| December 06, 2008 | Saturday | Zilhaj 7, 1429 |
Of privileged entry and educational apartheid
The unsung heroes
He was once a strong, robust man. Israr Ahmed’s fragile figure was lying on the bed like the remains of a broken but precious urn.
THOUGH the earlier cold-spell, witnessed during the middle of November, has sadly subsided, the evening breeze and early morning chill in Karachi still justify the writing of a piece on hot beverages. And considering the fact that the whole of December, January and February are ahead of us, methinks there’s more cold weather in store for the metropolis.
Having said this, Pakistanis tend to have a propensity for hot beverages – read tea – year round. Be it the relatively frigid months of December or January or sweltering June and July, citizens of the republic cannot do without their dozen or so cups of tea. Perhaps we have our erstwhile colonial masters to thank for putting us on this road to ruin.
But I must say, here I am displaying an open disdain for tea, a beverage so loved by my fellow Pakistanis that it might be a capital offence to insult the stuff in print or in public. Yet come the chilly winds of the Karachi winter, even I – pun intended – warm up to the idea of having a steaming cuppa.
Chai-wallahs are as numerous in Karachi as there are types of plant species in the Amazon rainforest. You’ll find one under every rock. But a café named after a piyala, or bowl, stands out. One must say that the tea served up at this joint is deliciously different. So much so that it has changed a non-believer like yours truly into a certified disciple of the brew served up in a distinctive piyala. Located right off the main road, all sorts congregate at this watering hole to savour the bowlfuls of sweet, milky tea. And on a chilly winter night, a warm, crispy paratha dipped in the bowl of tea is nothing short of divine. Just remember to tell the waiter to make them Sulaimani, unless you like your parathas incredibly greasy. But if you don’t mind the grease-fest, you can also go for the house omelette or cholas. My personal brotherly advice: avoid the cholas.
And when talking about tea, one cannot forget the fabulous, nutty pink Kashmiri chai, that is available in parts of the city. The place that instantly springs to mind is Boating Basin where, after a gorge-fest, a bit of Kashmiri chai is the perfect end to a meal. I remember back in history when meals were prohibited at wedding parties, an innovative host served Kashmiri chai to guests at a winter wedding.
Moving on, we come to my personal favourite: coffee. With that rich, unmistakable aroma, the caffeine kick it packs and the mature, intense taste that warms to the core, in my book, coffee is the king of hot beverages. From the expensive coffee houses in the more up-scale parts of town, to the cats selling ‘espresso’ from little machines in popular markets to the stuff one makes at home, there is simply no way of going wrong with coffee. Well there is, but you have to be exceptionally talent-less to botch up a cup of coffee.
The last few years have seen a mini-explosion of coffee houses in the city, where the young and hip congregate. One is not sure if it is the pull of the magic brew that pulls ‘em in, or simply the fact that coffee joints are the latest ‘in’ thing. There has even been the spread of a café chain across the city that sells different kinds of java, as well as that demonic shisha. Now if only they could serve up authentic gahwa – Arabic coffee flavoured with cardamom – in Karachi, things would get really interesting.
But if both tea and coffee fail to catch your fancy, I have recently discovered a winter drink that has to be tasted to be believed. This magical concoction is known as kastori doodh. I first heard about kastori doodh when a friend and I stopped at a popular Burnes Road lassi joint to down a couple of cool ones this past summer. Curious, I placed an order for kastori doodh, only to be told by the waiter that it was only available in winter.
Well, winter’s here, and in my quest I marched right back up to Burnes Road to seek the Holy Grail. Even in the relatively cool December night, the punters were downing glasses of lassi as if it were 40 degrees outside. None of this for us, I told by ever-sceptical culinary companion. We had come for kastori doodh.
And kastori doodh we got. Yellowish-cream in colour, it looked like the kind of milk sherbet served at nazr-o-niyaz during Muharram, only it was hot, piping hot. With the first sip, my senses came alive as the rich, creamy milk, sprinkled with almonds, entered my system. It was rapturous.
I asked the proprietor of the lassi house just what the hell they put in it. Well, a magician – as well as a restaurateur – never tells, so he didn’t. They only thing he’d give away was that egg goes into the concoction. Whatever they put into it, who cares, as long as they keep it coming!
qasim.a.moini@dawn.com
THERE is no doubt that security is a major issue in Islamabad given a plethora of suicide attacks and other bombings that have cut a swathe into the once-fabled peaceful capital over the last two years.
However, every now and then measures taken under the pretext of security make life miserable for ordinary citizens. For a long time now, concrete blocks have become an enduring feature of Islamabad at every major crossing or bend.
As if life was not tough already for the locals, there was this unlovely spectacle last week at the Overseas Pakistanis Foundation Girls College of taking things too far — in more ways than one.
National Assembly Speaker Dr Fehmida Mirza along with several other women parliamentarians were a picture of pomp at an oath-taking and annual prize distribution ceremony.
But so heavy was the hand that sought secure passage for the VIP movement that scores of students and their parents could not even enter the college, thereby defeating the whole purpose of the exercise.
It doesn’t take genius to configure what a disappointment it must have been for some of the bright ones amongst the students to miss out on a high mark event that is both awaited by them and their parents.
A report published in the Metro section of Dawn’s Islamabad edition last Saturday quoted the mother of one student, who was to receive an award, as saying that despite producing the invitation card, the security personnel turned her away and closed the college gates.
