Punjabi Punk & More.

14 Apr 2010

This Dawn article presents interesting glimpse for someone alien to the Pakistani Music scene.

An accompanying slideshow is available at the media gallery.

It also provides a glimpse into anti American views in Pakistan, thanks to Ali Azmat. People still blame ‘the West’ and their intelligence agencies for everything, as the Pakistani ego issue continues. For those who haven’t heard his music though, it’s really good. His latest album, Kalashinfolk, is especially interesting. It draws inspiration from the Red Hot Chili Peppers, but has an obvious Pakistani outlook. Gallan, a famous single off the album, is classified by Ali Azmat as ‘Punjabi Punk’. That better get you interested.

The part about Junaid Jamshed is a bit too dismissive I think. Its more complicated than him becoming a ‘maulvi’ and quitting music. I think we should him that much credit, and if you look up some of his interviews, there’s more to it.

Just a Note About This Blog.

13 Apr 2010

I started this blog as part of my coursework, and that officially ended yesterday. With the great fun that I’m having writing this though, and also considering how addicted I am to the Stats page, I’ll continue posting to this website. Perhaps often not as frequently, but this blog lives on nonetheless.

Happy Reading.
Please do leave comments.

Zeerak.

TMI.

12 Apr 2010

NWFP is renamed. The parliament rejoices. Historical issue is addressed. People protest. Police abuses power. Many die in clashes. Government condemns. Military still on the offensive. 200’000 flee from the fighting. Military begins PR efforts. The world worries of new nuclear arms race. Threats of nuclear security continue. No end is in sight.

And you thought Pakistanis were lazy.

As the war continues, people in Hazara are protesting that they are not represented in the new Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa name. I am not aware of what name they would like to have appended to that, and considering the general state of things, it’s likely to be a second hyphenation. Ugly, but its a solution. We did call it NWFP for so long. As of know I have not come across any suggestion/solution to this conflict. The 18th ammendment passes the lower house, the upper house walks out, the squabble continues.

Meanwhile, while American and Russian world leaders work together to reduce nuclear arsenal, Pakistan and India choose to go on the offensive. CNN tries an experiment in a Pakistani private school, by showing pre-teens The Day After, a movie about nuclear warfare.

They get results Pakistanis would seem used to, but CNN is surprised. Apparently the girls realise they can cause a lot of damage, but why should we give them up when others have them. The girls, like the government, are confused. But they, are 12. And CNN is surprised. Read the entire story here.

The whole thing is making me think though. What if terrorists get their hands on nuclear arsenal? Unlikely, sure. We take the argument as an ego attack and not as a legitimate threat. What if?

They have nothing to lose.

India-a-aa, India!

12 Apr 2010

Below is an excerpt from an interesting Op-Ed piece in the NYT, titled A Particularly Punjabi Quarrel:

“During my childhood in Indian Punjab, Pakistani Punjab was omnipresent. The reception from Pakistan TV out of Lahore was superior, and we consumed a daily diet of Pakistani serials, ghazals and news reports. We naturally chose to disregard the routine anti-India propaganda of PTV. Any visitor to our otherwise-nondescript town was always taken to the border to witness the “Beating the Retreat” ceremony. A colonial legacy, it signaled an end to the day’s hostilities as the khaki-clad men of the Indian border security force and Pakistani rangers in olive-green Pathan suits stiff-marched the length of the checkpost, dramatically eyeballed one another, flung the gates open, and, unsmiling, shook hands. A joint show by the two enemies, it provided a chance to gawk at the Pakistanis on the other side and see that they looked just like us.”

Manreet Sodhi Someshwar’s words reminded me of the time I crossed the border. It takes a while, and unfortunately we did on board a bus and not on foot, but it was still interesting. My teacher said “You’ve just lost a half hour of your life”, that of course was referring to the time difference and not to the time we’d spent in customs and border control. That was much longer.

On the way back though. I distinctly remember calling my parents from Atari, the Indian side of the border between Amrtisar and Lahore, from a Pakistani Jazz (very popular-cultured network) phone, which would not get any signals at Wagah (the Pakistani side of the border). Talk about security.

My host family’s driver was showing us around Delhi. Taking us to cheap bazaars all over. But everywhere we went, I would make sure to say I was Pakistani, because I would get such an overwhelming response. I remember the driver telling us something along the lines of “if a person from every country is standing in a line, and an Indian had to choose one of them to embrace, he would go hug a Pakistani”.

