Rebecca

‘Packing up. The nagging worry of departure. Lost keys, unwritten labels, tissue paper lying on the floor. I hate it all. Even now, when I have done so much of it, when I live, as the saying goes, in my boxes. Even today, when shutting drawers and flinging wide an hotel wardrobe, or the impersonal shelves of a furnished villa, is a methodical matter of routine, I am aware of sadness, of a sense of loss.

Here, I say, we have lived, we have been happy. This has been ours, however brief the time. Though two nights only have been spent beneath a roof, yet we leave something of ourselves behind. Nothing material, not a hair-pin on a dressing-table, not an empty bottle of Aspirin tablets, not a handkerchief beneath a pillow, but something indefinable, a moment of our lives, a thought, a mood.

This house sheltered us, we spoke, we loved within those walls. That was yesterday. Today we pass on, we see it no more, and we are different, changed in some infinitesimal way. We can never be quite the same again. Even stopping for luncheon at a wayside inn, and going to a dark, unfamiliar room to wash my hands, the handle of the door unknown to me, the wallpaper peeling in strips, a funny little cracked mirror above the basin; for this moment, it is mine, it belongs to me. We know one another. This is the present. There is no past and no future.

Here I am washing my hands, and the tracked mirror shows me to myself, suspended as it were, in time; this is me, this moment will not pass. And then I open the door and go to the dining-room, where he is sitting waiting for me at a table, and I think how in that moment I have aged, passed on, how I have advanced one step towards an unknown destiny.

We smile, we choose our lunch, we speak of this and that, but -I say to myself -I am not she who left him five minutes ago. She stayed behind. I am another woman, older, more mature…’

- Daphne du Maurier, 1938

Reminiscing

Something I didn’t share earlier. Something I made for work and then didn’t quite make use of later. Thought of uploading it and sharing it here today as I’ve been missing the experience and hope to visit again, soon. It was an amazing venture in that I hadn’t ever visited an under-privileged area, especially schools, of Pakistan ever before.

Soundtrack is one of my favourites: Kiara by Bonobo.

I have nothing to say about Veena Malik, Sana Safinaz & Earth Hour 2012

I fall in love with their videos every year.

‘Bringing a change’, ‘making a difference’, perhaps bringing a different kind of change – there’s nothing I can say that could be divergent to what’s being heard most around in the country by us citizens of Pakistan. So, I’m just going to go ahead and share this video, quietly. Choosing to remain positive has become really hard. However, this is something positive. Suffering hours of load-shedding is not and something that we’re not choosing to do. This is.

Earth Hour 2012

Emblem

I noticed gaining a couple of new followers in the past few days and hence, found myself guilty of being motivated to write a post. Otherwise, I really was quite complacent in my cocoon, reading.

Oh Most Merciful God,

Remember when it expressed its feelings about ‘all things random’; when it said it doesn’t appreciate them random. It asked to always be prevented by them random. Well, it has found itself drowned in them random. And boy is it enjoying them random.

Anyway, from here onwards, it stops addressing God.

I’m regretting having told a meticulous and painstaking bunch of people about this blog. Not that I’m scared of being judged but I avoid the possibilities/instances as much as I can. Obviously, it eschews and discourages the idea. One could say it has been victimised an above average number of times. One could also say, it is an extra judicious being. After all, in the end, there really is no escape. But there’s definitely a fun part to it. It tends to experience that. Everyone does, it’s pretty sure.

What is currently over the top of its head is people, their statuses (financial) in society. Oh and money. Lots and lots of things about money. One assumes only folks in the banking sector get to handle money matters the most but that’s not true any more to it. Then there are the intelligent, witty and rather focused people out there. And ofcourse, let’s not forget those that are gifted with physical beauty. If you’re rich, you’re jealous of the person richer than you. If you’re intelligent, you’re jealous of the person more intelligent than you. If you’re beautiful or handsome, you’re jealous of the person handsomer than you. It declares jealousy an art and a sign of being human. Only it can get quite adverse at times, so be sure to practice a minimal amount of it, in order to stay human.

It has had an overdose of political debates, both at work and home. It fears a burn out. It seeks information on whether there is any other country in the world more politically exciting, nerve-wracking and abusive than its own. It would like to know the point of everything random yet pertinent for survival. It does not want to hear or come across the word ‘change’ again. Even though it knows that that cannot happen under the present circumstances.

I bought a book from an old book shop and while reading it, it discovered pages torn out of a diary dated 1987. It brought slight chills and a very, very tiny smile. One of the pages had a list of things to buy, I suppose. It was rather outlandish to see the price of a sweater marked 126. I’m pretty sure it’s in Rupees. It thinks this is pretty cool too.

