I never thought I would waste ten thirty minutes of my life praising our new president, but I just have to write this one. This post on Karachi Metblogs is criticizing Zardari’s comments in the visitors’ log of Jinnah’s tomb on his death anniversary. Though I secretly hope for a day when discussing the Pakistani President’s language skills becomes our only concern, but we have to solve a lot of more fundamental problems before we can focus on developing the desi version of Bushism.
The blog also shared this scanned image of his comments, which says something like:
May Good give us the strut to save Pakistan. Asif Ali Zardari, President, Islamic Republic of Pakistan.
I think there are many possible reasons for this ‘writo’ and I believe that we should forgive Zardari for this writing “Good” instead of “God”. You see…
- He was not typing it, and hence, did not have a spell checker handy. When was the last time you wrote a complete sentence using a pen? (for me it was many years ago). This shows that he may be a l33t geek in disguise who relies on the underlined red lines too much.
- He has written either ‘Gaad’ or ‘Good’ – if it is ‘Gaad’, he was either in his l33t mindset, or he wanted to emphasize the word but lacked the tools (bold/italics) to do so, and used the long ‘aa’ as a last resort. If he used ‘Good’, then he was probably trying to translate one of Allah’s 99 names to English. I’m pretty sure one of those names means ‘Good’. This shows that he does care about Islam.
- He did not use Allah, as these days, the word has negative connotations, thanks to our terrorist brethren. God is a more neutral and ‘enlightened’ word. After all, the American Army top guys are visiting Pakistan these days, what if the next visitor signing the visitor book is one of them, and what if he gets the wrong impression? We must appericate his foresight and attention to detail.
- Good, God or Allah, the important point is that he capitalized the G, and that, my friends, is the line that separates a believer from a non-believer, or so I have been told many times. So Zardari strives to be politically and religiously correct.
Even though the above is enough to start respecting Zardari, we are not done yet. The second word that he used, and one that has been misquoted as “strength” by many people, is actually “strut“. Let us check wikipedia for the various meanings of ‘strut’.
A strut can be
- A structural component designed to keep two other components apart. Struts provide outwards-facing support in their lengthwise direction, which can be used to keep two other components separate, performing the opposite function of a tie. That is a beautiful analogy! It doesn’t take an engineer to see what Zardari is trying to say. Not only that, but a strut can also mean
- to walk proudly and with a bounce. and pride is one thing that we need, if we want to save Pakistan.
The above is conclusive proof that Zardari picks his words carefully and has a good command over the English language – good enough to make puns and say a lot in a few words. On top of that, I am assuming he can speak Urdu and perhaps Sindhi equally well, which makes him a trilingual. Now you tell me – how many languages can the US, Chinese or the British leaders speak?
Oh yea, one last thing, he loves his deceased wife so much that he still carries her picture everywhere he goes, even when he is on TV. Brings tears to my eyes really.
Well – the 60 Million $ question is
Is Asif Zardari smarter then a 5th grader?
I forgive his typos – but the way I read the message
May God give us the strenght to save Pakistan [from] Asif Ali Zardari,
LOL go figure
Alright, Mr. Zardari made a mistake. Now either you forgive him for that or criticize him. So, you have only two options…
I ask the author… what bullshit are you saying by trying to make his mistakes a NO MISTAKE.
HUH!
Zardari is a programming guru, the best software architect that this country has ever seen.
Now he is openly encouraging the usage of ‘struts’ for salvation of Pakistan so that we can develop high performance and enterprise applications by following the advice of our true architect.
Lets dump every other technology and adopt struts!
@Burhan, oh yes, most of the struts references on the wiki page fit pretty well, that’s why I am so impressed, though not many people are into Java (Teeth is a ceffeine addict and an exception) so I avoided mentioning it explicitly.
@Rashid Only weak men admit their mistakes, and ‘make no mistake about it’, Zardari is anything but weak.
Thanks for your comment though, it verified my suspicions that what I say is mostly bullshit, and added to my understanding of the “what-is-wrong-with-pakistan” puzzle.
@TeethMaestro another question is, does he NEED to be smarter than a 5th grader? 😀
Dear All,
Why you people seem to be so serious for just the spelling mistakes by The Worthy President of of this Worthy Country PAKISTAN? Plz plz plz, don’t regret for what he is!
Just sit back and feel relaxed bcoz he is the icon of the nation today and don’t forget that he’s the one who got rid of MUSHARRAF…….Ok?
