http://pique.pk/education/06-Dec-2013/stifling-education

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December, 2013

Stifling education

The quality of Pakistan’s government school teaching, as well as the dire state of its textbooks, undermines the education of our children

Rabia Ahmed 

A student at an ESL (English as a second language) institute in Pakistan failed a basic English exam, even though she herself taught English at a local nursery school. Sadly, the most common reaction to this is, “Oh well, they’re only little kids.”

And that is the pivot upon which this article turns. Does it matter how – or what – very young children are taught, and who teaches them? More specifically, what are the aims of education in Pakistan, and does the present system fulfil these aims?

The Constitution of Pakistan (1973) Article 7 (b)says, “The state of Pakistan shall… remove illiteracy and provide free and compulsory secondary education within the minimum possible period.” But the present picture of our education system gives a conflicted picture of whether or not these intentions are being made reality: schooling in Pakistan is not compulsory, although government schools and textbooks are free from years one to ten.

If literacy is defined as the ability of persons fifteen years of age and over to read and write, Pakistan’s literacy level is just 54.9% of a total population of more than 193,000,000 people. The small fraction of the country’s GDP spent on education in the budget (2.4% in 2010, ranking Pakistan at 161 out of 173 countries) could be augmented by decreased spending on and by officialdom, but that is not the subject here.

The United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) says: “Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory.” Malala was shot in Swat for highlighting the ban by the Taliban on educating girls. This makes those imposing this ban criminals, as well as those parents who do so for cultural reasons.

As for the question about young children: recent research at King’s College in London and Brown University in the US dealing with the secretion of a substance called myelin in the brain, and appears to provide the answer. The finding sindicate that the brain is at its most mouldable until the age of four. It concludes that from birth to the age of four is the best time for a child to learn a language. The better the education at that most receptive stage, the more the student is likely to learn. A teacher who is unable to converse in English herself is likely to waste this opportunity.

In Pakistan generous funding from international organisations is available, but ghost schools (institutions that exist on paper alone) and schools that offer less than the minimum requirements stipulated by the constitution,proliferate at a proportionate rate. According to a report issued by its ministry,12,794 schools in Sindh lack adequate shelter, 34,386 are without electricity, 26,669 do not have boundary walls, 23,349 do not possess a lavatory and 25,237 have no access to drinking water.

It is a requirement in the Punjab that government school teachers must possess at least a Bachelor’s degree in education. The same requirement does not apply to private school teachers. The cost of these qualifications is very low at government universities and colleges, but much higher in the private sector. Recent changes have also fixed the salaries of government school teachers to a minimum of grade 16, while government university teacher salaries start at grade 18.

The national education policy makes it mandatory for government school teachers to undergo additional training once every five years. This training is provided free of charge. In the Punjab – where the number of teachers is very large – it is not always possible for many teachers to benefit from these courses.

However, other short training courses, lasting from two weeks to six months are available, also free of charge. These courses are heavily sponsored by the British Council, USAID and other international organisations, which also provide stipends for qualified teachers willing to work in more remote areas of the country.

With all these benefits and regulations, it can only be that teacher absenteeism from their jobs and from these courses is – like other infringements in society – beyond the control of the authorities. In fact,many of the problems in the educational sphere in Pakistan appear not to be as a result of the rules,but that these rules are either overridden or too easily set aside. A major aspect of this problem is the quality of textbooks used in teaching students in government schools.

There is a vast difference between the textbooks used by students taking the OLevel exam,and those used by matriculates. This contributes to the ever-widening gulf between the haves and the have-nots, which starts with education, but goes on to other facilities (or their lack thereof), and manifests itself in the extremism, unrest and violence we see today.

Publication rights of textbooks in the Punjab are granted to private publishing houses. The books were once printed on the cheapest possible paper, such as newsprint. This, for a poor country, is understandable. The low standards seen in the rest of these publications is not, and these cannot be blamed on poverty.