There’s an obvious love between Indians and Pakistanis. I remember chanting “India-a-aa India” when Pakistan was losing miserably at Qadhafi Stadium, Lahore (This chant led by a bunch of Sikhs in the middle of the stand and then cheered on by all the Pakistani fans around them). Some feel this has changed since the Mumbai attacks, but I can’t say first hand, my last visit to India was ’06. As of now, Sikh pilgrims, an important bond that held both sides of the Punjab together over the Radcliffe Award, are no longer granted visas to go anywhere, they can only visit cities specified in the visa, as reported here. The same thing applied when I went to India a few years ago. Even if the people want governmental tensions to leave them, efforts like this will still be there to stare us in our faces when we try to forget about the conflict. The conflict strengthens and reimposes itself on South Asians.

Who are we? The Pakistani Identity Crisis.

12 Apr 2010

Dawn article about restoring/preserving historical sites:

“Identity is what distinguishes heritage from history. We can ignore, if not redo and delete, portions of our history that we choose not to like but we cannot avoid our heritage. It is, after all, what makes us what we are.”

So well said. For some reason this seems to me a succinct explanation of why say Pakistani monuments like the Badshahi Mosque (pictured below) aren’t as well known as say the Taj Mahal. Granted, there are some differences, but Pakistanis have been confused as to how to portray them. Is this Muslim architecture? Is this an Indian heritage? Is that something to be ashamed of. Personally, yes ,yes and no. Whichever the case, there’s no reason to be scared. As teh article puts it:

“Letting our roots wither at the altar of commercialisation is as dangerous as the idea of ignoring them due to their pre-Islamic origin.”

Things are still confusing for Pakistanis today. Voices like the above exist, but are lost in everything else.

You’ll Need a Security Guard.

11 Apr 2010

So this is some more interesting commentary I found at the Dawn Blog, published late March. Asif Akhtar writes:

“With all this finger pointing on who is a Taliban and who isn’t, and all this debate over whether the Taliban are really that bad, and trying to find alternative paranormal explanations for the frequent blasts, I think sanity has packed its clothes (from the closet) and taken a good long vacation, leaving our politicians et al to beat their chests in the parliament we have as an excuse for a political institution.”

The rest of the article is here. It’s titled “You’re a Taliban. No! You’re a Taliban!”

It draws from political name calling on various statements made, and now the most common accusation to gather public support being along the lines of “he supports the Taliban”.

It tells you where anti-Taliban sentiment is at the moment. But the last paragraph itself is not very hopeful. Unfortunately, even with the war, with the need for focus, and even some much awaited policy change, politics in Pakistan at times remains a mess of an identity crisis, a lack of leadership and evidence of general stagnancy.

Many young people have already decided to stay away from politics, unless their family has been involved in politics before. Which brings to mind a talk/seminar we had at the Woodrow Wilson school here at Princeton – a rather depressing tale of the state of affairs in Pakistan led by Zia Mian, and others involved in International Relations with Pakistan). My friend and mentor asked exasperatedly in the end, “So, what do I do? As a Pakistani, what should I do?”. Zia answered, “Get a security guard and go into politics”.

It was moving for all of us. Not least because none of us planned to do so in any case, the depression of the details of the talk still looming over our heads. It remains still.

The Bare Skin Rebellion.

11 Apr 2010

Here’s how this Dawn report of a Peshawar fashion show begins.

“Days after bombers tried to storm the US consulate, models defied the Taliban to sashay down a catwalk in Pakistan’s troubled city Peshawar, flashing navels and exposing shoulders.”

Pakistan’s multitude of fashion weeks, confusing all but the ones conducting them, continue to rebel in their own way: in this case bare skin.

Other rebellion exists, but for some reason this is 2010’s anti-stereotype as some Pakistanis would have it. Some would say this brings out the western influence that is so prevalent in the country today, others would point to the fact that many modern families which are by no means extremist, may still find this out of place, exiting cultural bounds, and maybe even crossing moral boundaries. But the dichotomy does exist.

Am I a Fan or am I a Fan?

10 Apr 2010

Go Mohsin Hamid.

Ok this was not intentional. But he just wrote an editorial for Dawn yesterday. And I loved it. I think it’s some real insight.

