sidewalk scribbling

“But seriously, don’t you think the MeToo movement is just a bit over the top?” says a 31-year-old Pakistani man with his feet up on the coffee table, flipping through the TV channels as his wife stands over the stove in the kitchen, cooking dinner.   “Well maybe- ” begins his mother only to be interrupted by his father: “Of course.   That is the problem with today’s generation.   They’re just complaining all the time and turning small things into big issues.” “Things have changed you know, I could see women crying about equal rights before but we’ve pretty much achieved equality now,” the 31-year-old man continues.   “Honey can you hurry up with the food, I’m starving!” Isn’t it delightful when you’re in the middle of a situation so saturated in irony it’s almost unbelievable that you haven’t slipped and broken a collarbone yet? It may be a difference of opinion but you know what, I don’t think equality of the sexes has been achieved – not in th...

There are people who can make a cup of coffee or start a new episode about fifteen minutes before they should be leaving for the airport (because they have a flight to catch or something) – except these are the people who would never say ‘I’m going to leave in 15 minutes’, it’s more like, a few minutes, oh, maybe a couple more, in a bit, can I at least finish my coffee? They’re the people who can simply walk at an even pace to catch their bus, or think about what they ate for dinner last night rather than outline the 7 things they will do first when their plane lands, and then an alternate 7 steps in case their bags take too long to arrive. Would it surprise you greatly if I said I don’t happen to be in the above category of people? Over-thinking and its two best friends, anxiety and guilt - picture a cheery trio holding hands and skipping towards a raging fire.  Okay, so a fire is a bit dramatic, let’s change it to a bumpy, muddy shallow hole in the ground? I ...

The vocabulary box given to young girls born in the late 1980s in Pakistan had many words to play with – dolls, sleep, cry, eat, pink, white, Ami, Baba, hello, bye. And as they would grow, more words would be plopped into the box or sometimes slipped into it when they were sleepy or too busy to notice – work, kitchen, care, compromise, weak, patience, strength, clean, sacrifice. Why - a word that I only realized is essential to grow and develop and learn and understand was really discovered in university, and I am forever thankful to LUMS for teaching it to me.  The skill and art of questioning. We aren’t encouraged to question, generally, and the more check boxes ticked against your name, the further they put the word away from you – female? Two rungs up the ladder; Pakistani – three rungs higher; young? Two rungs up. Wait, did you say female? Let’s just put it up where you can’t even see it so it’s more comfortable for all of us.  We were taught it is ...