.
Something really sad happened last week: Akbar Ali poisoned himself, his wife and three of his six children because of poverty. The man and his daughters are dead, while the wife is still alive. Only God knows what he must be thinking before he decided to take the toxic pills and leave his younger children to suffer alone. But this is something we will never know. Akbar was a worker at a garment hosiery factory and lost his job because the factory closed due to the current energy crisis. His problems compounded because he had a large family to support.
This is not the first poverty related suicide in the country and it won’t be the last. Berating the government for rising poverty will not make much difference unless it is backed by some serious thinking and action to tackle the issue. Akbar and his family would have been alive if he had a smaller family.
The biggest threat to Pakistan is neither its hostile neighbour, nor an international Zionist conspiracy. Rather, it is the country’s rising population. Pakistan’s population grew exponentially — from 33 million in 1947 to over 180 million in 2009. With over three million Pakistanis born every year, Pakistan is the second largest contributor to the world population after India. The total fertility at 4.0 is highest in the region as women in Pakistan have more children than its neighbours.
Although Pakistan initiated its first population control programme in the 1950s, it has not achieved much since then. There is minimal impact on use of contraceptives (only 23.9 per cent) and fertility has not reduced dramatically like it has in Bangladesh and Iran, although they started their family planning programmes in the 1970s and 1980s, respectively.
One of the reasons for the failure of family planning programmes in Pakistan is the administrative structure. Family planning is curiously separate from the health ministry and while it comes under the federal government, health is a provincial subject which completely de-links the two. Amalgamation of family planning in health is integral to achieve any success. Provision of all health services should be linked with family planning. The government needs to be pro-active in teaching young people about family planning and sternly deal with populist politicians who try to derail any such educational efforts.
A coherent approach is needed to combat the social and cultural stigma attached to it and it should be combined with effective service delivery in all parts of the country. Running adverts on TV is useless if the information provided on ground is ineffective and outreach activities are non-existent. To date, the biggest reason for the failure of the programme has been the lackadaisical attitude of successive government’s and lack of political commitment. Unless that is altered, change will remain elusive.
Forty per cent of Pakistan’s population lives below the poverty line and it can no longer ignore the fact that small families can help in coping with poverty more effectively. The government needs to realise and impart this message to others that low birth rates are needed to create national and personal wealth. Problems of high unemployment, increasing poverty, floundering education system, crises of food, water and energy will be exacerbated if we continue to add more and more people. If the population growth is not checked on priority basis, the country will be undone by the sheer number of its own people.
Originally written for Express Tribune
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Thursday, 24 June 2010
Tuesday, 15 June 2010
A country only for fanatic men
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Back in 2002 when I was a rookie journalist, I met Jeewanti, a teenager who was doused with acid to avenge a property dispute with her family. She was the first person I met who has faced an act of violence against her. Unfortunately, I have met various people since then who have faced violence and brutality, be it Munno Bheel who is fighting to release his bonded family for over a decade or the peon in my former office who fled his home in Chitral because he was a Shia living in a Sunni village fearing persecution for his faith. One of my friends has lost her uncle, a surgeon, during the period when sectarian groups were targeting and killing Shia doctors in Karachi.
Every minority, be it ethnic, religious or sectarian, and weaker groups have faced violence and persecution in this country. If you are a religious minority in the land of pure, you have about as much of an opportunity of growth as a one-legged man in a kicking competition. Constitution bars you from holding the highest offices in the country. Your temples and churches are vandalized and you are not allowed to propagate your religion. You are lucky if you are a Christian or a Hindu, at least you can call your places of worship by their real names; if you happen to be an Ahmadi, you cannot even do that.
If you are a child, you probably are one of too many children in the family; your parents do not give you enough food and attention. There are not enough schools and even if they are, you parents cannot afford to send you and you are working to contribute to family income. At workplace you are probably abused. If you leave home, you will definitely be sexually abused and will probably end up using drugs. If you happen to end up in a radical madrassah, there is a great likelihood that you will end up as a suicide bomber, perpetuating violence and terror to others.
