A foreigner’s love for Pakistan

[Ignited Mind]

Guys your acting just as pathetic as some Indians "oh look a foreigner loves my country." get over it losers.

LOL Excuse me?

Foreigners in love with India are dime-a-dozen. We are that integrated with the world.

I hope your philistine self knows who the following are:

We don't have ho toot our own horn.

 

[A1Kaid]

Why do you people even bother posting articles from Express Tribune or Dawn, much of what they have been printing lately is rubbish, stories of little substance and significance and often with shoddy evidence and support.

 

[Desert Fox]

A foreigner’s love for Pakistan

GORDAN SUMANSKI

My exposure to Pakistan was limited. I classified it as one of those countries that was created on religious concepts, was racist toward the rest of the world and wanted the Americans dead.

Call me ignorant, but with the way Pakistan is portrayed in the media, as a foreigner it is hard not to be deterred.

Then, by sheer luck and forged destiny, I met a Pakistani woman and fell truly, madly and deeply in love with her.

There was beauty resonating from deep within her and it came out in her dark, soulful eyes.

Little did I know, that in less than a few weeks, my entire life would change because I was not only falling in love with a person but I was embracing a culture, a lifestyle and above all I was going to embrace a country deemed one of the most dangerous in the world.

The first aspect of Pakistani culture I fell in love with was the food. There is nothing in this world that can come close to the comfort provided by haleem, nihari and a warm, buttery piece of naan.

The spices and herbs used in Pakistani food are unique, authentic and jump-start the day reflecting Pakistan’s vibrant culture. Not to mention all sinuses are completely cleared when those green chillies hit the back of the throat.

You know what takes the cake?

After hours of gruelling work I finally made my own batch of haleem and it was delicious.

Moving onto the people; warm, hospitable, welcoming and dramatic in every sense. Pakistani aunties and uncles will make sure us young lads are fed, pampered and shown off like none other.

Some of my best memories from last year are being fed huge amounts of biryani on Eid, dancing with a friend’s family at his dholki and always being the centre of attention.

I was told I did the bhangra better than Pakistanis themselves. I feel like I belong, without even having to try.

Everything is said and done dramatically adding pizazz and flamboyance to language, clothing, conversation and events. Every “Ufffff” is elongated to maximise expression and every “hai Allah” is comical.

My personal favourite is “bussssssssssssss,” with a sizzling hiss at the end to fully convey the dramatic tone being used.

My future mother-in-law sent me a beautiful, blue kurta from Pakistan to wear at a wedding.

Loose and airy around the body, I feel like I am allowed to breathe and walk freely in it. It also has a regal feel, with stunning embroidery work, long, formal sleeves and truly reflects the comfort present in Pakistani culture. It is easier to sit on the ground, cross-legged in a shalwar kurta and personalise the experience of eating with hands, chattering with guests, shoulder to shoulder, enjoying the feeling of being communal and united. I also find digesting food a lot easier after having eaten while seated on the ground.

What shocked me most about Pakistan’s people were its women.

I was always under the impression that most Pakistani women succumb to marriages arranged by their parents, come out to Canada to get away from extremely conservative and patriarchal settings while the ones left behind live under a staunch code of dressing without the ability to truly enjoy themselves and the world they are living in.

On the flip side, I have come across intelligent, smart, ambitious, and sagacious, not to mention confident and beautiful women who believe in themselves and have utmost faith in their country despite all the crime that is committed against women there.

Pakistani women are entering all kinds of fields may it be journalism, politics or filmmaking.

They are curious and eager to bring a change into their country through education and reform. It is inspiring to meet and be in the company of these visionaries, my future wife included, who is charitable and generous toward her community in the most humbling of ways.

What I have learnt from this experience is that judgement cannot be passed on a country, religion, culture or group of people through biased exposure to news reports or because of the actions of a select few.

To attain the bigger picture you have to immerse yourself into their culture, like I have, and then form conclusions.

As far as I am concerned, I have no doubt that when I do visit Pakistan, which will be soon, I will go with an open mind sans fear.

I know I will be welcomed in the most hospitable fashion and I cannot wait to see the beautiful country with my own eyes rather than through documentaries, films, photographs and literature.

A foreigner’s love for Pakistan – The Express Tribune Blog

This is just because he met her Pakistani woman. If he didn't meet her, would he love Pakistan?

