I wear a short trouser when it is un-Islamic? I poked her back. “You can always change when you have to pray,” she suggested. The Taliban may come and get me, I joked. “It’s fashion. Everyone wears it,” she snapped.

She even offered to accompany me on my next shopping trip and help me find the right clothes. Thankfully I have not bumped into her since.

Though I am yet to be personally counselled by women who run fitness centres, I have heard of others being warned to get back into shape to keep their husbands from straying like tomcats. I know women who have somehow managed to squeeze in an hour at a gym, missing out on precious family time, to keep their skins aglow and their husbands at home...

The murtimaker...

2010-07-22T11:39:00.002+05:00

Unmindful of the many unkind glances that come his way Zahid Hussain silently continues to do what he is best at – carve idols of gods and goddesses -- in an otherwise famous art and culture address of Islamabad.

A man of few words Hussain hardly every looks up when the holier-than-thou visitors shower him with unholy looks and tap their cheeks with a “tauba-tauba”.

Thirty-something Hussain is one of the four proponents of the ancient Gandhara art in the country. He learnt the art of making idols twelve years ago and now retails his wares from Lok Virsa.

It is difficult to get Hussain talking. “I carve on Schist stone. I get it from Swat Valley,” he tells me reluctantly.

I wonder if he has ever been threatened or attacked for making ‘murtis’. I wonder if his family approves of his art. I wonder if he will teach his children his art. I wonder who his clients are.

I bargain for two beautifully etched Gandhara boxes and soon Hussain decides to talk. “The stone is available in three shades -- green, gray and black. It’s not easy to carve on stone. Even little details take up an entire day,” he offers showing me a chipped nail and his slightly gnarled fingers.

I notice the many Buddhas and other gods and goddesses forming an interesting backdrop in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. “I get the stone cut and set in the quarry and then I start work on minute details. It is a tedious process,” he explains.

“There are only four of us in the entire country who practice this art,” Hussain informs. Not surprisingly a little box embellished with Gandhara art costs up to Rs 1000. The bigger ones can cost up to Rs 2000-Rs 3000. A small Buddha bust costs about the same, and the idols are priced at Rs 5000 upwards. Apart from idols, Hussain also makes vases and wall hangings.

Hussain’s thin and haggard frame suggests that the going has not been good for him. “There are hardly any buyers from amongst locals. Very rarely I get a Pakistani customer who takes interest in the idols,” he said.

Yet there is no dearth of people who raise an eyebrow at his art and lecture him on what awaits him in the Hereafter. “Sometimes they try and argue with me that this is against Islam. It is difficult to convince them that practising this art is not against the spirit of Islam,” he said.

What about his family? Do they lecture him too? “They have accepted me, but they are not happy. I seem to have embarrassed them.”

Has he ever been threatened for making idols? “No. My seniors in Lok Virsa appreciate my art. No one can threaten me here,” he said.

The silver lining in Hussain’s career is the fact that he retails from Lok Virsa and his clients are primarily foreigners. They adore his Buddhas and also other idols. “It’s mostly the foreigners who buy the idols. They love Gandhara art,” he declares.

By now Hussain and I are friends. He leaves his seat and shows me his “good” pieces explaining why they were his favourites. He also agrees to be photographed -- posing with all his exquisite pieces.

R.I.P...

2010-07-07T13:14:00.004+05:00

We’ve come across the weirdest number plates in Pakistan. If the ever popular “RIP” and the many “LOVs” and “LUVs” speeding on the roads weren’t funny enough, we recently stumbled upon a “BRA” and an “STD”!

Crossing the India-Pakistan border – Part II

2010-06-17T17:19:00.004+05:00

My return trip to Pakistan on the famous Delhi-Lahore bus was once again very memorable. This time for all the right reasons!

Pakistani authorities took note of the complaint that I had lodged against the Special Branch guy who flung my personal belongings in all directions on the pretext of checking my baggage. The Pakistani media too reported the incident of my family and I being robbed and harassed while crossing the Wagah border.

Soon enough several people who matter called my husband to say how sorry they were about our unpleasant experience. The Indian media too carried stories about our mistreatment at Attari.

It took me quite a few days to get over the incident. I dreaded taking the bus again and requested for permission to fly back. My plea was turned down because, according to rules, I cannot change my port of immigration.

I braced myself up for another eventful journey on the bus even as my 15-year-old niece, who is visiting us, would fly the same day to Lahore. The real plan was if I was unable to cross the border for some reason she was not to board the flight.

When I went to buy the bus ticket, I was told that the visa stamp on my passport had become faint and therefore a ticket cannot be issued to me. I was told that I would be offloaded at Attari. I convinced the officials to issue me a ticket even though they thought it would go waste!

I spent my last day in Delhi getting a letter from the Ministry of External Affairs (much thanks to a colleague) to facilitate my travel. The letter was faxed to the immigration in-charge at Attari and I was carrying a copy.

I reported a little before 4 am at the bus terminal in Delhi. I asked my sister who had come to drop me to stay on till I was cleared. After my baggage was hand-checked, about half-a-dozen officials scrutinised me. As expected they objected to my visa stamp.

“Is mein to kuch padhne mein nahin aa raha,” an official remarked. I read out the dates for his benefit, but he would still not clear me. I saw my passport being tossed around. My heart sank. I decided to show him the letters from the MEA. He cleared me.

It was a smooth ride till Attari, with friends, family and my husband, everyone calling to find out if I was doing okay. I hit Attari at about 2.30 pm, with my sister by now on her way to Delhi airport to drop my niece.

As we were stepping off the bus, the supervisor announced that he had caught a South African woman with drugs a week ago and if we had anything to confess we should do so now. As I wondered what a South African was doing on the bus, a Pakistani woman from behind made me smile with her loud, “Not me!”

I sent up a little prayer, hoping for the best, and preparing for the worst.

I hit the immigration counter. The officer at the desk asked a woman who was ahead of me in the queue to step aside and took my passport.

He stamped my passport in less than a minute, and when I handed him the letters from MEA and a photocopy of my passport he said he didn’t need them.

Another officer, who was by now parked behind me, directed me towards the customs and I was cleared in the next minute without even my baggage being checked.

I was happy to notice that I was the first one to be cleared and in a record five minutes (compared to 90 minutes the last time around). The officer, who was with me, asked me if I wanted chai-paani. I had a glass of water and then he was gracious enough to apologise for what had happened earlier.

I asked him casually when would the bus reach Lahore, and he introduced me to the bus supervisor who announced it could reach early if I wanted!

As I boarded the bus again my next worry was crossing the Wagah border. We were there in the next 10 minutes. I got into a longish queue and then I noticed the Pakistani officer at the immigration counter leave his seat and come towards me. “Pehle baaji ka karenge!” he announced.