If you are a sectarian minority, then you are on the hit list of all sectarian outfits. They can burn your houses and places of business if you are in Chitral or can shoot you from a distance of 2 meters in Karachi and get away with it. If you are an Ismaili Muslim, chances are the religious parties will try to get you declared a non Muslims when they can’t think of any other political issue to hijack.
If you are woman, you will be malnourished and uneducated to begin with. When you are a little older, you will probably be doused with acid, burned, tortured, married off to men of inappropriate age and character to pay off debts (vani), killed (karo kari) to either implicate or secure money from opponents of your family. You will be raped, at times even by the police and other security forces, to settle dispute and at times because men think they can get away with it. Your testimony in the court of law is that of half of a man, and your citizenships rights are limited.
The way things are in this country of ours; soon it will turn into a place where only rich right wing fanatic Sunni men would have any citizenship rights. If you are a religious Sunni man who is spewing venom against the minorities and women from the pulpits, you have an unassailable immunity. The way things are, the future migrations from the country would not be for economic reasons, they would be for liberty and freedom.
Originally written for Express Tribune. This is the unedited version.
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Friday, 11 June 2010
City of extremes
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A modern city is the locus of both opportunity and inequality. Migrants from the hinterland come to cosmopolitan centres looking for an urban experience. What they usually get is accommodation in polluted, overcrowded and under-serviced slums in hazardous locations, often brutally evicted by the city administration. Just like malls and expressways characterise a modern city, inequality and urban disparities also define it.
But inequality is not a new phenomenon; it has been a central feature of cities even in the medieval era where the rich and poor lived side-by-side in walled cities. If the city was divided along spatial class divide in the bygone era, it is now shaped more by the logic of the market than the needs of its inhabitants, in a globalised capitalist world, giving birth to newer types of inequalities.
The economic restructuring, the shift from labour-intensive production to capital-intensive production and from manufacturing to services has expanded informalisation. City centres are being gentrified – for instance eviction of hawkers and rickshaw-free zones – to attract global investment capital and the poor are being pushed into the slums and to the periphery, making them outsiders in their own cities. Though the problem persists everywhere, it is more pronounced in cities of the developing world. Karachi perhaps takes the cake for being the only city in the world where no public buses are allowed in the business centre of the city, I I Chundrigar Road, making it difficult for poor people to access capital and people with capital.
In terms of population Karachi is one of the fastest growing cities in the world and the ratio of inequality is growing just like its population. There is disparity in terms of access to everyday necessities such as drinking water, schools, clean neighbourhoods and safety. The inequality becomes more pronounced in times of distress such as deteriorated law and order situation and natural calamities. Before Cyclone Phet hit the shores of Keti Bunder there was warning that it may hit Karachi. While the affluent citizens were busy planning cookouts to celebrate the rain, thousands of citizens were dreading flooding and electrocution. This exposes the normally hidden caveats in the city administration’s capacity to deal with contingencies and the cavalier attitude of its well-heeled citizens who, instead of assisting people in the less well-off neighbourhoods, were busy storing up fuel for their generators. Last year over 25 people died and 150 injured due to rain in the most modern and cosmopolitan city of Pakistan. This is not counting the number of children who contracted water-borne gastroenteritis that afflicts slum dwellers every year after rains. For how long will people continue to die of electrocution because of faulty wiring and drown in open manholes which they cannot see in the rain?
A lot of important responsibilities of the state in responding to the needs of urban citizens are now transferred to non-state agents, who do not hold any accountability to the public, making the city a place of extremes — of immense wealth and poverty, of comfort and misery, cosmopolitanism and communalism, hygiene and disease, hope and despair. The question that we all need to ask is if we can continue to live in a city that renders millions of its poorer citizens ‘outsiders’. Such a stark divide usually leads to anarchy; can we afford more anarchy or do we need to make it a more inclusive city?
Originally written for Express Tribune
.