This has made it think that life is moving really fast. There’s very little time left to a particular set of things to happen. To must happen. But it has only one path to follow. And things may only happen that way, on that one path. A very good chance lies in them not happening. But it has decided to remain calm, stay determined and let it be. Let it be, let it be, let it be.

Like English, Like Education

A similar version of this piece appeared in Pakistan Today.

The Education Department of Punjab passed on a notification that all public sector schools of Punjab be converted to English medium schools from this year onwards. The Punjabi children of Pakistan are suddenly studying in English-Medium Schools today. All it required was the effort of passing a mere statement. Point to be celebrated here is that changing the medium of instruction has been taken as a precondition in order to raise the standard of education.

It is not to be implied in the least that English medium schools do not account for a higher standard of education. Most likely, a majority audience of this article and the writer (I) have studied from an English-medium school. We believe that it was good quality education that we acquired. What’s to be noted and pointed out is that our curriculum was shaped accordingly and most importantly, our teachers were well-versed in the language. Over here, clearly no such manoeuvres have been performed. Before making this declaration, such aspects may have been taken into consideration by the Punjab government. Changing the curriculum is one of the first things that should have been undertaken, followed by a comprehensive teachers’ training programme. There are quite a number of unemployed, trained teachers out there who could have been recruited for the purpose.

On my recent trip to Lodhran in South Punjab, I was able to visit a total of 8 schools that were previously being run by the government. Without shedding light on the physical condition of the schools that were most disturbing to the human eye, although ambience does signify itself as an important factor to take into account whilst endeavouring to provide healthy education, I would come straight to my point here that I did not find any of the children with whom I sought to interact, speaking possibly in any other language than their local one, which was Saraiki. Their books were in Urdu and English Language. Upon further examination, I found that children had memorized those pages in English and were not able to tell what it meant. Considering the fact that teachers are not qualified enough and children do not find the language spoken in their daily lives, it really is not surprising that they do not know what they were studying. It affects a lot of things including them not being able to choose a profession for themselves, other than that of a farmer or a tailor, which were the two most common answers I received when I asked them about their future plans.

The English language, without a doubt, is one of the dominant languages in the world. According to a report by UNESCO, estimates have suggested that around 50% of today’s spoken languages may be extinct in the year 2100. Education accounts for one of the fundamental factors in the disappearance of these languages. Most of them would be indigenous ones. Based on this, it is not unexpected when we find out that indigenous children do not show school achievement levels that are above satisfactory or are even a close match to children studying in privately owned schools. They are taught in a language that is foreign to them and which they do not understand for the initial years of their education which are definitely the most important years. That leads to them discontinuing their education at a later stage in their lives and start looking for odd jobs. Children in Africa suffer these circumstances and it would not be a bolt from the blue to find a similar scenario in Pakistan.

It is a well-known stigma that since the birth of Pakistan succeeding governments have not been able to recruit staff that is qualified enough to teach English in public sector schools. There are no trained teachers who could teach in English or even teach the English subject as it should be taught. In such a situation, the government should not risk the future of the country for the sake of a foreign language. When students and teachers are well versed in the language of instruction, only then are they capable of sharing knowledge, ask and answer questions, take plunges of creativity and fashion an environment of healthy and interactive discussions and debates in the classroom. That is what learning and educating is about and stands to define quality education and raising the bar.

Very few nonproft entities after taking these areas of concern under deliberation have been able to come up with a novel approach of brightening the young minds of our nation. Supplementary reading material in local languages like Saraiki and Punjabi is being introduced in the local schools of Southern Punjab. The idea behind this particular endeavour is basically to allow students to remain connected to their indigenous language. And to be able to understand and grasp moralistic messages that the stories entail and narrate so that they may relate to them in their day to day lives. It’s only possible when these stories are in a language that children find themselves most familiar with. The reading material consisting of short stories that children find interesting enough and which comes to them like a breath of fresh air in order to think creatively, critically, freely and out of the box. Only then can we expect them to become responsible and active citizens of our nation.

Similarly, some educational foundations are working on agendas such as sending their teachers to cities like Karachi to serve the purpose of ex-situ teachers’ training programmes. A majority of them belong to indigenous communities of Punjab. Their training takes place at one of the top institutes of the city where they are exposed to a healthy educational environment. They undergo a process of learning and adaptability to modern methods of teaching so that they are able to impart gainful knowledge to their students and apply methodologies learnt back in Lodhran.

