The Express Tribune Magazine - October 17

OCTOBER 17-23 2010

Aftermath The Muslim experience after 9/11

JUNE 13-19 2010

JUNE 13-19 2010

OCTOBER 17-23 2010

Cover Story 20 Aftermath The Muslim experience after 9/11

Feature 24 Finding Peace in Latif’s Music The power of song at Bhit Shah 26 Partying for Pakistan How to have fun and contribute towards a good cause

Comment

20

30 The Convert Fareed Zakaria analyses Tony Blair’s political savvy

Up North and Personal 38 Expect the Unexpected Zahrah Nasir realises its best to lay low on a stormy day

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Review 34 What’s new in restaurants, films and books

Regulars 6 People & Parties: Out and about with beautiful people 18 Tribune Questionnaire: Feeha Jamshed on individuality 40 Horoscope: Shelley von Strunckel on your week ahead 42 Ten Things I Hate About: Pets

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Senior Sub-Editor: Nadir Hassan, Features Editor: Faiza S Khan, Sub-Editors: Batool Zehra, Hamna Zubair Creative Team: Amna Iqbal, Jamal Khurshid, Essa Malik, Anam Haleem, Tariq Alvi, S Asif Ali, Sukayna Sadik Publisher: Bilal A Lakhani. Executive Editor: Muhammad Ziauddin. Editor: Kamal Siddiqi.

For feedback and submissions: magazine@tribune.com.pk Printed by: Yaqeen Art Press (Pvt.) Ltd., Karachi

JUNE 13-19 2010

PEOPLE & PARTIES

Girl Power Students, celebrities and entrepreneurs attended the Ladies Fund Entrpreneurship Conference in Karachi.

Lubna

Robert and Tara Uzra Dawood

6

A student asking a question OCTOBER 17-23 2010

Hamida Dawood

JUNE 13-19 2010

PEOPLE & PARTIES

Sidra Iqbal

Rukaiya Adamjee

8

Selina, Amir, Sameera and Sidra OCTOBER 17-23 2010

Wajiha Malik and Tara Uzra Dawood

Nilofer

Saeed

Sharmila Farooqui

JUNE 13-19 2010

PEOPLE & PARTIES

Gordon James Gordon, GM Avari Hotel, Karachi

Muna Siddiqui

Sadia Khan

10

Hadi, Mehr, Sherri, Tara Uzra Dawood and Moiz OCTOBER 17-23 2010

ir

en Zam

Shahe

Shazia Marri

JUNE 13-19 2010

PEOPLE & PARTIES

Beauty Bash Fashionistas attended the launch of Asmaa Mumtaz’s styling studio in Lahore.

Zara, Lali and Saher

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Tashoo, Saira and Deeda OCTOBER 17-23 2010

Uzma and Noshin

PHOTO: LALI KHALID, THE DRESSER

Asmaa and Rabiya Butt

JUNE 13-19 2010

PEOPLE & PARTIES

Arfah, Zoya and Zain

Aachi

14

Lali and Taimur

Uzma

Maheen, Asmaa and Hassan Shehryar Yasin OCTOBER 17-23 2010

Shammyl and Rida

JUNE 13-19 2010

PEOPLE & PARTIES

Sara Shahid and Deeda

Qudsia, Uzma and Nadeem

Hadiqa

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Asmaa and Lali OCTOBER 17-23 2010

Natty

Deeda and Juju

JUNE 13-19 2010

PHOTO: AYAN ANIS / KOHI MARRI

“The whole country despises the same person at the moment” Young fashion designer and heir to TeeJays, Feeha Jamshed on the miracle of child birth, going blank and wanting to be a horse.

What is your idea of perfect happiness?

Perfect happiness is in any given moment.

If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

I would think twice before doing something to myself.

What is your greatest fear?

Losing my memory.

What do you consider your greatest achievement?

Not the greatest but on the list of achievements would be to get TeeJays back in people’s minds like it was in the seventies and eighties.

What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?

That I sometimes go blank when I need to do something.

What is the trait you most deplore in others?

People have lost their individuality and running after the same thing has made them robots. That they think they have the right to control other people’s lives when they can’t even control their own.

What is your greatest extravagance?

Travelling and, at the moment, a good massage.

What is your current state of mind?

My current state of mind is always in a parallel world.

On what occasion do you lie?

Sometimes to avoid the unlimited questions that come one’s way.

Which living person do you most despise?

According to me the whole country despises the same person at the moment...

What is the quality you most like in a man?

Honesty and the ability to be comfortable in his own skin.

If you were to die and come back as a person or a thing, what would it be?

Either the same person but in the seventies. Or, if I have to come back as an animal, a horse.

Where would you most like to live?

Here, up in the mountains or on an island.

What is your most treasured possession?

The conversations I had with my dad and my paternal and maternal grandfathers when I was younger.

What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?

When you completely lose yourself and become a slave to your own or other people’s insecurities.

If you didn’t do your current job, what would you choose to do?

I would be running a really cool magazine and the office would look like a magazine in itself where the walls would just be covered with collages of posters of music, art, pop art and fashion.

What is your most marked characteristic?

My chilled malangi attitude.

What is the quality you most like in a woman?

The fact that a woman can change a cell into a baby inside her with the help of God is spectacular.

Who is your hero of fiction?

Robin Hood.

Which words or phrases do you most overuse?

Well, it depends on the situation; different phrases come to mind.

What is your greatest regret?

Regrets are things that turn out to be a learning experience for the present and which lay foundations for the future.

When and where were you happiest?

I am happiest whenever I sit with my friends and family and relive old moments, whether from my childhood or things that happened a few days ago.

What’s your favourite quote?

“Style makes the man, man then creates revolutionary fashion.”

Which talent would you most like to have?

To be able to sing.

How many hours of loadshedding did you experience yesterday?

The electricity went five or six times. a OCTOBER 17-23 2010

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COVER STORY

OCTOBER 17-23 2010

Daniel Mackelvey Peyser has been stressed out by the wave of Islamophobia in the US. “I’ve had unusually high anxiety these last couple of months,” said New York City resident Peyser, who converted to Shia Islam two years ago.

