Manic over Malala

On Friday 11th October 2013, a 15 year old girl could potentially be the youngest person ever to receive a Nobel Peace Prize. Not only is this a a brave young girl with more gumption than most children her age, she is also a Pakistani.

Logic dictates that being a Pakistani, a nation of beggars not choosers on the international front, the people would be rooting for this candidate. They would pray with the same religious urgency they exhibited for inzee bhai to make the distance between the wickets after whacking another solid one. Or the way that every aunty and her sassu maa came together to beg God for Mr. Khan to live to see another day. Or the way they pray for the Indian team to self combust during a Pak-India match. However, instead of majority support, we have a nation of people spinning fairy tales that would put the Grimm brothers to shame.

The reason for this is simply the fact that we have trust issues. Once bitten, twice shy has been on a repetitive loop lately, and like the forlorn, our ability to love has dissipated. Malala being considered as a candidate is so unfathomable to most, that they all escape into that safe haven in their minds where cynicism runs amok, never bothering to consider that this is just a 15 year old child. Thus the positive attention must be another US propaganda ploy hence Malala is a closeted American, probably descending from the Roosevelts themselves, carefully placed in Waziristan for the perfect opportunity.

Don't get me wrong. I agree that that Edhi is the one true national hero and that no one deserves the peace prize more that he does. But he is not getting it. The reasons behind that can only be generalized assumptions at this point and how ever evil they may be, the bottom line is that this will not be his year. We can sit here moping and beating our chests till we're blue in the face, and no one on the international stage will bat an eye lash. The only sure shot way to grab their attention is to yell Osama is Obama and lets face it, no one has the guts to use that one anymore. So grab a hold of that patriotism and rally behind our one last hope for redemption. Cheer on the girl that wants to support women's rights. If for nothing else, then do it for the fact that the world might finally be able to form a distinction between the people of Pakistan and the Taliban of Pakistan. 

Royal Academy Of Art: Summer Exhibition Review

The Royal Academy of Arts put up an edgy and modern exhibition running from 10^th June to 19^th August in the main galleries for the 245^th year this summer, which was a colorful contrast to previous years.

The crowd was not your expected mix of stuffy art critics and snooty Art history majors, but instead was a welcome pot of students, tourists, couples and families.

This is the largest exhibition in the world and this year the coordinators, Norman Ackroyd and Eva Jiricna, revamped the display, where the rooms were a variation from the conservative layout that has been the RAs trademark for the last 244 years.

There was a noticeable energy to the entrance room, where the tightly packed walls made you jump right into it. The rooms were divided by discipline namely photography, prints, architecture, films and much more.

Some rooms were more appealing than others, first among them being the series of six tapestries entitled The Vanity of Small Differences by Grayson Perry, telling the story of the rise and fall of Tim Rakewell.

These tapestries were beautifully done, with bright colours and surreal drawings complete with illustrations telling Mr. Rakewells story. It was these illustrations that captivated you, making you feel more connected with the work once you understood the background.

The last of these tapestries, which illustrated his death, was a very moving piece. The work was very stark and blunt which is probably why it was so memorable

Another room that left a mark was the media of painting, drawing, photography and video. Photography always has a more human aspect to it, so it was no surprise that it was a well-received display. With some beautiful landscapes and portraits, it was a welcome change from the rest of the exhibition.

The sculpture display, which was a surprisingly easy room to co-ordinate through despite my large backpack, was the only room that was not packed to capacity. The sculptors were well lit, setting a welcoming ambience for people to take their time walking through them.

The most striking piece was a life-size recreation of an original Fiat 500 in steel and bronze rods by Ron Arad, which posed a sudden contrast to the modern everyday vehicle making you realize how far the world has come.

The largest room, which was hall three, was the least flattering of the lot, with unending abstract canvases draped across the walls assaulting your senses and leaving you with a confused taste.

Over all, the exhibition was an afternoon well spent, especially since a portion of the revenues is used to fund the R.A schools, providing a platform for future Picassos.

Bubble Tea- My first solo feature as a journalist in training

‘Frankenstein’s lab’ is what comes to mind when you walk into this small store On Rupert Street in trendy Soho. Complete with employees dressed in white lab coats, black walls with recipes drawn in chalk and test tubes used to hold the various liquids- this is a bubble tea store.

Bubbleology, as the chain is called, is the newest global craze. This delicious Taiwanese tea is served to you custom made to your tastes. You can have it hot or cold, milky or fruity and with many delicious flavors to choose from, it is refreshing drink for any season.

Angellos Berdos, 21, the branch supervisor, has been working at the store for almost a year. When asked how many customers he has to serve a day he said: ‘Per day? We get 500 a day at least. It’s not as busy during the afternoon but after 5pm, the cue reaches all the way to the bus stop.’

Originating from a happy accident in a teahouse in Taichung, Taiwan, the inventor, Liv Han-Chieh, had a brilliant idea to serve cold tea in the same way that she had been served cold coffee. From there on the recipes progressed until Bubble Tea stretched from street corners in Indonesia to high class stores in the UK.