I was amused. He even filled out a form for me and took me to a customs officer to clear me. The customs officer, whom I had interacted with on my way to India, looked at my passport and said, “Bahut zyada idhar se udhar jaya jaa raha hai.”

“Don’t you remember me?” I asked him. He looked up and said loudly, “Arrey yeh woh lady hain jinhonein complaint ki thi….jinki chori hui thee.”

I exited conscious that everyone was looking at me. I made the all-important call to my sister to let my niece board the plane.

I also made a call to a friend to pick me up at Lahore by 5 pm. To my surprise the bus hit the terminal at 4.30 pm, with the bus supervisor calling out loudly, “We’ve come early for you.”

I sat at the terminal for the next 30 minutes waiting for the friend to show up. We drove to the airport, much ahead of my niece’s scheduled landing at 6.10 pm.

Crossing the India-Pakistan border…

2010-05-21T11:53:00.001+05:00

I usually fly to India from Pakistan. Last week, for the first time, I decided to take the Lahore-Delhi bus because I wanted to see the famous Wagah border and also the countryside.

The moment I stepped into the Pakistan Tourism Development Corporation terminus in Lahore and met the rude staff, porters included, I wondered if it was a bad idea to take the bus.

I waited patiently for the Special Branch personnel to manually check my luggage as there were no scanners. To my horror, a man from the Special Branch began tossing my belongings all over the table and on the floor.

When I objected, he bragged that he had some time ago nabbed a woman who was carrying fake currency. The same treatment was meted out to my sister-in-law and my parents-in-law who were travelling with me. Soon all their stuff was on the floor too, with all of us trying to shove things hurriedly into suitcases because there were just 15 minutes left for the bus to leave.

We were also body-searched by a woman from the Special Branch. The woman made me empty the contents of my bag on her table, spraying my perfume liberally on her blue chador. She checked the money in my wallet, holding it till I asked her to return it.

She made my mother-in-law and sister-in-law empty their hand bags and “requested” my sister-in-law to “gift” her a sunscreen lotion. Before accepting the “gift”, she even asked her how it should be applied!

At the Wagah border, the Pakistani immigration officer refused to stamp my passport. He argued that I could only fly to India (since I had never done the train/bus route before). I explained to him that I could not cross the border on foot (a luxury only the diplomatic community enjoys) but I could take the bus or the train. He ordered me to go and sit.

I was the last one to be called in. He asked me for a police report. I told him I have been exempted from police reporting according to the visa issued to me. He looked at me suspiciously, went to his boss’ room, returned and immigrated me. All along, the Special Branch officer, who had checked my luggage in Lahore, was parked near the counter and having fun at my expense.

Five minutes later, the immigration officer called me again and cancelled my immigration. I was shocked. He told me I was not allowed to do the land route. I again explained my case to him. He went back to his boss’ room and then returned. “Behan aap naaraaz kyon ho rahi hain? Main kar raha hoon na aapka kaam,” he said.

I was immigrated again. As I was leaving the counter, the Special Branch officer called out loudly “Allah aapki kher karey”.

We crossed over to India and were off the bus again – this time at Attari. I was happy to be back in India. Happy that my ordeals were over. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

As I was filling out the immigration form, my mother-in-law announced that about Rs 10,000 in Indian currency was missing from her wallet. I checked my bag and found that a little pouch in which I was carrying some jewellery was missing. The only time our hand bags were checked was when the Special Branch woman had opened them in Lahore.

A few minutes later, I got tapped on the shoulder by a man who had the first three buttons of his shirt open and didn’t quite look like an official. "Passport,” he said. I had just been robbed and I didn’t fancy a man running away with my passport.

“Can I see your identity card please?” I shot back. The man looked at me disgustedly and then walked towards a colleague and whispered something into his ears.

As I continued to stand in the queue for the next ten minutes to get my passport stamped, I noticed that all officers were checking me out one by one.

All hell broke loose when I passed on my passport to the official at the counter. He stared at it hard for a few minutes and then tossed it to the other officers. It changed hands a few times and then three officers took me aside. “You live in Pakistan?” asked an officer.

“Yes. I have been there for over two years,” I offered.

“You are not allowed to use the land route,” the officer from across the counter announced. “You should have a letter from the Pakistan government saying that you can cross the border through this route,” the officer argued, with four others, and scores of passengers looking on.

“But the Pakistanis have cleared me,” I argued.

Soon I found myself sitting in the senior-most officer’s cabin. I repeated myself again for his benefit. He didn’t seem to understand anything at all even though he was introduced to me as the boss at the immigration office.

I was already feeling tired so I asked him if I could use his phone. “The phone is dead,” he said. “We will have to send you back to Pakistan,” he announced. I asked him if there was any other phone that worked at the immigration office. “You think I am lying?” the officer barked.

I told him that I would like to inform my office that I was stuck at the border. “Don’t impress me with your press,” he said rudely.

It suddenly dawned on me that my parents-in-law would be worried because I had “disappeared”. I asked him if I could go and inform them that I was with him. He declined my request with a firm “no.”

By now I had answered all his questions – a dozen times each – “when did you go to Pakistan”; “when was your last visit to India?; “what do you do in Pakistan?”; “what does your husband do there?”; “why did you decide to board the bus and not fly?....”; “how many Pakistanis do I know?”

I was quite exhausted. He stared at me hard and then said, “Why are you nervous?” I insisted I wasn’t. He waved his hand dramatically rubbishing my answer. “Of course, you are. Look at your face.”

I gave up. I realized there was no point talking to someone who was out to “frame” me. He asked for references in Delhi and Islamabad. I gave him sister’s address in Delhi and also an uncle’s, who is a senior IAS official. When he asked for a reference in Islamabad, I gave him a top diplomat’s number.

He removed his glasses and looked at me, “How do you know him?”

It was at this point that the officer decided to let me go back to the lounge, with the half-open-shirt officer parked nearby lest I try to escape!

I saw from the place where I was sitting my mother-in-law crying and pleading with folded hands with officers to be allowed in to speak to me. I saw my sister-in-law also crying. I also noticed my co-passengers giving me looks as if I had been caught with drugs, explosives or worse, a suicide jacket!

I sat in the lounge for another 30 minutes without my passport. Then half-a-dozen officers reappeared saying that I was right and that I was allowed to cross the border in the bus.

The officer who was introduced as boss to me handed me a sheet of paper asking me to write that “I am innocent”. I told him that I am innocent and that I needn’t write that on paper.

He gave me a hard stare and then told me to give in writing that I was not aware that I could cross the border in the bus (even though the officials themselves admitted that I could). I had no option so I did.

