Positive vibes Pakistan

[LegionnairE]

Pakistan is the first country in the Islamic world to have had a female Prime Minister. Her name was Benazir Bhutto twice elected.

Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) was one of the best airlines in the world and Air Hostess Momi Gul Durrani was the face of success.

Pakistan-born quantum astrophysicist Nergis Mavalvala, dean of the MIT School of Science

Yasmeen Lari, country's female architect who built some of the most iconic buildings of Karachi including the Taj Mahal Hotel, Finance and Trade Centre and the Pakistan State Oil House, making her mark in a male-dominated profession

Nigar Johar – Pakistan’s first woman three-star general

First female Supreme Court Judge

​

I already knew about Benazir Bhutto but the rest is news to me, thanks.

MIT Astrophycisist lady in particular is very impressive.

 

[ghazi52]

.,.,
SUMMIT
ALHAMDULILLAH!!

Big news from Annapurna

Today at 6:30 a.m. PST, Shehroze Kashif has successfully summited World's 10th highest peak Mount Annapurna 8091 meter

In the process, Shehroze has become the youngest ever person in the world to climb Eleven 8000 Meters peaks Ma Sha Allah

 

[ThunderCat]

Please give specific examples so that I can measure your knowledge on this subject. Because the 'majority' of Anatolia is much more comfortable for women than the suburbs and peripheral towns of western metropolises. The real problem is in the cities. Patriarchy is a cultural phenomenon regardless of region in the country. Let's discuss where and how much this restricts women's lives.

Even If we exclude Kocaeli, Antalya, Izmir etc, starting from blacksea region to Trakya then downt to Adana, should we also exclude the inner western Aegean and even the Taurus? Are you referring to the southeast region? What does mostly mean?

I have traveled to many corners of Turkiye: the Aegean, the Black Sea, even the inland parts of the Mediterranean, highlands of Black sea region, Trakya, Eastern Anatolia, and Central Anatolia, the prophets city of South Eastern Anatolia's Urfa, also Mardin and Antakya, Antep etc. intersects of old history and religions... I find it very interesting that you are trying to decide this with internet social media narratives, while I, cannot make such a generalization and feel the need to explain that the situation is not that simple.

Exactly my point. What you wrote I bolded in black.

No I am not judging this by Internet. Both my parents have been to Turkey separately before they even met. My mother lived in Ankara for five years in the 70s.

She found the urban life is liberal but rural people and lower income people are patriarchal/conservative.

My father drove from Germany to Pakistan around the same time with his Brazilian girlfriend. When he drove through Turkiye, he told me about a year ago he sometimes felt he was in a right-wing religious country.

My point is it depends where you go. And the law in Turkey might not prevent women from doing anything. But their families can be strict with them.

Likewise for Pakistan or the average Muslim country. If you visit urban/suburban upper class areas of Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad etc. you'll find women are free and participating alongside men.

Even foreigners would live in these areas. But lower income areas, rural areas etc. are typically patriarchal/conservative. If you watch the videos I posted, you'll see the differences.

And the same you'll find in Turkey. Although it's not clear cut. Maybe some rural families are more liberal, likewise for Pakistan. But on average it's like that.

 

[nahtanbob]

The year 2011 saw a number of positive developments in Pakistan’s Information and Technology (IT) industry, from app development to global recognition and a series of awards.


HIGHLIGHTS

Pakistan Fast Growth 25
In a first for the IT industry, the Pakistan Fast Growth 25, a ranking of fast growth companies, listed 10 IT companies on its index.

Official Game for ICC 2011 Cricket World Cup
Local development company, Mindstorm Studios developed the official game for the ICC 2011 Cricket World Cup.

Pak-India ICT Firms to enhance trade up to $5b
Pakistani and Indian IT committees held bilateral talks separately on both sides of borders in March – aimed at enhancing trade ties in the field of IT.