A modern city is the locus of both opportunity and inequality. Migrants from the hinterland come to cosmopolitan centres looking for an urban experience. What they usually get is accommodation in polluted, overcrowded and under-serviced slums in hazardous locations, often brutally evicted by the city administration. Just like malls and expressways characterise a modern city, inequality and urban disparities also define it.
But inequality is not a new phenomenon; it has been a central feature of cities even in the medieval era where the rich and poor lived side-by-side in walled cities. If the city was divided along spatial class divide in the bygone era, it is now shaped more by the logic of the market than the needs of its inhabitants, in a globalised capitalist world, giving birth to newer types of inequalities.
The economic restructuring, the shift from labour-intensive production to capital-intensive production and from manufacturing to services has expanded informalisation. City centres are being gentrified – for instance eviction of hawkers and rickshaw-free zones – to attract global investment capital and the poor are being pushed into the slums and to the periphery, making them outsiders in their own cities. Though the problem persists everywhere, it is more pronounced in cities of the developing world. Karachi perhaps takes the cake for being the only city in the world where no public buses are allowed in the business centre of the city, I I Chundrigar Road, making it difficult for poor people to access capital and people with capital.
In terms of population Karachi is one of the fastest growing cities in the world and the ratio of inequality is growing just like its population. There is disparity in terms of access to everyday necessities such as drinking water, schools, clean neighbourhoods and safety. The inequality becomes more pronounced in times of distress such as deteriorated law and order situation and natural calamities. Before Cyclone Phet hit the shores of Keti Bunder there was warning that it may hit Karachi. While the affluent citizens were busy planning cookouts to celebrate the rain, thousands of citizens were dreading flooding and electrocution. This exposes the normally hidden caveats in the city administration’s capacity to deal with contingencies and the cavalier attitude of its well-heeled citizens who, instead of assisting people in the less well-off neighbourhoods, were busy storing up fuel for their generators. Last year over 25 people died and 150 injured due to rain in the most modern and cosmopolitan city of Pakistan. This is not counting the number of children who contracted water-borne gastroenteritis that afflicts slum dwellers every year after rains. For how long will people continue to die of electrocution because of faulty wiring and drown in open manholes which they cannot see in the rain?
A lot of important responsibilities of the state in responding to the needs of urban citizens are now transferred to non-state agents, who do not hold any accountability to the public, making the city a place of extremes — of immense wealth and poverty, of comfort and misery, cosmopolitanism and communalism, hygiene and disease, hope and despair. The question that we all need to ask is if we can continue to live in a city that renders millions of its poorer citizens ‘outsiders’. Such a stark divide usually leads to anarchy; can we afford more anarchy or do we need to make it a more inclusive city?
Originally written for Express Tribune
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Tuesday, 1 June 2010
A time for introspection and soul-searching
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After every major incident of violence that is perpetuated in name of Islam, religious leaders, politicians and common man of the streets repeat that those who kill and maim others are not Muslims and Islam is not a violent religion. In past few years, too many Pakistanis, no matter what their faith and sect is, have died because someone killed them in the name of religion. The rhetoric that Islam is a peaceful religion will not cut it anymore. We need to introspect why as a society we tolerate violence in general and condone it when it is perpetuated in name of religion.
We bemoan the horrific crimes against Muslims under Israeli and US occupation in Palestine and Iraq and try to justify violence in our society because of those crimes but that is not true. We, as a society, condone torture and violence against weaker sections of the society in name of religion even before the invasion of Iraq and have legislation to support this violence. Both Blasphemy Laws, which can and have discriminated against minorities, and gender biased Hudood Ordinance use religion to maintain the status quo in which a powerful Muslim male is the sole source of authority and there is no room for personal liberty and individual thought. These laws make it very easy for anyone to score against either the non Muslims or women.
We glorify attackers and mass murderers such as Ahmed Shah Abdali, Nadir Shah and Mehmood Ghaznavi in our text books and popular media. We deify them and their acts of barbarism because they were Muslims and those who were killed by them were not Muslims. None of them fought in the name of Islam as we are led to believe. They were kings with colonial mindset who wanted to expand their kingdoms and annex the fertile heartland of river Indus, Ganga and Jamuna. Attaching any exalted and noble intentions to the expansion of their kingdom is factually and historically incorrect.