I looked through some English and Pakistan Studies textbooks for classes nine and ten, approved by the Punjab Board for this report. The paper quality has improved, but even a child with the most generous secretion of myelin is unlikely to respond positively to such texts.

The English textbooks teach less English and more Islamiyat, and in the dullest possible way. If there are Harry Potter fans reading, think about Professor Binns, the ghost teacher who, without realising he was dead carried on teaching, boring his students to death. We start with a chapter about the Prophet Muhammad, which includes several lines in Arabic,and the full version of ‘peace be upon him’(in Arabic), every time a religious personage is mentioned. There are then two preachy little chapters about patriotism, followed by one about Hazrat Asma. Remember, Islamiyat is also taught as a separate subject.

Do you know what a “cataphoric reference” is, or an “anaphoric reference”? I have no idea either, and that’s in a class nine textbook for students who in many cases have very poor English. The students – most of them from underprivileged homes where education is scarce and English is not commonly spoken– are being taught terms they are unlikely to ever use again.

Some way down the line, these textbooks will produce a matric graduates who will not know to put ‘an’ instead of ‘a’ before ‘anaphoric’, but may have a nebulous recollection of what anaphoric means – only to forget it during his first job as an electrician’s or grocer’s apprentice. Besides this, the textbook repeats two chapters, omits one, and two pages in a new book are half-missing.

The problems run deeper with Pakistan Studies, which is once again a study in Islamiyat. Textbooks for this subject portray Pakistan as exclusively for Muslims. The only mention of minorities is at the end of the textbook for class ten. Clearly at that age they are considered equipped to handle such unfortunate facts of life in an appropriate way.

In her book, The Language Police, Diane Ravitch – an educational historian and policy analyst – criticises this stifling of the study and expression of views by groups with vested interests. Ravitch’s book explains how pressure groups of varying political persuasions have manipulated the content of educational textbooks, often at the expense of quality, accuracy and the education of those who read them. The result is what we see in Pakistan today.

We possess some extremely dedicated professionals – some of whom I consulted about this article, but did not wish to be quoted. Unfortunately,their voices are overridden by those unqualified in the field. If this continues, Pakistan will in turn be overridden by the rest of the world.

http://pique.pk/culture/04-Nov-2013/the-biblio-bus
Pique November 2013

The biblio bus

From a humble mobile library to an enormous educational feat – Rabia Ahmed meets the Alif Laila Book Bus Society

Rabia Ahmed

“Whatever the cost of our libraries, the price is cheap compared to that of an ignorant nation.”  Walter Cronkite

1978 was the year General Zia became the president of Pakistan, but it was also the year that the Alif Laila Book Bus Society (ALBBS) came into being in Lahore, proving, that there is always a brighter side to life.

You fall over a library every few miles in an educated society, but the people of Pakistan, grappling with their own crippling problems, do not miss what they never had. Libraries are conspicuous by their absencein Pakistan, creating a crucial void in our lives.

Alif Laila, an NGO based in Lahore, started life as a single library in a stationary double-decker bus. It was founded in 1978 by Nita Baker, who had been living in Lahore for several years, but left Pakistan the following year. That original bus still stands, and remains stocked with books and toys. Basarat Kazim is the current president of the society’s six-member Board of Governors, with Rabia Khan as vice president. Alif Laila is now successfully associated with several organisations including the Punjab Library Foundation, UNESCO, UNICEF, Save the Children, Toyota, Tetra Pak, ICI and others.

Basarat Kazim,the author of several award-winning books for children, donates all proceeds from her booksto Alif Laila.I visited Basarat after hours at her office in the private school she works at in Lahore.

“I was a raw recruit,” she laughed. “I didn’t know what an NGO was, although I worked with Alif Laila since it began.”

“Later, in the early 1980s when Lieutenant General Ghulam Jilani Khan was governor, I posted my children outside his residence with a petition for approval of library premises,”Basarat recalled. “We were given the library premises anda library was constructed for us in the park in Gulberg II, where our bus was parked. That became Alif Laila’s reference library.”

