A Thousand Words

One picture can represent so much.

Five months after I met M, I moved to a college town four hours away. I had applied to that school even before I met M, and I wasn't going to change my plans just because I'd met some boy. 

I was very sad and lonely there, as I am not what you would call an extrovert. Or outgoing. Or friendly. Of eighteen months I lived there, finishing up the last of my Bachelor's degree, I stayed in that town by myself only three weekends. I stayed three more weekends when I had visitors. (Twice my best friend, once my parents.) I didn't make a single lasting friend from that time in my life. It's hard to make friends if you're never there, and every weekend I would drive home. I spent almost every Saturday with M. 

We fell into quite a routine. Especially considering I was supposed to be falling into a routine in another town hours away. Where I was going to school and had a job and paying money to rent a room. But I couldn't seem to help myself, and every weekend without fail, I'd spend eight hours in my car, on my way to my M.

Even though I remember being miserable a lot of that time - all except Saturdays - I only feel happy remembering it. That's what time can do, make you forget hardship and remember only the good things, the happy times. I remember hating to see a certain highway sign because it meant being away, leaving. (Plus a couple of hefty speeding tickets.) But I've driven on that highway once since, as a newlywed with my M by my side on our way home after visiting family for Thanksgiving. I could no longer remember hating that road. In my head, it wasn't the road that had taken me AWAY from M, I only remembered it as the road that had taken me TO M so many times. 

Those Saturdays when I would visit, M would sometimes plan elaborate outings. Miniature golf. Science Museum. Going with his friend who was test driving Audis and BMWs. (Fun day!) Sometimes he wouldn't plan anything at all. We'd watch a movie. Once I sat on a couch and read a book while he worked on a paper for hours.

He would cook for me a lot, too. The first Pakistani food he made was ground beef with peas served rolled up in pita bread. Once when I was sick, he called his mother for a chicken soup recipe she made for him when he was sick. Needless to say, it was not the chicken soup I was used to having when I was sick - but I liked it. (When I asked M for his input for this post, he reminded me that I took the soup leftovers with me and my dad really liked it.)

In the picture above you can see a blue dish with a helping of some channa daal M had cooked when I had visited him. He'd given me the leftovers to take to school with me, with pita bread because he knew I wouldn't have any at home. To thank him for being so kind, I'd written him a thank you email and I took this picture to show him how much I'd enjoyed his hand-packed meal. 

In the picture there are other little things, too. In the left hand corner you can just barely make out two books, one black and one blue; my copy of Teach Yourself Urdu and a biography of Muhammadﷺ. The biography had been given to me by one of M's friends. I had bought myself Teach Yourself Urdu. A few months later, one of M's close friends would visit Pakistan and M would ask him to bring back books to help me learn Urdu. I didn't like the Teach Yourself book and it hadn't been helping me. The friend called M to say that he'd found a good book with the basics and a tape of conversational Urdu. He'd called from Pakistan to make sure I could play a tape in this age of CDs (I could) and he brought it back all the way from Islamabad in his precious limited luggage space.

Unfortunately it was the same Teach Yourself Urdu book. Now I had two copies.

In the picture there's also a clear glass bracelet. Since first hearing about these glass bangles, I'd wanted some of my own. It took a while, but M eventually did buy me some. We drove on his motorcycle to the only desi bazaar he knew of and he let me pick out the ones I wanted. The lady behind the counter was very nice and helped me find the right size - it looked several sizes too small, but she showed me how she eased hers onto her hand. 

Outside, in the parking lot, I tried to put one of the bracelets on like the woman had shown me but it broke as I tried to ease it over my thumb, it's glass shards slicing two deep cuts into the flesh on the back of my hand. Riding on the back of M's motorcycle on the way home, I bled all over his clothes. Later he would show me how I could use soap and water or lotion to get the too-small bracelets onto my too-large wrist, but I would still break them one by one over the course of the next few weeks and months. Eventually I would have only one bracelet left which would somehow outlast the rest. It lasted so long that all the green paint wore off and it was completely clear. When it broke, I saved the pieces. 

All of these stories - this history - comes flooding back when I look at this one little, insignificant picture. It's not just the mendhi on my hand, a bracelet, a plate food, my dorm room desk. It is so much more.

Old Stomping Grounds

I am what some might call "overly sentimental." I like to keep things that have sentimental value. A lot of things. I also like to revisit places that have sentimental value. Even if they're not my places to have sentimental value about. It's like I'm even a sympathetic sentimental fool.

So anyway, M used to tell me lots of stories. So many stories. I could already find my way to his favorite "cold-drink shop" by myself even before we landed in Karachi the first time, and I could have pointed out his favorite neighbor's house along the way. That's how many times I heard about these places in M's life. 

Whenever we had a spare second I would always say "Tell me a story about.....(insert random topic.)" I still do that actually. If it's about M, I want to know about it! (Hi Mian! Love you!)

