Pakistan Travelogue I

I don`t care whether they will be factual or not. I just want hamidm2 to write several ``travelogues`` to some of my favorite cities. I want him to describe in his inimitable style, his experiences with religious nuts, with ostentatious ladies, and with ``my $hit doesn`t stink`` type self-promoters. Here are some suggestions:

1. Hamidm2 goes on a pilgrimage to Mecca
2. Hamdim2 does a yatra and self-immersion in Benares.
3. Hamidm2 drinks too much beer and relieves himself against the Wailing Wall.
3. Hamidm2 and Kaka visit the Golden Temple in Amritsar.
4. Hamidm2 interviews Narendra Modi
5. Hamidm2 is elected to the Duma

Re: # 544
Hamidm,
My first act will be to appoint you Pope.
I think that you are the best thing to happen to religion since the Reformation. :)

Re: # 542

Kardesh,

...... i have great confidence in you - i think you will make a fine minister :)

tahmed #523, {``Job Opening for all underemployed chowkies...(send resume to the Vatican)``}

While virginity and past moral uprightness are not key qualifications for the job, future celibacy and sound thinking are a must. Tahmed Sahib, with all due respect to your selfless motives and your passionate concern to keep scout employed, your ``job opening`` post is not very wise. Although I am ready for a female ``popi,`` or ``mome``, or ``mama mia`` or as they say in Latin, ``Madre Castrata,`` I don`t think that any female Chowkie will make the cut. While we have a few semi-virgins on Chowk, current moral uprightness and a commitment to future celibaby are out of the question for Chowk females - unless you consider lesbian behavior to be chaste and morally acceptable.

But then what can you say about the standards of those who, every week, line up so that they can kneel with their mouths open, in front of a standing white man, dressed in loose garments?

#529 Kaalchakra {``Kardesh for minister for promotion of sufficient vice and prevention of excessive virtue.
saminasha and scout for ministers for feminist affairs and keeping kardesh in his place.``}

Who died and left you incharge of nominating low ranking morality ministers? OK, OK, I know, wise guy, someone did die. Don`t rub it in.
I must warn you that if nominated I will not run and if elected I will not serve. First of all, being responsible for promotion of sufficient vice is not my style. Man, sufficient is a weak term. It means allowing Meera to kiss but not deep throat the guy. It means allowing the two feminists to exchange lewd lesbo comments, but not to be able to adopt Faisaluno as their impossibly-begotten offspring. It means letting Prashant123 aka Gujju go to Lahore and come back a virgin, that means without a sweet doughnut sticking from his backside.
Prevention of excessive virtue sounds like a thankless job. It means I cannot offer Rekha my own hand in marriage - because that would be the right thing to do. It means I cannot kiss Meera to give her some alternatives. It means I cannot save either of the two feminists from a life devoid of any heterosexual experiences.

The only feminist affairs these so-called ministers of your choice can conduct are the lewd, lesbionic (sic), and those involving extreme misandry.

I used to think that you were one balanced and mentally-endowed person on Chowk. Unfortunately, you have let your own boundless papal ambitions cloud your judgement. You may make it to Rome, but no more jiggy jiggy for you, my friend. Celibabcy is a mandatory requirement for that job.

hamidm2 #534, {``a stench of death and heeng hang in the air ``}

...........by patels and other indians of dubious origin ........... i prefer to take my chances with norman bates and his.......

Love this.I shudder when i think of what you`ll write when you visit coorg.Thanks for the laugh.

hamidm2 #534, {``a stench of death and heeng hang in the air ``}

Hamid,
You had me laughing so loud that I spilled my coughee in my dosa. You are so funny, I hope you continue with the motel jokes. I liked the one about the preacher with the $20 date. You are hilarious.

I still can`t figure out what got everyone sweating and fighting here. :)

SO, this pudgy ingrate goes to lahore ,waxes eloquent about the airport road and ends up at the only nightspot in town where the educated folk rock on till the wee hours of the morning, er , closing time, which must be 11pm??.Whoopee!!!.Lahore has a Dunkin Donut franchise!!.Progress in pakistan.Way ahead of india.All this is so boring.And the acrimony and pettiness in the interacts is overwhelming.This weezil went there to find his roots.Hope he did.