The park is now a children’s playground, and the old double-decker bus guardsits entrance.Its upper deck is equipped for storytelling, the lower one filled with books.It is reserved forboys and girls aged eight years and younger. There is another double-decker called Dastangou (or Storyteller) parked nearby, and this serves asAlif Laila’s mobile lending library.

Alif Laila’s reference library is alow, round building with a wraparound veranda tucked under a tangle of trees and climbers inside the park, and staffed by a full time librarian.Girls of any age and boys below 15 can use it during and after school hours.

All Alif Laila libraries are bright, colourful, andfull of children.Alif Laila’s facilities are available across the economic divide, meaning all children from government and private schoolsare able to use the facilities. Family income and education levels are divides that ALBBS aims to bridge.

On the day I visited, the children at the reference library were from a local government school. Alif Laila’s own bus had picked themup, accompanied by an attendant, and they were to bereturned to school the same way later. I met Khadija [name changed], who is eleven, and Atiya thirteen. They havefour and seven siblings respectively, all at school. Their mothers are uneducated; Khadija’s father is a salesman in a store, Atiya’s an Imam at a mosque.

I asked the girls several questions, including the cliché, “What would you like to be, when you grow up?”Instead of the typical reply of “Mein doctor banoon gi,” the Imam’s daughter said she wanted to work for the police, and her friend opted for the army.Other girls in the group talked about becoming dentists and computer programmers.

And so it appears that Basarat is succeeding in her ambition: enabling Alif Laila to “foster the thought processes of children (particularly girls), until they are able to think independently and critically; to build bridges, know their roots, and stand tall and proud.”

In that well lit circular room,with its spotless carpet, surrounded by books, games and DVDs, children, books in hand,sat on chairs near the shelves, or snuggled into a pit of large bright cushionsin the centre of the room. They told me they were able to borrow two books from the lending libraryfor a period of two weeks. The feefor the service is Rs. 500 per child, per year for private schools, and Rs. 50 for government schools. Interestingly, the record for books returned in good conditionis appreciably higher for children from underprivileged homes. Perhaps they value the facility more.

Alif Laila’s first major grant after its initial fundraising efforts was a cheque for Rs. 95,000 from the Dutch Embassy. The money was used to buy audiovisual equipment. When donations started coming in afterwards, including a grant from the Punjab government, a small Suzuki van was obtainedfor transporting children to and from the library, and Dastangobecame Alif Laila’s third main library, driving out to children in their own communities with books, storytellers and puppeteers on board. There is now also a pert little rickshaw adorned with the slogan “Read Pakistan, Read!”puttering around Lahore’sModel Colony, Shah Jamal Colony, Gulberg III and Walton, loaded with books for children.

At the request of the basti’s residents, ALBBS branched out for several years, setting up, running, and actually teaching at schools in Basti Saidan Shah in Lahore, whichdesperately needed more schools. It initiated classes from nursery to the third grade, providing activity based learning, and worked in the area for almost twenty years. Other schools were established at Bhabra and the old Walton airstrip.

“The children were very smart,” recalls Basarat, “but extremely poor. Our aim was to ensure that at least one person in each family became literate. We ran those schools until the squatter settlements were moved to make way for residential projects.”

ALBBSnow concentrates on libraries, and also runs hobby clubs for girls at their resource centre adjacent to the library park. This centre is run by donations from the Global Fund for Women. Girls come, or are brought to the centre from their schools once a week, to take part in clubs of their choice: computers, electronics, crafts and art – with digital photography in the pipeline. They learn about recycling, make little electronic toys, learn to use computers, make cards and bangles, and paint.That is Alif Laila’s mission, to provide hands-on experience to “enhance the capabilities of young women, creating in them a sense of wonder, the urge to explore, experiment, discover, understand and innovate.”

