Featured

Hopeless but not serious

Humayun Gauhar

“Where the hell have you been, old man,” asked Maverick the Monkey. “You don’t look quite yourself. Is something the matter?”

“You don’t look quite so good either,” I replied. “I thought you would be in London with the prime minister’s huge entourage of sycophants, gallivanting around at state expense. You’re not very good at being a chamcha, are you?”

“Nah,” he replied. “Too expensive. My wife always insists on coming along and spends too much money shopping. What the state gives stooges on a joyride as spending money is a pittance. Can just about buy an ordinary meal. Better to stay at home.”

“That makes two of us,” I said, “the difference being that I happily take my wife with me everywhere. I won’t move without her, even when I go to Lahore for a few hours.”

“You’re saying that to save your hide because you know she’s going to read this, aren’t you?”

“No Maverick. I really hate it if she isn’t along.”

“Then she must be the best travelled wife in the world,” said Maverick plaintively.

“Probably,” I mused.

“So what’s wrong with you?” asked Maverick.

“Well, my eyes are going. I can’t see too well any more; even what I write is a blur. I may have to stop writing entirely if this goes on.”

“That’ll be a relief to some,” said Maverick teasingly.

“No, to many, I suspect,” I replied seriously. “They did an angiograph of my eyes and found some liquid behind both my retinas. So they’ll either do some laser treatment or give me three injections in each eyeball, two weeks apart. Neither will undo the damage, but may stop further deterioration. They say it is hemorrhage due to high blood pressure or hypertension, whatever you want to call it.”

“High blood pressure is a symptom, not a disease,” Maverick told me, as if I didn’t know. “It’s usually because of clogged arteries. Is that it?”

“Not that I know of. I’m having an angiograph of my cardiac and renal arteries on Tuesday. Only then will we know for sure. The arteries of my neck are clear. My blood profile is great – high good cholesterol, low bad cholesterol, low lipids and triglycerides, urea, PSA and all the jing-bang lot under control.”

“Then its not ‘pressure’ of the blood flow but ‘tension’ as in hyper, like you’re crazy. What are you so tense about? You’re not carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders. If things go to hell, let them. You can’t do anything to stop it even in your own country, leave alone the inevitable ride to hell that Europe is on and America staring military and economic defeat in the face. Whatever will be will be – Quai Sera Sera.

Maverick continued impishly, “They must have told you to lose weight, fatso, and stop smoking cigars.”

“I don’t need a doctor to tell me that. Even a monkey can see it. Oh sorry, I didn’t mean to offend you or perjure monkeys. Please don’t take it personally. I like you and your wisdom-filled visits.”

“Watch it. You’re not on one of your television programmes on which you can say anything and everything and get away with it. Remember, you are descended from us monkeys, and ‘descended’ is the operative word here, for you are a descent in evolution. If you had been an ascent, the phrase would have been ‘ascended from the monkeys’.”

“Have it your way,” I said. “My optical condition is hopeless but not serious. The doctor has put me on a fruit diet, so I’m now like you monkeys, but the situation is hopeless because I love good food. I am a chef and am going to start a restaurant soon. My wife is skeptical about it, so I’m thinking of calling it ‘Khyali Pulao’. It is Pakistan’s national dish – Imaginary Pilaf – living in a dream world. But then dreams are the stuff reality is made of. However, the situation is not serious because I have stopped smoking. Instead, I’ve switched to those electronic ‘cigarettes’ and don’t miss my cigars any more. But I know one thing. Even if I lose weight and stop smoking, my hypertension won’t go away. There’s something called wear and tear, you know.”

“That’s the attitude,” my friend. “Take things as they come, especially those you can do nothing about. Start dictating, to man or machine. Go get one of those Samsung Galaxy II Note gizmos that can take dictation in Pakistani English and transcribe at the same time. Every problem has a solution. You only have to find it.”

“Well, I just have to sell one more puppy to buy one,” I said.

“I know that great mystical verse must be swirling around in your head: ‘Kagha sub tun khaiyo, chun chun khaiyo maas ray; do naina mut khaiyo, inhain piya Milan key aas ray’ – ‘O crow, eat my entire body, pick on it morsel by morsel; but don’t eat my eyes for they are longing to meet their Beloved’.”

“Look, Maverick,” I said, using a most unfortunate phrase for one losing the ability to look. “My inner eye is just fine. Some of us can see the Beloved even on the earth plane.”

“So what does your inner eye tell you about our country?” asked Maverick seriously.