While his name and Caucasian background do not give him away, a beard, a keffiyah wrapped around his shoulder and a tasbeeh rotating his fingers certainly do. “I like it to be visible that I am Muslim,” said Peyser.

aftermath

The Muslim experience after 9/11 HANI YOUSUF

Nine years after the 9/11 attacks, the site of the former twin towers are open to a new controversy. A December 2009 frontpage New York Times story broke the news of a Muslim prayer site that was born from an abandoned Burlington Coat Factory, a popular American discount clothing chain. This modest mosque, only two blocks from Ground Zero, the popular name given to the area that once was the World Trade Centre, aspired to become an Islamic centre. The New York Times breaking news story quoted Imam Feisal Abdur Rauf, the cleric behind the initiative, as saying, “We want to push back against the extremists.”

News of the proposed Islamic center went unremarked until August 2010. Peyser, who is a graduate of Columbia University’s School of Social Work and is politically active, thinks that reactions to the Islamic centre coincided with campaigning for the 2010 gubernatorial elections held in September and November.

“It’s something that comes up as a wedge issue,” said Peyser while eating his veggie burger at a halal restaurant in Uptown Manhattan. “The difference is that it is one of those issues that are a little more dangerous.” A Christian Science Monitor opinion piece published in August 2010 is headlined “Ground Zero mosque as wedge issue: Muslims vs. ‘real’ Americans.

Unlike Peyser, Khadija Haseeb looks Muslim. She is Pakistani and wears a hijab. Haseeb moved to New York in late 2008 to join her husband who already lived there. In April 2010, the couple moved to Wisconsin, where she began a master’s in education at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. Haseeb did not always wear a hijab. She started wearing it five months after moving to New York. “Being a hijabi in New York was not much different than being a non-hijabi,” she said. She said she experienced no discrimination except when shopping at high-end stores like OCTOBER 17-23 2010

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COVER STORY Bloomingdale’s and Gucci, where she felt a marked difference between the way she was treated before and after adopting the hijab. “But wearing a hijab in Wisconsin is a whole different story,” said Haseeb. “I didn’t feel any discrimination, I just felt a lot of reluctance,” said Haseeb, “reluctance in approaching, reluctance in talking, reluctance in being friendly.” Haseeb said being a Muslim was a constant struggle and it wouldn’t have been

“If I sit down next to someone on the subway they may or may not move, but if I pull out a Quran or something with Arabic writing on it, the minute other seats open up, they move,”

if she didn’t wear the hijab.

“If I sit down next to someone on the subway they may or may not move, but if I pull out a Quran or something with Arabic writing on it, the minute other seats open up, they move,” said Peyser. He said he is more paranoid of people he knows than of strangers. He said statistics that say seven in ten New Yorkers don’t want the Islamic centre to be built make him paranoid. Not so much of strangers than of people who know him. “It makes me think which seven of my ten friends don’t want it but don’t say it to my face,” he said.

Along with coursework Haseeb teaches at a school in the Milwaukee area where she is the only Muslim at the school. Once, while teaching a class, they heard a noise outside. “A student gets up and asks, ‘Are we under attack? Are you guys attacking us again?’” said Haseeb adding that she didn’t know how to handle the situation. “That was the point I totally broke down.”

The mentor teacher with her explained to the class that they shouldn’t blame the entire community for the actions of some.

“It’s totally ingrained in the future generations that are coming up,” said Haseeb. “At least it seems so in my teaching experience.” Haseeb said that Islamophobia in the US is “media-induced.” She mentioned the Islamic centres in the Midwest that have been causing protests at a smaller scale than the one in Lower Manhattan. The mosque in Sheboygan County, Wisconsin sparked off a similar debate. Opposition to this mosque was reported in a Time magazine article in August this year. The story quoted an unnamed resident of that area as saying, ““I know they’ll say there’s the violent or jihad Muslims and there’s the peaceful Muslims, [but] to me it doesn’t make a difference be-

Statistics Number of Muslims in the US: 7 million Number of mosques in the US: 1,209 Number of hate crimes against Muslims in 2010: 112 Number of employment discrimination claims: 803 Average income of US Muslims: $42,158

cause their goal is to wipe out Christianity around the world.”

On August 25, Ahmed Sharif, a cab driver in New York City was stabbed by a passenger. Headlines in daily newspapers left no doubt that it was a hate crime perpetrated by an Islamophobe.

The New York Times headline read, “Rider Asks if Cabby is Muslim, Then Stabs Him.” Headlines in daily newspapers usually say something negative about Muslims, said Peyser. It is no wonder then that there is an uptake in hate crimes, he said. “Even the cabby news was news for like what, two days,” said Peyser. The bombing of a mosque in Florida while there were worshippers inside, even if no one was injured, did not make make the national news, said Peyser.

“If that had been a synagogue or a church that Muslims blew up, imagine the kind of headlines it would have got,” said Peyser. a

22 OCTOBER 17-23 2010

OCTOBER 17-23 2010

FEATURE The music of the Lower Indus Valley is mesmerising and there’s no better place than the shrine of Shah Abdul Latif to witness its power. Since 1740, when Latif settled on the mound of Bhit Shah and started training his group of musicians to perform his unique form of music, a concert has been held every Thursday night at the shrine between Isha and Fajr prayers.

finding peace in Latif ’s music When the tempo of the music rose and the high notes resonated

BY SALMAN SIDDIQUI

Many musicians from interior Sindh started out their musi-

cal careers from this mound and achieved widespread fame by singing the Waees and Kafis of Latif. Allan Faqir, the Sindhi folk legend who sang the massive hit “Humma Humma” with popstar Mohammad Ali Shaiki in the 1980s, was first introduced to the general public at Bhit Shah in 1967. Other stars, including Faqir Ghafoor, Dhol Faqir and Hussain Bakhsh Khadim, spread the Sufi saint’s message of love and peace through music from this mound. One of the Waee wizards of today is Faqir Jumman Saeen, who recently performed at a Sufi festival in New York along with Abida Parveen. He paid his respects to the revered saint immediately on his return.

Before the musical night began, musicians said a prayer for the revered saint while sitting on the courtyard facing the grave.

Faqir Jumma and his band of 11 performers started the musical night with a prayer. As soon as Jumman began plucking the first notes on his five-stringed Damboor, women seated in front of him let their hair loose and started swirling their bodies to the rhythm of his music. Latif had devised a Damboor instrument that is unique to Sindh; the Arab and Persian version had only four strings before the saint’s innovation in the 18th century.

When the tempo of the music rose and the high notes resonated throughout the courtyard, the captive audience gathered around Jumma began to whisper among themselves, “Look, the women are being possessed by jinns!”

Women, some as young as 16 and some old as 45, twirled their bodies, banged their bangle-filled hands on the floor and splashed their hair on the courtyard to the sound of music as if in a trance. The spellbinding performance of both the musicians and the audience left everyone awestruck.