All this to say that I still like hearing all his stories about his pre-me life. And I'm still overly sentimental.

One of the coolest things this sentimental fool got to do when we visited Pakistan for the first time was revisit some of M's old haunts - the setting for so many of the stories. We visited all his old schools, the places he used to tutor for extra money, even the house one of his uncles didn't even live in anymore - just because he had loved visiting their house so much! He showed me all his favorite places to shop, his favorite sweets shop, and the restaurant he ate at with his college friends almost every week of his college years.

But I think his favorite place to revisit was his college.

The entrance to M's University

The Hallowed Halls

I think I even turned M sentimental, too. He stopped and wanted me to take this guy's picture because he said it looked exactly like his best friend studying in the exact spot they always used to meet up with each other. (Although I have to say, it does look just like him from the back.)

We tried to go into the library while we were there, too, but we were stopped by the security guard. He made us go to the office of some woman, she must've been the head librarian, to get permission to enter since neither of us were students. She was lovely and asked a few questions about where we'd come from and why we were there, and gave us permission to stay as long as we liked. We didn't stay more than a few minutes, though. M had just wanted to show me the table he always used to sit at and another location where his friends had played a trick on him once.

Afterwards, M wanted to go to the old "canteena" where he used to grab a bite to eat. He bought his old favorite kabob roll and proclaimed it just as good as he remembered. Then he bought us some ice cream on the way out from one of the ice-cream guys. (The ice cream truck there was an ice cream bicycle! The guy had a whole freezer apparatus on the back of his bike and he peddled it around selling ice cream treats, including two Wall's ice cream cones. Which I proclaimed just as good as I was hoping it would be. 

Then I had to take pictures of M posing in front of his old class buildings.

Yep. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one around here who's overly sentimental, right M?

You've Got The Wrong Guy

People sometimes happen upon our little blog conversation via google search terms. Sometimes these are predictable, and sometimes they're not. There are some weird people in the world looking for some weird things - and that's all I'm gonna say about that. But somewhere in between mothers-in-law, traveling with a baby to a developing nation, and building up a tolerance for spices (Shh! Don't tell them I'm a wimp) and the weird stuff I don't even want to acknowledge - is some pretty funny stuff.

Here are some of the recent keyword searches that have brought people to my little corner of the Internet: (This is not my idea, I read a post like this a long time ago on The Pioneer Woman.)

Let me know about latest pakistani shalwar kameez designs  

You are asking the WRONG person. First, I'm very forgetful so it's unlikely I'll remember to keep you updated. Second, the only "latest pakistani shalwar kameez designs" I am aware of are when my over-middle-aged middle-class mother-in-law brings me back from Pakistan. Lovely woman, but she's not exactly cutting edge, is all I'm saying...

Salwar kameez ugly outfit

Well, that's not a very nice thing to say. Who wants to see pictures of ugly outfits, anyway? Desi What Not To Wear, coming to a TV near you!

Kids of desi girl and gora guy

I know, I know - I too just wanted to be able to think about what our babies might look like. If you want to see my son (just a peek of the side of his face) there's a picture at the end of this post.

3 things muslim man do when wife disagree

At my house, the muslim man first tries to talk to the muslim woman. Then they discuss whatever they need to, and a mutual decision is made. You're right - it's as easy as 1, 2, 3! Hope that helps!

Pakistani parents wont let me marry my american girlfriend

Uh oh. Wrong place to be then. That's all we talk about around here! 

Warm milk for babies or cold

NOOOOO!!!!!

To know if aunty is is intersted in me

This one was from India, just so that we have a better picture of what he meant by "aunty." All I can say is I hope you're an Uncle!

Name guess - 9 letters arabic starts with t

What? How lonely does someone have to be to try and play word games with their internet browser? I have no idea.

Marrying a gori vs desi girls

I don't think I'm impartial in this debate, perhaps you should look elsewhere? I wonder what kind of information they were looking - which side of the question did they hope to bolster? Hopefully it wasn't someone looking for Google to make an impartial decision for them.  

Will babies sleep better if you warm their milk

Don't do it!!!  

What do pakistani do on thursdays nights  

Hmm. Clearly I don't know everything about Pakistani culture, because I didn't know there was something that all Pakistanis do on Thursday nights. Hopefully some of the better informed contributers here will be able to enlighten us all in the comments. What DO Pakistanis do on Thursday nights?

What about you guys - how did you find this site?

Scenes & Stories Around Karachi Vol. 2

I get nervous when someone knocks on my door in America. No one ever comes to my home unless I specifically invite them, we don't receive our mail here so there's no deliveries, and utilities and other things like that generally make appointments. So who could possible be knocking on my door? 

