tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-76351410049644350972024-03-21T09:55:24.183-07:00HarpocratesNaeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.comBlogger23125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-70813386224583353062012-07-30T12:36:00.000-07:002015-05-30T21:09:35.078-07:00<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<h2 style="text-align: left;">
The Scent of a City</h2>
by Naeem Safi<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhi_ZDrNGlqqMj9cOL5nwx85qdgSEffKaKg5zdztsTamiBPO_Fz2oGGLXbl-hVThru7dfIiYXnFEWBbJsKZDnvBGP6ZTW9p_xsUa8kVcIQxI7drZpHJl7K_Uz6-lAt_UhdwMraVLfA7TZg/s1600/1-Above+Sarafa+Bazaar.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhi_ZDrNGlqqMj9cOL5nwx85qdgSEffKaKg5zdztsTamiBPO_Fz2oGGLXbl-hVThru7dfIiYXnFEWBbJsKZDnvBGP6ZTW9p_xsUa8kVcIQxI7drZpHJl7K_Uz6-lAt_UhdwMraVLfA7TZg/s400/1-Above+Sarafa+Bazaar.JPG" width="265" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Façades above Sarafa Bazaar</td></tr>
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Much has changed over the centuries but Peshawar’s strategic importance has never faltered. Accepted as one the oldest living cities, it is also thought to have had the world’s tallest building at one point—a Buddhist stupa.<br />
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The current image of Peshawar, battered and dangerous, owes much to the mediated knowledge spread mainly through media—and endorsed by events that have killed hundreds of its inhabitants. The consistent collisions of interests in the region have left the residents of Peshawar with little else but to romanticise the city’s past, recollecting bits from the chapters that deal with all that was glorious. Understandable, when much at present appears to be dust and smoke.<br />
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But look closely and with love and you will find a lot still to appreciate. Follow the footsteps of world-renowned travellers and conquerors and arrive at the highest point in Peshawar, Gor Khatri. The archaeological findings here date back 2,500 years, in one of the deepest archaeological trenches of South Asia, and make experts claim that Peshawar has been alive for eons. Civilizations here, among several layers of earth, have left occasional terracotta pieces, jewellery, coins, weapon fragments and bones—samples from which are at display in a shabby little museum at the corner of the compound. The Goraknath temple was reopened for worshippers last year and located parallel to a mosque sharing the same compound.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaYtSo1sI2mWbew3-65CckxWS-1iVBMwjHe4cuXsGe5VILSk1u4pWbZbVllDNFx9TheZHZbIGTC9ZcOVum4QNgGn0IPfzffNJtru7uKhR9KXtWVmg8WnpNpNAWziHWazEySHSA3zwk4h8/s1600/2-A+Door+at+Masjid+Muhabat+Khan.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaYtSo1sI2mWbew3-65CckxWS-1iVBMwjHe4cuXsGe5VILSk1u4pWbZbVllDNFx9TheZHZbIGTC9ZcOVum4QNgGn0IPfzffNJtru7uKhR9KXtWVmg8WnpNpNAWziHWazEySHSA3zwk4h8/s1600/2-A+Door+at+Masjid+Muhabat+Khan.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Door at Masjid Mohabbat Khan</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgkt25sLaTuLmMYccI_288PM9qlLHASEGxubp08ZEr8yRzP6p3vo7jpOloOPYXBpuEKTgxuW8kwdUEvKTYLnMNWI-IRLMnLr7A7lbHmwOaj1JUD2nfhMVltG5WSUCBowJJP_xa0cXvXaI/s1600/5-Spice+Merchant+at+Bazaar+e+Dalgaran.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="228" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgkt25sLaTuLmMYccI_288PM9qlLHASEGxubp08ZEr8yRzP6p3vo7jpOloOPYXBpuEKTgxuW8kwdUEvKTYLnMNWI-IRLMnLr7A7lbHmwOaj1JUD2nfhMVltG5WSUCBowJJP_xa0cXvXaI/s320/5-Spice+Merchant+at+Bazaar+e+Dalgaran.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Spicing Up, a Spice Merchant at Bazaar-i-Dalgaran</td></tr>
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Through the western gate of the complex, once the residence of the Sikh general Avitabile, go down towards Chowk Yadgar. If not pointed out, one can easily miss the historic Sethi Mohalla, just a few yards towards the right. It hosts a number of architectural marvels built in the 19th century by the famous merchant family, exhausting the art of building and decor by incorporating techniques and styles from India, Persia, Turkey, and as far as Russia. Each house holds a record of the riches and tastes from times gone by.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdG_XHu_z1BHnalgMtA7_OQDgRl6p1Q-gr0JYm_SItF4WJTx3aZXuq8E1KUsEJ-GzK7zvk_giKBFM0e3J1NXp5JRnA41eNSWcbMOrPa94j3-kKc6fxqbT48O3lxrvoVuaL24Z32whfJrM/s1600/3-Lapis+at+Shinwari+Market.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdG_XHu_z1BHnalgMtA7_OQDgRl6p1Q-gr0JYm_SItF4WJTx3aZXuq8E1KUsEJ-GzK7zvk_giKBFM0e3J1NXp5JRnA41eNSWcbMOrPa94j3-kKc6fxqbT48O3lxrvoVuaL24Z32whfJrM/s320/3-Lapis+at+Shinwari+Market.JPG" width="212" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lapis at Shinwari Market.<br />
(Peshawar's Christie's)</td></tr>
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Further down the road is Chowk Yadgar, now a reinterpretation of the plaza hosting an old monument and the stand from where, up until the late 70’s, one could hop onto buses to Kabul. The new design has an added underground passage with some parking, few shops, and landscaping on top. The steep alley called Sarafa Bazaar, lined with goldsmiths, reaches Lady Reading Hospital and Bala Hisar Fort. The famous Shinwari market has genuine antique Afghan jewellery, ceramics, glassware, and textiles. Nearby is the Mughal period Masjid Mohabbat Khan, its elaborate arches and domes adorned with colourful frescos. Just a few decades ago, a donation of loudspeakers by a devotee had triggered passionate protests by religious leaders calling for their removal. They declared that they were sorcerer’s horns for their resemblance with record players. The legacy of that thinking has sadly come true for the city.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hakeem's Laboratory at chowk Pipal Mandi</td></tr>
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One route from the Chowk reaches Pipal Mandi and winds towards the historic Qissa Khawani bazaar. Along the way is Bazaar-i-Dalgaran, filled with the aromas of teas and Indian spices, serving the taste buds of its customers with unique blends. Even the inquisitive Michael Wood was not disappointed when he ended up here in search of an ancient tea called soma. In his documentary, The Story of India, he says, “the Rig Veda talks about a sacred drink, central to the Aryan’s rituals; a speciality of the tribes around here... there are many of their thousand poems devoted to the merits of drinking soma, almost as an elixir of the gods.”</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Teatime: At a balakhana of an old inn in Qissa Khawani</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9APwlg2IVf5nqVFDlihojSQ72zTL8S_IMBHUE3TlMeqAAW4GOntwC7rKhKOAUqd_78cvCqh_5oEb5MluphzKAKQeyw2wtEuk3Ar-GDtx9N0G-C8zsLCLZ_TLsLD4TivFVAHFUX-hWjE4/s1600/7-A+Shop+at+Bazaar+e+Misgaran_1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9APwlg2IVf5nqVFDlihojSQ72zTL8S_IMBHUE3TlMeqAAW4GOntwC7rKhKOAUqd_78cvCqh_5oEb5MluphzKAKQeyw2wtEuk3Ar-GDtx9N0G-C8zsLCLZ_TLsLD4TivFVAHFUX-hWjE4/s320/7-A+Shop+at+Bazaar+e+Misgaran_1.JPG" width="212" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Remains of a Heritage at Bazaar-i-Misgaran</td></tr>
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One reminder of the times changing is the aluminium, stainless steel, and plastic being sold by the bronze and copperware sellers of Bazaar-i-Misgaran, catering to the declining tastes or the shrinking budgets of their customers. All that is left of their glory days are the copper samovars that are still used by the traditional qahwa khanas and chai khanas. At the turn to Qissa Khawani is the alley where Peshawar Pottery was once an attraction for ceramics lovers. Once upon a time, Qissa Khawani was the place of exchange for merchandise from Central Asia and India. The bazaar ends where Kabuli Gate once was. It has silently disappeared to make way for the trucks that have replaced the caravans.</div>
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Like most historic cities of the region, the tangible and intangible cultural heritage of Peshawar has fallen prey to the onslaught of kitsch. The fragments that remain owe their existence to the lack of means for their replacement rather than to their conscious preservation. For taste has hit new depths. Now grey blocks and monstrosities ostentatiously covered with cheap tiles have replaced the classic city architecture such as balakhanas and jarokhas with their intricate woodwork, arches, and stuccoes.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4Y60luaXsszvQsqS4Dva45WpP9OvMSFBJzJyWEW8SHOnrIDjLX4Bb6nr9bYl8vdm0s55ZwHOcQZ_ShVF7B1CZ4Db3x_2cNksy6e_PyC7FkqcASOnsNB8dHhlLJytVdeqhlIcNDFFUs7Y/s1600/8-A+Shop+at+Bazaar+e+Misgaran.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4Y60luaXsszvQsqS4Dva45WpP9OvMSFBJzJyWEW8SHOnrIDjLX4Bb6nr9bYl8vdm0s55ZwHOcQZ_ShVF7B1CZ4Db3x_2cNksy6e_PyC7FkqcASOnsNB8dHhlLJytVdeqhlIcNDFFUs7Y/s320/8-A+Shop+at+Bazaar+e+Misgaran.JPG" width="212" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Replacement at Bazaar-i-Misgaran</td></tr>
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Once known as a city of gardens, the cityscape has been vandalised by none other than its elected leaders who have constructed unjustifiable overhead bridges, consuming green belts and trees along their paths, in utter disregard for historic monuments. However, much can still be salvaged. In spring, blocks after blocks of the city are drenched in the scent of citrus flowers, a scent Mughal Emperor Babur had noted on his way to India.</div>
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Published in DAWN, <i>All About Lifestyles! </i>June 22, 2012</div>
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Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-72943928965881983822012-07-30T11:54:00.000-07:002015-05-30T21:11:48.629-07:00<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-CP9rczY_cE0AkwzGCBnouiNMOTnPYg87WpUC5uYTYlm0mZUKfDaTbCoCX9DnHR-Hdt1059kRKO2ONWBC0bqaVj3Wz00hd6ZnVRpmtVJze2r9Nd5AjakVNk8rlcHSCqDpGLFnf5OIYU4/s1600/1-DSC02374.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><br /></a></div>
<span style="font-size: large;">Life and Times of Kaka Ram</span><br />
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<i>Gorak Nath Temple, at the Gor Khutree Archaeological Complex
Peshawar, is now open <o:p></o:p></i></div>
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<i>for Hindu worshippers who regularly visit the site to pray</i><o:p></o:p></div>
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By Naeem Safi<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-CP9rczY_cE0AkwzGCBnouiNMOTnPYg87WpUC5uYTYlm0mZUKfDaTbCoCX9DnHR-Hdt1059kRKO2ONWBC0bqaVj3Wz00hd6ZnVRpmtVJze2r9Nd5AjakVNk8rlcHSCqDpGLFnf5OIYU4/s1600/1-DSC02374.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-CP9rczY_cE0AkwzGCBnouiNMOTnPYg87WpUC5uYTYlm0mZUKfDaTbCoCX9DnHR-Hdt1059kRKO2ONWBC0bqaVj3Wz00hd6ZnVRpmtVJze2r9Nd5AjakVNk8rlcHSCqDpGLFnf5OIYU4/s320/1-DSC02374.JPG" width="228" /></a>The sun has just disappeared behind the Khyber Mountains.
Beneath the long hanging roots of the old banyan tree, a devotee is sweeping
leaves to clean the earthen floor for worshippers who are expected to arrive in
a while.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Hundreds of birds above are chirping before settling down
for the night. The fenced lawns outside are full, with noisy children running
around and playing, the adolescent sauntering on the paved walkways, and their
mothers gossiping. These late evening visitors are usually from the nearby <i>mohallahs</i>
who come here to escape power outages — and take refuge in the Gor Khutree
Complex.</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjryJaI_T05yQIGMK8oOubaGShH59bX3JeHKGx5g7vqG3TNGOwhNUb6uLMVJ1GpScu0f15Rq4LM5aJOeQBLLi1HE4y1c72z_eQzTHhDq7KN03rnT-BggvEgZWfGm1QiCSBG8t5jXkWa0Iw/s1600/1-DSC02351.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjryJaI_T05yQIGMK8oOubaGShH59bX3JeHKGx5g7vqG3TNGOwhNUb6uLMVJ1GpScu0f15Rq4LM5aJOeQBLLi1HE4y1c72z_eQzTHhDq7KN03rnT-BggvEgZWfGm1QiCSBG8t5jXkWa0Iw/s320/1-DSC02351.JPG" width="227" /></a>The colour palette for the sky is rapidly changing and the
light tones of gold are turning into crimson, and violets merging with dark
greys. Calls for evening prayers over loudspeakers lure males of all age groups
to the mosque at the northwestern corner of the Complex, which has accommodated
many before them, including kings, princesses, and camel caravans.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Gorak Nath Temple, at the Gor Khutree Archaeological Complex
Peshawar, was built during the Sikh period around 1834 to 1849. Their Italian
General, Paolo Avitabile, used the Complex as his residence. The temple is now
open for Hindu worshippers who regularly visit the site to pray to their gods.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Just a few yards south from the mosque, Kaka Ram, the <i>seyvek</i>,
is giving final touches to the preparations in the Gorak Nath temple. Unlike
the marbled floors and numerous fans at the mosque, his temple has earthen
floor and a couple of helpers are connecting a power cable to the central
building to light a few bulbs. Kaka Ram is waiting for the prayers at the
mosque to finish, as some of his guests are Muslim, colleagues from his office
at the secretariat, who will also attend Sheranwali Mata’s parshad tonight. </div>
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<o:p></o:p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnnkY6z7_EeyhegioZJQW-812fo86gKE9RgNBDuNNlASM9iMNklL5ny3LTeiS64FaiYdsJHshV2eEF4U999M9B4AW5-DofHiXGTSfNEYV-P1GbQLtjmeAYvIXMqRgNkS7QLIfGR5BSjDc/s1600/1-DSC02370.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnnkY6z7_EeyhegioZJQW-812fo86gKE9RgNBDuNNlASM9iMNklL5ny3LTeiS64FaiYdsJHshV2eEF4U999M9B4AW5-DofHiXGTSfNEYV-P1GbQLtjmeAYvIXMqRgNkS7QLIfGR5BSjDc/s400/1-DSC02370.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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Six decades back, he was born in a humble little house
adjacent to the temple. Many generations of his ancestors have served this
temple before. His father died when he was seven. They were expelled from their
ancestral house; his mother had fought back through courts. She won the temple
back, in the year 2011, but their home at the compound is lost, almost forever.