In February of this year, ALBBS extended their services to Multan and Muzaffargarh in collaboration with USAID, with the message‘Read, Lead and Succeed’. Its mobile library visits 40 schools in the area, and it has fitted another 100 schools with library corners and books.Earlier, they ran a one-year pilot project in Sheikhupura, funded by the Open Society Foundation, whereby a room in a local government school was decorated, equipped for a children’s library, and more than 3000 books provided.A mobile library ran for the duration of the project, and now, after that period, ALBBS continues to pay expenses for the library at the school.

Alif Laila is associated with the Pakistan Reading Project, a programme launched by USAID and implemented by the International Rescue Committee here in Pakistan, which fosters reading skills. So, in addition to its own libraries, ALBBS helps communities set up their own.

A conference organised by ALBBS took place in Lahore this October, entitled ‘Setting up Community Libraries for Children’.Participants from allover Pakistan shared their experiences and attended workshops and training session with the aim of setting up libraries in their own communities.Many participants represented disaster struck areas such as Baluchistan, so they were also looking for aid for their projects – disaster relief is another field in which Alif Laila participates.

A member of the International Board of Books for Young People (IBBY), Alif Laila received funds under the ‘Books Build Bridges’ programme from IBBY during the 1995 earthquake in Muzzafarabad, and the2010 floods in Sindh, and set up libraries for 110 schools in the affected region.

The conference was full of purpose and activity.Participants learnt about the therapeutic power of books (called bibliotherapy), performed skits, and took it in turns torelate personal memories oftraining to ‘de-inhibit’, so that they may use this skilllater in telling simple everyday stories to children.

There are, as they say, several ways of skinning a cat. If the goal is to improve conditions and provide a better tomorrow for our children, imposing bans and policing the streets is one way; but by far the most enduring solution is to equip young people – and especiallythe mothers of tomorrow – with the necessary skills for peace and survival, so they can be independent, confidentadvocates for change and rights – again, especially those of women and children. This is what ALBBS tries to do. Whatever it costs, it works out cheaper than the losses endured by ignorance
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WHEN A LOVED ONE DIES

Express Tribune By Rabia Ahmed Published: October 23, 2013

How do people cope with death and loss of a loved one?

Dumbledore’s response to this,

‘To the well organised mind, death is but the next great adventure,’

This was interesting because truly, how people cope with death does appear to depend largely on the mind of the person (or persons) involved.  More specifically it depends on the individual’s answer to the question; which is the final frontier, life after death, or the act of dying itself?

In other words, does life go on after dying, or does it all end with death itself.

Tina may not have succumbed to her disease had her family been able to afford the on-going treatment required to stabilise her condition. Her mother expressed less bitterness and anger than expected, and coped well with her grief, saying with simple dignity that this was as much life as was given her daughter on earth, and as much time as they were meant to spend with her now.

‘I am grateful to God for it,’ she said.

Some people would say her attitude was too accepting, but here it is important to perceive the difference between an acceptance of reality and an acceptance of a wrong, much as the two overlap.

In Tina’s case the fact that she died because of a lack of finances was a wrong, and it is right to consider this unacceptable and to make an effort to prevent such a thing from happening again. Her mother however was referring to something different. The key word in her statement was ‘now’, which implies a ‘later’, which is a time when Tina’s mother looks forward to being re-united with her daughter.

It is this that gives her hope and prevents her from falling into a depression.

Louisa Blair, in the Official Publication of the College of Physicians Canada notes that people’s attitude to death and dying depends on their understanding of ‘life and when one believes life begins and ends.’ In other words (and once again) for those who believe that this life is simply one stage in a continuous process and not the end, it is easier to accept the transition, or what we call ‘death’.

One of the most peaceful conversations I have had was with someone who had lost her mother that same day. Sitting together, we spoke of her parent, and how she must be doing at that time. The daughter spoke of her mother not as lying lifeless, but as well and joyful, and said that she imagined how wonderful it must be for her mother to be reunited with her husband after she died.

