DIARY OF A SOCIAL BUTTERFLY: NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN

Published November 5, 2023
Illustration by Sarah Durrani
Illustration by Sarah Durrani

You know that film Never Say Never Again? I think so it was made for us only. Oho baba, I know, vaisay tau it was a James Bond but I think so instead of Shorn Connery, the hero should have been Nawaz Sharif.

When he was packed off to UK last time by You Know Who, Mulloo said to me ‘good radiance to the Sharifs, they’re never coming back now’ and then she got ready in her red and green PTI jorra and with her red face and green contacts waali eyes and went off to attend Imran Khan’s big welcome jalsa.

And now just look! Imran is in jail, and a big welcome jalsa for Nawaz was in Minar-i-Pakistan. And the cases against him have disappeared like all the mango baaghs around Multan.

So yesterday, Mummy called and said that her old bearer had given his notice because she had refused to raise his celery. “I mean, beta, it’s not as if mehngai is only eating him up,” she told me. “I also have to buy orgasmic chickens for Daddy’s daily shorba and pay celeries of 10 other servants and our astrophysical bijli ka bill and Daddy’s golf club ki fees and my monthly low lights at Beauteous Ones, and I also have to buy our flights to Dubai for Xmas with Uncle Dodo and Aunty Sameen.

Things may seem ‘same old, same old’ for us, but looking at Nawaz Sharif, one should never lose hope

“I mean, does Mashooq have any idea how much air fears have gone up? He tau thinks I am made up of money only. So, I just told him, I said zuroor jao but don’t think you can ever come back okay?” So immediately I said, “Please Mummy, don’t say like this. Apart from your orgasmic chickens, you might also have to eat your words tomorrow.”

What a marry go around vaisay. But one thing doesn’t change. And that unchanging thing is Shady. You remember Shady na? Oho baba, Cobra my sister-in-law’s husband Shadab? Who was with PML-Q first and then snitched sides and went over to PML and then, in last election, ditched PML and rushed over to PTI?

And then he disappeared for a while, when so many MNAs disappeared, and now he’s returned saying he’s been in Northern Areas all this time, just on chhutti you know, and that he’s seen the light and the light is Nawaz Sharif and that could Janoo please try and get him a ticket for the next election?

So Janoo told him kay aik tau I’m not a bus conductor with PML that I can get you tickets and, doosra, Shady, if you keep snitching sides like this, you will lose all credibility with your voters. And he said, “Bhai jaan, mind na karein, but you are also crack. Credibility you only need with You Know Who. Who are voters, haan?”

Baaki despite of the party season coming, I have to tell you that I am a little bit depress. Aik tau smock is here and my delicate, khandaani lungs are suffering. They are not tough and recipient like aam logs’ lungs na, which can go on chaloing no matter what kachra they have to breathe.

Doosra, the news from Gaza is so sad, so sad kay don’t even ask. All those wounded children… Pehlay se my nerves were shattered, now my heart is also shattered. Allah poochhay iss qaatil Nootan Yahoo ko. And all these hippo critical gora countries that keep on sidling with him, while paying rip service to human rights and what all. As if humans are themselves only and they have all the rights. And everybody else can go doobo.

Teesra, I could have behlaowed myself with the cricket World Cup but that also we are loosing. Even to Afghanistan, can you imagine? Fourthly, Covid is coming back. Fifthly, unlike The Terminator and Nawaz Sharif, PIA is not coming back. It’s so down in the dumbs kay it can’t even pay for fuel. Jidhar dekho, udhar bad news. Honestly these days tau I don’t feel like switching on the TV even, kay pata nahin what all I’m going to be objected to now. I’m that much depress.

Mahira’s shaadi on Insta in Bhurbhan was a little bit of a subtraction, sorry sorry, I mean distraction — aik tau my brain is also melted na, a bit like the polar ice cabs — but then that also finished and it got dark again.

So, I said to Janoo, is there any light at the end of the tunnel? He said, yes. It’s the oncoming train. But then I look at Nawaz Sharif and how his kismet has jaagoed and I say to myself Never Say Never Again.

The writer is a columnist and a satrist and has published six books previously, including the bestselling Social Butterfly series.
X: @Moni_Butterfly

Published in Dawn, EOS, November 5th, 2023

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