My ordeals were, however, far from over. It was the customs official’s turn to embarrass me. “Why did the IB take you away?” he asked, sounding very amused.

Later, on the bus I learnt of other stories of harassment – such as an old woman having to part with Rs 1,000 and another who had to give Rs 3,000 to ensure smooth sailing into India. The bus hit India 90 minutes behind schedule because of my “detention”.

Ever since I have been wondering if the officials “detained” me hoping for their palms to be greased or I just paid the price for rubbing the half-shirt-open officer the wrong way.

Madhuri and I...

2010-04-29T19:58:00.005+05:00

I first met Madhuri Gupta at the Republic Day function in Islamabad two years ago and mistook her to be a Pakistani. Blame it on her size, the glitter on her clothes and her perfect Urdu accent!

She was chatting with a few local journalists when I was introduced to her. We got talking about Pakistani newspapers. She told me that I was wasting my time reading English newspapers. “If you want to read real news, read Urdu papers. That’s where the real gossip is,” she said airily.

I was new to Islamabad then, she asked me if I’d seen the city yet. “I’ll show you around,” she offered tossing her golden-brown hair back. For want of something better to say I told her that I liked her sari. She gave me details of where she had purchased it and then we parted with her insisting that “we meet again”. “I will come and see you,” she promised.

For the next two weeks she was on my mind. I had imagined her to be a compulsive shopper who would drag me to scores of stores before striking the right deal and I was dreading her visit. I was glad when she made no attempt to call or see me.

Over the years, we kept bumping into each other. She would tell me how she drove at breakneck speed on the Lahore-Islamabad motorway and I would deliver my “wahs-wahs” on cue. I would usually comment on her hair-colour or her clothes and vanish.

Somehow, she never struck me as an overtly intelligent or a career woman. On one occasion, I asked her if life was difficult for a single woman in Pakistan. She evaded a definitive answer. “Sometimes I don’t cook for days on end. I just eat Maggi and go off to sleep. That’s a problem when you are alone,” she said.

What struck me most about Madhuri was her energy and her confidence. She made friends easily and her excess weight never bothered her.

One of my longest encounters with Madhuri was in December last year. She had just driven back from India and was wearing a smart coat. “I got it from Lajpat Nagar,” she told me. She said her trip to India had exhausted her and that she was happy to be back in Islamabad.

“I feel I am back home,” she said. The look on my face gave me away. “Home is where you live. Good or bad, this is home,” she let out her trademark loud laugh.

I asked her how much more time she had left in Islamabad. She said she should be out in a few months. “Back to Delhi?” I asked. “No,” she said. “I am hoping to get London or Washington,” she said coolly.

I let out a long “wow”. “Two back-to-back foreign postings?” I asked again. “Yes,” she said, adding that she had done foreign postings before.

“I was in Baghdad earlier,” she told me. I was impressed. I decided that I had misread her all along. She was, after all, an exceptionally bright woman who had been sent by India to Baghdad and Islamabad – the world’s most dangerous cities. She started telling me about her days in Baghdad and I took in every word.

I asked her how her Islamabad posting happened. “Did you want to be here?”

She told me that she had learnt Urdu to be here. “I hired a Muslim woman to teach me. She came home and taught me for two years. She taught me everything from the scratch. I didn’t even know my ‘alif-bays’,” she said.

I was sure that her love for sher-o-shayri prompted her to learn Urdu. Her answer surprised me. “No. I don’t like all that.” Still I was impressed because I had tried to learn Urdu – but found the going tough.

I met Madhuri the last time in January. I spotted her smiling her polite smile at every body. We exchanged pleasantries but couldn’t quite talk.

When I heard two days ago that Madhuri had been held for allegedly spying for Pakistan, I couldn’t believe my ears – to me she was this woman who would rather worry about the golden on her clothes and her hair than pass on state secrets.

Not reading Fatima Bhutto…

2010-04-25T19:41:00.004+05:00

I had been quite taken in by Fatima Bhutto when I came in two years ago. Her website was dead then, but I read every word of what she wrote in her weekly column for a local daily.

I liked the way she presented her case when her aunt Benazir Bhutto was alive, and also after she was assassinated. I found the reams about her villainous uncle Asif Ali Zardari very convincing too.

I enjoyed her rare anecdotal takes, which had little to do with her famous surname – my favourite being the piece she addressed to her fans some of whom had wanted “to make friendship with her” and some others who had emailed marriage proposals to her.

Post-Benazir, Fatima was seen as the next Bhutto to reckon with. She reminded everyone of a young Benazir and soon enough she was the foreign media’s darling baby.

Her column for the local daily was suspended shortly after and she started writing for thedailybeast.com and thenewstatesman.com and occasionally for internationally renowned newspapers.

That’s when I started dreading her writing. Though still lyrical, Fatima’s well-packaged pieces became rather predictable. I was, of course, moved by her accounts of what she had to suffer as a little girl – but the overdose, week after week, was beginning to turn me off.

The writings were almost always about how her father was killed; how news of his death was broken to her; how the powers-that-be had embarrassed her by asking her real mother to meet her at school when she was in grade 9; how she had no plans of plunging into politics; how she had never misused her magic surname; how Zardari-Bhutto kids were not the real Bhuttos; how the country is being led by corrupt criminals (read Mr Z); how little they (read Mr Z) have done/or plan to do for the nation; and how demonic her late Wadi Bua was.

Towards the end of 2008 she made a deal for her tell-all tome on the Bhuttos– which she lovingly calls SOBAS. I was happy for her.

While she was working on the book, she continued to write for thedailybeast and thenewstatesman – pegging her column on the news of the week, draconic cyber laws to drone attacks, and then going back to the Benazir-Zardari-PPP rant.

Some months ago, I got to see the real Fatima Bhutto. Well almost as real as she can get for me.

Fatima, who detests Facebook (she would rather have “lunch with David Milliband every day of the week than be on FB”), surprised everyone by showing up on Twitter October last.

“I despise Twitter. But I'm tired of strange Fatima Bhuttos posting as me. I won't be very active - I hate unnecessary abbreviating FB,” read her first tweet.

I, of course, decided to follow her. Initially, she tweeted about stuff she was reading and then soon enough she was trying to settle scores with the fake Fatimas on Twitter.

“Twitter has been wildly useless in removing the fake me…and is no longer enjoying the Kafkaesque irony of it all,” she tweeted. “That's a new fake. How do these people have the time?” read another tweet.

I was quite amused. Fatima wasn’t. After wasting time in a one-on-one fight she got the fake Fatimas suspended. “Twitter victory is mine!” she tweeted excitedly one day.

In between she tweeted about her acts of charity: “Bringing our total of computers given to community centres and schools to 11…If I knew how to put pictures up here I would, but am hopeless.”