It's totally different in Karachi. Lots of people come to the door of my in-laws house in Karachi. Political parties come to make sure my father-in-law will be voting for them (and sometimes "make sure" means intimidation), the milk delivery guy comes to drop off some milk, neighbors, friends and family drop by unannounced, beggars come to ask for money,  and people come to sell things. There's a lot of knocks throughout the day. 

One day while I was visiting, there was a knock. My brother-in-law went to answer the door and soon came excitedly into the room, telling me to grab my camera and come with him. He knew I'd want pictures of this:

A guy and a monkey. I'm not even sure what you'd call this guy. Like a snake charmer, but with a monkey. I'm sure monkey-charmer is not right...

This monkey had learned all sorts of tricks. Here he was parading around as Musharraf. The monkey handler used bananas and a stick to get the monkey to do the tricks. (He didn't hit the monkey, he just tapped the stick on the ground wherever the monkey was supposed to go.)

Here, the monkey was doing some kind of combat. Later he was shot and played dead.

After the show was over, the monkey handler wanted money for the performance. He wasn't pleased with what we gave him, saying that since we'd taken pictures and videotaped the performance, we should pay him more. He'd even trained the monkey to sit in our doorway so that we couldn't close the door until we paid up.

Just a regular day in Karachi.

Scenes & Stories Around Karachi

I take a lot of pictures. On my first trip to Pakistan, I took an average of 100 pictures a day. 

Most of the pictures I've posted on here are ones I've found digging through my photo archives looking for specific things. Like pictures of shalwar kameez, or my trip to the Wagah Border, ortailors, or paan stains in the streets. I recently went back through almost all the pictures from both of our trips to Pakistan for a friend who wanted to see some, and I happened across a few of my favorite scenes of Karachi. 

I took this picture during our first trip in 2004, on one of our first outings. We went to Tariq Road to buy me some clothes. (We didn't buy anything though, because everything was more expensive than we'd expected.) Down one of the adjacent streets, all these food carts were lined up. This guy's selling juices and smoothies, and I had never known an orange could be peeled like that before. I remember when I was very young, I had a teacher who could peel an apple all in one go with a long, curly snake of the peel as a result, but who know you could do it with an orange, too?

This picture is from when we visited my youngest brother-in-law's soon-to-be-fiance's house to inquire about them getting engaged. She lived in a pretty nice apartment building, but because it was Qurbani season, lots of people had animals and they had made a space to keep them in the parking garage. I loved that one of the goats was wearing a jacket!

I really like to ask shopkeepers if I can take their picture. I love to see people swell with pride about their business and all of their hard work. This was one of my favorites - a samosa shop in North Nazimabad. We were on our way to one of M's uncle's house and we'd called him to ask where the best place to get samosas around there was. He'd directed us to this place and when we told the guy at the shop, he was really happy about that. When I asked if I could take his picture, he called over some of the other staff and arranged his pile of pakoras a little to make for a nicer picture. Even the guys in the back rolling out the samosa dough were happy to let me take their picture.

This was when we went shopping - I think back near Cooperative Market where M buys all of his electronics components. This was by far the busiest shopping day I had ever seen in Karachi, with the streets filled with people and the roads clogged with every kind of vehicle from bus to donkey cart. 

This was the first day we went out after Bhutto's assassination and the subsequent days of rioting. Our first trip was to our airline's office on Shararah-e-Faisal Road. While we were in the office finding out that the earliest flight with seats available was for 15 days after we were scheduled to leave (No thanks then, we'll keep our original tickets...) a construction worker and his chotta, (helper) had pushed their cart in front of our car and we were blocked in. M started to move the cart, and the cart owner came running over quickly. I asked (/mimed) to ask the boy if I could take his picture. His pose was fantastic, and after I'd shown him the picture from the camera's screen on the back he called out to his father and/or boss to come look at how much style he had! Then I asked M to pose for a picture to to remember how he'd had to help them move their cart. 

M usually leaves his crown at home when we're out & about in Karachi.

Who's Doing The Adjusting After All?

A lot of people ask me about the adjustments I've had to make by marrying a Pakistani. Those questions come in all forms with different tones, from my grandmother's critical "Why can't you have a more American life? You are an American, you know?" to my husband's aunt's "Wow, you have adapted so well to our culture!" meant as a compliment to me.

I think that no one can really see the full picture. My husband and I make our life from the myriad options we both brought with us into our marriage. The final makeup of our life is somewhere in between and it changes daily. It has it's own life cycle. There were times when I wore shalwar kameez out around town almost half the time and cooked Pakistani food for dinner almost every night. Now is not one of those times. 

But the thing I've always wanted to explain is that I don't think I'm the one doing the majority of the compromising or adopting of cultures. I think my husband has.

