Yaadish Bakhair: Abdul Hadi

Abdul Hadi of Nauabad, Quetta

"Observe what he does, look into his motives, find out in what he is at peace. Can a man hide himself? Can a man hide himself?" 
                                                                                            Confucius
Abdul Hadi (Mama Hadi)

“Oh, so you are Hadi sahib’s nephew. Why didn’t you say so earlier? No problem, just give me a minute and I’ll get your file in. Please have a seat here. What would you like to have? Green tea or tea with milk?” I have no count of how many times I have heard that in the numerous government offices of Quetta, from superintendents, section officers, office clerks and peons. Hundreds of times, I am sure, if not a thousand. Anybody who has lived in Pakistan, or knows a thing or two about how Pakistani government offices work can easily understand what that sort of thing means and can easily relate to it. There, in Pakistani offices, especially government offices, unless you hear something like that from the demigods who populate those offices---all the way from the G-21 secretary to the peon, or the chaprasi--- you are sure to spend days, weeks and months, if not years, without getting the smallest of things done----your very legitimate official things, that is, as were my cases. Unfortunate as it is in a way, through the years that I lived in Pakistan, I got things done that way, by mentioning the magic word: Abdul Hadi. 

                                   

My uncle Abdul Hadi, the elder brother of Nasim Ahmed about whom I wrote earlier on this blog site, was a workaholic. A government servant all his life, he was a dedicated professional. I have used that adjective "professional" before. What I primarily mean by it is someone who does his or her best in the most difficult and trying of situations. It has, of course, other denotations and connotations as well, but that is the meaning that I often have in mind when I use it. Abdul Hadi became a public servant soon after graduation, moved through the different tiers of the provincial bureaucracy by dint of hard work and finally retired as an Assistant Commissioner for Quetta District. Just like in private life, he was old school in public life, too. What that means is that he had an old-fashioned work ethic which required a sincere commitment,  a principled dedication to his work. Ever ready to deal with all sorts of emergencies that his tough job demanded, he was often on duty round the clock, all day and all night, and would return home at dawn only to leave again for work a couple of hours later. 

In office with local elders

Widely known, especially in the official circles of the city, he was loved and respected not just for his professionalism but more than that, for the kind of person he was: generous, self-effacing and at home with all, irrespective of social class, age, caste, tribe or ethnicity etc. He was more Hadi Sahib than Abdul Hadi Hazara or any other ethno-religious appellation attached to his name that would make him tribal, parochial or sectarian, or so perceived, if I may put it that way. For sure, he had his own distinct identity---ethnic, linguistic, cultural-religious, like we all do----but he was there for all, an awami figure universally approachable, as a true public servant should be in an ethnically and linguistically diverse, multi-cultural society. And that is also because he was old school through and through. Like his good friends and colleagues from almost all the ethnic and linguistic groups of Quetta City, he was an authentic Quetta Waal. He belonged to that breed and generation of people who are now fast becoming extinct as its last remaining members who embody the old values (iqdaar) of Quetta Waali retire and pass away. Indeed, the city will be impoverished in a very profound sense when the last of these noble souls vacate the social, cultural, political and religious landscape of Quetta City.

Pishin posting (in white shalwar kameez and coat)

Abdul Hadi was a man of community. The community that he was born into and where he lived all his life is called Nauabad, meaning “new neighborhood’ or “new community” although it is anything but. There is a story about this old Alamdar Road mohalla of equally old Hazaras that it was established at the start of the last century by his father Mullah Ghulam Ali and with that it came to be known as “Nauabad”. I cannot attest to the authenticity of that, though. My uncle Hadi was a regular and constant presence in his community. Exhibit: on any given evening, especially after he retired, he could be seen cleaning not just the patch of asphalt in front of his house, but the entire street. Water hose in one hand and a sturdy long broom in the other, he would wash and sweep the narrow street with a small army of boys and girls, all mohalla kids, running about him and helping as he instructed each one of them their assigned chores. One of these kids would pick the pile of collected garbage, another would bag it, a third would run it to the collection spot for final removal and a fourth would assist with the long hose to make sure it did not get bent or stuck somewhere and so on. And then there were times when he would use his position to make sure the mohalla had its electricity, water and gas running, not in a way that would be considered unfair or illegitimate use of power, or abuse of authority, but doing all of it within the bounds of propriety and general human decency. Those who obliged, who carried out his orders or requests, did so more because of his accommodating character and genial personality than because of his official authority or position in the government, anyway. In him and in what he used to do in and for his community, one could discern the ethos that are the very foundations of any tightly-knit traditional community where people are like one big family, like a single organic unit, where they are equal partners in everything small and big, in all that makes the community smile and cry, in happiness and in tragedy, or in life and in death. Old school, again. 