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Muharram Raaz, a local journalist who moonlights as a pir OCTOBER 17-23 2010

in the area, says that there are many tales of women being pos-

shrine to enjoy music in Bhit Shah along with his entire family.

sessed by supernatural forces in this part of the world. “But not

“I find peace of mind here,” he says. “We come here to listen to

all of them are true,” he says. He went on to give an example of

the best music in the world,” he added.

one 14-year-old girl, whose father sought his help in exorcising his daughter, who was supposedly possessed by a jinn.

The shrine’s Sajjada Nasheen Nisar Hussain Shah said he was aware of the new realities resulting out of the recent at-

“When I reached the house, I found the girl walking around a

tack on shrines, such as the one on Lahore’s Data Darbar. “One

tree and screaming hysterically,” Raaz recalled. He said he recit-

must understand that it has always been the culture of shrines

ed verses from the Holy Quran and gave the girl a glass of water,

to welcome people from all races, religions and beliefs. No one,

which she threw at his face and said “the jinn has made a home

including sinners, can be stopped from entering the dargahs of

in my body, go away.”

saints,” he said.

Raaz sensed that the girl acted more strangely in the pres-

However, the security at the shrine is lax. There’s no secu-

ence of her family members. He asked her father and brothers to

rity guard manning the gates. The walk-through bomb scan-

stand at a distance. He then told the girl that he knew she was ly-

ners too were not working. Shah said it was the state’s re-

ing to him and urged her to tell her the truth as he might be able

sponsibility to provide adequate security and nothing could be

to solve her problem. “It was then that she broke down and told

done if it didn’t bother with the arrangements at the shrine.

me that her father wanted to marry her off, when all she wanted

He agreed that extremists might try to target the shrine, es-

was to go to school,” he said.

pecially because of its unique culture of music. But he insisted

At a time when even shrines are under militant attack, people like the middle-aged Maula Bux come every Thursday to the

that “the state must ensure that nothing untoward happens at Latif’s shrine.” a

25 OCTOBER 17-23 2010

partying for

pakistan

BY FIFI HAROON

26 OCTOBER 17-23 2010

“Pakistan is cooking!” says Hammad Nasar of Green Cardamom; a London-based visual arts organisation that occupies curatorial space in Granta’s recent Pakistan edition. It may be a recipe for disaster, but terrorism, floods and corruption have made Pakistan infamous.

So it’s not surprising when a country inhabiting the first three headlines on most daily news bulletins starts finding dates in London’s event calendar. Last week was marked by two polar opposites: one sprouting from Britain’s colonial roots in the Indian subcontinent, the other from the racial mix (up?) of modern British society. From the genteel playing fields of Chelsea where Major Langland’s largely Pakistani XI tried valiantly to battle against the strapping British Army XI to the hot, sweaty global/ dance beats of the ‘Party for Pakistan’ at Islington O2, the common aim was to make some money for a beleaguered country.

Ninety-three-year-old Major Geoffrey Langland, eulogised by the Guardian’s Pakistan correspondent Declan Walsh and the BBC in print and television, certainly deserves acclaim for running an exemplary school high up in Chitral. Langland witnessed Pakistan’s birth in 1947 and chose to stay on. His life, full to the brim with adventure and educating, could easily find celluloid glory in a Tom Hanks film. He has sipped tea with a Princess (Diana), lunched with a General (Ziaul Haq), taught a world class cricketer (Imran Khan) and been kidnapped in Waziristan by a disgruntled tribal politician. As I said, Hollywood would look at him and mentally go ker-ching.

There was another general at the Major’s cricket fundraiser for the Langlands School and College. Former President Musharaf, looking somewhat dashing and civilian in a brown suede jacket exchanged pleasantries with the Major before he was accosted by British journalist and Bhutto family confidante Victoria Schofield demanding to know why he hadn’t actually returned to Pak-

Former President Musharaf, looking somewhat dashing and civilian in a brown suede jacket exchanged pleasantries with the Major before he was accosted by British journalist and Bhutto family confidante Victoria Schofield demanding to know why he hadn’t actually returned to Pakistan.

istan. The rest of us were content to gulp down slim cucumber sandwiches and crumbly scones while marvelling at the novelty of a Pakistan-England cricket match without suspicious no-balls.

I was also quite humbled to shake Major Langland’s hand and thank him for what he’s done for the country. The man is a marvel; 93 years old and still sharp as a whip on a horse’s back. And he’s pretty much dedicated his life to providing a decent education to the next generation in a remote part of his adopted country.

From old school to new Britain. “It’s a party for Pakistan, not a Pakistani party,” clarifies British Pakistani rapper-actor Riz Ahmed in a tongue-in-cheek promo for the event which shows Rapper Plan B turning up in a shalwar kameez for the dress rehearsal. I have a flashback to the first episode of “George ka Pakistan”, when a novice George Fulton arrives at a Karachi party in desi attire and ends up standing out like a sore thumb. “Com-

27

edy is a way of approaching people that is not blinkered,” says OCTOBER 17-23 2010

FEATURE Ahmed, “You can’t be indulgent or preachy when you’re trying to invite people in. But when you make them laugh and you’ve already got their attention.” So Party for Pakistan was a way to raise funds, draw attention and have a pretty great time “without being too precious.” A novel concept for many Pakistanis; we as a nation are rather inept at laughing at ourselves.

The event line-up fielded some club heavyweights; with Plan B heading the A list. Plan B aka Ben Drew’s second studio album “The Defamation of Strickland Banks” (2010) went straight to the top of the UK album charts, so he’s not exactly small fry. Then there were DJ’s Nihal and Pathaan, and the elusive Facejacker, who has made a career out of tricking people into believing just about anything in his immensely popular TV show on Channel Four.

Riz Ahmed’s first big attention-grabber led to shock and awe with Post 9/11 Blues. a satire on the fallout from the attack on the Twin Towers. He followed that up with Road to Guantanamo, playing one of the Tipton Three and more recently the hugely funny Four Lions. which tells the story of four bumbling wannabe Muslim terrorists fashioned a little too closely after the 7/7 bombers for many people’s comfort. I chatted to Ahmed about what motivated him and a motley crew (entrepreneur Imran Gilani, DJ Hanif Boogie and promoters Curious Generation) to embark on the party route to fundraising. “Some friends of mine were involved in raising funds for Haiti. It seemed absurd to me that there wasn’t something like this for Pakistan. We have a prominent diaspora in the UK and a history with Pakistan. The British public has been great at donating money but the news is dying down. So it’s up to us to create the interest. There were other people like Plan B who felt the same way and they didn’t need to be from a Pakistani background to think this is important.”