Been watching tv again, and the world media has been speculating on the new pope already.One of the names being thrown out is Archbishop Ivan Diaz of Mumbai(the second largest catholic diocese outside of Rome).Is the world ready for an indian pope?.Is India ready for an indian pope?.Throws up a lot of interesting posers.The eight indian catholic cardinals are getting ready to go to Rome to do their thing.Some of them were interviewed on NDTV today.Something`s brewing.

...bah!! this fiction gets 500+ hits...if you really want to read a proper travelogue, check out my i-logs from today onwards for the real thing...thank you ferzana versey...;)

parag,

honestly i don`t give a rat`s behind if you liked pakistan or hated it, it would have been ok either way, the best thing was that you got to visit your ancestral past. that is priceless.
good for you.... a lot of people talk about visiting their past but few actually have the luck or motivation to do it.

re: Khurram Miyan,
(Most people would agree that 90% of tamil Brahmin girls are ugly as home made lye soap, then how can you let your good looking gals fornicate around with north indians/Punjabis)
Your Meera is being banged by a no-good looking Bhatt (whose Butt she surely must have licked to get that role), but do i see any serious form of protests from you guys. No. The only thing i see are some mullahs making a noise about some goddamn kiss. They are missing the whole picture. IN Bollywood of today, there are no free lunches. Meera must have opened her veil (and much more) before Bhatt opened his purse.
Be that as it may, it is all for the good of both countries. As more Paki actresses get banged by Hindus in India, it will only make the relationship better and truly unique.
As for your post, you only need to look at the fate of those actresses. Hema Malini is fighting a court battle to give legitimacy to her children. No respected Tam Brahm will marry Rekha, who epitomises the word ``b!tch``. As for Kalpana Iyer, God knows where she is.
IN today`s India, middle class women pursue their career with freedom that was unavailable in the past. Some stray into the film world due to glamor. The talented ones make it but they have screwed up personal lives.
Such choices are not available to middle class women in Pak. Which is why you even ask this question why South Indian Brahmin females are allowed? What do u mean by allowed? They are free to do what they want but they have to face the consequences of a conservative society (which is what Tam Brahms still are).
Sridhar

nightmare at howard johson ..... part - I ..........

........ ever since i discovered a used condom snugly tucked under the sheets, i have tried to stay away from holiday inns and other fine small town establishments run by patels and other indians of dubious origin ........... i prefer to take my chances with norman bates and his guests - homosexual bible salesmen, drunken truckers, mass murderers on the run, and the odd preacher with his twenty dollar date ..................

........... so when i pulled into the driveway of the howard johnson in meridian, mississippi, i was worried even though the secretary had assured me that it was the best place in town ............a town which had held its last lynching less than ten years ago, and where the blacks still got off the sidewalk to let a white person pass ........... the white people ate grits three times a day, married their first cousins, chewed tobacco, hung confederate flags from their rusty pickups and, like their ancestors, suffered from bad teeth ........... but i noticed that there was a doctor srikant patel, dds, right across from the dunkin donut and kitty-corner from a dr gopintah patel md, family practitioner, general surgeon and diplomate of the american institute of psychiatary ............. a hotel with a dunkin donut and two quacks named patel next to it didn’t sound too good – a stench of death and heeng hang in the air ....... i shuddered and a cold sweat trickled down my spine ......... i saw the shadowy creatures - shapeless forms from the otherside - lurking in the twilight just behind the cracked glass door and the eerie red ``vacancy`` sign that spluttered overhead .................

........... ``good evening, velcom to harvud jaansun....... are you from india ?........ my name is govardhan patel, this is my daughter karishma `` ......... in the background I saw a woman in salwar kameej looking at me with lustful eyes- she had the same sultry and haunting look as the scrawny woman at dunkin donut …………” she is the night aaditer and she goes to the komuneety kalig – studying to be a physical thurapist” …..……… and i thought I heard her whisper , “you can check out any time, but you just can’t leave “ ………… across the street men in white robes and hoods were burning a cross on somone’s lawn ........i noticed one of them was wearing a big-toe-in-strap chappal and had rather dark feet ........