She parted with life on the first day of last May.<o:p></o:p><br />
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According to Kaka Ram, more than 2000 people attended her
funeral, the majority of who were Muslims. </div>
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He recalls his childhood times, when
the huge well under the banyan tree used to be frequented by parents with
ailing children, both Hindu and Muslim, to receive <i>ashnans</i>, a sacrament
that is believed to cleanse and protect its receivers from evil spells. His
dealings and relationships with Muslim friends and neighbours are not tainted
with biases or discriminations. They all celebrate Holis and Eids together and
there is no <i>purdah</i> among their families, something reserved only for
very close relatives in a traditional Peshawari society.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUyus7T96yJEizEC2bnYBH0rdz8cIwxX0kAzu5ptM8NF_talJnd21xWYdPZ2eRdw3GxtLrCn5QtuPJmjyDI2jDP5QZg7HWmiNW6so95cJRy9gmezkeRkJJvIB26CI9WSu_jd8dGZIlozc/s1600/1-DSC02392.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUyus7T96yJEizEC2bnYBH0rdz8cIwxX0kAzu5ptM8NF_talJnd21xWYdPZ2eRdw3GxtLrCn5QtuPJmjyDI2jDP5QZg7HWmiNW6so95cJRy9gmezkeRkJJvIB26CI9WSu_jd8dGZIlozc/s320/1-DSC02392.JPG" width="240" /></a>The Muslim guests have finished their prayers and are now
waiting near the well for the ceremony to begin. Pundit Gokal has arrived from
another temple to lead the prayers, and the number of worshippers is gradually
increasing. The pundit is preparing a huge platter of fresh fruits at Mata’s
mandir while the attendees are gathering in the arched aisle in the front.
Following a few rituals, the congregation, with equal number of women, and
quite a few children, started chanting the <i>parshad</i>. <o:p></o:p></div>
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The sky has turned deep blue and the banyan tree looks more
imposing against it, the flickering light of oil lamps animating its long
shoots. The birds have gone almost silent. The visitors outside, in the lawns,
are gradually thinning out and the peace of the night is gradually engulfing
the compound, and the streets around it.</div>
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Published in The News on Sunday on June 17, 2012<br />
<a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/jun2012-weekly/nos-17-06-2012/foo.htm#1">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/jun2012-weekly/nos-17-06-2012/foo.htm#1</a>
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Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-68158368437834155262011-07-12T08:19:00.000-07:002011-10-13T08:22:22.171-07:00Profile: Karakul Hat Maker<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: medium; "><p align="CENTER"><b><span>“Karkul defines us”</span></b><br /><i><span>Bashir Ahmad Khan from Peshawar has not given up on<br />the craft of karkul-making that earned him<br />prestige and bread all his life<br />By Naeem Safi</span></i></p><p class="BODYTEXT-1stpara"><span>Karakul hat, popularly known as Jinnah cap in Pakistan, was much in use, if not in vogue, till the late 1980s. It stood for ‘an image’ due to its symbolic association with the founder of Pakistan and was used by high officials and common citizens alike.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>Now its representation is left on the currency bills where a stereotypical Jinnah adorns it. In its heydays, there were more than 50 master craftsmen making various types of karakul hats in the Qissa Khawani and Ghanta Ghar bazaars of Peshawar. Today, against all odds, only a few are left seen preserving the craft.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>Bashir Ahmad Khan, in his late 50s, is one of those few who haven’t given up on the craft that has earned him prestige and bread all his life. How he ended up in this trade is an interesting narrative and an inspiration for many.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>Living in a small village in Dir, Bashir was only eight when he got a chance to go to Peshawar and with his elder brother, and ustad, Haji Anwar Khan.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>“I remember the day when I left my village along with my elder brother. Those were the times when Dir was a princely state where the only public transport was a bus owned by the Nawab, and one’s leaving to the city would be quite an affair. My brother was leaving for Peshawar and I along with my parents were going to drop him,” says Bashir.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>“I created a scene there demanding to go with him. He fell for it, and my mother immediately washed my clothes in the nearby stream and I boarded the bus in that single wet outfit and a pair of shoes.<span>“My brother was a master craftsman at Baghdad Cap House with Haji Sabzaali (father of Sen. Haji Ghulam Ali), but he got into a conflict with Haji for taking me along and we left Peshawar. We arrived in Karachi on a steam train and started working with a wholesale karakul hat-supplier on Bandar Road. For six years we worked for 50 paisas a day — eating daal-chappati and sleeping on a wooden bench outside the shop—before moving to Peshawar.</span></span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>It was 1965 war days, and as a little boy from the mountains, I used to marvel at the red fireworks in the sky that my brother had explained were antiaircraft guns firing at the enemy planes.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>“In Peshawar, I started my apprenticeship at Peshawar Cap House, with Habbibullah, running errands and learning the skill for around eight years. But it was with Haji Bashi — at Bukhari Cap House in Ghanta Ghar — where I mastered the karkul making, learning it from my brother who was employed there. Later he parted ways with him and opened his own store by the name of Sarhad Cap House.”</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>Suffering from arthritis and a plunge in sales, Bashir recalls how leaders like Z.A. Bhutto and Wali Khan had visited his humble store and that how almost all of the heads of the state wore his caps from Auyb Khan and Yahya Khan to Zia ul Haq, Naseerullah Babar, Aftab Sherpao, Nawaz Sharif and Qazi Hussain Ahmad. “Gen. Fazl e Haq was a great admirer of our work. And he would order around half a dozen caps every month for as long as he was the governor,” he says.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>Unfortunately, none of Bashir’s three sons knows the skill and has a couple of learners running the business for him. “Nothing can match the experience, and respect that it earns for you. It is my advice to my children to master the skill of karakul-making despite other occupations, as this is something that defines us. It has earned a name and respect for my family and me. This is what made heads of the state, governors, and ministers visit our shop.”</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>Since ages, the fur of the karakul sheep is imported from northern Afghanistan into Peshawar. Karakul (or Qaraqul) is a breed of sheep raised mostly in Central Asian and some African states for their fur that is valued for its unique textures, patterns, and colours. The fetuses or the newborn lambs are slaughtered before the tight curls of their fur begin to unravel with time or the mother’s tongue.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>Contrary to the popular notion that the fur is obtained from the aborted lamb fetuses, Bashir says that only the newborn male lambs are slaughtered and the females are left to mature for further propagation. The skins are plastered with hop flour for basic curing by the farmers in the mountains; however that makes the skins very brittle.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>The price of these skins have soared ten times in the last decade or so due to their high demand in Europe, Japan, USA, and Canada. Jinnah version of the Karakul hat is the most liked one in Pakistan and the non-Pashtun Afghans, which has both ends peaked and is usually packed flat in a box. However, it is the Peshawari cap, also known as Ayub Cap that is more popular amongst Pashtuns on both sides of the border. It has only the front end peaked and the back side is round, hence packed in a round box and cannot be folded. The fully rounded version, Garda, is popular in certain parts of Afghanistan.</span></p></span></div><div>=====================================================</div><div><br /></div><div>Published in The News on Sunday</div><div><a href="http://www.jang.com.pk/thenews/jul2011-weekly/nos-10-07-2011/enc.htm#4">http://www.jang.com.pk/thenews/jul2011-weekly/nos-10-07-2011/enc.htm#4</a></div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-39383987502918325222011-01-30T23:42:00.000-08:002011-10-13T08:45:46.891-07:00Architectural Heritage<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: medium; "><p class="BYLINE" align="center" dir="ltr"><b><span>19th Century Marvel<br /></span></b><span><br /></span></p><p class="BYLINE" align="center" dir="ltr"><span><i>The Sethi House in Peshawar has used techniques and aesthetics<br />from a very diverse range of sources</i></span></p><p class="BYLINE" align="center" dir="ltr"><span><i><br />By Naeem Safi</i></span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>Peshawar, the oldest living city of South Asia, has always been a melting pot of cultures and civilisations throughout its known history. Archaeological investigations on the famous Gor Khuttree mound in the walled city of Peshawar have identified human settlements dating back to 539 BC. That makes it one of the most unique world heritage assets where European, Central Asian, Persian, and Indian civilisations have left their marks.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>On the southern side of this mound, less than 200 meters away from the Gor Khuttree, lays Mohallah Sethian -- which has seven magnificent mansions built by a famous business dynasty of the 19th century India, the Sethis. The Sethis had business links with India, China, Central Asia and Russia, which were seriously affected by the Russian Revolution. The Sethi Complex bore the brunt of hard times since then, till 2006 when the MMA government bought one of these mansions for the purpose of conservation and handed it over to the archaeology department.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>The Sethi House was built by Haji Karim Baksh in 1882, and has used techniques and aesthetics from a very diverse range of sources. The layout plan resembles plans of old houses in Baghdad, while the decorative elements used here can be traced to Samarkand, Bukhara, Persia and India, which makes it one of the richest living architectural record of building techniques, tastes and craftsmanship of old times of the region.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>The Sethi House is a three storey building with huge basements on all four sides of the central courtyard, making intelligent use of the ground levels. The incredible ceiling heights of these basements, there multiple levels, intelligent use of wooden jalis, panjalis, and baadgirs for light and ventilation, and compartmentalisation for different usages are good examples of space utilisation and energy conservation for compact urban properties. A well-protected vault in one of the basements with a strong steel door is a telltale sign of the riches the Sethis had to guard.<span>Walking through load-bearing brick arches one finds a fountain in the central courtyard, which is not functional these days, however it does not need a lot of imagination to picture the calming effect of its music on the inhabitants. The structure of the building has used enormous amounts of wood with brick fillings. The central courtyard is surrounded by doorways and windows on the ground floor. Balconies of the balakhanas, the upper two storeys, open into it and connect all levels for instant communication -- a significant feature as opposed to the contemporary house plans that approves the western-style of individualism. The views on all sides of the courtyard is that of wooden doors, basta windows and panels, all intricately carved with floral and geometric motifs, blending Gandhara with the Islamic practices of those times. The splendid woodwork is embedded with beautiful stained glass pieces which make a colourful show for the indoors during daylight, and for the courtyard after dark.</span></span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>Mostly pukka kali is used as a base for the fresco work; however there are a few instances of bypassing the standard technique, an observation made by architect Tahir Khattak, head of the documentation of the project.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>Inside the rooms and living spaces, one finds ornately embellished cheenee khanas as the central decorative elements. These cheenee khanas alone have used many layers of the crafts that one might find only in palaces of those times. Starting from the aina-kari, which are then embedded in manabat-kari that is covered with kashi-kari. There are panels with paper paintings which are framed in plain glass, with the repetition of the layers mentioned above. The false ceilings are decorated with panels made of hundreds of wooden pieces that are studded with wooden reliefs painted with pigment paints; a technique known as tarseem bandi.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>The elaborate use of decorative elements like carvings, fretwork, fresco tracery, stucco tracery, floral motifs used in scrolls, freeze lines, arches, and paintings makes it a monumental and arduous task for any conservation intervention.</span></p><p class="BODYTEXT"><span>Proper conservation and interpretation of the tangible cultural heritage will open many doors for the researchers, a task so vital for a culture that is still in search of its identity on many levels. One must contemplate that it is our built heritage -- which we are leaving behind -- that is most likely to survive in its original form and not our intentions. Our claims or level of honesty should not be the only benchmarks to qualify us to intervene in such projects, for it requires a lot of experience, technical expertise, and above all, sensitivity to qualify for that.</span></p></span></div><div><br /></div><div>======================================================</div><div>Published in The News on Sunday</div><div><a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/jan2011-weekly/nos-30-01-2011/foo.htm#1">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/jan2011-weekly/nos-30-01-2011/foo.htm#1</a></div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-66238359054773517332010-09-07T19:37:00.000-07:002011-10-13T08:42:16.709-07:00Review: Sanjh<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: small; "><i><p align="CENTER">Sanjh by RetroArts, has brought together around 100 artists to raise funds for the flood-affected</p><p align="CENTER">By Naeem Safi</p></i><p align="JUSTIFY">It is said that residents of Muslim Spain -- when Granada was at the pinnacle of civilisation of its time -- reached a level of sensibility where giving a single fruit as a gift would symbolise sharing a part of one’s life.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Pakistan, a tiny country in terms of its stature, and all time low on the charts of civilisation, is witnessing something roughly similar in its spirit to the above-mentioned sensibility. Sanjh (togetherness, exhibition’s title) by RetroArts has brought together around 100 artists to raise funds for the flood-affected Pakistanis. The exhibition, which includes paintings, sculptures, photographs, and digital prints, has opened yesterday at Alhamra Art Gallery and is scheduled to remain open for a fortnight.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">It is one of those rare art events where one will find such an overwhelming number of artists -- senior as well as new -- from Pakistan and abroad, showing under one roof, setting an example to set aside all differences, if there were any, and connect for a better and secure future. Apparently, all this may sound like a cliché, but in reality, is not that common.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The donated artworks, mostly, were originally produced in other times and with different moods and intentions; it is the collective objective behind their display that makes this particular exhibition different from the others. The visual artists have put in their bit, by gifting some pieces from their lives to get some bread and medicine for the flood victims. Now it is for the art collectors, the donors, and the public to show their level of sensibility.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The Pakistani apparatus could learn a few lessons from its counterparts in the First World for how they have used, and are still using, visual and performing arts for the promotion of their respective ideologies, especially in the second half of the 20th century.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">It is not easy for everyone, and especially artists, to remain indifferent to the reality that surrounds them, particularly when the reality is predominantly dark and grim; a spark of light is always welcomed. While the local and foreign media -- driven by the pressures of their respective marketplaces, and greed; the soulless leaders -- political and other; the ever-growing mass of pessimists; and above all the fundamentalists, are painting everything black in Pakistan, let the artists come out of this chaos, head to the forefront and splash some colours on the horizon, neither for left nor for right, but for hope and life. The artists must spearhead the quest for identity, as they are usually the first ones to break on to the other-side.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Some of the featured artists in the show are: Saleema Hashmi, Ahmed Ali Manganhar, Ayaz Jhokio, Farida Batool, Huma Mulji, Aasim Akhtar, Mohmmad Ali Talpur, Ayesha Jatoi, Asif Ahmed, Amira Farooq and others.</p></span></div><div>======================================================</div><div>Published in The News on Sunday</div><div><a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/sep2010-weekly/nos-05-09-2010/enc.htm#5">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/sep2010-weekly/nos-05-09-2010/enc.htm#5</a></div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-83810978547761879822010-08-23T23:23:00.000-07:002011-10-13T08:26:37.922-07:00Book Review: Images of Afghanistan<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: medium; "><p align="CENTER"><span lang="EN-AU"><span><b><span>Beyond the curtains</span></b></span></span></p><span><b><span></span></b><i><p align="CENTER">A book that will help alter perceptions about Afghanistan</p><p align="CENTER">By Naeem Safi</p></i><p align="JUSTIFY"> </p><p align="JUSTIFY">Images of Afghanistan: Exploring Afghan</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Culture through Art and Literature</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Arley Loewen and Josette McMichael</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Hardback, 350 pages</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Price: Pak Rs.1995</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Oxford University Press, 2010</p><p align="JUSTIFY"> </p><p align="JUSTIFY">The lack of awareness regarding the Afghan culture is mainly due to the scarcity of literature available on the subject. After the Soviet occupation, whatever interest was developed in Afghanistan revolved around its political history and evolution through various conflicts. And the Afghan arts and literature were overshadowed by the cloud of smoke and dust raised by the decades-long war.