Nauabad

Nauabad

                                                                                            

There was something about Abdul Hadi of Nauabad, something that one could not quite point out clearly or put in precise words, yet one knew it and felt it because of his downright, unostentatious presence. There was humility and a dignified demeanor, for sure. There was the generosity of spirit and self-effacement that I have already mentioned. These were qualities that attracted both the young and the old equally. But there was something more: a certain calmness, a quiet repose that was a kind of carelessness about, or a disregard for the mundane and the petty. This carelessness was invariably accompanied by an attentiveness to things usually ignored by the many, a subtle attentiveness to the invisible, little things: an attitude that can be called sophisticated simplicity (exemplified in the way he dressed and spoke) and that befits a dervish. Perhaps it was that. This quiet calmness could be seen not only when he was doing his community chores with his team of mohalla kids---which he obviously enjoyed---- but also when he was in the midst of his often nerve-wrecking, round-the-clock assignments as the Assistant Commissioner of Quetta district. After all, he was, yes----old school.

With friend Flt. Lt. Samad Ali Shaheed

Yaadish Bakhair.


Note: The people that I write about in this Yaadish Bakhair series were all too human, just like the rest of us: frail, fallible, imperfect. The attempt here is not to paint them as super-humans, or to elevate them to the angelic realm of perfection, but to shine a light on one, two or some aspects of their multi-dimensional personalities. These are mere fragments, or fragmentary sketches, about the subject personalities the way I saw and knew them, and the way I now remember and write about them. These are not whole biographies. How could they be? Yes, there is choice involved since we cannot do without that when we engage in any discourse, of this type or any other variety: a story told is always another one ignored. Others may see things differently and may wish to draw their own conclusions and sketches.

For more, click:Hussainabad:The place, the people and their values

Visit (click):          Dervaish's Quetta Channel (Youtube)

TGB: The noble, the holy, the sage and the primordial

TGB: The noble, the holy, the sage and the primordial (Hanif)

"Let the beauty we love be what we do."                                   Rumi

" The noble man is one who dominates himself.

The noble man is one who masters himself and loves to master himself; the base man is one who does not master himself and shrinks in horror from mastering himself.

The noble man always maintains himself at the centre; he never loses sight of the symbol, the spiritual gift of things, the sign of God, a gratitude that is both ascending and radiating.

The noble man is naturally detached from mean things, sometimes against his own interests; and he is naturally generous through greatness of soul.

The noble man is one who dominates himself; the holy man is one who transcends himself. Nobility and holiness are the imperatives of the human state.

The knowledge which man does or can enjoy is at the same time animal, human and Divine. It is animal in so far as man knows through the senses; it is human when he knows by reason; and it is Divine in the contemplative activity of the intellect.

For the sage, every star, every flower, is metaphysically a proof of the Infinite.

Primordial man knew by himself that God is; fallen man does not know it; he must learn it.

Primordial man was always aware of God; fallen man, while having learned that God is, must force himself to be aware of it always.

Primordial man loved God more than the world; fallen man loves the world more than God, he must therefore practice renunciation.

Primordial man saw God everywhere, he had the sense of archetypes and of essences and was not enclosed in the alternative "flesh or spirit"; fallen man sees God nowhere, he sees only the world as such, not as the manifestation of God."

                                                       Isa Nur Al Din (Frithjof Schuon)

Haqq.      Khair.     Jamal.

For more, click: Bandagi

Yaadish Bakhair: Sadiq Ali

Sadiq Ali of Hussainabad, Quetta

Sadiq Ali (Kaka Sadiq)

"The best things in life are not things."                           Ann Landes

It is early morning in mid-summer in Baleli, some 30 kms out of Quetta City in the direction of Kuchlak, Pishin district. It’s a Sunday and we are all in the middle of the lush orchards in the heart of this Pushtun farming region outside Quetta City. There are more than a dozen of us from Hussainabad, mostly young Hazara men in their early 20s. I am the only one who is not in the same age group. 

The reason why we are here is swimming, to be done in the “pool” which is actually a brick and mortar reservoir that the local farmers use for storing water for agricultural use, a talaab as they call it in the vernacular tongue. It is commonly known as “Panj Foota” by the patrons who have gathered here today. Translated into English, that means a 5 feet deep pool. Brimming with clear, blue (tube)-well water, it is smaller than a standard 25 ft pool but is large enough to function like one. Two have already dived in as the others get ready to jump in. Suddenly there is loud noise, at first not clear but which soon becomes clear as a litany of expletives shouted out by one of the two swimmers inside the pool. He has just resurfaced right in the middle of the pool and is screaming, “It’s shit! It’s real, stinking shit, a big, long lump of turd! ^%#)*&^%#...It’s shit! Yuck, it smells bad! #&^%$#F&…it’s sticking to my ear…!” As he says those words, he disappears underwater and resurfaces again next to us, near the edge of the pool. We all freeze for a few seconds, not sure how to respond to what has just happened. The shouting swimmer springs out of the pool and starts running wild in the orchards, constantly slapping his right ear with his right hand. Suddenly everybody bursts into loud laughter and the guy starts screaming his profanities at us. Upon close observation by the others, it is discovered that somebody had used that pool----the popular Panj Foota talaab----as his private toilet the night before and, given the size, shape and hardness of that lump of fecal waste, he had been constipating for quite some time! Precious Sunday spoiled, all return to the city, dry and without a good day’s swim. On the way, some of them tease the poor guy who had the honor of discovering the smelly brown lump floating on the surface of the water in the middle of the pool. If I am not mixing this particularly memorable day with another Sunday visit to Panj Foota, I was with my uncle Sadiq Ali, my Kaka Sadiq.

