What will I teach my daughter? Re: #107 #106 #105, #104 Dad knows MORE than diddly

An interesting debate on ABCD vs. FOB and relevance of religious customs and values in modern life!

Pardesis who follow religious customs tend to over-emphasize their importance and obsess with the virtues, whilst those who do not, summarily reject those religious customs as having little significance in today`s world!

The important thing to remember is that religious customs and traditions are NOT in themselves an End, but that they are the Means to achieve an End. Praying regularly does not automatically equate to being a good Hindu, Christian or Muslim, but it MIGHT teach one to be humble (not arrogant), considerate (not selfish) and kind (not malevolent). Therefore, praying in itself is not an End or sufficient to make the person a worthy human being, but it might create the spirit which leads to becoming a humble, considerate and kind person.

Similarly, eating halal food is in itself not a virtue/value, but it teaches self-restraint and ability to say NO (isn`t this important for freshman/woman living away from home and exposed to an environment where everything-goes?). Again, I emphasize that eating halal food does not automatically qualify for a stairway to heaven or guarantee steadfast character, but it is more likely that such a (wo)man is able to make the difficult decision of following the correct path (e.g. of honesty) when faced with a choice!

This is where parents make a mistake and try to instil religious customs just to portray themselves as righteous hindus and muslims, instead of explaining the core moral values that these customs are trying to instil.

We cannot force anything on the children (case in point being the family whose children ate halal in front of their parents and non-halal in their absence). All we can do is to explain the reasoning and logic of why something is being expected of them and hope that they have the wisdom to understand and the courage to make the right choice; for they say ``true insight comes from within``!

But, maybe am naïve to think that reason and logic would fly in front of an over-confident teenager, but I know for sure that ``Dad, with his years of experience knows MORE than diddly``

What will I teach my daughter? Azmat - Your article leaves much to be desired, but fellow chowkers have already performed a postmortem and so it is needless to elaborate. Instead I will congratulate you on having a daughter!

Most people are too thick-headed to realise what a BLESSING daughters are. Their love for the parents is more deep-rooted and intense than the sons. They are more sensitive, kind and considerate to their parents when they are old as compared to the sons who despite receiving all the attention and resources are more likely to turn their backs to the parents. One should not create stereotypes, but I`ve witnessed plenty of examples to justify this observation.

Of cource, the unknown factor is how this new generation grows up to become, given that they face the dilemma of somewhat contradictory signals from their parents/culture on side and their surroundings and media on the other. However as they say ceterus paribus (all things equal), girls are better for the parents than boys!

What will I teach my daughter? Azmat - Your article leaves much to be desired, but fellow chowkers have already performed a postmortem and so it is needless to elaborate. Instead I will congratulate you on having a daughter!

Most people are too thick-headed to realise what a BLESSING daughters are. Their love for the parents is more deep-rooted and intense than the sons. They are more sensitive, kind and considerate to their parents when they are old as compared to the sons who despite receiving all the attention and resources are more likely to turn their backs to the parents. One should not create stereotypes, but I`ve witnessed plenty of examples to justify this observation.

Of cource, the unknown factor is how this new generation grows up to become, given that they face the dilemma of somewhat contradictory signals from their parents/culture on side and their surroundings and media on the other. However as they say ceterus paribus (all things equal), girls are better for the parents than boys!

Irrational Exuberance – Gambling on Pakistani property market Re: # 94

Doer Ali, Good for you that you`ve made money and, seriously, I hope that you can get yourself to sell the $600k house in the next six months and lock-in your profits!

As far as your plot in Islamabad is concerned, I would book a flight and try to dispose it off ASAP. Because as it happens, March was the peak of the property boom. For since then, property prices have stagnated or fallen, primarily due to the scandalous collapse in stock market from 10,355 to 7,000. All those stock market gurus (your so-called DOERS), who had leveraged their positions 10x or even 30x (what`s the matter with us desis, we seem to lose all sense of proportion!) lost their shirts and had to sell realisable assets (i.e. plots) to fulfil their stock-financing liabilities! Karachi Defence Phase 8 has already come down by 20%. Plots surrounding Pindi/Islamabad have come down on average by Rs. 25lacs ....

Irrational Exuberance – Gambling on Pakistani property market Re: # 14

If you want to look into the future and see how US market is going to be in 12 months to 18 months, you should look at what`s happening now in Sydney`s property market. This is because the property cycle in Sydney is at a much advanced stage; e.g. both price escalation and interest rate tightening started much earlier than USA! Sydney had house-price inflation running at 20% plus some 18 months ago. However these days, house prices are registering falls of -5%. Investors mistake that there is an imaginary floor to the house price inflation at 0% and somehow house prices can stabilize without falling! They seldom do....

1. Its noteworthy that even Alan Greenspan has been cautioning on ``localised property bubbles``. This is the same guy who refused to acknowledge the dot.com bubble and till 2000 was singing praises of the New Economy!

2. $1.2 trillion of adjustable-rate-mortgages will be reset in the next two years at considerably higher rates and this will force already over-stretched homeowners pushing the sell button.

3. If you live in North-East, Florida, California or New York, and can`t make up your mind between renting and buying, then read this insightful article http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/25/realestate/25cov.html

4. Also, study of filings by house builders will show that there has been the largest amount of insider sales of company stock by their executives! Do they know something we don`t...ladies & gents, I think the signs are clear!