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">A people of a land can be understood by their expressions, through various mediums, of their beliefs and aspirations. And anyone who wants to understand what drives this magnificent nation must see inside their hearts and minds, which is exactly what this collection has done, to a certain extent, and for the first time ever.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Though it can not be termed as a scholarly reference, as stated in the editors' note, "Academics may say that Images of Afghanistan lacks sufficient critical thought or that it is nostalgic…. Rather than an academic treatise or a cultural history, this book is designed to give a flavour of Afghanistan for people who want a starting point." Perhaps it is due to this understanding that the need was felt to include a preliminary chapter on seeing "Culture through the Windows of Art and Literature," for beginners.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The Afghans' love for music, poetry and other arts is best reflected in the moving foreword by Ashraf Ghani, "In this there is hope, hope for tomorrow, for and Afghanistan with dignity."</p><p align="JUSTIFY">It is the first compilation of this type on the art and literature of Afghanistan, 32 chapters, grouped in seven sections that describe and discuss Dari and Pashto literature, themes of cultural significance, traditional arts, performing and fine arts. The two sections on literature cover the history and evolution of Dari and Pashto literature, its major influences, poets and prose writers, various genres ranging from the court poetry of the classic times to the traditional poetry of today, folk tales, children's rhymes, proverbs, short stories, and modern trends. The section on culture evaluates various themes that shape the Afghan mindset, especially their code of honour and everything around it. The traditional arts section begins with a study of Afghanistan's archaeological and architectural heritage from the times of the Silk Route and then covers calligraphy, traditional urban planning, woodcarving, and pottery.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Performing and fine arts are analysed in the second last section, with some beautiful insights that helps one understand and connect to the artists' feelings. The final section features two contemporary Afghan authors who write in English, Mullah Nasruddin, the role of Afghan women in literature and music, some other folk tales and the cartoons and comedy in the contemporary Afghan culture. Citations given at the end of chapters are a good reference for further readings on Afghanistan.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The books published by Oxford in Pakistan are seldom designed according to the contents and one's expectations. Same is the case with Images of Afghanistan, from its dust jacket to the hardcover and layout design, is not even above average.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">One must admire the editors' humility and honesty. Their decades-long attachment with Afghanistan, living the culture, and their sincere desire to understand it makes the compilation much more authentic on the level of inquiry, than a majority of other publications on Afghanistan's culture by the 'orientalists.' Along with that, around two dozen contributors from varying backgrounds add myriad perspectives to the assorted themes in this compilation. However, one does have a feeling that the scope of the project is such which demands further editions on each theme discussed in it. The cognoscente from Afghanistan and the world need to explore this untapped region for its riches.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">This book will help alter the perception about anyone who wants to understand Afghanistan, its roots and evolution over the millennia, and most importantly feel it beyond headlines.</p></span></span></div><div>======================================================</div><div>Published in The News on Sunday</div><div><a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/aug2010-weekly/nos-22-08-2010/lit.htm#2">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/aug2010-weekly/nos-22-08-2010/lit.htm#2</a></div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-47552239137237956062010-08-16T11:52:00.000-07:002011-10-13T07:56:47.833-07:00Profile of a Street Artist<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: small; "><b><span ><p align="CENTER">An ordinary citizen of extraordinary faith</p></span></b><i><p align="CENTER">By Naeem Safi</p></i><p align="JUSTIFY">Lahore has witnessed and endured its own share of the human evolution over the course of the millennia—the greater part of which is—not by the Lahore known to us today, but by what is known as the Walled City of Lahore, once a capital of the Mughal India, where the river Ravi used to flow below its magnificent walls, of which only a few meters of remnant has survived. The complex labyrinth of streets and bazaars within could be accessed by thirteen gates, Delhi Gate being one of them. Here each street has its own story to tell; studded with myths, legends, anecdotes, and events from history—layers upon layers just like the ground underneath them.<p align="JUSTIFY">Inside the Delhi Gate bazaar, just opposite the lane that leads to the historical spice market Akbari Mandi, is a street called Gali Surjan Singh, within which is Kucha Charkh Garan, a cul-de-sac. Here lives Bhola, in a very old house on the corner of this kucha, originally built by a Hindu, which his father had bought for seven thousand rupees when he and his siblings were little children.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Bhola came into picture, or should one say several pictures, when I was documenting the Shahi Guzargah. Bhola has painted his advertisements "Bhola painter, Delhi Gate" in Urdu with consistency over the entire route, composing them into the available spaces on the façades, which are not very prominent yet clearly visible. It was the paradox between the very name Bhola, which means gauche, and this advertisement campaign that first intrigued me. Being from a relevant discipline, it was an interesting set for me to respond to.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Bhola is painting for the last 25 years, a profession that he inherited from his father who left this world about exactly the same period. But he is not our regular bloke who caters to the aesthetics (or the lack of it) of the bourgeois. He paints advertisements, mostly text based, on banners, streamers, and walls etc, usually for the common folk. A profession which used to be considered as art that later evolved into graphic design. But he still calls himself a painter, just like the others here, who are in the same business. And he would share with pride how he did projects on the GT road, outside Lahore.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">A few days back, I was walking down the gali when someone asked me, "When will I get my photos?" I looked back and it was Bhola, standing there just wearing an old but stainless brown shalwar, holding a blue t-shirt in his right hand and a cigarette pack in the left. A caked layer of henna over his unevenly shaven head, some of which had dripped down his neck. He seemed much weaker and down than before.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Since he uses the walls in the gali to hang the banners, his work was very slow due to the monsoons. We both looked up to the dark grey sky as a few drops announced it was time to move. We took cover under the scaffoldings that are being installed for the restoration of the street façade. I asked him how he is managing all this and he said he can barely make ends meet for himself and the medicine of his mother— who is suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder. She is like this since he moved to the ground floor of the house along with her, following the marriage of his younger brother, where there is no ventilation or view. Once, he did get engaged with a fine girl "…when there was no silver in my hair." But somehow they could not get married. He dropped the idea altogether afterwards. I asked him who will take care of him in his old age.<p align="JUSTIFY">The level of his indifference towards material world is such that he said he refused to get his share of the house transferred in his name because he has nothing much to do there. Once his Heaven (mother) is gone, he would rather sweep up his parents’ graves and live in the graveyard.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">His left arm and right leg are affected by polio, most probably, but he says it was typhoid when he was an infant. He can not lift that arm, though he can hold things in his hand. Despite the low season and other challenges he has not lost his hope and says that Allah is their guardian. Then to support his belief, he shared his observation of an old man who rides a bicycle through these lanes early in the morning and scavenges various recyclables from the garbage.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">One may wonder that if everything about and around Bhola is so common, then why should one be interested in his story? He may appear to be an ordinary citizen and his story may be common, but his outlook on the sound and fury of life is not; just like his existence.</p></span>=======================================================<div>Published in The News on Sunday</div><div><a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/aug2010-weekly/nos-15-08-2010/she.htm#1">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/aug2010-weekly/nos-15-08-2010/she.htm#1</a></div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-12811680871306401012010-07-12T08:32:00.000-07:002011-10-13T08:44:58.331-07:00Dance<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: medium; "><span lang="EN-AU"><b><span><p align="CENTER">Rhythms of life</p></span></b><i><span><p align="CENTER">It took ages for the cultural expressions in Gilgit-Baltistan to develop and mature, they are now fading away at a much faster pace -- there is a dire need of proper documentation</p><p align="CENTER">By Naeem Safi</p></span></i><span><p align="JUSTIFY">Gilgit-Baltistan, being one of the most beautiful places on earth, has a lot more to offer than just the scenic beauty. Contrary to the popular belief, the inhabitants of these valleys in the northern areas are much more cultured and civilised than their counterparts in the urbanised communities of the south. Their respect for diversity, belief in originality, unaltered hospitality, a rich value system, and love for peace can hardly be matched by the mechanised, 'modernised', educated, and enlightened humanoids.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Up in these valleys, one is lucky enough to witness a humble old man -- passing by on the dirt road, with his coarse hands, worn-out clothes, and bent under the weight of a straw bundle -- transforming into this leaping and beaming dancer. As if some ibex jumping from rock to rock, with that special gaze and swift moves painting images in the air, like many of his ancestors would have done before him. The brisk footwork, the stop-motion-like feel of it, the strong eye contact combined with facial expressions, the gradual transition of gestures and moves from suggestive to persuasive, entrap the intoxicated spectator in its web, just the way a hunter would trap his prey or a lover his beloved. Reflections of feelings, emotions, and aspirations, like frozen images in each move or 'frame' of the dance. These can vary between an eagle's dignified romance, a charging soldier, the swaying dervish, a noble commander, a jolly sportsman and many others. In some styles, certain moves and gestures clearly show imitation of the mating dance found in various other species.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The dance styles found here have roots around and beyond the Pamir knot, and have evolved through many generations and religions. But somehow the origins and inspirations have been lost among the changing layers of ideologies and cultural mingling, change in lifestyle preferences, and the gradual decline in reliance on nature in its un-adulterated state.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The dances specified for cultivation, Bao Faow for instance, and other such for harvesting and other seasonal festivities have their roots in old times, and these might have been proper religious rituals of the pre-Islamic times, like the famous Navajo hunting chants. The dances of these valleys are inter-connected with layers of aesthetics, poetry, music, history, mythologies, and drama. However, the dynamics of response vary from tribe to tribe, family-to-family, season-to-season, types of rituals, and festivals. Each style or occasion requires its own music, poetry, age group, and set of costumes. Along with the regional and tribal signature styles, individual performers improvise and adjust their moves according to the music and type of event, moving back and forth between the spiritual and the carnal, the plural and the singular, the subtle and the perceptible. Despite so many variations and improvisations, there is some method, some order in this disorder, that distinguishes its variants from the others.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The narrative may not be as elaborate for the non-locals as other dance forms of the subcontinent, Kathak for instance, but that could be because of the weak vocabulary available to translate such ethnic expressions, especially their interpretive aspects. These puzzles need masters and experts to study them carefully and then translate them.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Dance, in its essence is celebration of life and not lines. It is strange that dances from these valleys yet have to make it to the national level 'cultural' celebrations, the way the rest of the four provinces are represented by an assortment of dance styles of their own. One of the most valuable and priceless assets of this country is its rich cultural diversity. And all the efforts to consciously neglect or undermine these marginalised communities and their unique identities, for some hypothetical idea of unity, have caused a lot of damage and a good part of this priceless heritage has already been lost forever.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Who knows that this art form -- if approached with a genuine desire for inquiry in mind, on onomastic, anthropological, and other such levels -- may reveal certain aspects, which can connect the scattered dots of identity in crisis and fill in the gaps. High-level academic investigations will not only help understand the beauty of it, but may be able to connect the present with the original sources of inspiration.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Such cultural expressions are beyond religious and geographical boundaries. And though, it took ages for these cultural expressions to develop and mature, they are now fading away at a much faster pace, are in dire need of proper documentation. The range of complex gestures must be deciphered, not just for the sake of preservation but also for further promotion. The preservation of the intangible cultural heritage is the least the inhabitants and the authorities of this part of the world must do, especially when mindless 'development' plans in the very region are destroying the rich range of other heritage forms, like the marvellous petroglyphs along the ancient Silk Route -- which are undoubtedly a part of the world's heritage.</p><div><br /></div></span></span></span></div><div>==========================================================</div><div>Published in The News on Sunday</div><div><a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/jul2010-weekly/nos-11-07-2010/enc.htm#2">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/jul2010-weekly/nos-11-07-2010/enc.htm#2</a></div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-57887514869538683792010-05-24T21:34:00.000-07:002011-10-13T08:17:05.548-07:00Review: Aasim Akhtar<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: medium; "><b><span><p align="CENTER">Hazy dreams</p></span></b><i><span><p align="CENTER">Aasim Akhtar's recent drawings at Rohtas II were like characters in a finely woven plot where each individual is signifying the other and carrying multiple themes along the way to the final act</p></span></i><span><i><p align="CENTER">By Naeem Safi</p></i><p align="JUSTIFY"> </p><p align="JUSTIFY">But solemn is the silence</p><p align="JUSTIFY">on the silvery haze </p><p align="JUSTIFY">That drinks away their</p><p align="JUSTIFY">voices in echoless repose,</p><p align="JUSTIFY">And dreamily the evening has</p><p align="JUSTIFY">stilled the haunted braes,</p><p align="JUSTIFY">And dreamier the</p><p align="JUSTIFY">gloaming grows.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The stanza from The Fairy Thorn by Samuel Ferguson best describes the overall mood of Aasim Akthar's "And dreamier, the gloaming grows", which is a series of his recent drawings that went on display at Rohtas II, in Lahore. The series uses the minimalist choice of materials -- 15 drawings framed in white, graphite on paper, with a couple of pastel works, and hung on white walls.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">At first glance, some of the works look like a continuation of Marvin Bileck's etchings and engravings; not just for the choice of the title of the show but also for the choice of forms used, like the ones in the Heart to Heart, with which the show begins. However, it goes beyond that where the narrative begins with a metaphor from nature, and then goes on to engage metaphors of the nature. The varying tones of grey, and the choice of intimate instances -- personal, telluric, or the marriage of both -- is divulging the subconscious. It is nature that creates attraction between the two opposites and connects the organic forms of existence, or even the inorganic ones. The show is like a journey through the colourless mist of melancholy, where the images seem like reflections from a very lonely place. The place where subtle is part of the obvious, and obscure is rendering clarity.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Most of these drawings are like whispers, almost motionless, and embedded within them are the fine suggestions of the ineffable; while some are meandering through the moonlit landscapes of carnal desires, from a perspective that is slightly drifting towards the Other side, away from the land-of-the-sane-and-the-sure. A place where tall peaks of human passion are laden with tales that need to be told, and the walls of deep gorges are painted with shades of concupiscence. The interplays between the positives and the negatives, and the animate and the inanimate -- especially in the case of the five Bodyscapes -- are giving birth to the new and the more meaningful.