I can’t help but agree with Riz Ahmed when he uses the invariable buzz words: “disaster fatigue”. The inconvenient truth is that there is too much competition out there. If we want the world to keep giving we are going to have to give something back.

That’s why initiatives like Party for Pakistan or Major Langlands Twenty20 cricket match work. It deters people from believing they are pouring money into an endless pit. It allows them to enjoy an afternoon tea on the green or dance away their blues (post-

Riz Ahmed’s first big attention-grabber led to shock and awe with the

9/11 or otherwise) with some of the best club acts in the business

satirical Post 9/11 Blues

without feeling guilty for actually getting something for their money.

Where I don’t agree with Riz Ahmed is when he contends that “it’s tricky to try and create something as big as Live 8 for Pakistan.” Okay maybe not as big as Live 8 but how about something substantial? Ahmed feels that “people have become hardened.

It’s a different kind of time. The more we are exposed to different disasters the less they move us unfortunately. I don’t think we can mobilise that sort of coverage, support or media attention

28

now.” The issue is, if we are unable to create exactly that kind OCTOBER 17-23 2010

In Chelsea Major Langland’s Pakistani XI tried valiantly to battle against the British Army XI of mobilisation, Pakistan is going to become yesterday’s news.

The ragged newspaper that gets thrown away. A forgotten story.

Of course the world has changed. But it may have changed to our advantage. I think the time is ripe to make a huge online pitch. We need another party for Pakistan. Bigger, better, brighter. We need to get together and get on to every big media event’s hit list; be it ‘Pop idol’ gives back or persuading celebrities to come together and do a ‘Song for Pakistan,’ we have to get onto their radar. So how do we do it? The new buzz words here: social media marketing. The idea is to get like-minded people working together and raise some seed money to actually run the show.

Let’s be honest: no one has the time to do this 24/7 without getting a pay cheque. Get on Twitter. Use Facebook and Four Square to death and pool talents, resources and contacts to build, create and do. Tell Naomi Campbell to mass produce her T-shirts for Pakistan and see if you can get the franchise. Forget gripes with commercialism and sponsorships and start telling our story to the big corporations. Become eminent cyber guerrillas. To borrow from Adidas: impossible is nothing (you might start by in-

“people have become hardened.

It’s a different kind of time. The more we are exposed to different disasters the less they move us unfortunately. I don’t think we can mobilise that sort of coverage, support or media attention now.”

vading Adidas’ website and telling them Pakistan is a great place on which to focus their corporate responsibility campaign). And remember, party hard. a

29 OCTOBER 17-23 2010

COMMENT

the convert

BY FAREED ZAKARIA

If Tony Blair could get rid of his messiah complex, he would be a great politician 30 OCTOBER 17-23 2010

Blair’s politics were based on the views of a middle class guy

The years since the end of the cold war divide into two very different ages. The first, the 1990s, was dominated by the rise of free markets and free trade across the globe. The second, since 9/11, has been defined by terrorism, counterterrorism, war and Islamic radicalism. Bill Clinton is the symbol of the

losophy, Politics and Economics tutorials at Oxford but rather by

first decade and George W Bush of the second. Tony Blair is the

industrial power. “In a sense they wanted to celebrate the work-

only major political figure to span both eras, beginning his po-

ing class,” Blair writes of Old Labour, “not make them middle

litical life in the corridors of Davos and ending it in the mud flats

class — but middle class was precisely what your average worker

of Basra. He tells both tales in his engrossing memoir, A Journey,

wanted himself or his kids to be.” This insight was at the root of

but they never fuse into one larger story.

Blair’s rethinking of left-wing politics.

something much simpler. “I was middle class,” he writes, “and my politics were in many ways middle class.”

This is a larger statement of principle than it might seem. The Labour Party was founded to protect the working class, the huge mass of people who worked at factories when Britain was a great

The first half of the book is mostly about the rise of New La-

Blair presents his version of the third way not as an ideology,

bour, the so-called “third way”, which Blair attributes largely to

but as the common-sense view of a middle class “guy” who comes

his leadership, not without justification. He explains his conver-

at things from outside the hothouse of party politics. When de-

sion from the hard-left democratic socialism of the old Labour

scribing how he helped Gordon Brown — his partner in reform-

Party in a way that rings true. He was not one of those kids ob-

ing the Labour Party — he says he provided Brown with “a normal

sessed by political arguments. His ideas were shaped not by Phi-

person’s view of politics.” “The single hardest thing for a practicOCTOBER 17-23 2010

31

COMMENT

“It was war. It had to be fought and won. ... All this came to me ... with total clarity ... and stays still, in the same way, as clear now as it was then.” — Blair on 9/11 ing politician to understand,” Blair writes, “is that most people, most of the time, don’t give politics a first thought all day long.”

Their days are spent “worrying about the kids, the parents, the mortgage, the boss, their friends, their weight, their health, sex and rock ‘n’ roll.”

From Brown, Blair got mentoring about the Labour Party, the ins and outs of its organisation and its culture. Press reports of the book have made it sound as if Blair is nasty about Brown, but that is not true. He is complimentary, to the end, about Brown’s intelligence, drive and dedication. He expresses concerns about Brown’s willingness to take risks and his commitment to New Labour ideas, but mostly he describes their eventual clash as inevitable. They both felt they deserved the premiership, and Blair got it.

Blair never really identified with Labour’s long and romantic past. There is not a single Labourite prime minister he seems to admire. The British political figures he speaks well of are David Lloyd George, the last Liberal Party prime minister; the economist John Maynard Keynes, who was in his time a centrist figure; and Roy Jenkins, a Labour politician who left the party because it had moved too far left. He mentions Margaret Thatcher with care, knowing that she is an object of loathing for many on the British left, but he clearly believes that her market-based reforms were necessary and productive.

The political figure he most closely identifies with in the book, and for whom he has undiluted praise, is Bill Clinton. “He was the most formidable politician I had ever encountered,” Blair

Blair’s style keeps the reader thoroughly engaged

writes. “And yet his very expertise and extraordinary capacity at the business of politics obscured the fact that he was also a

much broader struggle. “It was war. It had to be fought and won.

brilliant thinker.” He sees Clinton’s approach as “a genuine, co-

... All this came to me ... with total clarity ... and stays still, in

herent and actually successful attempt to redefine progressive

the same way, as clear now as it was then.” Everyman has turned

politics: to liberate it from outdated ideology; to apply its values

into Winston Churchill.

anew in a new world.”