Netsol deal in India
Local ICT company Netsol engaged with Indian companies to provide applications for financial services.

Google grants to social innovators
Google granted $250,000 to Pakistan Software Houses Association for the P@SHA Social Fund

Pepper.pk mobile apps triumph
Local app developers, Pepper.pk hit the number one spot in Blackberry App World.

TenPearls wins Nokia contest twice
Pakistani IT firm TenPearls marked another record, beating out 800 entrants to bag second position and received a $50,000 cash prize at ‘Nokia & AT&T Innovators 2011 Contest’.

Pakistan Shines at APICTA
Pakistan was declared the winner of two gold and five silver awards at the 11th annual Asia Pacific ICT Awards (APICTA) 2011 in Pattaya, Thailand.

Congratulations to everyone for the successes!

2011: Pakistan IT industry’s golden year – The Express Tribune

this looked promising

 

[Edevelop]

Exactly my point. What you wrote I bolded in black.

No I am not judging this by Internet. Both my parents have been to Turkey separately before they even met. My mother lived in Ankara for five years in the 70s.

She found the urban life is liberal but rural people and lower income people are patriarchal/conservative.

My father drove from Germany to Pakistan around the same time with his Brazilian girlfriend. When he drove through Turkiye, he told me about a year ago he sometimes felt he was in a right-wing religious country.

My point is it depends where you go. And the law in Turkey might not prevent women from doing anything. But their families can be strict with them.

Likewise for Pakistan or the average Muslim country. If you visit urban/suburban upper class areas of Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad etc. you'll find women are free and participating alongside men.

Even foreigners would live in these areas. But lower income areas, rural areas etc. are typically patriarchal. If you watch the videos I posted, you'll see the differences.

And the same you'll find in Turkey. Although it's not clear cut. Maybe some rural families are more liberal, likewise for Pakistan. But on average it's like that.

Turkey geographically, historically and culturally need to be broken down to understand the situation.

The Aegean coast has the most secular population but that's like 10% of the country's population and slowly and steadily the seculars are being diminished. Erdogan systematically made them irrelevant by giving lower middle classes more power and many have converted into an entrepreneurial class whereby now they have the influence to impact politically on national stage. There was a time in Izmir where a woman with a headscarf would be looked down upon or worst pulled down physically. Gone those days...

Culturally, Turks are not Europeans. I don't know why people even debate this. Sure its population has Albanian, Bosnian, Greek, and Bulgarian roots, but the Ottoman conquest and migration and interracial marriages etc have made them more Middle Eastern.

Fact is in modern day, regardless whether Turks practice Islam or not, most would feel like outsiders in Germany, Austria, Sweden, and Netherlands and elsewhere they go. Not only their language and culture is predominantly Central Asian, Arabic, and Persian influenced, their family oriented culture is so strong that outside of maybe Mediterranean countries, it would not be possible to feel like home. Also do note no matter how individualistic or europeanized the seculars are, they still won't eat pork and will in fact wash their butts. lol.

I would even say that it is no argument to suggest they are somehow different from other muslims of the Middle East. If being fair skinned, wearing mini skirts and drinking alcohol is the criteria of "liberal" and "European" then what are Lebanese people who do the same and btw are much more south geographically.

 

[ThunderCat]

Turkey geographically, historically and culturally need to be broken down to understand the situation.

The Aegean coast has the most secular population but that's like 10% of the country's population and slowly and steadily the seculars are being diminished. Erdogan systematically made them irrelevant by giving lower middle classes more power and many have converted into an entrepreneurial class whereby now they have the influence to impact politically on national stage. There was a time in Izmir where a woman with a headscarf would be looked down upon or worst pulled down physically. Gone those days...

Culturally, Turks are not Europeans. I don't know why people even debate this. Sure its population has Albanian, Bosnian, Greek, and Bulgarian roots, but the Ottoman conquest and migration and interracial marriages etc have made them more Middle Eastern.