“Frankly, my inner eye says the same thing: ‘The condition is hopeless, but not serious’. It is hopeless for the underprivileged many but not serious for the charmed few. Whatever the outcome of our crises, which in all probability will be more crises, the charmed few will always remain on top of the heap, particularly as long as they keep the masses hopeless with the old nostrum that, ‘God ordained your condition to be so. It’s a divine test’.”

“I agree,” said Maverick. “But things are also hopeless because the will and ability of those who you have charged to do something about it are wanting. However, they are not serious if one has the capacity to find solutions and the will to implement them.”

“It’s a learning process,” I said. “Let it continue. Don’t abort it. Let it get as bad as it may. Only through suffering will we learn. It may take us beyond our lifetimes, but at least our progeny will live better lives.”

“What’s the guarantee?” asked Maverick mockingly. “In any case, I don’t know what you mean by ‘let the process continue’. Even what you call abortion is part of the evolutionary learning process, be it intervention by the age-old military-judiciary-cleric nexus or chaos and anarchy or revolution. They are not aberrations just because you don’t like them. Let whatever has to happen, happen. Then roll with the punches, get up, dust yourself down and get on with it. In the meantime, you really have made humans of yourselves, haven’t you?”

I knew Maverick was using the word ‘humans’ where we humans would use ‘monkeys’.

“Very funny,” I said. “How can you say that?”

“Look at what you’ve done to poor Khalil Gibran. You’ve done his ‘Pity the Nation’ to death. He must be turning in his grave. There are people who are even adding to it. ‘Pity the nation that thinks a Liquid Propane Gasbag is a sage and its real seers are foreign agents and real agents are seers’. Or how about: ‘Pity the nation whose prime minister would upset the system to protect $60 million dollars stolen from the people’. Or, ‘Pity the nation whose judges order its prime minister to do something that he thinks violates his oath and the constitution’. You want me to go on? ‘Pity the nation that doesn’t understand the spirit of its constitution nor the intent of its makers, but interprets it to mean what suits them’.”

“Stop, Maverick,” I screamed. “You’re going to be hauled up for contempt like the prime minister.”

“Sadly, your rulers only play to the gallery,” said Maverick, “and very badly too I might add. But one day the right things will be done, when the movie ‘Planet of the Apes’ becomes reality. You’re not too far away from it. Good thing is, we won’t have to lobotomize you. You’ve already lobotomized yourselves.”

humayun.gauhar786@gmail.com

Sign of Economic Times – Vintage GM Futureliners Go for a Song on ebay

Its a sign of our economic times as well as the domestic US auto industry of the big three – General Motors GM, Ford & Chrysler.

What was supposed to be a slam-dunk vintage auction of a rare ( 1 of only 12 worked up and produced )  GM  “Futureliner”  bus , and listed on eBay did not even receive the lowest level of bids.

GM “Futureliners”  were first mocked up and delivered in the early 1940′s , stopped because of WW2.  They were then upgraded and paraded around in the 1950s for auto conventions and the like.  Amazingly the 1950 upgrades were totally futuristic with such auto technologies and technological demonstration advances as jet engines , full stereophonic sound and microwave ovens.  Finally these bus prototypes were retired in the mid 1950′s by GM auto execs – having run their course of time.

Getting back to eBay auction great bidding was expected.  In 2006 at the world renowned Barett-Jackson auctions in Arizona USA FM Futureliner # 1 sold for a record 4 million dollars.

Still at the 2012 auto auction on ebay – with an initial bid of  $ 500,000 , bidding only went up incrementally to $ 5600 to $ 505600 in sum total.

The eBay auction was ended early by the listing agents , whom were highly surprised and even exasperated.  Its a case of both not counting your chicken before your eggs hatched and also a clear Its a case of both not counting your chicken before your eggs hatched and also a clear example of the normal cyclical volatility that you can expect in the vintage and classic automotive marketplace.

Midtown Ford is one of Winnipeg Manitoba best known and highest volume Ford dealers & dealerships.  They are a volume seller and take online price quotes for both Ford F150 trucks as well as Ford Fiesta cars and Mustangs

It’s ‘it’

Humayun Gauhar

When I heard the verdict against the prime minister in the contempt of court case, Akbar Allahabadi’s verse came to mind:

Muzzakar kay liyay ‘he’ hai, mouannas kay liyay ‘she’ hai;

Magar Hazrat mukhannas hain, na heeon mein na sheon main.

It’s a parody on the English words ‘he’ and ‘she’, while ‘mukhannas’ refers to eunuchs.