Hanna Lake, Quetta

My uncle Sadiq Ali was the second youngest among his brothers, my father being the eldest of the five brothers. Swimming was one of his passions and it was he who taught me how to swim. Apart from the Panj Foota Sundays, he would also take me to Hanna Lake which was the other popular place for Hussainabadi swimmers. He would pull me behind him or swim me on his back to the deeper sections of the lake and then leave me there all by myself to swim back to the shore. That is how many of us boys learned to swim then. In Quetta of those days it was rare, a matter of shame actually, for a Hazara boy not to know how to swim. Swimming and Hazaras were things synonymous.

Sadiq Ali (wearing yellow cap) with friends

But it’s not just swimming that I remember when I think of Kaka Sadiq. First of all, he was a man of many friends, and all very good friends. He always had ample company, be it the swimming excursions, the movies, the picnics in Pir Ghaib or Ziarat, or any other social occasion in the community. Talking of movies, he was also the uncle who often used to take me along with him to watch Hollywood westerns at the iconic Regal Cinema of Quetta. All the well-known westerns and war movies I watched at that cinema with him and his friends: McKenna’s Gold, Shane, High Noon, Dirty Dozen, The Great Escape, The Magnificent Seven, Death Wish, The Poseidon Adventure, to name just a few. 

Kaka Sadiq loved movies, not just Hollywood movies but also Bollywood productions. And what an age it was, the 1970s and early 1980s when Bollywood churned out some of its greatest movies starring superstars like Rajesh Khanna, Amitabh Bachan, Jeetandra, Sanjev Kumar, Dharmendra, Shatrugan Sinha, Pran, Shashi and Rishi Kapoor, Vinod Khanna, Sunil Dutt, Danny, Amjad Khan, Rakhi, Zeenat Aman, Parveen Bobby, Neethu Singh, Poonam Dhillon, Hema Malini, Mumtaz, Shabana Azmi, Sharmila Tagore et.al. When the age of VCR dawned in Quetta, Kaka would have these great movie watching gatherings in the evenings, with half the mohalla (neighbors) seated on the rooftop and in the open backyard of his house on Samad Ali Shaheed Street. The old top-loading, bulky Phillips VCRs that ate the brick sized tapes bootlegged from Germany, Denmark and the U.K. by returning Hussainabadis, needed constant cooling with two pedestal fans running at full speed to keep them functional in the sweltering Quetta summers then. The movies were blockbusters of the day: Sholay, Don, Qurbani, Yarana, Dostana, Lawaaris, Amar-Akbar-Anthony, Qarz, Muqaddar ka Sikander, Anand, Deewar, Zanjeer, Gol Maal, Pakeeza, Amar Prem, Kati Patang and yes, Kabhi Kabhi and Bobby. Those last two movies in the list above were Kaka’s favorites and it was the songs of these movies that were always playing in his Mazda Luce. Songs like “Hum tum ek kamray mein band hon…aur chabi kho jaaye….’ And then there was the Kishore song from the 1975 movie Julie that he used to hum all the time: “Bhool gaya sub kuch, Yaad nahi abb kuch oh ho, hmm hmm, ek yahi baat na bhooli, Julie I love you…” He just loved that song, so much so that he even nick-named his eldest daughter Julie. What a time it was!

                                                     

Oh Yes, the Mazda. First, it was the Mazda Luce 1500cc, and then the navy blue 1800cc one. Those were beautiful cars about which I have written previously on this blog. Although he changed cars later on in his life, he loved those Mazda models the best and would never stop talking about them. My love of cars comes mainly from my uncles Sadiq Ali and Sikander Ali.

Sadiq Ali, his friends and the Mazda Luce

But it was something else----more than the movies, the cars, the Panj Foota and Hanna Lake swimming excursions-----that make up my most vivid and enjoyable memories of my years with Kaka Sadiq: kites, or patang/guddi baazi. Kaka Sadiq was a great kite flyer, a connoisseur when it came to guddi baazi. During the freezing months of late fall and early to mid-winter, I would be on the roof with Kaka, I holding the charkhali loaded with the finest and the most expensive manja of the season and he flying the kites, doing pechaow battles with the master kite flyers---the khaar baaz kite flyers, or the cool dudes----of Lodi Maidan and Tel Gudaam, an old neighborhood off the main Toghi Road. And how exciting all of it was for me. Lips dry and chapped, all the extremities of my body like ear and nose tips red because of the extreme cold weather, fingers with cut marks filled with half-dried, jelly-like blood clots because of the excessive use of razor sharp manja, but none of that mattered as long as the wind was good and the sky full of kites. Kaka had an expert’s eye when it came to manja and kite and his favorite kite was the graceful Paan Chobi, a special type of kite that was made with a seamless, single sheet of kite paper, no stripes, designs or patch work of any kind. The paan chobi had match stick sized, finely cut wooden strips glued to the paan, the bottom part of the kite. This special paper and stick combination in the paan gave the kite stability and strength in strong winds and it was one of the best attack kites in a pechaow, save the split-framed curvy patang.