Shah Waliullah, who is venerated by most South Asian religious scholars, wrote a letter to Ahmed Shah Abdaali to invite him to attack the Marhattas. Shah Waliullah instigated this violent attack, which killed thousands of soldiers on both sides, because he did not like the declining clout of Muslims scholars in the court and hoped that the war would to restore Ulema's former power and influence. How can a society that lionizes people like him ever hope to achieve peace?
Tackling individual incidents of violence and terrorism can never bring the desired result. Unless the philosophy and ideology behind violence prompted in name of religion is challenged, there won’t be much point in expressing indignation over it. The Jamia Hafsa fiasco is a case in point. The administration of Lal Masjid and Jamia Hafsa violated many laws and started war against the state which is considered treason by the constitution of Pakistan but most Pakistanis including the politicians and highest level of judiciary voiced their opinion against government operation because it was against a group of people who were using religion to support their violent stance.
When religion becomes a source of income and a point of politics for people then people will use it to further their interests and foster violence in name of religion when it hurts their interest. Unless we decide to look inward and deal with such demons, peace will remain elusive.
Originally written for Express Tribune, this is the unedited version.
.
After every major incident of violence that is perpetuated in name of Islam, religious leaders, politicians and common man of the streets repeat that those who kill and maim others are not Muslims and Islam is not a violent religion. In past few years, too many Pakistanis, no matter what their faith and sect is, have died because someone killed them in the name of religion. The rhetoric that Islam is a peaceful religion will not cut it anymore. We need to introspect why as a society we tolerate violence in general and condone it when it is perpetuated in name of religion.
We bemoan the horrific crimes against Muslims under Israeli and US occupation in Palestine and Iraq and try to justify violence in our society because of those crimes but that is not true. We, as a society, condone torture and violence against weaker sections of the society in name of religion even before the invasion of Iraq and have legislation to support this violence. Both Blasphemy Laws, which can and have discriminated against minorities, and gender biased Hudood Ordinance use religion to maintain the status quo in which a powerful Muslim male is the sole source of authority and there is no room for personal liberty and individual thought. These laws make it very easy for anyone to score against either the non Muslims or women.
We glorify attackers and mass murderers such as Ahmed Shah Abdali, Nadir Shah and Mehmood Ghaznavi in our text books and popular media. We deify them and their acts of barbarism because they were Muslims and those who were killed by them were not Muslims. None of them fought in the name of Islam as we are led to believe. They were kings with colonial mindset who wanted to expand their kingdoms and annex the fertile heartland of river Indus, Ganga and Jamuna. Attaching any exalted and noble intentions to the expansion of their kingdom is factually and historically incorrect.
Shah Waliullah, who is venerated by most South Asian religious scholars, wrote a letter to Ahmed Shah Abdaali to invite him to attack the Marhattas. Shah Waliullah instigated this violent attack, which killed thousands of soldiers on both sides, because he did not like the declining clout of Muslims scholars in the court and hoped that the war would to restore Ulema's former power and influence. How can a society that lionizes people like him ever hope to achieve peace?
Tackling individual incidents of violence and terrorism can never bring the desired result. Unless the philosophy and ideology behind violence prompted in name of religion is challenged, there won’t be much point in expressing indignation over it. The Jamia Hafsa fiasco is a case in point. The administration of Lal Masjid and Jamia Hafsa violated many laws and started war against the state which is considered treason by the constitution of Pakistan but most Pakistanis including the politicians and highest level of judiciary voiced their opinion against government operation because it was against a group of people who were using religion to support their violent stance.
When religion becomes a source of income and a point of politics for people then people will use it to further their interests and foster violence in name of religion when it hurts their interest. Unless we decide to look inward and deal with such demons, peace will remain elusive.
Originally written for Express Tribune, this is the unedited version.