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The Wind of Desire beautifully portrays the classic contest between the pull of desire and the vast abyss that is filled with myriad obstructions impeding the former. Along with that, the desire to break free from it, and glide over this chasm towards the ultimate bliss, intensifies this contest. The distorted torso with the bloated chest seems to be filled with the immense burden and pain that is precipitated by this conflict, as if desire is a deity and human flesh its ambrosias, struggling for survival yet defenceless and being sacrificed for a 'sacred' and inevitable cause of making the desire immortal.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">In the Poppy Seed, poppy buds, flowers, and stems are rendered and composed in a manner in which they are dancing to the tune of life, depicting the never ending attraction between the pollen and the carpel, present in almost all living beings, in one form or the other, and a major thesis of life itself. The pale coloured petals of the blossoming flowers are the only objects that have used some hues in the entire body of works displayed in the show. Such a limited and careful application of colour, in this context, is apparently suggesting, or desiring, the feminine as a source for brining the colourfulness into the grand scheme of existence.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Apart from the individuality of each work, the discourse created by the titles in a particular order, and parallel to that the catharsis produced by the visuals in that order, further add on other meaningful layers to the set in totality; like characters in a finely woven plot where each individual is signifying the other while at the same time asserting its own identity, and carrying multiple themes along the way to the final act.</p></span></span></div><div><br /></div><div>======================================================</div><div>Published in The News on Sunday</div><div><a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/may2010-weekly/nos-23-05-2010/enc.htm#2">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/may2010-weekly/nos-23-05-2010/enc.htm#2</a></div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-82095607232124980852010-02-14T11:11:00.000-08:002011-10-13T08:16:39.168-07:00Interview: Amira Farooq"The best part is the absolute isolation"<br /><br />By Naeem Safi<br /><br /><i>Amira Farooq lives and works in Lahore. She received her BFA from NCA in 2004, followed by a brief adventure in print and electronic media as a model and presenter. Since then she has been painting and recently had her first solo exhibition at Nairang Art Gallery. She creates intense dialogues concerning the complementary nature of human relationships, emotions, and the existence, by juxtaposing the opposites in contrasting colours and forms -- usually, along with some elements from nature.</i><br /><br /><i>She is the fifth person to go to NCA from her family, and that too only to pursue fine arts. "Father is an architect, and mother is a designer. It definitely had an influence on me, because you see the way your house is kept; every little thing, like how to view things."</i><br /><br />TNS: How has your major in printmaking at NCA influenced your work?<br /><br />AF: It's all connected. I need variations in expressions, because you learn things that you might use in the other medium. Printmaking is a two-dimensional medium and I think that comes out a lot in my work. But the more I paint, the more I break away from that.<br /><br />TNS: How has NCA affected your work, if at all?<br /><br />AF: NCA, obviously, is an old structure, and has taught me some discipline that you can't work without. But apart from that, it is the exposure that I got there, by meeting people from all over Pakistan, which was a huge eye-opener and got me out of my own little bubble. It has influenced my work more, conceptually, rather than in technique or skill.<br /><br />TNS: How do you conceptualise your images? Do you draw on ideas or memories?<br /><br />AF: I just pick an emotion, focus on it and I paint the visuals that best describe it. Sometimes I sketch, but most of the times I am working straight on canvas. I have to have music to work; that really helps channelling the emotions and in focusing.<br /><br />TNS: How much role the element of chance has in your work?<br /><br />AF: I think everything that we do in life is half chance. When you start making a painting, you intend to do one thing, but during the process you discover things, maybe through the paint, or let's say something spills over, or all of a sudden you see something on the canvas that you hadn't intended to make before. So yes, there is the element of chance in almost all creative processes.<br /><br />TNS: What famous artists have influenced you, and how?<br /><br />AF: Michelangelo has influenced me for one sheer skill, prolificacy. And then Dali for his mind; you just can't walk away from Dali without reacting. I really love Van Gough because he was the rebel of the art world. I, kind of, relate to him in terms of feeling misunderstood. In order to achieve greatness, there is a certain amount of suffering involved, and nobody gets it better than Van Gough. And then when I'm sitting down and painting, in my space, my biggest influence would probably be the first cave painter. Because here was somebody who was free of conditioning and approval, and all he thought about was just making an image, and re-creating something that he had seen in nature. And I think you have to be really free in your head from the voices of other people while you paint. So, I channel that anonymous caveman -- or woman, we don't know -- who started painting on the cave walls.<br /><br />TNS: You mean you paint without any inhibition and do not expect any sort of appreciation for your work?<br /><br />AF: When I am painting, the viewers are not there. They come into the picture when I show them my work. There is a dialogue. Not every piece can be loved by everyone; but every piece is loved by someone. That is a sort of validation that you need, to keep working. Because there is so much isolation in this profession that without that feedback, sometimes, it's hard to see what you are doing is really important. The job description of the artist is to be the conscience of the nation. In order to love something, you have to be free of your own selfish desires.<br /><br />TNS: Do you feel that your technique of rendering is a bit simplified for painting?<br /><br />AF: One could look at my work and say that it's not as 'skilled' as it is expected to be, but that is exactly my point. I'm trying to create a stylised version of reality that looks very simple from a distance, and even child-like to some extent. But at a second glance, the concept is not child-like at all. The paradox I like to play with my work is to keep the visuals very simple and the concept a little out of the box. Lately I've gone back to the primaries; if it's a simple thought, I might use fewer colours. It depends on what I am trying to say.<br /><br />TNS: What are the best and the worst parts of being an artist?<br /><br />AF: The best part is the absolute isolation, and it is just addictive once you start expressing yourself on a daily basis. Being an artist gives me a licence to insanity.<br /><br />But then, the stereotyping can be very inextricable. Because most of the people believe that I will automatically be liberal and open to everything and anything under the sun, which is not the case. I have very clear-cut preferences and very precise likes and dislikes. And being a female artist, there are a lot of sexist gender issues attached as well.<br />===================================================================<br />Published in The News on Sunday<br />http://jang.com.pk/thenews/feb2010-weekly/nos-14-02-2010/enc.htm#4Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-80393463164146977722010-02-09T10:57:00.000-08:002011-10-13T08:30:52.978-07:00Experience<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); "><i><p align="CENTER"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" >Qingqi</span></b></p><p align="CENTER" style="font-size: small; ">By Naeem Safi </p></i><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; ">On way to the Walled City of Lahore for a photography assignment; the road is blocked after one had crossed the Railway Station. The closed windows and the popular songs on an FM channel running western songs are the only solace against the noise and the visuals of the dilapidated urban fabric.</p><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; ">In the midst of all this sound and fury, something shiny and very colourful catches the eye. It looks like two metal benches welded together and then set on wheels. It’s a Qingqi rickshaw decorated with vibrant coloured motifs and objects.</p><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; ">But then, it’s not the only one; there is a swarm of them, not all of them colourful and decorated. They are causing the roadblock. That just adds to the passion, and one scrutinizes this weird looking ‘thing’ that some humans use as a vehicle.</p><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; ">One finds some striking similarities between this machine-age-creature and our beloved state, beginning with the question of its origin. Some say these things were inducted after removing the tongas with an organised campaign (read conspiracy) by one of the ‘top 10’ families. A propaganda campaign was launched against the horses on various forums, instilling fear in the masses of some extremely dangerous virus found in horse droppings.</p><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; ">The same horse — which made empires for humans — had to witness this disgrace by the same ‘superior’ species; thus leading to a partition between the two, both sides oblivious to the real causes.</p><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; ">Instead of planning a proper urban transport alternative by the government, this wonder-of-the-world was offered instead. What a way for a nuclear power to enter the 21st century.</p><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; ">The structure of this creature is a puzzle in itself — half bench and half bike (of Chinese origin) and some interesting improvisations according to the owner’s need. It is imagination stretched to the maximum. But in a way, they are ahead of the Greeks in creating a mythological creature that not only exists in real life, but plays a vital role in the common man’s life—a god or a beast; leave that to the riders of this storm.</p><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; ">It is beyond comprehension why would someone spend so much money and effort to decorate a badly designed product and above that, seek a stamp of approval for that? We will have to wait for some white skinned foreigner to approve of this futile exercise as ‘art’; just like its predecessor, the so-called Truck Art.</p><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; ">The passengers are compulsorily divided into two groups, each having a view of the same journey 180 degree apart from the other. The driver’s seat has a provision for an extra passenger, whose weight balances this creature against the load at the back (doctrine of necessity?). The cannibalized bike pulls the entire load (population) with its small engine (economy), as a result, making more noise (read owning the conflicts of the entire Muslim Ummah — another myth?) and creating more pollution.</p><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; ">The passengers on these swarming creatures get to hear the blasting sounds (the religious and political rhetoric) as if they are riding in some rally, but in fact are barely travelling, and that too in a dehumanised manner. They are denied the right to privacy and, above all, a sense of decency.</p><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; ">The whole thing just shows the psyche (or helplessness) of our people who will do anything to get from point A to point B; no matter how harmful and senseless the means are; compromising their honour and dignity.</p></span></div><div>======================================================</div><div>Published in The News on Sunday</div><div><a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/feb2010-weekly/nos-07-02-2010/she.htm#3">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/feb2010-weekly/nos-07-02-2010/she.htm#3</a></div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-32999813358425898792009-12-28T02:26:00.000-08:002011-10-13T08:17:31.814-07:00Interview: Saeed Akhtar<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: small; "><i><p align="CENTER"><br /></p></i><b><span><p align="CENTER">"Art is all about our lives, why hide it?"</p></span></b></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: small; "><i><p align="CENTER">Professor Saeed Akhtar’s contribution to the development of art in Pakistan can hardly be matched. His is undoubtedly a classic master. His observation, mastery of skill, combined with his imagination has produced the most remarkable works that appreciate the beautiful in the local by idealising them in various thematic settings. Quest for the Divine beauty was the focus of his recent exhibition.</p></i></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: small; "><i><p align="CENTER">By Naeem Safi</p></i><p align="JUSTIFY">The News on Sunday: Have you always been an artist?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Saeed Akhtar: I had this appetence for art, just like everyone else has that for one thing or the other. However, before that, I was interested in automotive mechanics, especially motorbikes. I would disassemble the parts and join them again, marvelling at their beauty and the capacity of human brain.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: Which aspect of art is more consequential for our times in this part of the world?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">SA: Art encompasses all aspects of life through architecture, textiles, ceramics, and other such disciplines. A molvi once said to me that I’ll burn in hell for teaching drawing. I replied that it is for Him to decide, but what can I say about you, the core of ignorance. He works as an electrician, and has learned his trade with a lot of beating from his ustad, instead of learning it in an appropriate institute, where he could have learned proper drawing. The absence of quality art education at school level has turned this society into the mess it is now, where all one see is entangled cables hanging in front of ugly facades. I can not imagine a single moment of life without art.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: Do you believe that this attitude has anything to do with the shifting interest from realism to abstraction?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">SA: In our days, art was believed to be a means of earning money, and for that one needed proper training in seven-eight skills to achieve the required level of understanding. These days words are stressed upon more than any other skill; this does not solve the problem. When an artist is not well equipped with the required set of skills it will breed frustration. But who knows, the artists of today can be more successful than those of our times, as each period has its own requisite set of skills. And I believe the young artists are well aware of that.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: As we are talking about changing times, how is Saeed Akhtar of today different from the one of 1960s?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">SA: Learning, is what distinguishes them. Our teachers could see one eighth of an inch error in perspective in a glance. I once asked my teacher, "Ustad jee ay inni inni ghaltiyan tohano nazar aa jandian ney?" He said, "Hann puttar, sari umar lang gai ay wekdey." I would not have much consciousness then, regarding my errors; the teachers were there to identify them. Now I can depend only on my own judgement.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">My canvas offers me new challenges everyday, it annoys me, it hurts me, and it makes me feel like crying. But the joy that follows a finished work is unthinkable for anyone else. This is what my struggle is all about, since coming from the age that was all about learning the fundamental skills.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: What interests you the most when deciding a subject?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">SA: Anything that comes out nicely in the end. Beauty is not the only standard; beyond that, it’s the expression that matters. The thought of painting eyes kept bothering me for a long time; I would paint and wash repeatedly. The eyes that I painted on a 4’x4’ canvas remained untouched for quite a while; one day I started drawing lines around them that turned out to be my own image, from the time spent in Quetta.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: How do you choose your hues and tones, some of them being imaginary for you?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">SA: I am not familiar with the look of blush, or a suggestion of greenish tint on some freshly shaven face. But I can not deny their existence. I see tones and then blend them according to my imagination. However, I am not too cautious with colour application; and sometimes my misjudgements fascinate viewers.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: How do you see the nude in the broader scheme of existence?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">SA: I believe this whole existence is for the human body. If you pay attention, all the activities that you see around you are linked to the human body, the dress, the building, and almost all of the innovations related to such products. God says that He has created the human body in His own image, which is the most beautiful. In other words, the more beautiful a human, the closest she/he will be to the Divine. God is beautiful and loves beauty. Though we can not imagine His beauty, we can still idealize the glimpse of it in the human form. The Romans and the Greeks have done the same. The seven nuktas that make an alif follow the human proportions with which the whole Quran is written. Sharing beauty and joy is not a sin.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: You believe you are looking for the Divine in such manifestations of beauty?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">SA: In this regard, human face attracts me the most. I saw a face, when I went for haj, and thought that the artist who painted Mary must have seen a beauty like this. Such beauty leads to beautiful thoughts where we find our own ideals.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: The figures on display in your recent exhibition portray such beauty?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">SA: Beauty is somewhat personal. I like high-bridged noses, some people don’t. Some like narrow eyes, while I like big eyes. You have to see the beauty in its context, because different regions have different perceptions of it. The bright coloured attire and ornaments used in our deserts in the South can not be appreciated through some other culture’s perspective due to the difference in sensibilities. The working women with Gandhi, had just fabric wrapped around their shoulders, and were not wearing any blouses. In our childhood the women would wear tehband with kurtas, and there was no concept of bra. Why do we want to see the female in stiff and straight posture anyway? Similarly, since I have lived in Quetta, I really like the graceful turbans wore by the men there.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">In my recent exhibition, only five paintings are a bit exposed, and they were the first to get the sold tag. And the apparently unusual postures are nothing but images from daily life that is not tied with ropes, and which can be extraordinary on its own. One of my paintings — showing a female figure in motion on a swing, her hair swaying in the wind and the bust visible through the drapery — was bought by a lady. I enquired where she had it hung; it was in their living room. Art is all about our lives, why hide it?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: What is the story of buraq?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">SA: It is all about emotions and has little to do with the tangible. Our prophet’s journey through heavens — and his description of the ride, which was much faster than light — brings to mind such visuals that guide us to the path of breaking free. Look at the fascinating colours of feathers on this planet; buraq, for me, is the culmination of all flights.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: How do you feel about art appreciation and art criticism in Pakistan?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">SA: Artists have colours and art critics have words to play with. But mostly the critics here use the same old vocabulary, and you feel like reading the same thing over and over. Our art institutes mainly focus on the Western Art and art history as the art. And in comparison, there is not much of the published material available on the local arts and artists. Do art students know about the local artists as much as they do about the Western artists? How many art students actively visit art galleries and exhibitions, or know about Shakir Ali Museum, Chughtai Museum, or the Alhamra Permanent Art Gallery?</p></span></div><div>=======================================================</div><div>Published in The News on Sunday</div><div><a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/dec2009-weekly/nos-27-12-2009/enc.htm#2">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/dec2009-weekly/nos-27-12-2009/enc.htm#2</a></div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-84710159686030624712009-10-19T01:28:00.000-07:002016-09-17T11:12:21.063-07:00Interview: Julien Columeau<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: large;">"I think writing is born also out of a dialogue with
