10 Reasons Why It Is NOT Awesome Being a Woman in Pakistan

Someone thought it would be a good idea to write a post about how awesome it is to be a woman in Pakistan. I started reading it, highly expecting it to be sarcastic. It wasn’t. So here’s my take. 1. People Always Compliment You. They will always refer to you as khoobsurat, sexy, kya kamar hai and many other endering terms. They also go the…

The Silence of the Digital Sheep

  Pakistan is a country that has lagged behind the developed world in information and technology for as long as we Pakistanis can remember. Yes, we’ve even lagged behind the United States, which has some of the slowest internet connections in the entire ‘Western World’ and still sports Dial-Up internet – something even we Pakistanis look down on. Yet Pakistani is quickly becoming a very active nation…

Just Another Statistic

“Twin bomb attacks on a paramilitary force academy in north-west Pakistan have killed 80 people” “A suicide bombing at Pakistan’s premier aeronautical manufacturing complex killed seven people.” “A powerful explosion apparently detonated by a suicide bomber in the eastern city of Lahore on Thursday killed at least 23 people” We, you and I, read the news, sigh over the pictures…and forget all about them. I…

Dinner in the war zone

  “My husband didn’t want our children to come to Pakistan because it’s dangerous.” I looked at her and suppressed a smile. We were at a restaurant in Islamabad, at a dinner hosted in honour of a relative visiting Pakistan from the US of A. She had been asked why her children hadn’t come along. And she explained that her husband and in-laws felt that…