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Wednesday, 7 April 2010
An open letter to Ayesha Siddiqui
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Dear Ayesha,
First of all, let me congratulate on you on your impending divorce. People usually commiserate at an event like this one but I know you have fought long and hard for it and you totally deserve all the accolades for having won this battle, as the kids on internet forums say; EPIC!
You are a miracle worker. You have mastered the art of doing impossible things and that too effortlessly. Let me tell you why I believe that you are the smartest Indian woman ever.
First of all, what started off as a blitzkrieg news session on romance of Shoaib Malik & Sania Mirza soon turned into the saga of Shoaib Malik and Ayesha Siddiqui. Every PR firm in India and beyond should be queuing outside your doors to sign you up. You have managed to become the most talked about Indian, nay, South Asian in a very short span of time with doing much. All you had to do was produce a doctored photo (even an organization as virtuous as "Times Now" had to put the disclaimer on their website that they cannot prove the authenticity of the photo) and viola – a person as famous as Sania Mirza was relegated to the back and all of a sudden, it was all about you. Did Shoaib marry Ayesha or not? Did they sleep together or not? Have they made a child together or not? Heck, you even managed to drag a fellow Hyderabadi Mohammed Azharuddin into it and he was so scared of you (rightly so) that he claimed not to have known any Siddiqui family ever. After three days of this hoopla, people started asking, who is this Sania Mirza again. Now who else but you could have done THAT?
People thought that only skinny skanks in their twenties with their big hair and flawless skin stand a chance as serious gold diggers but you have proven them wrong. If rumors are to be believed you are at least ten years older than Shoaib, you probably weigh a 100 pounds more than him, you sport nerdy glasses and wear a black burqa and you still manage to snare him to sign the dotted line – twice – first on the marriage contract and then on the divorce papers. I am sure you must have made some decent amount of money (some say its 40 million Indian Rupees) in the process as well. Once again, you have accomplished the impossible. If the matrimonial ads of jeevansathi.com that spring up on every Indian website are to be believed, getting hitched is big shit. You would strike gold if you start a school where you teach girls to get hitched to eligible, preferably rich and famous, men with limited intellectual capacity and raging hormones. With your proven record, mommies and daddies will line outside your door with bags full of cash to get enrollment in your program. Your intelligence will make so many mommies and daddies and their not so comely girls very very happy.
Baji Ayesha, your ‘mahanta’ knows no boundaries. In this awful economy, you have even created business opportunities for some folks. With your allegations and counter allegations, bookies have started betting on the odds of Shoaib and Sania ever making it to the altar. If you manage to delay the wedding, even by one day, you will be making a lot of people happy – and richer – who have actually put faith in your abilities and betted against the wedding.
Your magic does not only work in India, it spreads it bounties across the border as well. You are so good that you have managed to get a totally useless Apa Firdaus Aashiq (our minister for Family Planning) to work, at least for one day. Her ministry is pretty useless (you can tell that by the number of children being born every second in Pakistan without any planning) but even she jumped in and said that she will present Shoaib and Sania Mirza a family planning kit. She can now claim that she has performed her duties as the minister for at least one day in her tenure.
You have also given the opportunity to extremely farigh PML-N workers in Multan to stage a protest against the FIR you lodged against Malik and provided them with a chance to vent their misplaced anger.
Who would have thought that people in India and Pakistan would ever see eye to eye on anything but you have forced “Save Indian Family Foundation”, a men's rights organization, in supporting a Pakistani man Shoaib Malik. When you filed the case against Shoaib Malik under section 498A of Indian penal code, Save the Indian Family Foundation sprang into action saying that you have misused the domestic violence act and asked that the case be removed against Shoaib as soon as possible. If only you decide to put your magical powers to use for Pakistan - India peace, who knows we may settle water dispute and resolve Kashmir issue. Imagine, millions of children in both the countries who do not go to schools because the governments are busy piling up arms will be able to get education because of that peace and you will end up as the winner of Nobel Peace Prize! You will be right there with the likes of Obama and some other old white dudes. Only you are capable of bringing food and education to millions of South Asian children Ayesha, only you.
