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Overcoming adversity and reopening schools in Swat

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As one travels, on the highway, from Peshawar to Swat, the lush green fields, dotted with tall poplar trees, appear breath-taking, and gradually the silhouette of the mountains become visible. The low-lying mountains gain height and the sound of water springs, gushing from the crevices of rocks create a melancholic music. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="590"] Photo: Sameera Rashid[/caption]   On a winding road from the Chakdara to Mingora, people are seen crossing the clear waters of river Swat, on makeshift bridges, and plum trees with delicate pink flowers bloom on the roadside orchids. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="590"] Photo: Sameera Rashid[/caption] Not only does Swat cast its spell on visitors with its wide towering mountains, whose peaks are half-hidden by curls of mists, but also another element of surprise is the mushroom growth of schools, both for girls and boys, in the Swat valley. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="590"] Photo: Sameera Rashid[/caption] The construction boom of schools in Swat belies the image of a war-ravaged region, infested with militants, where schools are routinely bombed by the Taliban militants, and where school girls are shot for speaking about female education. But the truth is that in the aftermath of the military operation, which was launched in 2009 to reclaim the area from militants, the people of Swat are seen eagerly sending their children, including girls, to the English medium schools being built with generous foreign donor funds. To understand what has triggered the school boom in Swat, I visited Fiza Ghat Sangota Presentation Convent, which had been blown to pieces in 2008 by Taliban militants for providing western education to girls and for acting as a centre of Christianity. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] Photo: Sameera Rashid[/caption] After the partial reconstruction work, the school was re-opened in 2012. Some parts of the school, however, such as the gymnasium and auditorium are still under construction. As I took round of the school, beautiful girls, smartly dressed in their uniforms, with their hair neatly tied in ponytails, sang poems, in Urdu and English, with full gusto and enthusiasm. The younger girls synchronised their hand movements animatedly to convey the meaning of the poems. The students of the middle and senior sections were perfectly fluent in English. The school principal, Sister Greta Gill, explained that when the girls are admitted in the nursery section, they can only converse in Pashto, but gradually, they become fluent in both Urdu and English. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="337"] Photo: Sameera Rashid[/caption] The classrooms were visually pleasing and tastefully decorated with artwork, maps, murals, stuffed toys and models of stars, comets and planets. The windows were not draped with curtains, as is the practice in all schools, and you could view the misty clouds hanging low over mountain peaks right outside the class windows. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] Photo: Sameera Rashid[/caption] When I asked the girls in ninth grade about their career aspirations, all of them replied in a chorus that they wanted to become doctors. However, as I prodded a little more, three girls added, after some hesitation that, they want to become army officers, and one chipped in, to my utter surprise that, she wished to become a cricketer like Shahid Afridi. So, apart from the conventional vocation of medicine, some girls were also striving to enter male-dominated professions. Then, I put another question to the class, I asked if they liked Malala Yousafzai and, surprisingly, the class echoed with a resounding

“No.”
Unable to believe their response, I asked the girls to raise their hands if they didn’t like Malala, and, 28 girls, in a class of 32, raised their hands. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] Photo: Sameera Rashid[/caption] Then I asked them to explain why they felt this way about Malala – a daughter of the soil and a global symbol of resistance to Taliban tyranny and misogyny.
“She likes Obama, so we dislike her,” said one girl. “She is using her story to earn money,” answered another.
Considering the fact that the Taliban militants have put the girls of Fiza Ghat Sangota Presentation Convent under great ordeal by bombing their school, the anti-Malala narrative of the students mirrored the narrative of Taliban against Malala. They felt that she was pandering to western interests and bringing a bad name to Pakistan. The joviality and confident demeanour of the Swati girls had taken me by surprise, but their anti-Malala sentiments, had also left me flabbergasted. Still perplexed, I turned to Sister Greta Gill, the moving spirit behind the re-building and renovation of school. She had shifted to Swat from Rawalpindi, before the school opened in 2012, and began the admission process under the shade of trees. I personally witnessed her taking care of her students just like any doting mother would – a mother who took pride in their achievements. Sister Greta said,
“The people of Swat are socially conservative, and parents, especially mothers, are not educated; so, the girls are brought up on the ages-old anti-colonial narrative, which, in a way, echoes the Taliban narrative. We are unable to counter that narrative at the school, as the Taliban militants, whose leader Mullah Fazlullah operates across the border in Afghanistan, and still scouts the area, sending us intimidating messages. Therefore, we keep mum about the Taliban and Malala Yousafzai and remain focused on our educational activities.”
Meeting the girls of Presentation Convent Sangota was inspirational. It re-affirmed my belief in the resilience of human spirit to overcome adversity and also opened my eyes to the insatiable quest of the people of Swat to educate their daughters. But to defeat the Taliban on the ideological front, the meta- narrative of Pakistani society, which is built on the so-called ideology of Pakistan, also needs to change state by state.

10 things my 3-year-old taught me this summer

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Summer vacations always bring out an all-new, never-known-before side to kids. Some days are filled with frantic fire fighting and others are just an awe struck pause at what these little ones are capable of. The absence of a school routine and the luxury of designing their own days brings all sorts of surprises. Here are some fun rules I observed this summer: 1. If you haven’t used your toothbrush as a tummy scrub, you’re under utilising its potential. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="350"]fail animated GIF Photo: Giphy[/caption] 2. Lessons in Physics: All balls, when are thrown upwards towards the ceiling, bounce back. Except the play dough ball. And the second play dough ball. And the third one too. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="320"] Photo: Tumblr[/caption] 3. If you can’t break into an incurable, contagious and uncontrollable giggles right in the middle of a crying spell, that’s just downright sad! [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="303"] Photo: Mashable[/caption] 4. If you take less than five seconds to forget what you were fighting over with your friend and suddenly jump to making new plans with them, you’ll end up being friends with them for a long time. This doesn’t apply to parents though. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="256"] Photo: Neogaf[/caption] [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="200"] Photo: Neogaf[/caption] 5. Let the older kids negotiate snacks, junk food, parties and what not. Just use that time to grab whatever spoils they’ve left unattended. Once they’ve negotiated, just demand your share and both ends shall be secured. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400"] Photo: tumblr[/caption] 6. In times of parent trouble, head straight for the grandmother’s room, right under the quilt - stay there for as long as possible and  you’re safe! [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="200"] Photo: Tumblr[/caption] 7. When bored, just shout ‘lizard’ or ‘spider’ and run screaming in whatever direction you want to take the kiddie train to follow. Improvise ahead. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500"] Photo: tumblr[/caption] [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="325"] Photo: tumblr[/caption] 8. Monsters do exist and it is up to you to take them down whenever, wherever and however. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500"] Photo: Tumblr[/caption] 9. No matter what the adults believe, the world under the dining table and the bed is REAL. Just make sure you have the invisible safe with you for all times when the usual becomes boring. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500"] Photo: Mashable[/caption] 10. Most importantly, you need to perfect the art of faking a hurtful wail for times when all else fails. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500"] Photo: tumblr[/caption] [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="150"]angry dance Photo: Mashable[/caption] I am not a fan of summer camps and structured activities during the holiday season. Holidays belong to the little ones as much as school days belong to us. It is much easier involving kids in our activities of the day rather than especially going out of the way to get these little ones enrolled in places like summer camps where they will be kept busy and entertained. Let them explore. Let them create. They find their own ways of entertainment. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="300"]28 Kids Being Idiots Photo: buzzfeed[/caption] Of course there are situations where this doesn’t apply and I respect that. However, I can assure you that there is some pleasure (and long term value) in involving the kids, in small ways, in everyday household chores. Besides helping them discover their interests, it also helps develop a bond between the parents and children, which goes a long way. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="300"]Dizzy Soccer Ball Kick GIF Photo: PBH2[/caption] For times when the house crystal is at threat of being broken, there is always the option of the faithful outdoor world! Let them dig up the lawn, collect snails, water plants, chase monsters or create their own kingdom – mums  are better off looking away lest they find out about the various new species of germs about to enter the house. Ignorance is real bliss here. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="275"] Photo: PBH2[/caption] One important mum lesson I learnt is, no guilt for their boredom. In fact, it is perfectly alright to let them experience boredom here and there. It makes them creative. While they come up with their own new games, we just need to keep an eye on them – which we are wired too well to do anyways. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="300"]Funniest Kid GIFs Ever Gymnastics Photo: pbh2[/caption] [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="280"]Bubble Gum GIF Photo: pbh2[/caption] Kids are pretty good at busting boredom – theirs and ours. And what’s not to handle about a little mess; it’s just some soiled shoes, stinky and sweaty hugs anyway! Oh and let’s not forget the cobwebs from under the beds. That is just part of the everyday life of a mother and it won’t last very long so you know how the saying goes, if you can’t beat ‘em’, join ‘em. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="298"] Photo: Tumblr[/caption] The final day saver is good old caffeine. As long as mum’s supply of caffeine is intact, the summer cannot really go wrong. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500"]Yeah, you may be a coffee addict. BUT IT MAKES YOU FEEL ALIVE. | 28 Problems All Coffee Addicts Will Understand Photo: Pinterest[/caption]


What if your daughter doesn’t want to be a ‘doctor bahu’?

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In a recent conversation with a mother to little girls, I asked her what she had planned for her children with regards to their education. I was merely referring to school choices but she told me, quite categorically,

Matric, FSc and then straight to medical college!”
It seemed quite standard a response for the desi mind-set, but I couldn’t help but wonder. What if they want to do something else? What if they want to grow up to be writers or study hieroglyphics or become physicists or God forbid, singers? What if they hate being doctors? What if they hate studying biology? What if they want to be the next Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy or the next Sana Mir? What if they want to invent something? And most important of all, what if the only reason you want them to be doctors is because you want to get them ‘good rishtas (proposals)’? What is the point of educating a girl with a degree you know she is not going to use? Why are you setting her up to study and survive in a competitive environment, where she is going to have to study for four years for things she’s probably not going to remember if she doesn’t keep studying for another 10 years? Why are you telling her she needs to do well in school, in college, in the entry tests – when the only time she will use her professional degree is when her in-laws will have the sniffles? As a pre-medical student, I got a lot of eye-rolls and shocked expressions when I refused to even sign up for the medical college entrance tests. I was meeting the merit, I could have gotten in, but I refused to register. It was a sad day for a lot of people in my family.
“She’s got so much potential, why doesn’t she want to be a doctor?”
When I chose to study clinical psychology and worked as a teacher, and even after I managed to earn well with my degree, I still often hear detractors wishing that I had gotten a medical degree. I have no idea why. And I’ve stopped trying to figure it out. The formula in our society goes something like this:
‘Remotely intelligent human female with remotely decent grades’ + ‘Must get married soon at a decent child-bearing age’ = Medical degree
A lot of my classmates, who went to medical college, went down the marriage and family route. Many of them didn’t study or work further. I know many women around me who quit their degrees right after college to get married. So their knowledge of medicine is about as equal as my knowledge of biochemistry – very low. Most of these women say they ‘chose’ not to work, which is a choice and I respect that. But let’s be honest here, shall we? How many of us, women who chose to pursue their medical degrees and then quit soon after because the US-returned bachelor was just too good to pass up, actually went ahead to get their degrees knowing that they wouldn’t quit? How many of us actually knew from the very beginning that the only reason they’re studying day and night and cramming up book after book was not to help the cause of humanity as healers but to find a suitable groom? How many of our mothers proudly tell their friends that they’ve found a ‘doctor bahu (daughter-in-law)’ for their son, who will soon be attending all their kitty parties and producing healthy, sturdy sons? In a recent conference held under the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC), it was revealed that about 50% of women, who graduated from medical colleges, never worked. Never worked. At the moment, there are 65,324 female doctors and 8,300 female dental practitioners in Pakistan. Only 50% of these are active healthcare professionals. They studied at the government’s expense, enjoyed the subsidised education, got the government to invest in them, and once it did, once it spent 2.4 million rupees on each student, they decided to spend twice the amount on a designer wedding. Students who get admissions in government medical colleges spend around 100,000 on their degrees. That’s less than a designer dress, less than what you will probably spend on your Thailand honeymoon. That’s a career, a profession, a deserving seat that you just spent on social approval. Educate the women. Make them doctors, engineers, pilots what have you. But don’t make them doctors just so they can bag a good rishta. Don’t force them to become doctors just because a literature, visual arts major, a botanist or a mathematician is a lesser degree, an insult to her credibility as a person and as a woman. Don’t make them doctors just because you need to tell other people that your medical-degree-holder daughter’s greatest achievement is finding the best catch in your sight. Give them an education they can use even from home. Empower them to earn even if they cannot leave their house, empower them enough to play a role in society, to shoulder the responsibility of a citizen in society and raise a family. If you want a medical-degree-holder daughter-in-law, make sure that the questions you ask at the time of meeting the family are topped with,
“Please do assure us, you will work after marriage?” instead of, “I hope your rotis are round and you do not have any fertility issues!”