In February, she got busy publicizing her book on Twitter. She regularly listed upcoming international events; uploaded links to interviews she had given to famous people; how she “squealed, blushed and ran” when she saw her book cover; how her book was sold out everywhere.

“Finished filming a book promo with two very brave filmmakers who flew in and out of Karachi most quietly to do the filming,” she tweeted another day. She even graciously thanked India for making her book a bestseller.

This isn’t Fatima’s first book (she has written two before) but with this one she has put her best foot forward. If her magic surname, which she has never ever misused, was at work when she was sealing the book deal or when she was giving interviews to A-list interviewees or when she was chalking plans for embarking on global book tours – it was obviously absolutely unintentional and totally coincidental!

The sailing has been smooth for Fatima all along, yet she has showed little grace when faced by critics, including an uncle, who claim that the book is full of glaring half-truths or that she has needlessly demonized her aunt to make a hero out of her dead father.

“Pakistani media is spitting blood over it – which is to be expected…” she tweeted. In another one she wondered what people who “hate” her have in common!

She even got petty with her followers on Twitter wondering how they had access to her account when she had blocked out “undesirables”. The real shocker, however, was when she ticked off an Indian follower in Mumbai who said he didn’t like her book with: “Why don't you get off my page?”

An open letter to Bhai…

2010-04-19T11:54:00.008+05:00

Bhai on his trusted mobike

Dear Bhai,

Hope all is well with you.

Forgive me for communicating with you in this manner – I did train a pigeon but it took off when it figured I was an Indian in Pakistan.

First things first. Thank you so much for keeping track of this blog and reading all posts – not just once, but over and over again, all the time, from all kinds of locations. I really do appreciate your interest in my interests.

I am truly indebted to you for this and so much more that you do for me all the time. If only I could return the many favours…

Bhai, I feel so special and so cared for each time I step out of the house and you try and match footsteps with me. The other day when you followed me into the superstore and kept me company when I was shopping for groceries, I was so moved.

I noticed that you asked the store supervisor and other shop helps too to take good care of me. It felt so good being the cynosure of all eyes – including the customers’. And you looked so cute making a mental note of which pulses I eat and which brand of flour I buy. Ah! I so wish I could tell you so.

I also spotted you carrying a packet of Ariel washing powder. You remembered to shop for Bhabhi even on duty? She must be one happy woman!

I was delighted when you and another Bhai walked into a laboratory with me where I had gone to collect medical reports. Of course, as you would have gathered, the reports weren’t mine but my maid’s. Yet the fact that you care makes me feel so nice.

I felt honoured when you walked into the upholstery store with me. Because of your presence the sales guy helped me make up my mind in record time. I figured how possessive you were about me when you pulled up a museum guide for talking to me too much.

I also loved the way you spent time with me in that teeny-weeny jewellery shop some time ago. There was barely enough space for the two of us, yet you did not deprive me of your company even for a second. It was nice of you to take interest in the kind of designs and gems I like. Ditto when I checked out Pakistani handicraft and you tried to get details of my likes and dislikes from the salesmen after I had walked out of the store.

Did you know that I like that smile on your face when you look at me and when you take a sharp U-turn on your red Yamaha to announce that you are there for me – always. I feel so thrilled when you follow me on foot when I decide to go for a walk.

I love the way you hang around under that tree in front of my house with your pals (you know, the chowkidars and guards) and keep a careful eye on my house. I am positive that if it wasn’t for your special job you would have attained Moksha by now. I don’t know the Urdu equivalent of Moksha, but in English its “salvation”. Familiar? Did they teach you about “salvation” at your madrassa?

I want to put on record that the chowkidars and guards are doing a brilliant job of filling in for you while you are away. I would even recommend a raise for them and, if I may say so, a weekly off. Of course, I’ll miss them tremendously – not to mention their “meow-meows” (when they see me with my cats) and their comments when I play badminton – but then you know I am all for good working conditions.

Thank you again for making my stay so comfortable in your country. I will try and write as often as I can to you. I know you’d love to write back, but then don’t worry your silence is worth a million words. And, of course, you can continue to pay/repay me in kind for writing to you.

My salam to bhabhi/bhabhis (as the case may be) and muah muahs to the chunnu-munnus.

Best,

Your pyari behan

Miss the good old ‘Khuda Hafiz’…

2010-04-08T13:20:00.002+05:00

The other day I was chatting with an old friend on Facebook and then she had to leave suddenly. The good-bye message on my screen read: “AH”.

The “AH” – short for Allah Hafiz – surprised me because she usually signs off with “tata” or just “ta”.

I am all for the good old Persianised “Khuda Hafiz” and hate it when people correct me with “it’s Allah Hafiz”, underlining the “Allah” in the Arabised and, therefore, more pious and religious version.

In the two years we’ve been in Pakistan, the switchover from “Khuda” to “Allah” has become more prominent and I’ve had several people correct me.

As a kid, I was taught to say “Khuda Hafiz” and it just seems so odd when people expect me to say “Allah Hafiz”.

I remember for days and weeks after my mother passed away about two years ago, I regretted not having said “Khuda Hafiz” to her. We were both laughing over something during a chat on the phone and I just told her that I would speak to her later. Of course, I never did because she was dead a few hours later.

Even though “Allah Hafiz” is fast gaining currency in India too, my father is one of the few people I know who still ends his conversations or signs off his emails with “Khuda Hafiz” or “KH”. He even uses “Khuda” liberally – “Khuda chahe toh ho jayega…” or “Khuda na kare aisa ho…”

Some days ago, I found that a group called “Bring back Khuda Hafiz” had been floated on Facebook, pleading Muslims to stick to the good old Persianised “Khuda Hafiz” instead of the new Arabised version “Allah Hafiz”.

“Support Pakistan's innocent, historical goodbye – Khuda Hafiz. Stand against the essentialist ideology working to remove it from our colloquial discourse,” read the note by the creator of the group.

I immediately joined the group, and persuaded some others as well, yet the going has not been easy for the group.

Facebookers have joined in to make a case for Allah Hafiz. “The word Khuda means God which can also be used while referring to deities...,” argued a member.

A couple of Pakistani columnists have been writing about the shift from Khuda Hafiz to Allah Hafiz. Khaled Ahmed wrote about “the rise of the Allah Hafizites” a few years ago. More recently, another columnist wrote that when he was growing up he never heard anyone say Allah Hafiz and that now “Khuda Hafiz” has few takers.

Even as I will continue to say “Khuda Hafiz” (more so, because my ancestors came from Persia), I know that soon, as a Pakistani writer famously remarked, “Khuda Hafiz ka Allah hee hafiz hai”.