You have broken the boundaries of fame that even Ashwariya Rai has not managed to do so. Yesterday, I was surprised to find that my Chinese Uyghur teacher who has lived in Colorado for long and now teaches in Rotterdam and does not know jack about cricket asked me the latest on the Shoaib Malik drama. Between you and Aafia Siddiqui, the name ‘Siddiqui’ is shinning so bright, I see many people taking it up in future for getting famous. Who knows, Mahesh Bhatt may end up making a film titled “There is something about Siddiquis.”
I have two other far more important deadlines to meet but I am so impressed by your brilliance and intellect, I couldn’t wait to appreciate you any longer. You do know that you are a genius.
Baji Ayesha, you rock!!!
From an ardent admirer of your craft.
PS: As per ToI news report, Shoaib had to shell out 150 million Indian rupees in the out of court settlement.
Wednesday, 10 March 2010
Twitter, Imran Khan and Aafia
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Twitter is fun. If you are lucky, you can annoy other people and have fun at their expense. It all gets funnier if the people you make fun of are Z list celebrities who are also on twitter and are probably following you.
A friend and I had doubts about a Jemima Khan profile on twitter as we were not sure if it was a genuine account or not. So in a conversation last night, I wondered if it could be a fake Jemima Khan account. It was an innocuous conversation and we forgot about it, she apparently she saw that, got pissed and in order to prove that she is the real McCoy she scanned her passport with all the details and put it up on twitter! I mean I know she is a blonde and not particularly a bright one (she married Imran Khan after all), but who puts up their passport details on a public twitter account which is open for all?
As if that was not enough drama, some desi men with fantasies of skinny blonde British women falling for them jumped in acting like knights in shining armor advising Jemima to remove her passport details. She then put up another photo of her passport – minus the details – on twitter (she has later removed them both but a pal from across the border saved that passport photo & emailed it to me). I mean what were those gentlemen thinking, she has had a Desi man, she is not gonna fall for another one. One desi dude in one lifetime was enough, dontcha think?
Anyways, that got me started along with two other tweeters, Naheed and Mirza on all things Jemima and her erstwhile husband. Mirza shared that in another century, Liz Hurley and Imran Khan had dated. It just reminded me that in the same century, Liz Hurley and Hugh grant also dated and then Imran Khan got married to Jemima and then Jemima dated Hugh Grant and now perhaps Imran Khan is dating the whole Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan which makes it kinda really kinky circle. Mirza then suggested that maybe it’s time Imran Khan and Hugh Grant should get up close and personal. In any case, Jemima has beaten Mr. Khan when it comes to getting intimate with famous people of the same sex – remember the lip lock between Kate Moss and Jemima (it generates 183,000 links if you google it - in case anyone wanted to know that).
By that time, Jemima Khan got really angry and gave me two names; twalker (that’s twitter stalker) and tweak (twitter freak). Now I am all game for name calling but they have to be smart and inventive. If only Ms Goldsmith had actually spent some time in college in her younger days instead of playing house with an aging Lothario, she would have known that tweak is actually a proper English word found in all major English language dictionaries. Her exact tweet was something like this: “What a relief to discover you can block the tweaks (twitter freaks). I'm banishing dissidents like a despot.” Even the statement was kind of a let down. After writing 'expert' articles on democracy in Pakistan in esteemed publications like Vogue and Harper's, I never expected such naked despotic glee from Ms Goldsmith.
We decided to let go of Ms Goldsmith and stick to her former and far juicier half. Naheed asked us if Imran Khan has remarried and then started listing the names of all the women Imran Khan has ever been with but I suggested that we need to leave that alone. After all, if one starts listing all Imran Khan's exes, 140 characters wouldn't be able to do him any justice. That man has been very very busy for most of his adult life and he is in now in his late 50s.
