When the Baby of the Family Got Married

“You just watch when Monty gets married,” he’d said as he brushed away his tears, “Then I’ll really cry.” This was vintage Sher Alam. Over the years, in multiple retellings of this incident, which happened when the eldest of our four siblings got married, the love and genuineness that Sher Alam, self-titled as Baati, the baby of our group, wanted to convey has never been lost amidst the laughter and mirth. As sisters and brothers-in-law, nieces and nephews came, they all developed their special equations with ‘Baati Dada’. I won’t lie; when the announcement of Sher Alam’s wedding finally came, there were definitely mixed emotions.  On the one hand, there was elation, excitement and curiosity even as to how the erstwhile kid, who, until recently, […]

BOOK LAUNCH: HOME #ItsComplicated

Each time I come home, it’s with a foreboding sense that this time I won’t experience the same ecstasy and bliss of returning to an innocent and purer cocoon that still binds and bonds me to my childhood. Each time, I’m happily mistaken. The airports and points of departure continue to keep pace with my journey of self-discovery, but my mooring, my anchor, remains steady as ever. Despite the changes to the scenery and the people, there’s a part of Pakistan that all of us carry within us. It’s that part that calls us when we’ve been away for too long. And it’s that part that always makes me feel like I’m walking back in time to an era where everything seems to stand still. […]

Roadside Buddha and the Meaning of Life

What is the meaning of life? How does one attain happiness and, more importantly, hold onto it? These are the type of introspective questions that are bound to pop up in one’s head when you forget to bring a book along, your phone is about to die, and the person in the seat next to you has made it clear that they would rather pretend to fall asleep than talk to you.  As the sun is a sullen red ball about to dip over the horizon, traveling by bus during the afternoon is perhaps the best time to indulge in actions, lazy cousin: introspection.  Just make sure to fulfil all the requirements mentioned above in addition to a window seat. Because no amount of explanation […]