I’ll call you when I get lonely…

2010-04-01T23:51:00.005+05:00

The Sania Mirza-Shoaib Malik affair has brought back memories of another Indo-Pakistan wedding that happened over half-a-century ago in England.

Zainab (name changed) was an unusually bright student from a small central Indian town who was encouraged to pursue higher studies in England. As expected, she excelled at the university and also found her soulmate in a fellow student – a Pakistani.

The two got married and after some years her husband decided to move back to Pakistan with their children. Zainab had to give up her Indian nationality. Few years later, Zainab and her husband parted ways. Zainab’s husband decided to relocate to another country, and she back to India.

Zainab had little idea how difficult it would be for her to regain her blue passport (I am sure it is true about green passports as well). She ran from pillar-to-post (her hometown to New Delhi); met all the right people (some of whom were in positions of power and were known to her family) but nothing worked.

She continued to make several trips to India over a period of 10 years (by now she had touched 50), but all her efforts proved futile. She argued with Indian authorities that she had no family in Pakistan (as her children had opted to stay abroad) and that she was old and wanted to be back where her roots were.

On one of her trips to India she overstayed, hoping to see them bend rules for a woman who was now in her sixties, and quite harmless. The cops from the local thana came and harassed her, called her names and tried to stop her from doing the odd things (this would bring tears to anyone’s eyes) to sustain herself. She pleaded that she had no one to go back to, she didn’t have anyone to take care of her, and obviously none to bury her when she is gone – but nothing moved them.

Zainab and I come from the same small town, where she is like folklore. I have had the honour of meeting Zainab a couple of times. I have heard her stories, seen copies of letters sent to people who mattered, and, of course, her tears.

I saw her giving her best shot till they decided to throw her out. Her departure reminded me of the time when she corrected me in her impeccable English, “It’s ‘may I take my leave’ and not ‘may I take your leave’ – because you are leaving, I am not!” I thought to myself “she is taking my leave”.

Ever since she has been living in Pakistan – trying to make a living. Trying to forget the country of her birth.

After several years, I spoke to Zainab today. I wasn’t sure if she’d recognize me, but she did. “Of course, I know you,” she said, when I phoned her, surprised that I was in Pakistan. "I asked her how she was. “What do you expect of a 80-year-old?” she chuckled. She said she hadn’t been to India in years. “I don’t have anyone to go back to.”

I told her I’ll come and see her, that I’d take her to India and that she could stay with me.

“Please do that,” she said. I asked her if there was anything I could do for her in Pakistan, and she replied, “I’ll call you when I get lonely.”

Reading namaz in church...

2010-03-29T22:54:00.002+05:00

A domestic help has most kindly agreed to work for my husband and I. I must admit that I wasn’t exactly excited at the prospect of being “interviewed” by her (to borrow a phrase from a dear friend who has been rejected in such interviews a few times now), going by her size and age, but so far (day four) the going has been good (even though on day one, I shuddered when she lovingly called me ‘bachchey’!).

Our new help is a Pakistani Christian – not a Pakistani Punjabi Christian, but a Pakistani Sindhi Christian. She speaks excellent Urdu, with a good amount of English thrown in, unlike local Christians, most of whom speak Punjabi.

Since many members of the minority communities have dual names in Pakistan, our help too gave a Muslim name when she was interviewing me. However, when she came in to work, she revealed her real Christian name.

Call it cultural assimilation or whatever, I found it rather awkward when she greeted me with “As-salam-alaikum”; when she began a chore with “Bismillah”; when she retorted with “Inshallah next time”; or when she showered praise on our cats with “Mashallah kitni samajhdar hain”.

I am aware that most religious minorities in Pakistan speak like that but I decided to tell her that she needn’t prefix-suffix her sentences with Inshallah-Bimisllah-Mashallah in our home. “My dadi taught me to say Bismillah. It’s a habit,” she told me. I didn’t know what to say to that.

It just reminded me of another occasion, when a Hindu shopkeeper in Islamabad explained to me, “Hamari do ‘Eid’ hoti hain. Ek Diwali, ek Holi.” The shopkeeper told me his community didn’t feel harassed, didn’t want to relocate (they had strong business interests and were well off) but liked to keep a low profile – and, of course, the two names – one for local consumption, the other for near and dear ones.

Another time, I heard a Hindu priest in a television documentary saying “Allah chahega to sab theekh ho jayega”, and our predecessor’s domestic help referring to his ‘pooja ghar’ as ‘namaz ka kamra’.

As per her terms and conditions, our new help wanted Sundays off to go to church. I asked her if a lot of Christians go to church, and she remarked, “Arrey, bahut Christians hain yahan. Namaz padhne ki jagah nahin hoti.”

Did you hack my account?

2010-03-26T21:21:00.005+05:00

Like everyone else, I have been making the most of Facebook, trying to connect with Pakistanis I have read about, authors whom I hold in high regard, and, of course, ordinary people like my husband and I.

I was happy when an author, a singer, an activist, an actor and some other Pakistanis added me to their lists of friends.

The singer, who is a favourite, was quick to reply to my note too. “It’s always a treat to meet Indians. My wife and I would love to have you and your husband over,” he wrote to me. He even sent me a nice couplet on how Indians and Pakistanis had felt the pain of Partition.

I, of course, jumped at the offer. For me it was a double bonus – he was my favourite and I didn’t have to beg him to meet me. However, when he told me where his home was I realized that was a no-entry area for Indians. “No problem. My wife and I will come over. Just tell us the time and date,” he wrote back, giving me his mobile number, insisting that we should meet “soon”.

A couple of days later, I sent him a text message inviting him home to dinner. The singer graciously thanked me for the invite, saying he may be in concert that day. So I asked him to give us a convenient date; but he never took us up on that.

Around the same time, I added a young professional, who writes regularly for an ezine and occasionally for Pakistani newspapers. My husband and I met him at an Indian diplomat’s reception and, I thought, we got along quite fine.

We parted on a cordial note promising to keep in touch, regretting that we hadn’t met earlier. That evening I added him on Facebook and we exchanged a couple of messages over something he had written after attending that reception. However, when I did invite him home, he told me he could be busy that day and that he would confirm later. He never did.

I was beginning to wonder what’s wrong with my friends on Facebook, till I added a relatively unknown Pakistani, who in my opinion, writes very well.

Two days ago, I found out it was his birthday. So I sent him a message wishing him the best and the same day he chatted with me briefly. After the usual pleasantries, he told me his yahoomail got hacked soon after he added me and wondered if that had happened to other Pakistanis I had interacted with.

I told him I had no idea. The questions that followed made me feel like a suspect (I do so wish I had the brain/resources/time/inclination to hack email accounts). He then very politely floated the idea of deleting me. I agreed wholeheartedly because I didn’t want to be the source of trouble for him or anyone else.