Living with polio in Pakistan

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“I always wanted to study but my dream to get higher education remained just that, a dream. I was unable to complete my Matric because of my disability. It would pain me immensely to see girls who were with me in school going to college and making something of themselves.”
Maria, while wiping her tears, was discussing the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) government’s new scheme regarding free education for the disabled. Maria is 32-years-old and is a resident of Gulbahar in Peshawar. She was diagnosed with polio when she was one-year-old, soon after she got her polio vaccination. She is currently living with her brother as her parents passed away a few years ago. She told me that she was performing well and is enthusiastic about her studies but broke her right hand thrice during her school days and couldn’t walk properly either. She said that there was no adequately functioning hospital in K-P for polio stricken children at that time.
“My parents had to take me to Lahore for my check-up and that’s when I got my first pair of orthotic shoes. Now they have facilities in local hospitals but the conditions are really bad.”
For Maria and the rest of the disabled people of our nation, living with a disability is very hard since there aren’t any proper facilities or educational prospects for them. According to statistics, there are more than five million people living with some form of disability in Pakistan, with the number of polio patients increasing day by day. Even when people try to curb the disease, their efforts go in vain because they end up being targeted by extremist groups. Due to this, there is a serious security risk for polio workers who want to help the polio stricken children but fear for their own lives as well. Talking about the rising number of children with polio, Maria said,
“I feel unbearable pain when I see the children from K-P helplessly suffering from this virus. I do not want another child to live a life like mine, a life of misery, sadness and grief. I wish I could go door to door and explain to each of the families how important these two drops are for their child’s life. It’s like your child’s life is in your hands and it’s up to you how their future unfolds. What they say about polio drops affecting a person’s ability to produce children in false. They’re just rumours. Children in my family have gotten polio vaccines when they were young and they’ve grown up normally, gotten married and had normal babies.”
Maria has been married twice but it didn’t end up working out both times due to her disability. She said,
“If I were educated enough, I wouldn’t have to rely on anyone right now. Currently, I am working as a substitute teacher at a local school where I get a monthly salary of just Rs5,000, which does not allow me to manage my living expenses alone. Even though I am living with my brother, I understand that he has his own family to support. Occasionally, my sisters help me out as well but I feel reluctant to discuss my needs with them. I wish such schemes were introduced during my time so that I would have been able to get an education and lived my own independent life instead of relying on people.”
There are countless other Marias living a similar life in Pakistan. Our children are our nation’s future. I commend the K-P government for taking such a stand and initiating such a scheme, but now it is time for other provincial governments take note and follow suit. It has come to a point where it is not as much of a choice-based decision as it is need-based. Even though education remains a priority, the underlying problem is the presence of the polio virus and the lack of health facilities present to eradicate it. This month alone, 220 cases of polio have been reported in Pakistan. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), Pakistan is at a “tipping point” as the remaining endemic countries in the world, Afghanistan and Nigeria, have seen a significant decline in the number of cases this year.  The number of cases increases by the hour. Yesterday, Wednesday, October 23, three new cases were reported. Today, on World Polio Day, Pakistan has officially broken its 14-year-old record when it crossed 200 cases. How far is Pakistan from eradicating polio, one might ask? Well, as per the country’s Expanded Programme on Immunisation (EPI), it is estimated to be more than 500,000 children away. This troubling figure is the number of children who have not been vaccinated each year over the past few years for a number of reasons. But there is still hope. WHO Emergency Coordinator for Polio Eradication, Elias Durry, told The Express Tribune, that the county has the capacity work toward a polio-free Pakistan by the end of 2015. He said,
“The upcoming six to nine months are critical.”
As the country is working towards fighting polio and the extremists who are doing their best to halt any hint of progress being made, the need of the hour remains educating people so that polio-infected families to step forward and take the initiative themselves. Provincial governments need to step up immunisation programmes and make sure they are carried out to the end. If that is asking for too much, the least they can do is provide polio workers with necessary security so they can do what the so-called elected-by-the-people-government can do for the people who elected them.

My secret admirer

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The doorbell rang. It was 2pm and I was preparing food for lunch. It was almost time for my 15-year-old son, Omar, to come back from school. Wiping away sweat from my forehead with my left sleeve, I rushed towards the entrance. But there was nobody there; just a small package tied with a red ribbon-flower. I was shocked for a second. It wasn’t any special occasion that I could recall neither was it anyone’s birthday at home or any sort of anniversary. I picked it up. It had my name written on it but the box had no name of the sender. Amazed, I came inside, holding it tightly in my hands and put it aside in my bedroom. Five minutes later, Omar arrived and, in the midst of catering to him and setting the table, I totally forgot to open the gift. I got very busy with my son and his little mischief and so, the whole day passed without me really thinking back to the mysterious gift lying in my room. In the evening, when my husband came home, the first thing he noticed upon entering our bedroom was the package. His suspicions arose the same way mine did, there was no sender name on it and the package contained an expensive women’s perfume! He called me to our bedroom and asked:

“Who sent you this present? Such a nice fragrance!” “I don’t know. There was no name on it.” “Who could it be? Do you have any idea?” “No. All my friends are abroad. And with my parents dead, who else might it be? I can’t think of anyone.” “Very strange!”
Had it been just that one incident, it would have been okay with my husband. But no; that anonymous person kept sending me more gifts – a bouquet, a golden wrist-watch, a bronze purse. Slowly, it began getting on my husband’s nerves.
“Who the hell in this world is sending you these expensive presents?” “I already told you a zillion times, I don’t know. Why don’t you believe me?” “I’ve got a feeling you have some sort of a secret admirer and are refusing to tell me about it.” “What rubbish! You do recall that we married because we are in love, right?” “Yes, but…” “You’re just being insecure, dear. I’m just as curious about these as you are, but I promise, I don’t know who is sending them.” “You’re lying. How is it possible that someone sends you gifts and you don’t even have a hunch?”
Then, out of nowhere, my husband slapped me in the face – this was the first time in my life that I had experienced such an assault. It shook me to my core. I was utterly dumbfounded. My ever-so-loving, kind and gentlemanly husband had turned into a wild beast. I couldn’t bear the pain. It wasn’t my fault that I was getting those gifts. I started crying but my husband turned his back on me in anger. At that moment, my son came into our room, a bit hesitant.
“Daddy, it was me. I was sending those gifts to Mum.” “Don’t try defending your mother, Omar.” “No Daddy, it’s really me. Let me show you all the bills of the gifts I purchased.”
Omar had some papers in his hand. My husband snatched it from him and had a quick look. His expressions changed immediately.
“Mum, I just wanted to tell you that we don’t need birthdays and other stupid occasions to exchange presents. I just wanted to tell you that I love you... I’m sorry, Mum...”

Can the Pakistani education system stop catering to political agendas please?

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The issue of school curriculum has been under discussion in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) for some time now. The 18th Amendment devolved the education sector to the provinces but that has yet to bear fruit, since the leaders who have decided to take up the responsibility of planning a ‘better’ future for the youth of K-P still need to achieve some constructive results. Playing its ‘due’ role, the coalition government in the province wants to change what is being taught to children at schools. The changes desired are within the lines of ‘religious’ and ‘national’ teachings, according to the members. They want chapters on national heroes like Bacha Khan to remain in the textbooks – a reasonable demand as children should be well aware of the country’s history. However, the text on certain personalities has been considered ‘objectionable’. For instance, a chapter on Raja Dahir has been asked to be removed from the textbooks, despite him being an important part of Indo-Pakistan history. Why? History is one of the most important subjects in any curriculum. It helps provide clarity in hindsight and guidance which can only be achieved when all sides of the picture are shown. Deciding between who to make a hero and who the villain is the first problem; this gives a very subjective picture and is likely to be different for every person and community. But by erasing them completely from our textbooks, have we not decided to deprive our children of learning about human variety? It is a fact agreed upon by many that books have the ability to take its reader to places they may not be able to go physically. By teaching students about personalities from not only Indo-Pak history but from the history of different countries across the globe, they can be exposed to a world outside their own, thereby helping them broaden their horizons. There have also been talks of minimising any knowledge based on religions of the minorities in Pakistan. Pulling out the mention of a part of the population from the textbooks does not erase the fact that they are also citizens of our country and that they exist in this world – you cannot isolate a child’s mind in this manner. When a child is growing up, he is gradually acquainted with the people and places around him. This is usually done by parents or guardians who keep repeating relations and names of things to the child. As the child grows older, he is also taught about the name of the street their house is on. All this is taught simply to familiarise the child with his surroundings. But familiarity cannot be confined to their own home. There is a world outside that exists and at some point in their lives, these children will have to face it; keeping them sheltered from dissenting worldviews or leaving them ignorant to important parts of history will make it very hard for them to cope with the advances of the world – advances that have been made after understanding that history shaped them to be the way they are today. And this is where the role of books comes in. Alienating a child from the expectations of the world, depriving him from information that gives him the ability to form his own opinions is very important. If these books, however, betray the naïve trust of a child and only present the lopsided image of the world, no one but the child suffers. Not letting the child understand the difference between various communities, cultures, traditions, people and religion will only detach the child from a reality he deserves to know about. Not understanding this reality and giving the child a foundation of rigidity and conformism in thinking will only breed inflexibility and intolerance. Instead of debating over texts related to religion, national heroes and national villains, we should work on assembling and including text on viruses that are plaguing the nation. Children should be taught about polio, hepatitis, dengue and other viruses. They should be able to understand how to protect themselves and be responsible citizens. They should be taught comparative religious studies, and science and other relevant courses should be taught without a religious tilt. They should be taught to respect every living creature on this planet – they should be taught that there will be different opinions they will come across, but it is our responsibility to respect each one; whether we agree with them or not. The principles of Islam – treating your elders with respect, the old with patience and children with love, regardless of their religious backgrounds, keeping yourself and your surroundings clean, saying no to violence and all the others – should be taught to them. Juxtaposing education with politics is the making of an unjust education system that will churn out graduates with distorted, and even unacceptable, worldviews. The children are the ones who suffer, and by extension, so does the country. Have we not suffered enough already? In Pakistan today, there is no acceptance for minority groups, in fact, many a times they are forced to change their religion or retreat lest they be killed or burnt. In the past we have let a number of successive governments use education as a platform to forward their personal agendas. And we are completely blind if we cannot see the impact it has had on us today. The violence and intolerance that prevails today gives evidence to just this. We let them do this for several years and we are reaping the seeds today. But today, we are in a better position to see what we had to endure, and we must make sure our children and their children do not go through the same. We have to say no to marginalised history. We have to say no to tilted science. We have to say no to learning about one religion only. We have to say no to our education system becoming a victim of politics again and again. Instead of jeopardising our future by poisoning our past, we need to become more aware about what is being taught to our children in school. We need to take a stand and hold our government responsible for advocating intolerance, rigidity and inflexibility. We need to make sure they start from the grass-root level and let our children embrace the world, in all its colours, varieties and glory. We need to protect our children from becoming political guinea pigs.