For male it is ‘he’, for females ‘she’;

But esquire is sexless, neither in the ‘hees’ nor the ‘shes’

The verdict is neither he nor she. It’s ‘it’. Prime Minister Yusuf Reza Gillani was convicted, but his punishment was detention in court till the judges choose to ‘rise’. It lasted 39 seconds. Having given their short order, the judges collected their wigs and gowns, rose and left, leaving the defence counsel speechless, to have his say later in a press conference. We are moving towards trial in media rather than by media.

What can I say? Why didn’t the judges go the whole hog, sentence the prime minister to six months and say that as a convict he is no longer eligible to be a member of parliament and thus no longer prime minister? It would have been clear and we would have gone on with our wretched existence. Instead, our confusion has been further compounded. If the judges just wanted to make a token example of the high and mighty by showing them that they are not above the law, they only made our uncertainty more uncertain. If they sidestepped the issue of eligibility and threw the ball into parliament’s court, then we are in for the long haul and much errant nonsense. Perhaps the bench divided, resulting in something for everyone – punish the prime minister without really punishing him.

The contempt case was a sideshow. The real show is to get President Zardari thorough the Swiss courts and make him return the $60 million that he and his wife stole from the people. Not a bad thought, but why depend on a foreign court? Why not order the Lahore High Court to start the retrial of the case that the Supreme Court had asked it to years ago? That court had found Zardari and Benazir guilty of corruption, but because of a taped telephone conversation between a judge adjudicating the case and a government official, it was rightly declared a mistrial by the Supreme Court, which asked the High Court for a retrial. It didn’t throw the judgment out. Why has that been hanging fire for years? Why throw the ball into the Swiss court instead?

The prime minister’s refusal to write a letter to the Swiss authorities to reopen corruption cases against President Asif Zardari despite repeated orders by the Supreme Court over two years led to the contempt. Gillani’s reasoning is not without merit: the president has immunity under the constitution while in office. By writing the letter he would be violating his constitutional oath to preserve and protect the constitution by violating its Article about immunity. Those opposed to the PM’s contention dug up history: two of Islam’s greatest caliphs had presented themselves before a court. They forget that it was a court of their own state, not a foreign court of a non-Muslim country. Those great caliphs would never have countenanced going to a foreign court nor been sent there by their own court. Forgotten is something more important: the concept of immunity does not exist in Islam. To provide constitutional immunity to certain state office holders in an Islamic republic is a violation of the Faith. What is needed is an amendment of the constitution, instead of tying ourselves into knots.

The net result is that convicted prime minister or not, new prime minister out of this National Assembly or not, the letter will not get written so long as there is a People’s Party led government headed by a People’s Party prime minister. Q.E.D.

Our confusion gets further compounded while urgent cases remain pending and Pakistan hurtles into incremental chaos. This is what happens when a country is being led in every branch and at every level by hollow men, more interested in creating optics, enhancing their importance and expanding their jurisdictions than in solving the people’s basic problem of abject deprivation. Such people are themselves mukhannas ‘its’.

It would be unfair to write about the verdict until one has read the full judgment. But the question cries out: why did the Supreme Court reserve judgment in the first place? One would have thought that they did because they wanted to deliberate before arriving at a conclusion and release the full judgment the same day as the verdict was handed down. After all, this is not a case of Gangu Taili committing contempt. It is the Prime Minister of Pakistan for God’s sake. Not good for the country or the democratic process that is evolving in fits and starts and which all today’s protagonists made such a big deal of in President Musharraf’s time. We are told that the judgment was delivered to the Speaker of the National Assembly that elects the prime minister and to the Election Commission last Friday, but I haven’t seen it yet.

How can the prime minister be removed?

He can be persuaded to resign by the president or his party for the greater good to avoid a tamasha. No surprise that many in the People’s Party are preening their feathers for the job, but only the one who pleases the president will wear this crown of thorns.

Being an ex-convict, does he attract the article in the constitution pertaining to ineligibility? The Election Commission can determine this but only if the Speaker of the National Assembly refers the matter to it. The Speaker can only do so if parliament asks her to. And then she can take a month to decide.

He loses a no-confidence vote, which is up to the opposition that doesn’t have the numbers.

What are the prime ministers options? He can buy time, but only for a time. It seems difficult how he will get out of this one for long. He has made a defiant speech in the National Assembly saying that he will not leave office unless the Speaker asks him to. He can buy time by:

Going into an intra-court appeal, which means to another bench in the Supreme Court comprising other judges. It is unlikely that another bench will embarrass its brother bench even if the prime minister’s appeal has merit. But the PM could buy a lot of time in so doing.

