Changes in values, lifestyles

An excellent article on how life is changing in Karachi.

Changes in values, lifestyles
Arif Hasan

CHANGES in the social values and lifestyles of the elite and middle classes in Karachi are all too visible. However, the changes in the social values and lifestyles of the lower and lower middle classes are hidden from view. The most visible expression of the change that has taken place in these classes is the emergence of young couples holding hands or sitting with their arms around each other on the benches in the parks in the city.

This behaviour is surprisingly tolerated by the other visitors (even bearded ones) to the parks and has led in some cases to the segregation of spaces among families, male visitors and couples. As one waiter at Hill Park put it, “There is nothing you can do about this. You cannot quarrel with the zamana.”

In an attempt to understand this phenomenon, I have over the last five years interviewed or had a questionnaire filled by 100 young couples in parks and at the Sea View beach. They all belong to the lower and lower middle classes. Of these, 28 couples were married. Of the 100 women, 32 wore the hijab and 68 wore a black or grey ‘aba’. Only 18 couples were interested in politics and/or read political news in the newspapers. Eighty-three were interested in migrating to another country towards which seven married couples and 16 unmarried men had taken some steps.

The reasons for wanting to migrate were in order of importance; one, there was no justice in Pakistan; two, they would never be able to own a place to live in; three, married couples were afraid that they would not be able to educate their children properly; four, there was no affordable entertainment and recreation; five, there were too many family disputes often related to behaviour patterns of the young which they considered hypocritical; and six, they lived, worked and travelled in terrible environmental conditions.

These couples certainly do not constitute the majority of young people in lower and lower middle-income settlements in Karachi but they are definitely trendsetters as their numbers are rapidly increasing.

What has brought about this very visible change apart from TV and the “trickle down” of the lifestyles of the more affluent sections of society? I feel that the most important reason is that for the first time in our history we have a very large number of unmarried female adolescents. In the 1981 census, 37.54 per cent women and 13.14 per cent men in the age group of 15 to 24 were married. If we project the 1998 census figures to 2007 then less than 20 per cent of women and six per cent of men in this age group are married today.

Also, the low-income settlements that I knew in the 1970s and 1980s have changed. Then they were purely working class settlements and women did not work. Today, there are doctors, engineers, formal sector entrepreneurs, persons employed in the corporate and IT sectors, bank managers, college and school teachers (the majority of them women), living in these settlements. This is a sea change.

In order to know more I discussed the changes that I have noticed with older residents and the more upwardly mobile community members of low-income settlements. They agreed that the major change that has taken place is the break-up of the extended or joint family and this has played a key role in the change of values and behaviour patterns. Among the reasons given for the break-up of the joint family is that previously there was one earning member and others were dependents. Today, there are many earning members and hence the patriarchal structure cannot survive.

Money from abroad was also cited as a reason for the break-up of the family since it created jealousies and the nuclear family of the person sending it broke away from the rest. In addition, working women have also adversely affected the joint family system for it has led to quarrels and disputes. My friend Mansoor Raza’s survey of people sleeping in the streets revealed that the majority of them consisted of young men who had run away from home and old men who had been abandoned by their families.

People are not conscious of the changes that have taken place and as a result are confused. For instance, one person reported how, after much heartburning and violence, he agreed to let his daughter marry out of his caste and how terrified he was of what the reaction of his clan would be. However, there was no reaction except for a few elders being sarcastic — his peers did not particularly care. “The traditions are gone but we do not know it for out of fear we do not discuss these things,” was his conclusion.

Older residents agreed that an increasing number of youth are “undisciplined” and violent gangs are emerging in their localities. One of the reasons given for this is that parents have become more liberal because of a “change in the times”. Other reasons given are unemployment and the terrible state of public education and its uselessness. An increasing number of young people are doing their Matric and Intermediate and after that they are not willing to do manual labour.

Meanwhile, jobs that are available in the market require technical skills and more and more of them require formal “sanads” and not just experience with an ustad. These jobs are mostly in the textile, medical and construction industry. However, there are no educational centres where one can be trained for these jobs. Those that do exist are too few and far too expensive. For example, there is a great demand for male nurses but there are only five institutions that one can apply to. Admission fee to these institutions is between Rs30,000 to Rs40,000 and the monthly fee is between Rs2,000-3,000.