Aao Parhao – Jo Seekha Hai Wo Sekhao

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As part of a remembrance to Robin Williams, I arranged a showing of Good Will Hunting and invited some school friends over. After the movie ended, one of them remarked on the critical role the protagonist’s teacher and mentor, Prof Gerald Lambeau (played by Stellan Skarsgård), had on Sean Maguire (played by Robin Williams) and his development.

“We didn’t have anyone as dedicated as them. Not even close.”
I had to disagree and thought back to an incident back in March 1991. The phone rang and my mother picked it up.
“Hello, is this the home of Sibtain Naqvi?” a lady asked.
My mother confirmed that it was, but was surprised to know someone was calling her son.
“This is Mrs Zubair, his class teacher. He hasn’t come to school for a week. Is everything alright?”
My mother told her that I have been ill with jaundice and won’t be able to make it for a few more weeks. Mrs Zubair became concerned at the prospect of me missing school for that long and not being able to prepare for the impending final exams.
“Can you please bring him to my home so I can give him lessons there?”
We went to her house in Sea View apartments and, after pleasantries, she gave my mother a sheaf of papers saying that these notes cover what has been done in class in my absence and she will give lessons every week so I don’t fall behind. True to her word she would cover each day’s lesson and patiently sit with me for hours until she was satisfied with my performance. More importantly, she would do it in a welcoming way, asking about my health, preparing the right snacks and making sure I am taking my medicine. In this role she was nurse, teacher, friend, guardian angel and much more. At that time I did not fully realise the enormity of her generosity. As children we cannot comprehend the sacrifices made my adults around us. I never gave any thought to the fact that she had a family of her own and was putting me ahead of others in her life. Today, older and wiser, I feel overwhelmed by the mark her selfless gesture has left on my life. She made me realise that a child’s first mentor and hero is none other than his teacher. A wise man once said that teaching is the noblest profession. The ideals of imparting knowledge, shaping character and giving direction are noble indeed. The great philosophers, the thinkers and writers were mostly teachers in one way or another. Aristotle gave Alexander the Great the vision to conquer the world, not just with the strength of arms but with Hellenic ideals and bridge the east and west. Confucius, John Locke, Henry David Thoreau, Sir Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein are just a few other great teachers that come to mind.On the religious side, the prophets were essentially teachers, albeit divinely inspired. Can anyone deny that Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad were teachers of both moral and social values? Fortunately, I have been lucky to have been taught by some truly outstanding individuals. Mr Ranjit Singh, the Chemistry teacher during my O’Levels, was one. He taught the other section and six months before the exam, my group of slackers and I realised that we didn’t know our acids from our alkalis. As a rule, he didn’t take on students in the middle of the year but we begged him. He agreed but on the condition that we will work twice as hard as any other in his class. Each evening we would troop into his home at Boat Basin and soon we were on our way. Chemistry had always been an unsolvable mystery but, with Mr Singh, it became fun. He would tell us the names of things in Singhalese and talk about life in Sri Lanka. So well did he teach us that a bunch of Chemistry tragics ended up with good grades and to this day you can wake me at 3:00 am and talk about the periodic table, organic chemistry and the ionic structure (copper II sulphate ions are blue). There were many others who influenced me from a young age. Mrs Baseerat was my fifth grade teacher who once in a while allowed us to play a game of antakshri and encouraged a love of classic songs. There was Mrs Khokar, who told me I have a way with words and let me submit my writing assignments in verse. A student once drew an unflattering caricature on the board and she found out. Rather than castigate him, she praised him for his artistic skills and then matter-of-factly told him that she doesn’t care what he draws as long as he does well in studies. There was Mr Samad who had been afflicted with polio in his childhood. He walked with supporting crutches but carried himself with quiet dignity. Mr Samad had a sonorous reading style and in his day would match Zia Mohyeddin for his rendition of Shakespeare. He introduced me to Anglo-Indian literature through RK Narayan’s Malgudi Days and that is a legacy I will pass on to my children. Not all my great teachers were from school though. Mr Humair Yusuf taught me at IBA and with panache converted a grammar class into a ‘Rhetoric and Writing’ one. Business programs usually don’t include discussions on why ‘knight’ is spelled with a ‘k’ but he did it and inspired in us a love for rhetoric and linguistics. The one thing common between them all was their passion for teaching and the sense of wonder they were able to instil in us. The idea was not to become mere authority figures but to engage the students in ways that left a lasting impression. Great teachers are their own masters and not bound by the straitjacketed approach taken by lesser practitioners. For instance, Claude Elwood Shannon, the ‘the father of information theory’ and founder of both digital computer and digital circuit design theory, was also an avid juggler and unicyclist who would go from room to room on a unicycle. A senior professor and researcher told me about a mathematical question he posed to his students and if they solved it he would take a dip in the nearby lake. They solved it and he took the jump. Naked. In the middle of winter, in Scotland. Now that I work with some wonderfully talented academics and teachers at Habib University, I am constantly reminded about how they and their brethren shape the lives of those entrusted to them. Teaching is a calling and the best ones treat it as a sacred trust between them and their young charges. There is no Hippocratic Oath that formalises this relationship but then none is needed. Would you ask a parent to take an oath to nurture their child? As Aristotle said,
“Those who educate children well are more to be honoured than they who produce them; for these only gave them life, those the art of living well.”
No truer words can be said about these people, these heroes. This blog is part of an interactive campaign called Aao Parhao – Jo Seekha Hai Wo Sekhao (Come Teach – Teach All That You Have Learnt); a Call-to-Action to help change the future of Pakistani children, launched by the Express Media Group in collaboration with Ilm Ideas. So join us, by reading, watching and telling us what you think. To be part of the Aao Parhao movement, please visit our website, like our Facebook page, and follow us on Twitter at to get regular updates about all our activities, learn about teaching opportunities and share the stories of inspirational teachers. [embed width="620"]http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2c2rbp_aao-parhao-theme-song-rahat-fateh-ali-khan_music#from=embediframe[/embed]

This was not revenge, this was murder without mercy

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From today, we can no longer be divided into groups and raise slogans for politicians. Today, we need to join hands and stand together as Pakistanis for the future of this nation. The ‪‎Peshawar attack is another brutal example of the heinous criminals that infest our nation. As the death count rises, we are counting the bodies of dead children. Dead children, for God's sake. There is no excuse for this brutality. There is no excuse for this infamy. There is no excuse for anyone to even consider fighting for anything other than the Pakistan that 132 families sacrificed their future generations for today in the attack on a school. They have given a sacrifice that should never have been asked for. Now, we must honour their sacrifice and eliminate the organisers, attackers, supporters and their financiers from our soil. We must take this as a declaration of war by the terrorists on ‪‎Pakistan. They have launched a cowardly attack on our children; we must return it with the brutal force that our military possesses. We must deliver from the air and the ground, until the mountains of the tribal areas flow with the blood of the terrorists. We must avenge these deaths without restraint and without mercy. This is not a time for questioning. This is not a time for consideration. This is a time for action, fierce military action, no matter if it means crossing the border into Afghanistan to take out the hideouts and safe havens within that country. We can no longer be just Pakistani. We can no longer be just Muslims. We can no longer stand with politicians until this problem is removed from our soil. We must transform. We must rise. We must fight against the cancer that has invaded our land and taken our loved ones. We must avenge the deaths of the 148 souls that were lost two days ago, just for going to school. We must rise... better, stronger. It was 5am here in Karachi and the day was filled with sadness, anger and reflection for me, as I am sure it was for many of my fellow Pakistanis and human beings around the world. Throughout the day, there were lulls when we Pakistanis were alone with our families and ourselves, in a time of quiet reflection, as the television continued to flash the gruesome images of the carnage that happened in Peshawar at ‪the ‎Army Public School (APS). Dead children scattered around school grounds, in classrooms and cafeterias, like they were waste to be thrown away. No, they were not waste. They were lives of future generations that were lost because people can't get beyond themselves to fight what is staring us in the face. There are many who are taking great joy in pointing out on various international newspaper websites, that ‪‎Islam is to be blamed for this violence, forgetting that hundreds of thousands of ‪Muslims have condemned these actions since 9/11. No, they haven't forgotten. They choose to be wilfully blind to our statements. We can never condemn it enough for them to listen or understand. No, they are blind to the carnage in whatever form, they are deaf to the cries of families mourning the loss of their loved ones and they are dumb in every sense of the word. There are many who are taking great joy in the carnage that was carried out because they call it "revenge" for the North Waziristan military campaign. They are pretenders of Islam, not real Muslims in any shape or form. But our condemnation of them falls on deaf ears as they are the same breed as those taking joy in relating Islam to terrorism. Both of these groups share a similar position that is significantly different from where a human being would stand. Murder in any form is murder. You can cloak it in any language, wrap it in any faith and present it however you wish - it is still murder. These groups have a shared misunderstanding that Islam is a religion of war, hate and violence. Both do everything they possibly can to make sure that everyone else hears them above all else. They are more important than the dead children's bodies. They are more important than the families that mourn. They are more important than humanity. They are more important. And then there are those who are broken in their hearts, minds and souls trying to understand what these poor children did to deserve this brutality. They were not part of any war. They were not carrying weapons. No, the only uniform they wore was one issued by their school and the only weapon they carried were the textbooks that would guide them out of darkness and into light. But let's be honest with ourselves. The attack was not revenge for the North Waziristan military operation. No, this was a continuation of the carnage that Pakistanis have lived with since 2005. The carnage that has taken 70,000 innocent Pakistani souls from their families, their friends and their country's future. They were not wearing uniforms. They were not carrying weapons. No, they were innocents just like the children that were murdered in Peshawar. They were not fighters. They were not warriors. They were not enemies of anyone. And today, you are celebrating their death with your statements. You are dancing on their fresh graves, washed in the tears of their families, because you are more important than these 132 innocent souls that are gone. So please go back to professing your hate. Go back to spreading your lies. Go back pontificating on things you have no understanding of. Go back to your self-contained world where only you matter. The rest of us, those who still cling to humanity, we are calling it murder because anything else would just be inhuman.