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Regarding the war on terror, the book assumes a very different

When speaking about the challenges of his first term in office,

character. It is marked by grand statements, sweeping generali-

Blair writes honestly and openly. The style is not the elegant Ox-

sations, constant evocations of destiny and national character,

bridge prose that might have been expected of a former prime

and long quotations from government reports and Blair’s speech-

minister but one filled with Americanisms. It is breezy, informal

es. All that was gray becomes black and white. There are hints

and candid enough to keep the reader thoroughly engaged.

of this personality earlier in the book. One day as Blair is worry-

Then comes 9/11, and Blair’s world turns upside down. He

ing about his New Labour agenda, he finds himself browsing in

writes that he immediately saw the terrorist attacks as part of a

the library of the prime minister’s official country house, Che-

OCTOBER 17-23 2010

nores politics, national interest, history and specificity, shoving a set of widely disparate phenomena into one grand narrative.

So two secular dictatorships and a Shiite theocracy are lumped with Al Qaeda, a Sunni fundamentalist movement that actually despises all those regimes.

One smaller example: Blair reveals that in his dealings with Vladimir Putin, Russia’s prime minister and then president, he was “sympathetic” to the fact that Putin’s war in Chechnya was being fought against “a vicious secessionist movement with Islamic extremism at its core.” But as a student of history, Blair surely knows that the Chechens were forced into the Russian Empire in the mid-19th century after decades of fierce resistance and have been desperately trying to free themselves ever since, on purely nationalist grounds. Over the last two decades, the Russian Army has killed 100,000 Chechen civilians, 10 percent of the population, and transformed more than a quarter of the republic into a wasteland. So yes, today there is Islamic extremism in Chechnya, but to describe the situation as Blair does misses something crucial.

On Iraq, Blair simply will not yield any ground to commonsense observation, as if any chink would be fatal to his position.

He insists that were it not for Iran and Al Qaeda, the twin forces of darkness working to undermine it, Iraq would have stabilised quickly and the invasion would have been a great success.

Throughout his discussion of the war on terror, Blair embraces any tortured logic to support his essential view that the war “is one struggle.” Al Qaeda entered Iraq after the invasion, so that proves that invading Iraq and fighting Al Qaeda were really one common struggle. And that is why he seems in recent public comments to be in favour of a preventive war against Iran.

It’s a pity that Blair has tried to turn himself into a messiah.

The world has much need of him as a politician. The fact is that Bill Clinton and Tony Blair were the two most successful political figures in the post-cold-war world because they understood the essential truth of economic policy in our times, which is centrist pragmatism. The left can govern only if it shows that it is ceaselessly determined to reform the public sector, be a good steward quers. He then compares his problems with civil service reform

of the people’s money and understand the needs of the middle

to Churchill’s battle against fascism. It is what his closest aid,

class. Blair’s brief discussion of the financial crisis showcases yet

Jonathan Powell, describes as his “messiah complex.”

again his political intelligence.

After 9/11, the messiah is unleashed. The enemy, as he sees

In a strange sense, Blair on terrorism recalls nothing so much

it, is Islamic extremism, a deep-rooted and worldwide cancer re-

as the Labour Party ideologues he used to make fun of as they

quiring a massive, sustained, generational onslaught from the

loudly declaimed about the nationalisation of industry, unilater-

West. Blair is admirably frank and tough-minded, but at heart,

al disarmament and workers’ communes. They were obsessed by

his is a millenarian view that resists any nuance or complexity.

an ideology, contemptuous of complicating facts on the ground,

Blair describes Dick Cheney as wanting to work “through the

fed up with a public that didn’t see the light and supremely con-

whole lot, Iraq, Syria, Iran, dealing with all their surrogates in

vinced that history, ultimately, would vindicate them. What do

the course of it.” Blair endorses this view. “It is one struggle,” he

you know. Tony Blair has turned out to be Old Labour after all. —

declares flatly. The problem with this perspective is that it ig-

NYT Syndication Services a

33 OCTOBER 17-23 2010

REVIEW

featured review of the week

restaurant fine-dining your way through history

BY NYLA DAUD

“Well no, the surname didn’t help at all,” laughs Ahmed Cheema good-naturedly. The public unfolding of Ahmed’s project proposal had been decidedly stormy. Cooking? Cheema senior wondered why in the world his son wanted to waste precious foreign exchange ‘learning’ to become a cook at an American institution! Apprenticing his son to the village ‘naee’ seemed a much more sensible thing to do.

But, having inherited his mother’s passion for food as an art form, Ahmed nurtured his project with an aesthetic and historic edge — the result is Andaaz. At a giddy three-floor rise, Andaaz spells history, art and a passion for food. Silhouetted against the magnificent Badshahi Mosque, Ahmed says, “This had to be my first choice of location for the restaurant, given the menu. Food tastes best when complemented by the ambience.” The ambience is established as you scale the old world flight of stairs flanked with historical mementos and antiques; it is an artistic journey through time that prepares you for the culinary experience you’re about to have.

The class act of desi cuisine, which Cheema has laboriously salvaged from the currently rampant mixes in the market, needed a specific backdrop: royal and regal. Guests flocking for tandoorgrilled — not charcoal-burnt, mind you — delicacies cannot but imbibe the pervasive sense of history. Having made the choice between Mughlai dastarkhwan and solid furniture sittings, both settings under the open sky, they become part of the unfolding drama of time and taste. It’s not just the luminescent dome of Aurangzeb’s mighty mosque in the background that calls for a willing suspension of disbelief but the feel of a vibrant and alluring bazaar-culture that has not really changed with time.

Andaaz reflects Iqbal Hussain’s influence and Ahmed frankly admires the artist’s courage in breaking ground for a culinary venture in the heart of the old city. “I was like, ‘Oh wow,’ when I came to dine at Cuckoos as a student. Iqbal Sahib had changed the 34 way people look at this area.”

OCTOBER 17-23 2010

The wow factor stayed put even as this restaurateur picked up technicalities at the Florida School of Culinary Arts. The excitement of that first exposure to the timeless ambience and rich culture of Lahore’s innards continued to marinade as Ahmed proceeded on a voyage of discovery: Calcutta, Goa, Peshawar, Sindh, Balochistan, Punjab, nothing was to be missed.