The rising gap between poverty and wealth is a major factor in the social and political alienation of the young in the lower and lower middle income groups as aspirations increase but resources and opportunities do not. The solution lies in the development of good public sector educational institutions equal to those of the elite and in the teaching of English. For example, it was mentioned in one of the discussions that at a private school a normal female teacher earns about Rs1,500 to Rs3,000 a month whereas someone who is good in English can get up to Rs8,000 to Rs10,000 a month.

Private schools are expensive and often a family has to choose which of its children it will send to them. In the absence of an affordable and useful public school education system more and more students are being sent to madressahs. “At least they learn how to read and write there and without reading and writing there is no future today.” “In a government school they learn nothing but corruption from their teachers.” “These are not schools, they resemble aasar-i-qadeema. No water, no toilets, no furniture, broken floors and collapsing roofs.” These were some of the comments that were made during the discussions.

I conclude from the discussions I had that we will have a very different society in Karachi in the next decade. It also points to the need for a major reform in the education and social sectors and in state culture along with corresponding changes in city planning priorities. If that does not happen, political and social alienation will increase and so will the chances of conflict and further fragmentation.

Emotional Abuse of Children

An excellent article on preventing emotional abuse of a child. Although modern research comes up with some pertinent points on how to prevent, its good to know that our Prophet (peace be upon him) closed the door on child emotional abuse 14 centuries ago. If we can follow his life, like we have been told to do, we will close the door of child’s emotional abuse forever. Some examples from his life are

1. He never even once talked to a child in anger, even when the child has directly disobeyed by not doing an errand which he had asked the child to do.

2. He treated his grand children in particular and all children in general with great love by playing with them. The example of him giving a ride to Hazrat Hassan and Hazrat Hussain (may Allah be pleased with them) on his back are very popular.

3. He also didn’t allow un-necessary stopping of children so much so when some of his companions (May Allah be pleased with them), tried to take away children from the place where he was praying, he stopped them.

4. One another instance, which I have heard, is that once he was giving a ride to one of his grand children on his shoulders. He came near a mosque and decided to offer Nawfil prayers. He started praying with the child on his shoulders. While going in Rukuh and Sujood, he put the child off from his shoulders, and when he stood backup, he put the child on his shoulders once again.

All this modern research, as mentioned in the article below, is great as it only strengthens our belief that the life of our Prophet (peace be upon him) was perfect and should be followed both in letter and spirit. The article appeared in the Sunday Magazine of Daily Dawn in September 2007.

An invisible plague

Parents need to realise that emotional abuse is as harmful to their child as any other form of it, writes Sharifa Lalani

Emotional or psychological abuse is the most common yet difficult form of child abuse to define. I remember one example of it which occurred when I overheard a mother scolding her daughter for getting a C grade in her class. “You are such a dumb girl,” she told the sobbing child, who could not have been more than five years old. “It’s the same every year; you shame your daddy and I and sometimes I can’t believe you are my daughter.” Although my stomach churned with rage on the child’s behalf, I said nothing because I thought if I said anything the mother would tell me to mind my own business, but I had no doubt that I had witnessed a case of emotional child abuse.

According to Kairys & Hanson, (2002) “Emotional abuse is a repeated pattern of damaging interaction between parents or caregivers and the child that becomes typical of the relationship and conveys to the child that he or she is flawed, unloved or unwanted.” From the outside of that young body, you can’t see the bruises, but inside, the little child’s heart is wounded. This trend is getting very common in Pakistani culture and society. Many times, parents don’t appreciate their children. They restrict the use of sentences like “Hey you have done a great job”. Instead they always try to find their weaknesses or compare them with other children.

Byron, (2000), a psychologist, who has conducted many studies on parenting and early childhood development, says, “The effects of emotional child abuse may be at least as devastating as those of physical abuse.” His research suggests an even greater decline in mental and physical development as emotionally abused children grow older than in physically-abused children. It is because emotional abuse affects the child as a whole and destroys his self esteem. The words which were used by the mother were not of a woman who had spent a bad day, nor was she prompted by the child’s behaviour, but by her own psychological problems.

Dr Jay (2001) a psychiatrist, refers to the “four Ds” of emotional abuse: deprivation, distancing, depreciation and domination. Abusive parents may use one or all of the four Ds to play out their own psychological conflicts and avoid facing up to the real pressures of child-rearing.