Besides her, several other students, parents and even media persons were reportedly, held up by the high flyers. And while inglorious treatment was being meted out to “lesser mortals”, high government functionaries had no trouble getting even closed gates reopened.
A security guard later disclosed that an influential had directed to stop the students and their parents from entering the college for purposes of security. Not only is the insinuation that doing so would have somehow compromised VIP security flimsy, it is downright insulting.
One cannot but empathise with these students, who can be excused for thinking that to find their way they may, too, have to join the VIP ranks, whatever it takes for them to reach the destination so that tomorrow they aren’t treated like children of lesser god.
Not that inside the OPF Girls College, the lessons were any better, which brings one to the point about official patronage and exceeding eulogy.
Dr Fehmida Mirza’s election as Pakistan’s maiden woman speaker was doubtless a feather in her cap and a milestone for the country in terms of women’s emancipation.
But apart from holding fort in the National Assembly, she appears to be just one of a handful of prominent ruling party leaders bending over backwards to be seen as the greater propeller of the Benazir name game.
As well as constituting a Shaheed Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto Award for tenth graders winning distinction from the next academic year, she also announced Benazir Bhutto Scholarships, the recipients of which would be referred to as Benazir Bhutto Scholars.
Not finished with the naming spree, she left the OPF college premises by offering support for the construction of a new block of girls hostel, which she recommended be named as Bakhtawar Hostel.
It is hard to find a more sycophantic splurge even by the standards associated with cronies in this part of the world.
Being a part of the First Family has its advantages but few will agree that mere surnames are the building blocks of education.
But talk of building blocks and you can’t escape the shocking disclosure that made Islamabad sit up and take notice, a few days ago, pertaining to the alleged role of Federal Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education in facilitating the chief justice’s daughter.
As widely reported by the media, Farah Hameed Dogar was able to secure 21 additional marks in a highly controversial review of her exam papers but one which paved the way for her entry into medical college — all at the expense of thousands of lesser privileged students.
The manifestation of such educational apartheid and mockery of justice is, if anything, a sad reflection of the institutional decay in Pakistan.
However, far from taking up the cudgels for those who were at the receiving end of the boost for Ms Dogar, the National Assembly Speaker, cancelled a meeting called up by the House Committee to take up the issue before a complete halt announced by a one-member Supreme Court bench.
Last week the prime minister’s (now-former) press secretary was quoted by the journalist, who broke the story, to have warned that the government would never proceed on the case if the story made the fine print.
Fine print it did make, but in the end, the secretary was sacked — in all probability, made a scapegoat to protect bigger fish.
The writer is News Editor at Dawn News. He may be contacted at kaamyabi@gmail.com
“I apologise,” he smiled as I entered. “It is rude of me to greet a woman without getting up… but I have been paralysed.” He gave me the information with a smiling face. This warm welcome gave me the much needed support to ease out my discomfort.
For even the most detailed preparation would not have readied me for the emotional roller coaster ride that I had taken during the course of filming for the documentary, The Unsung Heroes, based on the lives of cameramen who have fallen victim in the line of duty.
Israr Ahmed’s wife pulled a wooden chair with a high back and a comfortable cushion for me and I sat down facing him. In the mirror hanging on the wall opposite me, I could see a windowless cupboard full of medicine.
Israr was working for CNBC when he was shot in the crossfire while covering the military operation at Red Mosque in 2007.
He was in front of the mosque as security forces were surrounding the militants holed up inside. Suddenly, he looked to his left where cameraman Nadeem Khan from DawnNews was standing. Israr gave him a word of advice. “Be careful mate, you could get shot.”
These were perhaps the only words of caution that any among the more than 50 Pakistani cameramen caught in the middle of action had received.
With almost no training of working in a war zone, most of the cameramen were working without life jackets and helmets.
Nadeem told me later that Israr’s advice shook him; otherwise it was easy to be swept by the tide of emotion while filming highly adrenaline charged events.
“I crouched low. The next thing I saw was Israr writhing in pain. I realised he’d been hit by bullets. The irony of the situation chills my bones even today,” he said. “I picked him up, bleeding and unconscious and got him to the ambulance.”
Israr on the other hand can hardly recall the events. “All I remember is the hospital, the pain and the faces of my children.”
As Israr narrated his story, his five-year-old daughter kept on adding bits to the tale. To her, it was almost a fairy tale, in which her father, her hero, had come out of the huge castle on fire after fighting with the dragon.
One year on, Israr is still paralysed. A young man with two children, his dreams of having a bigger family, a bigger house and a bigger name as a newsman have all been put on halt.
I left Israr’s house facing the unsettling reality. Could a simple precaution such as a flak jacket have prevented scarring Israr’s life forever? More so in Pakistan, which Reporters without Borders categorises as the third most dangerous place in the world.
Admittedly, major channels have been considerate towards their wounded cameramen by looking after their hospital expenses and giving them paid leave of absence. But this after tragedy has stricken. “What is needed is proper training and safety equipment; awareness of the dangers and the need to mitigate them. Only then we can avoid or minimise the risks associated with reporting from the battlefield,” says a TV executive. This awareness may come too late for Israr but, perhaps, others may benefit from it.
(The Unsung Heroes will be shown on DawnNews at 10.30pm on Saturday and at 3:30pm on Sunday)