Lub pay aati hai dua bann kay tamanna meri

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On December 16, 2014 The Express Tribune blogs desk received many submissions from grief stricken people from all over Pakistan. These people wanted to show their solidarity with the families of the victims. They wanted to mourn the deaths of the students and teachers from the Army Public School, who were brutally massacred by the TTP in Peshawar. Due to shortage of space, we were unable to accommodate many, but we understood that this was a traumatic event in which every Pakistani’s protest should be recorded. So, this post was created as a window for people to come together and participate in this protest against terrorism. It was created for people to be able to voice their shock, protest, grief and condolences. The following are 10 entries we received that we thought summed up the feelings of most of us out there; while these only represent a small amount of the actual submissions we received, they convey the same message – that of grief, sorrow and a nation plunged in misery. Join us in recording our protest against terrorism. Join us in standing strong with the families of the victims. Join us in putting up a united front. Join us in being Pakistani. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="450"] RIP Asad Aziz. Photo: Facebook[/caption] The Diary of Sheroo from Peshawar   I have surpassed all the ordeals of my life, the unwavering pangs of anxiety which loitered around me a day before the exams have somehow receded. The pen that I am still holding is drenched with red, it writes in red too. I need to make Ms Asma proud but she is nowhere to be seen. But I do see Ali, Shahrukh and Habib in the near distance; trying to ensconce themselves into the laps of their numb parents. I had always loved writing and Ms Asma adored my brief essays. But the mere absence of paper at this very moment has insisted me to grapple the piece of a torn pocket from Gul’s shirt. It has my school’s monogram similar to the one I made in my notebook, a little asymmetrical. The last time this pen touched paper, I vividly remember it poured blue ink. Today, it bears red and it is a testament of the efforts I should be exerting as per Ammi’s wishes,

“Dil laga ker kaam kia kero” (Work hard with all your heart)
Therefore, I am writing this today, to my parents, with all my heart and soul. Something sharp and uncannily metal-like entered my ravenous cave of a stomach, piercing it open. All the while I swayed in the day dreams of the sandwiches I forgot at the dining table this morning. I was rooted to the ground, mortified to death and shut my eyes while hot tears seared my face. It has happened more times than I can count; I usually forget my lunchbox but never have I cried. But this day is different. As I open my eyes, a blinding iridescent light whispers in my ears,
“You will never die, you are a martyr.”
Now you explain to me – Ms Asma taught us about the martyrs in the battlefield last year in Grade One. How can I be labelled as one in my classroom? I didn’t know that my classroom was a battlefield too… Here comes my mother. She looks frailer than usual. Mother has been wailing besides the motionless body, clutching the lunchbox I had left on the table. I have been trying to reassure her through the red I am writing with,
“Dear Ma, I am a martyr. You should be grateful to the veiled maverick who barged in to my class this morning and chose me for the gift that entered my belly.”
Yet she wails and continues repeating,
“Mere Sheroo ka kia kasoor tha?” (What was my Sheroo’s fault?)
Ma just keeps crying. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] RIP Aimal Khan. Photo: Facebook[/caption] Animals   With tears streaming down my face, I write of things we can’t replace. Humanity, was killed yesterday, For the thousandth time, in the thousandth way.   When powers created monsters within, Why didn’t they ever pause to think? When rabid dogs begin to grow, They will bite every master and foe.   When morning came yesterday, and they awoke, They left their parents, with love and jokes, Every soul, a little precious pearl, Our future hopes, each boy and girl. Merrily they rode to make futures bright, Educating their minds, lighting the night.   Who knew some beasts wanted their souls, Those cowards who live like rats and moles. How much lower can you get? You take lives with no regret.   Butchery of every kind and type, You sacrificed for Satan our youth so ripe, But you forget that there’s a God Who’s marked your doom with a branding rod. You go to extremes, amusing devils around, In life and death to miseries you’re bound.   And now whenever you return to Him, Each second of eternity will be grim, You’ll burn like torches with fire so strong Your cries of help will be sweet songs,   Those parents whom of kids you deprive, Will curse your existence till they are alive. Each heart bleeds for the loss of flowers, Those shining faces who laughed for hours.   I hope they get to heaven soon, No fear of wolves preying at noon. We say we are free but today we know, Behind this facade let’s throw.   We can’t be free till we kill all worms. Each virus we bred, all living germs. Let’s realise we are the reason we fell, Those innocent lives request us to tell, Their stories in the red light of truth, That pain of slaughter, nothing can soothe.   Their bravery gives us hope and chance. Let’s stand together on this one stance. Let’s not blame God, the world or fate. Let’s amend ourselves before it’s too late. Because of our mistakes we lost those lives. Let’s not give beasts anymore knives. I wasn’t scared   As always, I woke up early in the morning, resisting the alarm that was parting me from my warm bed. I complained about not getting enough sleep but when I opened my sleepy eyes, I realised just how glorious the morning looked. My mama’s gorgeous face marked the beginning of my day. What a beautiful day, I thought. She rushed here and there to make sure I get everything I would need in school today. While combing my hair, she gave me a kiss on the forehead and prayed for my success. She forgot to pray for my well-being that day, I guess. My friends, my gang, waited for my arrival in the school bus. As always, we began playing and laughing, and the bus driver, as usual, turned around to yell at us to keep it down and not distract him. He told us to sit quietly with our seatbelts on because the traffic was dangerous. But we believe he secretly enjoyed our chattering, so sat down, but we didn’t stop – not until we got to school anyway. In school, more friends joined in and the laughter continued. It doesn’t take too much to make us happy. We love our friends, our parents, our siblings, our teachers and our school. Especially our friend – so you can imagine that laughter was an inevitable accompaniment. But today, our laughter was disturbed by frightening sounds. Kind of like the nightmare I had. You remember that, mama? My nightmare, the one I woke you and baba up for in the middle of the night? The sound was like that. My heart started racing and all I could see before me now was monsters. They looked angry and they didn’t want us to laugh. They wouldn’t have used those machines in their hands to hurt us if they liked laughter. I was very scared. We were all very scared. I stopped laughing so they would stop frightening me. I hid under my school bench. We were known as the heroes of our school, my friends and I. But today I was scared of my school. And that sound. I stopped moving so they wouldn’t notice. But they did. And then they came for me. I tried to scramble away, I kicked and punched, I cried and wailed but they held me down. And then… and then I wasn’t scared anymore. They put the scary machine straight on my heart but I wasn’t scared. I heard that frightening sound again, but I wasn’t scared. Pain seared through my body, but I wasn’t scared. And I left a mark on them. It is a red mark on both their hands. Now you will be able to identify them. I am safe, don’t worry about me. And I know you must be asking yourselves some questions again and again like,
“Why did they do all this? What did they actually achieve?”
But I have figured it all out. They tried to scare us. But we weren’t scared. You don’t be scared either. Just don’t be scared. That’s all they want. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="533"] RIP Hamza Ali Kakar. Photo: Facebook[/caption] One of the 141   Today, she wakes up to silence. It’s 6:45am and this is usually the most frenzied part of the day. Between packing lunch to tying Farhan’s laces and the search for his misplaced copies; she did not have a minute to waste. But today, it is different. There is no frenzy; no anticipation of the van driver honking at the gate; no morning rush to get Farhan ready to be on time. Farhan was her son, her first born. Farhan is dead; one of the 141. Today, he wakes up to shock. Farhan was his class fellow; his play mate and his best friend. They had shared countless memorable moments together. From playing cricket to exchanging notes in the classroom to running around ringing neighbours’ bells; a flood of memories came to haunt him and he knew these memories would haunt him for the rest of his life. He was spared because he was in the bathroom while Farhan was attending the training at the auditorium. He wishes he was dead too. He wishes he was with Farhan. He wishes that he does not have to go to school again; he wishes he does not have to see that empty desk beside him. Farhan is dead; one of the 141. Today, he wakes up to anguish. This is the time Farhan used to come to his room to bid him goodbye. He would hand him over his daily pocket money. It was Farhan’s secret stash; the one he got daily from him, without the knowledge of his parents. Farhan was his grandson; the eldest and most special. There is no one to ride on his shoulders now; no one left to call him “Dada Jan”, no one to massage his legs at night. Farhan is dead; one of the 141. Today, she wakes up to relief. She has been married for over five years but has been unable to conceive. She has prayed; held vigils and pleaded to God to grant her a baby. But today, she wishes her prayers are never heard. She doesn’t want to bring a child into a world which is so utterly dark and scary; where children are killed while they study; where mothers have to lose their children as ‘collateral damage’. She is Farhan’s neighbour and she is happy for the wish that was never granted. Farhan is dead; one of the 141. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] RIP Mubeen Shah. Photo: Facebook[/caption] I bleed a million tears   How many more before they say no more? How many more before they say we fold?   How long do we wait for this to be over? How long do we wait for us to be sober?   We lost it, yet we fight, the unknown, the killers. We lost it, yet we hope, the sunshine, the rainbows.   The blood that rains, the smoke that prevails, Is yet to find me, is yet to find you. How long can we dodge the bullet? How long can we survive the shelling?   The sorrow of terror is hollow, Like the hope that we give and take. It’s just a matter of luck, That we are safe, for a few days.   I hear the bombardment, in my head, Of a thousand exploding thoughts, for those who are dead. You call them martyr, you call them heroes, I call them legends from books of the un-dead...   Is God silent or teaching us a lesson? Maybe it’s Satan, in for a bloodbath. Wake up before Satan gets to your homeland, For him, no religion is holy neither is any land.   Muslims, Christians, Jews, Hindus, all bleed the same, And so do those who are killing them in vain. Then how can you choose by skin colour, Who is to die, who is to suffer?   Every time I see them die, I cry a thousand words, I bleed a million tears, yet I am insensitive to the pain I feel. It’s worse than the massacre itself, for I fear an absence, Of tears and words and blood, the next time I see them die.   Stop it all, for we have nothing more to offer. Stop it all, for we all are human. Stop it all, for we all are children of God. Stop it all, for we all are broken. Stop it all, for we all are broken. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] RIP Umer Hayat. Photo: Facebook[/caption] I dreamt of a future   I dreamt of a future when I was eight, I dream of one now, still the same.   Where there is one God and only one, And in His name we don’t kill and burn,   Where for every child there is a home, A place to live, a place to learn.   Where children are safe from the evils of today, Murder, terror, rape and dismay.   The day we’re not afraid anymore, Of everything in our hearts and outside our doors.   A time we see men as men, And learn to live, to coexist again.   When women are not objectified, Hurt, sold and sacrificed.   I dreamt of a future when I was eight, Innocent, naïve, I bowed and I prayed. An ode to the victims of Peshawar   The sun was fine, with a good shine. It was another day, which I thought would simply pass away.   I left my house, dressed for school, Not to forget, I was my parents jewel.   I met my mates; we were having a good time. After all, we were all in our prime.   With plans to enjoy and have some fun, Who knew, how fast this time would run.   Suddenly, things took a steep turn, And everything around us began to burn.   All I could hear were gun shots being fired, What animal had all this conspired?   As world closed in, things got blurred, No one knew what hell had occurred.   We ran around, trying to find places to hide, But there was no one who could guide.   My friends, my colleagues and my mates, Had already started facing their cruel fates.   They lay there dead, in the pool of their own blood, Never had I imagined such a red flood.   I hid behind a desk with my eyes closed, But soon a devil with black boots approached.   He found me alive and then he stared, I swear to God, never had I been so scared.   Then there was another noise, And a sudden cold in my spine took away all the joys.   I could feel the pain but my mind was in chaos, As I thought of my parents back at the house.   I fell down and there I lied, Was there anything that I could have tried?   Things got dark and I closed my eyes, I guess there would be no goodbyes.   The security forces and the rescue teams, Would soon come in with their fancy beams.   They will fight the devils with rage and hate, But sadly, for me, it is too late.   The sun has set, and now people would cry, But did I really have to die?   I came to school to be empowered to rule, But boy, was I a fool. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] RIP Muhammad Yaseen. Photo: Facebook[/caption] Because I went to school   I am dead today, Because I went to school, Where I chose a book and read.   I am dead today, Because I went to school, Where I played with a friend.   I am dead today, Because I went to school, Where I giggled my face red.   I am dead today, Because I went to school, Without knowing that it was my end.   I am dead today, Because I went to school, In this land, where you now stand. If only we could…   No words, or any act, can describe the devastation that our nation is going through. The loss is irreversible, and the pain too irremediable. But we can all contribute a little to the cause in memory of those little souls. These are some of the words I wrote in an effort to capture my sentiments, after yesterday’s horrific incident. Just a gesture through which I could contribute… a little. If words could bleed, If thoughts could impede, If only our souls could do justice to the creed.   If our agony could calm the sinister wave, If our teardrops could replace the blood they crave, If only our conscience could be less shallow, less concave.   If we could gag our ears to the sounds of the cry, If we could muffle our hearts in order to defy, If only we could hear the pain in that last goodbye.   If those screams could ape, If the shade, the desolation could escape, If only we could see those faces beneath a doused drape.   If we could hold that face in our hands, If we could let lose all faith, all strands, If only we could know how it feels to let go of the last hope that stands.   If we could see the teardrops getting dried, If we could realise how much she waited, with arms open wide, If only we could know how much she disproved and denied.   If we could smell his blooming blood, If we could see how fears rouse, and nightmares flood, If only we could know when folds the celestial bud.   If we could see the sun turning red, If we could save the pearls that fell off the thread, If only we could know the pain of burying the things that were left unsaid.   And if words could bleed, If thoughts could impede, If only and only our souls could do justice to the creed. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="466"] RIP Rafiq Bangash. Photo: Facebook[/caption] And the sky rained blood...
  “Wake up beta, wake up or I’ll tell your dad,” said my mom as she tried her best to wake me up for school.
Handing me over to my father was a sign of her giving up on me. My father deals with matters according to his mood and he isn’t a morning person. I didn’t want to take this risk early in the morning so I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes and made an extra effort to leave the comfort of my warm bed on a chilly December morning. As I walked out of my room, dressed for school, my mother looked at me lovingly with her big black eyes. I always wondered what struck a chord of happiness within her seeing me in my uniform; I thought my uniform was drab. And just like every other teenager, I used to ignore that look as much as I could. She kissed me on my forehead and I left for school. I didn’t have breakfast as an ongoing protest for being woken up too early for school. I reached school ten minutes late. This was a tradition for me in order to avoid the morning prayers. Walking towards my class, I was thinking about the comfort of my bed,
“If only I could have stayed home today”, I thought to myself.
When I reached my class, my teacher informed me that there were to be no lectures today because of a security drill taking place in the auditorium.
“Great!” I thought – sleeping in the auditorium was far more comfortable than sleeping in class.
I was sitting in the auditorium with my eyes shut, trying to sleep. Students from other grades were standing around, chatting away noisily, and disturbing my attempts at sleeping. All of a sudden, there was shouting and screaming, my eyes snapped open and I saw some students locking the auditorium door while others rushed to hide under desks. Right after, I saw the auditorium door being broken down and men dressed in black rushing into the hall. They began firing. Confused and afraid, I managed to sneak my way under a chair and tried to keep quiet, although I wanted to cry and run home to my parents. I must’ve pinched myself a million times to make myself realise I wasn’t having a nightmare. Some seconds later I saw one of the men dragging our teacher by her hair and shouting something about vulgarity and shame, and then he set her on fire. She burnt to death in front of my eyes; then they did something I never expected, they told students to recite the kalma and they began shooting them – my friends, my classmates. I shut my eyes, fearing I would be next. As soon as I closed my eyes, I was in my happy place, I saw my mother’s face, her big black eyes looking at me with all the love in the world, telling me to keep myself together, to pray to Allah (SWT)for forgiveness and to never lose hope. I began feeling numb in my legs; I was shot, probably when the terrorists were entering the hall. I was happy yet sad. Happy because this torturous ordeal would end soon for me and sad because life was over too soon for me. I tried my best to not think about my mother at that time because I knew she wouldn’t want to see me in this state. So I just closed my eyes and starting humming the Morning Prayer that I’d dreaded so much all my life.
“Lub pay aati hai dua bann kay tamanna meri, Zindagi shamma ki soorat hou khudaya meri, Door dunya ka mere damm se andhera hojaye, Har jaga mere chamaknay say ujala hojaye” (From the lips comes a prayer in the form of a desire My life should emulate a candle, Oh God. Lift the worldly darkness due to my efforts. Every place should be enlightened by my light)