Deprivation and distancing: The children are so deprived that they start distancing from their parents and find other alternates, a teacher, aunt or uncle for emotional attachments. Psychologically, unavailable parents rarely cuddle a crying baby or express interest in child’s development. As a result, their babies fail to develop a secure attachment with their parents. A physically-abused child will avoid the caretaker for fear of being abused, and an emotionally-abused child does the same thing, because of the disappointment of not being accepted. Think of a normal parent’s reaction when their baby takes the first step: it’s a celebration, a reason for praise and excitement, but in homes where emotional unavailability is the standard, the milestone is ignored and it is viewed as a demand for closer supervision.

Depreciation: Words like “always” and “never” (implying that the child invariably fails to live up to a parent’s expectation) are keys that distinguish a consistently abusive parent from one who criticises occasionally in anger and frustration. In ambitious middle class families, one of the most common forms of emotional abuses is unfair criticism for any achievement that does not meet the parent’s expectation, such as, when child’s secures a B grade instead of an A. Dr Jeree Pawl, director of the infant–parent programme at San Francisco General Hospital states that “Perfectionist parents may display irrational expectation. They have completely unrealistic ideas about how long an infant or toddler should wait to be toilet –trained, or be expected to be quiet.” The normal behaviour is seen as a deficiency on the part of the child and failure on the part of the parent.

Domination: The use of extreme threats to a child is a common form of emotional abuse. In Pakistani culture, statements loaded with words analogous to ghosts are used to frighten them. Children are often disciplined by saying “Allah Baba” will come or a “Jinn” will take it away. The invisible boundaries are built between child and parents. The child is told that it will not be in his/her favour, if he/she violates the parent’s orders. All parents try to dominate their children in a certain way, by either setting standards of conduct or by imposing parental values on children; but there is a big difference between domination through education, and domination through cruelty. Abusive parent gets his or her way by frightening the child about following his or her wishes. Mullen, Martin & Romans (1996) write: “A study of suicidal behavior reported that a history of physical abuse increased a subject’s risk of suicide attempt fivefold, whereas a history of emotional abuse increased the risk by more than 12 times.”

For some young adults, the experience of having been emotionally abused as children have made them determined to become good parents themselves, but problems do not show up until they have had children of their own. In such types of cases, the therapy involves every member of the family as the problem can not be solved in isolation. Once a parent realises something is wrong, this can open up the whole matter of how the family works and other family members can be brought into the therapeutic process.

I often think if I did the right thing in keeping silent when I overheard the mother calling her child “dumb”. I feel I should have spoken up and said something like, “every one has some strength and weaknesses and nobody is worthless.” I asked a psychologist if she thought that a comment from another adult might have made her treat her child even more harshly. The psychologist replied, “That’s possible, but may be the mother is not able to understand that she had harmed her child in any way.”

According to Rostain (1999) “parents may not be aware that their criticism has reached a point of harm to the child. They may acknowledge stress or tension in the family that contributes to their lack of support.” Sometimes children are able to survive abuse if they find a support system other then parents, like a teacher, an aunt or uncle who makes them feel worthwhile in spite of what their parents say. People should mind other people’s business when a child’s life is in danger, and that means the child as a whole physically, mentally and emotionally.

The treatment of emotional abuse includes counseling and psychiatric therapy. Play therapy and therapeutic day care programmes are available for younger children. Limited attention to the issue of emotional abuse and limited availability of psychiatric therapies for children present major obstacles in managing this problem.

School or shooting gallery

A nice article which appeared in the Daily Dawn Magazine of 2nd September 2007, primarily targetting Convent Education. The writing is pretty good and justifies her wish to take out the school newspaper. I am sure the Headmistress would be biting her nails.

School or shooting gallery

By Maryam Musharaf Shah

I’ll come right out and say it: convent schools must be banned. There should be a human rights association against such breeding grounds for stupidity and bad English.

I myself attended a convent in Karachi, one of the better known ones, and more likely than not, many of this magazine’s readers’ children are probably enrolled there too. Out of the 13 years I spent there, 10 were sheer bliss (since I didn’t know any better) and the remaining three proved to be a sort of educational hell.