Fact is in modern day, regardless whether Turks practice Islam or not, most would feel like outsiders in Germany, Austria, Sweden, and Netherlands and elsewhere they go. Not only their language and culture is predominantly Central Asian, Arabic, and Persian influenced, their family oriented culture is so strong that outside of maybe Mediterranean countries, it would not be possible to feel like home. Also do note no matter how individualistic or europeanized the seculars are, they still won't eat pork and will in fact wash their butts. lol.

I would even say that it is no argument to suggest they are somehow different from other muslims of the Middle East. If being fair skinned, wearing mini skirts and drinking alcohol is the criteria of "liberal" and "European" then what are Lebanese people who do the same and btw are much more south geographically.

Arguably there is minor overlap between Turkey and Europe. Maybe some similar Mediterranean food, drink, music etc. Most probably like Southern Europe as in Greece.

But I agree Turkey is much more similar to the Middle East and Egypt culturally. I agree with everything else you wrote. I even told a kemalist Turk who fanatically repeated how he comes from a "secular family" and how "secular" Turkey is.

I pointed out to him there are plenty of Muslim majority countries that are secular like Lebanon and the fanatic laughed at me.

The same in Pakistan as other Muslim majority countries. Some areas are more secular than others. But if you ask me in terms of size, the largest secular part of Pakistan are the upper class areas of Karachi, including the suburbs.

But even there the Westernized upper class will not eat pork even if some of them drink alcohol. They will celebrate just about everything about European culture except the religion.

And even Christmas celebrations are more to do with celebrating Western culture without the religious elements.

They also commonly confuse secularism with Europeanization. Like the English medium school in Karachi I went to in the 90s. I read in a 2005 news article online how they're teaching various other European languages at the school.

The kids were learning German language and culture in an event. All dressed up in traditional German clothes and doing traditional German ballet and a parent commenting on this wrote how "progressive" it is for the children, otherwise they'd end up in an Islamic madarassah instead.

Because to them being Westernized is their version of "secularism" and "tolerance." I notice such white-washed people in Pakistani society are usually from the Muhajir upper class and Sindhi upper class.

I totally agree on Turkey & Lebanon. I guess maybe because Lebanon has a large Christian population which are pro-European, although some Levantine Christians are also very conservative.

 

[Valar.]

One or two comment about some new news story is okay but can you guys just please take your irrelevant comments(to thread's main theme) somewhere else? Thanks.

 

[Edevelop]

Arguably there is minor overlap between Turkey and Europe. Maybe some similar Mediterranean food, drink, music etc. Most probably like Southern Europe as in Greece.

But I agree Turkey is much more similar to the Middle East and Egypt culturally. I agree with everything else you wrote. I even told a kemalist Turk who fanatically repeated how he comes from a "secular family" and how "secular" Turkey is.

I pointed out to him there are plenty of Muslim majority countries that are secular like Lebanon and the fanatic laughed at me.

The same in Pakistan as other Muslim majority countries. Some areas are more secular than others. But if you ask me in terms of size, the largest secular part of Pakistan are the upper class areas of Karachi, including the suburbs.

But even there the Westernized upper class will not eat pork even if some of them drink alcohol. They will celebrate just about everything about European culture except the religion.

And even Christmas celebrations are more to do with celebrating Western culture without the religious elements.

They also commonly confuse secularism with Europeanization. Like the English medium school in Karachi I went to in the 90s. I read in a 2005 news article online how they're teaching various other European languages at the school.

The kids were learning German language and culture in an event. All dressed up in traditional German clothes and doing traditional German ballet and a parent commenting on this wrote how "progressive" it is for the children, otherwise they'd end up in an Islamic madarassah instead.

Because to them being Westernized is their version of "secularism" and tolerance. I notice such white-washed people in Pakistani are usually from the Muhajir upper class and Sindhi upper class.