He asks the National Assembly for a vote of confidence which he will get.

He calls elections; the People’s Party plays victim-victim at which it is champion, and wins. However, that doesn’t get rid of his conviction so whether Gillani can contest or not is moot.

He gets super defiant and asks parliament to ratify his Executive Order restoring the sacked judges. Parliament refuses to do so and the judges are out again. That would mean war, serious war, between the three branches of government.

The National Assembly, representing the will of the people, elects the prime minister and only the National Assembly can throw him out. Parliament is the only institution higher than the Supreme Court and that is where the PM can and should go. It is about time parliament stamped its authority on the state instead of being a rubber stamp. It would make for a head-on-clash between the legislature and the judiciary but it’s also about time that we clearly demarcate the boundaries of the jurisdictions of the three branches government. It’s not the Durand Line. Let’s determine who runs the country, the executive, the legislature or the judiciary or all three together within their strictly demarcated domains. Just when the country needs stability most, the three branches of government are busy destabilizing it like Mafiosi in turf battles. But they’re not Mafiosi, they’re institutions that some ignoramuses call ‘pillars of the state’, forgetting that an Islamic state has only two pillars, God and the people, His vicegerent.

They should realize that they’re preparing the ground for yet another extra-constitutional intervention that people will welcome. But this time it may not be led by a four-star general.

humayun.gauhar786@gmail.com

Peace the only option

Humayun Gauhar

Anyone that thinks that war is an option has got to be a nut. Anyone that thinks that war between nuclear- armed countries is an option should be committed. Nuclear weapons are there to stop wars from happening, not to start them. By that measure Israel’s Netanyahu should be in the nut house.

Peace is the only option, peace that is acceptable to all sides. That is honourable. Else it is not peace at all, only an illusion of it. India and Pakistan are champion illusionists, but illusionists would know better anyone that illusions evaporate very fast.

Pakistanis are a very optimistic people, a most endearing, quality and a very big strength. Any India-Pakistan summit and we feel that peace is at hand. Most laudable, for it underlines not only that we are an optimistic but also fundamentally a peace loving people who want to get on with their lives. Which makes our lack of peace at home ironic, but that is another subject. When our Zardari recently broke bread with their Manmohan Singh in Delhi, we went through naive excitement for the umpteenth time. If you really want peace certain realities have to be borne in mind.

India’s state terrorism particularly in Kashmir begets and reinforces freedom struggles what it calls non-state terrorism. Blaming Pakistan deflects attention from its state terrorism. Sure Pakistan gives it succor as any adversary would, like India did the ‘Mukti Baheni’. But it was our own state terrorism and iniquity against the Bengalis that caused it. India took advantage, as any adversary would.

If Pakistan were to ignore Kashmir the struggle might lose some of its teeth, but only for a while, for soon it will grow new ones. The Kashmir revolt is a creation of Indian intransigence that Pakistan takes advantage of. I have always said: state terrorism begets non-state terrorism. Non-state terrorism will remain no matter how many treaties you sign while brushing cores issues under a carpet dyed in human blood and woven with the weak threads of bilateral trade, film productions and cricket matches. As long as state terrorism persists non-state terrorism will continue. Period. I cannot understand why the world cannot comprehend such a self-evident truth.

India is a large country with a small country mentality whereas Pakistan is a relatively small country with a big country mentality. Ours comes from the millennium-long Muslim rule over India. Conversely, India’s comes from being ruled by Muslims for over a millennium. I don’t know how much currency this theory has, but both countries should have disabused themselves of such complexes by now. India, I feel, is beginning to get out of this mindset with its economic upswing, but it will not be totally eradicated until the next generations in both countries take the helm for they are less burdened by stories of slavery and Partition. Land and population sizes don’t matter, the human condition does. That the majority of our peoples live in abject poverty makes us puny. By that measure – and it is the only relevant measure – Singapore is a much bigger country than either India or Pakistan. Its real resource is the high quality of its leadership and its greater human capital development. By these measures, India and Pakistan are pathetic.

Strong and wise rulers on both sides can bring detente. Neither Zardari nor Manmohan can be accused of either strength or wisdom. Cleverness: yes. Strength: hardly. Wisdom: a big fat no. Only strong and wise leaders can ‘sell’ an inevitably compromise-laden agreement to their peoples without their patriotism being questioned, their opponents making capital out of it and a ratings-hungry media taking jibes at them.