If only Pakistanis were just as compassionate, caring, and welcoming towards each other as they are to foreigners.

 

[A1Kaid]

LOL Excuse me?

Foreigners in love with India are dime-a-dozen. From the fab four to MLK. We are that integrated with the world.

We don't have ho toot our own horn.

It's usually the hippie type of people that love India, mainstream people have a less favorable view.

Now get back on topic I was just making a reference to make my point this thread is pathetic.


P.S The picture you just added proves my point, what a coincidence.

 

[BronzePlaque]

This is just because he met her Pakistani woman. If he didn't meet her, would he love Pakistan?

I have never met a Pakistani in my life, never had the chance to get to know one..But i have been raised to love Pakistan and Pakistanis..I am happy to be raised that way and %95 of Pakistanis here that i met are really kind, warm hearted people..This "Love Pakistan" tradition amongst Turkish families is very widespread here, and the reason is very justifiable..

So i see no reason why he wouldnt love Pakistan even if he didnt meet his lady

 

[Ignited Mind]

It's usually the hippie type of people that love India, mainstream people have a less favorable view.

Now get back on topic I was just making a reference to make my point this thread is pathetic.


P.S The picture you just added proves my point, what a coincidence.

lol hippies! ROFLMFAO

See this why I've, of late, reduced my participation on PDF.

Philistines like you are just so abominable with your abject and proud display of ignorance that it just ruins the whole milieu of the site.

Here, educate yourself:

Will Durant, American historian: "India was the motherland of our race, and Sanskrit the mother of Europe's languages: she was the mother of our philosophy; mother, through the Arabs, of much of our mathematics; mother, through the Buddha, of the ideals embodied in Christianity; mother, through the village community, of self-government and democracy. Mother India is in many ways the mother of us all".

Mark Twain, American author: "India is, the cradle of the human race, the birthplace of human speech, the mother of history, the grandmother of legend, and the great grand mother of tradition. our most valuable and most instructive materials in the history of man are treasured up in India only."

Albert Einstein, American scientist: "We owe a lot to the Indians, who taught us how to count, without which no worthwhile scientific discovery could have been made."

Max Mueller, German scholar: If I were asked under what sky the human mind has most fully developed some of its choicest gifts, has most deeply pondered on the greatest problems of life, and has found solutions, I should point to India.

Romain Rolland, French scholar : "If there is one place on the face of earth where all the dreams of living men have found a home from the very earliest days when man began the dream of existence, it is India."

Henry David Thoreau, American Thinker & Author: Whenever I have read any part of the Vedas, I have felt that some unearthly and unknown light illuminated me. In the great teaching of the Vedas, there is no touch of sectarianism. It is of all ages, climbs, and nationalities and is the royal road for the attainment of the Great Knowledge. When I read it, I feel that I am under the spangled heavens of a summer night.

R.W. Emerson, American Author: In the great books of India, an empire spoke to us, nothing small or unworthy, but large, serene, consistent, the voice of an old intelligence, which in another age and climate had pondered and thus disposed of the questions that exercise us.

Hu Shih, former Ambassador of China to USA: "India conquered and dominated China culturally for 20 centuries without ever having to send a single soldier across her border."

Keith Bellows, National Geographic Society : "There are some parts of the world that, once visited, get into your heart and won't go. For me, India is such a place. When I first visited, I was stunned by the richness of the land, by its lush beauty and exotic architecture, by its ability to overload the senses with the pure, concentrated intensity of its colors, smells, tastes, and sounds... I had been seeing the world in black & white and, when brought face-to-face with India, experienced everything re-rendered in brilliant technicolor."

A Rough Guide to India: "It is impossible not to be astonished by India. Nowhere on Earth does humanity present itself in such a dizzying, creative burst of cultures and religions, races and tongues. Enriched by successive waves of migration and marauders from distant lands, every one of them left an indelible imprint which was absorbed into the Indian way of life. Every aspect of the country presents itself on a massive, exaggerated scale, worthy in comparison only to the superlative mountains that overshadow it. It is this variety which provides a breathtaking ensemble for experiences that is uniquely Indian. Perhaps the only thing more difficult than to be indifferent to India would be to describe or understand India completely. There are perhaps very few nations in the world with the enormous variety that India has to offer. Modern day India represents the largest democracy in the world with a seamless picture of unity in diversity unparalleled anywhere else."