I totally agree on Turkey & Lebanon. I guess maybe because Lebanon has a large Christian population which are pro-European, although some Levantine Christians are also very conservative.

Oh some Levantine Christians I have come across are indeed very conservative. Despite French colonialism which always aimed to impose its own cultural hegemony, the Lebanese consider themselves as proud Arabs, although they are basically Phoenicians by blood and Arab nationalism is a relatively new phenomena coined by Naser of Egypt with the intention of forging political and cultural unity which has been a success.

This is much like the Turkey situation except Turks and Europeans under rule were unified and converted due to Ottomans and Istanbul subsequently became known as Rum or the new Rome or Rome of the East. It is pertinent to note that mainland Greece including the Aegean region was also part of that. If not for the West which has a habit of divide and rule, pitting groups and neighbouring regions to war and distorting history, it would have been one. Right now they are trying to do the same thing with Ukraine which is historically, linguistically and culturally Soviet/Slavic/Eastern Orthodox who have more in common with Russians than Western Europeans and by that I mean Anglo-Saxons and Francophones.

As for Pakistan, I agree, Karachi is the most liberal city and there is a specific social class in Lahore, and Islamabad too who like western way of life. But generally, I have observed that Pakistan is not too conservative if you take Punjab and KPK out of the picture. Baloch religious practices are either very private in nature or they are simply not very religious people. Sindhis on the other hand are true mystics who were never interested in political islam and finally Kashmiris and Gilgit Baltistanis are normal practicing muslims who are neither patriarchal nor tribal.

 

[ThunderCat]

Oh some Levantine Christians I have come across are indeed very conservative. Despite French colonialism which always aimed to impose its own cultural hegemony, the Lebanese consider themselves as proud Arabs, although they are basically Phoenicians by blood and Arab nationalism is a relatively new phenomena coined by Naser of Egypt with the intention of forging political and cultural unity which has been a success.

This is much like the Turkey situation except Turks and Europeans under rule were unified and converted due to Ottomans and Istanbul subsequently became known as Rum or the new Rome or Rome of the East. It is pertinent to note that mainland Greece including the Aegean region was also part of that. If not for the West which has a habit of divide and rule, pitting groups and neighbouring regions to war and distorting history, it would have been one. Right now they are trying to do the same thing with Ukraine which is historically, linguistically and culturally Soviet/Slavic/Eastern Orthodox who have more in common with Russians than Western Europeans and by that I mean Anglo-Saxons and Francophones.

As for Pakistan, I agree, Karachi is the most liberal city and there is a specific social class in Lahore, and Islamabad too who like western way of life. But generally, I have observed that Pakistan is not too conservative if you take Punjab and KPK out of the picture. Baloch religious practices are either very private in nature or they are simply not very religious people. Sindhis on the other hand are true mystics who were never interested in political islam and finally Kashmiris and Gilgit Baltistanis are normal practicing muslims who are neither patriarchal nor tribal.

Levantines appear to be of Neolithic pontic farmers who settled in the region, which could explain many of them being white/euro looking.

I think Punjab can be liberal in terms of ubran areas. Don't know about Kashmirs, but they can be conservative, at least the rural class.

Yes Sindhis are much less religious. They seem to be more interested in their cultural/ethnic identity than their religion which is often based on falsehoods, though not always.

 

[Edevelop]

Levantines appear to be of Neolithic pontic farmers who settled in the region, which could explain many of them being white/euro looking.

I think Punjab can be liberal in terms of ubran areas. Don't know about Kashmirs, but they can be conservative, at least the rural class.

Yes Sindhis are much less religious. They seem to be more interested in their cultural/ethnic identity than their religion which is often based on falsehoods, though not always.

I'm a Kashmiri and generally we are not that conservative.

Yes we pray, fast and we don't drink alcohol, etc but aside from that we don't force our women to wear burqas or force them to sit at home and not go to school, work, or to eat street food or even force them into marriages without consent etc.