I know, most people in West Punjab speak Punjabi,but what is happening at official level?
Can anyone throw some light?

Following article is not very old.

A People Without a Language
Eric Cyprian




It is a unique phenomenon that the educated Punjabi is ashamed of
his own mother tongue and thinks that it is the language of the
uncultured. He therefore, takes pride in the fact that he is
illiterate in his mother tongue, though he may speak it fluently and
use it for special purposes. Urban educated Punjabis use their
mother tongue for informal conversation, especially in the exchange
of obscenities with intimate friends in stag parties or in all male
company. They are almost totally ignorant of the riches in their
mother tongue and many of them have heard of some of the classics in
Punjabis but have the haziest idea of the content of well-known
poems. They may be familiar with some Punjabi songs and a few folk
songs made popular by films and TV and radio artists. Till recently
Punjabi language and literature were not taught at any stage in the
Punjab. About two decades ago with great difficulty the Punjab
University was persuaded to start post graduate studies in Punjabi
language and literature, and there is a steady stream of students
who have completed their MA studies in Punjabi and have gone out to
teach Punjabi to Intermediate and BA students in some colleges.
Teachers in schools and colleges do not encourage students to take
up the formal study of Punjabi. In rural areas teachers and
principals of some colleges exert their utmost influence on students
desirous of taking up the formal study of Punjabi and usually
succeed in dissuading them from taking up Punjabi as one of their
elective subjects. The few lecturers appointed in colleges in the
Punjab are treated as untouchables by their colleagues and made to
feel inferior to lecturers in other subjects.


One reason for the alienation of the Punjabi educated people from
their mother tongue is the flexibility of the upper classes to
collaborate with the enemy. When the British came the opportunists
flocked to bend their knees to the new rulers and made enormous
gains thereby. Later when Pakistan was established it was the
Punjabi elite who in alliance with the Urdu speaking that controlled
the machinery of the state and also manipulated the levers of
financial and economic power. They thus formed the ruling class, but
for obvious reasons did not wish to be recognized for what they
were. They therefore, disowned the Punjabi language and identified
the ideology of Pakistan with Urdu, Islam, and the two-nation
theory. Now that ethnic grouping has become a reality which cannot
be swept under the carpet, and when the Pathans, Baloch, Sindhi and
Urdu speaking mahajirs have asserted their identities and claimed
their share in the governance of the country, the Punjabis per force
will also have to recognize themselves for what they are and be
content with their own part of Pakistan. This recognition has just
started and in a few years time Punjabis will be as proud of their
culture and language as Sindhis, Pathans and Baloch are of their
language and culture.


To trace the decline of the Punjabi language and literature in our
Punjab we have to delve deep into our history to find the causes for
this decline. It is surprising that during the Sikh rule in the
Punjab the court language remained Persian and all legal and
government documents, firmans, etc were in the language used by the
Moguls in their state business. But Punjabi flourished both among
the Sikhs and the Muslims because of the fact that for the Sikhs
their sacred books were in Punjabi language written in the Gurmukhi
script while for the Muslims there was a body of mystic poetry by
the great Sufi saints of Punjab which was the means for the
illiterate masses to get acquainted with their religion.


For the Sikhs the Granth Sahib was the sacred book and hence
literacy in Punjabi was a religious duty. In the case of the Muslims
since the bulk of the Sufi mystic poetry was committed to memory and
recited by a large number of bards, poets, and entertainers,
literacy was not all that necessary. Apart from the poetry there was
the large body of religious oratory of the zakirs of Multan who
displayed their art during the Muharram when they moved millions to
tears with their masterly rhetorical renderings of the tragic epic
of the Karbala. For these reasons literacy in Punjabi was not
widespread among Muslims.


Throughout history Punjab has been on the route followed by invading
armies from the times of Alexander the Great, and even earlier. It
therefore became part of Punjabi culture to resist these invaders
even if they were Muslims. There exists a vast body of resistance
poetry in the shape of dholas and vars, (forms of narrative poetry)
which chronicle the brave deeds of the people of the Punjab when
they opposed the invaders and waged their own form of guerilla
warfare against the alien armies. These poems were part of the rich
folk literature in Punjabi which has fortunately been recorded on
tapes and preserved by the National Institute of Folk Heritage. The
field workers and research workers of the Institute have done their
job, but as yet scholars and folklorists have not as yet made use of
these treasures to piece together the history of the people of
Punjab.


