A Day In The Bazaar

#16 great point... so maybe to come extent its our fault men are lazy bumbs? :)

Great article though.. I saw so many of my aunts and neighbors in it.

That was indeed a great peice of work.I LIKED it.Keep it up.

Hi!
It is a fact that the kind of frustrations she was living with could have very well made her do it. A very possible reaction. But one other angle would have been, which usually is the case, that women start taking out their frustrations on thier children by beating them or torturing them. It would be hard to digest this, but this is a fact. However I do agree with your angle and reaction as well. I say, it must have been a sight watching a women beating a man. If WWF ever went to Pakistan, they would`nt have to search alot for women wrestlers. :)
But I must say again, a wonderful piece!
H

Thanks everyone for your criticism and praise!

waqaralisheikh: I`ve written humorous AND depressing pieces, and I personally enjoy reading and writing the former more. Unfortunately, issues that are covered in the `depressing` stories are usually more true to life, and they may appear to be negative and morbid, but by not writing/talking about them, they don`t go away. Anyhow, I will keep your comments in mind!

hamid_81: Believe you me, I`ve seen it..and it was quite a sight! Anyway, the main theme behind the story is not, as you`ll appreciate, men beating women or women beating men. It`s about frustration and helplessness which can make anyone lash out. Perhaps the fact that women DON`T go around slapping men shows just how horrible this woman`s life was and just how desperate she was to somehow get all the anger out of her once and for all!

Bhains: there`s no point in being subtle, the truth`s the truth. I don`t make the traditions of our society or the norms of our culture, I just write about them. And the truth is that when boys are born, their birth is celebrated with much more aplomb than the birth of girls in Pakistan, in every section of our society. Of course, there are exceptions to the rule but this is definitely the more widespread sentiment.

Thanks for reading and getting back to me, everyone!

Hi!
A very well writen piece I must say! There is just one thing that seems a little unnatural to me. I have lived in Pakistan for 18 years and I have never seen a women beat a man in bazaar. I have however seen women getting a beating by men. And even if a women starts to beat a man, he would definetly respond with much more intensity. So that was something that did not click .
Hamid

Strikes home. I guess such is the fate of the majority of our people. Unfortunately this pent up anger is commonplace and tends to make people more and more negative about life, thereby putting themselves deeper into the rut.

#17 ukps, i think = ullu ka patha`s

Hi Sobia,
I really got caught up in the flow of the story. Hameeda is a victim as much as she is a perpetrator. She lives through the lives of others, not her own, as many women (and men) do.
Really think you can develop your gift of narrative. Yeah, definitely keep it up!
Chithra

though i admire the kind of ideas that your writing revolves around, i wish you wouldnt be so damn direct sometimes, such as:

``his birth was celebrated as if he was a first-born (Nusrat did not count, for she was a girl). ``

its better to be a bit more subtle

With a sister like this... ;) Great job Sobs!

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``Hameeda always indulged Anwar, far more than she indulged her twelve-year-old daughter, Afifa, and her twenty-year-old daughter, Nusrat, because Anwar was her lifeline. He was the one who was going to take her out of this lower middle class rut that she had been in all her life. He was the son, you see. He was going to study, become a ‘big officer’, earn good money, buy her a way out of this everyday monotony of middle-class living.``


...this para struck me the most...if only us women stopped indulging our men so...maybe they wouldn`t grow up to be such spoiled ukps...

#14

LOL

Becharee Hameeda found out the hard way

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AAmir

one of the points of the story is that Hameeda has no other option realistically but to accomodate, which adds to the anger...

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