The great anomaly is where real power lies in both countries. It should with the chief executive who is the head of state and prime minister. But both countries are dynasty ridden. So in Pakistan it lies with the constitutionally ceremonial president because he is also co-chairman of the ruling party by virtue of being Benazir Bhutto’s widower. That is where his power comes from. In India, an Italian catholic lady is leader of the ruling party only because she is Rajiv Gandhi’s widow. That is where her power comes from.

Manmohan Singh is a weak, proxy prime minister as is Pakistan’s Yusuf Reza Gillani. Singh belongs to the small Sikh minority and is keenly aware that he has to go the extra mile to ‘prove’ his patriotism in the backdrop of the Sikh rebellion for an independent state during the eighties, the storming of the Golden Temple and the assassination of Indira Gandhi by her Sikh body guards. Gillani is in office at Zardari’s pleasure while he and his son are running from the courts.

Both countries face difficult elections soon, as does their great ‘ally’ America. America will have a determining say in any India-Pakistan deal. All decisions by these three countries now will be heavily informed by the need to get re-elected.

Without the military leaderships of both countries on board any expectation of a meaningful deal is a pipedream. While our army’s role in policy-making is well known, the Indian military’s role is camouflaged. Nothing new: the US military often plays a decisive role in foreign and defence policy. If it did not Iran would have been attacked by the Bush the Brat.

Should we forget the ‘core issue’, Kashmir and the UN resolutions asking for a plebiscite there? Or should we sort it out first. Or, should we put it on the backburner and normalize relations in other areas – which India calls ‘Confidence Building Measures’? Kashmir will not let us forget it as long as a freedom struggles rages there. And it will continue raging with or without our support. In fact, the Kashmiri freedom fighters could even turn on us for abandoning them. As long as the Kashmiri freedom struggles continues unresolved the sword of Damocles will keep hanging over our heads for it takes only one madman on either side to vapourize all of South Asia. Best to do all simultaneously – core issue, other delimitation issues and CBMs – what Musharraf and Vajpayee agreed to, a ‘Composite Dialogue’ and hope for the best. What is needed is simultaneous statesmanship and raw guts on both sides. Leave it to the functionaries and we will continue nitpicking for another six decades.

India and Pakistan should stop tussling over an America-free Afghanistan and arrive at a mutually acceptable understanding. Afghanistan may not want either of us anyway. As if killing ourselves over Kashmir isn’t enough, we cannot go killing ourselves over Afghanistan too.

Illogical demands should stop. Asking for Hafiz Saeed without furnishing adequate proof is illogical. America has to ship up or shape out of the India-Pakistan equation instead of being a fly in the ointment by placing a bounty on Saeed’s head one day and then changing it to a bounty for evidence two days later. If you don’t even have evidence what the hell are you doing placing a bounty on someone head? The only sense it makes is that you are trying to derail the normalization process.

America wants peace for its own reasons.

1.   It realizes that war between India and Pakistan is no longer an option. Another war between them could well mean another World War. The US and its traditional allies will suffer unacceptable multi-sectoral damage, regardless of what happens to India and Pakistan.

2.   It wants to an India free from ‘Pakistani sniping’ to focus on creating an economic and military bulwark against fast-growing Chinese economic and military might.

The conundrum is that while America says it wants India-Pakistan normalization, it doesn’t want them ganging up to form a South Asian Economic Association or some such, which has the seeds of becoming another giant. Worse, Pakistan’s presence could be instrumental in bringing China into the fold as India could Russia. Can you then imagine what a ‘monster’ the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation with the South Asian Economic Association could become? Soon energy-rich Iran and the Central Asian states would want to be part of the action.

They needn’t worry, though. America is so far ahead in the sciences – medicine, genetics, space, computer sciences and so much more – that it cannot lose its position of preeminence though it will certainly lose some of its monopoly. No bad thing for America either, for sharing over-lordship might bring it’s foreign and defence policies into the realm of civilization and rationality.

humayun.gauhar786@gmail.com

Fisherman & Anglers Expand Your Horizons – Deep Sea Ocean Fishing

No doubt about some people live to work whether others live to fish. On top of that fishing trips achieve religious significance with them – it’s like spending time with old war buddies. One fishing sport that remains not covered or indeed even unknown in the eyes of many most accomplished anglers is deep sea fishing.  There have been all types of improvements in not only fishing tackle but also world wide travel.  For example you can now fly down on a “last minute” air ticket to Cancun for a song.  Book your ticket on the internet.  Whereas family and friends may wish for days lounging on the beach or days tours to Chichen Itza – you and your buddies may decide to devote yourself to rounds of deep sea fishing excursions instead. It’s definitely a case of “different strokes for different folks:  What are the hallmarks however in planning a successful deep sea fishing trip and day excursions out fishing for those big elusive blue marlins and the like?