So, what makes Andaaz’s serving of bihari or malai or badami kebabs or Khyberi jhinga or mutton karahi or kajoo chicken not feel like having reinvented the wheel? “This is an effort to preserve the taste of desi food. I am not experimenting with recipes. I am using authentic recipes that have been eaten by people in these parts for ages. The battle is to keep the recipes unadulterated by modern day shortcuts. Changing the sequence of marinating or tampering with the order of adding the spices is a sure recipe for disaster.

Sub-continental cuisine depends for its taste on basic spices but

tradition Ahmed has nurtured his project with an aesthetic and historic edge

“I was like, ‘Oh wow,’ when I came to dine at Cuckoos as a student.

Iqbal Sahib had changed the way people look at this area.”

it’s the way you handle them that can bring out the subtlety of taste. Everybody uses cream and cheese in malai kebabs but take a detour by cutting on the marinade time and you end up losing the spirit of the meal.”

Thus guests driving down to Fort Road can be sure of the real thing; not the least being the tanginess of the tikkas or other grilled delicacies because Ahmed Cheema is a great disciple of the traditional tandoor. “Grill your meat over charcoal fires and out go the juices. The tandoor is the best oven ever invented,” says Ahmed, “Its shape ensures that you can get the high temperatures required for the perfect sajji. You see, in grilling you need to keep the juices inside the meat to prevent it from going dry.”

Cheema believes that serving food is also an art form seeped in history, which explains the demure damsels carrying hand-basinets and mini-hammams offering to help you wash your hands while you are rounding off your meal with paan masala picked off pewter platters. Having re-established the past, Cheema is however in no mood to put up his feet. Cheema next venture is going to be entirely, authentically present day.

35 OCTOBER 17-23 2010

REVIEW

book race and freedom

BY AMMARA KHAN

“The black man is not. Nor the white,” said Frantz Fanon, proclaiming that although the black-white dichotomy has lost its biological credibility, it is a lived experience within history that has been conceived as ‘real’ for a long time and thus, cannot be ignored. The persistence of postcolonial conflict in literature and philosophy is evident to the pertinence of historic-epistemological conditions of racism found in the modern conscience.

The classification of races was a simultaneous juncture with the emergence of countries and empires in what Foucault calls the ‘Classical Episteme.’ These Western fetishes, classification and marginalisation remain the backdrop of Isabel Allende’s latest novel Island Beneath the Sea. Set in the French colony of SaintDominigue and the Vieux Carré of New Orleans, between 1770 and 1810, the story focuses on Zarité, a slave girl of mixed race who is bought by Toulouse Valmorain when she is still a frail child.

Valmorain is a young Frenchman man who inherits a huge plantation and hundreds of slaves in Saint-Dominigue by his father. Zarite is condemned to a complicated relationship with her master in her search for freedom.

Although the Haitian revolt is not the focus of the narrative, Allende draws an accurate picture of the struggles between the affranchise, African slaves, the Republican and monarchist colonists.

“History repeats itself, nothing changes on this damned island,” says Allende to highlight the endurance of political unrest in Haiti today. The narration of the events in the history coincides with the convergence of Zarité from a frail child who needs nourishment and protection to a strong-willed woman who projects an esoteric status beyond the apparent circumstances she inhabits.

The invocation of indigenous resources by the author gives the otherwise boring narrative its shine. This brings us to an important motif which is essential to the overall narrative. Voodoo beliefs and dances serve as merging reality and spirituality in the story. “The 36 slave who dances is free”, Zarité is told when she is still a child.

OCTOBER 17-23 2010

liberty Isabel Allende sees freedom as something more than just political

The island beneath the sea is the symbol of everlasting spiritual freedom that is the greatest desire of Zarité.

In contrast to the vibrant character of Zarité, Valmorain’s is a rather flat character—a self-centered chauvinistic authoritative man. Although he owns her, he does not really know his slave.

By marginalizing her as the ‘Other,’ he fails to grasp the spiritual significance of Zarité.

Allende’s concept of freedom does not fit the structuralist notion of binary opposition of a slave master: Valmorain is a slave to his limited vision, his wife cannot escape her own mental terrors, while Zarité is capable of experiencing the essence of freedom in her dance: “No one can harm me when I am with the drums, I become as overpowering as Erzulie, loa of love”. Allende’s ambivalent treatment of freedom is closer to the post-structuralist emphasis on textual aporia we find in Derrida and Bhabha.

Enlightening and entertaining at the same time, Island Beneath the Sea is a great addition to Latin-American literature.

film of babies and bores

BY BATOOL ZEHRA

“Everybody loves babies” proclaims the film poster for Thomas Balmés documentary Babies and it seems that the director took that dubious assumption as a precept during filming. The documentary follows four babies from birth to first steps: Ponijao from Namibia, Mari from Tokyo, Bayar from Mongolia and Hattie from San Francisco. But adorable as the children are, they just can’t seem to make the documentary work. Babies are fascinating creatures. . . to their parents and watching babies is as trying as watching your not-very-close friend’s not-very-well-made home videos.

Babies captures some sweet moments in the lives of its subjects and will certainly hold meaning for them but for the general viewer it is singularly unenlightening.

The documentary’s observation of these babies’ parallel lives comes without a coherent idea or worldview. The only driving force behind scene after interminable scene of babies eating, babbling, crawling, playing, and pooping seems to be the idea that everybody loves babies and would want to watch them doing the mundane things that babies around them do every day. As the four babies reach important milestones in their first year, the documentary manages to highlight the differences in child-rearing in different cultures. In the age of YouTube, this documentary is certainly redundant and Thomas Balmes has done nothing that National Geographic and anyone with a handycam had not done already.

The result is that nary an image from Babies will truly excite.

Because the disjointed piecing together of the footage which resulted in 30 seconds of seeing Mari crawl followed by 20 seconds of Bayar’s carpet was not mind-numbing enough, the director thought foregoing subtitles could only help. So while the adults babble on in their native languages — Japanese, Mongolian, Namibian and English — we have no idea what they’re saying. Most of the time then we not only have no idea of what the babies are doing, but also none at all of what people around them are saying. Another concern, what exactly is Balmes trying to show? The camera

unenlightening only a mother could truly love Babies

rarely moves above the level of the baby — think of how boring a crawling baby’s view is and you’ll forgive them for the ear-shattering crying that the documentary is liberally peppered with. The focus on breasts in the scenes after birth, only seemed to confirm the view that the director wanted to explore how the world looks like to a baby after birth. Pretty soon though, we are looking not at the world from the vantage of the baby, but just at the baby itself with absolutely no reference to what is going on around it.