My husband will never again get to live in the country he was born and raised in, where he spent most of his adult life. This is something we agreed to before marrying, that I will want to live in America. My husband will have to struggle his entire life to try and impart his heritage to his children, and he may end up disappointed if they don't identify with their Pakistani heritage as much as he'd wish. He will also struggle to ensure that they are fluent in Urdu. Even with his best efforts, they may not be. He has had to change his expectations of a spouse, the roles of spouses in a marriage, gender roles and expectations in general, and what he expects his life to be like. He can no longer enjoy a Pakistani party like he used to. He must be "on the job" translating for me the entire time. Even at family gatherings (maybe especially at those) he can't just sit around chatting with his cousins, he must be actively ensuring I'm engaged in the conversation as well.

This is not to say that he deserves any accolades from the rest of the world for these things, just that compromise is a two way street and I don't think many people in our life understand or value the compromises he's made on his side. 

Some people might say that these don't count as much because he chose this life. He chose to come to America and should lead an "American life" (whatever that means.) But he originally came to America only for graduate studies. He didn't have to decide he was going to reevaluate his stance of gender and the role of women in society. These are compromises he's made by marrying me, just as I've made compromises to marry him. I sometimes think that the compromises on his side are the pretty big ones. Eating on the floor and where we spend our winter vacation seem like relatively smaller compromises to me.

The Evil Eye

Nazar, or the "Evil Eye", is a possible culprit when bad luck or hardship comes your way. I don't always understand this myself, but here is what I have heard about it. Hopefully people who know better than I can explain it better or more correctly in the comments.

When you are boastful or have something people could envy (even without being boastful about it), that envy could cause you bad luck. Someone described it " as less of a luck thing and more of an "energy" thing. It's sort of a new age perspective... you know, people's bad energy affects your good energy" which I thought was a great way to explain it. I'm not sure if it's similar to or the same as black magic, and I don't think that these people have to even actually wish bad things to you. I think it just comes from the envy itself.

One way to ward off this kind of nazar is to downplay the things you have. As a result of this, some people put a black smudge on a baby's forehead. It's like the black smudge is an imperfection and will stop envy of the cute baby. 

Some people have remedies for nazar. If you think that some bad luck has come your way and it might be because of someone's nazar, you can pursue some of these remedies. I know some who go to hakeems or wise people to remedy possible nazar. My mother-in-law burns six red chilis - she says that usually burning a red chili will fill your house up with smoke and you won't be able to stop coughing. But if you have nazar on you and you burn the red chilis, there won't be any smoke at all and you'll know you were under nazar. 

Another remedy I found online searching for cures for nazar: "Take seven knots of turmeric and recite the following words thrice on each knot. “Al-Islamu Haqqun Wal-Kufru Baatil”. Throw each knot one by one into the fire after reciting the above words on them and fumigate the affected person with the smoke thereof." (Source.) 

In Islam, when you fear that you are under this kind of influence, I've read that you should recite certain portions of the Quran - specifically Ayat-ul-Qursi and the four 'Quls'

One of my favorite stories that involves nazar is when we visited Pakistan with our son. My husband likes to jump around and be rough and funny, and he was carrying our son on his shoulders like a sack of potatoes saying at the top of his lungs "Bacha lay lo! Pyara hay, susta hay, acha hay!" Dhus dollar ka bacha lay lo!" (Come take a baby! It's lovely, it's cheap, it's good! Come get a ten dollar baby!) My mother in law smacked him on the arm so hard and told him to stop, it was too boastful and it would lead to nazar. It was so cute to see my husband as his mother's son, getting hit on the arm like that.

The reason I remembered this is because my in-laws house is currently suffering from the rain in Karachi. A friend suggested I take down the pictures of my husband's family home in Karachi just in case nazar was the culprit. My mother-in-law agreed with her, so I've removed the post with the pictures of the house for now.

Three Things

Over at Whimsy's blog, she does a fun Friday Blogdrought remedy. This week, it's three of our own favorite posts. I can't stomach reading back too much of my own writing - mostly because of all the typos - but these three instantly came to mind. (And then I had to go back and re-read them to edit out all the typos.)

It Was All Lies

The nefarious M.

Memory Lane

Because I'm a big sap.

Forks For Another Wife

What might've been. And unfortunately, they're still around.

The Family Home In Karachi

*Disclaimer

The things I write about do not hold true for all of Pakistan or all Pakistanis or all of Pakistani culture.

My experience with Pakistan and Pakistani culture is very limited. Really very, very limited. While I would have been able to pick Pakistan out on a map before I met my M, I couldn't have told you anything about it except that I think it has nuclear weapons and there might be some issues with India. I do not have a wealth of knowledge about anything related to Pakistan, even now after two trips there and close to six years of marriage.

The only things I do know are what I have experienced since being married to my husband. You might be surprised how limited that is. Pakistan is an overwhelmingly diverse place, a rainbow gradient of all kinds of cultures; each step north between India and Afghanistan or east between China and Iran brings about a huge differences in every part of Pakistan and in the lives of Pakistanis. Each of these current influences and some historic ones have shaped Pakistani into a widely diverse place. I know one teeny, tiny speck of that, and even then only through the eyes of an outsider. 