As far as Imran’s second round at nuptials is concerned, I have a feeling he will do a complete turnaround. In the past, much to chagrin of all the aunties (who were not really aunties back then) he had almost exclusively dated foreigners. Now, in his new Maseeha-e-Islam avatar, he will only take the plunge when 'Qaum ki Beti' Aafia Siddiqui returns. Imagine a wedding invite that says ‘Imran Khan weds Aafia Siddiqui’, would it not be a Jamat-e-Islami and Talibaan wet dream? If Ms Siddiqui agrees to marry Imran Khan, then nothing can stop him from becoming the most powerful man in Pakistan.
Naheed disagreed with me. She believes that Aafia Siddiqui will sell Imran Khan at the juma bazaar for a bucketful of ammonium nitrate, which got me thinking. Ms. Siddiqui is a paak baaz Muslim woman, she will probably not agree to a union with a former play boy who has been with MTV VJs (tauba tauba haram). In any case, if the choice of her last husband, Ammar al-Baluchi, a nephew of the 9/11 mastermind, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and ten years her junior, is any indication of her taste, she is into young Jihadist boy toys, not old Romeos like Imran Khan.
PS: I still have Jemima's passport shot with me but I chose not to publish it, for obvious reasons.
Twitter is fun. If you are lucky, you can annoy other people and have fun at their expense. It all gets funnier if the people you make fun of are Z list celebrities who are also on twitter and are probably following you.
A friend and I had doubts about a Jemima Khan profile on twitter as we were not sure if it was a genuine account or not. So in a conversation last night, I wondered if it could be a fake Jemima Khan account. It was an innocuous conversation and we forgot about it, she apparently she saw that, got pissed and in order to prove that she is the real McCoy she scanned her passport with all the details and put it up on twitter! I mean I know she is a blonde and not particularly a bright one (she married Imran Khan after all), but who puts up their passport details on a public twitter account which is open for all?
As if that was not enough drama, some desi men with fantasies of skinny blonde British women falling for them jumped in acting like knights in shining armor advising Jemima to remove her passport details. She then put up another photo of her passport – minus the details – on twitter (she has later removed them both but a pal from across the border saved that passport photo & emailed it to me). I mean what were those gentlemen thinking, she has had a Desi man, she is not gonna fall for another one. One desi dude in one lifetime was enough, dontcha think?
Anyways, that got me started along with two other tweeters, Naheed and Mirza on all things Jemima and her erstwhile husband. Mirza shared that in another century, Liz Hurley and Imran Khan had dated. It just reminded me that in the same century, Liz Hurley and Hugh grant also dated and then Imran Khan got married to Jemima and then Jemima dated Hugh Grant and now perhaps Imran Khan is dating the whole Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan which makes it kinda really kinky circle. Mirza then suggested that maybe it’s time Imran Khan and Hugh Grant should get up close and personal. In any case, Jemima has beaten Mr. Khan when it comes to getting intimate with famous people of the same sex – remember the lip lock between Kate Moss and Jemima (it generates 183,000 links if you google it - in case anyone wanted to know that).By that time, Jemima Khan got really angry and gave me two names; twalker (that’s twitter stalker) and tweak (twitter freak). Now I am all game for name calling but they have to be smart and inventive. If only Ms Goldsmith had actually spent some time in college in her younger days instead of playing house with an aging Lothario, she would have known that tweak is actually a proper English word found in all major English language dictionaries. Her exact tweet was something like this: “What a relief to discover you can block the tweaks (twitter freaks). I'm banishing dissidents like a despot.” Even the statement was kind of a let down. After writing 'expert' articles on democracy in Pakistan in esteemed publications like Vogue and Harper's, I never expected such naked despotic glee from Ms Goldsmith.
We decided to let go of Ms Goldsmith and stick to her former and far juicier half. Naheed asked us if Imran Khan has remarried and then started listing the names of all the women Imran Khan has ever been with but I suggested that we need to leave that alone. After all, if one starts listing all Imran Khan's exes, 140 characters wouldn't be able to do him any justice. That man has been very very busy for most of his adult life and he is in now in his late 50s.