different authors and that makes you conscious of a very important thing; that
there are books that you have never read and you would love to read but nobody
has written them and you are the person who is going to write them. Writing is
always about writing what others haven't written."</span><o:p></o:p></div>
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By Naeem Safi<o:p></o:p></div>
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<i>Julien Columeau got a degree in Islamic Studies from
Sorbonne, Paris, and has been working as an interpreter for an international
humanitarian organization for the past twelve years. Was posted in India,
Afghanistan, and lately Pakistan. Heavily influenced by philosophical and
literary theories of Maurice Balnchot, Georges Bataille, Jacques Derrida, the
'enfants terribles' of French Thought. Has published two novels in France. His
third French novel, Zahid (story of mujahid turned pimp) is under press in
Paris.</i><o:p></o:p></div>
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Following are the excerpts from an interview TNS had with him
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The News on Sunday: Can you recall precisely when did you
decide to become a writer?<o:p></o:p></div>
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Julien Columeau: I don't think I ever decided to become a
writer; I think I just decided to write. Becoming a writer, in my sense, sounds
a bit pompous. There are very few people that I'd call writers. In French we
have this concept of 'écrivain'. Écrivain is somebody whose life depends on
writing. He is the person who'd die if he didn't write a book or a line. He
lives out of writing, spiritually, gets his energy out of writing and not out
of anything else. I think it is very difficult and very few people can attain
that. Most of us get energy from writing, people who are like me, who are in
the habit of writing, as people are in the habit of smoking. We derive our
energy from writing but I don't think we derive all our energy from writing and
we are striving to get close to that stage where you are one with your writing.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: Could you tell us about your writing habits? Do you
follow a strict regime or wait for inspiration or the 'right mood'?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: I don't believe in inspiration and I don't believe in
getting in the mood either. I think what you have to write is within you and it
has been within you for years. It's very much connected with your own
subconscious. I think writing is a form of a conscious dialogue with your own
subconscious. It's all about you letting your subconscious talk very often. You
have to go and meet a psychoanalyst and you don't decide the time when you are
going to meet him and, unfortunately, it's following a very strict routine. All
the psychoanalysts stress a lot on the importance of routine.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: How important is company or setting for a writer?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: It is important, to some extent, but it is also very
good to be able to see it for your own imagination and not for your physical
aids. I think in order to write fiction you need to give more importance to the
unseen. I would say that without having been to Lahore I would have never
written the book, Saghar, if I talk about myself. But at the same point, when I
wrote Saghar I don't think I was in Lahore.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When I had the first idea of Saghar I was quite far away
from Lahore. The city was some kind of a memory or a fantasy. And this is why I
didn't feel restricted by geographical facts that at times you feel you have to
respect if you are talking about a given place.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It actually got me a lot of liberty to write about Lahore in
a very dreamy way. In order to translate it into words you need to feel the
distance. I was not describing Lahore, I was describing the vision of Lahore,
which is very imprecise and I wanted it to be so.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: You have written a novel about poet Saghar, by the same
name. Would you like to share the experience?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: I didn't have to go through much actually; it was just a
couple of book readings about him, written by those who were close to him, who
had a lot of love and respect for him, which was good. And I feel that a lot of
Urdu poets have earned people's respect but I don't think many poets have
earned people's love to the extent to which Saghar had. I have the feeling that
he is very dear to the people of Lahore, especially the Walled City and some
adjacent areas where he used to move around and that's a very specific thing.
So what I encountered first was people's love for Saghar, and a lot of them
could still identify themselves with Saghar and his memories, as if Saghar was
embodying a period which is dead now.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And then I realised there were important things missing,
unfortunately, people were talking about their perception of Saghar and their
love for Saghar but not much about Saghar himself. And they were talking a lot
about what they assumed Saghar was going through -- mentally, spiritually, and
philosophically. The thing that was missing was Saghar 's point of view itself.
It was then I realised that I'd have to go through his diwaan as often as I
could and try to interpret it in my own way into some fiction. I've been writing
the fiction for a couple of years, which was to find a kind of fictional
background for a lot of the verses by Saghar, which moved me and that was the
beginning of the purpose of writing the book.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: What has influenced this text more: reading Saghar or
living in his city?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: Yes I'd say both of them but especially Saghar himself,
meaning whatever I could get from his poetry, from different biographical
accounts, and what also I could gather and understand, which is very important,
is that people don't know much about his life. So it's mainly about some kind
of gaps which I noticed in his biographies, huge gaps. People were not aware of
very important things; they knew where he was born, where he died, but they
didn't know what happened to his mother after 1947. They didn't know who
inspired him, whom he referred to all his life in a very metaphorical way. So
basically what I didn't know about Saghar is what inspired me to write about
him.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: You feel that your perception is different from that of
the local Urdu writer?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: I'm not too sure. It's debatable. If you talk about the
local writer you might be talking about the masters. Obviously I cannot write
anything classical because I don't know much about classical literature. People
in the modern age feel differently. The set of experiments attempted by
contemporary writers in the past thirty years have taken Urdu literature to its
limits, for instance Enver Sajjad, Anis Nagi, and the stories of Hassan Askari,
the first stories written in Urdu that are very fresh and willingly used the
method of stream of consciousness. I was very much influenced by poetry as
well, especially Majeed Amjad.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: Do you use such a rich vocabulary in French as you've
used in Urdu?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: The aspects of language, which I stressed on and
exploited, while writing in Urdu and in French are different. In French I wrote
in a very intellectual and internalised way, and in Urdu I tried to exploit the
colourfulness of the language.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What you write is not what the language tells you to write
but you are telling the language what it is to express. I was more conscious in
the beginning when I was writing in Urdu, so that not to make it obvious for
the reader that it's a foreigner writing. And since I had to write in the voice
of Saghar I was not allowed to write anything but what I imagined would be a
very rich, colourful and precise language. The effort was very conscious in the
beginning but soon it became Saghar 's voice itself and then I was possessed by
it. If I think about most of the scenes I have no idea how I wrote them, or no
recollection of the mood I was in. This connection of distance is what helped
me feel Saghar 's character and hear his voice within me.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: So what you are saying is that you had some sort of a
spiritual experience?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: I would not say that at all, being very far from
roohaniyat. I think it's a very material experience. And in spirit it's a very
sexual experience.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: Do you believe Pakistanis have understood and appreciated
Saghar the way he deserved it?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: Saghar was a malamati, somebody who despised himself and
made himself despicable in the eyes of the society. I don't think there is any
question of deserving. He stays in people's memories as a malang, with all the
sensitivities and sensibilities that are associated with it, and that's what he
wanted. This is something that I talk about in the novel, the malang who was so
present in the public spheres and life. While malang is somebody who lives a
life of retirement or that of a hermit, which was not his case. And I somehow
came up with this idea that maybe Saghar could have been rejected by the other
malangs that creates a different state of mind in the end where Saghar is
completely satisfied with his life and he feels that he is neither a malang nor
a normal person anymore. The last thing that gave meaning to his life was the
company of his beloved.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He created his own mental space. I have the feeling, as far
as his interaction with drugs is concerned, that it became a habit later at
some point. As in the beginning it was born out of his wish to experiment with
different states of consciousness. He talked about drugs, using the metaphor of
wine and the name he chose for himself, Saghar. But it was more than just
consuming drugs consciously and in a very organised way as far as his poetic
dynamic is concerned. A point that I'm highlighting in the novel is that he
became a malang out of compulsion, to some extent. But at the end it is his
decision. When he walks out of the hotel room towards Data Darbar, he is
someone who knows where he is going, with an aim in mind to describe and
analyse the old process -- when he says "mein khud ko munazzam tarikay sey
taraaj karonga", the only instance of the future tense in my novel.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: Would you like to elaborate on the protagonist's choice
in Saghar to appreciate the military parade over saving his love?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: That's the feature of Saghar, him being a patriot. I'm
describing something that some people witnessed but the context is fictional
where his girlfriend is feeling the effect of withdrawal and he is out to get
some money for her heroin. She is dying while he is doing that.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I felt like it was echoing with the beginning of the second
part when he writes the national anthem of Pakistan and in return loses his
personality. It's a kind of metaphor expressing the way the states crush
individuals through the passion that they ignite in their hearts and minds
about the nation and other confused and meaningless concepts.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Saghar is very much attached to mythology, and nation is
very much part of the mythology which is beyond his own existence and that
makes him jealous of these soldiers for being part of it, yet real creatures.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: You feel other writers influence your writing?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: I think writing is born also out of a dialogue with
different authors and that makes you conscious of a very important thing, which
is that there are books that you have never read and you would love to read but
nobody has written them and you are the person who is going to write them.
Writing is always about writing what others haven't written. You have to be
faithful to the originality. You need to distance yourself from the authors who
give you energy through their ideas in order not to write in the same style as
them. The idea is to achieve the balance between yourself and the others,
because if you're too much of yourself then nobody will understand a single
word of what you write.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: Before learning Urdu, what was your perception about
this culture?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: A person coming in contact with something that is new to
him has some prejudices. And I had some kind of fixed ideas in my mind and was
going pretty much by all the stereotypes which are being circulated outside
Asia. Learning Urdu was a very important and central experience, the experience
of changing yourself through a language that is a very fresh object to you.
While doing that, you give up on your own culture and background and more of
your inner self and identity and focus on something else. And if you have been
able to focus on that then you will realize that it doesn't really make any
difference if you write in Hebrew or Urdu.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: Your favourite Urdu authors.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: My favourite Urdu writers are poets. First on my list
would be Majeed Amjad, then Saleem Ahmad and maybe not immediately Saghar,
which may sound very paradoxical. I love what he wrote but I don't think he
reaches the heights. He was not like a literary figure who is coming up with
literature consciously. His own process of creativity and writing was very
different in nature from the process of Majeed Amjad and Saleem Ahmad, or N.M.
Rashid.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Each poet's poetry is, or defines a different genre. It's
not that some people write in the poetical genre but I think that Majeed Amjad
writes in the Majeed Amjadian genre. It goes beyond style because style is
about repeating a certain set of images or combination of words. It's born out
of the unity of the inner kaifiyyat and the way this kaifiyyat meets the
author's world through words. I feel a lot of silence, or sakoot -- being stuck
in time -- in Majeed Amjad's poems. Or like Joan Elea who was toying with the
zero, or nihilism.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: How do you see the contemporary Urdu literature?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: Urdu literature was in danger, some time ago, to die of
suffocation. And I don't think many literatures can survive by themselves.
There have always been two currents of Urdu literature, one is the riwayat
pasand, who want to go by the tradition; and there are people who want to break
free from the tradition.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I have the feeling that that kind of hangover with tradition
was very much present with Urdu literature when the taraqi pasand were going to
take over. Then some people, among which Asad Farooqi, and Muhammad Umar Memon,
and Ajmal Kamal, realised that Urdu was going to die out of suffocation and
decided to open the window by translating and adapting works from other
languages into their own.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
TNS: Anything else you want to share or shed light on?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
JC: I wrote this novel first in French, and then I realised
that very often I ended up explaining some concepts indigenous to this land.
Then wrote it in Saghar 's language and changed it to the first person that
gave me the liberty to impersonate him and play his role actively in my mind.
Actually Urdu freed me from all the constraints that I was feeling while
writing in French. People would find it very paradoxical for me feeling much
more freedom in writing in a language which is not my mother tongue. But it was
as if I was equipped with a new and fresh imagination, which was a very
exciting and unique experience.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The book I have written is more of a tribute than a novel.
