I have always argued with my parents to show me the nice side of Pakistan. Every visit, plans are made, yet finally, they’re broken. Disappointed and disheartened, I would find Pakistan hopeless. The hopeless land of a fifty-year old with an abuser for a husband who sells glass bangles to spoiled five-year olds; the hopeless land of a man with no legs and only one arm waddling on the street to beg for a coin, a rupee, a chance; the hopeless land of no electricity for five hours and heat of over 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Hopeless.
My grandmother smiles widely, her eyes twinkling as she wraps her arms around us, a single long scarf wrapped around her hair. My grandfather smiles the widest I’ll see him smile during this visit, and finally my mom is able to feel the embrace of her parents. My dad watches with happiness, and maybe a hint of sad reality, as he imagines his parents, gone too far, and too many of his siblings who have also passed as my mother’s siblings bustle to see the foreigners.
It’s strange because in this moment, I don’t feel any different. It’s only till we start laughing, talking, exchanging knowing glances, and expressive gestures that one of my uncles will point out my and my sibling’s accents, making fun of what we say and namely, how we say it. We shrug it off with laughs and jokes, but the first petal falls from the flower that is our ancestry, our heritage, our characteristic that makes us who we are.
I spend time with my grandmother, who at seventy years old, takes care of the entire household: finances, cooking, and managing everyone. Her perseverance and stories of her brave young self make me stare in awe at her and the beautiful, strong person she is. Endurance is a heroine quality and my grandmother makes sure we know it. But I can’t help but be helpless when I see her in the middle of the theater of Pakistani home politics. I feel hopeless. And dejected. And bewilderment at how the world works.
We finally make it to the awaited bazaars, and of course I’m excited: shops upon shops of culture, culture that is mine. But it’s ruined. The drive to the shops is dangerously bumpy, with unfinished dirt roads as our red carpet and beyond bustling traffic in the peaks of rush hour. The shops are lined with pollution as couples and children throw chip bags and empty cans of Cola over their shoulders. They fall into the growing pile of filth, flies accumulate, and stray famished dogs and cows try to scour something out of the rubbish. We finally make it into an antiques shop, and the array is beautiful. A variety of different trinkets, from tasbeehs to blue and clay pottery to wood figures to jewelry, all so vibrant and beckoning. The shop is a like a rose in the desert.
Our first road trip every time we went to Pakistan consisted of a two-hour drive to my father’s hometown: Sialkot. The long drives are something that I ignorantly treasured because of the nature and scenes we would see. On the surface, the scenes that were shown to me were picturesque: rice fields with laborers carrying pots on their heads reminiscent of The Jungle Book. There were mountains, flower fields, and oh such beautiful moments of staring out the car window watching the world go by. “Raw moments,” I would say. But who am I that I can smile at the workers maintaining the rice fields, working on a slave contract. Who am I that I can admire the “raw” beauty of something that costs another so much pain? This superficial beauty would be one of the highlights of the trip
This time, my dad takes a different route. We still see some raw beauty but these directions include more developed areas. And with more developed areas comes urban poverty. Children begging on the streets is the norm. While at a rest stop, we saw a small boy selling some sweets. Skin dark from the summer sun, hair orange from henna, and hazel eyes wary and worn, he couldn’t be more than seven years of age. My mom called him over and asked him how much one pack of sweets was, and he said 100 rupees, or roughly a dollar, and my mom gave him much more than that. His eyes widened for a millisecond and then he was back to his wary self. He forced my mother to take exactly how much she paid him, and my mother in turn dolefully took them. I wondered about why the boy was adamant on giving us how much we paid for, because here, beggars will curse you when you give them less than they expect, yet this boy was given more than he expected, and he chose to be fair. I thought maybe he comes from an abusive household where he has to sell a certain amounts of sweets. I thought maybe he was a part of a bigger gang of street people and he wouldn’t even be able to keep the money at the end of the day. And then, I realized, this boy was adamant and fair and he gave me the hope for this country and for this world. i think about his ragged and stained shirt, imagining a mud-brick house where he spends hot summer nights sweating and worrying about how much he’ll make tomorrow. He’s seven. My seven-year old sister’s biggest worry is what show she should watch on TV. This boy’s worry was how perilous the journey to make money was to bring food on the table. That boy embodies the hope and the hopelessness I feel in regards to this country.
Pakistan has ripped the bouquet of roses out of my hands and tossed it on the floor, stomped on it, spit on it, and then planted the remnants, watered them, and watched wistfully as they started to grow. My initial hopelessness has turned into hope.
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I totally get it. I haven’t been back there in about a decade and not sure if I ever do want to go back again. It consists of some of the best and worst people and objects.
What a vivid journey you take the reader on during your family trips to Pakistan, I truly enjoyed your piece. You paint this really intricate portrait of your personal experience witnessing the surrounding upheaval, correlate it to current political/social conditions, then conclude the story with an inspiring and moving anecdote that could serve as the beacon of hope in this very conflicted country. Your voice is clear and it’s confident; you seem to know the ropes in the country and having that ‘local’ vibe although you perhaps have dual citizenship/residency is an interesting perspective.
Here are some notes:
1. I liked this because you have that ‘familial outsider’ component which many can relate to/find interesting:
=== It’s only till we start laughing, talking, exchanging knowing glances, and expressive gestures that one of my uncles will point out my and my sibling’s accents,
It’s also create a vulnerability / likability of the character.
2. This is a powerful sentence! Excellent
We shrug it off with laughs and jokes, but the first petal falls from the flower that is our ancestry, our heritage, our characteristic that makes us who we are.
3. AP Style : any number 10 and above can be written numerically. It’s easier on the eyes and more effective than writing out seventy.
=== I spend time with my grandmother, who at [70] years old,
4. I was thrown a little by the ‘red carpet’ part since in western countries there aren’t necessarily red carpets rolled out to get to department stores and such. I feel like it’s a false equivalent and it would make more sense just saying [ freshly lined pavement ] or something to that effect.
=== The drive to the shops is dangerously bumpy, with unfinished dirt roads as our red carpet
5. I would change the order to read:
[ famished stray dogs ] and cows….
because typically no cow in any underdeveloped country is a stray…that’s $$
6. Here was an opportunity to give us the first description of a shop at the bazaar and it was ‘beautiful’ but it has to be more than that because the word bazaar lends itself to something extravagant.
We finally make it into an antiques shop, and the array is [ immaculate ] .
or lux, bountiful, etc
7. I found this sentence to be confusing:
Our first road trip every time we went to Pakistan consisted of a two-hour drive to my father’s hometown: Sialkot.
Maybe:
We kick off each trip to Pakistan with a two-hour drive to my father’s hometown: Sialkot.
8. At first I didn’t get how it was ‘ignorant’ of you to treasure the scenes but the paragraph really came together well, nice perspective!
=== The long drives are something that I ignorantly treasured because of the nature and scenes we would see.
9. Fantastic!
And then, I realized, this boy was adamant and fair and he gave me the hope for this country and for this world.
10. This is such an important closing sentence but I think it could be reworded:
This boy’s worry was how perilous the journey to make money was to bring food on the table.
Overall, exceptional piece, I look forward to reading more!
Nice !!