As an avid reader and aspiring writer, by the time I hit the eighth grade I had decided on journalism as the perfect career for me. After all, I was getting straight As in English Language and Literature and I was more of a people person than a lab rat. Medicine, the field my parents had chosen for me as The One, didn’t seem as glamorous as being a desi Christiane Amanpour. Burdened with their disappointment and tut-tut-ing, I turned to school for comfort. I figured starting up a school newspaper would be ‘oh so much fun’.

The school administration, however, turned out to be worse than the bureaucracy my father has to face at Nadra. They wanted a prototype of an issue of the newspaper; eager as I was, I spent two months working on one, forcing my unfortunate father to drive me to page-makers and printers and collect estimates and so on.

One fine school day, I submitted it in to the headmistress’s office. It came back to me through a lowly secretary, a harsh ‘unacceptable’ scrawled all over the front page.

Unacceptable! Can they say that to you? Was my work ‘unacceptable’? Did she not know how utterly impeccable the spellings and grammar were in all those articles I personally typed up and laid out on all those pages? Has there ever been another eighth grader in the history of that God-forsaken school who had come up with a whole newspaper on her own?

There was no accompanying note saying ‘Tone it down, and I’m sure we can work things out’. Nothing else at all. I was simply unacceptable. I cried that night, having learnt a harsh lesson: school would not get me far in achieving my ambitions.

Three years later, as I was leaving the institution for my A-levels at a high school situated in Old Clifton, I faced the headmistress once more. She asked me why I wasn’t applying for the A-level programme at my beloved convent, my alma mater, the school that had given me ‘everything’. I merely replied, “I deserve better.”

It’s not common for students to dislike their learning institutions to such an extent. It scared my parents, to say the least. They thought I was a sadistic little thing, relishing the thought of the day that hell-hole would burn down.

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Acquiring education at a convent school may not be as fruitful an experience as many of us assume it to be

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But exactly what had my convent given me? An education? I could have gotten better, much better, at a number of other schools in Karachi. Discipline? My supervisor in my last year at school once ordered a security guard to ‘jail’ us in a confined area beside the reception. We were a dozen girls who had come to school for extra classes before taking our O-levels; our supervisor, who doubles as a receptionist at some random hospital and who for some reason called hair ‘hairs’, thought we were being rowdy. Might I inform you that three of those girls were student council members, including yours truly. And as far as I could see, we were far from rowdy; we simply couldn’t find our chemistry teacher.

People argue, “But St. ---- must have given you something you cherish!” I must admit it did, but without knowing it. I met my closest and oldest friends there. We hung onto each other through the worst years of our school life, collectively rolling our eyes at teachers who couldn’t teach biology to save their lives. We perched protectively on our own little bench in the vast school ground, helping each other get away with breaking rules. The school didn’t seem interested in cultivating our talent; one of my friends was a wonderful singer, the other a writer, another could speak perfect khaliss Urdu and had the potential to be the star of our make-believe drama society.

But no. The entire student body was treated as one big teeming mass of potential criminals (please recall the aforementioned make-shift ‘jail’). Extracurricular activities were limited to sports and that again was limited to the boys since we had nobody on the sports staff willing to coach us basketball. Girls strutted around school making goo-goo eyes at them, while debating what kind of wedding they would want. Believe it or not, no less than four different teachers lectured us in our last year on the importance of marriage and children and how we girls must ‘understand our limitations’.

I’m all for finding a husband and raising a family but you simply DON’T insert this message in between lectures on biotechnology. On top it all, an Islamiat teacher in our tenth grade class quite subtly told us of her views regarding the Taliban and basant (‘it is HARAAAM!!’)

Get real. Our teachers had a responsibility towards us and that solely referred to teaching us the syllabi and encouraging us in our strengths. Instead, we got Marriage 101. Even at the age of 16, when the rest of my brainwashed classmates were giggling over potential proposals and picking out their rishta pictures (I’m not exaggerating, I saw some that robbed me of my sleep at night), I realised that something was grossly wrong at this institution. I had teachers who were intimidated and even suspicious of my fluent English while I stumbled on without any help in Urdu. I was targeted in a vicious character assassination campaign by a teacher who, and it delights me to give you this information, was fired once my mother got through with her. Admittedly, I got justice but school isn’t supposed to be like a shooting gallery with the students being vulnerable pigeons. Rather than working for us and with us, our beloved convent worked against us.