‘She must have been so happy to meet him,’ the daughter said with a smile on her face, and we talked of how much her mother had missed her husband, and how much they had enjoyed each other’s company. I like to believe that the visualisation brought the daughter a degree of happiness, because she spoke also of her mother’s happy reunion with her parents and with a son who had died some years earlier.

Human beings thrive when they look ahead. This applies to societies, which stagnate when they are mired in the past as well as to individuals for whom the thought that a person who dies is only parted from them ‘until we meet again’ is a source of pleasure and comfort.

My father, asked during his final illness about what he was thinking of, replied that he was no longer concerned with those around him, but that his entire attention was fixed on ‘looking ahead’ to meeting his mother who died when he was very young.

It gave me strength, as a parent’s conviction tends to do, that if he looked forward to death, so could I, when the time comes, be comforted by the thought of meeting him again and running the natural course of things.

http://pique.pk/culture/07-Oct-2013/the-cuckoo-s-calling

October, 2013

The Cuckoo’s calling

J.K Rowling

Rabia Ahmed

 

‘The Cuckoo’s Calling,’ J.K Rowling’s second venture into the world of adult muggles, is the first of a promised series featuring Cormorant Strike, a private detective.

Rowling had wished to return to writing via crime fiction, starting with this book but wanted to do so ‘without hype or expectation.’ So, she used the pseudonym Robert Galbraith. Unfortunately Galbraith’s real identity did not remain secret for long but Rowling wishes to continue using the pseudonym for the series, perhaps whenever she writes science fiction, just as Agatha Christie used the name Mary Westmacott whenever she wrote romance. 

“It was a fantastic experience,’ Rowling said, speaking of this brief period of anonymity. ‘I only wish it could have gone on a little longer,’ she said. She has filed a lawsuit against the persons who broke her cover.

Whilst the cover existed, the book was turned down by at least one publisher. No publishing house would have refused a known J.K Rowling book, even if she were to write as badly as Rita Skeeter.

On the other hand, when the manuscript was accepted by Sphere Books (a trade name for Little, Brown and Company, the publishers of ‘The Casual Vacancy’) even before she was known as the author, Rowling must have been chuffed. She was published  on her own merit. Not that she, the author of Harry Potter should lack confidence in that regard; which proves her other point, about expectations.

There are similarities between this book and ‘Casual Vacancy.’ Both express Rowling’s personal aversion to the spoilt rich segment of society and her empathy for the struggles of the less well off. She’s obviously been there herself and is able to take her readers there as well. 

Even while it was thought to be the unknown Galbraith’s first book, ‘The Cuckoo’s Calling’ sold some copies, but when it was exposed as J.K Rowling’s latest effort, sales shot right up on Amazon.

The projected books will continue to star this book’s protagonist Cormorant Strike, an Afghan war veteran, known from now on as the man linked to the investigation into the death of Lula Landry, a supermodel. 

(As an aside, celebrity names are rarely this alliterative nowadays. I wish she’d chosen another name for her famous model).

There are, of course, faults in the book, and the biggest one would have struck me even if I weren’t looking for it: Rowling here is too meticulously descriptive, which she wasn’t before. You wonder at times where a particular description is leading to?, whether it has a bearing on what follows? Will a minutely described object turn out to be a murder weapon? The closely detailed dress incriminating evidence? But no, she’s simply setting every scene very carefully before she starts the action, actually a bit too carefully. It’s only towards the end that she stops projecting the impression of being a creative writing major, doing her careful best to sketch everything as she was taught. Perhaps being less descriptive was a failing she found with her earlier writing.

On the other hand, the descriptions stop short of being tedious, and do help in visualizing the scenes and the characters although they really could have been less stand alone and more woven into the action.

So, did I read this book thinking, ‘Oh, I’m reading a new crime fiction called ‘The Cuckoo’s Calling.’ Or, did I read it as ‘Hey, a new book by J.K Rowling!’

I have to admit it was the latter. You can’t escape it, not if you’re as huge a fan of Harry Potter as I am.