Everybody does not love babies, and few will find a compelling reason to like Babies. a 37 OCTOBER 17-23 2010

UP NORTH AND PERSONAL

expect the unexp

BY ZAHRAH NASIR

It’s been a rumbly, grumbly, thundery sort of day today with periodic sun rays selecting targets at random: the rump of a woe begone mule; the grime-encrusted face of a child; the wedding finery of a teenage girl; the red, bronze and yellow tinged leaves of autumnal trees and, most surprisingly of all, the luminescent snow white feathers of a confused homing pigeon resting beneath a suddenly glowering mass of piled up dull grey clouds. There was ‘that’ kind of feel in the air. An atmosphere

of something a little off balance. A day to expect the unexpected.

A day that didn’t disappoint! The morning progressed with one unlikely event after another.

The painted China Doll, who resides in a house overgrown

with trees, called from her overgrown field, her tinkling, teeth-

grating tone setting the dogs off in a flurry of frenzied barking.

“Zahrah Auntiiii, Zahrah Auntiiiii, Zahrah Auntiiiiiiiii! You

are coming to the wedding aren’t you? You’re already late so

I’ve come to get you and do you have a silver bag I can borrow to match my shoes. Silver nail polish too, although gold would be okay?”

The China Doll – her actual name escapes me – is a scaled up,

insubstantial version of the porcelain Cinderella in a midnight blue, star-dotted ball gown and has earned me the reputation of a ‘healer’. When I met her, she was throwing the most incred-

ibly childish fit, weeping, wailing, rolling her eyes, drooling, stamping her feet and gurgling nonsense in a relative’s kitchen

when the two frightened girls sent to fetch me hauled me in.

Other women were standing around in awe having tried, and failed, with every calming remedy they could think off.

although how she was going to magic it home, unless she ex-

wasn’t ill, wasn’t in shock, wasn’t anything other than furious

did not lend it to her, I never did find out.

Having ascertained that the China Doll wasn’t an epileptic,

at being refused the loan of a piece of jewellery she fancied, I

Not owning a silver bag or any shade of nail polish at all I

did what any other disgusted person in their right mind would

couldn’t lend them to her but get me to the wedding she would,

terminedly haunted me ever since. Materialising as she does,

lish students among them) who had periodically hammered on

have done and slapped her, hard, across the face. She has deout of bushes, from behind slender tree trunks, out of morning mist, evening gloom and completely out of nowhere, she is

never attired in anything but her spotless best. No rags for this

38

pected me to carry it up for her, is quite beyond me and since I

particular Cinderella I can tell you. She is in training to be a lady

but once forgot herself as far as to ask to borrow the lawnmower OCTOBER 17-23 2010

as would the two dozen women and teenage girls (my three Engthe front gate all morning. Donning the first ironed shalwar

kameez that came to hand, I reluctantly toddled off to join the ‘clan’ . . . and walked straight into Amy Winehouse!

Queen of the big-hair brigade, six inches of false eyelashes

plastered into place with six inches of mascara outlined with

pected

rible. Whasmatterwiem?”

“It’s your shoes” I gulped. “They’re awestruck by your shoes.”

Cornering one of my students, an exceptionally bright young

lady in her early twenties, I suggested she introduce herself to the seventeen-year-old London Pakistani who was a relative of the groom-to-be and surprise her by speaking in English. Off

she went, her extremely smart peach and cream chiffon jora

flowing in the breeze, duppata demurely in place and a wicked gleam in her eye. Marching up to Amy Winehouse with her

hand extended, she said a few words and marched back, leaving Amy totally gobsmacked!

“That was quick,” I said in surprise. “What did you say to her?

She looks shocked.”

“I was down at my Uncle’s house in Rawalpindi last week,”

she explained. “My cousins are over from Manchester and one of them – he’s fourteen – taught me some new words so I practiced those.”

“What did you say?” I repeated in trepidation. “Come on. Tell

me.”

“Well Aunty. I don’t like her and I don’t like how she’s dressed

or how she is carrying on. She is the kind of girl who get’s Pakistanis a bad name.”

“Out with it. What did you say?”

“I know it isn’t very nice Aunty but my cousin told me that it’s

what you say when you want somebody to go away.”

“What?” I demanded, trying to keep my voice down.

“Well…..I just told her, ‘F*** off you b******. F*** off back to

London, we don’t want you here.’”

Stunned speechless at first, I then had to bite my lip in an at-

tempt at stifling the volcanic eruption of laughter and instruct

my prize student absolutely never to say this again….ever….. and that I’d explain a little more when she came for her next

lesson which I, by the way, am dreading as she is sure to have learned more in a similar vein if my knowledge of Lancashire teenagers is anything to go by.

Meanwhile, not to be outdone, Amy Winehouse was quietly

so much eyeliner that she resembled a chimney sweeps brush with a lurid red mouth, this out of place vision, balancing on

six inches of strappy gold stiletto heels, a heavily embroidered crimson and gold churridar, vastly overworked shirt, six inch

long earrings and an extraordinary feather boa kind of duppata

filling all the gaps in between, lit up a cigarette in a six-inchlong golden holder, strutting her stuff as she cursed, in a rough London accent into her glittery mobile phone. Good grief!

Who on earth invited Amy Winehouse to this little mountain

filing her blood-red talons and planning her revenge over by a

prickly rose bush and, with visions of mayhem and even murder in my overcrowded mind, I went to calm her down. which is when the china doll tapped my shoulder and whispered “Zahrah

Auntiii. The bride has locked herself in the washroom and refuses to come out. She says she doesn’t want to get married. Her mother is crying. The bride is crying. The bridegroom has just arrived. The maulvi is waiting, there are 300 hundred guests and she refuses to come out. We need you to talk to her please.”

The moral of the story: When weird atmospheric conditions

wedding in rural Pakistan?!

prevail and there is ‘that’ kind of feeling floating around, it is

body’s staring at me at all the time and I don’t know why. Itsor-

ly restored. a

“Whorrryou?” she asked as I stared in fascination. “Every-

best to lie low until after the storm has broken and sanity is safeOCTOBER 17-23 2010

39

HOROSCOPE

BY SHELLEY VON STRUNCKEL

Aries March 20 – April 19 Putting off decisions until Saturday may

seem an unnecessary waste of time. However, once you realise that it’s the second of this year’s two, rare, Full Moons in Aries,

you’ll understand why anything major should wait. This involves plans, commitments and, most importantly, matters of

a personal nature. The insights you gain over the coming week could transform your perspective on your life, and yourself.