The Paan Chobi kites

 And then Kaka suffered a terrible stroke. That ended many things for us, including kite flying. The left side of his body became almost completely paralyzed and he had extreme difficulty remembering and doing things. It was devastating for the family, for all of us. Our time together took a new turn: regular visits to Dr. Manaf Tareen’s clinic, the only properly qualified heart specialist and surgeon in Quetta then. I would take him to Dr. Manaf’s clinic twice, and sometimes, three times a week. Kaka’s children, my cousins, were still very young, all of them of school going age. Sadiq Ali also had a unique sense of humor, his satirical remarks were sometimes acerbic and his wit, darkish. At times he would say things that one was not sure what to do in the way of response. One day, on one of our regular visits to the cardiologist Manaf’s clinic, while sitting in the waiting room for his turn, he whispered in my ear: “Is this man really a doctor or is he pretending to be one? I think he is a pretender.” He then turned his face away and himself started pretending, as if he had said nothing and I had heard nothing. He sat there for a few seconds like that, keeping me confused, and then suddenly looked my way and smiled and while he was doing that the buzzer rang: it was his turn. “Lexotonil”, he murmured as we got up to move from the waiting room to the doctor’s room. Lexotonil was the drug (some kind of anti-depressant I think) that the doctor prescribed to him every time we visited his clinic.

Click:  Julie Song Link: Bhool Gaya subh kuch, yaad nahi abb kuch...

Sadiq Ali and friends

I listen to the great Mukesh song Kabhi Kabhi now and then, and often to songs by Kishore Kumar, my favorite singer, and when it is either Mukesh’s “Kahi door jab din dhal jaaye…” (another of Kaka’s favorite from the movie Anand) or Kishore’s “Bhool gaya sub kuch, yaad nai abb kuch…” I cannot but think of Kaka Sadiq. As the great Kishore sings this beautiful song, all the bits and pieces of the images and events of the past flash inside my head, some of which fragments I have tried to put together as sketches here: Panj Foota, Hanna Lake, the VCR Bollywood movies with house-full rooftop, the Hollywood movies at Regal Cinema, the drive in Kaka’s beautiful Mazda Luce with his good friends and then the visits and the long, long waits at Dr. Manaf “the pretender’s” cardio clinic, only to get more of the same drug: Lexotonil. Perhaps Sadiq Ali, my uncle, knew better, after all.

Yaadish Bakhair.

Note: Manja = glass coated kite string, also called dore or taar.

Charkhali = wooden spool with extended support sticks on both sides used for winding kite flying string, called manja or dore

For more, please click:  Cars of Quetta in the 70s and 80s: 
And here: Regal Cinema Quetta: The Old Turkey Buzzard
Please visit: Dervaish's Quetta Channel (Youtube)

Yaadish Bakhair: Nasim Ahmed Asadi

Nasim Ahmed Asadi of Nauabad, Quetta.

"Where you were born is less important than how you live."
                                                                                  Turkish proverb
Nasim Ahmed (Mama Nasim)

“Alao, goda pakoda! Tum kaisa hai? ", he would greet me every time I visited him in Nauabad, an old Hazara neighborhood off Alamdar Road in Quetta City. And he would almost always be in the middle of carrying out some chore, making or fixing something. Long before he bought his car, he had a 1973-74 Honda 110cc motorcycle commonly known as Benly. It was a red machine which he maintained meticulously, paint bright and shiny under a thick coat of the finest wax and chrome----with which that particular Honda model was loaded-----glittering in the sun. Nobody ever saw that motorbike dirty. Yes, meticulous is one of the better adjectives to describe him. Just like his bike, then his Vespa Scooter and finally his car, he himself was also well-maintained: always dressed in clean, starched and well ironed shirts and trousers and wore polished shoes that would make the best TV commercial for Kiwi Shoe Polish. He was a relatively tall man with long flowing hair like that of the young Robert Redford in his 1960s movies. In the latter years of his life, he had grown a salt and pepper beard which added the layer of age and the grace that comes with it to his already attractive personality. That welcoming smile never left his face: even when he was in a bad mood and angry, the smile would soon return and it would be all good again. This was Nasim Ahmed Asadi, my maternal uncle, or our Mama Nasim. 

Honda 110 Benly

The “goda” in his greeting meant a horse, a pony, and the “pakoda” just an added term to rhyme with the first. “Pony” he also used to call his eldest son and my cousin Haider. Also, there hung a painting of a pony on one of the walls of the verandah in his house, done by the famous Hazara artist Ramzan Shaad. So, there was obviously something about the animal that he loved. 

National Bank of Pakistan, Quetta

Nasim Ahmed was the second youngest among his siblings. By profession he was a banker. At the end of his illustrious career at one of the country’s oldest financial institutions, the National Bank of Pakistan (NBP), he retired as a vice president. Even in retirement his former colleagues, friends and juniors would consult him on the finer and more complex matters of banking law and bookkeeping etc. That is how good he was at his job, just like his other brothers, all of whom were model government servants: Station Master Abdul Baqi of Pakistan Railways, Abdul Hadi who retired as Assistant Commissioner Quetta, Abdul Mehdi of Pakistan Telecommunications (T & T) and Insp. Abdul Rahim of the Police Department of Balochistan. Professionalism of the highest caliber was a family thing for the brothers.

