Innocence lost

Cheers to the amazingly life changing year that 2011 was,it was one of those years that you finally start ‘getting’ things as they are.If you had been reading my previous blog posts you would know that I learned a lot of lessons often in a hard way,but even these bad experiences have enriched me deeply and inculcated this new perspective,insights which I wouldn’t have got  if I hadn’t lost my so called ‘Innocence’.

The year gone by was an ‘year of firsts’ for me in many,first time your heart skips a beat,first time you feel responsible for fates of many,the first time you act recklessly,first time you know for sure where you stand in a crowd of nameless faceless people and countless other inexplicable incidents .See the funny thing that happens when you grow up is that you suddenly become aware of all the taboos-things you can no longer afford to do, and that also things that you could have gotten away with ,back when you were this frail and innocent being.

By the way,during my brief stunt at work front,I got to experience that the whole horrible bosses thingy is a myth in fact.People are generally nice ,its just that at times our ulterior motives drive us to selfish things.Moreover not all heartbreak need to be gruesomely emotional and ugly ,at a certain point of time you just have to ‘man up’, you may not forgive faults but forgetting is the key ,Time has this uncanny ability to hide things,just as dust settling on books for long periods of time hides the title inscribed on them.Or maybe I have got numb experiencing all of this time and time again plain and simple.

So, it could be different for you, this is a fact that you never know how it feels until it happens to you and rips you apart.Now as every careless fun stage of life  apparently comes to and end,there is this immense burden of societal expectations and personal aspirations,two things which in my case do not seem to be inline with each other.But after all this experimenting on professional and personal fronts, one thing is for sure  I may still not now what I want out of it all but I do know what I don’t want.Which is truly remarkable achievement being the indecisive impulsive train wreck that I oft become.And I believe that the tables could turn anytime,often when we are  least expecting em.

Innocence  is indeed generally overrated and underappreciated in our society.I now realise that I didn’t always have to do the right thing,and be the right person,so I now decide to choose what feels right to me.One has to take chances,do things which didn’t feel right.As Beth Ditto song goes ‘the world is full good intentions,but Paradise is hard to find’.The world is not a place for angelic clean frail beings even the saints sin,so losing this whole facade like mirage does indeed open doors and broaden your horizons. Alongside we  have to be very careful for what we wish for,as in my case what I often thought I needed turned out to be the terminal illness that could have taken me down.At the end of the day no one should have regrets or at bare minimum avoid such regretful choices.In conclusion,there is no point in keeping your innocence if it doesn’t do you any good , and even more so if its holding you back.

P.S. the graphic used is not mine

Political Roundup 2011

As with every other year in Pakistan’s political history,this year was also very ‘crucial’ and presented a lot ‘delicate circumstances’.The most mind altering event of all was the killing of OBL in Pakistan, which subsequently ruffled a lot of feathers and left many of us bewildered and at times confused.A great lot  debated whether this whole debacle even happened but the fact is it exists as an event in history ,it no longer matters what really happened in that big mansion in Abbotabad .The world somehow knows he was there and was subsequently killed.That’s it.It is this perception that matters now not the facts.

We also saw our CJ running around taking suo moto notices from mundane stuff like food+utilities prices to highly controversial yet pointless stuff like PCO judges and NRO,all of which boiled down to nothingness basically.Just a lot of men with pot bellies in drab ill-fitting black suits blabbering equally absurd and meaningless crap on media.There was Hajj pilgrimage corruption case ,flood in Sindh for second year in a row,then railways network was closing down and now even PIA planes being grounded.I guess we should all get Bata & Servis running shoes and start cross country marathons for travelling like the old days.

While the Arab peninsula  was having Jasmine Revolution,in Pakistan we saw this emergence of this new ‘enlightened elite’ followers of  former cricketer turned politician Imran Khan,with one particular follower complaining in about heat while protesting that went viral on Internet.And then there was this amazing show of power by huge ‘Jalsa’  in Lahore,that rattled the political veterans’ thrones so much some of them later joined the very party that was criticizing them.But what bothers me  about Imran Khan is his lack actual operational plan,as his rhetoric is flagrantly optimistic and self glorifying which is at times on the verge of delusion and his empathy for talibanistic right wing .Even if he claims to change the system,it is the harsh reality that its ‘The Bureaucracy’  that will actually ‘do’ the dos so it is unlikely his dreams will materialize if at all.And also consider the fact that more than 60% of population resides in rural areas where a lot of people maynot even hear of him.

This year Pakistan suffered another major blow to  its esteem when players of national cricket team were convicted of ‘spot fixing’,the scandal itself was quite demeaning but the way the players first denied and then resort to blaming each other was grossly shameful.

There were also these almost traditional waves  of violence  in the Karachi,where people were beheaded and put it into gunny bags,there were news of human slaughterhouses being discovered .Which was then followed by this dramatic accusations by former minister about another party’s alleged crimes.Then again it was CJ’s notice getting us nowhere.

In a country were there is less than 10% spent on education and health,it was only a change of weather that led to this catastrophic wave of dengue fever deaths,with at least 20 dying a week.People were practically confined to their houses slithering themselves with insect repellents as if it was musk oil.But what it all did was that  it exposed our fragility in public policy and also our rulers’ apathy toward wellbeing of the citizens.Not only was the government not prepared,it didn’t know what to do about it when it was actually happening .Thankfully the weather changed and the deadly insect carrying the disease  eventually fizzled out.