While English may be the ‘language of power’ and the ‘language of today’, we cannot let it hamper our country’s youth’s creativity and act as a hurdle on their paths of learning. We need to realize that our system of education is still far behind in adopting such a strategy as the Punjab Government has done. Activities such as those described are essential and the need of the day. They only push down on the priority list trivial issues such as iterating and understanding the English Language. However, it is definitely hoped that together we may be able to tick that off one day too.

COP17 – Climate Change Conference – Durban 2011

The 17th Conference of the Parties (COP17) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the 7th Session of the Conference of the Parties serving as the Meeting of the Parties (CMP7) to the Kyoto Protocol, is currently being held in the sunny city of Durban, South Africa. It has brought together representatives of the world’s governments, international organizations and civil society. The discussions, that will continue till the 9th of December 2011 (began yesterday, 28th November 2011) will seek to advance, in a balanced fashion, the implementation of the Convention and the Kyoto Protocol.

A brief introduction to what they are: The Convention on Climate Change sets an overall framework for intergovernmental efforts to tackle the challenge posed by climate change. It recognizes that the climate system is a shared resource whose stability can be affected by industrial and other emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. And the Kyoto Protocol is an international agreement linked to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The major feature of the Kyoto Protocol is that it sets binding targets for 37 industrialized countries and the European community for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions .These reductions amount to an average of five per cent against 1990 levels over the five-year period 2008-2012.

The Kyoto Protocol, which was serving as the only effective legally binding agreement on Climate, is unfortunately coming to an end with Canada being the first to withdraw. Since Canada has failed in an epic manner to reduce its carbon emissions, it is now looking to seek a fresh agreement during this conference. Allow me to say: Shame on you, Canada.

A lot of pressure is being built up on the leaders, especially upon deciding the fate of the Kyoto Protocol.

A certain Farrukh Zaman from Pakistan will be there who will be reporting the updates on the Conference, most probably through the Express Tribune, as the COP17 Negotiator Tracker. I hope we all realize how important the results of this conference are for Pakistan having suffered such massive, deathly floods. Besides him, it is not in my knowledge for the time being who else from Pakistan is in Durban. But I would like to know.

This is where you can get all the live updates of the COP17. There are many others that you can google up.

Find below: Pablo Solon, former lead negotiator of Bolivia, speaking to OneClimate at an Occupy COP17 ‘General Assembly’ meeting.

Practice and Bashing

They say to keep healthy and in shape, one must exercise regularly. Similarly, I have discovered that in order for a person to write well and avoid writer’s block, s/he must write (be it anything at all) on a regular basis. It may be easier for those who write about their personal lives or day-to-day encounters/experiences on their blogs or do writing for a living. But, I do not do either of those things. Still, I’d like to remain in touch with writing.

Now, I used to think that most of my work already involves writing. So, it won’t turn sour. But no, one cannot call it ‘writing’. Because that is all research, surveys, reports, policy manuals (basically crap I tend to love and hate) and all that dorky/geeky work one does after graduating in an even dorky/geeky subject in order to pursue a dorkier/geekier post-grad, later to attain a dorkier/geekier designation and more later to produce dorkier/geekier kids. Yes, it was all for the sake of kids, what you had been doing all this time. And if they don’t turn out to be as dorky/geeky as you had imagined, or more like expected of them to become, then you hate your life. Disagree with me. I disagree with myself too. But I’d be doing all of it for sure.

Keeping strictly under consideration that there’s not even a little streak of journalism in me, therefore, do excuse me when I come forward to share how particularly annoyed I have become by Dawn Images Magazine. I’m guessing many people could (once again) disagree with me but aren’t we all tired of the same ‘Men vs Women’ or ‘Men from Mars, Women from Venus’ sort of articles? Goes without mentioning, there are numerous housewife-woeful-articles along with working-women-choosing-to-remain-unmarried-after-30 articles that have successfully added to my sheer annoyance, not to mention All-things-Pakistani-Dating/Relationships. Sure, they have great points to share with our hypocritical society that lets sons on a loose to enter the house at 3 am but would go all ‘OMG’ if daughters dare do such a thing, but do give us all a break. Enough with how men are pigs and women are angels and how men hate marriage and women can’t get enough of it and how women are gossip-mongers and men can keep secrets or how men keep their rooms filthy and women are clean-freaks or how men love their moms and women keep competing with men’s mom’s cooking or how men love watching soccer matches and women can’t stop watching Desperate Housewives. Seriously, it’s fun and on a great number of occasions, I have found myself cracking up at many of the pieces. But now, I do and am guilty of thinking that we could use something new to read on a pleasant Sunday morning.

It also goes without saying that I do love Dawn’s section called ‘Earthly Matters’.

Enough with the Practice and Bashing.