Shopping with Perveen

Chris, let me add my own words of welcome to you. We need more gora Amrikkans (if not, then gora Europeans will work, too!) to provide more diversity – to change this place. An all desis environment is hopeless – for all desis are hopeless – as you are well aware (you married one – you are probably even more hopeless (Psst: I married one, too!))!

I am brown man in Amrikka! White people – no like brown color - brown very bad!

About the piece, who cares – this site will publish anything – even my pieces (before I was black-listed (I think))! All liars and thieves! These bloodies do not understand… make problem for me… Humph!

This site…chowk staff…cheap man! I work – janitor. These here rich men…no work! I poor man… all chowk writers …poor man…except some chowk writers… they poor woman…!

Never mind!

If I were critical of your piece, I would of course have told you to put a Cork into it! :)

Also, there is some wisdom of the ages from that specimen of the land of the ancients – that you portray in this piece.

You know, ten bucks here, ten bucks there… soon it adds up to some REAL money.

In an art gallery, near where i live, there is a painting hanging on the wall. It was just a plain canvass with a ``+`` sign on it done using a staedtler lumocolor pen. Along side was a description of the painitng with some people singing great peans ... and hell it was expensive.
For the life of me I could not fathom what it was all about? I mean you can take a 2X3 or a 2X2 canvass and do the same. ANd I go through some dozens of them pens every six months and mark the same sign(s) on many pages. I do not consider those pages art, and neither could I consider the painting art. Perhaps beyond my understanding.

This article also fall in that same category. And for once I agree with Neembu!

welcome to chowk chris :)

good piece, amusing and insightful. parveen doesn`t have any cousins in karachi does she?

These bloody critics thinking too much and nots likings
I ams likings
Likings very much
Giving big smiles to face.

I liked the piece. I sort of got lost in the middle but the ending was a clincher. Nicely done.

#15, Chris,
I daresay it would seem you`ve found your calling, ``very much by accident.`` Your column a month or so ago on the army`s role in and contribution to Pakistani civil society had an element of detached impartiality and studious insight-- measuring up the cons without forgetting the pros-- I`ve rarely seen elsewhere.

Loved it. Short, simple, funny and yet so relatable. Well done, Chris. Let`s have more of you on chowk. :)

Chris:
Nice! I like!

Hey, there is some serious sociowhatever commentary here. I really think that many Pakistani folks need to learn the lesson that small-scale retailers are people too. The rich drop a couple of thousands for a meal at Pizza Hut without blinking an eye, and the next morning their begums will be seen at the local cloth market haggling the seller to knock his price down 50 percent, or else.

(Okay, the cloth retailer might not have been the best example, but you get the drift)

Chris, I`ve been meaning to write you at manticore, but I guess I`ll just take the op here: I find your columns refreshingly balanced, rigorous in analysis, and rooted in a realism hard to find in too many others. For that, thanks.

What is the nature of your `social work`, by the way? Feel free not to answer in this public forum, if you (don`t) wish to.

rgds,

Re: # 14 Mostly I deal with project monitoring for Pakistani NGOs and some internationals. Work mostly in health and education sectors. Journalism is something I have only come to in the last couple of years...all my stuff that was published prior to that was very academic...dry as dust really. Got into journalism very much by accident, and also very much at the encouragement of another Chowker - Beena Sarwar, who has pieces here regularly.

Chris,

OK, I mistook u 4 Casey. :-(

Re: # 13

all goras look the same to you, hain? :)

Re: # 18
There`s an old proverb: `For a non-Chinese all Chinese look alike!`

I remember one Jewish guy asking me while travelling from Hyd to Bombay:

`Why all Indians look alike?!?!`



I know of one gora who`s writing Pak newspapers. It`s a mistake.

Chris,

I read a couple of ur articles in the The News, Pakistan, 2/3 yrs ago (may be 4/5). Then ur pix is published with ur Stetson and u are loking lanky and young. U didnt have ur bushy, swirling moustache then........clean shaven, I guess.

I didnt read ur stuff after that.

Re: # 9 LOL!!! Oh boy have you got that wrong! The person you are referring to is Ethan Casey, an American, who no longer writes in the Pakistani press - at least not so far as I am aware. The moustache has been with me since my teens and I have never, ever, in my entire life owned or worn a stetson nor would I ever want to. I write a weekly column in the News on Mondays, plus other roughly fortnightly pieces which are longer and look at the Pakistani domestic political scene.

I first started writing in The News in February 2005...so taking your timeframe it is possible that you have not read any of my pieces at all!

Hallo... funny and different. Different is good, but I would have liked to see it come together better.

-zensufi-

Re: # 7 Thanks...how do you mean `come together better?`