Those who support Shareef brothers, I must tell them that Mr. Nawaz Sharif was the one who had presented MUSHARRAF as a gift to this nation due to his worst ever policies of becoming AMEER-ul-MOMINEEN and KARGIL issue. Don’t forget that….. due to Mr. Nawaz who is no more SHAREEF at all, the Pakistani nation has suffered with many problems…. some of those are narrated as given below:
1) MUSHARRAF
2) Judiciary issue
3) Suicide Bombing issue (don’t forget that it started after 2002 and continue till today…..this is the best ever gift by NAWAZ and MUSHARRAF to this AWARE nation)
4) Staggering concept of Government (such as Q-league)
5) Chaudhary brothers
6) Aataaa bohraaan
7) Bijl bohraan
8) Mahangai (inflation)
9) Laal Masjid issue
10)Jaamia’ Hifsa issue
11)Martyrdom of Great NAWAB AKBAR KHAN BUGTI (The only hope of Balochi nation)
12)Strengthening MQM (Don’t forget 12th May killings)
13)Martyrdom of Greatest leader of the world…Mohtarma
14)Steel Mill and Stock Market capture issues
15)blah blah blah…….ohhhh….there’re so many issues….i m really tired and can’t point out all.
So….Dear Nation and its daring HEROES and HEROINES, these are the gifts given by Mr. Nawaz who is unfortunately SHAREEF……..hahahhahahah
Let’s forget the so called mistakes by Mr. Asif Ali Zardari and let’s not doubt on his qualification. He is the most deserving person for this post. Take Care and Sorry if my comments hurt u….Hahahahhaha
Accept him as a National Hero….!!!
Jeay BHUTTO and Jeay ZARDARI….Pakistan Paa’indaBaad!
I am sorry to have to explicitly point it out that the post is filed under ‘Humor’ and was meant to be dripping with sarcasm – I can see that I have failed and should probably retire as a writer.
Somebody has even added me to a list of ‘Jiyalas’ to be bashed, how cool is that!
Or maybe he just did it to give his nation a laugh 😀 on purpose
ROFL man this is one of the best. “Struts” to save Pakistan? hahaha I bet there would be a better solution in .NET Framework!
I still can’t stop laughing…
@Awais
Buddy id you like counting ‘Gifts’, then I could present a list of Zardari’s gifts but I’ll make a long story short. I’m not a fan of Politics, but to me, the best leader I have seen is Musharaf. Sure he did take some controversial steps, but he was the one who actually built this country’s economy and the tech industry (including to NADRA, one of the most sophisticated information systems in the world). And that’s all what matters to me.
From what I have heard from the NADRA employees, the sophisticated NADRA ID card databases, the electronic passports and the PISCES facial recognition system etc. were all gifts/orders from the US of A so that they may keep a better track of the people coming and going out of our country to support the terror war (insert ‘of’ or ‘on’ according to your preferences). They were financed from the terror war funds, and the CIA etc. were provided direct access to the live data. They still did provide jobs to a few thousand families – I guess every cloud has a silver lining.
Just googled for a quick link to verify the above, it seems like our ‘eternal enemies’ – the indians, have a much clearer picture than our rulers do
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/881925.cms
well i dont think dat pakistan has any best leader to solve dese issues so my suggestion is we should rent out dis country
nd dear awais malik
sir
wid due respect
[A future promise from Mr. Jatt to Mr. Awais involving a procreation attempt via the excretory system (which will probably not work as intended) and conversion into a female dog was edited by the blog owner]
Maybe one should think about how exactly did a scanned copy of something like that reach the publisher of it?
Not really sure about this particular picture, but I have used my digital camera to ‘scan’ my ID card/passport many times – the pictures were pretty close to flat-bed scanners and were accepted wherever needed. Hand-held scanners are around too, and I HOPE our national archive guys use them to take digital snapshots of documents much like the visitor log at the tomb. There has been no official statement from our government on this (as the matter is too trivial perhaps?) but they haven’t denied it either, have they?
Zardari’s misspelled remarks proved fabricated:
Source: http://www.nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/Politics/26-Sep-2008/Zardaris-misspelled-remarks-proved-fabricated
Zardari’s misspelled remarks proved fabricated
KARACHI – The ongoing campaign against President Asif Ali Zardari regarding his poor knowledge of English during his recent visit to Mazar-e-Quaid has proved a malicious and wicked electronic campaign that has tarnished his image in the eyes of the general public and analysts who did not bother to verify the facts.
Some hidden hands have sent an email to different journalists, newspapers and electronic organisations claiming that the President had misspelled the words God and strength.