After its completion I visited Saghar's shrine and asked for forgiveness from
the baba.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
==============================================================<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Published in The News on Sunday<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
http://www.jang.com.pk/thenews/oct2009-weekly/nos-18-10-2009/pol1.htm#1</div>
</div>
Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-58499779792025701902009-08-31T00:54:00.000-07:002009-08-31T00:56:23.379-07:00Truth or Lies<p> <b>SEEDMAGAZINE.COM</b> <i>August 31, 2009</i> </p> <div id="content"> <div id="leftCol"> <div id="titleDek"> <div id="title"> <h2><a href="http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/truth_or_lies/">Truth or Lies</a></h2> <p id="byline"><span id="cat" class="ideas">New Ideas</span> by <span class="author">Veronique Greenwood</span> / August 17, 2009</p> </div> <p id="dek">A new study raises <b>the question</b> of whether being honest is a <b>conscious decision at all.</b></p> </div> <div id="articleContent"> <p class="image credit"><img alt="" src="http://seedmagazine.com/images/uploads/true-lies_320x198.jpg" /><span>Photo courtesy of <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/fotos_dos_ornelas/">Rui Ornelas</a></span></p> <p>In a famous set of experiments in the 1970s, children were observed trick-or-treating in the suburbs. Some were asked their names and addresses upon arriving at a door, while some were asked nothing. All were instructed to take just one piece of candy from the bowl, but as soon as the owner of the home retreated into the kitchen, the children who hadn’t provided their names and addresses shoveled the candy into their bags, sometimes taking everything in the bowl. Psychologists posited that anonymity made the children feel safe from the repercussions of their actions, an effect they call deindividuation. </p> <p>Moral psychologists have since constructed myriad experiments to probe the workings of human morality, studying how we decide to cheat or to play by the rules, to lie or to tell the truth. And the results can be surprising, even disturbing. For instance, we have based our society on the assumption that deciding to lie or to tell the truth is within our conscious control. But Harvard’s Joshua Greene and Joseph Paxton say this assumption may be flawed and are probing whether honesty may instead be the result of controlling a desire to lie (a conscious process) or of not feeling the temptation to lie in the first place (an automatic process). “When we are honest, are we honest because we actively force ourselves to be? Or are we honest because it flows naturally?” Greene asks. </p> <p>Greene and Paxton have just published a study in the <i>Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences</i> that attempts to get at the subconscious underpinnings of morality by recording subjects’ brain activity as they make a decision to lie. Under the fMRI, subjects were asked to predict the result of a coin toss and were allowed to keep their predictions to themselves until after the coin fell, giving them a chance to lie. As motivation, they were paid for correct predictions. For comparison, the researchers ran tests in which they asked subjects to reveal their predictions before the coin toss. The scientists then analyzed the subjects’ success rates using statistics: The dishonest were identified as those who guessed the results of the coin toss more times than chance would dictate. </p> <p>Greene and Paxton had hypothesized that if deciding to be honest is a conscious process—the result of resisting temptation—the areas of the brain associated with self-control and critical thinking would light up when subjects told the truth. If it is automatic, those areas would remain dark.</p> <p>What they found is that honesty <i>is</i> an automatic process—but only for some people. Comparing scans from tests with and without the opportunity to cheat, the scientists found that for honest subjects, deciding to be honest took no extra brain activity. But for others, the dishonest group, both deciding to lie and deciding to tell the truth required extra activity in the areas of the brain associated with critical thinking and self-control. </p> <p>Their findings—that honesty is automatic for some people—is part of a growing body of work that shows that many, if not most, of our daily actions are not under our conscious control. According to John Bargh, a Yale social psychologist who studies automaticity, even our higher mental processes, ranging from persistence at an activity to social stereotyping to stopping to help a person in need, are performed unconsciously in response to environmental cues. And Jon Haidt of the University of Virginia has found through numerous studies that we make some moral judgments, like those involved in the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolley_problem">trolley problem</a>, based entirely on our emotions and are unable to explain logically why some things are right and others wrong.</p> <p>Greene and Paxton’s study suggests that honesty in particular is automatic only for some, which Bargh interprets to mean that some portion of the population might be naturally honest, while others struggle with telling the truth. “It could potentially be some of the most intriguing evidence for group selection,” Bargh speculates, adding that the results are reminiscent of the evolutionary idea that “cheaters” and “suckers” coexist in a specific ratio in the animal kingdom. The classic example is parasitic cuckoos and the hapless birds that raise the cuckoos’ young. Bargh wonders if the ratio of “cheaters” to “suckers” exists in our species as well. In the Halloween party experiment, were there children who did not take extra candy even though they hadn’t revealed their names and addresses?</p> <p>Greene and Paxton specifically state in the paper that they are not drawing conclusions about how the “honest” and “dishonest” group behave beyond the confines of the experiment, so to answer some of these deeper questions they plan to submit subjects to a retest and assess the robustness of the labels. If these designations hold up to further testing—if people really are consistently honest or dishonest—the pair would then hope to identify what individual personality traits might predict each case. Then the experimenters will also try to track down what kind of situations—like being reprimanded or being alone in the room—bring out honesty and dishonesty. They hope to thus search out the roots of automatic morality.</p> <p>One surprising finding from this study reveals the complexity Greene and others face in trying to dissect moral behavior: The decision to lie for personal gain turns out to be a strikingly unemotional choice. Some moral dilemmas Greene studies, like the trolley problem, trigger emotional processing centers in our brains. In his coin toss experiment, there was no sign at all that emotions factored into a subject’s decision to lie or to tell the truth. “Moral judgment is not a single thing,” Greene concludes, suggesting that although we often lump them together under the heading of “morality,” deciding what’s right or wrong and deciding to tell the truth or to tell a lie may, in some situations, be entirely disconnected processes. </p> </div><!-- articleContent --> </div><!-- #leftCol --> </div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-50659750887265599862009-08-30T22:37:00.000-07:002011-10-13T09:28:52.353-07:00Interview: Michal Glikson<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: small; "><b><span><p align="CENTER">"It's hard to believe that</p><p align="CENTER">people can even make art here"</p></span></b><i><p align="CENTER">Michal Glikson is presently studying her masters in painting at Baroda School, Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, Gujarat. In 2008, she was invited as artist -- in resident to the National College of Arts, Lahore, where she gave a presentation of students work from the Baroda School and showed the Baroda series. The Lahore Series evolved out of her internship in NCA's specialised miniature painting department and has been shown in Baroda in tandem with a presentation of students work from the NCA, Lahore. Lahore Series was exhibited in May 2009 at Damien Minton Gallery, Sydney, Australia. Excerpts of interview follow.</p><p align="CENTER">By Naeem Safi</p></i><p align="JUSTIFY">The News on Sunday: How did you end up in this part of the world all the way from Australia?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Michal Glikson: My interest in this part of the world began when I was studying politics as a secondary degree to my fine arts degree and I became really fascinated by imperialism, colonisation, and particularly the links between the colonisation of Australia and the exploitation of the subcontinent by the British Raj. So it was following the trail of the British and their empire that I first went to India.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Then in 2006, I was really interested in the connections between the kinds of news coverage that we got about the 2005 earthquake in Pakistan and the links between that kind of media coverage and the old history of British exploitation. It was some kind of fascination with wanting to understand why the news coverage would be so skewed, linked historically to the old patterns of exploitation. That's why I really wanted see for myself what was really happening at the scene of the earthquake or what had really happened to people on the day that it caused the kinds of media coverage that we got in Australia which presented the Kashmiri people in a very bad light. I was quite sceptical and was interested in finding the root of that feeling people's stories. TNS: You exhibited at Rohtas a few weeks back, how did that go?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">MG: There was not a large turnout but the people that were there seemed to really enjoy the work and I got some very nice feedback particularly in the guest book. People really seemed to grasp where I was coming from, which was a place of not just compassion but more a place of wanting to make connections, to actually step into the shoes of people.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: What made you choose children as a primary audience?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">MG: The works are done for children and adults but I hoped to engage children's attention, to capture the other end of what the media wasn't presenting -- media was presenting a sophisticated kind of view that you get from the lens of the camera and the flashy sensation. I was hoping to present the kind of story that you get upon reflection and that speaks to children in terms of the language that they speak when they are beginning to draw. In making the works I felt like a child a lot of the time.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The style is one of a childlike simplicity. I don't attempt to mimic the way children draw but I do comment in the style of the drawing in ways the things that stand out to children, which are colour and a sensitivity of line. At this stage I didn't want to present this view as an exquisitely controlled experience but to be one much closer to the surface of the skin.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: Do you believe in the bourgeois and humanitarian divisions of art?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">MG: I think it is a reality and I wish it wasn't there. Many people are in denial of that and we have to ask whose interest it serves that they continue to deny that schism. There is a lot of money to be made out of denying certain schisms in our society -- there is a lot of money to be made by denying that chocolate makes you fat.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: How do you feel about the local art scene, especially in relation with the socio-political challenges that this region is going through?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">MG: This is going to sound kind of tough, but it's hard to believe that people can even make art the way things are in Pakistan, similarly in India or Australia for that matter. And this is because there is such an enormous distance between the people making works and the people suffering the issues. There are people making works who are trying to reach down into the issues, but there is such a great socio-economic and political distance between the makers of the works and the sufferers; and then again a distance between the makers whose works get seen and the makers whose works don't get seen. It's kind of like an enormous beast not going anywhere and tripping over itself, because the thing is who is enjoying or reading the works.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">It's not that I think that things are much better in Australia, where we don't have a huge gallery-going audience. But the gap between the gallery-going audience and the non-gallery-going audience is a little smaller than it is here. Here it's like people are making out whilst riding a serpent. And you can see the serpent of the country waving around and these little artists on top almost sucking their thumbs but trying to look at the serpent and make-work.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The role of the artist has largely become of someone who sits on the periphery of society and sucks their thumbs. And sometimes they make a lot of money by doing so, and they come into the centre and then go out again. But they are not regarded as a writer of books; they are regarded as somebody who is in some kind of basket or rocking chair.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">TNS: What is the alternative to sucking thumbs?</p><p align="JUSTIFY">MG: There is a wonderful book that really attacks this kind of predicament and that's the The Reenchantment of Art by Suzi Gablik, in which she talks about how a whole new epoch of the way we regard and make art has to begin and has begun and it really sets a challenge that everybody who is making anything ought to really a look at.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">I am grappling with it myself and not succeeding but we must grapple with it. And that is, that people who make things should be putting themselves right on the street in the face of the things that needs to be re-made. It's a literal agenda that she proposes; it's as literal as a new architecture that is efficient, and in its efficiency beautiful, and in its beauty democratic. It's about a new way of recycling and organizing our garbage and not just making art out of garbage but actually programming into the very way that society is operating. It's difficult to describe in words but the process or the product has to really be something that people can use.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">For me that was the most rewarding aspect of the whole earthquake story thing, the process of actually sitting down in some field with some people who had lost so much and doing a portrait of them as beautifully and truthfully as I could in the given circumstances.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Their stories weren't really getting out there. Journalists had come and gone, snapped pictures and left. One of the things that every creature really thrives on is energy. In the end, for me, it was not about making pictures, although the end product was something that people could see, but the actual experience.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">============================================================</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Published in The News on Sunday</p><p align="JUSTIFY"><a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/aug2009-weekly/nos-02-08-2009/enc.htm#2">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/aug2009-weekly/nos-02-08-2009/enc.htm#2</a></p></span>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-16053235282588458702009-05-18T07:00:00.000-07:002011-10-22T05:34:28.260-07:00Experience<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana; font-size: small;"><b>Pain is very personal</b></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana; font-size: small;"><i>A few brief glimpses -- among hundreds of thousands more -- from the camps inhabited by people now called internally displaced</i></span><br />
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By Naeem Safi<br />
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Pain--has an Element of Blank--</div>
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It cannot recollect</div>
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When it begun--or if there were</div>
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A time when it was not.</div>
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Emily Dickinson<br />
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Pain is personal -- a deep, dark emptiness -- may be some part of which can be traced in the blank eyes of those who are feeling it. But that is the thing with feelings -- it is hard to express the best and, unfortunately, the worst with words. It's beyond the faculty of language. No wonder observing a few minutes of silence is the best way for nations to express feelings.<br />
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Can one write about the blankness in the eyes of a mother from Swat who has left the dead body of her husband on a bed behind locked doors, and fled the area with her children to survive -- physically, of course. She, carrying the newly acquired title of the widow… Can all the gory metaphors really make one feel what the children, women, and men of Swat are actually going through?<br />
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What words would you choose when you meet an old man, who is bent down with age, carrying his entire refuge in a plastic bag on his shoulder, empty gaze fixed on earth and mouth slightly open with fatigue, with rubber slippers that are stitched together with multicoloured threads, dragging his feet which have become one colour with dust, as if the dust is slowly taking over his body.<br />
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"We were 17 in total when we left Chinärgè," Muhammad Zaman, 73, narrates, "but at Barikot we realised we were walking through a curfew zone. Everyone around us panicked and ran for their lives in the mountains to hide from the army... It was late at night, when I climbed down to Dargai with strangers, and then walked all the way to Mardan in the hope that I might find my sons, Munir and Nazar Hussain, among the crowd. Spent a night there and came back to Jalala. It's been four days and I'm still looking for them."</div>
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A very old man handed over his two granddaughters to some strangers, pleading to take care of the little girls -- for God's sake. If this is not the only case, then the history of the lost children of Balakot might be repeating.</div>
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A family left a boy, who had polio, back in the valley inside their locked home, because they had to cross the mountains on foot. They left some dry bread and water by his side. Now the mother is a living dead, praying for his life but with very little hope.<br />
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These are just a few brief glimpses. There are hundreds of thousands more. One does not even have to use one's imagination to lose it. It takes thousands of years for cultures and cultural landscapes to develop. These IDPs are the victims of pride.<br />
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The damage done to a people and a culture is irrecoverable, but no one seems to be aware of that. The government is asking for more from the donor countries, but the majority of IDPs and their hosts yet have to see the first sign of any government presence. On the other hand, the government is refusing to acknowledge the total failure on its part for not being able to plan things properly. It still has to own this mess along with everything that is going on. Even the All Parties' Conference was just another drawing room meeting, some participants denying the government's announcement of their support for the military operation. It is not surprising that the overwhelmed locals and volunteers in Mardan, Charsadda, and Swabi find it hard to believe that the government was not aware of the scale of the catastrophe. Chomsky has rightly observed, "Hypocrisy is the standard. It's ugly, but it's the standard."<br />