My husband's family has roots from the province of Bihar in India, and my in-laws were born there and spent much of their childhood there. I've been told by someone knowledgeable that he and his family have Bihari faces. They left India after Partition and lived for many years in Bangladesh, only leaving for Pakistan around the time of the 1971 war. My husband was raised in a "middle-class" family in a largely Mohajir area of Karachi. They still live there today. He came to America when he was 25 and has lived here for soon to be 10 years. 

That is the tiny slice of Pakistani culture I am most exposed to. It is from that very specific baseline that I write about my life and my experiences with Pakistani culture. Even one different link in that chain would make for big differences. There are places in Pakistan where I would probably not know the first bit about life their, language or cultural practices. And not just far north, NWFP places, but even in Karachi, even in Pakistani-American homes in my own area. 

There is so much history and diversity in Pakistan, I cannot speak for anything but my teeny, tiny slice of life in this long chain of modifiers: American-wife-of-Pakistani-immigrant-from-Bihari-one-time-Bangladeshi-Muhajir-middle-class family.

Oh, About The Beds...

I wrote earlier of being stuck in a bedroom, sitting on the bed with some ladies. It's not as weird as it sounds.

In my experience, beds in Pakistan  and I assume much of desi culture can be considered a perfectly acceptable place for even newcomer, previously stranger guests to sit and socialize. In Pakistan and even in America, social gatherings can include people wandering into and socializing in bedrooms while sitting on beds. I think it has to do with the limit on space/multipurpose use of furniture thing we discussed before when talking about dining room tables, and as a result it is tied largely to wealth/class and whether someone has enough social spaces in their home without resorting to using bedrooms.  In M's family and the vast majority of desi social gatherings I've been to, it's just a norm; a bed is nothing more than a place to sit during the day.

That's not true in my perception of American culture. I would never show a guest to my bedroom except on a house tour given to only close friends or family. Guests would never dream of entering a bedroom in an American house unless specifically directed to. Beds are considered very personal places, and I can't imagine anyone even sitting on my bed except me and my husband. Even when my own parents visit they wouldn't sit on our bed unless I told them they would be sleeping in that room, and then it would be clear that the linens had been changed and they could consider it their bed during the duration of their stay (and then I would not sit on "their" bed, probably.)

Just a cultural difference. Sitting on the bed at a Pakistani dinner party = usually not weird. Even today most social functions I attend in Pakistan and with our more diverse social group of South Asians - in all but large homes - dinner parties include bedrooms as spillover party rooms.

More About The Separations

After that first experience with gender segregation, M and I were hyper vigilant about trying to make sure the situations we were in did not mirror that first dinner party. We had a few tips and tricks to do this.

First, we would try to show up on time for the party. That way we would be some of the first people there. It's surprising how much the first guests can dictate how the rest of the evening goes. If we showed up first, we could get some interesting conversations going, basically refusing the small ways that gender segregation would be enforced. If I was in the middle of a group of men having an interesting conversation it was more likely that the next-arriving guests would assimilate into that group and so on, thereby ensuring a mixed gathering.

There were a few times in those early days when we just couldn't help it. The host of whatever gathering would make sure that as soon as possible, the women and men were in separate spaces. M, though, knew not to let a repeat of that first party happen. He would come check on me every 15 or 20 minutes, try to engage in conversations with the women so that he could spend a few minutes with me, and make sure we left as soon as I was no longer happy. I was always impressed with his efforts and it was very clear that my happiness and comfort was very important to him, and that he would do whatever it took to make sure I was happy and comfortable. Even being the lone guy standing in the doorway to the ladies' room.

After a while, though (a long while, we're talking maybe a year after we were married) it seemed like this was a blight on our social lives. I'm sure we were regarded as the people who always screwed everything up, and neither M or I would have much fun at social gatherings. We were always on pins and needles and always apprehensive. And by that time I had made friends of a lot of these women and often even enjoyed hanging out with them. So we had a talk and decided to relax the rules a little, give in a bit to the gender segregation, but continue to always be aware of the others (read: my) comfort level just in case it was time to leave.

Nowadays it's still pretty rampant and most social interactions with Pakistanis are gender segregated. M's family is not very conservative and don't segregate their family functions, but some of his extended family on his fathers side do. A lot of the functions we went to during our last trip to Pakistan for my BILs wedding were very strictly separated by gender by the bride's family. Even gatherings in our own home end up that way by the men slowing spilling downstairs to play video games and the ladies staying upstairs. 

I still hate it though, and I think it's unnecessary. It will continue to be one of the aspects of Pakistani culture I struggle with forever, I think.