Mark Twain: "So far as I am able to judge, nothing has been left undone, either by man or nature, to make India the most extraordinary country that the sun visits on his rounds. Nothing seems to have been forgotten, nothing overlooked."
Will Durant, American Historian: "India will teach us the tolerance and gentleness of mature mind, understanding spirit and a unifying, pacifying love for all human beings."

William James, American Author: "From the Vedas we learn a practical art of surgery, medicine, music, house building under which mechanized art is included. They are encyclopedia of every aspect of life, culture, religion, science, ethics, law, cosmology and meteorology."

Max Muller, German Scholar: "There is no book in the world that is so thrilling, stirring and inspiring as the Upanishads." ('Sacred Books of the East')

Dr Arnold Toynbee, British Historian: "It is already becoming clear that a chapter which had a Western beginning will have to have an Indian ending if it is not to end in the self-destruction of the human race. At this supremely dangerous moment in history, the only way of salvation for mankind is the Indian way."

Sir William Jones, British Orientalist: "The Sanskrit language, whatever be its antiquity is of wonderful structure, more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin and more exquisitely refined than either."

P. Johnstone: "Gravitation was known to the Hindus (Indians) before the birth of Newton. The system of blood circulation was discovered by them centuries before Harvey was heard of."

Emmelin Plunret: "They were very advanced Hindu astronomers in 6000 BC. Vedas contain an account of the dimension of Earth, Sun, Moon, Planets and Galaxies." ('Calendars and Constellations')

Sylvia Levi: "She (India) has left indelible imprints on one fourth of the human race in the course of a long succession of centuries. She has the right to reclaim ... her place amongst the great nations summarizing and symbolizing the spirit of humanity. From Persia to the Chinese sea, from the icy regions of Siberia to Islands of Java and Borneo, India has propagated her beliefs, her tales, and her civilization!"

Schopenhauer: "Vedas are the most rewarding and the most elevating book which can be possible in the world." (Works VI p.427)

Mark Twain: "India has two million gods, and worships them all. In religion all other countries are paupers; India is the only millionaire."

Colonel James Todd: "Where can we look for sages like those whose systems of philosophy were prototypes of those of Greece: to whose works Plato, Thales and Pythagorus were disciples? Where do I find astronomers whose knowledge of planetary systems yet excites wonder in Europe as well as the architects and sculptors whose works claim our admiration, and the musicians who could make the mind oscillate from joy to sorrow, from tears to smile with the change of modes and varied intonation?"

Lancelot Hogben: "There has been no more revolutionary contribution than the one which the Hindus (Indians) made when they invented ZERO." ('Mathematics for the Millions')

Wheeler Wilcox: "India - The land of Vedas, the remarkable works contain not only religious ideas for a perfect life, but also facts which science has proved true. Electricity, radium, electronics, airship, all were known to the seers who founded the Vedas."

W. Heisenberg, German Physicist: "After the conversations about Indian philosophy, some of the ideas of Quantum Physics that had seemed so crazy suddenly made much more sense."

Sir W. Hunter, British Surgeon: "The surgery of the ancient Indian physicians was bold and skilful. A special branch of surgery was dedicated to rhinoplasty or operations for improving deformed ears, noses and forming new ones, which European surgeons have now borrowed."

Sir John Woodroffe: "An examination of Indian Vedic doctrines shows that it is in tune with the most advanced scientific and philosophical thought of the West."

B.G. Rele: "Our present knowledge of the nervous system fits in so accurately with the internal description of the human body given in the Vedas (5000 years ago). Then the question arises whether the Vedas are really religious books or books on anatomy of the nervous system and medicine." ('The Vedic Gods')

Adolf Seilachar & P.K. Bose, scientists: "One Billion-Year-Old fossil prove life began in India: AFP Washington reports in Science Magazine that German Scientist Adolf Seilachar and Indian Scientist P.K. Bose have unearthed fossil in Churhat a town in Madhya Pradesh, India which is 1.1 billion years old and has rolled back the evolutionary clock by more than 500 million years."

Will Durant, American Historian: "It is true that even across the Himalayan barrier India has sent to the west, such gifts as grammar and logic, philosophy and fables, hypnotism and chess, and above all numerals and the decimal system."