Dear Arham, I will never forget the last day you went to school…

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To my dear brother Arham, My Arham, that day, before you left for school, I remember seeing a vibrant smile on your face. It was as if you were excited for the day to come. I miss that smile now. I think about how energetic and cheerful you were that day. I still remember how, in the car, you kept going on and on about playing video games with Zawar and kept boring me with your chatter. I would give anything to hear you speak now. When Abbu dropped you to school, I remember how you rushed to pick up your bag and ran excitedly to class. You were so full of energy. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="533"] Photo: Shaheer Khan[/caption] You were always so nice to everyone around you. I keep thinking of how you remembered all of our birthdays and prepared special gifts for us days before they were due. You loved us all equally. Ami says that the night before that day, you came downstairs just to bid all of us a goodnight. Maybe you knew you were going to leave us soon... I remember how you loved playing warfare games, like the Call of DutyCrysis and Battlefield. You wanted me to play Crysis because you believed it was ‘action packed’ – but I never played it. I am going play it now. I’ll play it again and again, little brother. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] Photo: Shaheer Khan[/caption] This morning I went to your class. It was empty. There were school bags placed on empty seats and each bag had a page with the name of the owner written on it. Your teacher cried when she showed me your seat. She said that you sat in front of her, in the front row of the class. She really loved you, Arham. I could tell from the look on her face and from her tear-drenched eyes that she really loved you. Everybody loved you, Arham. Everybody loved you because you loved everybody too. I heard Madam Qazi showed profuse bravery and saved the children, Arham. You know, she had asked me to do a presentation on career options for intermediate students. She had asked me twice but I didn’t do it. Why was I being so lazy?! Why couldn’t I have just done this small task for her? I wish I had. While I was passing by the administration area of our school with Ammi, I could smell a certain fragrance in the air. Ami could smell it too! The scent was something that I had never smelt before. I could tell that it was not an ordinary, earthly smell, but I couldn’t find where it was coming from. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="338"] Photo: Shaheer Khan[/caption] I know you are happy up there with Allah (SWT). I always pray after Isha prayer and ask Him to let you talk to me in my dreams. Even if it is just once. At least once. You should talk to me. Abu and Ami need it. I need it. We know you are okay, but I just want to hear you say it. Take care of your friends there. I can imagine how festive the air around Jannat must be right now, I am sure you lit up the sky with your presence. Allah (SWT) must be so happy that such innocent and brave souls are now near Him. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="338"] Photo: Shaheer Khan[/caption] Take care of yourself, Arham. I miss you. And please talk to me in my dreams just once. Please. Just once. At least try. Your bhai always, Shaheer PS: The game that you were downloading before you left for school is downloaded now.


Help your child deal with the trauma of #PeshawarSchoolAttack

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What started as a usual day for many school-going children – with the routine hustle bustle of school life, class work, worries about upcoming exams, excitement about the winter holidays and carefree play and discussion with friends – sadly turned into a series of incomprehensible and barbaric acts of terrorism with chaos, injury and death all around. When we, as adults, are still grappling with how and why someone would take young and innocent lives, the shock, insecurity and trauma the children will be experiencing may be manifold. The acts of terrorism are random, beyond comprehension, a deliberate attempt to harm and leave both children and adults feeling afraid, helpless, numb and insecure. With events so irrational, targeting those who are defenceless, all feelings and thoughts experienced at this time are natural and normal. It is important to remember that what you and your children feel right now are neither abnormal reactions nor a sign of emotional weakness. While different adults and children react differently to traumatic experiences, some immediate normal thoughts and reactions include:

  • Worries about what will happen next
  • Feelings of guilt about one’s own life, ‘continuing with one’s routine’ while ‘others suffer and mourn’, ‘not doing enough’
  • Fear of certain people and places
  • Recurring thoughts about the incident
  • Avoidance of anything (place, people, discussion) that reminds of the incident
  • Constant state of “hyper-vigilance” and “hyper-arousal” i.e. increased sensitivity to sounds, sights, smells
  • Extreme sadness and grief
  • Anger
  • Confusion
Children additionally worry that similar incidents may happen again, a loved one would get injured or killed, they will be separated from their family or that they will be left all alone. In the days to come, depending on how closely the kids were directly affected and exposed to the traumatic event, they may continue experiencing some of the following:
  • Persistent fears related to the event or about similar events
  • Sleep disturbances such as nightmares, screaming during sleep and bedwetting,
  • Loss of concentration
  • Irritability
  • Recreating event (talking repeatedly about it, “playing” the event)
  • Anger
  • Guilt
  • Increased sensitivity to sounds (sirens, planes, thunder, backfires, loud noises)
  • Excessive fear of places, and things
  • Physical complaints (stomach aches, headaches, dizziness) for which a physical cause cannot be found
  • Clingy behaviour
  • Separation anxiety
Adults and parents are often apprehensive about whether to talk to their children or not, and if they do, how much information would be sufficient. They are also concerned about what to say and whether what they say and/or do would be understood by children. Parents and adults can play a critical role in helping children cope better by: Listening to them to:
  • Allow children the space to talk about their feelings through words, play, stories, drawings and the likes. Talking about how they feel will help you address underlying fears and assumptions that are irrational such as,
“I caused the event to happen,” “I should have done something to stop it”.
  • Allow them an opportunity to come up with their own ways of self-care and coping with the issue. Ask them first,
“What can you do about the feelings and thoughts that you have?” “What will help you feel better?” “How can I help you?”
Talking to them to:
  • Normalise their feelings and let them know that it’s okay to feel the way they feel.
  • Answer their questions honestly, in an age-appropriate manner, but without making any false promises.
  • Share your own feelings about the situation. Make sure that you do not over burden the children with your worries and let them know that despite feeling sad or upset, you are still available to listen to them and support them. 
Supporting them by helping:
  • Prepare for similar events in the future. This could include people-to-approach, important contact numbers to remember, places to hide in, and the likes.
  • Maintain a daily routine.
  • Engage in healthy and positive experiences of play and interaction with peers.
  • Monitor children’s television and internet viewing of such events as well as adult discussion around them. The images shown in the media and the insensitive often sensationalised reporting by many television channels can further add to the trauma experienced by these children.
 It is essential that you allow yourself time to process your own emotions and remain as calm as possible while dealing with children, as children tend to react to adults’ fears and anxieties. Seek professional help if you feel that the intensity of the symptoms and effects does not lessen after a few months and/or the feelings continue to overwhelm you or your children and/or there are other previous traumatic experiences which have not been addressed.