Separate But Not Equal

A few months into knowing M, we began to socialize with his friends. He'd come to that particular school in part because there was a Pakistani professor who was working hard to import as many students from Pakistan as he could. As a result, his school had a pretty large population of Pakistani students for him to socialize with.

The first ever dinner invitation we received as a couple had been from The Maulana - the most religious, longest bearded, always shalwar-kameezed guy. He was so kind. He made so much food and even though I was the only female in attendance, he made sure I felt comfortable and enjoyed the food. (He never once made eye contact with me, though.)

After falling into a pattern of joining M in his social visits with that and other Pakistani friends, I began to feel more comfortable. Then, one day, we were invited to a dinner that was to be a large dinner party - almost all of the Pakistani students and their families (as a few were married as well.) I thought nothing of it - I'd been to a few Pakistani student dinner parties already, I'd had a nice time, this would be no different. I was wrong.

When we got there, a few people had already arrived. There were several men there that I'd never met, and I wasn't introduced to. Soon after The Maulana also arrived, and M told me that the men were going to join together in a congregational evening prayer, and that dinner would be served afterward. One of the women there - a wife of a grad student - signaled for me to come into the other room (a bedroom). Inside there were two other wives of grad students (one was also a graduate student herself.) I had thought I would wait somewhere while they also made their evening prayer, but none of the women prayed. Instead we all sat on the bed. 

It was an uncomfortable silence most of the time. The three wives were all very different. One was from India, had only been in America a few months, and barely spoke to me all night. Another was Pakistani and had known my husband back in Pakistan as well and spoke to me more than the first, but still not that much. The third (the graduate student) was the only woman besides me to wear jeans. She spoke the most to me, asking me not only the usual questions about how much I knew about Pakistani culture or whether I could cook, but also fairly atypical (in my experience, anyway) questions about my own American life and my studies.

Eventually we'd been in the room for a long time. I had seen prayers performed before, and I knew they didn't last that long. I wondered when we'd all get back in the same room and start the party already! Just then, one of their husbands came to the room and told us to come eat. I was so relieved to be out of that cramped room where I'd been set aside for the past 20 minutes. I was so relieved I'd be back with my M instead of having to make forced small talk with these strangers who I thought I had so little in common with! 

But I was not going to be reunited with M. What I saw when I walked out of the room was that all the men had already filled their plates with food and arranged themselves in a circle on the floor around a large sheet serving as a kind of floor tablecloth. They had already begun eating without us. Even my M. There was no room in the circle for anyone else. The women were to eat at the dining table in the next room.

So I ate. I didn't even look over at M. I was pissed off. What was he thinking? Why would he think I wanted to spend my whole evening with these other women instead of him? Why was he allowing this? Why didn't he come and rescue me, take me with him to the "Men's section" or just leave alltogether? The more time that passed, the more upset I got. After eating we women again went into the bedroom and again made as much forced small talk as we could. 

At one point M did come to the doorway of the room, smile on his face, and asked how I was doing. I was so upset at that point I couldn't speak, so I just did a curt head nod. What else could I have said, anyway? "Why the hell have you left me to rot in here with these people I don't know?" I think he must have known there was more to my head nod, though, because not long thereafter he came back to retrieve me from the this room, asking if I was ready to leave. I was ready all right. 

We left, got in the car, and started driving away. It took me sometime before I could compose myself enough to speak. When I did I was all accusation and confrontation. How could he leave me like that? What did he think he was doing? Who the hell leaves their girlfriend in the company of strangers for hours? What was up with this boy's club business? It was a very heated tirade. 

Eventually he calmed me down with protestations of apology, carelessness and thoughtlessness as well as promises that it would never happen again. He asked how my evening had been and I told him exactly what I thought about having dinner holed up in a room with three women, two of whom I had never previously met and one I knew only superficially. I told him just what I thought he could do with his segregated dinner parties. 

Unfortunately, the gender segregation did not end that day.

Begging For A Little Bland

All right, I give up. I'll admit it - this post has instant-karma style come back to bite me. I admit it - I cannot take the spices anymore! I am so tired of eating Pakistani food day in and day out I went and made myself a box of Kraft Mac n' Cheese the other day just to get a BREAK from all the red chili. I had obviously lulled myself into some false sense of competency, but you, my dear readers, should know - I can only take two weeks of it before I go absolutely crazy!

The Wagah Border

One of the absolute coolest things I ever got to see in Pakistan was the Wagah Border flag lowering demonstration. When we visited Lahore in January 2005, we stayed with a fellow Ph.D. student M had gone to school with (and his lovely wife and son.) They were the absolute best hosts I have ever in my life stayed with. They provided for our every minute need and had already planned out every day to include all of the top sights of Lahore and it's surroundings.

One of the excursions they'd planned was visiting the Wagah Border. Wagah is the only road border crossing between India and Pakistan. It's closed every evening, and the flags of both countries are lowered at sunset. I'm pretty sure the flag lowering thing is a "flag etiquette" throwback to British rule. 