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The media has got something new to sell. The TV channels are feeding their huge 24-7-transmission bellies, and some even have the courage to make skits on the scarcity of naswaar in Mingora. TV talk shows are a good pastime. And an FM radio correspondent, reporting about the plight of pregnant IDP women in Mardan, thinks it would be a good idea to add, "…and since khan saab is seldom satisfied with fewer kids, so we have a lot of such pregnant cases here." After all, it's all about entertaining the audience.<br />
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And the audience, in this theatre, is playing its role. There are stalls on every other crossing, with loud speakers screaming and banners showing in big bold letterings the names of the 'concerned' individuals and organizations.<br />
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If it were not for the people of the immediate districts that absorbed the major load of the IDPs, the world would have witnessed a disaster of much greater proportions than what it is coping with now. The locals are mostly farmers living in farmhouses. They still have not shown any sign of displeasure or fatigue to their guests. But they too fear the time when there will soon be no grain in their stores.<br />
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It is true that some of people supported the Taliban. But regardless of the time and the context, has not movements throughout history gained sympathies of a few common men? Masses are like a herd of sheep, they will cheer and dance if ushered towards a sports festival, and will support any gun that promises a better future (and is frequently pointed at them). May that promise come from a red banner, a green banner, a white one, or the bright blue; along with them -- no God, one God, or more than one gods, there will always be a few to follow them.</div>
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Published in The News on Sunday</div>
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<a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/may2009-weekly/nos-24-05-2009/dia.htm#4">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/may2009-weekly/nos-24-05-2009/dia.htm#4</a></div>
</div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-51933895869625613942009-05-11T08:57:00.000-07:002011-10-13T08:03:09.513-07:00Travel<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: medium; "><b><span><p align="CENTER">Yurkhun valley in Upper Chitral</p></span></b><i><span><p align="CENTER"> </p><p align="CENTER">By Naeem Safi</p></span></i><span><p align="JUSTIFY">Being one of the 9 to 5 slaves, I was thinking of planning for the few days of freedom that I am going to get in the coming summer. After consulting half a dozen backpacker friends and dropping their usual suggestions for the mainstream destinations, a veteran hiker cum tourist guide and young documentary filmmaker suggested a corner deep in the North West that -- contrary to my fantasies -- did not have any nymphs (but yet) sounded full of mysteries and even some myths.</p><p align="left">It is Yurkhun valley in Upper Chitral, and branches out on passes of Qarumber, Chilingi, Darkut and the historic Boruhgul Pass. The altitude of these passes ranges between 4000 meters to 5000 meters, and host more than 30 nameless alpine lakes, including the famous Qarumber and mythical Sirkhun. These pastures are mostly wetlands and are usually accessible by horses or otherwise on foot. There are a few hot sulphur springs for those who love bathing au naturel under the heavens with snow-capped mountains all around. Apart from its boundless inanimate beauty, this region is home to some of the rarest wildlife like golden marmot, ibex, Marco Polo sheep, yak, and the legendary snow leopard.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The valleys do not have any significant human settlements but some scattered mudstone houses that are inhabited by three major ethnic groups i.e. Tajik, Uzbek, and Kyrgyz. The common language among these groups is Wakhi, along with Kyrgyz, Kwar, and Uzbek.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">These scattered inhabitants of the highlands heavily rely on dairy products obtained from the nutritious yak milk; rice, bread and yak meat.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Apart from the constant struggle for survival, which gives them a high level of endurance, they play buzkashi, yak polo, and horse polo for pastime. And if you are a windsurfer, then do not forget to pack your gear, as this is no less than ideal a place for windsurfing.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">After getting an extensive briefing on such a prepossessing region from such a reliable source, one is not left with many options but to start exercising and begin collecting the stuff.</p></span></span></div><div><br /></div><div>=====================================================</div><div>Published in The News on Sunday</div><div><a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/may2009-weekly/nos-10-05-2009/foo.htm#1">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/may2009-weekly/nos-10-05-2009/foo.htm#1</a></div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-57299525241583437222009-04-13T23:50:00.000-07:002011-10-13T08:03:33.428-07:00A Walk<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: small; "><i><p align="CENTER"><br /></p></i></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: small; "><b><span ><p align="CENTER">Idiot's guide to re-colonisation</p></span></b></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: small; "><i><p align="CENTER">Exploring Lahore's walled city, in and around Dilli gate, to experience the extraordinary</p><p align="CENTER">By Naeem Safi</p></i><p align="JUSTIFY">You put on your rugged jeans and the most comfortable walking shoes and check the battery and the card of your camera. Fill your bullet flask with chilled water and glucose; tuck in a pack of disposable ear plugs and half a pack of coin tissues in your shoulder bag, along with a cheap medical mask; all this to get into an urban jungle, and get out in one piece, body and mind. You have decided to explore the walled city of Lahore on foot. You either choose a Sunday to have an uninterrupted look at the urban fabric or some workday to float with the social flood on the streets.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">You choose a gate that was apparently used by the rulers of a great Indian empire for entering into the city. They say Dilli gate is called Dilli gate because it faces Delhi. You cannot really see that unless you have attained an elevation of a few thousand feet. But if you are acrophobic, then all that you can see it facing is the Lunda Bazaar -- a place that offers the best quality canvases, if you are into painting. You will find it in various sizes, textures, and ratios of cotton. Or if you are into some production with a tight budget then may this be the Universal studio's warehouse for you. Just jump in with your costume designer. However, if this is your first time then make sure the designer is not a lady, and if that is not an option then pray she is attractive, and if your zodiac sign has no mercy on you then you can always add an extra hour for haggling. Even if you are not into any theatre or film production, this market is still very useful for what Shakespeare called a stage. But then you will have to act accordingly, even though if you are not in Rome, you can act like Romans while wearing their trash. All you need to do is just look down on those who cannot afford Marks & Spencer; learn some English, never mind the correct pronunciation, and there you go, being accepted and respected like a first class citizen. Enjoy being a gora saab in the third world. This is the Idiot's Guide to re-Colonisation</p><p align="JUSTIFY">You look at the variety of outfits in multitude of forms, materials, colours and fashions and recall images from your school days how your fellows would fool crowds and sponsors by getting their entire ranges from here, dismantling them and then re-stitching them into some Frankenstein fashion. The trick is to cover the jumble of dresses and models of all heights, shapes, and proportions with appropriate lighting, loud music, and fog machines.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Here you can get fresh canvas bags, designed and made to your taste, for very nominal price and once you have what you want, you can gesture to all the Gucci's, and the sort, a V, an L, fare le corna, or any finger of your choice, depending on your level of achievement and contempt.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">There is an antique coin seller sitting on the ground in front of a heap of coins of modern times too, but mostly they are the heavy bronze ones found in the foundations of centuries old buildings of the walled city, which are demolished to make room for the ever-growing demand of high-rise commercial buildings. The vegetable bazaar near the Dilli gate has farm-fresh vegetables and fruits, where the ones with foreign names are not as expensive as in the posh areas of the city. There are fish, mutton and poultry. The smell and sight of the meat business are not very welcoming. The bazaar is connected with a street that has a treasure trove of pottery and some other beautiful handmade collectables.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">You feel hungry after a while and you can choose from a variety of chickpeas, ranging from spices of Mexican proportions in pools of crimson red oil, to the ones moderately spiced. There are some barbecue stalls offering chicken spare-parts and a couple of Afghani food joints in Lunda Bazaar crossing that branches out to the scrap metal market. You can try any of these only if you have a military grade stomach and immune system or if you don't mind finishing 'War and Peace' in a single sitting while getting rid of the load.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">A local soul guides you and you find a four decade old mutton channey wala in a street just before the Dilli gate next to the pottery and meat street. The small shop has a few tables with wooden benches and a line of frames with images of gates of the walled city of Lahore. The food is not bad; the ambiance -- well, one does not have much of a choice. This is not the sort of food that one can enjoy while on iPod.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">You finish your food and come out of the street and there you are, right in front of the Dilli gate. You need some pro-level footwork to avoid being hit by the flux of traffic and the manure on the tarmac that is emitted by the oldest form of transport still used heavily in the maze of the streets -- bulls, horses, and donkeys that pull various sorts of cargos, stuck in the urban jungle with their masters. Their emissions can be hazardous to us, another animal species, but are not a threat to the planet, rather are an essential part of the eco-system, unlike the human genius. Relatively no noise pollution either, except for the rhythmic stamping of the horseshoes. On these streets the number of carts pulled by animals is almost equal to those pushed by humans.</p></span></div><div><br /></div><div>======================================================</div><div>Published in The News on Sunday</div><div><a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/apr2009-weekly/nos-12-04-2009/foo.htm#1">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/apr2009-weekly/nos-12-04-2009/foo.htm#1</a></div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-5356231250711151252009-03-02T21:43:00.000-08:002011-10-13T23:54:03.313-07:00Journey: Beyond Jbad and Macondo<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Beyond Jbad and Macondo<br />
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By Naeem Safi<br />
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With the mention of Afghanistan the first images that come to mind are war, terrorism, and savage people. However, the truth is that Afghanistan can be as beautiful as the rest of the world and its people as human as we think we are as William E. Gladstone had put it his speech once:<br />
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"Remember the rights of the savage, as we call him. Remember that the happiness of his humble home, remember that the sanctity of life in the hill villages of Afghanistan, among the winter snows, is as inviolable in the eye of Almighty God, as can be your own."<br />
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The first pleasant surprise is the beautiful road between Torkham and Jalalabd. It is a gift from Pakistan to their Afghan brethren. The road winds through beautiful landscapes, olive groves and streams. The sheep, in distance, with their gray wool seem like cotton flowers against the dark metallic terrain. The adobe villages with children running and laughing on cowpaths among green fields are serene images of hope.<br />
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The images of decades of war can still be seen on the bullet torn ruins still left at a few places, the occasional Humvees patrolling the roads for security, and Black Hawks in the skies. But all that aside, the streets and bazaars of Jalalabd are bustling. The boys in Jalalabad call it Jbad, no pun, just affection.<br />
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As we are accustomed to the Afghan dress and to their lifestyle somewhat, for us the cultural shock arrived in edible form -- in the bowl of fruit shake, which was supposed to be eaten with spoon, as it was too thick and was beyond the capacity of any straw. The Afghani cheese is saltier than Feta, and is not aged that much. It comes in flying saucer shape, instead of square cake, as it is traditionally matured in baskets. It is savoured with honey and those big Afghan naans for breakfast, and of course the green tea.<br />
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The youth in Jalalabad is much interested in acquiring various sorts of education offered to them by public and private sector institutes -- from sciences to information technology and humanities. But the most common craze is for learning English language. It not only makes them good candidates for employment, it opens their boundaries of communication.<br />
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On the invitation of the driver working for an NGO, we went to his village in Hisarak, southeast of Kabul, but in Nangarhar province. The four hours drive on the dirt road was an adventure in its own right, testing the limits of the SUV and its tires. The region is mostly barren with vast plains and snow-capped mountains on the horizon. There are very few small villages on that route, with some of the houses built like mud-castles. The vernacular architecture in that setting paint unforgettable images on one's mind.<br />
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Finally after covering long stretches of the dirt road and climbing many mountains, we descended into a small valley, preserved like an oasis in those vast stretches of the uninhabited lands. The climate was much cooler and the ambience filled the senses with limitless tranquillity. It was a permutation of spring and summertime, and really hard to believe, like love at first sight. There is a freshwater stream coming from the leftover snow of the last winter. On either side of the stream there are terraces of different crops, dotted with fruit trees and some stone-wood houses. The total population is barely over a hundred.<br />
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After stretching our legs at the humble terrace in front of the guestroom -- which is a few minutes climb from the stream -- and having sweet milk-chai (that was especially prepared for us, as it's not very common among Afghans) we decided to stroll down to the stream. It is like some dream world, where most of the wild growth and herbs are edible, and each one has a distinct pleasant aroma. The first reference that came to mind was Marquez's Macondo, as "The world was so recent that many things lacked names [for us at least], and in order to indicate them it was necessary to point." Our guide was pointing at each species, uttering its local name, and then persuading us to try them, while describing their qualities.<br />
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Our excitement hit the peaks when the hosts stopped under a mulberry tree, one climbed up, and two held a chadder below. In a few seconds the chadder was filled with juicy berries, which were very different in their colour and taste from its variant found in the plains of Pakistan. We thought it was party time, but the hosts had another plan. A small dam was built in the ice-cold stream and the berries were poured into it. It is really hard to describe that experience in words.<br />
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Since we were covered with enough dust from the travel, we inquired about the possibility of taking shower. Then realised it was not decent to ask for shower, instead we should have asked for bathing. But I guess the host did not understand the difference anyway and asked us to follow him while instructing a young fellow to grab towels for us. We walked along the stream downwards and then took a track along a water channel, exchanging greetings with the local farmers busy tilling their vegetables. We reached a point where the channel was going through a hollowed-out tree trunk over a small ravine. The host stopped and we all gave each other those inquisitive looks. Then he walked into the log and removed a stopper and the water started splashing on the stones ten feet below. Lo and behold, finally we had arrived at the world's most beautiful shower! Just imagine visuals like some Amazon tribe dancing and singing in the rain.<br />
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After a good night's sleep, we were ready to climb to the Chilgoza Pine jungle the next morning. Though it was not the nut-harvesting season, the view of the trees and the valleys beyond them was breathtaking. Sitting on the mountain top, the elder brother of our driver was telling us stories of his jihad times and that how the Soviets had come from the land and the sky to their village eliminating everyone that was present including the animals. The wind blowing through the pine needles was producing the background music to his memories, as if giving voice to all those who had passed away without knowing their crimes.<br />
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Published in The News on Sunday<br />
