Asif Hanafi – Blogging from somewhere

Having watched the speech of Altaf Hussain on his 56th birthday, where he promised to bring the much needed change in Pakistan. He claims that MQM can solve the sugar crisis, the wheat crisis, the suffering of the Kashmiri’s and the Serakis. On a number of previous occasions MQM has lent moral support to their balochi counter-parts.

Most people would laugh off Altaf Hussain and MQM as just another corrupt organization, however out of all the present political organizations MQM is the fastest growing and possibly the least corrupt.

Having made the above statement, in no way do I defend that MQM has no corruption, I am quite sure on its lower levels and unimportant ministers there is wide-spread corruption. This basically means that “people” mis-use the political and street power of MQM for their own personal advantage.

However their are certain leaders within MQM that I have come to respect and admire, Mustafa Kamal, Haider Abbass Rizvi and Dr. Farooq Sattar. Out of the three Haider Abbass Rizvi is one man who whenever he speaks, people listen, he is ALWAYS well dressed, rarely raises his voice and talks about the facts. A number of people when asked who should become the next prime minister of Pakistan unanimously chant Mustafa Kamal, I however beg to differ. Mustafa Kamal as hardworking as he may be does not possess the character and personality of an leader. He can rule, yes. But can he lead? Haider Abbass Rizvi on the other hand, seems always to be well prepared in all his TV shows and speeches and more importantly, he gives the impression that he has a vision for Pakistan.

However, MQM has a long, long way to go before they can be consider presenting a serious candidate and for that they must adopt best practices, modify their organizational structure and spurt out ONE message only. The number of social groups that have sprung up online some official some unofficial seem to project a more racist MQM and a Altaf Hussain MQM only.  The time has come where Altaf Hussain must realize that in order to win Pakistan over, it will take more than a few of his speeches. MQM would need to attract more educated, subject-matter experts into its organization in order to build an efficient government. Political parties in the past have always assigned ministries AFTER they have been elected into power. Its time that MQM sets the stage apart, and highlight key individuals who will run those ministries after election.

Less than 3 years left to find an energy expert, agriculture expert, education expert and a commerce expert.

The clock is ticking, and the people of Pakistan are getting tired and restless. Its time MQM takes the steering wheel with Haider Abbass Rizvi in the driving seat and give Pakistan the “leadership” it so desperately requires.

If they are to win the elections in the coming years, its imperative they penetrate Lahore and to do that, they need to first united Pakistan under one flag. The national flag of Pakistan.

When people turn around and say Luxury has no scope in Pakistan they are oh so mistaken. With a population of over 170 million people at least 1% i.e. 1.7 million people have the “cash” to buy luxury products. Unfortunately with counterfeit products coming in from China and Taiwan and lack of warranty or product support in Pakistan hinders people from buying.

Fear no more, Bang Olufsen is here to save your day.

With its “awesomestest” sexiest design, the BeoSound 5 is a must to have.

Why?

Because music lovers have thousands of tracks. Accumulated over the years they were either  downloaded, bought, recommended or accidentally ended up in the car.

What the BeoSound 5 does is not only ALLOW you to store up to 500 GB of  sounds it does something that only a highly paid genius can do. It organizes your tracks.

What? Yes boys, it organizes them! Suppose your in the mood to listen to some sad songs because your girlfriend just dumped you and you either use your iPhone/iPod or Windows Media player, select a few songs that you can remember and put them in the playlist on repeat. Well with the BeoSound 5, you don’t have to do that anymore, just play the sad song and BeoSound will scan the rest of your music and play similar tracks based on parameters such as rhythm, syncopation, key tonality and vocal harmonies. Amazing? I’ll give you another example, having a girl come over? Let BeoSound 5 be the DJ.  Not only with the chick fall in love with you for owning the BeoSound 5 and possibly get turned on by it, but once your settled down on the sofa bed, the BeoSound will continue to play similar tracks to the way you want the evening to be, nice, slow and romantic.

Anyhow, your probably wondering whether BeoSound 5 is available in Pakistan?

Yes it is, Bang Olufsen has partnered up with the Buksh Group, hence their retail shops are located in Karachi and Lahore.  4-C, 9th Commercial Lane ZamZama, Karachi and 9-k, Empire center, Main Boulevard, Gulberg, Lahore.

So you get a full warranty, service and installation if you so require.

How much does it cost?  You need to go and feel it, touch it, play some music before you decide what the BeoSound 5 is worth to you.

In my very busy schedule I took time out to watch New York the much acclaimed movie by Kabir Khan starring John Abraham, Katrina Kaif, Neil Nitin Mukesh and Irrfan Khan.

First I would like to say that Katrina Kaif looked very hot, cute and cuddly.

Having covered an important point the movie revolves around Omar (Neil Niten Mukesh) who moved to the United States two years before 9/11 happened. Yes folks, this movie is about Muslims living in USA post 9/11 and how they had to cope with the rise in racial discrimination.