As in the years gone by the energy crisis persisted in 2011 as well,with industrialists and even civilians protesting.It was also the first time that gas load shedding took hold for the general populace.Nobody knows who is getting ‘gassed’ and by whom.

Towards the end of the year,NATO planes attacked and  killed army men sparking rage in both civilian and army rulers but I couldn’t help and wonder  that this killing was a big deal only because the ones killed were army people, then what about the common people being killed by drones and indigenous army operations? How was that somehow ok.It highlights the very important fact of our society that all human lives may be equal but army still is indeed more equal than others.NATO supply lines were  subsequently blocked ,there was protest by our ‘fashion-savvy tranny-voiced’  Foreign Minister.Moreover drone attacks have stopped so it means there was some kind of agreement between them and our military that it let them do it in past.But lets see how long the army puts up with its billions of dollars of military aid blocked,a sane person cannot ignore the bitter truth that the US is biggest trade partner,biggest donor,and even FDI contributor.Our ‘Islamic brethren’ don’t even give us few days loan for petroleum import payments,so you know they wont stand by us in our rainy days.

There were these so non-controversial nude photos of actress Veena Malik for a magazine,which she first denied and then kinda accepted.What was really disturbing was the fact that people who were immensely hurt and enraged by her defiant ways in the day ,were searching the Internet and ogling the very photos at night.So it doesn’t matter whether she was right or wrong,at the end of day it did garner her a lot of publicity

The year ends with cracker busts by the name of ‘memo gate’,where someone from Pakistan is alleged to have written to US govt to protect against a possible military takeover against present democratic regime.There is a ‘judicial inquiry’ taking place, lets see how it progresses ,as it is still being brewed by our pseudo political analysts. but I am sure of one thing that is  it won’t get anybody anywhere.its all like running in circles!

A flippant side of FASHION

With back to back fashion shows, this past month was more than eventful to say the least. First there was the Karachi Fashion Week, then Bridal Couture Week and then the weekend marked the end of PFDC fashion week. Hoards of glitterati flocked to venues hoping to see some good clothes, to socialize with beautiful people and to amp up their otherwise banal lives. But after a few of these presentations you suddenly start feeling this urge to yawn, as after one or two of them all of the collections start to look very run of the mill and cliché.

As models started to parade down the runway one after another at KFW , one couldn’t help but notice that a lot of clothes lacked that savouir faire,there were western rip offs of Jennifer’s jumpsuits and poor finishing on garments, inconsiderate colour choices and some even resorted to sorry act blatantly copying other Pakistani colleagues as well (most notably new menswear brand copying the older collection of Munib Nawaz).At the couture week, it was battle of extravagance through and through with embellishments so fine and fabrics so regal that they sometimes outshined the actors that wore them. At the PFDC shows,veterans such as HSY and likes stuck to their tried and at times tired designs ,however there were some welcome exceptions ,most notably collections of some recently graduating fashion students and few others such as Khaadi Khaas,Ayesha Hashwani and Kamiar Rokni.Sadly all except few of designer’s lacked the commercial viability ,originality and at times even credibility to be there to present

Eponymous handful of veteran models such Nadia Hussain, Rabia butt and Faiza Ansari stole the show,with the exception of Iraj who at times was on the verge of ‘runway overkill’, the ever elusive Iman Ali  graced one of the ramps,Reema ,Shaan and Wasim Akram also showed up as if we are not tired of watching them on every other TV channel .But all in all zombie-like walks of the newbies added much needed humor and highlighted the apparent lack of capacity building and training at model’s end pretty well.

To the press, organizers touted of portraying ‘softer image’, development of indigenous economy, opportunity for export promotion and blah blah. But what they said was utterly bull crap to me, as we all have heard this before, but at the end of the day their ‘claims’ have failed to materialize .We cannot continue to burry our heads n the sand like ostriches, not anymore at least. Just because we are having more shows it doesn’t mean the industry as a whole is prospering. Non- formalization of modeling contracts, Intellectual property rights violations, lack of sponsors/venture capitalists are some of the problems that still haunt. Moreover, by having worked in this industry I know for sure that having such shows won’t help the domestic textile industry in anyway because most of the designers use imported fabric from south east Asian countries or even worse illegally smuggled fabric from neighboring Afghanistan border.

Besides, its common knowledge that our fashion fraternity lacks the essential ‘espirit–de-corps’, however it should never mean that an industry with less than 100 designers/brands in just 3 cities, should have several representative bodies and hold numerous fashion weeks in a season, whenever their egos may desire. You can’t just have one for the sake of having one, if you want to be taken seriously and earn respect as a proper business and craft.

All of this pejorative write-up should not paint a pessimistic outlook, We all are quite aware of the fact that bridal couture, lawn series and T shirts sell like anything in Pakistan , and hopefully they will continue to do so in future as well

Given the unfavorable exchange rate and a decrease in purchasing power, I predict that the majority of fashion labels wont be viable in the long run if they continue to do business the way they do (by selling one or two avant-garde pieces ,moving to middle east or by selling designer lawn).We would have to reevaluate our business practices and probably our vision as a industry too, if we aim to continue doing the business or otherwise it could fizzle-out like IT bubble in Pakistan.