http://jang.com.pk/thenews/mar2009-weekly/nos-01-03-2009/foo.htm#1</div>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0Khogyani, Afghanistan34.261756524459805 70.175170898437534.052195024459806 69.8593138984375 34.471318024459805 70.4910278984375tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-16549128162276802082009-02-15T00:18:00.000-08:002011-10-13T08:40:52.427-07:00The Expression of Love in PakistanIn all these battles of the East and the West, orthodoxy and liberalism, where do we stand? What is our own expression, if not silence?<br /><br />It is not really about claims; it's about performance. Talking about now, not our grand past, where do we stand in the contemporary societies and cultures when it comes to expressing our love.<br /><br />The notion that this culture does not have the capacity to enjoy and celebrate sensual experiences altogether is the anomaly bought by the urban youth who are overexposed to the West. The welcoming of spring as Basant or romanticizing the monsoon rains in songs are examples of celebrating, without philosophy or creed, our presence on this planet and cherishing just whatever good is around -- the simple joy of being human. The expression can be different and less liberal, but the capacity was always there.<br /><br />We are not a species that can claim to have a monopoly over love. A male fish trying to win the heart of his beloved in the deep waters, pairs of birds cuddling on the trees or in some lake, butterflies fluttering over the flowers are the images that tell the story of their survival. One major attribute that distinguishes us Homo sapiens from the rest, apart from intimacy, is that we can express our feelings through words.<br /><br />We, the people from the East, are very romantic, but it seems that either we have some ideal image of the beloved -- are shocked and disappointed once successful -- or we just love the idea of being in love.<br /><br />This question needs further exploration as the Eastern poetry and music are great when it comes to suffering and yearning for love, the period known as firaaq -- absence or separation. But where do all the songs and poetry disappear when love is consummated, known as visaal (union). Our poetry is mostly object- or, shall we say, beloved-centered, which is the core theme of love poetry almost everywhere. But then comes enjoying the post-visaal life which pertains to things other than the beloved herself.<br /><br />Another interesting fact in our poetic or lyrical culture is that the gender of beloved is usually feminine, with the exception of a few contemporary poetesses. Even if the adjectives are not feminine, the point of view is mostly masculine -- something that is in contrast with the contemporary Western tradition of song and poetry. The clichéd image of the female trapped in a tower or by an evil person, and the male fighting the world to rescue her are somehow still followed. The heroes' struggles have created great epics, but what is the story inside the tower?<br /><br />Freedom of expression and different sets of values have encouraged diversity and liberty in the Western cultures and have brought the point of view of the female singers into the mainstream. It is important to understand this difference as it does affect the overall mood of the lyrical tradition.<br /><br />The majority of the movies produced in the Indian subcontinent follow a pattern in which the protagonist is a hero only when he is single and has to overcome many obstacles to get to his beloved, and once that is achieved, it serves to be the ne plus ultra of heroism for our hero, end of story, no more dancing or singing -- an interminable kitsch syndrome of epic proportions.<br /><br />Since the only legitimate relationship between a male and a female, in this society, is that of man and wife, and the majority are arranged, there is not much left to be merry about -- as the whole relationship is conceived by external factors and not from a spark within. An arranged marriage is like choosing a closed box from a number of designs on a shelf, with nothing much but date of manufacture on each, all of which have something edible, and then either praying to be lucky or trying to develop a taste later, commonly known as compromise.<br /><br />The metaphor of food should not be considered sexist, as it is even worse in the case of females: their boxes choose them. The absurdity of the analogy is nothing compared to the practice itself. No wonder all the singing and dancing ends there. Or is it because of the fact that sharing the post-visaal experience is too indecent for our culture, where even 'legitimate' spouses are not allowed to suggest their intimacy let alone show much affection in the presence of others. It seems that the culmination of love is also a culmination of the songs, or we yet have to develop a taste for cherishing daily experiences like having a cup of coffee, a walk, some quality time, a touch--and write songs about them. So far we see this in the cooking oil and tea ads.<br /><br />Ballet, salsa, tango, waltz etc -- dance forms that are the poetry of human body, originated in cultures that allow the male and female bodies to be intimate in public. How many dance forms do we have in our culture that allow us to express our feelings for our loved ones? The fact that such a dance would fall in the post-visaal experience: once in touch with our love, silently we stand. In our culture the idea of post-visaal pleasures seems to be absent altogether from any form of social expression, but children.<br /><br />Kuch ishq kiya kuch kaam kiya by a celebrated poet is a testimony to how this culture considers love to be something useless. In the Sufi tradition Ishq with a human is reduced to just a majazi (simulated) one. This is a major shift from the rest of the species, as all the worldly pleasures are considered futile, even if legitimate. The result is painted on the walls all over our beloved country, sending the poor love moths on guilt trips for the 'wrong-doings' of the teenage (usually the result of un-consummated love). This is an amazing mastery of a culture over the hypocrisy that allows the claims of cures to be painted on the walls, but is not ready to acknowledge the restrictions as a cause, or the very disease itself.<br /><br />Though it is not a question of integrity to borrow the visual icons like the heart-shape from the West, as they had borrowed it from the ancient Egyptians who might have gotten it from somewhere else, it is still important for us to know how our ancestors expressed their love. We, who are dependent on the West to express our love, and follow the Middle Eastern traditions to show our resistance and hatred, need to ask ourselves what our culture is contributing to this global village. In all these battles of the East and the West, orthodoxy and liberalism, where do we stand? What is our own expression, if not silence?<br /><br />=====================================================<br />Published in The News on Sunday<br />http://jang.com.pk/thenews/feb2009-weekly/nos-15-02-2009/spr.htmNaeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-84104894429619528522009-01-01T18:24:00.000-08:002011-10-13T07:59:12.118-07:00Review: NCA Degree Show 2009<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); "><span class="Apple-style-span"><b><span><p align="CENTER">Of Utopias and Dystopias</p></span></b><i><p align="CENTER">The degree show of the NCA is undoubtedly one of the biggest annual events of this region, showing some of the best works produced by students coming from myriad backgrounds -- tangible and intangible</p><p align="CENTER">By Naeem Safi.</p></i><p align="JUSTIFY">Like the year before, the 2008 Degree Show was held at the main campus of the college and at the relatively new venue, the Old Tollington Market, which originally was the Punjab Exhibition Hall and has been restored to the Heritage Museum a few years back.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">In most of Pakistan, a beautiful weather does not necessarily bring smiles on the faces of those who love to walk. The Mall was filled with knee-deep water and the visitors had no choice but to either use their vehicles or wait on either of the venues. It was made worse by the constant power failure, when the spectators could neither go out nor watch the display.The museum space was dedicated to the disciplines of communication design and textile design. A common theme among the communication design works was that very few were up for selling any product, and even those who were, had picked the products with some sense of belonging to the land. One thesis, I'm Not for Sale!, went as far as completely rejecting advertisement and branding, which is a full U-turn for a use of the discipline that was envisioned by Freud's nephew Edward Barnes at the first half of the twentieth century to create artificial need for products that people do not need. Similarly, most of the works were dominated by challenging issues like national identity, environment, rights, and responsibilities. The final output clearly showed a lot of gray matter being utilised behind the fabulous works produced by the young designers and the much improved teaching standard.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The textile section showed some pretty pieces and work but was not offering much that one could muse one's mind with. The attempts of stretching textile design over the domains of something that borders abstract expressionism and pop art, or the literal interpretation of the psychedelic is not likely to help this pragmatic discipline, even on the pretexts like search of the original thought.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Ceramics of Halyma Athar were meant to be seen in motion in a claymation. The fusion of genres in this particular instance was among the best in this degree show. Her eye for details and the colours achieved through glazing creates a beautiful dream landscape. Fahad Alam's fusion is not of the genres but of different glazing -- like raku, resist firing, and different smoke techniques -- with that of calligraphy from the architecture of Aybak's times. The pottery and murals produced in the process are stunning.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The works shown by the students of the department of fine arts (according to their catalogue, 'the art making' department) was as varied as ever, offering some really insightful works along with the usual. As the global village is dominated by fear and misery, the work of the students responded accordingly by depicting wars and suffering. Where their fellow students from architecture department were trying to design structures for utopia, they were showing the disturbing yet true face of the dystopia they are forced to dwell in.Starting from miniature, where needle and scissor was present as always and the scale of the wasli ever expanding, the selection of themes and mediums show a much liberated class of future miniature painters clearly showing some major transformations in the primal practice. Replacing dots with more than ten thousand miniature terracotta bricks, Noor Ali Chagani moves the miniature of Pakistan into a domain yet to be explored and much contested by the traditionalists. Sajjad Hussain's theme of living in war times is a vivid translation of our times. In one instance, where he is showing a soldier in camouflage enjoying his slumber with his boots on a 'flipped' version of Hafiz's poetry, and a Persian gilim -- small rug used by Persian soldiers in the field -- beside him. The flipped verse under the boots is a very powerful metaphor used by Hussain. All boots are made for walking, but some boots are made for walking over everything. The presence of a machine-gun along with a surahi and wine-cups in the same setting shows the intoxicating quality of unprecedented power enjoyed by the war machines in some of the left-over states of the post-colonial times.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Abdul Ghaffar Afridi's sculptures are the most distressing visual experience, where he had put his installations in a closed space where the very light was black. Coming from an area that is now ruled by terror, his choice was obvious to show the Dark Ages his people are going through now: the power of media in forming the popular views over the untold facts, the people's reliance on the news chosen for them by the media, and the sorry state of affairs that is created by this dependence. One can better understand the feelings of the artists coming from the marginalized lands by Nuruddin Farah's (a Somali novelist) remark that, "To starve is to be of media interest these days." Like Ibrahim Ahmed's attempt to protect the innocence against the brutality that is inflicted on the children of his region. Covering books and writing boards with steel and dolls with body armour are very strong and disturbing images. The conviction with what these sculptures are produced is as unsettling, as the artist says to have enjoyed the pain that he had to face through the cuts and bleeding while handling the material with bare hands. Though the overall theme of the show was very gloomy, these instances show the seriousness of the situation around us.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Imran Mudassar showed the body armour in his drawings, Figurative, from a different perspective. His personal experiences, like his campus being barbed-wired to protect the students from the unseen threat, made him question the very tools that are used for protection. The irony of weapons is that their producers claim to protect some but in fact are used for destroying the others. The sarcastic title, Life Drawing, is of a drawing of human figure on the digital print of a wall in Kabul that is splattered with bullet holes. The most appalling of his works is the video installation, Dinner for Two, in which a video is playing under a transparent container showing the common people from top. The container is 'surrounded' by cutlery with weapons and barbed-wires printed on them. The use of common people as a 'main course' consumed by wars and conflicts is the most appropriate metaphor for these times, yet serving as a fuel for the war lords and the media, hence given the romantic title.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">The subject of the academic result, unlike other art exhibitions, is common with every degree show when one interacts with these fresh graduates. The factors influencing and shaping ideas of the young artists at art institutes are somewhat different than the rest of the practicing artists: mainly the need to justify their work to a select audience, the peer pressure, the need to get approval from their teachers and the like. While not undermining the importance of the process that harbours learning and better understanding of the arts, a linear application of it sometimes has adverse effects on the creative individuality. This creative milling produces the individuals who will form the future expression of this region on varied mediums. Gloominess aside, the hope in their eyes and their smiles aspire nothing less than a better future.</p><p align="JUSTIFY">============================================================</p><p align="JUSTIFY">Published in The News on Sunday</p><p align="JUSTIFY"><a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/jan2009-weekly/nos-25-01-2009/enc.htm#2">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/jan2009-weekly/nos-25-01-2009/enc.htm#2</a></p></span></span>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-90399945653006489472008-05-25T06:15:00.000-07:002011-10-13T08:05:55.386-07:00Book Review: Coming Back Home<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); "><p align="JUSTIFY"><span class="Apple-style-span" >Expecting from this review to cover each area of this compilation might not be fair. This is just a foretaste of what this book has to offer. Coming Back Home is yet another credible compilation on Faiz by the renowned literary scholar Sheema Majeed, whose name is not new to the Faiz reader. The book is divided into four parts, each giving a distinct perspective into his life and his world. There could not be a better timing for its arrival because it reminds how Pakistan started and what the aspirations behind this state were.</span></p><p align="JUSTIFY"><span class="Apple-style-span" >The first part follows a very elaborate introduction by Khalid Hassan and is a careful selection of Faiz's editorials and articles for The Pakistan Times, covering almost every aspect -- political, social, cultural, or intellectual -- of Pakistani society of the era. The articles give a rare insight into the formative years of Pakistan and one can clearly see the origins of the present national imbroglio. Part two of the book covers some of his very moving interviews, where he gives a very intimate view on Ghalib and the state of affairs that lead to the poetic style of that period. It is a rare find for Faiz lovers, bringing to light some amazing observations about the great poet. In an interview titled 'There's No Concorde To Heaven,' he expresses his faith in the wretched of the earth thus: "do not lose faith in the ordinary people. They are capable of great deeds. They shall overcome." One should not assume that these words were uttered out of sheer passion, rather he had his reason despite acknowledging the fact later in the same interview that, "the dream of Pakistan was in shambles. The pieces could not be put together. The country had been mortgaged to the neo-imperialist power bloc." The interview section ends with his talk to Amrita Pritam Kaur, him saying in a certain context, "There is intense pain in love, but friendship is peace." The third part following the interviews has two essays by Khalid Hassan and I.A.Rehman, with a very intimate look into Faiz and his life. Both of the essays offer something that is for sure the not-to-be-missed part of the compilation. The book ends with homage to Alys Faiz, an all-embracing interview by Cassandra Balchin. Who else could have known Faiz better than Alys? This is such a beautiful conclusion of the book.</span></p><p align="JUSTIFY"><span class="Apple-style-span" >Overall, this compilation is a very valuable record of the times gone by, showing some clear images among the blurred ones and bringing some disturbing silhouettes to light. It takes us on a journey to the times of the young Faiz, the dreamer, who was living with all his passion and intellect, which was not reserved just for his people, but rather had a universal appeal. He is sentimental, emotional, reasoning, complaining, persuading, encouraging, and above all, persistently reminding his people never to lose hope and always strive to make this world more liveable.</span></p><p align="JUSTIFY"><span class="Apple-style-span" >Faiz is no more among us but we can still hear the echoes of his very bitter but astute reading of our political crises: "the machinery of the law had to be prostituted for personal whim." He uttered these words, when the country was barely eight months old, with "chilling accuracy", as Khalid Hassan has written in his introduction. Have things improved since then? If not, is this not the right time for us to tell this to the political puppets and their directors to stop "prostituting" all of the institutions of this state-in-shambles? According to Faiz, "the law has no potency unless it is backed by the government and government has no validity if it is not backed by the law. If these two institutions begin circumventing each other by tricks and stratagems the people will soon give up recognizing both. If a government starts behaving towards the law in the same fashion as a tax-dodger or a black market operator, all the lawbreakers will soon become the law-givers of the community." Faiz warned us against what is happening in the streets, on the TV and in the assemblies even now.</span></p><p align="JUSTIFY"><span class="Apple-style-span" >Faiz not only romanticized politics, like Neruda and others, he brought reason to poetry and arts too--persuading writers, artists, poets, and the common man alike, for a better tomorrow. Our land has somehow ceased to produce such visionaries and intellectuals. After reading him, one feels that many contemporary writers have become numb and apolitical. The columnists today are mostly entertainers and pseudo intellectuals, each with his/her own style of repeating the same information, that people usually are familiar with; and they fail to give a break to the people, unlike Faiz, and make it clear to the people that they should never buy tickets to the political theatre. This compilation opens a door to the place in our past where we can find some remedy for the current calamity caused by the imposed political and cultural circus; a place where someone was dreaming and hoping for the 'cultural renaissance'. A visionary who had "slept on an empty stomach--many a time", but his pride will not let him go to even his friends, let alone the powerful 'others.' Something we have forgotten as a nation, to have a sense of pride and honor, possible even with an empty stomach.</span></p><p align="JUSTIFY"><span class="Apple-style-span" >At the very least, we should try to understand his pain and love for this country and its people and peacefully get rid of these "petty tyrants." Has not the time come yet to reclaim our "privilege of free citizenship in a proud and freedom loving land."? This book should not gather dust on the shelves, or become a source for after-dinner discussions among the armchair revolutionaries. This book is a valuable source of inspiration to understand the political message of Faiz and also to know ourselves and realize our collective potential.</span></p><p align="JUSTIFY"><span class="Apple-style-span" >Let us conclude this with a quote from the introduction of this book:</span></p><p align="JUSTIFY"><span class="Apple-style-span" >"Nijat-e-deed o dil ki gharri nahin aayi/ Challe challo ke who manzil abhi nahin aayi"</span></p><p align="JUSTIFY"><span class="Apple-style-span" >Unfortunately true for today.</span></p><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; font-family: Verdana; ">=============================================================</p><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; font-family: Verdana; ">Published in The News on Sunday.</p><p align="JUSTIFY" style="font-size: small; font-family: Verdana; "><a href="http://jang.com.pk/thenews/may2008-weekly/nos-25-05-2008/lit.htm#2">http://jang.com.pk/thenews/may2008-weekly/nos-25-05-2008/lit.htm#2</a></p></span>Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7635141004964435097.post-73557764544461967542007-05-12T01:11:00.000-07:002007-05-12T01:18:51.323-07:00The Countdown to 50%10936th day...Naeem Safihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05312773538386792954noreply@blogger.com0