Posted in desi, fun on February 28, 2008 | 37 Comments »
I thought I’d do what I thought might be a “witty” take on Stuff White People Like and adapt it to what Pakistani Americans like. With the many caveats that are necessary - these are stereotypes, they are not universally applicable, they have a class bias (I don’t fit them either - well, okay, not [...]
Posted in desi, gender, poetry on February 15, 2008 | 17 Comments »
This is a poem that I’ve had hidden away for seven years. It tells the story of my own sister’s divorce in Pakistan, and the response from many on-lookers. There were sympathetic words too, but they were mostly muted - because no one wants to be on a losing side.
________
DIVORCEE
Hi there.
What happened to you?
He broke [...]
Posted in Pakistan, USA, desi, fun, gender, religion on January 21, 2008 | 9 Comments »
I have a paternal uncle who arrived in the deep South 50-some years ago. He was the only foreigner the area. His face was splashed all over the newspapers as “Mo” the tennis star from Pakistan, who had a tennis scholarship at Clemson. Wherever he went, he was recognized: “You’re Mo, aren’t you!”
So 50 years [...]
Posted in Pakistan, desi on January 8, 2008 | 1 Comment »
An evocative piece about Pakistani life by Mohsin Hamid, author of “Moth Smoke” and “The Reluctant Fundamentalist.” (Hat-tip to Baraka).
‘As an admiring American roommate of mine once said, “All you guys do is hang out.”‘ For which, see my most recent post.
Posted in desi, gender on January 2, 2008 | 1 Comment »
This is not a true “review” but a collection of thoughts on the book by Samina Ali. It took me a long while to read it, weighed down as I have been by academic and then parenting work, but once I started it, I definitely couldn’t put it down.
At first, it was annoying. I thought [...]
Posted in children, desi on December 3, 2007 | 18 Comments »
I need to create:
1. Urdu foam letters that are safe for a toddler.
2. my own board books
3. burn CDs with Urdu children’s songs.
Can someone tell me how to find the materials, and easy ways to get these things done in minimal time?
Posted in Pakistan, cultural, desi on August 27, 2007 | 1 Comment »
A beautiful evocative piece by Asad Raza.
Excerpt:
“Lahore is the conservatory of a lost world whose traces have been largely erased from more touristic destinations, like Delhi and Agra - I will come to the reasons for this below. The world in general has few cities that interweave so seamlessly a great vitality today (the city [...]
Posted in cultural, desi on August 22, 2007 | 7 Comments »
<<<<<<<SPOILER ALERT>>>>>>>
Svend and I are hopelessly behind in our movie-watching, so we don’t even try to keep up with them as they come out. Still, I try to regularly expose my own inability to keep up with cultural developments by providing rough and ready reviews of books and movies. If you wish to avoid spoilers, - well, [...]
Posted in Urdu, cultural, desi on August 22, 2007 | No Comments »
The great author Qurratul Ain Hyder (whose father was Sajjad Hyder Yaldaram) passed away at the age of 80: see Indscribe’s post on the subject.