‘Mr Bean’ dubbed into Pashto a big hit in Pakhtun areas

Courtesy: Daily Dawn of 3rd September 2007

By Sadia Qasim Shah

PESHAWAR, Sept 2: A dubbed version of a popular English comedy serial has been gaining popularity among the fun-starved viewers in Pakhtun areas.

The mostly silent and bumbling “Mr Bean” (played by Rowan Atkinson), one of Britain’s most successful comic characters from a serial of the 1990s, has recently become popular in the province and neighbouring Afghanistan due to the dubbing of its episodes into Pashto. The episodes are available on Compact Discs.

Zahirullah from Bughdada in Mardan district has been dubbing episodes from the serial and chunks from “Shrek” films in Pashto. He has dubbed 15 CDs since 2002. The public ratings of “Khrash Prash Durha Dabao” and the recently-released album “Ma Mah Shmera Dar Gadyam” are high as both are comical. “I have sold more than 100,000 copies,” Zahirullah told Dawn.

A graduate of the Mardan College, 28-year-old Zahirullah, who wanted to become an actor, could not fulfil his dream due to his family’s conservative views. But now he has found a way to satisfy his taste by using his voice.

Kids like the antics of Mr Beans whom Pakhtun viewers know as ‘Babuji’ but adults also can’t help laughing at the Pashto slangs and comic dialogues of Babuji.

He said that he got inspired from one of his neighbours named Babuji who walked and behaved like Mr. Beans and so he named Mr Beans as Babuji in the dubbed version.

“People of all ages can watch my dubbed CDs as they are not only pure comedy but also has colloquial Pashto which Pakhtuns are slowly forgetting now,” he said.

He said that even a Maulana of one of the mosques in his village asked him for copies with a request to remove all music first.

Babuji, Nana Patekar, “Shrek” and “Donkey” are the most favourite characters to Pakhtun viewers after Zahirullah’s dubbed CDs introduced them in the villages of the NWFP, Afghanistan and even Pakhtuns living in Middle East countries who don’t understand even a single word of English.

Zahirullah said: “I am not in it for money. I am doing it for fun now although I started doing it to fulfil the dream of becoming an actor.”

Zahirullah, who knows how to use the computer, writes the scripts spontaneously to synchronize the slang words with the spoken words on film, he then mixes voices and edits it on his own.

He said: “I can demonstrate my skills in 42 different voices, including both male and female voices.”

He holds premier shows in different villages of the NWFP and the Middle East where a large number of Pakhtun immigrant workers live.

His religious-minded father relaxed rules and let him produce such CDs on one condition that he would also do something for his people.

Zahirullah has recently set up a ‘Saya Trust’ to help needy children and plans to set up a burns unit and hospital in Mardan district.

He said a private production house in Charsadda used his name and his picture on their production which had ‘abusive language’.

He said: “I have initiated legal action against them for violation of copy rights.”

Talk Shows

Till a few months/years back, I was of the opinion that the host of Talk Shows being telecasted on the multitude of TV channels is something which is creating more confusion and having no results. But I feel that I was wrong in that. Talk Shows are playing two very important roles at this point in time. First of all they are creating awareness of the issues that we are faced with today and what impact they are having on our future.

Secondly and mostly importantly they are resulting in refinement of thought and ideologies. e.g. a person with a view of some issue takes it to a talk show, where is he is bombarded with issues and problems on his view and ideology. This results in him refining his view and creating a spark in his mind that what must he be doing in order to make his view and ideology more acceptable to the masses.

But there are still some talk shows around which are happy to see people fight amongst themselves. I think rather then that they must try to discuss ideas with each other and try to refine those ideas.

Life and various moments in life, sometimes results in the changing of our point of view. I feel that this is just one of those moments.

Desert Picnic.

For picnics I have been to many places. Sea Sides (usually go there), Mountains, parks etc. As far as I can remember, there are two places where I haven't been. Forests and Deserts.

Just went to a desert picnic arranged by my company, Agility Logistics. It was fun for both bachelors and family. Huge tents were erected and coolers and Air Conditioning was used to keep the temperature at acceptable levels. A tent was also there which contained stalls from various restaurants. Some cabins were there for toilets. And one cabin was there for showers as well. yes showers !

