Walked beside burning buses, dodged through bullets but I am not leaving Pakistan

It’s barely been 15 minutes since I arrived in the safe confines of my home and I am still trembling from what I just experienced.

Location of event: Mausamyat

Date: March 20, 2011

Time: 7:30 pm

Coming from: Extra class at City Campus, IBA (Sadar)

My friend was supposed to drop me at Mausamyat from where I had to move straight ahead towards my home by public transport while she had to take a right turn for her home. As we reached Mausamyat, we saw how terrible things were – just as how my mom had warned me. The whole area was pitch-dark and the only source of light was from the bus burning in huge flames on the right. My friend said that she could drop me home and I fearing for the safety of her car unwilling agreed saying that it was just five minutes away. However, her driver said that it was 5 minutes but was ‘very very far’. I caught his intention and said that I’d go on my own and that there was no need to ‘drive very very far for me’.

Reality stung me harder than expected as I got off the car. I have walked a number of times in daylight from Karachi University to home amidst burning tires when political protesters burn buses and everything unwanted that comes their way. But today was different – the sun had set and so had all hope. This time there was almost no pedestrian on the dark road and absolutely no woman. Usually there are two modes of traveling for me or for the public in general– bus or rickshaw – but there were none of these for my rescue. It was terrible for a 21 year old girl to stand there in that with a man or two a few yards away from her self in the darkness where even buildings seemed to have been burned down to ashes just like the burning buses in front of them.

All human life that existed was tucked safely away in cars which drove at alarming speeds in their respective directions. Here, there was no vacant rickshaw – a few here and there were all occupied. As for buses – I could see buses coming at the edge of Mausamyat, seeing the burning bus as an example of what would be done to them if they entered that zone, and taking a quick U-turn. I switched on my ‘survival mode’ – ready for anything that might happen and highly alert on detecting any way of commuting, of getting to any place of safety. Today was the first time I was actually scared.

What I was scared of was not the dark, but of what happens in the dark, in the absence of people – mugging and abductions. Standing and frantically searching for hope there for 5 minutes seemed like experiencing an eon in a doomed world.

Finally hope paid off and I found what was never seen in that area – a chinchi. I leapt to it. There were only men in it of course but I couldn’t have been more thankful to Allah for the help. The ride from there to Safoora – a ten minute drive through a dark, devasted, doomed world it was.

As I approached Safoorah, I wondered how I would get home from there because it’s a 5 minute walk away from there and things most probably had to be bad there too. Fortunately, my mom was able to come at Safoorah and pick me up from there. But when I saw her face in the car, I saw it was streaming with tears. She said she had dodged firing right outside our house on her way to pick me up. She was scared, worried and depressed.

As we reached home, as safety engulfed me once again and as my trembling slowed down I knew one thing for sure – I was not leaving Pakistan like this. The last thing I want to do is escape when I know I can make a positive change.

There was a time when I had never seen a ‘mini bus’ or a real beggar in my life, had never heard of the words Sindhi, Mahajir, etc, had never experienced a ‘hartaal’… there was a time when my only mode of transportation was my dad’s Corolla and my school’s air conditioned buses. That was when I lived in a glamorous city called Dubai. Now I live in Karachi and life is the absolute opposite but it’s very real. This is what the truth is, at least for me, a citizen of Pakistan. And I being a Pakistani, the citizen of a Muslim state will never abandon it the way many do.

PS. When I got home, I was told that 3 individuals had died at Mausamyat before I had gotten there. Very unfortunate.

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63 years - Are our borders still safe?

Alhamdulliah, we are are very lucky indeed to have Pakistan intact after 63 years in spite of the innumerable calamities and difficulties that have befallen our beloved homeland Pakistan.

 

Today I feel very proud that I belong to the Islamic Republic of Pakistan - a country which was created in the name of Islam. I also feel very proud of my dear brothers and sisters who have served the armed forces of Pakistan in order to protect our borders, on which enemies constantly have their eyes upon.

The border of Pakistan was created to make us, the Muslims of the sub-continent, feel safe. So that no non-Muslim could succeed in harming us in any way, as had been the case before. That was the purpose of the border. 

However, my pride on my dear country's border and it's sovereignty is hurt when I see cases of people disappearing within our own borders, some of them who later turn upin prisons in foreign countries. At hearing such cases, I, as a Pakistani, feel insecure about my own future!

For example, one case is that of Dr. Afia. One Pakistani being tried by the US judiciary in the US! How is it legal in any way to try a person in country X, when the person belongs to country Y ?

Now, this is not the story of one Pakistani. There are hundreds, perhaps thousands of such Pakistanis who have become the victim of rendition - who have been 'disappeared' by someone within Pakistan and then later turned up to be in some foreign country with a list of criminal charges.

Recalling the purpose of our country's border - to keep it's citizens safe - makes me wonder if our borders really are as good as they used to be.

Pakistan Zindabad!!!

Weren’t we already expecting Bombs today?