Driving through the country to Wagah.

Visitors crowd both borders - where there are spectator seats for just this purpose - to watch the ceremony. It's actually much more about who can yell the loudest and stomp the hardest - the Indian or the Pakistani border guards. Someone told me that the relations between the border guards can be seen as a barometer of India-Pakistan relations. It was quite the spectacle when I was there - and that was during a time of relative calm.

Before the flag lowering.

When we set out to drive to Wagah I didn't realize how long it was going to take. It's quite far! We did get lost a bit on the way, and ended up arriving to Wagah a teensy bit late. On the way M's friend had mentioned that there would be people waiting for us there. His wife's father had been pretty high in the Pakistan Army, so that would determine where we sat. Those Army guys get some kinda special treatment, lemme tell ya.

Driving past the regular parking.

When we did finally arrive, we drove PAST the area where it seemed all the cars were parked. An Army official came running up to our car and instead of yelling at us like I thought he would, he asked if we were Iqbal Sahab's guests. They he showed us where to park (almost IN India, it was so close to the action!) and then scurried us to our seats. The seats lining the road leading to the border gate were separated by gender, so the guys & gals were split up. I could see all the seats for the general public, and then special rows of seats lining the road. He just kept walking and walking - past where anyone was even sitting! He led us to the VERY FIRST bank of seats. We were all alone, me and the friend's wife.

Pakistani Ranger sets aim on the border gate. Also - look! That's me!

The guards march forcefully down the street, yell and stomp their feet, slap the hands of the Indian border guards (or maybe it was just a quick, forceful handshake.) Then the flags are lowered. It seemed to me that the Pakistani flag-lower-er was always a little bit behind, so that he could ensure the Pakistani flag was a little higher than the Indian flag at all times. The whole time the crowds are chanting patriotic things on both sides (and even a few threats to the other side, even in good times.) They ceremoniously take the flag away, the gates are slammed shut, and the Pakistani Rangers stomp away. It was great!

About to begin lowering the flag.

Blatant display of machismo.

Adversarial Lineup.

Afterwards you could pose for pictures with the guards at the border.

It was such a completely different experience than I ever thought I would have in my life. Seeing such a demonstration, being treated like such a VVIP! We even were escorted over to a tent area near the border gate for tea and cookies afterwards!

Chai stand outside the Wahah Border.

My Brothers-In-Law

I have two BILs and they're both really great. They're both younger than M (b/c he's the eldest kid) so they're considered younger than ME, too, even though one isn't. It's like the wife gets elevated to the age of the brother and deserves the same respect they show the elder brother. Like, they don't call M by his first name only, they have to add "Bhai" (which means brother) to the end of his name as a sign of respect. And therefore they don't call me by my first name either, they add "Bhabhi" to the end of the name as a sign of respect. When M was the only brother that was married, I was called simply "Bhabhi" but now that another brother is married, they use our names + Bhabhi to distinguish us.

So my two BILs are great, we'll call them H and J. J is the 2nd oldest kid and H is the baby of the family. (H is the one who's coming to America for studies soon.) I met them for the first time when I traveled to Pakistan a year after our marriage. We had spoken on the phone only very briefly beforehand and they were both very shy around this new American girl. J was more friendly the first time, so we bonded a little more than H & I did. 

But both of them treated me like an absolute princess. If I swatted at a mosquito, they'd be up in a flash to run to the corner store for more mosquito repellant. Both times I've visited Pakistan they've done every little thing for me without even being asked, bringing my favorite soda or jalebis from the mithai shop down the street for me at 5 o'clock in the afternoon when they're hot & fresh. Once I complained that I thought I was getting a cold and J (who is a doctor) left the room quickly and returned 10 minutes later with some medicine he'd gotten at the pharmacy. They're both really sweet, great guys.

J got married in December 2007 and we planned out 2nd trip to Pakistan to coincide with the wedding. H had been in Saudi Arabia for a year or so working on his Master's degree. His English had improved a lot since he'd left and he was less shy. (I suspect his English had been one of the reasons he'd been so shy around me in the first place.) He and I spent a lot more time together and bonded a lot during that second trip. 

Now H is coming to America for his Ph.D., and his school is in the next city over. Of course he'll live with us. He'll be here at the very least for four years, and he'll live with us for as long as he needs or wants to. He'll surely stay with us the first year, but it's not out of the realm of possibilities that he'll live here the whole time. He's engaged and he'll bring his wife over with him as soon as they're married. If he can get his visa situation in order he'll be here at the end of August. If he can't get a visa that quickly he won't be here until January. Either way he'll probably have his wedding in December, and she'll probably come as soon as her own visa situation is worked out. 

