AH

1. To help Pakistan: Like other expats, I also want to help Pakistan but I believe that can be accomplished far better by earning the big $$$ in Western countries and investing/donating the money within Pakistan. Both Indian and Chinese expats have benefitted their countries greatly by investing back home and, more importantly, by working from within Western media, business and political establishments.

2. To ‘deWesternize’ the children: Here I agree somewhat with Syed Rizvi (July 2, 2:06) that parenting is primarily the responsibility of parents and simply moving to Pakistan will not solve anything. Pakistani youth is very attuned to Western media. MTV and HBO are popular in youth culture in all but the poorest socio-economic circles. All these expat parents who think that simply moving to Pakistan will save their children are deluding themselves; they haven’t got a clue about popular youth culture in Pakistan.

3. To preserve Islamic identity: I strongly believe in the statement by a British imam that British Muslims need to forge their own identity; not a Pakistani Islam or a Saudi Islam, but a British Islam. The same goes for other expats. At some point we Muslims need to realize that being a good Muslim does not require wandering the streets of London or New York in a jabba or burqa. A good Muslim can be a clean shaven Wall Street executive, or a lady Newscaster, or a lady doctor.

My siblings could not get admission to decent Pakistani schools even though they had good marks from American schools. The reason is that nothing in Pakistan gets done without bribery or connections. We were openly asked to ‘contribute’ if we wanted admission to a reputable school in Karachi.

The other thing I noted personally was the strong resentment from many Pakistanis towards expats. India is starting to develop it’s own identity and pride, but Pakistanis still don’t have faith in our country. Most people can’t wait to get out of Pakistan and they seem to resent anyone who has managed to ‘escape’.

The post-colonial attitude is so deeply ingrained in our psyche, it even permeates our language. I am always amazed and saddened to see banners, signs and text (even in official media and government documents) which use English words, albeit in Urdu script. Almost all government institutions are named in English. Most government forms have English titles, written out in Urdu. And many upwardly mobile Pakistanis feel the need to pepper their conversations with English words as a sign of culture and erudition. It is a sad reality that we shun our beautiful national language Urdu, the language of poets and authors, in a subconscious homage to colonialism.

I am not able understand that what was your point in objecting about the bombing of terrorist hideouts in the mountains and migration of Swat’s inhabitants to the safer places due to unavoidable military operation. Just for your kind information our army is not bombing the area indiscriminately but targeting & killing the terrorists only. Furthermore, due to the gravity of the situation and nature of the terrain, air force bombing was inevitable. The scale of insurgency is different is Swat and you can not compare it with the liberation movements in Kashmir & other parts of India.

Unfortunately, we still have a minority in Pakistan who supports and sympathizes with so called Taliban and try to safe them by giving arguments like yours. They try to project, as if the operation is not against terrorist but against the common people of Swat, which is totally baseless and misleading. Please don’t make up your mind on the similar lines. Rest assure that Gove. of Pakistan and Pak army care about their common citizens and military operation has been launched to make their own lives and property safe and secured.

We all Pakistanis value the sacrifices and suffering of all affected areas people and appreciate their cooperation and understanding in this regard.

The expat dilemma — how to exist as — “aadha teetar aadhi batair”.

The expat dilemma — not the ‘jet lag’ after an 18 hour trip — but the ‘millennium lag’ — after an overnight jump from JFK to Islamabad airport.

Expat dilemma — NOT “do in Mecca as the Meccans do’ – or not to ‘do in Rome as the Romans do’ — but do in Mecca as the Roman do — and do in Rome as the Meccans do.

Salaam. Thank you for responding to my email.

First let me give a little background about myself. I am an Indian Muslim( Ayesha Khan) who currently lives in US. My parents live in Gujarat. It is absolutely true that in 2002 riots (where 750 Muslims and 300 Muslims died over a period of 2 days) there was a lot of anger and fear in our community.

Things are different now. In 2007 elections, my parents voted for BJP (Modi’s party) as did many of their friends and acquaintances. BJP won seats in a fair election in many Muslim majority areas. Why? There have been no riots since then. The development has been the fastest in Gujarat amongst all places in India creating economic opportunities for all. The administration is completely free from corruption – which is such a rarity in India (As I am sure it is in Pakistan) and there is absolutely no discrimination against Muslims. The current IG of police in Gujarat is a Muslim, which also assures us that a similar situation will not recur.

Anyway, poor overpopulated countries like India and Pakistan will have insurgencies because the state does not have the capacity to deal with everyones’ grievances at the same time. So India has had insurgencies in Punjab, Kashmir, Assam just like Pakistan has had in (what was then East Pakistan), Balochistan Swat, Bajaur, Waziristan. The only difference is that in no circumstance has the Indian air-force bombed its own citizens – whether Kashmir, Punjab or Assam. Definitely there have been army presence and/or counterinsurgency operations. So I am not denying the need for the operation even in Pakistan and I salute the brave soldiers for their sacrifice. I am simply questioning the bombing since bombs do not have eyes and the civilian collateral is much larger. (12 million people from Bangladesh had moved to India in 1971 and 3 million people from Swat have been currently displaced. Last year, half a million people from Bajaur were displaced. This type of mass migration has not occurred i India due to absence of bombing. That is the aspect of security that I was referring to.