It was this uncle who taught me how to ride a bicycle, my first bicycle, a red 18” Sohrab, and then a motorcycle, my Yamaha YB 100. The love of motorcycles was something we shared. We would go for rides together. I would follow him to Hanna Lake and Urak Valley, he on his spanking clean Benly and I on my Yamaha. Often, my cousin Misbah would also join us on his Kawasaki. He also taught me the finer points of bike maintenance. He was a handy man, very good at making and fixing things. An amateur carpenter, he had many other skills as well such as electrical and mechanical, not to say anything about masonry and gardening. When he was not doing banking stuff----he always brought work home, his room had piles and piles of files and ledgers from his office---- he was either making or repairing something or reading religious books, which filled the shelves of his bookshelf. He just did not like sitting idle and doing nothing. 

A religious seminary

Religion was very important for him and nothing animated him more than a mention of certain religious personalities, ideas or issues that he held very dear and in high esteem. For example, he often got very excited and emotional during religious discussions. His attachment to certain pious figures of Shia Islam, both classical and contemporary, was absolute and he would often brook no difference of opinion about, and certainly no criticism of, certain revered figures of the faith and of potentially controversial issues, including the politics of religion. It was not a heartless and irrational (sectarian) extremism that has come to define the landscape of Quetta, and of Pakistan in general, in recent decades. But rather, it was the love of faith in a sincerely devoted man who, despite all the displays of emotionalism and even righteous anger at times, never failed to see and understand faith in its entirety, with both eyes so to speak: the eye of mercy as well as the eye of justice, with the eye of jamal (beauty) as well as with the eye of jalal (majesty), immanence as well as transcendence. His Thursday nights and Fridays (Sundays) were often spent in the nearby religious seminary called Jamia e Imam Sadiq (AS) on the main Alamdar Road where he would engage in long religious discourses with the resident religious teachers and senior students. All the local mullahs and zakireen knew him well because of his regular attendance at the Imam Bargahs and the seminaries. The month of Muharram had a special place in his heart and he often went on pilgrimage to Iran. Such was this man, our Mama Nasim. The son of a well-known and respected religious scholar, Mullah Ghulam Ali (my maternal grandfather), he was the most dedicated to religious causes among the brothers.

The "goda" on the wall

Professional banker, skilled handy man, kind to both the elderly and especially to children, and always curious about gadgets, itching to do something useful with his time and skills, Mama Nasim left this world in 2009. Among us siblings, my elder sister was his favorite. She also had a special affection for this uncle of ours. He was a frequent visitor to our house and often brought us things that we loved--- mostly our favorite toffees and biscuits. The red Benly and that painting of the pony on the wall are etched in my mind forever, just like Mama Nasim’s warm and welcoming smile.

Yaadish Bakhair

For more please check out: The Bikes of Quetta in the 1980s

Please visit:                    Dervaish's Quetta Channel (Youtube)

Our Post-Pandemic World: Some reflections

Our Post-Pandemic World: Some Reflections

"If we don't do the impossible, we will be faced with the unthinkable."
                                                                          Murray Bookchin

As I write this, the global number of people affected by COVID-19 and the deaths caused by the virus are 3,644,841 and 252,366 respectively (Source: Worldometer). In Pakistan, the numbers are 21,044 and 476 respectively (Source: Dawn.com ). In many places the lock down has been extended till the end of May. In some places, however, such as Australia and some East Asian countries, governments are relaxing the social contact restrictions and allowing firms and public facilities to re-open for business. Schools remain closed in many places. This pandemic is now considered as the most devastating affliction that has befallen humanity since WW II in the last century. No living memory can recall anything like it. While the political bickering and blame game continues to identify the cause and origin of the virus (Trumpola the Racist Buffoon and his Christian evangelical fundo Secretary of State Mike PompousPeo increasing their anti-China vitriol by the minute), there are now more urgent and important speculations as to what will come next. Importantly, there are debates about what will be regarded as the new “normal” in a post-pandemic world. 

"Chinese virus! Chinese Virus!"

This virus has punctured many myths the world over (myth as in the modern sense of something untrue and non-factual, and not in the traditional sense of something that is higher or “truer than the visible truth”). The biggest of these has been the one about the no-holds-barred neo-liberal globalization. It seems that the almost religious belief in the truth and goodness of neoliberalism has finally been shattered. There are now calls for the return of the state, all essential organs of which have been the focused target of attack by casino-capitalism that is the neo-liberal globalization project. Listen to what Financial Times, the biggest and the loudest of the cheerleaders for neo-liberalism and globalization in the past four decades, is saying in its editorial entitled “Virus lays bare the social contract”: 

“Radical reforms — reversing the prevailing policy direction of the last four decades — will need to be put on the table. Governments will have to accept a more active role in the economy. They must see public services as investments rather than liabilities, and look for ways to make labour markets less insecure. Redistribution will again be on the agenda; the privileges of the elderly and wealthy in question. Policies until recently considered eccentric, such as basic income and wealth taxes, will have to be in the mix.” (FT, April 4, 2020 editorial Source: FT.com).