As a student in grade 9, I pledge my future to Pakistan – do you?

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On December 16th, around 10am, a group of heavily armed men belonging to the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) stormed the Army Public School and Degree College in Peshawar. These men opened fire and took several students hostage in the main auditorium of the school. The number of casualties is officially reported to be over 140 and more than 180 injured. TTP has claimed this attack to be in retaliation to Pakistan’s military offensive known as Operation Zarb-e-Azb, which started in June, 2014, in North Waziristan. This school was attacked in an attempt to kill the future military potential of Pakistan, in the hopes of establishing superiority. To sum it up, we are living in a world where this sort of a mind-set exists – a world where grown-up men take revenge on other grown-up men by murdering children. When you turned on your TV, this tragedy was plastered everywhere, and still is. When you open Facebook or check Whatsapp, this is the subject of all discussions. When you wake up every morning, the newspaper on your breakfast table bears stories pertaining to this on the front page. You mourn the loss, remember the families in your prayers and maybe even go as far as updating your status about the inhumanity of it all. And as time passes, you come to the sad conclusion that there is really nothing you can do to make up for the lives lost. But think again. I now speak directly to the generation who is still growing up; the generation whose brothers were killed in Peshawar; the generation who sees their cities burn on TV without even understanding why it’s happening – I speak to my generation. It is true that we cannot oppose this sort of evil directly; it is not in our power to launch an armed struggle against it or to shield our people from it. Not yet. But what we can do is train ourselves for a struggle against this evil, and the only way to do this is by educating ourselves, inside and outside of this country, and then put this education to good use in our country. I’m sure many of us have thought of leaving the country for the purpose of attaining higher education and then never returning, settling down in a foreign land, and peacefully dying there. But I urge you to think twice. Maybe this wake up call to the future generation has been voiced one too many times but I voice it out again – your country needs you. It does not need your sympathy or your tears, it needs you. So whatever you decide to pursue, be it medicine, law, humanities, business, science, art or anything in between, use it as means to counter the inhumanity prevailing in our world – the inhumanity we all saw on December 16, 2014. Change is never brought about overnight, and while efforts against fighting evil are being made by the generation currently in power, they will never bear fruit if we don’t stand up and continue their mission. So, mourn the lives lost and pray for their families but don’t let that stop you from going to school and doing what you need to do, because that in itself is the greatest disrespect you can give to the martyrs of Peshawar. On this day, I pledge my future to Pakistan. And I hope you do too.


How I tackled the “Sir, I don’t think Shias are real Muslims” concept

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I started my career as a Religious Education (RE) teacher in September 2013, in a school that has nearly 1500 students ranging from the ages of 11 to 18. Of these, approximately 75% come from a Muslim background. Due to the comments and vitriol usually directed towards Shias, I chose to hide my identity as a Shia Muslim from my class. If my students ever asked me what ‘type’ of Muslim I was, I never felt the need to tell them that I was Shia. I merely insisted that I was just a Muslim – but they were never satisfied with that answer (a reflection of the state of affairs we live in). It was not because I was scared of their reaction but because, as a teacher you always have to think of the wider implications of every decision you make. However, this did not stop the students from sharing what they had been taught to think of the global Shia community.

“Sir, I don’t think Shias are real Muslims.” “Sir, aren’t Shias the ones who cut themselves?” “Shias have some weird beliefs, sir.”
During lessons, whenever the topic of Shia Islam came up, I heard all the regular comments and misconceptions I was already used to hearing. Even though I always corrected them – without revealing that I belonged to the very group they were making these comments about – this led to little change. And while I found this experience very amusing (lesson number one = don’t take comments by your students personally if you are a teacher – you will not survive), I was disturbed at the same time. I did not blame these students for having such views, because they were only repeating what they had been taught. My concern was with the sources from where they were getting this misinformation from. However, ignoring all these things, I continued to concentrate on my teaching and, all praise to God, my reputation amongst my students and peers soon began to rise, and I generally felt well-received by my class. I tried to show my faith through my conduct and manners rather than labelling myself under some umbrella term, and it eventually paid off. Fast-forward to September 2014, and I was (somehow) appointed as head of RE at my school and I was now in-charge of the curriculum, results, teaching and progress of every student who studied RE as well as the staff members who taught this subject. This, coupled with the spiritual boost I received from my visit to Karbala that year during Arbaeen, made me feel more confident about my faith and helped me in gradually displaying my religious beliefs more openly to my students and colleagues alike. I started praying with my hands down, wearing a ring and wristbands with the names of Imam Ali (RA) and Imam Hussain (RA) written on them – which led to many questions – and started taking days off on Ashura and the likes, when the rest of the school’s Muslims would come in regularly. Furthermore, when students asked me whether I was Sunni or Shia, I would give a straight answer, which often led to amusing responses.
“But how sir? You’re normal!” “Wow! I’ve never met a Shia before” “You know what sir? For a Shia… you’re not too bad” “That is so cool sir!”
After telling them about my faith, I would ask them,
“Has that changed your opinion of me?”
And fortunately, with almost every student, the response has been a negative. This helped them to realise that one needs to respect all people, irrespective of belief systems. It was the best decision I ever made. The students began to admire me even more and realised that I was the same person – regardless of whether they knew I was Shia or not. This then, naturally, allowed me to answer questions more directly (of which there were many) and made it easier for me to remove the misconceptions they had. My experience is summed up by a comment two 16-year-old girls made to me a few weeks ago:
“Sir, we’re not going to lie. We have heard some crazy things about Shia Muslims but you have made us realise how normal you are and how many of those things we were told wrong.”
With the position I am in, I have now included the Shia perspective in all parts of the school’s RE curriculum. This discusses Islam holistically – be it Islamic history (we teach about how the Sunni-Shia split happened and Ashura), theology (the concept of the 12 Imams and Ahlulbayt), ethics (Ijtihad and the institution of Ayatollahs), architecture (the shrines of the Ahlulbayt), literature (the Psalms of Islam and The Treatise of Rights by Imam Zainul Abideen) and media (both Ahlulbayt and Safeer TV). The reaction to these topics have been incredible – the students (whether Muslim or not) have had a genuine fascination for learning this side of Islam that they have never come across before. This has led to a level of tolerance in the school that I have never seen before. Yes, it is a little selfish of me to add this to the curriculum, and many would say that I should focus on Islam generally and not go in the sectarian divide, but we live in a world where the words ‘Sunni’ and ‘Shia’ are used so much – in the media and by the people around us – that the young people have become susceptible to negative ideas. They need to know exactly what the difference between Shias and Sunnis is, and not make one the devil and the other, the saint. It is only through the understanding of each other’s beliefs that we can strive for true unity. Shia Muslims are being killed because of misconceptions. I am in a position where I can remove these misconceptions at an early age and where young people can learn about the authentic teachings of different world-views, so that when they leave this school, they leave with religious literacy. Not every religious class has to be one-sided. I do not want the readers of this article to think I am some sort of a Shiite preacher at my workplace. This is the way I approach all subjects I teach. Along with removing ‘Shiaphobia’, my curriculum also aims at removing Islamophobia in general, anti-Semitism and all other forms of prejudice and discrimination towards people of faith or non-faith. As a Muslim RE teacher in a school where the majority of pupils are Muslim, I regard it my duty to remove all hints of intolerance. And today, I am treated as an unofficial Islamic scholar. Muslim students ask me questions about Sunni Islam and other sects whereas non-Muslim students ask me about Islam and other religions. They do not care that a Shia Muslim is answering their questions. They now embrace it. And it is important that these children have a place to get answers to their questions, and if I am able to provide a fraction of what they need, I do not regret my decision one bit. They deserve it and so does Islam. This post originally appeared here.

“If you want to teach here, you have to wear a burqa”

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“You just have to wear a burqa inside the school; you are free to take it off when you leave the school premises,”said the principal of a Karachi-based school while interviewing a candidate. “It’s just a garment,” thought the candidate, and a garment that was helping her get a higher salary than all the other schools.
So she signed the teaching contract and took the burqa home with her. All day at home, that burqa in her bag haunted her. How could she don something all day that represented something she hadn’t fully accepted in her heart? Wasn’t she lying to impressionable children? Wasn’t it hypocritical of her to wear it? Wasn’t it hypocritical of the senior staff at this school to force her to wear something she wasn’t convinced of yet?
“I just take it like a uniform,” said another teacher to her in the teacher’s lounge the next day. “But who am I doing purdah (covering) from?”
She questioned fumbling around with a confusing shroud that overwhelmed her entire being.
“Umm, maybe from the male staff,” said the other teacher. “So why don’t they just hire female staff only then?”
The other teacher thought for a minute.
“Maybe it’s from the students,” she said after a pause. “But my students are younger than five-years-old” “Maybe it’s to show the parents that their children are in good hands,” she offered once again.
She rolled her eyes at the idea that only a person in a burqa is best suited to teach ‘morality’ to kids. Who will teach morality to the burqa-wearing principal who wanted her to don a burqa from 9am to 2pm? But a job is a job, so she wore the burqa like any uniform. After all, it wasn’t like she was teaching at a madarssa or anything. It was a popular school with a good name attended by children from the upper middle class background. How bad could it be? Soon enough, she found out it wasn’t just a uniform. The classes were gender-segregated from grade three onwards and the books had absolutely no pictures. If there were faces, the eyes were all blurred. Children were not allowed to clap, dance or hear music.
“How do I encourage the students when they do something right?” she asked the principal about the ban on clapping. “Just say Alhumdullilah” she replied with great emphasis on the last word. “Can I clap and say Alhumdullilah?” she argued. “There will be no clapping,” the principal said sternly.
The Bismillahs, Alhumdullilahs and MashaAllah were always uttered with an Arabic accent. Montessoris were strange there too – no dolls, action figures or stuffed toys. She could understand not wanting to keep Barbies in the play group as kids learnt negative body image from such toys – but you couldn’t even find cute little baby dollies here. If there was a picture of a pig in a school book, teachers were supposed to skip that page and students were penalised if they said ‘pig’ while looking at the picture of a pig. The letter P was for everything else but ‘pig’. Lord knows how many times her students said ‘pig’ to each other and giggled just because they were told not to. She wondered what would happen to these ‘protected’ and ‘indoctrinated’ children once they graduated from this school. How would they react and respond to pictures of real people, pigs, dolls, clapping, and women without burqas? Would they judge other children for clapping or playing with dolls? Their cousins, friends and neighbourhood kids? How would it feel if she ran into one of her young students and her family at a shopping mall, and she was dressed in her regular jeans and crop top? What would the child think about her? Would she end up teaching and bringing up a tiny Taliban here? That day she handed over her burqa to the school principal.
“My morality and ethics don’t allow me to continue this job,” she said and left the school building.
This post originally appeared here. 

