Teaching your child how to drive? Bad idea!
A few years ago, I crashed our car onto a footpath as I was learning how to drive by the beautiful, empty stretch along the sea. My father was in the passenger seat and I maintain, to this day, that he should be held more responsible than me. Is this tossing of blame typical, youthful insolence on my part? Perhaps, to an extent, but hear me out. Parents can certainly do a lot of things, wear many hats, but there are some tasks you just need to call in the professionals for. In my case, it was learning how to drive. Yes, I ...
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I am a victim of the infamous Black Prado: Here is my story
They followed me. They stopped my car. Is this the Prado incident everyone is talking about? It was past midnight on a cold November night in 2012. I was returning home when my car crossed main Ittehad and went straight into Phase VIII, some 20 meters away from the first newly placed barrier. It was then that a policeman stopped our car, flashing his torch incessantly at the driver’s window. Being a woman, I did not expect to be stopped and I thought the minute the cop realised that I was in the car, he would gesture for us to go ahead. Strangely, this did not ...
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Stolen: A cop ‘car’naama
This year Iqbal Day fell on a Friday and the entire country had a day off, excluding the ever-privileged car thieves in Karachi. I went to offer Jumma prayers with my father in my old, beloved car. When I left the mosque feeling elated after the long, long prayers, little did I know what was in store for me. When I didn’t see the car where I had parked it, it occurred to me that something had probably gone very – very wrong. My car was gone! Could someone have stolen it? Who would steal a car as old as mine? Gosh! I hope ...
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Agha Waqar and his ‘science-less’ kit
In a telephonic interview with Agha Waqar Ahmed on July 29, 2012, for Sindh Express, most of my questions to him were about the physics, thermodynamics and chemistry behind his water kit. However, some questions regarding thermodynamics were not addressed as they should have been and I felt as though Waqar knew more about the ‘engineering’ behind his kit but not the ‘physics’ that went into it. Though it is not mandatory for an inventor to be a PhD, this age of fraudulent and quack inventions calls for every aspect of an invention to be examined thoroughly. Allow me to refresh ...
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The truth about Agha Waqar’s water car kit
Our social media and our mainstream media are known for publishing news irresponsibly and without verification. I was compelled to write this blog which is aimed at highlighting another instance of unverified reporting by the media. Some days ago, my friends told me about a certain episode of Hamid Mir’s programme “Capital Talk” on Geo TV. This episode was about a man called Agha Waqar – a proud Pakistani who claimed to have invented something called a ‘water car kit’. Obviously, the first thing that I said upon seeing this was “Bravo!”, as ...
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Learning how to drive
“Speed bump ahead,” the driving instructor says. I should probably do something I thought. I wait a bit. “Speed bump ahead,” he repeats, this time a bit more urgent. I can actually see the speed bump now. On the Sea View road, out my right window I can see the beach. It’s 11 in the morning and families are already out, lazily enjoying Cornettos (ice cream) and camel rides… Bahir nahin, saamnay dekhay! (Don’t look outside, look ahead!) Speed bump! Clutch! Brake! It’s a tiny speed bump, so I don’t experience the car-flinging-in-air kind of thing I think I’m going to have when the ...
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Hail Farkhand Iqbal, the King of Islamabad
Expect a court battle soon over whose daddy owns this city. Earlier this week, CDA chief Farkhand Iqbal’s son, no doubt proud of his dad’s great list of accomplishments including stealing and unsealing the Bhoja Air black box and making ludicrous comments about other agencies to deflect blame for his own failures, decided to establish his father’s stranglehold on the city for all to see. After a mother and son made the mistake of driving their car into the path of his daddy’s car on his daddy’s road near Kohsar Market, causing an accident that was in no way the younger ...
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Professional beggars: More greedy than needy
Allah keh naam par 10 rupay dey dey beta. (Please give me Rs10 in God’s name, son.) Roti khila dey, tujhey ek naik aur khubsurat biwi miley. (Give me bread to eat and you will find a beautiful, decent wife) How many times have we heard this and cringed from deep within? Such phrases are played like rhythmic rhetoric every time you park your car on a signal. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a feudal lord’s son who will throw acid on his wife, neither do I commute in a chauffeur driven, air-conditioned SUV. I’m a common Pakistani who walks the same streets like millions other ...
Read Full PostShia killing: If we tolerate this, our children will be next
Last week, I heard the news of the targeted sectarian killing of Jaffer Mohsin. The name didn’t ring a bell at the time, but later that day, when a friend told me that a fellow schoolmate’s father had been shot dead, it jogged my memory. I then realised that doctor Jaffer Mohsin was our friend’s father. That’s when the memories came flooding back. Back when I used to live near my school building, Dr Mohsin’s family lived in the lane next to mine. Like regular Pakistani youths who bond over a common love for cricket, his sons and I played the ...
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(Almost) swindled at the toll-booth
Most of us living in Lahore or Islamabad have travelled via the motorway M2 at least once. Starting at the Islamabad toll-plaza and going all the way to the Thokar Niaz Baig toll Plaza Lahore, the only stops you get to make are at gas stations-turned-restrooms-cum-dine ins. They charge twice as much for a packet of Lays or a bottle of water as the retail price. And even if you choose not to make a stop during this three to four hour spine-snapping journey, do not fool yourself into believing that you saved yourself from these rip offs. Read ...
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