Hospitals are in a mess in the most advanced capitalist countries such as the UK, Spain, Italy and the USA. Medical supplies are running out. Firms are going bankrupt. State support for the most vulnerable institutions and sections of society in these model capitalist countries is not forthcoming. Interestingly, countries like China and Cuba, the most reviled nations by the neo-liberal Western elites, are sending medical personnel and supplies to places like Italy and Spain. Oh, the irony!

The rot began in the 1980s, for example, with Britain’s Margaret Thatcher, that vile wonder woman of cannibalistic capitalism who notoriously claimed that “There is no society; there are only individuals” and who often repeated the mantra, along with the B movie actor-turned-president of the USA, Ronald Reagan who would chime in with, “The government is the problem" and "There is no alternative” (TINA) to this inhuman form of casino-capitalism. As these dedicated followers of Ayn Rand, the godmother of nihilistic individualism, and of the grand daddy of slash-and-burn economics, Milton Friedman (of the “Chicago Boys” fame), destroyed the most important organs of the post-WW II welfare state in the Western world such as health, education, transportation etc., they elevated a culture of unrestrained avarice, mindless consumption and smugly celebrated inequality everywhere. “Structural Adjustments” were touted as the cure for all the ills of economies. Their most sacred word then was "efficiency". Their policies essentially meant privatization (selling off public entities to favorite private businesses and corporations), downsizing (getting rid of workers in order to maximize profits), breaking trade unions (divide and rule), relocating manufacturing and also many essential services to places where labor was cheap and environmental regulations lax or non-existent among other measures, the effects of all of which are now becoming visible. “Trickle-down economics” it was called by both the ivory-tower theoreticians of neoliberalism and their neo-colonial shills in the media (exemplified by the NY Times’ imperial messenger Thomas Friedman and others of his ilk). The logic was that the rising tide that produced the uber-rich elite in every country, would also lift the poor and the vulnerable. In other words, there would be enough crumbs falling off the table of the greedy corporate CEOs, presidents and the like for the poor to lift themselves out of poverty. 

"Capitalist neo-liberalism: Greed is good!"

The same policies were enforced on the Southern world (the so called “Third World” or the developing countries) through the Bretton Woods Institutions (World Bank and IMF, the two deadly tentacles of the imperialist monster). In Pakistan, for example, both the Sharif and Benazir governments, and before them the regime of the dictator Zia ul Haq (of the West-funded Afghan Jihad, “Koray, Pansi, Martial Law” and Jabra Chowk fame) were dedicated neo-liberalists. Begging bowl in hand and kneeling down in front of their masters in IMF, World Bank and their other Western overlords, and always playing the double game in a country where nothing seems to be as organized as hypocrisy, the decades of 1980s and 1990s Pakistan were marked with unprecedented corruption committed by them. Benazir, and especially the wily husband Zardari (the irremediably corrupt Mr. 10 percent) and the rogue Sharifs took turns to loot and plunder the economy as they built their own family empires in the Gulf and EU countries. Pakistan’s opportunity to be a sufficiently self-reliant, mid-income country was squandered by these criminally inept politicians and equally corrupt, double-dealing military generals. Today’s Pakistan is very much a product of the unwise policies and blunders of the past three decades. One is not sure whether Mr. Ego Man, PM Kaptaan Insaaf Khan, has corrected course, his bombast and grandstanding notwithstanding. After all, he sits in the lap of the very decadent forces of status quo that are the cause of all the mess that average Pakistanis find themselves in right now. 

In the White House: Yesterday's freedom fighters, today's terrorists!

This digression was to provide a necessary background. Let’s get to the reflection part about our post-pandemic world.

Welcome to the age of quarantine economy

First: what is the new normal going to be like? Will there be a normal to go back to? Will there be a fundamental change, a worldview or paradigm shift, in the way we live, conduct business, do politics, engage in all sorts of public activities like sports, entertainment, even personal conversation, etc., or will it be business as usual? The majority opinion is that most things will change, for example, businesses, education, health and transportation, international travel and tourism, social interactions and so on. The way we interact with each other will be transformed in many ways. For instance, what will become of handshakes and kisses on the cheek, two popular forms of greetings in many countries around the world? What about hugs? Will we invent new ways of greeting like waving, head shakes or even adopt something like the Japanese bowing? Will the mask become a permanent daily accessory, say, like a shirt and a pair of trousers, or like a shalwar kameez? Expect big changes in lifestyles.

More importantly, now that there are widespread calls from influential quarters for active state intervention and involvement and for taking into account the plight of the vulnerable and the neglected in society, will there be serious focus on social justice? Will the pathological inequality that is the most visible gift of neo-liberal globalization of the past three or four decades be addressed? Equally, if not more importantly, will there be a course correction with regards to environmental degradation and climate change? In short, will we overcome our collective madness and stupidity and move towards a socially just and ecologically sane world or will it be the same deadly status quo? Admittedly, there are more questions than answers at this point.