Knowing who the author is increases the challenge Rowling faces: she must make the reader enjoy the book because it is good, not because she wrote it, and generate a wish for sequels.

Did I enjoy the book?

Yes, very much. The story unfolded well. The characters were skillfully drawn; I’d like to maintain their acquaintance, and I’m looking forward to the next book in the series, which will apparently be released in 2014.

This book is more interesting than ‘The Casual Vacancy.’ The plot grabs you; when everything is about to be resolved at the end, I found myself covering the rest of the page with my hand, so I didn’t see the ending without meaning to.

Still, the only way Rowling can now prove her undoubted skill in this genre is if she succeeds in selling subsequent books in the series as well as this one has sold; and also if she manages to totally eliminate Harry from their pages, and replace him with Strike.

A new hero has been born, a most interesting one. 

SECURITY CHECKS: WHY ARE MILITARY (LOOKING) MEN AND WOMEN EXEMPT?

Express Tribune Published: September 22, 2013

A police officer checks a car at a security check point in Islamabad . PHOTO: AFP

My husband and I had the dubious fortune of visiting a government office recently. Before we entered we were stopped at a security barrier as usual. My husband has a martial air about him, it seems, because they often mistake him for an army officer. In Lahore, that’s useful.  Not one to be left behind, I too can produce my alter ego when required, you know, as though there’s something smelly under my nose, like Mrs Malfoy, and that’s useful too.

The security guard took one look at us two stiff necks in the back seat and his resolution wavered, as did the instrument in his hand, the danda (pole) with the mirror at the end with which they check the underside of a car.  He poked defiantly at the wheel, but without wasting our time further, let us through to our appointment with the big stink at the other end.

We don’t normally terrorise the local populace this way but we just wanted to see how well this security works. As we found out, so much for security at this barrier.

Certain persons in their wisdom from their air conditioned offices have installed security barriers at the entrance to cantonments, hotels, government offices, malls and so forth. These barriers hinder the public as it moves about its business but clearly fail to hinder terrorists as they move about theirs.  Zamurrad Khan comes strongly to mind. What is going wrong?

Security is effective only if the checking is thorough and impartial. But naturally if each person is checked very thoroughly as he/she goes about his daily business life would grind to a halt. Therefore people are checked carelessly, or not at all.

Secondly, as mentioned above, those with presumed clout (such as army officers and Convent school alumni) get waved through, because the guards are worried about repercussions if they fail to oblige. This is not an unfounded fear; they are punished for doing their job. Unfortunately, terrorists can dissemble as well as the next guy, and they never fail to oblige either.

Thirdly, women generally get through without any checks at all.

I fail to understand the attitude towards women in Pakistan. Either, they get acid thrown onto their faces, and their heads blown away, or they are treated as the ‘mothers and sisters of the nation’ – pushed to the front of every queue and allowed unchecked through security barriers.

Well, I have no wish to be either mother or sister to some of the characters around, and I take exception to the presumption that I, as a woman, am incapable of transporting/detonating a bomb. I am not an idiot, ET’s profile photograph not withstanding.

I can pull pins out of my hair, so I am perfectly capable of pulling pins out of a grenade. Let me tell you: in class seven at CJM, it was I who ground that stink bomb under the heel of my foot in Ms Amy King’s English class.  Nobody knew this except my confederates, and now you do, but I still hope Ms King doesn’t read the ET. And you know the time Ms D’Souza (alias Choozi, the teacher who taught art to all of Lahore), was walking down the driveway into Cathedral school, and she did a double take and tripped over her umbrella? Well, it was because I chucked a tiny yellow toy (it was soft, very soft) chicken at her back from the safety of our car.

With that record, I’m a likely candidate for bombing the Parliament house, or throwing my spiky hair curlers at the Prime Minister as he rolls by in his armoured car and cavalcade of seventy. Guy Fawkes probably started just as small, setting little phantom fires at the local boy scout jamboree.  So, never underestimate the power of women. Witness mothers-in-law everywhere, and I am one too! Bwahaha!