If you look at Kashmir valley i..e I.O.K the women are far more educated compared to Punjabis and Pashtuns and that is despite the fact that it has less resources and under current illegal occupation.

I can confirm for a fact that I'm the 6th gen in my family who achieved higher education and at least one side of my family can trace its roots to Central Asia. Perhaps that explains why it's like that.

Otherwise the so called conservative Kashmiris you are referring to are the people from Azad Kashmir who are basically nomadic Punjabis who are culturally and linguistically Punjabi. They are totally different types. Even living in a first world country like the U.K, one will note they are pretty conservative including the 2nd and 3rd gens. It's almost as if there is Sharia law and not Common law.

 

[ThunderCat]

I'm a Kashmiri and generally we are not that conservative.

Yes we pray, fast and we don't drink alcohol, etc but aside from that we don't force our women to wear burqas or force them to sit at home and not go to school, work, or to eat street food or even force them into marriages without consent etc.

If you look at Kashmir valley i..e I.O.K the women are far more educated compared to Punjabis and Pashtuns and that is despite the fact that it has less resources and under current illegal occupation.

I can confirm for a fact that I'm the 6th gen in my family who achieved higher education and at least one side of my family can trace its roots to Central Asia. Perhaps that explains why it's like that.

Otherwise the so called conservative Kashmiris you are referring to are the people from Azad Kashmir who are basically nomadic Punjabis who are culturally and linguistically Punjabi. They are totally different types. Even living in a first world country like the U.K, one will note they are pretty conservative including the 2nd and 3rd gens. It's almost as if there is Sharia law and not Common law.

Okay, so you would be from the educated Kashmiri class. I don't have enough experience with Kashmiris, but i knew on social media. He claimed his father was a Mujiahid in the Afghan war of 1979-1989.

He some very extreme beliefs despite residing in a new world country. When you write Central Asian roots, are you referring to Tajiks/Pamiri people or a Turkic clan?

Or are you referring to the ancient migratory routes of ancient Dardic peoples?

 

[Edevelop]

Okay, so you would be from the educated Kashmiri class. I don't have enough experience with Kashmiris, but i knew on social media. He claimed his father was a Mujiahid in the Afghan war of 1979-1989.

He some very extreme beliefs despite residing in a new world country. When you write Central Asian roots, are you referring to Tajiks/Pamiri people or a Turkic clan?

Or are you referring to the ancient migratory routes of ancient Dardic peoples?

Tajik. My great grandmother spoke Persian although I also have some relatives who didn't migrate to Pakistan and continued to live in Srinagar. They tell me the Kashmiri culture is similar to Persian in a lot of ways and the reason why it's like that is because the Sufis like Shah Hamdan had a lot of influence. Besides natural beauty, Kashmir is known for its tulip gardens, architecture, Persian poetry, saffron, apples, pomegranates, rugs, textiles, paper cache etc. It resembles so much like Iran that often Iranians call it "little Iran".

 

[ThunderCat]

Tajik. My great grandmother spoke Persian although I also have some relatives who didn't migrate to Pakistan and continued to live in Srinagar. They tell me the Kashmiri culture is similar to Persian in a lot of ways and the reason why it's like that is because the Sufis like Shah Hamdan had a lot of influence. Besides natural beauty, Kashmir is known for its tulip gardens, architecture, Persian poetry, saffron, apples, pomegranates, rugs, textiles, paper cache etc. It resembles so much like Iran that often Iranians call it "little Iran".

I get your point in the last post. My mother's former housekeeper in Karachi and later in Abu Dhabi was a Hindko speaker but was born & raised in Kashmir.

So was his cousin who also worked for my mother. I wouldn't describe them as conservative as in they prayed five times a day or too patriarchal since they had no problem interacting or working for a woman outside their family.

Although in their own district they are commonly patrichal. But that's how rural life is in Pakistan.