Now go tell mommy you learned something new today.

 

[A1Kaid]

What a goon, he probably keeps a file saved on his desktop of good comments made by Westerners regarding India. Truly the sign of a low life. Good thing you've reduced your participation here, bring it down to zero. Besides most of those comments you posted are people giving a positive opinion of something that had happened in the Indian subcontinent that doesn't mean they "love" India, though we know what to expect from you.

 

[Ignited Mind]

What a goon, he probably keeps a file saved on his desktop of good comments made by Westerners regarding India. Truly the sign of a low life.

Actually this was the top link on google. All you have to do is enter the right search string.

Good thing you've reduced your participation here, bring it down to zero.

It definitely is good for you. I'm aware of the frustration light and knowledge cast upon the ignorant philistines.

 

[VelocuR]

There are many foreigners who love Pakistan, especially Arabs, I remember a thread in an Arab defense forum where Arab members showed full support and sympathy aftermath the floods in 2010. We were praying for you and calling for donations to Pak brothers.
http://4flying.com/showthread.php?p=718036

Thank you, bro. We appreciate you, it was unforgettable. The day we were heavily flood, Abdullah was cried due to Pakistan affected.

http://www.defence.pk/forums/strate...ahead-everyone-helping-pakistan-flooding.html

I have never met a Pakistani in my life, never had the chance to get to know one..But i have been raised to love Pakistan and Pakistanis..I am happy to be raised that way and %95 of Pakistanis here that i met are really kind, warm hearted people..This "Love Pakistan" tradition amongst Turkish families is very widespread here, and the reason is very justifiable..

So i see no reason why he wouldnt love Pakistan even if he didnt meet his lady

That's touchy man. Thank you!

 

[khanz]

first you complain western media only shows bad propoganda about pak then when somebody says something nice about it you gotta hate on it wtf some of you seriously need help.......

 

[livingdead]

I hope situation in pakistan improves, and foreigners are no more novelty. The thread title is bit embarassing.

 

[Panjabijutt]

Nice story, bro. What's her nationality? white? If she doesn't feel comfortable in Pakistan, can you move to UK?

She is white. A South African. She is comfortable here, but its the stares, the ogling, the fascination of locals as to why she is here etc etc that makes her feel embarrassed. For example....travelling thru the airport she gets pulled up by the men in "white clothes" for no reason except for a "chat" - when she travels alone. When travelling with me she never gets asked a single question! Also without fail each and every time, the women who do her body search at the airport always say "wow madam you are so tall" and why do you live in Karachi or something along the lines....

We could move to our home in the UK but she has business interests here in KHI so not yet....also she likes the easy paced life here in Pak..... As I said she is embarrassed by all the attention nothing else, she knows mostly it is absolutely harmless.

 

[RazPaK]

She is white. A South African. She is comfortable here, but its the stares, the ogling, the fascination of locals as to why she is here etc etc that makes her feel embarrassed. For example....travelling thru the airport she gets pulled up by the men in "white clothes" for no reason except for a "chat" - when she travels alone. When travelling with me she never gets asked a single question! Also without fail each and every time, the women who do her body search at the airport always say "wow madam you are so tall" and why do you live in Karachi or something along the lines....

We could move to our home in the UK but she has business interests here in KHI so not yet....also she likes the easy paced life here in Pak..... As I said she is embarrassed by all the attention nothing else, she knows mostly it is absolutely harmless.

My uncle's wife is Ukranian, and similar stuff happens to her as well. But she says our family has showed her more love than her own.

She goes back and forth to Ukraine, while my uncle stays in Pakistan, due to Zamindar work. She only likes coming during the winters, but as soon as the summer is starting up she goes back to Ukraine with my cousins.

 

[Jade]

Interacial marriages should be banned ... i wasnt even aware tht a muslim woman could marry a non muslim!!! i hope shes a christian.

Why mixed race children are the most beautiful. And without the variety, the world will be bland

Mixed Race - Half Indian Half Other

 

[Fasih Khan]

There are many foreigners who love Pakistan, especially Arabs, I remember a thread in an Arab defense forum where Arab members showed full support and sympathy aftermath the floods in 2010. We were praying for you and calling for donations to Pak brothers.
http://4flying.com/showthread.php?p=718036

Love and Respect for our brothers.