Most people have no wish to harm anyone, and I doubt if most of those poor sods who blow themselves up, do either. How can we understand what compulsions force them to do what they do? Little do we know about how children are kidnapped or even otherwise steeped in demonic doctrines; how the lure of financial security for their families is dangled before poverty stricken individuals, in exchange for and skilfully interwoven with visions of security in paradise. Perhaps these thoughts are also present in the minds of the guys at the naqas, who last week checked only the boot of my car, and let me through, when clearly visible on the seat beside me was a large, a very large ice box that could have contained half a grandmother, one bomb a-ticking, and five Kalashnikovs.

Lucky for everyone (and the grandmother), that it didn’t.

MY CHRISTIAN HOUSE HELP: PAKISTAN NEVER WANTS ITS MINORITIES TO SUCCEED

By Rabia Ahmed Published: September 2, 2013  EXPRSS TRIBUNE

Masih, at 28, remains where he started out, a full time cleaner. In the charming words of our brethren, Masih, is a ‘choora’, a dreadful term.

Pakistan’s fertility rate is likely to drop if women marry at an older age: that argument stands on its own considerable merit, because a young woman is likely to conceive more easily and often at this most fertile time of her life, but other factors also contribute to the high fertility rate.

In Pakistan, children are not just a source of joy, but necessary pillars that support parents in the parents’ old age. This is true of all cultures, but it acquires an imperative urgency in societies like ours.

Insaan Masih is a young man of no education but an innate sense of what should be. He has taught himself to read and write to a rudimentary level. His wife, given child bearing and rearing, housework and a job, remains illiterate. They have two children in school. Both parents have made their children’s education their priority in a way that I have rarely witnessed amongst more educated persons, where I have also rarely witnessed Masih’s attention to hygiene and other things, such as punctuality. He rarely takes a day off, always working an alternate day if he cannot make it once.

In spite of these qualities, Masih, at 28, remains where he started out, a full time cleaner. In the charming words of our brethren, Masih, is a ‘choora’, a dreadful term.

I began to realise the extent of the problem only when Masih started to work for us and it seemed to me that our then cook had something against him. I could find little wrong with our new employee, unless you call his horror of working in a room containing strangers a problem. He is ashamed of the job he does, and I have learnt never to ask him to ‘quickly dust that corner’ if an outsider is present in the room.

Finally, the cook came out with it. He wanted me to get separate dishes for Masih.

We never, on principle, separate our utensils from our employees, but the problem of course was that Masih is a Masih (a Christian). I refused, and our cook separated his plates from ours.

Several non Muslims have visited our home, but never has our cook objected to sharing the crockery with them. They, of course, are white, so Masih’s was a case of caste racism with which Pakistan is riddled and cursed, nothing to do with religion which condemns such prejudice. Masih possesses a name that identifies him with a minority community. He also possesses dark skin, which to the average racist Pakistani acts the way a red flag apparently does to a bull.

I took Masih for his driving test today upon his request. He is so used to being discriminated against because of his poverty and religion that he wanted me there simply as a shield, which I tried to be. I helped him put together the documents required (the licensing process will be the subject of another blog), and so was able to share, to some miniscule extent, what the Masihs of this country go through every day of their lives. It made me cringe.

‘What is your name?’ the man at the desk barked at the young man at my side.

‘Insaan *masih*,’ the latter in a very small voice.

‘Masih? A Christian?’ the voice dripped with contempt.

‘Yes sir.’

The man at the desk turned to another man at his side, in police uniform. ‘He is a Masih. Where should he go?’

Not even the man in uniform knew how to respond to this question, which is probably why Masih was waved along to stand in line with everyone else. We encountered similar incidents several times.

I left when his documents were made, and later, Masih did not get his license; they failed him for a (very) minor question. He must retake his test.