Deep Sea Fishing Point One – Get As Far Away From Shore as Possible:

When engaging with this big fish game, one needs to travel far distance from the shore in the part of the ocean that might well be called the “open-ocean”.  How do you know that you are there so speak?  Well oceans are vast but yet when you cannot see the shore – you are to begin with “far enough away”.  This is your “starting point” for deep sea fishing.  Not the end point – just a good starting point to find and land those “big ones”. For Deep Sea Fishing it’s all in a Proper Reliable & Good Boat:

Make Sure You Are Provided With Both a Large Enough & Reliable Fishing Craft:

Good and reliable ocean capable boats are essential for good deep sea fishing.  If you both want to find and land those big ones, and also consider it’s your serious hobby and vocation as well as vacation – why would you chintz on sailing in the M.S. Guppy?  Yet its not only a case of getting a good old solid tub but also one equipped with both safety and fishing comforts – like radios that work well , and GPS to both in terms of fish finders and navigation aids.  You want both safety and fish finding.  Additionally other comforts such as a marine head, sleeping accommodations and a well stocked refrigerated bar add to the mix.  Booking prices vary – both in terms of size of craft, time duration of booking, high season and low off season rates and of course your relationship with the skipper / skippers.

Deep Sea Fishing Species & Varieties:

Target fishes for deep sea sports fishing can range from species of Marlin, Sailfish, Wahoo, Jackfish, Yellow Fin Tuna and Shark. The species of some big fishes (Marlin, Sailfish and Shark) are already under wildlife protection program that killing and catching these is already prohibited. Jackfish on the other hand can be consumed. When caught, it can be sliced into thin strips for sushimi. Tunas are also consumable, usually when caught these are taken home by the players.

Open Your Fishing Pleasures To the Sport of Deep Sea Big Game Fishing:

As said its case of different strokes for different folks.  Some people go to a sun spot in the winter for beach activities while others go for food and shopping. Yet one major undiscovered area that keen sports fisherman and anglers are only just discovering is winter – and even off peak seasonal jaunts – all for the thrill of landing huge fish in open sea areas – deep water ocean fishing.

Roger Rainbow

Roger Rainbow – not only arranges for tours and time share presentations in Puerto Morelos – he is a local aficionado of the  best fine dining and freshest fish and seafood restaurants in Puerto Morelos Cancun & Playa del Carmen.    Roger also arranges for gay friendly tours in the Puerto Morelos Cancun Q Roo regions  .  Roger will also gladly do Cancun international airport pickups and arrange limousine service to nighttime party events – I am trying to facilitate rainbow travel services here in Mexico

I do rainbow travel day trips to the Mayan temples at Chichen Itza & Tulum from Cancun Playa del Carmen & Puerto Morelos Mexico
I will pick up at the airport if necessary
(Av. Rojo Gomez, north side of the church, Puerto Morelos, Puerto Morelos, Quintana Roo, 77580
phone – 1998-147-7016

Falling Chairs

Humayun Gauhar

As President Zardari stood up clumsily to deliver his annual address to parliament his chair fell. His sage said it was a bad omen – “Beware the ides of March” and all that jazz – for ‘The Chair’ is akin to a throne, symbolizing power and office. “You will have to pray at the shrine of a Sufi much bigger than any we have in Pakistan,” the sage declared. So Zardari decided to go to the biggest South Asian Sufi of them all, Hazrat Moinuddin Chishti (1141-1230 CE), whose shrine is in city of Ajmer in India.

Many kings, presidents and prime ministers have gone to Ajmer Emperor Akbar is said to have gone to Ajmer to pray for a son. Some say it was to a Sufi in Sheikhupura, I forget his name, but that is another story. Either way, Akbar got a son and successor from his Hindu Rajput wife and the Mughal dynasty continued.

The official reason for Zardari’s visit was that he went to honour his late wife’s promise or ‘mannat’ to the pir, but the talk in the bazaars is that it was the ‘bad omen’ that triggered it off. It could have been both. Should it matter?

