Flashback: When ‘fear’ was a word in the dictionary (By Sher Alam Shinwari)
Syed Amiruddin Shah Gillani hails from a spiritual family; his ancestors migrated from Iran many centuries ago and settled in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, providing spiritual guidance to people. Now in his 80s, he recalls a time when peace prevailed everywhere; there was no violence in the land of the ancient Gandhara civilisation.
“There used to be peace, hospitality; literary and cultural activities. A typical tribal society with hujra and jumaat (mosque) entwined in social norms and traditions that kept institutions and people tied together is now in ruins. The image of a peaceful Pashtun society is smeared with blood and the smoke of bomb blasts everywhere. Tribal life in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has undergone a tremendous change; for Peshawarites, fear was a word that existed only in the dictionary during the 60s and 70s,” Gillani recalls sadly. (complete article) (via umalik)
LAHORE: In a country like Pakistan where many children are deprived of basic education, one girl from Lahore has achieved something extraordinary.
Aiman Waheed, a nine-year-old girl from Lahore, has written and published a 64-page novel titled “The Dangerous Pet” which is available in the local market.
According to her family, Aiman has always been into reading books and completed her novel in a span of four months.
“I kept jotting down my ideas in the form of points. And when I started writing, the story just went with the flow,” the young author said.
The sixth-grader has already started working on her next novel which would be a mystery story.
Classics, thrillers, murder mysteries, tales of loss and woe, love and life- fictional stories can range from the realistic to the magical. Where do writers get their ideas and how much do their surroundings affect their imagination? Dawn.com speaks to Karachi based authors on the city and how it plays a role in their work. Bina Shah elaborates on Karachi’s shifting landscape, H.M Naqvi speaks on how Karachi sustains him, Maniza Naqvi talks about discovering the city as an adult and Mohmmed Hanif talks about how the city manages to slip into his work.
TASHKENT: In the middle of Central Asia, a professor has studied and taught Urdu for over half a century.
Professor Dr Tash Mirza is as passionate about the language now as he was in 1961, when he completed his doctorate in Urdu from Moscow University. His studies have taken him as far as Delhi, though his home for almost all his life has been Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan.
Mirza frequently visits Pakistan and India to attend seminars and conferences on Urdu literature. Now 75, he teaches Urdu at the city’s State Institute of Oriental Studies. (via aminalikesthisstuff)
We love shouting out load “Pakistan Zindabaad” But there are few who are working on a far extent on branding/improving the image of Pakistan. Today I came across Another reason to be a proud Pakistani. Read about such a person who is a well aged guy but his effort for Improving the image of…
If they snatch my ink and pen, I should not complain, For I have dipped my fingers In the blood of my heart. I should not complain Even if they seal my tongue, For every ring of my chain Is a tongue ready to speak.
COLOMBO: Abdul Karim Abdul Razak is an oddity. This Urdu-speaking Memon Muslim from what is now Pakistan, is a leading light in Tamil literary circles in Sri Lanka as a poet and writer!
Tall and fair with a stubble and betel stained teeth, Razak is every inch a Memon, who no one would associate with Tamil poetry at first glance.
But he has managed to break into a literary circle which has been the close preserve of ethnic Tamils and indigenous Sri Lankan Muslims whose mother tongue is Tamil. (complete article)
Sir Muhammad Iqbal’s 134th birthday is commemorated across Pakistan today: Allama Iqbal, born on November 9 1877 in Sialkot, was great representative of the subcontinent and an important personality for the Pakistan movement.
Iqbal was a Sufi poet for the modern age who aroused a revolutionary spirit in the nation through his poetry. His poetry has been translated in Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, English and several other languages and he is considered a great philosopher all over the world.
Unfortunately, he could not see the independence of Pakistan and died on April 21, 1938. (source, via zaraahmed)
This blog aims at telling you the "truth" about Pakistan. Unfortunately, today the news emerging from Pakistan on the Western media are so much polarized that it gives a very unreal image of Pakistan.
At "What no one told you about Pakistan", we aim at telling you the real stories about Pakistan.