10 reactions students have before the CIE results, explained through Disney

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It is that time of the year again, when the world is about to come crashing down and you would rather go into hibernation than face the inevitable. No, I am not talking about the apocalypse. I am focusing on something much worse – the CIE results. This year, the fated day befalls on August 11th, and for all O’ and A’ level students who appeared for the May/June 2015 exams, the countdown has already begun. Since I have gone through the same countdown during my time, I can empathise with a lot of students who will face the kraken tomorrow. And in order to make everyone else realise exactly what a student goes through during their final hours before the results, here is a list of reactions explained through Disney for better understanding. Because let’s face it – anything seems good when explained via Disney. 1. Hypersensitivity – to any and all things that remind them of doomsday… I mean, result day. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500"] Photo: Giphy[/caption] 2. Despair – while thinking about what tomorrow holds. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500"] Photo: Viral gifs[/caption] 3. Outrage – over how stupid this entire education system is, as a two-hour long test should not judge a student’s intelligence. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500"] Photo: Favim[/caption] 4. Calmness – because whatever’s done, is done; no need to fret over it! [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500"] Photo: Tumblr[/caption] 5. Calculated optimism – because some of the paper went pretty well and a good grade might be a reality. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="389"] Photo: Giphy[/caption] 6. Fear – over seeing a lingering ‘U’, ‘E’ or ‘D’ round the corner. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="488"] Photo: Tumblr[/caption] 7. Indifference – because the papers went badly and you couldn’t care less. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500"] Photo: Buzzfeed[/caption] 8. Confidence – because you know that you are getting straight A’s. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500"] Photo: Tumblr[/caption] 9. Fake modesty – because you know you will get straight A’s but why show it? [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] Photo: Faiq Lodhi[/caption] 10. Acceptance – because results are just a small phase of life, and this too shall pass. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="366"] Photo: Giphy[/caption] So for all the students awaiting their CIE results, good luck! And don’t worry, you will all do great.



The Tribe: No words to express its brilliance

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No words, no music, no subtitles. The Tribe is a Ukrainian film which takes place in a specialised boarding school for the deaf. Sergey, the new student, is quickly inducted into a student gang partaking in crime and prostitution. After a series of horrendous events, Sergey falls in love with one of the student prostitutes and breaks one of the unspoken rules of obeying the hierarchy of the Tribe. The film is absolutely brutal in its depiction of violence and abuse. Without the use of dialogues or subtitles, the emotions and motivations of the characters appear utterly truthful and in some cases, extremely barbaric. The world that is created within the confines of the boarding school, mirror that of the Stone Age. A time where proper spoken language was not yet developed but emotions and actions spoke much louder than words. And as evolution suggests, human species are not meant to live in solitude, they belong in tribes. And to survive, you have to mimic the barbarity yourself or perish. Miroslav Slaboshpitsky’s The Tribe is brilliant because it understands its limitations to sound and portrays it with various scenes involving long tracking shots, split screens or even ambiance. Each scene begins with the viewer picking up clues as to what the scene could be about and the results are fairly rewarding. This is one of the best films of the year. The Tribe is an experience you will likely remember long after watching it. [poll id="420"] [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] Photo: The Rolling Stone[/caption] [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] Photo: The Guardian[/caption] [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] Photo: Indieadam[/caption] [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="406"] Photo: IMDb[/caption]


Being a Syed-zaadi wasn’t a matter of pride for me, it was a curse!

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I was born into a Syed family. Since childhood, I’ve been told that this is a blessing as we are the direct descendants of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). Therefore, all Syed girls had a status equivalent to that of mothers of Ummah. Thus, it was forbidden for us to even consider marrying a non-Syed man. Everyone called the girls of our family bibi jee and, while growing up, this was a matter of pride for me. I was in my early teens when I first realised that there were a number of unmarried women in our family, belonging to all age groups. Due to family restrictions, finding a match for Syed girls was extremely difficult. For this reason, many of my cousins’ husbands were a complete mismatch. To make matters worse, most of my male cousins preferred marrying outside their caste as the men have no such restrictions. We were three sisters and one brother. My brother (who was two years younger) was the most important person in the house. His birth sparked frantic celebrations in contrast to rather muted welcomes accorded to my sisters. From that point onwards, he received preferential treatment when it came to food, clothes and was later admitted to the top boarding school in our area. Time passed and I turned 18. I was fair, tall and slim – ticking all the right attributes conventionally expected of an attractive girl. As I was coming of age, some of my female cousins were getting older; a few in their 30s and others in their 40s. Some still hopeful, others left with no dreams – trying to kill time within the walls of their homes. In a male dominated society, such as Pakistan, finding a suitable match for a girl over the age of 30 is challenging. And for us Syed-zaadis, it’s almost impossible. Some of my male cousins in their 40’s were able to find girls half their age. Most of their brides were non-Syed, and in my heart I used to wonder, if the Syed girls were given the status of mothers of Ummah, does it not make all Syed boys the fathers of Ummah? The decade I was growing up in was the mobile and internet era. The world around me was changing at a much faster pace, but life in my house was still anchored in the 18th century. In my family, not many girls were allowed to go to school or college. But my mother (who was also non-Syed) insisted my father let me go to college. The only reason my father permitted my attending college was so I could find an educated husband. Most of my class fellows were non-Syed and had never faced the same restrictions that I had. There were times when the pressure of being a ‘bibi jee’ was too much for me to handle. And then I met Hamza; a boy who used to wait for me outside my college every day. I didn’t want to speak to any man. I resisted talking to him for a long time, but he was persistent and I liked the attention of this young, handsome man. So, eventually I gave in and we started talking and exchanging notes. One day he handed me a mobile. I accepted his gift, not realising that it would change my life forever. We started talking to each other. He was different from all the men around me. He was supportive and encouraged me to study hard and follow my dreams. I wanted to dream but I was scared. Hamza was the only ray of hope in my life. One day, my aunt (my father’s unmarried sister who lived with us) saw me texting on my mobile. She immediately handed it to my father who read all of my text messages. My family threw a tantrum and everyone blamed my mother for allowing us freedom. My college life was also held accountable. Soon after, they decided to pull all my sisters out of school. But the worst was not over yet. I requested a friend of mine to contact Hamza and tell him about the whole situation. Hamza convinced his family and within a few weeks his mother and aunt came to my home to ask for my hand in marriage. My family took that as an insult; after all, how dare a commoner ask for the hand of a Syed-zaadi? My grandmother insulted Hamza’s mother by telling her that she would rather marry me to a dog than her son. I realised that being a Syed-zaadi wasn’t a matter of pride for me anymore; it was my biggest curse. Everything around me was falling apart and the only option I had was to kill myself. I thought of running away from home but I was too scared. I would bring a bad name to my family. I thought about how it would impact my sister’s futures. Weeks turned into months. My only contact with the outside world was my friend, who used to visit every weekend and bring messages from Hamza. My father arranged my marriage with a cousin of mine who was 42-years-old. My brother moved back home and started medical college. Every man around me was selfish. They only cared about themselves. If the men in our family ever cared, they would have never married any non-Syed girl. I prayed to my Creator every day,

“Oh my Allah, why do you bring daughters into this family? The ones you do, don’t give them a heart. Don’t give them brain.”
I used to think about my aunt, the one who spent her entire life taking care of her brother’s children. I also used to think about the many cousins I have who are too old to find a good husband. Every single woman in my family was suffering. I was being forced to marry a man twice my age; all my hopes were dying. Ten days before my wedding, I received a message from Hamza asking me to run away with him. This was my only chance of getting out of this cage, so I decided to be as selfish like the men of my family and leave home. It was my last day. I was depressed about having to leave my family, and scared as well. I waited for everyone to go to bed. At midnight I quietly walked towards the back door of the house. But, before I could open it, I heard my father’s loud voice asking me to stop. He was shouting from his window and his voice woke up my entire family who came running towards me. My brother stood with my father, a pistol in his hand. My grandmother started cursing me and crying. Before I could say anything, I saw my brother pointing the gun at me; a loud bang, followed by extreme pain in my chest. My mother came forward to hold me, but it was too late. I was already taking my last breath. The next morning the village people were told that my father accidently fired the gun while he was cleaning it. My whole family chose to remain quiet. No one reported the incident to the police; no one said anything to my brother. They all thought that he saved their pride. My family and other so-called respectable families have got a lot of blood on their hands. Death is not always physical; there are countless women who die every day by the misery inflicted upon them by the so-called respectable men in their families. For 100s of years, in a feudalistic society like ours, men have used religion as a tool to protect their lands and keep it within the family. When Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) can give his daughter’s hand in marriage to Usman (RA), who was not from his own family, then why can’t we grant that same right to our women? Disclaimer: The post is a piece of fiction inspired by a true story

The newspaper boy

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He threw it inside the house and as he cycled forward and heard it land softly on the doormat. Great shot, he thought. There were three streets to go. And the light around him was slowly spreading. He continued. In the street before the last, he slowed down because he was nearing the house filled with flowerpots. Previous shots had broken some pots and invited anger from the owner whose life seemed to be divided into the dozens of pots she had. This time, though, he came near the gate and slowly hooped it inside. The sound of contact with the floor was pleasing as he cycled away. Soon, with the day’s task being completed, he returned home. He changed his clothes and wore the school uniform which his mother had pressed for him. As he packed his bag, he saw his English notebook lying on the floor. His teacher had given him homework; make sentences with four words from the passage – and he had made none. He put the copy inside his bag and left. School was a strange place, he thought daily, because he always waited until it was over. After school, he walked to the next street, riddled carts brimming with vegetables, corn, samosas, jalebis and sugarcane. In that aroma, he cleared the dust from a patch of empty space, and waited for him. He arrived shortly, sweating as usual, from his day’s work. With an exchange of smiles, he gave him what he had and sat now on the side of his fruit cart. The fruit seller took the newspaper, and began to read the news for him, translating after every line – his daily dose. He listened intently, as a policy maker, politician, military general and a common man, all at the same time. He had found his personal news reporter, his teacher, just last month. He had started his part-time job distributing English newspapers at the beginning of grade five. Halfway through the first month, he had carried a copy in his bag to school. In his English class, he held on to the newspaper, finding it somehow more relevant than the stories and essays he had to memorise from his text book. His teacher politely refused, however, when he approached her after school and requested her to read the news. Though she could read, she had another job right after school. He was upset, not at her, but at himself, for not knowing the vocabulary. He looked again at the newspaper, full of text, big and small, and coloured pictures. His teachers and friends often spoke about how important English was because of jobs and further studies. But for him, it was something else. He often fantasised other things. When he would know another language, would the words softly step into his dreams? Would his thoughts be confused having so many words to choose from? Would the words come with their own pictures and memories of people who made them? And he was equally fascinated with the new letters. Who had come up with them? Who had decided why ‘f’ would have a soft bend towards its head and a spear through the chest? What was the dot in ‘i’ doing all by itself? And who had decided the common straight line and the half circle for b, d, and p? His favourite letter was x, not because of its shape but because it formed such few words. But yet it was part of the alphabet. It was essential yet always ignored. And there was something there he liked. With these thoughts, and a newspaper tucked in his right pocket, he went to the next street for jalebis. After the purchase, he sat down near the cart and began to eat thoughtfully. But the jalebi started to drip from the packet, and he took out the newspaper from his pocket and used it as a cover. It was this sight that the fruit seller had seen. Not every child carried a newspaper in his school pants, and so he had started a conversation, and was surprised to hear the boy’s request for him to be his newscaster. He had agreed on the condition that he would go away with two English words every day. And so the news sessions started, always ending with a brief lesson, and each word he taught, the boy repeated after him, then wrote down the word, along with its meaning in Urdu, and a sentence, which was dictated by the fruit seller. His daily homework was to find these words in the newspaper (which he was always excited about) and to make sentences, for which the boy used the English words in an Urdu sentence. It was towards the end of the first week that he was introduced to two words that disturbed things: life and death. He repeated the nine letters after his teacher 12 times and after a hundred and eight letters in the air, he gathered them and wrote them down at the back of his English notebook, along with their meanings and a sentence. The next day when he was about to throw the newspaper, his throw stopped in mid-air as he recognised one of the words in the headlines across all papers. He was so pleased he had spotted ‘death’ in big, bold letters. But as he cycled away, the meaning of the word came to him, and for the first time, the newspapers on his cycle felt heavy. And he suddenly realised that all the words he carried had weight. And he pedalled harder to keep the cycle moving. His heart, confused, began to beat in an odd manner. He looked again at the remaining newspapers and before ‘death’ there were numbers, double digit numbers. He stopped the cycle and tried to read who had died and where the deaths had occurred but the other English words gave nothing away about themselves. The number common across newspapers was ‘18.’ And he looked at it. The number suddenly seemed very, very cold to him. And aloof. It hid so many lives inside of itself, he thought. Households which had been broken, neatly into half. Dreams which had been buried. Futures that had been altered. And without knowing any of those people, he felt a soft weight as if all those had previously existed, now, had their 90 toes resting on his heart. For the next few days, his throws never landed on the doormat and instead landed on the car, air conditioning units and sometimes on the terrace or roof. His arm still had the same strength but he was no longer sure if he wanted to share the news. What if he didn’t throw the newspaper on that particular day? Would it be better that people did not know about the deaths? But he threw it anyway, he was merely a messenger and so in one throw, he threw death, life, killings, birth, damage, destruction, and rebuilding onto doormats and once again his throws began to land softly, despite the baggage. The next few days, he was reluctant in repeating the new words after his teacher, and when the words appeared in the air, he plucked them indifferently and inattentively, and committed many spelling errors.