Yes it should, because the Pakistani state, ergo the people, must have paid for some part of the visit, even though it is said that the president paid for everything from his own pocket, including the one million US dollar offering he gave to the shrine. Fine, but the questions then arises: from where did he get so much money? Best to leave it to the judges of our highest exalted court – the ‘Supreme’ one that is – to take suo moto notice. I don’t know how Muslims can call any court ‘supreme’ and that too in an Islamic state since in Islam only the court of God is supreme because only God is supreme and sovereign. That’s yet another discussion. No one will object because our people, particularly of Sindh and southern Punjab, have a proclivity to go to Sufis dead or alive for blessings and intercession with the Almighty. That in Islam no one can intercede with God on anyone’s behalf is forgotten. And – you guessed it – that’s yet another discussion.

So off our president went with son, daughter, sage, ministers, sycophants, journalists, media and staff in tow, enough to require two aircraft, one executive jet (wonder which anointed ones got to sit in that one with the ‘royal’ family) and an army C-130, the type in which this ‘royal’ family’s nemesis General Zia ul Haq crashed and perished with many others. That particular aircraft, legend has it, was the same that transported Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s dead body half way to his ancestral graveyard in Sindh before returning to Rawalpindi halfway with engine trouble and the body had to be shifted to another C-130.  Not that it means anything; else the sage wouldn’t have kept quiet. By the way, such is our attraction for graves that Bhutto’s mausoleum has become another saintly shrine. Why do you think that some Muslims level them off every few years?

It was good that Zardari’s private visit included a ‘sumptuous’ semi-official lunch with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Not that a constitutionally ceremonial president and a weak proxy prime minister amount to much in this land of dynastic rule with the fig leaf of British parliamentary democracy. But it is precisely because of dynasty that Zardari wields real power, being Bhutto’s son-in-law and co-chairman of his party, with his young son the chairman and icon of the Bhutto cult, a symbolic figurehead so far. As for Mr. Singh, real power lies with the daughter-in-law of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty who is also the leader of the ruling party. No matter: jaw-jaw is better than war-war a la Churchill.

Be all that as it may, our media’s hysterical hoopla that accompanied the visit last Sunday was shameful. So obsessed was it with Zardari’s lunch and pilgrimage that it callously paid scant attention to the worst peacetime tragedy our army has ever faced when 135 of soldiers were buried alive in an avalanche in Siachen. The two oldest civilizations in the world have been at each other’s throats for 28 years in what is called the “highest war in the world”. Stupid. Both have lost more soldiers to the elements there than to bullets. It’s about geo-strategy and water. To get news about the Siachen tragedy we had to turn to foreign channels. Shows how wonky priorities can get when the collective mind is wonky: the difference between right and wrong, relevant and irrelevant or less relevant is lost.

Our media went overboard on the visit because we as a people are merrily unaware of where the limits of respect for state office end and the courtier’s pathological sycophancy begins; of where constructive criticism ends and national damage begins. There was daydreaming galore by anchors, clapped out ambassadors, bureaucrats gone to seed, generals put out to pasture, all masquerading as analysts, most in awe of America, many members of the Langley Club or on its waiting list.

That the Supreme Commander of our Armed Forces chose to go to India in the face of this enormous tragedy was of no consequence to him or to our media. Symbolism is an important balm for broken hearts and destroyed lives, more, dare I suggest, than the symbolism of a spiritual pilgramage. Would the great Sufi of Ajmer have missed Zardari’s presence? Would he have any use for the one million US dollars offering? Only his progeny would. Custody of shrines by progeny is a booming business because illiterate, desperately poor and helpless devotees can go there for, if nothing else, therapy of a soul in turmoil, even if they know that only God can answer prayers and that the piety that lay with the Sufi did not enter his genes to be passed on to his descendants. In Zardari’s mind – and he is our best political tactician, mind you – the symbolism of his pilgrimage to Ajmer would hold importance with Sindhi voters, what with elections looming.

Shrines often become political constituencies of Sufi progeny whose habits their exalted forebear would have looked at askance. Their graves are where the credibility and constituencies of ‘Mukhdooms’ or custodians lie. It’s as primitive and predatory as feudalism and tribalism since all three societal forms prey upon the illiteracy, poverty and helplessness of the hapless. Pathetic. Sufis are people of peace, of love, of poetry and sometimes of trance and dance, which is why the ascetic disapproves of them.

Only those who cannot see God with their inner eye, in their hearts and in His creations pray to mortals or ask them to intercede with Him. Human beings find it difficult to think in the abstract. Go to mausoleums, certainly, because very pious and God-loving people used to live there, but don’t imagine that they can do for you that which only God can do. Genuine Sufis and mystics were incredible people for they saw beyond logic and came to their deductions through feeling with the mind and thinking with the heart. But their followers and adherents don’t understand this and ascribe to them and their progeny qualities that only God has. Here I go drifting off into another subject.

