In the name of marriages and funerals

I am a resident of Lahore Cantonment and can happily say, it has been a tranquil and soothing experience

I am a resident of Lahore Cantonment for more than six years and can happily say, it has been a tranquil and soothing experience. The leafy avenues on Sundays wear an endearing quiet, like the comfortable silence between lovers who seem weirdly mum to the onlookers but are soaked to the core in the ecstasy of intimacy, of companionship and empathy. I have this simmering relationship with trees and roads and vistas. They stand firm, seemingly unmoved as the world whizzes past. But they see and hear and I can hear them talk. It is a language few speak for it requires one to be shamelessly melancholic and full of sorrow. Sigh. I get carried away easily, such is the quaint charm of Lahore Cantonment. That said, roads in many other areas can be nightmares.

While the State continues to write new chapters of citizen woes with great zest, people are no less creative in dispensing misery. We have a habit of blaming the State for everything under the sun, conveniently washing our hands off our own duties as responsible citizens. We have our own states and we lord over them by our own rules. My state typically includes my home and public spaces next to it. And my rank in the societal pecking order has a direct bearing on the size of ‘My State’. Some are happy to limit their state to green belts outside their homes, there are others who don’t mind taking over the whole road if need be. Perhaps a manifestation of the infamous trickle-down effect Shaukat Aziz would talk about, prosperity of very few trickling down in time to miserable many. What has actually trickled down is elite’s penchant to grab without scruples.

Have your ever wondered about the common thread running through marriages and funerals? Well they are all mostly held on the roads, streets with a complete disregard for others who have an equal constitutional right over the road. We can’t seem to celebrate even mourn without breaking the law, becoming a source of misery to others both in happiness and grief.

Marriages are a source of pleasure for brides and grooms, but in most cases extreme displeasure for the people plying or living near the marriage venue. Hapless commuters are stopped in their tracks by the gaudy tents on the road. They have to turn back, discover an alternative route and negotiate the consequent pain and anger. Detours are mysterious, bringing adventure and romance if not imposed. Icing on the cake is people are neither apologetic about nor cognisant of the grief they inflict on others. Not to forget the loud, blaring music that is played at ear splitting decibels. Quite often you leave your house in some urgency and then find yourself staring blankly at a funeral congregation blocking the road. It is downright infuriating regardless of what the occasion is. In grief too, we seem to spare no one except the departed. The aggrieved make it a point to share their grief around by blocking the road. As one ponders the options while staring blankly at the gloomy faces, the anger inevitably withers as wails of grief spill over and fill the air. And you walk away thinking about the fragility of it all.

What explains this crude behaviour? Is this apathy or lack of empathy? Is it lack of education on people’s part or lack of administrative will on part of the State? Whatever the drivers are, one patently manifest trait is the “I don’t care” attitude and how it has taken root at all societal levels. Both the powerful and the weak operate without fear or remorse and with impunity. In the struggle to survive, to hatchet one’s way through the jungle that Pakistan is, the small courtesies are often deemed excess baggage, too unworthy of the devout inhabiting the land of pure.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 8^th, 2016.

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