I'm actually really excited about this. First, it's a great school for him to go to. It's one of the better schools he applied to, the area we live in has a really large Pakistani & Muslim population, and the school itself has Friday prayers on campus and zabiha food options in the cafeteria (which is kind of like kosher.) That's a lot of home comforts for him to have readily around him to ease his transition to America. How many US universities are like that!?!

It's also a really wonderful thing for my son. H is a FANTASTIC uncle. He is so kind, sweet and gentle with my son and his other nieces. I have never once seen him lose his temper or be anything less that thrilled to spend time with these kids, even when he was walking around holding a toddler and singing to her in a restaurant for HOURS when she was sick and wouldn't go to anyone else. He took care of her so her mother - his sister - could enjoy her dinner. He is so wonderful to my son that he asks for "H___ Chachu" (Uncle H) by NAME even though they only talk through the computer on Skype. So my son will be very lucky to have him around, and his Urdu will improve from having another language model in the house, too.

Also, it will be less of a transition that having Ammi here. H will stay in the downstairs guest suite, rather than staying in the guest room across the hallway from us like Ammi does, so there will be a little bit more family separation (downstairs is too far away and it's too cold down there.) He'll also live his own life, go to classes, make his own friends, etc. He'll take care of himself and all I'll have to do it cook an extra portion. Really, cooking is the only thing in the house that falls exclusively on my shoulders, anyway. H is probably a better housecleaner than I am. Heck, anybody is a better cleaner than me. 

M is also really excited that his brother is coming here. He thinks they're going to spend their days making electronics projects together and that H will run around and retrieve things for him like he did when he was a kid.

So you guys are in for many more in-law stories!

Because the MIL wasn't enough...

M's youngest brother recently applied to 4 American school's Ph.D. programs. He'll be following in M's footsteps by pursuing a Ph.D. in the exact same field. He'd applied to 4 school but 3 had already rejected him, and he just got the last school's answer last week. He's been accepted! He'll be coming to America soon!

Guess which school!?!?

Mine. 

Turning Tides

Big shocking revelation!

So the aunt? (She was lovely!) She made a big announcement during the family gathering. Her middle daughter has gotten engaged. 

To a GORA! (A white guy!)

Celebrating Independence

M has met my whole family - everyone I know, at least. I only have one set of grandparents, two uncles and an aunt and their families, so it really wasn't a whole lot of people. M has a very large family, as we've discussed before, so I haven't yet been able to meet everyone. The major reason for that is because even though I have traveled to Pakistan twice, not everyone lives there or visits at the same time I do. 

Most notably, his eldest aunt on his mother's side of the family lives in England. Although the visit Pakistan every year, our visits have never coincided. Her family is very respected because she was the first of the relatives to move away from Pakistan, the first to send heaps of money and gifts back home, and the first to bring relatives over with her. Abbu (my FIL) stayed with them for a time when he was in France for a year and M's grandparents (Nani and Nana) stayed with them also. They also provided a letter of financial support for M when he was coming to America for his graduate studies to prove he had financial support to pay his own way through school. (<-- Not his school, just the best explanation I could find.) Without that letter he wouldn't have been able to come here. 

This weekend, I will meet that aunt. She's come to America to visit and a big family gathering is planned. Usually these gatherings are just M and his three cousins and their families, but this weekend will be much bigger because three of those families have their parents here (2 for green card processes, and my MIL) and counting the UK aunt, that's four Aunties and/or Uncles (actually 4 Aunties and only 1 Uncle, all the other Uncles are in Pakistan right now.) Anyway, it's going to be a big party. 

I'm not really that nervous about meeting this aunt. I'm confident in my place in his family and she speaks English just fine, so I know we'll be able to communicate easily and well. But I am still a little nervous just because she's such an important member of the family. Either way, I know it's going to be a fun weekend because so many people will be there, and it will be interesting to see my MIL let down her hair around her 2 (dare I say favorite?) sisters. 

But the question remains: Why have I spent the last four year's worth of Fourth of July weekends with immigrants? 

Closing Doors

We are generally an open doors family. It's just the two of us and the baby, so there's not a whole lot of privacy needed. We sleep with the doors open and some of us (to remain unnamed, but not me) sometimes even leave the bathroom door open. The baby always uses the bathroom with an audience, and at night we leave the door open so we can hear him if he needs us.

Nowadays, with my mother-in-law staying with us, as you can imagine there are a lot more closed doors. All the bathroom doors are always closed, and now we all sleep with bedroom doors closed as well. The first night my mother-in-law left her bedroom door open, but I made M close it for her the next night. Any sound buffer is a good thing, I think, whether it's needed or not it can't hurt. We've brought out the good ol' baby monitor so we can still hear the baby.

It seems like such a small difference but it's a big impact. It's an existential thing; before the house was free-flowing, open, and our little family was never cut off from each other. Now it's stagnant in some areas and we spend a lot of time cut off from each other by all of these doors.