The store has two ‘scientists’ behind the bar at all times. Angellos said: ‘The summer months are a lot busier; there are many tourists around this area, and the heat is making people buy more fruity teas.’

When asked how the tea was made, Angellos smiles slyly and points to the back door.

The décor is complete with a large steel door marked ‘TOP SECRET,’ and when asked about what was back there Angellos said: ‘That is where we keep our recipes and ingredients. Our teas are completely fresh and the ingredients arrive every three hours. The ingredients are all from Taiwan where bubble tea is originally from.’

Another unique feature and its biggest appeal is the ‘Boba’ or ‘Tapioca’ which are small, black, chewy balls the size of marbles. They have the same consistency as jelly and they are added to your tea. You then use a thick, hollow straw to suck up the tapioca with your tea.

Angellos says that tapioca ‘gets him crazy, ‘and that it is the main reason he likes coming to work in the morning. ‘I can never have enough tapioca; I usually make my drink with double the usual amount. All the people that come in here order the tapioca before they pick a drink.’

Bubble Tea is just as famous in the winters, when the teas are served hot to customers. The more loyal customers are seen here in the winter months, with the tourist season over.

‘Taro is a big thing in the summer, it is ordered the most,’ says Angellos. ‘Usually people will come in here and ask for a suggestion, and I advise the fruit teas because they are easier to start off with.’

This ‘healthy delicious juice’ as a student at the shop, Zainab Mahmud, 16, called it is a must try on a hot summers day.

“she loved to walk down the street with a book under her arm. It had the same significance for her as an elegant cane for the dandy a century ago. It differentiated her from others.” 
― Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

“When we want to give expression to a dramatic situation in our lives, we tend to use metaphors of heaviness. We say that something has become a great burden to us. We either bear the burden or fail and go down with it, we struggle with it, win or lose. And Sabina - what had come over her? Nothing. She had left a man because she felt like leaving him. Had he persecuted her? Had he tried to take revenge on her? No. Her drama was a drama not of heaviness but of lightness. What fell to her lot was not the burden, but the unbearable lightness of being.” 
― Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Just finished reading this book and it has been a while since a book spoke to me in the way this one did. The author mirrored my emotions and expressed them through his characters even  though they were in very different place in their lives as compared to me. The protagonists are a husband and wife with a tumult relationship based on a desperate dependency on one another as opposed to a healthy balance of complementing personalities. The husband is incapable of monogamy and the wife is well aware. However it remains the elephant in the room through out the book as the two struggle to understand why they are so codependent, despite their obvious unhappiness.

My reaction was two fold. Firstly I related to the philosophical musings as the author highlights some pretty basic human flaws and strengths. Some of these I saw in myself, others I saw in the people around me. Secondly it highlighted how some emotional attachments can weigh down on a person when they are viewed more as an obligation rather than a choice. Over all it was a brilliant read I really recommend it as you will find little pieces of yourself all over this book.

What really happened at NA-57

My family and I trekked out to NA-57 (Attock) to cast our votes in our family village. The spirit and enthusiasm was infectious. Waking up on the morning of the 11^th, I felt like my country was once again united. Not because we shared the same political opinions, but because we all wanted to leave our mark, and Attock was no different. Brimming with activity and excitement, painted thumbs were proudly being paraded and compared.

At 5o’clock polling stopped and our family reconvened. This was where the problem started. My aunts complained that women were illegally stepping into the polling booths to coerce voters. In another incident, Punjab police had blocked the doors to the polling station, letting the women in 4 at a time as opposed to the usual 12, which was the capacity of that polling station. PLM-N supporters were being snuck in through the exit doors so they could caste their votes and all other parties were left ignored.

In the areas where support was stronger for non PML-N, delayed voting tactics were being used. Ballot papers, stamping equipment would miraculously disappear, causing countless voters to leave. Between the heat of the 2PM sun, the long queues, the children left alone at home, the number of women began to dwindle.

On another occasion, non PML-N polling agents caught presiding officers stamping ballot papers in PML-N favor and managed to get it on tape. Despite making it in time to quite a few polling stations, it was not humanly possible for the other candidates and their families to rectify the situation all around.

As the evening progressed, the results started rolling in. Attock is a small area thus in the past, results have arrived by 11pm at the latest. This year, however was a different story. By 2am we were still waiting on the results from 12 villages. We had a lead of about 1500 votes and were under the impression that this would probably end in our favor, as the remaining villages were scarcely populated.

The presiding officers of these 12 polling stations were refusing to attend calls. These were small, out lying villages and at 2am, exhausted from the day’s proceedings, no one was willing to trek out to physically check on them. 18 hrs after polling had ended, the results arrived. The papers the results were presented on were not the officially signed counter copies required by the ECP. Instead results were provided on plain pieces of paper. Polling agents complained that the counting of the votes in these villages was non transparent and that they were not asked to sign the final result before they were handed in. However official announcements were made anyways and the PML-N candidate was declared the winner.