Moinuddin Chishti is regarded as the greatest Sufi of the subcontinent for helping people, which is why is called ‘gharib nawaz’ or helper of the poor. The fire of the huge cauldron in which food is cooked and distributed free has been alight for centuries. It takes a ladder to get to its lip.

Back to the visit: Pakistan wants to be seen to be trying to improve relations with India, if for nothing else than to score brownie points with America. India has had the bad habit of linking disparate issues, particularly terrorism with everything. But now it seems that it is breaking that habit. India should remember that it is state terrorism that begets non-state terrorism. I will not say more. No point in laboring the obvious. America and India shouldn’t forget that no country in the world has suffered more at the hands of homegrown and foreign terrorism than Pakistan has and no country has lost more soldiers and civilians in fighting terrorists. Good luck. Peace is better than war.

humayun.gauhar786@gmail.com

Deep Sea Sports Fishing

One of the fun activities to engage with the upcoming summer season & break to enjoy the sun all the more is fishing. Sports fishing over the years with all the improvements in tackle never mind ease of travel to your favorite fishing holes and indeed access to worldwide travel has made angling and sports fishing a brand new sport and endeavor .For example of the newly opened vistas is deep sea sports fishing where you as a fisherman or woman can venture into the open ocean and be challenged to catch big and even fish fishes of your dreams. This is a fun and fulfilling task at the same time.

Deep Sea Fishing Point One – Get As Far Away From Shore as Possible:

When engaging with this big fish game, one needs to travel far distance from the shore in the part of the ocean called the open-ocean. This part is vast and faraway from the shore. It only supports barely ten percent of the marine organisms because of its low nutrient supply. The marine life that dominated this region is the big fishes that can travel far and wide across the ocean.

For Deep Sea Fishing Its All In A Proper Reliable & Good Boat:

Good and reliable ocean capable boats make this solid Deep Sea Fishing Possible. However the boat used should suitable for the challenge with the big fish. Some individuals who have found this game very enjoyable have acquired their personal equipments just for this activity. While those who are just looking for fun and wanted to try this can go for the service package provided by some rental businesses, leasing boats for this game. Typically aside from the boat, providers also offer captains and deck hands to man the boat and make the fishing game comfortable and secured for the players. Boats used for this game are well-equipped with amenities that can make the players stay all the more fun and comfy. This include sleeping, eating and shower facilities. To avoid dull moments entertainment devices are also typically present. There is also a sun bathing platform to enjoy while waiting for the big fish action challenge. Rental fee will depend largely on the length of time required for the activity as well as on the number of game participant.

Deep Sea Fishing Species & Varieties:

Target fishes for deep sea sports fishing can range from species of Marlin, Sailfish, Wahoo, Jackfish, Yellow Fin Tuna and Shark. The species of some big fishes (Marlin, Sailfish and Shark) are already under wildlife protection program that killing and catching these is already prohibited. Jackfish on the other hand can be consumed. When caught, it can be sliced into thin strips for sushimi. Tunas are also consumable, usually when caught these are taken home by the players.

Open Your Fishing Pleasures To the Sport of Deep Sea Big Game Fishing:

Big fish game is such a pleasurable and fulfilling activity to pursue. This can already be enjoyed anywhere in the world. It offers leisure of fishing at its best without having to be an expert fisherman. One thing should be considered though and that is keeping your part in conserving the fish species that needs it.

Carlos is a well known sports fishing charter operator in Puerto Morelos and its Cancun environs

Carlos recommends that with two major fishing tournaments upcoming in the Puerto Morelos area - the Don Andres Garcia Lavin – 3er -Tordeo de Pesca Deportiva de Puerto Morelos as well as the even better known twenty-third edition of the “César Martín Rosado” fishing tournament – already a tradition in Puerto Morelos which is the beginning of the serial “Pescando en el Caribe” (fishing at the Caribbean) sporting & angling events – it might well be a great time to book a fishing vacation and set of boat charters to the Yucatan Quintana Roo region of Mexico .  You can start it all by flying into Cancun international airport – perhaps even on a last minute travel deal booked online.

logicalfools.com
News, views and reviews. Local Eyes, Global Perspective
http://logicalfools.com/

logicalfools.com
News, views and reviews. Local Eyes, Global Perspective
http://logicalfools.com/