Kya aap Musalmaan hain?

2010-03-24T16:46:00.006+05:00

On our very first day in Islamabad, a Pakistani official, who had just returned after a stint in New Delhi, was surprised to hear that I am Muslim.

“Paidaishi Musalmaan hain, ya shaadi kar ke ho gayeen?” he asked me at a dinner meant to welcome us to Pakistan. Without any trace of embarrassment, he continued, “I asked because aap ke yahan to sab chalta hai na… (referring to mixed marriages in India).”

“By birth,” I replied, staring at his drink. He changed tack. “In Islamabad we use gas heaters,” he said, pointing towards a gas-fired water heater outside our home.

Our Muslimness has been subjected to post-mortem scores of times since. Most Pakistanis usually have that shock-and-awe look when it dawns on them that we are Muslims: “Par aap to India se hain na?” or “Aap lagti to nahin hain.”

Some others give us a warm hug, “Arrey aap to hamarey Musalmaan bhai hain” (that one truly makes my husband cringe); and many break into the predictable rant: “Musalmaanon ki haalat India main achchi nahin hai, hamein unki bahut fikar hai”, or worse, “Aap pehle se Musalmaan they, ya yahan aakar huye?”

If that wasn’t enough, the ‘bhais’ from the intelligence agencies often scale us on our religiosity – trying to find out if we read the namaz, keep fasts during Ramzan and drink (that’s over and above their all-important dossiers on our favourite veggies and pulses compiled by following us on each and every visit to the grocers).

In India, religion never propelled our associations, neither did anyone make us so aware of our Muslimness. Of course, I got told plenty of times that I don’t look Muslim, mostly thanks to my gene pool (my rather unusual name is also confusing), but it never sounded like an accusation.

I am unusually high on patience and usually smile my way through such chatter, telling most people that there are more Muslims on the other side of Wagah. But my husband doesn’t.

Once I heard him tell the anchor on a TV show: “India has had three Muslim Presidents, one of the richest men of India is a Muslim, and of the two Indian journalists posted in Pakistan, one of them (my husband) is a Muslim, so we really are doing fine.” I found his argument quite convincing.

I had thought I had seen it all till I was referred to Islamabad’s biggest privately run hospital for suspected appendicitis some time last year. After the doctor saw “Indian” on my form, she announced, “Ajmal Kasab Pakistani ho hi nahin sakta…”

Then she saw my Muslim surname and said, “Muslim?” I said, “Yes.” “We worry about the Muslims in India. Look at the Muslims in Gujarat…” she said, breaking into a long monologue, oblivious to the fact that I was wriggling with pain and hoping she would get on with her examination.

Eat, drink and be Murree...

2010-03-22T22:42:00.004+05:00

The late Minoo Bhandara was, in the words of his sister Bapsi Sidhwa, a “complex person”. He ran the Islamic world’s most successful brewery in a country where some 97 per cent of the people are barred from drinking alcohol and was a fierce champion of the secular Pakistan envisioned by Muhammad Ali Jinnah.

So when friends and relatives of the late Bhandara, who died nearly two years ago after being seriously injured in a road accident in China, gathered at his home near the famous Murree Brewery in Rawalpindi on March 21 for the launch of a book of his selected writings, there was nothing maudlin about the event.

The people had come together, as Sidhwa put it, to celebrate Minocher Peshaton Bhandara’s life and speaker after speaker recounted colourful stories that showed he was indeed one of Pakistan’s foremost champions of secularism and entrepreneurship.

“He made many enemies but he held enmity towards none,” Sidhwa told the gathering that included businessmen, diplomats and prominent members of Pakistan’s minority Parsi community to which Bhandara belonged.

And it was an unusual sight to see shalwar kameez-clad waiters serving chilled beer among guests seated on the lawn of Bhandara’s house, located a stone’s throw from the official residence of the Pakistan Army chief. Ah well, at least one former occupant of Army House – General Pervez Musharraf – was known to favour a Johnny Walker Black Label Scotch or two in the evenings.

Bhandara’s son Isphanyar told me his father had always held fast to Jinnah’s vision of a Pakistan where “all angularities of the majority and minority communities...will vanish”.

“My father was the biggest fan of Quaid-e-Azam (Jinnah)’s speech of August 11, 1947 to the constituent assembly of Pakistan, in which he said people should not be judged by their religion and should be free to go to their mosques and mandirs,” said Isphanyar.

“My father was also a staunch believer in India-Pakistan friendship and led many peace missions to India. Honesty and speaking the truth were two hallmarks of his life as a businessman and politician,” Isphanyar said.

Under Bhandara’s stewardship, Murree Brewery’s turnover grew from four million rupees in the 1950s to 2.5 billion rupees in 2008, despite the fact that the company cannot advertise its products in any way within Pakistan and not many Pakistanis are even aware of its slogan: “Eat, drink and be Murree.”

Born in 1938 to a prominent Parsi family of Lahore, Bhandara graduated from Punjab University and studied philosophy, politics and economics at Brasenose College in Oxford but had to return to Pakistan in his final year because of the death of his father in 1961.

Besides serving as the managing director of Murree Brewery, Bhandara was known for his efforts to promote arts and his political career as a parliamentarian. He even served as adviser on minorities affairs during the reign of Zia-ul-Haq, the dictator who ordered that anyone consuming alcohol should be punished with 80 lashes. (As we recounted earlier, alcohol continues to be available, albeit at a premium, in most urban centres of Pakistan.)

Bhandara was also a raconteur par excellence, and if ever proof of this was needed, it is there in plenty in “Calling A Spade A Spade”, the new compilation of his selected writings. Beginning with a colourful and risqué piece describing an encounter with Hollywood star Ava Gardner during her visit to Lahore for the shooting of “Bhowani Junction”, the book contains a series of incisive and insightful articles on issues as diverse as prohibition, terrorism and nuclear diplomacy.

Love in the time of jihad…

2010-03-20T22:27:00.003+05:00

Like all married couples my husband and I have our differences, but in Pakistan we almost always behave like the perfect pair made in heaven or in Bollywood – because the only time we missed the mark there was chaos in town.

Over a year ago, I was getting homesick and one day I shot off an email to my husband (that’s how I have always communicated about issues that matter even though in Pakistan I know that ‘Bhais’ are reading) suggesting that I move back to India.

My husband, who didn’t like the idea of being alone in Pakistan, read the mail and then decided to step out. He left home at about 9 pm asking me to shut the door, leaving me wondering if he’d seen the mail at all.

When he didn’t return till 11 pm, I decided to give him a call. I tried several times till about midnight but couldn’t get through. In India, I would have just gone off to sleep, but this was Pakistan – arguably “the most dangerous country in the world”. The more I thought about it, the more I panicked.