One of the most frequent tragic causes of headlines on Pakistani news channels is bombs. Bombs in the mosques, bombs at religious or political processions, bombs at other gatherings and even hospitals…

What is the common thing among them all?

Doesn’t take a second to get it – all these situations are heavily populated.

Here, a few e-clippings illustrate my point.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7181042.stm

http://www.newstatesman.com/2010/03/suicide-attacks-busy-city

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jul/01/pakistan-lahore-bomb-blasts

http://www.samaa.tv/News24920-YaumeAli_procession_ambushed_several_injured_.aspx

Today, I was feeling absolutely fine, yet I didn’t go to office. Simply because I was warned by my family and of course my own memory that today being 22^nd of Ramadan wouldn’t be safe day. There is nothing wrong with 22^nd of Ramadan absolutely of course, except that on this date, a culture to take out a religious procession prevails in Pakistan.

Since, the increase in frequency of bomb blasts in Karachi, Lahore, and Islamabad and even in the northern cities of Pakistan for the past three, four years, quite many a sensible people have started avoiding initiating or attending large gatherings. Avoiding such events isn’t a sign of cowardice, but as a way of protecting life, which is an asset from God, something we are bound to protect.

Given the situation of our country, I wonder what logic drives people to still plunge into processions, that too of the ritualistic sort, and jeopardize their own lives and their families’ future.

IBA-Course-Registration-Blues

One whole week of going to West Wharf, a place hundreds of light years away from my home, while fasting in this surprisingly hot week of August and going to field work to slums, hospitals, etc, made me desperately wait for that one Saturday which I could spend at my discretion.

  

But, it seems like IBA doesn’t like that idea. The course registration was supposed to take place on that very Saturday morning starting at 8 am. But what I call course registration here actually means…

...Waking up with sleepy, swollen eyes on a Saturday morning :’(…

...Refreshing the URL bar of your internet browser again and again and again for four continuous hours to find error messages of various kinds…

...Exchanging sms’s, talking to friends on the phone and discussing each others experiences with the system…

...Reading Facebook status uploads by fellow-ERP-victims, sympathizing with them and feeling better …

...Feeling that you have been placed in an unfair marathon – one missed course and there you see your perfectly orchestrated timetable burning to ashes.

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And after five hours of indescribable tension, frustration and failure – the whole system crashes totally. And we get to know that we will have to relive this e-nightmare again some day soon, and the very thought of it makes me want to return back to the traditional ink and paper and to escape IBA-Course-Registration-Blues!

IBA 'blues'

Event : Seminar on Osteoporosis followed by Iftar, at Marriott - for Free!

Assalaam o Alaikum All! :)

Good news for you! :) I am sure you must have heard of osteoporosis. Have a look at the diagram...

Since prevention is definitely better than cure, especially when it comes to health, proper education about how our bodies work, what happens in them when we age and how we can go about it to prevent greater loss.

Luckily, Novartis is arranging a seminar on Osteoporosis at Marriott on September 4, 2010 (Saturday). It will begin about at 5:30 and will be followed by Iftar, and that too for free!

People above 50 are invited. Also, they can be accompanied by people who they live with such as the their child or spouse. Let me know if any one you know who might be interested at my email address which is maryam_zahoor[at]hotmail[dot]com.

Land Mafias in Karachi thank God for the Floods in Pakistan

The floods that have been devastating for millions in Pakistan have delighted some people too – the land mafias.

Since, I live in Karachi, the capital of Sindh, one of the four provinces of Pakistan, I am getting to hear and even witnessing cases where land mafias are grabbing vacant property strategically.

The situation is that people from the flood-struck rural parts of Sindh are migrating to non flood-struck areas. Karachi, specifically has received probably the most number of such migrants. Now, those migrants who are still in search of residences are being used by land mafias. By land mafias, I mean people who have the experience of unrightfully grabbing/seizing other people’s property – apartments, bungalows, land plots, etc – and are backed by some kind of political power. Such mafias are simply breaking into vacant houses and inviting flood migrants to stay in them, pretending that the house is theirs or of some one they know. Such incidents are happening specifically in housing projects where a large number of apartments/ bungalows are vacant.

Yesterday only, a family friend’s vacant apartment got grabbed. When he went to check it like he did once or twice a week he found it was locked from inside!!! When he knocked, he discovered two women inside who, when hushed out, left immediately only slip into another apartment on the same floor which apparently too was being used these by migrants. Later on, they found out that 22 vacant apartments of the very same flat have been broken into. It was very easy to do so because most of the houses in that project are vacant and there is no union council which could have kept a check on what is going on and could have prevented this from happening.

Even in the presence of such unions, land mafias do grab property either because the union isn’t resource-able enough in terms of political contacts to drive the land grabbers away or because of their lack of motivation to do so – meaning that, the property owner isn’t offering them any monetary incentive to help him/her vacate the house. However, if the union is motivated to help and has political backing, it can make things difficult for the land grabber. But again, intrinsic motivation and political backing are very hard to find together!