Then smaller tents were also there where family and friends can collect for their chit chat and relaxation, in typical Arabic style, with carpets and cushions put in the corner.

An Arabic Round table was also there. By Arabic Round Table I mean a round table without the table. With arrangements for fire in the centre and cushions in the corner. This round table is used for everything from discussions to musical entertainments.

For Games and fun, there were arrangements for volley ball, basketball, football, table football (urf patteee), billiards, dominoes, cards and some arabic board games were there as well.

Arrangements were made for Magic Shows, Circus, songs and party.

We had a few games of Billiard and then came out for a game of Volleyball and it was GREAT fun.

The only uselessness was the desert storm. But it gave us a feel of how people used to live in these places and go about their day to day lives some 100 or more years back.

But in the end it was a nice experience.

The season of camel wrestling is back

Aisa Bhee Hota hay...




By Malik Tahseen Raza

MUZAFFARGARH, Feb 12: Tens of thousands of camel wrestling fans were standing breathlessly around a ring where two camels were trying their skills to down each other at a fair held in the suburban area of the town on Sunday.

The annual camel fighting fair, also called Patwari Wala Dangal, attracted thousands of the fans wherein over a dozen brightly adorned camels with bells on their humps, mirrored blankets covering their backs and colourful pompoms woven into their tails, took part in the event. The participanting camels came from Bahawalpur, Kashmor, Rajanpur, Nawabshah (Sindh) and Deepalpur. The most interesting fight was held between Patwari Wala and Tehsildar Wala camels that continued for 40 minutes and ended when Patwari Wala kicked and trampled the Tehsildar Wala. Soon the defeated camel growled and ran out of the ring to avoid the wrath of his opponent, the roaring supporters of the Patwari Wala ran towards the winner to celebrate the win.

This was the second camel fighting fair in Muzaffargarh this year. Before it, a camel fair was held at the shrine of Muhammad Musa near the thermal power station. Two more fairs will follow the Jaalwala fair to be held at Khanpur Bagga Sher and Basti Barian.

Besides Muzaffargarh, such fairs are held in Bahawalpur, Rajanpur, Layyah, Jalalpur Pirwala, Okara, Nawabshah and Kashmor.

In the cold winter months, which is also the mating season, there is jealousy as well as anger among camels. Rival males who are trying to engage the attention of a female begin to quarrel. This is when people take advantage of the seasonal changes and encourage them to fight each other.

It seems that camel, once called the ship of desert and bred for its skin, meat and milk and for transportation, has become a wrestling and money-making object.

“Now, my camel is strong and will charge Rs200,000 for a fight,” said Ibrahim Patwari, the master of the winner camel.

Mostly, in camel sport, the owner of a well-known camel charges Rs150,000 to Rs300,000 for a fight. This money is not subject to victory but a defeat costs a well-known camel costly as the animal loses its reputation and participatory charges.

A fight between two camels continues till the time a camel roars helplessly or runs away from the ring. A trained camel knows a number of moves such as how to trip his opponent, how to force his submission, how to throw him to the ground by pushing his head between his legs, how to force him to his knees by means of head and neck power.

A referee who is also called ‘assessor’ oversees the fight. The masters of fighting camels are not allowed to step into the ring.

“In camel fighting, the masters of the camels are kept away, because it is against the game rules,” said Malik Mureed Hussain Numberdar, an expert on camel fighting. He said mostly the camel masters did not even watch their ‘pets’ fighting because a defeat would cause them a heart attack.

Zawar Kazim from Budh Basti rears a wrestler camel called Mawali. He has dedicated the income of his buffalo farm to the camel.

“Rearing a fighter camel is very costly because you have to feed it properly,” said Kazim. The diet of fighting camels is very special and a huge amount is spent on that.

“I feed my camel on one kg dates, fresh greens, five litres milk, two kg desi ghee and one dozen eggs every day,” he said.

“Although it is expensive to bring up wrestling camels, I still do it because I feel indebted to this creature as it has given me recognition all over the country. Wherever Mawali goes, people come to see it,” he says proudly. Kazim has engaged two attendants to take care of the camel who feed it, take it for a five-kilometre jogging every day.

Wrestling camels arrive at the venue of a fair one month ago.