My head was inundated with the worst possible scenarios. I even stared at my phone wondering if I'd get a ransom call. And then I was crying.

I decided to make a distress call to a senior Indian diplomat. His first question to me was: “Did you have a fight?” I said, “No”, sounding quite composed. I even spared a thought for the guys who would have been listening to our conversation.

The diplomat asked me to check if my husband’s mobile phone was at home. I made a quick tour of the house, but he hadn’t left the phone behind. He made me read out my husband’s last official email, asked about his favourite hangouts and then announced that he was coming over with the mission’s security officer.

Within a span of 10 minutes I was flooded with phone calls – from officers, their wives, to friends – all trying to console (some “condole”); some offering me shelter for the night; some insisting that I relocate because “they” would come for me now; and someone even reminding me of Daniel Pearl, “another Daniel Pearl?” – but all genuinely concerned for my husband’s safety.

Just then my phone beeped. It was a text message from my husband: “Why is everyone trying to call me?” I heaved a sigh of relief and called the diplomat, who was on our way home, that my husband was “fine” and that he needn’t come.

But for him, the text message was not good enough. “How do you know it’s him? It could be someone else…,” he told me. I agreed.

By now the diplomat was home. “Ask him a secret question,” he said. I decided to ask my husband when our marriage anniversary was, but he dismissed the question with: “That’s public knowledge.” So I asked him my niece’s name.

A few minutes later my husband was home too – with all of us checking him out to see if he’d been kidnapped, beaten, drugged…

It turned out that my husband had gone to meet a journalist friend whose office is in a basement, hence I couldn’t reach him. Having read my email he was, of course, mad at me and was in no mood to rush home or call to say that he would be late.

That evening I realized that in the time of jihad it helps to play the perfect couple. I also realised the worth of our friends who went out of their way to help me, especially the senior diplomat who came home and kept his super seniors in the loop too. When I sent him a thank you message, he was very gracious reminding me that he was my senior from university. He even saved us any embarrassment by saying that he’d expect my husband to help his wife if he decided to go missing!

The nagging fear...

2010-03-17T00:21:00.002+05:00

I don’t even remember the first terrorist attack or suicide bombing I reported on after arriving in Pakistan, there have been so many. Over 60 a year since we came here in late 2007.

Initially it was just the security forces – their vehicles and check posts in some place that was just a spot on the map for me. Then it was Lahore and Rawalpindi before the terrorists struck in Islamabad.

With each blast, things become almost mechanical. Calls to contacts, officials or colleagues with the same old questions – where, what was the target, how many dead and injured? So cold and clinical, like most of the stuff which journalists do in such situations. After all, we were always taught to be objective by seniors in our days as cub reporters.

But once in a while, the terror does strike closer to home. I still remember the call I got from my colleague in Lahore early one morning last year, saying he wouldn’t be able to work for the rest of the week.

My colleague is a guy who always has a smile on his face and an easy laugh, never takes an off (like most journos in Pakistan) and never shirks – but this time he had a compelling reason.

His brother-in-law, a major in the Pakistan Army who had been through several scrapes during operations against the Taliban in Swat valley, was ambushed and killed while going to the rescue of some other soldiers.

We try not to think about these things and put them away in some corner of our mind. While talking to folks back home, the usual questions about our safety are answered with: “Oh, we’re ok. That attack happened far away from our home.”

But the fear is there, nagging away in some dark recess. Having heard so much from colleagues about how the terrorists were using mobiles to trigger their explosive devices, I almost freaked out when I heard someone tapping on the keypad of cell phone during the Friday prayers at our neighbourhood mosque.

I ignored the instructions drilled into my head by my grandfather that one should not allow anything to disturb the namaz, and turned to see where the sound was coming from. It turned out to be a young boy in the row behind me playing with his cell phone.

One tries to make some sense of the human cost of these senseless terror attacks and suicide bombings. Each of those hundreds of people killed that we report about have families and loved ones who will have to grapple with a sense of loss for a long, long time.

And one finally realises that one can’t really make much sense of things. What really drives these men who blow themselves up? What goes through their minds as they press down on the switch that sets off their explosive jackets or when they drive their explosives-laden vehicle into a target?

These are questions that people in Pakistan will have to grapple with while trying to find ways to end the militancy and terrorism in their country. We can only wish them luck and say a prayer for them.

(More thoughts on this issue by Kamran Shafi and Nadeem F Paracha, two Pakistani columnists who tell it like it is, here and here.)

Can you please repeat the question?

2010-03-15T13:46:00.004+05:00

When “wukla”, “masail” and “bohran” were still alien words for us, our news updates were courtesy the only English TV channel then available in Pakistan. But it wasn’t exactly easy to follow the heavy Brit-American accent or whatever spurious combinations that hit our hearing apparatus.

My husband, being the perfect mimic, would do a “pohh, pohh, pohh” imitation of the anchor when it was time for us to watch a prime time programme on the channel. We soon realised we weren’t the only ones who had difficulty following the anchor’s accent. We would often hear guests and correspondents ask (read complain to) the anchor: “Can you please repeat the question?” And repeat the anchor did, sometimes not just once, but twice and even thrice.

The sudden jump from the Brit-American to very Punjabised/Pushtuised accents of correspondents and guests was equally hilarious. On the one hand, the correspondent in Swat struggled with his English and explained how he had heard “the voice of the helicopters”, and on the other, the anchor did “pohh, pohh, pohh” with a flourish to put the day’s news in perspective. There’s no denying the fact that the anchor is a good journalist, but the accent was just so out of place.

We’ve seen several anchors come and go on the channel since, suffered some smart alecks too (one smarty mistaking the PML-N spokesman for the channel’s correspondent; and another insisting on asking “Yes but how many were injured” when news broke on the channel that former premier Benazir Bhutto had been assassinated in December 2007.

We’d thought we’d seen it all till Miss Venus was unleashed on us. Hard news wasn’t exactly her forte (she did a good job reporting on a fashion event once) and it was terribly difficult to follow her accent. In fact, had her name not been flashed on the screen we would never have figured that out either.

She fumbled almost every time she opened her mouth when there was “breaking news” (read terrorist attacks), tossed her hair back and smiled her smile. So while my husband sat glued to the TV waiting for the story to unfurl, I did the next best thing – watch her colourful danglers, fuschia lip colour to match her coat, her broad rimmed glasses which she wore sometimes to make up, perhaps, for her lack of intellect…

To be fair, the same channel also had some of the best anchors – those who didn’t have accents. Sadly, some of them have had to leave after the channel faced financial hardship.

