Aren’t you tired of the monotonous “Happy” and “Mubarik” Eids year after year? Why not try something different, like a “Sombre” Eid, for a change?
Don’t hand a 1000 rupee note to every one of your ten nephews. They already have plenty and will blow the money up in a day. Give them each a 50 Rs. chocolate instead, they would be just as happy. Use the 9500 rupees to feed a child. Like this one. For many months. Take your nephews with you. Compare.
Eidi Candidate
Do you really need those new clothes? Isn’t your wardrobe full already? They’ll go out of fashion next year. Or next month. Wear your best clothes on Eid. They don’t have to be new. Buy milk for this child instead. Before he dies. Realize.
A Pakistani Child
Skip one Eid visit to a friend who lives 20 kilometers away. Save 500 rupees in fuel and the eid cake that you were going to take with you. Drive around your residence until you find a child like this one, or this one. Give the money to her. Your friend has a cellphone, wish him over the phone. Tell him what you did. He’ll understand.
A Pakistani Girl
Turn the TV off for a few hours. It will only make you crave more stuff to buy. Instead of wasting time on the special Eid broadcasts for a few hours, read a book with your child – or read The Book. One more day won’t hurt. Learn.
I just watched the movie ‘Mongol‘ which is based on the early life of Genghis Khan, or Temujjin. The movie was shot in the Mongolian language, so I was surprised to spot many words that sounded like their counterparts in Urdu. I always thought the word ‘Urdu’ was from Turkish, but after a bit of research, I found out that ‘Horde’ means ‘Military Camp’ in Mongolian too:
Urdu is a Mongolian and Turkish word meaning “military camp” and is the root of the English word “horde.” When the Central Asian tribal warriors came into northern India, Urdu is the creole that ended up being spoken in the camps so that Hindu traders could sell the Muslim grandees their goods).
Among the Urdu sounds that I recognized were “Aba” for “father” and “Utho” for wake up. I’m sure there are many more common roots, but sadly, most of the mongolian online dictionaries use their alphabet, which I can’t read.
Not a lot has changed since the 12th century – we have continued being a horde, there is something in our nomadic roots that disagrees with settling down mentally and calling a place home. Our military camps are always at the forefront, and like a military camp, we still don’t really care about trashing this piece of land with death and destruction. Like Mongols, we trade and kill our women like animals.
As a trekkie-in-denial who watched the whole Deep Space Nine this year and who is also a citizen of Pakistan, I can’t help being reminded the Bajor of DS9 each time somebody is killed in the Bajour of Pakistan. Those of you who have seen the series (and know about the Bajourian incidents) will know what I’m talking about. The rest of you, if you are in Lahore and want to see DS9, you know who to talk to 🙂
The DS9 producer denies that the planet was modelled after an actual location, and says that “unfortunately, the homeless and terrorism are problems in every age.” which makes the similarities between the two places all the more interesting. I’ll attempt to list a few of the similarities that I can remember below from memory and without any verifications. Purist trekkies, please forgive me.
Bajor [Bajour] is a stategically located planet [area] at the border of a worm-hole [Pakistan]. The quadrant [country] on the other side is supposed to hold a lot of resources and trading opportunities. The people of Bajor [Bajour] were occupied by an alien race, when most of the Bajorans joined the Resistance, sabbotaging and attacking the invaders whenever they could, and finally fought them off. Bajorans [Bajourans] are a religious race, consulting their gods and prophets before making important decisions. Their religious leaders have a very strong influence over their politics, and sometimes take over and rule the planet [area]. Now, the Federation [US + allies], an alliance of multiple races that is technologically much more advanced than the Bajorans [Bajourans] has arrived and wants to help them rebuild, and ultimately join the Federation. Many religiously inclined Bajorans [Bajourans] are resistant to the idea…
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.
Zardari Comments
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.