Now what I want to know is, what happened between 2AM and 10AM that caused such a drastic change? Why was the PML-N candidate celebrating his win at 9PM when he was losing by 1500 votes? What prior knowledge did he possess that no one bothered to tell us? My families’ reaction to all this was to sit quiet and let it go. The same level of rigging took place in the 2008 elections and the case filed against this same PML-N candidate is pending to this day. Such cases are legally meant to be dealt with in a 120-day period but obviously that did not happen. Thus I understand their apprehension. But this year was meant to be different. 2013 was the first election I voted in. I was aware of the candidates, their past transgressions, their future promises and weighing all these factors, I cast my vote. Being the idealistic young adult that I am, the assumption I functioned under was that my vote would matter. The people around me, who had treated every previous election as a public holiday got out of bed on their precious Saturday to have their voices heard. Voter turnout was in record numbers. They, like me, felt that it was their right to get up and make the change that they have been cribbing about for the last 20 years.

However if I had known that this entire exercise was a sham, I would not have bothered. This article is not my way of saying that PML-N won this entire election illegally or that another political party needs to be declared the new winner. I am highlighting a situation as I witnessed it. I was very proud of the fact that a truly democratic election was about to take place. Irrelevant of the winner, I wanted a clean and fair election that I could look back to as the starting point for a new beginning in Pakistan’s history. I wanted to draw attention to the struggle of an entire family, that like countless others worked very hard for their people and were cheated out of their right. I have proof to support all the claims made above, but who is there to provide justice? Thus I wrote this article. If nothing else it will spread the word and cause more candidates to investigate their results. Maybe one day I will have the election I was hoping for.

THE GRUESOME TWOSOME SPOIL MY NIGHT ONCE AGAIN:

I have seen and heard of people in Pakistan do some pretty crazy things for self propagation and reinforcement of their status quo. But to use an endangered animal as a campaign intimidation tool in the cruelest way possible is crossing the line. The white tiger is an internationally recognized endangered species. It goes against numerous international laws to own one in a private residence without proper facilities. The Shameless Shareefs not only owned this endangered animal illegally, but were proudly parading it around the country. This not only reflects on their lack of humanity, but makes one reflect on the state of our legal system. There are no consequences for the wealthy and powerful. Anywhere else in the world, this heinous act would have been a deal breaker for their campaign. The media would have squandered their self worth and the activists would have ripped the remaining pieces to shreds.

The white tiger is the pride of the subcontinent. It is only found in this geographical area and the last sighting of the animal in  the wild was 50 years ago. They can only be found in WWF or affiliated sanctuaries OR as we now find out, the Shareefs backyard. My anger is not directed towards the gruesome twosome because I categorized them as mindless idiots decades ago. My anger is towards Mariam Sharif. This 'educated' woman did not realize that tying an animal, any animal, to the roof of a car in lahore's scorching temperatures is beyond sadistic. This majestic animal was subjected to the most shameless form of humiliation. If this does not motivate you to VOTE on saturday, I do not understand what will. This family might be in charge of OUR countries future for another 5 year term. In the face of such sense less brutality, one hopes to see the people inflicting such pain brought to justice. However as we all know, this too shall fade with tomorrows breaking news. Closure is granted to the privileged few. Keep this story in mind when you choose your candidate in Saturday. 

The youth of today are the leaders of tomorrow. Chills go down my spine when I realize that in context to the atrocities children commit these days. It seems that parents are no longer instilling the concept of punishment, remorse or right consciousness into their offspring. The world has gone from black and white, right and wrong to this perpetual murky grey and we all dwell there in peace. Shahzeb Khans death in Karachi was one of many incidents reported about elitists brats brandishing vigilante justice. These children think that they can take a life without reprisal, and it saddens me to say that they are not wrong.

Today another boy by the name of Humza Ahmed was shot by a guard in a residential area in Karachi. This is breaking news and I do not know all the facts of the story as yet, but I do know one thing. No matter what Humza was doing at this boys house, being shot dead at point blank range under the instruction of one of his peers was not the answer. These children only behave the way that they do because they live in a country where danger lurks behind every corner. Kidnappings, muggings, honor killings etc have become the alternatives to fairy tales and bed time stories in Pakistan. The situation never seems to improve. If one spent a week watching nothing but the news from morning till night, they would slip into a state of perpetual depression. Our judiciary is a joke, our executive is headed by a convicted felon and our legislative spends their time on important core issues such as BANNING BASANT because THAT is the route cause of bodies lining up our streets. And they alone are not at fault. We are a nation of useless citizens that prefer our ignorant bliss. We crib about the state of affairs in our airconditioned cafes and be done with it. And I am one of you.

 I started writing this as a way to vent my frustrations at the sense of helplessness I feel when I am asked to say another Ayaat-e-kareema for the consolation of a family that has prematurely lost a child. Humza and Shahzeb are two amongst many who have lost their lives in this manner. The only reason we know of them, is because someone around them cared enough to make a hue and cry on social media. We can not continue in this way. This could have been my brother or my friend. I will not let this one go. I will fight for severe punishment and I want the killers of these children hung up to dry as an example.