One thing seems to be certain: this pandemic will force a radical reform, if not the total end, of speculative casino-capitalism. The world economy that has been transformed from real manufacturing and provision of real services into pure speculative financialization (derivatives and all) in the past few decades will need a radical restructuring if we are to move in the direction of sanity. Not just costs, but profits also will have to be socialized; not just benefits, but harms also will have to be privatized. Since economies are now deeply and tightly integrated in the global system of finance and information, these will be the biggest challenges faced by the national and world leaders. Any level of de-linking or decoupling will be very difficult, if not impossible.

There is also a good chance that we will see the end of uni-polarity in geopolitics, what’s left of it anyway. This will essentially mean the end of US imperial power and reach, a power which was already showing signs of decline before the virus hit the world. For example, everything that Trumpola utters is a sign of the crumbling US Empire. Although it seems that China is already taking a leadership role by sending supplies and experts to all corners of the world, including the EU, there will be increasing tensions, both internal and especially external on the country threatening its stability, and that will be the greatest test of the China of Xi JinPing. 

There is even the possibility of a violent conflagration between a rising China and a declining US Empire, a possibility that has been there in recent years but which will become more marked in our post-pandemic world. Trumpola and his neo-con, evangelist Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are already beating the drums of war against China, just like George Bush did twenty years ago against the Muslim world. Clearly, China is now seen as the new enemy of the West (there is always a need for one, the modern West has historically defined itself in that manner, the eternally-Good vs. "the Evil One") and all the organs of imperialism, from think tanks to media to Hollywood are being activated to prepare the ground and prepare the Western public for a new confrontation. 

In short, we will see new re-alignments and re-groupings as globalization will come under skeptical scrutiny and may undergo radical transformations as a result of that scrutiny. As words like "global" and "globalization" increasingly becoming dirty, also expect a rise in nationalism, populism and demagoguery. Populists and ultra-nationalists everywhere are calling for de-globalization and re-localization.With protectionism as the ever-present alternative rushing in to fill the vacuum left in the wake of the collapse of liberal- globalist myths, these forces of reaction are the most visible candidates to provide support and justification for that alternative of the world turning inward. 

The sheer proliferation of conspiracy theories and disinformation on the internet is already overwhelming, and which brings into focus the role of the big digital technology firms, the Big Tech, especially the MAGFA giants (Microsoft, Apple, Google, Facebook and Amazon). Almost all of these giants have seen their shares rise in the wake of the pandemic. Power is accumulating in their hands and with that, as the old saying goes, comes the possibility of absolute corruption. In any change that we will see in the post-pandemic world, these giants will play crucial roles. A big question that many technology critics are raising is the question of their accountability. Governments everywhere are already seen to be helpless in dealing with them. For example, legislation is lagging behind or is absent on many new developments in the field. Technology writer Kara Swisher has warned us about the power of the Big Tech as to “what (their) unlimited power, Midas-like financial might, minimal oversight and very few actual consequences might mean for the rest of us.”. Writing in the New York Times she identifies some of the downsides of the accumulated, absolute power of Big Tech:” It’s not good that we have set up an epic system of haves and have-nots that could become devastating for innovative ideas and start-ups trying to get off the ground. Not good because too much of our data in in the hands of fewer. Not good because these fewer are largely unaccountable to those they serve and hard to control by governments that are elected by the people.” (The New York Times, International Edition, May 4, 2020). 

These are some reflections on our post-pandemic world. What will happen in a country like Pakistan? Since Pakistan is well integrated into the world system, the repercussions of any or all of these changes, in whatever degree, will be felt in Pakistan, as well. One important issue that I have not touched upon in this short piece is the role of religion in our post-pandemic world. What has the response of world’s major religions been to this crisis so far, and how will they cope with our post-crisis world? That in itself is a big issue, and will require a separate article which I intend to write in the coming days.

For more, click: The American

And:                   Who is COVID-19 ?

Please visit: Dervaish's Quetta Channel (Youtube)

Yaadish Bakhair: Muhammad Hussain (Mamo)

Muhammad Hussain (Mamo) of Hussainabad, Quetta

Muhammad Hussain (Kaka Mamo)

"The noblest form of mercy is to protect others from yourself."
                                                                           Abdal Hakim Murad
"The love we give away is the only love we keep."   
                                                                                    Elbert Hubbard

“And that’s how this tragic story ends. Having lost his “Kilander” (cleaner/assistant driver) in that gruesome manner, Neko, the veteran truck driver, never again made a stop at that dilapidated road side shack for chai, especially when he was driving by that cursed spot after midnight. The upper deck of his old “rocket” (pronounced "raakit", the bonnet-model of the classic flat-fronted Bedford truck) still has the brownish stains of the unfortunate Kilander’s blood, despite all the scrubbing. To this day, two years after the tragedy, he is haunted, and gets into fits whenever someone mentions that patch of highway near Jacobbabad, or the name of his dead Kilander.” Sitting in a semi-circle---- all ears, eyes wide open, mouths agape-----we, my siblings and I, would then slowly return to reality from the trance-like state into which we had been pulled in by this story-teller who was none other than our Kaka Mamo. “Kaka” means uncle in Persian, and in some other regional languages of Balochistan such as Pashto. His real name was Muhammad Hussain but for everybody in Hussainabad, Quetta, he was just Mamo.