In Room for Optimism, Hamid talks about the little glimmers of hope that a Pakistani or even a non Pakistani might look at in these troubling times. Cricket jokes are a plenty, fishing outside the off stump being the major subject. Of cricket too, I am a fan. But the article itself is a must read.

It’s even more interesting since I recently found out Hamid decided to move back to Pakistan, at least temporarily after the birth of his daughter, Dina. He mentioned this in one of the articles he wrote for the Guardian some time ago. I am not aware of where he is currently located, however.

Indian Women Fall For Pakistani Men.

9 Apr 2010

I was surfing the New York Times’ Lede Blog again (I’m there too often these days) and I found this snippet at the end of an article about the attack on the US Consulate in Peshawar. The coverage also included a video of the event.

“Readers who watch the footage from Pakistani television above may notice one sign of how routine bombings have become in the country. At one stage, as images of the latest attack were broadcast, the crawl at the bottom of the screen gave updates on a celebrity drama, the planned marriage of a Pakistani cricket star, Shoaib Malik, to an Indian tennis player, Sania Mirza.”

While the comment succinctly recognized the routine nature of the bombings, and at times indifferent and numb reactions from many of the population, it missed the fun part in the celebrity drama.

What it is has been made obvious I think. What a roar it has caused, not so much.

A friend posted this on my Facebook wall, the coverage of the made-for-Bollywood love story having reached across many allies and the Atlantic over to MSNBC.

Pakistanis, gossip obsessed as always (I am no exception), have of course taken to the craze. They have been amazingly enthusiastic and cheerful about the news, while the Indian side has been somewhat cold towards the couple. Raises some interesting sociological and maybe even political questions about South Asian relations. I’m not answering them though.

The Indian side has looked at another interesting sociological viewpoint though. It tries to explain what’s special about Pakistani men. I’m serious. It’s even called “There’s something about Paki men”. The Times of India thinks their “earthy” nature, and “rugged good looks” might have something to with it.

Some Pakistani journalists have unfortunately taken it a bit seriously. They raise good points, but it gives me less to joke around with. This Dawn editorial for example, uses the saga to talk about media ethics, and good journalism. Always good to know they’re thinking about it. (Just on a side note, is it just me or are Dawn editorials adapting to the web age too much, they’re ridiculously short.) Another blog post at Dawn by Asif Akhtar has better jokes than mine, but also finds reason to smack the media. With power cuts, terrorism, inflation and all he believes the media has better things to do.

Personally, I think he has a valid point, but I like my entertainment thank you very much.

A Secular Pakistan. Don’t Laugh.

9 Apr 2010

If you visit Pakistan, hang around some people remotely in touch with the news (which is everybody by the way, thanks to the scores of news channels that pop up everyday), you’ll probably hear at least once, the debate about whether Pakistan was to be an Islamic State, or a state for Muslims.

The question persists, no answer awaits. Not soon anyway.

Even the recent 18th Amendment, heavily undoing military additions to the constitution, does not dare touch with the Islamization of the Republic and the Constitution under ill fated General Zia.

People will say that Jinnah wanted to create a Britain away from Britain, his first line to the preamble being along the lines of “this is a secular state” (Some will laugh hysterically at this statement, saying that defeats the entire purpose of Pakistan. Not really, but sure.). Well that didn’t end up happening. Unfortunately I wasn’t around then and history textbooks are only so accurate. My knowledge ends there. Others will point to the white strip on the national flag, meant to represent the non Muslim minority. A few might argue Pakistan was created as a safe haven from religious persecution, not to institutionalization more of it. You might hear one of them, you might hear all of them.

With all that’s going on though, they remain arguments, thoughts, philosophy.

But Bangladesh’s recent banning of the use of religion by political parties will give Pakistan some new food for thought. Pakistanis’ love for both food and thought being greater than love for action, some of it is bound to happen.

I just found out about the new law in Bangladesh in a blog post I had open somewhere in my many open Firefox tabs. It’s called Kashifiat’s Blog, written by Dr Khalil Ahmed. It certainly got me thinking.

Little is likely to happen very soon, but people are on the move for greater human rights all over. And human rights movements don’t discriminate (not even in Pakistan). The War is another sign. It questions our relationship with religion, and has made people think all over the country. Through the power cuts, through the protests, through the bombings and through the breaking news, people slip in chatter about faith, extremism, rights and wrong. Religious TV shows, an off hand conversation over cigarettes or Coke (or both, with more food), or on the web. What results is a separate question, but talk at least, is in the air.