Taurus April 20 – May 20 While it’s true that in several situations

you either have little say in decisions or must leave them up to Shelley von Strunckel is an internationally acclaimed astrologer who created the first horoscope column for the London Sunday Times in 1992.

others, they’re more knowledgeable than you or have your best

interests at heart. In most cases this is clear. But even in those where the logic of their actions is unclear, your instincts tell you they’re trustworthy enough you’re happy to take a chance.

A frequent lecturer, she writes daily, weekly and monthly horoscopes in publications around the world including South China Morning Post, The Gulf News, Tatler, French and Chinese Vogue and now The Express Tribune Magazine.

Gemini May 21 – June 20 During this week of remarkable develop-

ments and stunning insights, you’ll both overcome various seemingly insurmountable obstacles and make amazing progress. But

things won’t always go as planned. Consequently, you’ll have to rely, first, on your feelings, as indicated by brilliant aspects by both your

ruler Mercury and the Sun to intuitive Neptune. And then, later in the week, on Mars’ extremely fortunate aspect to bountiful Jupiter.

Cancer June 21 – July 21 Because next Saturday’s Full Moon ends a

month long cycle of dramas involving family or domestic matters,

you’re somewhat on edge. However, a series of frequent and helpful or, perhaps, inspiring events and encounters both encourage you and pave the way profitable developments. This includes sudden and

rather unexpected events, which while they reshape arrangements at the last minute, you later realise were exactly what was needed.

Leo July 22 – August 22 A combination of good timing and surprising but exciting developments transform previously frustrating

situations into those brimming with unexpected promise. While in some cases their direction is clear, others involving moving ahead one step at a time. Or perhaps taking things on faith.

Virgo August 23 – September 22 Trusting your instincts is never

easy for an earth sign. But with both the Sun and your ruler Mercury brilliantly aspecting the planet that’s all about intuition

and transformation, Neptune, those feelings won’t just result

in insights. What you learn could broaden your horizons amazingly, via encounters, offers and exciting ideas. If in doubt, don’t say no. Explore absolutely everything. You’ll never regret it.

40 OCTOBER 17-23 2010

Libra September 23 – October 22 Ever since the Libra New Moon on the 7th, you’ve been reviewing your life with a critical eye to

situations and relationships that take a lot and give nothing in

return. While you’re not ready to say farewell to these just yet,

this week’s developments make you realise just how amazing your options are. Enough that you’ve the courage necessary to stand up for yourself.

Scorpio October 23 – November 21 Focusing on tricky obligations and disentangling yourself from unfair arrangements may not

sound appealing. While there’s no question these need atten-

tion, you’re still hoping for some sort of breakthrough. You get it, in the form of the opportunity to discuss these matters frank-

ly. Do so, no holds barred. This may mean revealing more than you’d intended, but it forces others to be just as open.

Sagittarius November 22 – December 20 Initially, certain ar-

rangements seemed a good idea. But they’ve been disappointing, although you’ve continued in that belief eventually they’d

be worthwhile. Now you must face the fact that these and various other commitments are cluttering your life. Ruthlessly cut

away the deadwood now, while you can. The more you clear the freer you’ll be for when Mars’ move into Sagittarius, on the 28th, changes everything.

Capricorn December 21 – January 19 If ever there was a time to act first and think later, it’s now. True, this impulsive approach is

entirely counter to your instincts as a Capricorn. But with the Full Moon on the 23rd triggering changes in elements of your work or

lifestyle anyway, this is no time to be cautious. So plunge in, knowing that you can tidy up details later.

Aquarius January 20 – February 17 Stunning planetary activity indicates not only intriguing ideas, but developments that could transform even seemingly impossible situations. Waste no time questioning the whys and wherefores of these, especially since many

have no simple answers. If ever there was a time to learn from

experience, it’s now. What’s more, things are moving swiftly. So much that once they’re gone, those options will vanish for good.

Pisces February 18 – March 19 Every Pisces has a rich fantasy life

in which both your problems and the dilemmas those you care about most are resolved, all in one go. This week’s stars bring

you as close as is possible to exactly that. True, this means taking

chances and, more challenging, persuading others to join you in doing so. Still, with circumstances this persuasive, they won’t

For more information, to order personal charts and to download & listen to detailed audiocasts, visit www.shelleyvonstrunckel.com

struggle much.

41 OCTOBER 17-23 2010

THE HATER

10 things I hate about ......pets

1 2 3 4 5

BY NADIR HASSAN

They are out to get you. A colleague once narrated a story of her friend, whose pet snake (!) hadn’t been eating for a few days. Every night, the snake would stay hungry and gaze soulfully at its owner. Eventually, she took her pet to the vet who had to put it down. The reason: the snake had been starving itself to build up an appetite and eat its owner.

Pet owners: If you keep a pet snake, you deserve to be someone’s breakfast.

6 7 8 9 10

Stubbornness. If your child refuses to eat his dinner, have a bath or sleep on time you will scold him, scream at him and maybe even smack him on the bottom. If your pet does all of that — and it will — you will just let it be.

They are our masters. We scoop up their poo, play inane games with them and feed them by hand.

The only good thing about this is that when an alien civilisation comes to conquer earth, they’ll go after the pets and leave us poor enslaved humans alone.

These creatures will bring the internet to its knees. You might think there is unlimited space on the web. You will be proven wrong by the imbeciles who post photographs of their pets on Facebook and videos of them on YouTube. You might think your cat looks cute in a bow-tie; we don’t.

Their depiction in popular culture. Hey, Timmie, Try getting stuck in quicksand for real some time. Lassie won’t be helping you out; she’ll be licking her nether regions.

The battered-wife syndrome. Here’s a common refrain from pet owners: “It’s not poor Choo-Choo’s fault that he bit me. I should have made sure the water in his bath was one degree cooler.”

42 OCTOBER 17-23 2010

Their promiscuity. Pets have no standards. They mate with just about everything, including stray animals and your couch.

Their taste for luxury. There’s a reason why pet food is more expensive than anything else at Agha’s supermarket. They know money is no obstacle to keeping our pampered pooches happy.

They bring out the eugenicist in humans. Pets turn us into Jospeh Mengle. We’ll gobble down just about every animal there is — so long as they’re not cute. The adorable ones we treat with tenderness, love and care. Pets make murderous racism acceptable. a

JUNE 13-19 2010

JUNE 13-19 2010