However, a verification of this matter by TheNation revealed that the campaign was a venomous propaganda against President Zardari that was aimed at tarnishing his image in the eyes of the masses.
The upshot of President’s comments in the visitors’ book during his visit to Mazar-e-Quaid made it clear that Asif Zardari had impeccably written “May God give us strength to save Pakistan” instead of “May Gaad give us strut to save Pakistan” that was being propagated by the hidden hands through the email.
President Asif Ali Zardari wrote his views in the visitors’ book on September 11, 2008, when he visited Mazar-e-Quaid on the 60th death anniversary of the Father of the Nation.
It was distressing to note that senior Eglish-language columnist did not bother to verify the facts and added fuel to fire in his column while referring to this fabricated story.
The propaganda was launched at a time when the President had gone to the United States on an official visit and during his absence nobody bothered to counter the venomous campaign and tried to present the truth before the media and the people.
When contacted Muhammad Arif, Resident Engineer, Mazar-e-Quaid, produced the book containing the views of the President.
Arif said that he was accompanying President Asif Ali Zardari during his visit of the mausoleum and witnessed him express his views by writing in the visitors’ book: “God may give us strength to save Pakistan”.
After the visit of President Zardari, several high-ranking officials of Sindh government including Governor Dr Ishrat-ul-Ebad Khan, Chief Minister Syed Qaim Ali Shah, chiefs of the armed forces and Naib Nazima Karachi Nasreen Jalil also visited Mazar-e-Quaid and expressed their views in the visitors’ book.
So guys why dont you just use your common sense and think before you post or publish anything.
The problem of people like you guys is that you have enough time to discuss destructive things which does not solve any problem. By participating in this propaganda you guys have proven that you guys lack common sense and you guys possess pessimistic mind.
Why dont you guys point out serious problems which may help any govt to help improve its strategies.
Have a constructive mind instead of destructive mind. Also do not post anything without doing research.
Disclaimer: I am not the fan of Zardari. All I wanted to prove was that you guys have enough time to be destructive and you guys dont even bother to prove your point with any source.
Khaliq Uz Zaman
Khaliq:
Thank you for taking the time to post this fact here, I hope you are spreading the truth on the rest of the blogs as well. I am sad to see that the point I was trying to make (albeit with a lame attempt at humor) didn’t get through to many people. Let me paste it again:
“Though I secretly hope for a day when discussing the Pakistani President’s language skills becomes our only concern, but we have to solve a lot of more fundamental problems before we can focus on developing the desi version of Bushism.”
The rest of my post was an attempt to find the proverbial silver lining, and being optimistic rather than pessimistic (as you claim us “guys” to be) – guess it didn’t work as intended.
By the way, it would be great if someone can “prove this point with a source”, for example, a scan/photograph of what Zardari actually wrote there, to remove all doubts.
I guess by your logic, the Palin video/’conversation’ is also a malicious and wicked campaign to tarnish his character, right? Or perhaps it really is a non-issue for the powerful president of the islamic republic of pakistan.
Disclaimer: “I am Not a fan of Zardari ”
All I want to argue here is that why don’t we pin point the real problems of Pakistan?
My Point here is simple: Criticize Government let it be any Party’s Government on the issues that has negative impact on lives of common people and on Pakistan on whole and appreciate efforts of any Party’s government that has done positive things for Pakistan.
I mean Why isn’t TV channels and newspapers promoting and highlighting the success of “Friends of Pakistan ” which is the positive attempt to help protect Pakistan from economic turmoil?
How on earth criticizing spelling mistake which was fabricated would help Pakistan’s Economy and well being? Is it really the concern of masses? Or for that matter by criticizing Zardari’s Humor with Palin, what are we trying to solve? Will it decrease the prices of basic commodities? Will it increase share volumes in KSE 100 Index? To my way of thinking, criticizing government and leaders for things that really don’t matter to masses is useless.
As I said I am not supporter of this Government but as a Student of Economics I would definitely support the consortium of “Friends of Pakistan” as it will help our economy to become more or less stable at least.
I am criticizing this government on the fact that it has levied 30 % Tax on Mobile Customers which is really very unfair. I am criticizing asif zardari because he did not talk much about Kashmir Issue. These are the concerns of masses.
I do realize this fact that it was an attempt of humor by you Sir Athar and I am sorry if you thought that my message was intended to you. My message was intended towards the people who have commented after your post like Teeth Maestro, Jat etc.
Nicely done. AAZ is a champion of champions in his own right. You know, when he was at Central Jail, he won the spelling bee. His competition however gave him a tough time.
HAhahaha nice nice!!