A Bedford "rocket"

Long before I got introduced to master story tellers, both from the East and the West, especially in the genres of crime, true crime, horror and psychological-terror, we children would get our entertainment from family elders like Kaka Mamo. Years later, when I first read and then re-read Stephen King’s The Duel or watched the blockbuster movie The Hitcher, I would recall Kaka's stories with which we had our imaginations soaked during the long winter nights of Quetta. His road stories were the best. You see, he himself was a truck driver for many years. My grandfather, who was a coal man, had put him in charge of the trucks that used to transport coal to far flung places in the Punjab province and beyond. But he was not made for any kind of desk work. He preferred the seat behind the wheel to the one behind the desk in some dingy office in Mach Town where the coal mines were and where the business of coal was conducted.  His first love was the “rocket” (pronounced "raakit") truck. These were heavy duty lorries that were made by the British automobile maker Leyland-Bedford. He was a rocket fundamentalist and knew about every nut and bolt of that heavy road monster. He reluctantly started talking about Hino and Isuzu brands during the latter years of his life when these Japanese trucks were introduced in Pakistan. But his love for the rocket never died. Rarely have I seen someone so passionately attached to a vehicle. 

Dilip Kumar

His love for the rocket was matched only by his great affection and admiration for the Bollywood superstar of the day, the one and the only Dilip Kumar. It was Dilip who deeply inspired him and informed his sense of style, and even of person-hood. This was pretty much visible in the way he wore his hair: jet black, amply oiled, tidily trimmed at the back and curled-up in the front. He was also very particular about his shoes, especially the hand made chawwat  (locally made leather sandals). These sandals were of the special type—made-to-order----ones that made a rather musical squeaking noise when someone walked in them. Another feature of the chawwat was that they were worn in such a way that the heel would protrude half way out, as if one was wearing a two sizes smaller shoe. That was the style and fashion then and nobody exemplified it better than Kaka Mamo. He knew almost everything about Dilip Kumar and his movies. He would recite the movie scenes with Dilip as the hero and his famous dialogues like a child would recite his or her multiplication tables. He was especially knowledgeable about the perennial rivalry between (the Muslim) Dilip and (the Hindu) Raj Kapoor, the other megastar of the Bollywood of that era. About that particular topic he was the Encyclopedia of Britannica. But what usually amused me was that after all the Raj Kapoor bashing that he would indulge in---and that was often-----he would utter something like this: “But yaar, we have to admit that nobody can play that role the way Raj Kapoor does, not even Dilip. Raj Kapoor ko salam hai!” 

Raj Kapoor

And to talk of Bollywood and not mention songs is like talking about South Asian curries without mentioning spices. For Kaka Mamo, the spice of the curry was, of course, Muhammad Rafi, the great crooner and balladeer of Bollywood for more than three decades. Rafi “the king” as Kaka would call him. Rafi and Dilip made the best pair then---Dilip the uber-actor and Rafi the super-playback singer-----just like Rajesh Khanna and Kishore Kumar would in the 1970s and early 1980s. While listening to Binaca Geet Mala on the radio (popular late night Radio Ceylon broadcast that played Bollywood songs) he would tell us the movie name, producer, director, the lyricist, the composer, the year the movie was made and especially the scene in the movie that was the background for that particular song. His knowledge of movies was immense, just like his knowledge of the rocket trucks. 

Muhammad "the king" Rafi

A short man with a solid body set on a solid frame, Kaka Mamo was not a loquacious man. A simple man, he was quiet, rather shy in some ways. In fact, he had a sort of serenity about him. I would even say that he still carried that innocence about him that many of us lose on the way to adulthood, as we embrace, wittingly or otherwise, the ways of the world and lose ourselves in worldliness: a sort of repose that one sees not just in children but also in God’s loved ones, those who are near and dear to God. We must recall the saying of Hazrat Isa (Jesus Christ, may God's blessings be upon him) that in order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven we must be like children. Muhammad Hussain Mamo kept to his business most of the time and was always ready to help out, especially in the community that was the Hussainabad of then. People knew him and he could be seen at most of the community events, be it weddings or sad occasions like funerals. After I left Pakistan, I hardly had any contact with him and then he left us all for his final abode. I was in the U.K. (for my studies, or maybe it was Canada) when my mother informed me of his passing away. The story-teller to us kids, the lover of old rocket trucks-----those perennial mechanical mules on the decrepit and deplorable highways of Pakistan----the admirer of the great Dilip Kumar and of the equally great Muhammad Rafi, and the man of style especially when it came to hair and footwear died while I was away from Quetta. I was not able to attend the funeral of Kaka Mamo but he is always with me whenever I read a good story, especially a scary road story, or when I listen to my own old collection of Bollywood songs, but above all, when I see a Bedford truck. 

Yaadish Bakhair.

For more, please click:  Hussainabad, Qta: The Place, the people and their values
And here:  Regal Cinema Quetta: The Old Turkey Buzzard

Please visit:  Dervaish's Quetta Channel (Youtube)