The foreigners were quick to recognize the political power of the
Punjabi language and once they gained control over the province they
determined to deprive the people of the Punjab of this weapon. The
British administrators brought with them a whole team of lower level
administrators from those provinces where their rule had been
consolidated and from where the British had recruited and trained a
large number of clerks, lower level police officers, patwaris etc.
Most of these were Urdu speaking men from the United Provinces of
Agra and Oudh. It will be recalled that the British had earlier in
Calcutta established Fort William College, an institution for the
development of Urdu as the language of the part of the
administrators that had public dealings, in thanas, in revenue
matters and in the army. The government functionaries that came from
outside the Punjab to assist the British rule over the newly
conquered province were skilled in Urdu and hence it was adopted as
the language of administration at the public dealing level and in
education. In this way Urdu was established in the Punjab and
continues to dominate the cities. It is said that Urdu is the
language of sophisticated people while Punjabi is crude. It is also
alleged that Urdu is the refined form of Punjabi which is the crude
form of Urdu. The refinements of Urdu and the crudeness of Punjabi
are myths. The fact is that the difference between the two languages
is one that arises from the differences between the people who speak
them. The Urdu speaking are indeed sophisticated to the point of
being decadent, while Punjabi is crude to the point of being
straightforward and blunt and therefore honest and direct. Urdu is a
courtly language which is meticulous in making distinctions of
status whereas Punjabi is democratic and treats a man as a man. To a
Punjabi, Urdu appears to be cliche ridden, emasculated and an effete
language whereas Punjabi is a manly, honest plain practical speech
which can be as ornate, colorful, as sweet and as mellifluous as a
situation may require. It can be forceful and emphatic and when
necessary it can be as melodious as the cooing of a dove.


There is now a growing consciousness in the cities among educated
people that Punjabi language should be developed and used at all
levels in our public life as well as in our intellectual life. There
was therefore a sharp reaction to the announcement of the Punjab
chief minister that in future Urdu would be the official language in
government offices. There were protests against this decision in
many cities in the Punjab and the champions of Punjabis demanded
that Punjabi be the official language in the Punjab and that it
should immediately be made the medium of instruction in primary
education which will make Punjabis at least literate in their mother
tongue. This is important because once the people of the Punjab
become literate in their mother tongue they will discover the vast
treasure of classical Punjabi poetry, the ocean of folk poetry which
is at present an altogether undiscovered country to them. Once they
begin to read Waris Shah`s Heer Ranjha, of Mian Mohammed Buksh`s
Saiful Maluk, the poetry of Bulleh Shah, Shah Hussain, Sultan Bahoo,
Ghulam Farid to name only a few of the works which at present are
closed books to most educated Punjabis. The second advantage of this
would be to abolish the artificial barrier that now exists between
the common people of the Punjab and the educated elite. And thirdly
we all would be able to read and understand contemporary Punjabi
literature, both prose and poetry. It might then be possible to
start a newspaper and publish books in Punjabi for educational
purposes as well as for the general reader. Many of our mass
literacy programs fail because we teach the illiterate adult not his
mother tongue but a foreign language. If a mass adult literacy
program were to make usr of Punjabi it would be an instant success,
because the learner would not have the double task of learning a
script well as learning a new language.

Manto thinks Veeresh is a crook. Manto says Veeresh is a liar. Manto also believes that `the quality of Pakistan manufactured cars is a thousand times better than India`.

Cars like the Sitara , the Pride of Pakistan ...


Sporting a 175 cc engine, the Sitara runs on petrol, has a 10-litre fuel tank and a four speed manual transmission. It can achieve a top speed of 60 kmph.

Lastly , Manto is of the view that Veeresh is jealous of Pakistan...

KKKhuram ...and while you were busy writing about the sex lives of old forgotten hindi movie actresses , your wife was getting humped by your brahmin boss...