In the meantime, another English channel was launched, with some anchors sans accents, but we never took to it; because by then we had figured out that it’s far easier to follow news in Urdu than decode English accents.

Cat house...

2010-03-13T01:17:00.003+05:00

We’d been in Islamabad a few months when one morning we saw the following headline: “Cat House raided in posh Islamabad sector”.

A few days later, I went shopping for groceries to the out-of-bound Peshwar More market and on my way back hailed a cabbie. As I sat with my many shoppers (polythene bags) full of veggies, the youngish cabbie’s query had me shocked: “Aap to Cat House jayengee na?”

I decided to get off. As I was collecting my shoppers, he asked, “What happened?” I said “nothing”, wondering if the Urdu press too called a brothel “Cat House”.

The cabbie was insistent. “Aap ko woh Sector F-7 wale cat house jaana hai na?”

He knew my address too. I was furious. I knew we Indians looked different, but that different! I shuddered at what Bollywood had done to the locals. I decided to take my first panga in Pakistan. “What about that?” I challenged him.

“Aapko woh billiyon walle ghar hi jaana hai na?”

I heaved a sigh of relief. It turned out the cabbie had driven me home before and had met my cats in the driveway and decided to call our abode “Cat House”.

I laughed – glad that I had resisted the temptation to kick him. On my way home, we discussed cats and Bollywood – even though I was itching to ask him if he knew the Urdu equivalent of the real Cat House.

James Bond – Part II

2010-03-11T23:32:00.015+05:00

Since my wife’s post on “Our James Bond” went down so well with people who follow this blog, I thought it was time for a Part II on the sleuths who are so much a part of our daily lives in Pakistan.

Like most Indians in Pakistan, I guess we have a love-hate relationship with our omnipresent shadows, who are now so much a part of our routine that we take them for granted. As my wife and I walked into a hotel’s parking lot for the Republic Day bash hosted by the Indian High Commission this year, a smiling man greeted me with a cheerful “As-salam-alaikum, kaise hain sahab?”

My wife couldn’t place him and asked who he was, since he obviously knew us. She wasn’t very pleased when I told her he was one of the “senior” shadows who usually oversaw the guys that stayed parked outside our gate, morning, noon and night irrespective of whether it was summer or winter.

Some of the James Bonds are more tolerable than others. Tariq was one who quite endeared himself to us. (I use his name as I am sure that’s not what his mother calls him.) He came up to me the first day he was posted at our home in Islamabad and greeted me.

“Sir, Tariq naam hai mera aur aaj se aap ke ghar par meri duty hai,” he said with a hint of a smile. I was a little taken aback as we were new in town then and most of our shadows kept a respectable distance. I returned his greetings and mumbled something about him letting me know if there was anything I could do to help him.

Well, Tariq certainly took me up on my offer. One day I got out of my home without Tariq realising that I was gone. When I returned several hours later, a sheepish Tariq came up to me and asked: “Where did you go, sir?” When I told him where I had been, pat came the reply: “Aur kahin to nahin gaye the?”

When two bulbs blew out in our home on a bitterly cold winter night, I decided to go to a nearby market and get replacements. I love walking, and as I made my way through the foggy night, a red motorcycle stopped next to me. It was Tariq. “Sir, where are you going?”

Feeling bad for the man, I told him I was only going to the market to get some bulbs. “Aur kahin to nahin jaa rahe hain? Koi party-sharty?” he asked. I assured him I had no such plans. “Achcha, thik hai sir. To phir mein jaa raha hoon,” came the reply.

It wasn’t exactly a one-way street with Tariq. My wife has a habit of wandering off while we are out together, and on one such occasion, she disappeared into a row of shops in a market. As I scanned the shops one by one, I realised someone was standing behind me. Tariq again. “Madam is in that shop,” he said, before slinking away.

Tariq isn’t the only shadow who endeared himself to the Indians. An Indian diplomat’s son once came home from school with an unusual assignment – his teacher wanted him to take photographs of himself with various objects and persons, including a policeman and a donkey. The diplomat was flummoxed as he had not seen a donkey anywhere near his home in Islamabad.

The diplomat made inquiries with his shadow, who offered to lead him to a place where there was a donkey. So, for a change, the diplomat’s car followed the shadow’s motorcycle, which led the way to a ‘katchi abadi’ – the Pakistani name for a shanty town.

The shadow assured the diplomat there was a donkey within the shanty town. But a new problem arose here – the diplomat’s son refused to wade through the refuse-strewn lanes of the katchi abadi. No problem, said the shadow, he would get the donkey out.

Soon, the shadow emerged from the shanty town, leading a donkey, and one very happy diplomat and his son soon went home with a photograph of the donkey and the kid!

Perhaps more surprising was the case of a defence attaché, who was greeted one day by one of his former shadows with a warm handshake and a greeting. The attaché asked the shadow why he was so happy. The reply truly stunned him – “Sir, I did such a great job of watching your home that I have been promoted and posted to the High Commission in London!”

The ‘Mr’ fixation…

2010-03-11T14:35:00.009+05:00

It was our first week in Islamabad and we were looking for a “money changer”, one of those ubiquitous shops where dollars are converted into the local currency. There are dozens of them in Isloo, just like the paan shops in India, but back then we didn’t know any.

We sought directions from a helpful cabbie, who told us that there was one behind “Mr Books!” So we headed for “Mr Books!” and found none. We took the stairs, checked all the shops on the first level, yet there was no “changer” in sight.

We were about to call the cabbie names, when we got told by a shop help that the changer was behind “Mr Books!” and not “Mr Books Too!”

We looked up and realized that the guy was indeed right and that we were parked in front of “Mr Books Too!” and not “Mr Books!” On our way to “Mr Books!” we saw a “Mr Old Books”, retailing second-hand books.

Ever since we have noticed a “Mr Chips”, “Mr Cod”, “Mr Food”, “Mr Craft” and more recently “Mr Cotton” – I know that some of them are internationally renowned brands but I would have preferred the Urdu equivalents: “Mian Machli” or maybe “Mian Bawarchi”.

We have it all mapped neatly in our heads now. When we have to go to Super Market, our landmark is “Mr Books!” (we get off, and always ask the owner about Mr Jaswant Singh’s impending Pakistan yatra to publicise his famous book on Jinnah); when we have go towards Constitution Avenue, we know that “Mr Cod” is a good option to stop by and hog; and, of course, “Mr Craft” is a great place -- but just to window shop.

I’m certain there are other “Misters” too, like the one I recently noticed at F-8 Markaz. I somehow recall it as “Mr Munchies”, but then I am sure only about the “Mr”.

But seriously what is this “Mr” fixation? A techie who blogs as “Mr A”; children who learn about “Mr Potato” at school and a country which has a “Mr 10 per cent” at the helm!