“This is an advertisement stunt as the news of the arrival of a fighting camel runs like a fire in the jungle and more and more people come to the fair,” said Makdoom Qalandar, whose camel fair will be held on Feb 17.

During their stay, the diet and expenditure of the wrestler and its coach are borne by the organiser.

Patwari said that the cost of hosting of camel’s owners was shared by other local people.

“People very proudly offer to host the camels and their masters,” he said.

Besides Mawali, other famous fighter camels are Wanwairri of Malik Baggi, Sohna of Makhdoom Qalander Sheikh, Patwariwala of Ibrahim Patwari and Rohi ka Raja of Faiz Kurai.

http://www.dawn.com

Friends Walking in Groups

Seeing a group of friends walk together can tell you a few things about their personalities.

Bossies. These guys try to walk in the front in a very serious mood, dictate where to go and what to do. Depending upon their nature they might seek advice but want to stay ahead of the pack and hence be the first one to be noticed.

Joyriders. Are happy to walk in the back. Hand in hand or hand in pocket, going wherever the group is going, have no problems whatsoever, wants to enjoy the time together with friends. Usually more bent on having fun and making the most out of their time. Also a bit relaxed in their approach and not very serious.

The Pushers. They walk with the joyriders, but when they are not satisfied with the progress or have to show the group the way forward, or take the group out of confusion, would come ahead and assume responsibility. Then after sometime when the confusion is over and things are or normal course, then these guys would just go to the back and resume from where they left off.

This applies to groups with at least 4 guys. What do you think ?

Using Laptops

Using a laptop with a wireless connection to internet. Kya baat hay. Having fun. Writing blogs, chatting, surfing internet. Really cool. Me and my friends sit in the drawing room with their laptops and surf the internet passing on things to each other.

Corporate Culture

Just recently I got a chance to see and work in a big organization, and hence witnessed the culture very closely. Everything is multipled by 100 when compared by smaller organizations.



If you relax you are gone, if you don't have a team and senior people in upper hierarchy then you are gone. Since continuously you have to prove ourselves with the work you do and also report it somehow to the upper management, so that they are aware that you have done something. Otherwise, according to them, we are just wasting our time and organizational resource. This is in complete contrast to the small organizations, you might have been working in before. Over there, you get work and you get a time frame and you have to deliver. Over here you have to create work for yourself continuously set your deadlines, go after the management for approval. You are known by the number of projects or sub projects or sub tasks that you have recently completed. It takes sometime getting used to.

Organized Bribe Collection System

A very funny thing happened today. I had parked my car near Electronics Market, Karachi. Eventually it turned out to be a no parking zone. Especially for my car, since all the other cars, remained untouched and mine was towed away.

So we (me, Mohsin and Faraz) went to Preedy Station. There the guy said that two charges would have to be paid for. One is the towing charges which has to be deposited here and the other one is the challan which would have to be deposited in the bank. He said that since we look as reasonable people therefore he will waive off the Bank Challan for us. And would just take the towing charges, which were 300 rupees.

Faraz started negotiating with him but the guy said that he cannot decrease this amount at all. So we said okay, we will pay 300 but give us the receipt for it. He said that if you want receipt then you would have to pay 550 rupees. 300 for towing and 250 for the challan. We made out that if he is not giving the receipt it means that he is going to put 300 in his pocket which would be a bribe and therefore we should avoid it. Therefore we said that okay give us the challan of 550.

Well to cut a long story short. The Challan (i.e. Challan for no Parking) was of 100 rupees (earlier he said that it was for 250), and the best of all the towing charges were of 100 rupees (earlier he said that it was for 300 and he cannot decrease even a single penny). So we took the challan, they could not do anything since it was written on the challan that how much is the challan for no parking and how much are the charges for towing. Therefore they looked in a very bad mood. And said 'Hum aap ka khayal kartay hain, aap ko humara khayal bhee karna chaheay'. (We take care of you you should take care of us as well).

Khair my friend Faraz would go to National Bank to deposit the Challan tomorrow, Insha Allah, and get my papers as well from the station. May Allah bless him for his efforts.

The sad thing was that this heinous crime was going on in broad day light. And no one was there to stop it ! People say that by following religion we cannot progress in this world. Surely if taking bribes in broad day light in such an organized way, is the sign of progress then let the glorious Islam stop us from such progress.