“What’s wrong?,” he asked. “These words are not helping me.” “Why?” “The more words I know, the more I worry.”
The fruit seller briefly paused, and then continued.
“If you worry for those around you, that’s being human, no?” “But what can I do for all that happens daily?” “That’s a good question, and I don’t know the answer.”
And the boy smiled at the response. He had rarely heard these two phrases together. People often acknowledged the worth in his questions and then hurried to answer them as if the sight of an unanswered question was dangerous. Others (who because of little knowledge, time or energy) acknowledged their ignorance and then continued with what they were doing previously. But this was a first, to be acknowledged for a question, and for the question to stand unanswered alongside his teacher, with neither of them moving away. He looked again at him, and asked him to repeat the words and their meanings, and his teacher responded.
“Feel, matlab mehsoos karna forget, matlab bhool jana.”
He said them aloud, multiple times, wrote down their spellings, and their meanings.
“The sentence for these two words is..” “Can I make a sentence this time?” “Do you want to hear my sentence first?” “No, I want to make one first, please.” “Of course, the sentence can be in Urdu but you need to use the words in English.” “Okay.”
And as his teacher waited, he wrote,
Agar mein feel kar sakta hun, tab mein kabhi forget nai karun ga.” (If I can feel, then I will never forget.)
The fruit seller patted his head and with eyes that smiled softly, moved on with his cart.

Dear Victoria’s Secret, does nothing really taste as good as skinny feels?

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Dear Victoria’s Secret, When I was 10-years-old I wanted nothing more than to be a Victoria’s Secret Angel; I would spend hours prancing around in front of the mirror in my ‘sexiest’ high heels, practicing my cat walk and perfecting my hair flips. After the first few times that I was rejected by modelling agencies, I began to see myself through their eyes – the fat hanging off my bones, the gaps in my crooked smile and the emptiness between my thighs that would never be empty enough. As I grew up, this turned into an obsession – I needed to make myself more desirable, conform to the ideal beauty standards you had imposed upon me when I was just beginning to bloom. And I guess I should thank you because your Bright Young Things collection of lacy underwear aimed at pre-teens helped me achieve this. I should thank you because my VS lace trimmed underwear with the words ‘Call Me’ emblazoned across the front was what made 13-year-old me feel more empowered – a word I used interchangeably with objectification. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] Victoria's Secret faces backlash for 'Bright Young Things' .
Photo: pinterest[/caption] I am angry. I am angry because last night I stumbled upon my sister’s shrine of models; glossy figures cut out from magazine covers, all slender legs and white skin, lustrous hair and hollow smiles – the epitome of femininity. I guess it all makes sense now – the constant meal skipping, calorie counting – she wants to be beautiful, she wants to be skinny, she wants to talk, walk, look and act like the models she sees sauntering down the runway. And the sad thing is that I don’t blame her. If my 12-year-old sister thinks that the only reason women were put on this earth was to be a vessel of sexiness and beauty then who am I to argue with that logic; isn’t that what the media portrays us as anyway? She is part of a generation that has been exposed to so much more than the objectification of women; she has learnt that a woman must be subservient; the eroticism of violence against women in advertisements by brands such as Calvin Klein allows her to associate violence and domestic abuse with pleasure. She has begun to realise – as I did at that age – that the size of a girl's waist is what defines her, so can I really blame her for starving herself just so she can fit in at school? [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="534"] The picture clearly represents gang rape. It's an ad from Calvin Klein that features one woman and 3 guys.
Photo: pinterest[/caption] Dear Victoria’s Secret – for this I blame you; not just you but the entire modelling and film industry that feeds off young girls’ insecurities and amplifies them. I blame you for brainwashing every adolescent girl in the world into believing she will never be happy until she has a 24 inch waist. I blame you for making my sister believe that the only thing she can ever aim to be is beautiful when I taught her to be so much more. I am sad. I am sad because I see my little sister going down the same path I went down when I was her age; the rabbit hole of insecurity and self-loathing that I tried so hard to prevent her from falling into. I’ve always been good at math and some days when I find her whispering to herself at the dinner table I realise she’s inherited my skill of counting calories. Some nights I catch her creeping into the kitchen to eat plain yogurt in the dark – a luxury her body craves but her brain denies. When she was younger, she wanted to grow up to be a mermaid; she acknowledged that it was a little impractical but drew the conclusion that she would learn how to breathe underwater eventually. These days, when asked what she wants to be when she grows up, her response is always “skinny” and I want nothing more than to rock her in my arms and tell her that the battle she is fighting with her body is not the end – happiness is like breathing underwater, all she needs to do is learn how to. My brother waxes as my sister wanes. Rotund cheeks and beefy arms – at the cusp of manhood he assertively fills in the breaks in my sister’s speech with his roaring laughter; he has been taught to emit, how to roll each syllable off his tongue with an air of authority. He has too many opinions on God and politics, and feels the need to voice all of them. He has good intentions but still believes that a small waistline can make or break a woman. I don’t blame him because this is how he has been taught to view women. Neither can I blame you, Victoria’s Secret for perpetuating these unrealistic beauty standards upon women because, after all, you too were founded by a man who had good but selfish intentions – who just wanted to buy his wife something ‘sexy’ so she could look good, for him. I don’t know if my sister’s body dysmorphia is a product of genetics or something she has been taught to view herself as by your company as well as other forms of media and print. What I do know is that there are little girls out there who whisper “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels” to themselves every time they skip a meal. And THAT needs to stop. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600"] Photo: Tumblr[/caption]


Unity, faith and discipline

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Unity, faith, discipline. These three basics I knew, I loved, and I respected. Etched into my heart from Independence Days of the past. These were the principles I’d thrive upon. I didn’t know a lot, and maybe I didn’t know enough but I knew unity and faith and discipline. This year, let’s celebrate our country’s independence. This day is about us, our land, our self-determination, our freedom and everything else we wanted almost seven decades ago. Ever since I was a little girl, my grandparents have been telling me about the struggle they went through to get to this “Independence day”; for themselves, and for us. So put on your green and white clothes, wave your flags up high – bring happiness to a nation that so frequently lives in despair. When I think of the way my grandparents would recall their past, tearing up, it makes me emotional as well. I realised how hard it must have been for them to achieve independence for our generation, and how sometimes we take all their hard work for granted. It wasn’t all good though; they lost their belongings, their houses, their friends – but they gained a country. It’s easy to imagine ourselves in their place, but that is only fiction, not reality. Unity: My blood bleeds green for my people. I long for them to be one, and I know that someday, they can be. Patriotism can unite our people, and eventually lead the country into becoming the developed and established nation we all long for it to be. Furthermore, we should celebrate our freedom by keeping in mind all we have lost for this independence, even though we have been facing innumerable problems for a very long time and it is disheartening. Liberation – the word echoes freedom; when we talk about an individual’s liberation, we picture someone untethered and unaccountable to others. But a country’s liberation means more than that. We were granted liberation, but we are still not united. We are broken and chaotic, so this Independence Day, all I ask is, is unity that far away as a concept from us? For today, unite. Faith: Pakistan was built with the notion of bringing faiths together, for taking a minority and making it into a majority in a place that could be called home. If I picture my past, there are many small moments that stand out. But every year, I recall Independence Day the most. I remember celebrating it ever since I was a little girl, all the way up to university – each year more vibrant than the last one. I remember singing the national anthem, wearing a green and white Shalwar Kameez, waving a big flag around, and listening to inspiring speeches about our country. Mostly, I recall singing jeeway jeeway Pakistanmera Pakistan he yeh tera Pakistan heis parcham k saae tale hum ek hain, and ae rah e haq k shaheedon. These memories make me want to help the people of our country, regardless of their religion or cast. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7RqByENW-dw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gD0RrDMFOLs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZVPRe5jRs4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x29OJ8iBFqk I always wanted to make my country proud. I remember that most, wanting to stand out in front of a big group of people, and show them what this land, this country, means to me. So I tried. I participated in all my school’s functions, regardless of what was asked of me – and today, I am grateful. Grateful that I partook in all these small moments of celebrating my country because those events precipitated in making me the patriot I am today. To those who claim Pakistan is a hopeless nation – don’t. Don’t lose your hope, your faith. Believe that our nation will survive through this. This is the time for change, the time to motivate our people. To those who claim Pakistan isn’t enough for them, and only celebrate Independence Day for the sake of celebrating – don’t. Don’t be a “nine days wonder”  because your nation deserves more than that. It deserves your love, and kindness everyday of the year. Not just on the 14th of August. Celebrations should not be obligatory on a larger scale; instead we should take the small moments of celebration as the important ones; as it is us, the people, who can make our country a happy one. We are the ones that can show others that there is a reason to celebrate, that our beloved nation deserves our love and happiness. So today, have faith. Discipline: Learn what’s right for your country, and follow that with all your heart. In school, I loved learning about our history. I recall seeing the vast map of the sub-continent, and my teacher telling me that the sub-continent was a place that harboured unity. That made me realise that Pakistan was created on the principles of unity, faith, and discipline, and one of the three cannot exist without the other. That’s why we should look to our past as an example of how people of different cultures, religions, and philosophies can live together. Our motherland should celebrate independence, the way the subcontinent celebrated unity. With one of the pillars, maybe the pillars of faith and discipline will come along too and someday we can wave our bright green and white flag under Teen Talwar, staring up at it in awe – because these are our morals, this is our country, and these are our people. Today, show discipline. I wrote this piece today because my grandfather reminded me of the importance of our wonderful nation once again. I hope this helped a little in reminding you too. Pakistan Zindabad!


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