Lawn ki kahani, meri zubani ( The story of Lawn in my words)

Published in TheNews Blog : http://blogs.thenews.com.pk/blogs/2012/03/21/story-of-a-lawn-hater/ Designer lawn, designer lawn, designer lawn! Every Sana, Nida and Hina is coming out with designer lawns. Thankfully never a fan of lawn as a material, it does not awaken the woman in me. However I remember my mother, who lives in Delhi, where summers are really biting, once came [...]

Celebrate the woman inside you !

Published in TheNewsBlog:  http://blogs.thenews.com.pk/blogs/2012/03/08/celebrate-the-woman-inside-you/ While discussing how one should celebrate International Women’s Day this year, a friend said: “It is not just the abuse outside that we women need to fight, but we have to fight an inside war too.” I did not quite understand what she really meant, but before I could ask she went [...]

FAREWELL TO HUMSAFAR with style.

Published in TheNewsBlog >> http://blogs.thenews.com.pk/blogs/2012/03/06/farewell-humsafar-with-a-style/ It was destined that I had to watch it. Yes nothing but destiny could do that, knowing how averse to dramas I am. Overwhelmed with the real life political and social dramas that go around us, fiction has never touched my heart. However, the imaginative FAREWELL TO HUMSAFAR potluck party called [...]

Gimme all your worries

Published in TheNews Blog : http://blogs.thenews.com.pk/blogs/2012/02/13/%E2%80%9Cgimme-all-your-worries%E2%80%9D/ “What if my boss doesn’t like my work?” What if I get cancer? What if I don’t pass the exam? What if my friends don’t like my dress? What if Mommy doesn’t come back from work? Worries! Age, gender and ethnicity, is no bar. From babies to youth to middle [...]

Do not call them mad, please!

Published in The News Blog on February 22, 2012 :http://blogs.thenews.com.pk/blogs/2012/02/22/do-not-call-them-mad-please/ When I feel feverish, lethargic, sneeze and have a runny nose, all know I suffer from common cold, and that I am infected with a virus. If I tell them that I went to see my GP and am taking meds, they all know medications [...]

Sights and Sounds May Disappear, but Smell Shall Linger.

Published in TheNewsBlog February 7, 2012. http://blogs.thenews.com.pk/blogs/2012/02/07/sights-and-sounds-may-disappear-but-smell-shall-linger/ “When I miss her, I go to her closet to sense my daughter’s fragrance.” Arfa Karim‘s Mom said on her 17th birthday. The words from the teary eyed mother gave me goose bumps. She was certainly not talking about the perfumes that Arfa adorned, but the odour that she [...]

Painfully Humane

Published in TheNewsBlog on January 31, 2012. http://blogs.thenews.com.pk/blogs/2012/01/31/painfully-humane/ A couple of days ago I met a neighbour outside the house, walking her two cute cocker spaniels. We exchanged New Year Greetings and as a ritual I asked: “So how did you spend your new years eve?” “Oh I spent my evening feasting with my girls.” she [...]

Daring to cross the love border

Published in Aman Ki Asha, The News on January 24, 2012. Ilmana Fasih shares some stories of building cross-border bridges through the social media A world without borders was my childhood dream. The desperation and the need for this dream to realise, came out in the open when I embarked on my ‘pyar border paar’ [...]

Of Unity, Faith and Discipline

First published in Blog TheNews :  http://blogs.thenews.com.pk/blogs/2011/12/22/of-unity-faith-and-discipline/ One evening, the perpetual sad news on the television of sectarian killings, petty politics, poverty and floods overwhelmed me and made me feel a little nauseated. To get fresh air, I walked outside in the lawn, only to see a threesome of geese sitting beside a bird feeder. [...]

Continuation of a joint heritage

Published in Aman Ki Asha , in TheNews on December 14, 2011. http://amankiasha.com/detail_news.asp?id=584 Ilmana Fasih recounts some examples of the ‘Ganga Jamuni Tehzeeb’ and centuries’ old, peaceful coexistence beyond religious divides An otherwise sane looking person I met at a party recently started to spew venom laced with conspiracy theories about “Hindu Muslim animosity”. To top [...]