As far as Imran’s second round at nuptials is concerned, I have a feeling he will do a complete turnaround. In the past, much to chagrin of all the aunties (who were not really aunties back then) he had almost exclusively dated foreigners. Now, in his new Maseeha-e-Islam avatar, he will only take the plunge when 'Qaum ki Beti' Aafia Siddiqui returns. Imagine a wedding invite that says ‘Imran Khan weds Aafia Siddiqui’, would it not be a Jamat-e-Islami and Talibaan wet dream? If Ms Siddiqui agrees to marry Imran Khan, then nothing can stop him from becoming the most powerful man in Pakistan.
Naheed disagreed with me. She believes that Aafia Siddiqui will sell Imran Khan at the juma bazaar for a bucketful of ammonium nitrate, which got me thinking. Ms. Siddiqui is a paak baaz Muslim woman, she will probably not agree to a union with a former play boy who has been with MTV VJs (tauba tauba haram). In any case, if the choice of her last husband, Ammar al-Baluchi, a nephew of the 9/11 mastermind, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and ten years her junior, is any indication of her taste, she is into young Jihadist boy toys, not old Romeos like Imran Khan.
PS: I still have Jemima's passport shot with me but I chose not to publish it, for obvious reasons.
Friday, 1 January 2010
New Year Facebook status updates from hell
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As soon as we are done with Christmas, emails, text messages and general announcements regarding the impending end of the year start appearing on social networking sites, wishing no one in particular.
There are those who want to sound philosophical and super intellectual and they would use words like existentialism and nihilism in their facebook status updates. One such update goes something like this:
This whole New Year business is just another reaffirmation of the inherent nihilism of our existence. Suddenly whats important is the launch of a new set of an arbitrary number of days, at an arbitrary moment in time initially chosen by an arbitrary group of people, an arbitrary number of years ago. Great going mankind.
WTF? Does anyone even bother reading stuff like this after the first line?
Then there are those who want the rest of us to know that they live in cooler places and actually have a life. Their status updates would be something like:
Having the time of my life at Sydney Harbour Bridge, yeayyyy!!!!OrHappy new year to you all from snowy NYC!!!
Notice that such messages are followed by multiple exclamation marks, as if living in New York is exclamation worthy or a snowy NYC in December is a sign of wonder.
There are some who just want to sound enigmatic or contradictory or both and they would write something along the lines of:
Happy New Year. We live in shitty times.
OrLooking back with gratitude, looking forward with hope.
I find such statuses most annoying. Gratitude for what? Hope for what? The sooner we lose hope and come to terms with the fact that life is gallactically fucked up, the better it is for the sanity of the society in general and for the cyber dwelling facebooking cynics like me in particular.
Apart from the dreamy or intellectual ones, there are some practical types. They don’t wish for world peace -- they know it is unattainable -- they only want prosperity and opportunity for their loved ones. One such message that I saw last night goes something like:
Happy new year to all my friends and family members. May this year bring us lots of wealth, prosperity and opportunities in our life (Aameen)
And last but not the least is the super cheery ones. They are so happy, they can make you go blind with optimism and turn anyone normal into a homicidal maniac with their glee. Check this one out:
--- is wishing everyone an Extremely Happy New Year 2010! May we all lose our belly fat and unsightly pimples, get gorgeous hair and hefty pay-raises and may the wrath of the Almighty fall upon anyone who looks prettier than us in group photographs. Amen! xXx ♥
What is wrong with this person? Why is she so happy over a bloody new year? Did she win a Pulitzer Prize, or an Oscar? Has she spoken with Kurt Cobain’s ghost who told her about a huge stash of heroine that he had hidden back in 1990 and is now worth millions? Did she sign a million dollar book deal? Has she shacked up with Prince William or did she win a fucking lottery?
We are finally here, in 2010 and we shall be here for another 12 months. Can we get it done and over with New Year messages please?
Update: The number of people ended up on my post looking for best new year facebook status updates is astounding. Facebook apparently rules.
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