Masih requires several half days for this process and money for transport, both of which are hard to come by for him. He is trying to better his position, which is possible if God wills it, but never if our countrymen have their way.

Masih’s job does not provide a pension, and one day when he and his wife are old, there will be no savings, given their salaries; the mere idea is ridiculous.

Who will look after them if not their children?  That the State might is an even more laughable expectation, therefore, the more children the better. I would be the same in that position.

This applies to almost all the people in this country, all disadvantaged one way or another, most of all by being subjects of a State which has failed to provide for its people any way you look at it.

HOW DO YOU EXPLAIN 'THE LOTA' TO A FOREIGNER?

Express Tribune 24 August 2013

Americans and Brits are especially fascinated by the lota.

We miss many things when we’re living away from home - mangoes, bun kebabs, paan, the dust, the loadshedding. Okay, okay, just kidding! We miss some of these things, but we manage without them, one way or another.

There is one thing you cannot do without, though, and that’s the lota. It is such an integral item of sub-continental and Muslim culture, that even a short term visitor such as the famous American designer Charles Eames couldn’t help but notice it most particularly when he visited India in 1958.  He had this to say about it:

“Of all the objects we have seen and admired during our visit to India, the lota, that simple vessel of everyday use, stands out as perhaps the greatest, the most beautiful.”

There you go. Beautiful? Yes, he was talking about the brass lota that the village women clean and polish with tamarind and ash each day, turning the ‘brass into gold’. They are beautiful… and very heavy.

Most people flying out struggle with weight restrictions, so carrying a heavy brass lota in your luggage is an extravagance when there are achaars (pickles), chilli chips and bottles ofMushroob-e-Mashriq sherbet fighting for space in a suitcase. The ubiquitous, elemental, and exceedingly essential lota loses out in the process. You will not see brass lotas much outside Pakistan. Instead, you’ll see ugly plastic ones which replaced the bronze ones in Pakistan a while ago in any case.

So what do you do once you’ve reached your particular pardes and you have no lota in the new house? You reach for the nearest milk bottle, of course.

You’ll find all sorts of milk bottles in people’s bathrooms out there – full cream, low fat, skim, soya, chocolate, vanilla, or my favourite, strawberry. People are strangely coy about them.

“Why’s there always a milk bottle in your bathroom?” visitors have asked – always American.

They’re refreshingly forthright.

In England I caught a native looking bemusedly at my strawberry soya milk bottle (organic) before she shut the door to the powder room, and I waited with an array of answers provided by errant nephews (one of whom claimed to possess a folding lota that fit in his wallet, but it turned out to be only a zip lock bag) for just this purpose.

The answers included:

1) I use it all the time to irrigate my nose. I have a deviated septum.

2) I prefer strawberry soya, so I removed the chocolate you saw when you were last here; sorry.

3) Would you prefer the chocolate? I can put that back if you like.

4) It’s a Pakistani superstition.

5) In Pakistan we like to keep our cows in the bathroom, but we can’t do that here, and the milk bottle reminds the kids of that tradition.

Or simply:

6) Which milk bottle? (That one really freaks them out for a while)

Sadly, for one reason or the other, most of those responses were not used – firstly because the Americans are honest enough to ask without being oblique so you are not tempted to match delicacy with wit, and secondly, because the Brits would rather die before they ask any such question. They’d pick their way through 10 milk bottles in a single bathroom and pretend it was a normal feature of every bathroom decor. In fact, they would claim that “it was Aunt Doris’ favourite bathroom accessory too, wasn’t it, Anthea?”

Oh, why the fuss! Bring the lotas out of the closet. Let Ikea carry dismantle-able ones in their standard flat colours, and back here in Pakistan, how about Haji Karim Baksh carrying a line of lota gifts for relatives in the West?

‘Loin of the Punjab!’ (sic) proclaims a T-shirt in one of the shops in Lahore, alongside a gun-toting portrait of Sultan Rahi. The lotas could carry just that slogan, no Sultan Rahi required at all.