Well no it isn’t, it’s really about the stupidity of the united states government and how they fucked up even more. The movie sends a very strong message that “look, your strategies and foreign policies create more terrorists”.

Without spoiling the movie, I highly recommend watching the movie, the acting was superb and the plot-line very real. The chemistry between Sam ( John Abraham), Maya (Katrina Kaif) and Omar was amazing, Sam is the universities most popular kid, Maya the American Born Confused Desi (ABCD) and Omar is the freshi from the motherland (India).

There arn’t any stupid songs popping up in the middle of the scenes and the background scenery is awesome.

The fact is that the director sends the message that not all Muslims are terrorists and most Muslims were shocked by 9/11. However I was not surprised with the ending, involve the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and your bound to find dead bodies. Who died? Whose working for the FBI and whose the terrorist.

Watch the movie and find out.

Paris can be an expensive city to live in specially if you live in the center. Free a French telecommunication company makes it worthwhile. With their awesome 30 euro per month package, you get a 20mb internet connection, IPTV and a telephone that allows you to call 97 countries worldwide, 24 hours, 7 days a week completely free.

Unfortunatly Pakistan falls in Zone 3 and costs 19 centimes a minute to a fixed line and 34 centimes to a mobile phone.

Why?

Because the Government of Pakistan has a small charge or they would say revenue sharing model with existing telecommunication companies in Pakistan.

When I moved to Pakistan in May of 2006,  I was quite skeptical of the political parties in Pakistan. Having read the history, the various news articles and hearing ambassadors, business personalities and friends, I had concluded that politics in Pakistan is something I will never take part in.

Living in Karachi the political party that made headlines in the past was MQM. MQM according to people in 2006 was involved in “mobile snatching, land grabbing and other mafia styled activities”. At first, the information was nothing new, ever since I can remember, everyone I knew warns you of MQM, to stay away for some reason or the other. “There dangerous Asif, don’t get involved”.

I heeded to that advice and kept my political thoughts to myself.

My first encounter with MQM was in 2006 “Eid al-Adha” a muslim festival where we sacrafice animals for God to commemorate the willingness of Ibrahim who was ready to sacrafice his son for God.

So, every year we have a few cows and goats for sacraficing and their skin which is worth a fair amount, how much I am uncertain. Anyhow in the area where I lived, K.D.A. Officers Society a couple of boys, reasonably dressed approached me whilst I was standing outside and asked if I would be willing to donate the goat or cow skin to them. They presented themselves as workers for MQM and showed the reciepts that they give in exchange. I instantly said “no thank you” and I thought, no way will I help this Mafia organization. God knows they might come back, ask for other things. After I had said “no”, the boys said thank you, wished me Eid Mubarak and went on their way. A few hours later I saw the collecting skin from one of my neighbours so I called them over and donated two skins. What shocked me was the politeness and the manner of respect they had for an unknown individual. I don’t have no Gaurds at home and i’m not rich, infact I consider myself upper-middle class according to Karachi standards and right than and there, my image of MQM started to change.

I did some research, read about Mustafa Kamal, CDGK and Dr. Farooq Sattar. I started reading up more about the history of Karachi, the violence that erupted in the 80s and 90s, the reason why Altaf Hussain and his friends formed MQM, the student movement, the power of the youth, equal rights and above I tried to find out whether MQM is responsible for the torture cells, mobile snatching, target killings etc.

On the Internet I found no supportive evidence of any of the above accusations and having been very impressed with the construction of the bridges and roads by Mustafa Kamal, I decided that if I was to vote, I would vote for MQM.

May 12th 2007, the Chief Justice of Pakistan (whom I don’t hold in very high-esteem) was in Karachi planning to raise more support on his “unjust” firing by the then President Musharraf (who I think was one of the best leaders in Pakistan). Advised to stay at home, I spent the day with two friends watching the news channel for updates. EVERYONE predicted violence and violence there was. How much exacty is uncertain but what IS certain that EVERYONE was involved. MQM, ANP, PPP, PML-N, JI and you name it! Seriously logically speaking, when you have over one million people on the streets all comprising of different parties you are sure to have some kind of spark. The publicising of the attack on AAJ TV was the most stupidest news story out of all of them. They broadcasted for the entire duration CLAIMING to be under attack. Riight, your gaurd(s) with their rusted shot-guns prevented the onslaught right? WRONG. They were not even the target, infact all of them walked out quite all right but you see that was an important milestone in Pakistan. It was the start of “politics” as an entertainment!

The more I spoke to people about MQM the more I realised that they just hate MQM, they don’t have a real reason, if anything went wrong in Karachi the blame would fall on MQM, yet those very people refused to accept the fact that Mustafa Kamal IS part of MQM and his work speaks for himself. “No” they say, it was the previous mayor he made the plan. So my reply to them is that for the last few decades we have had planners, who have talked about the problem, talked about a plan, maybe drafted one, but never really executed it. Mustafa Kamal did the job and a job well done if I might say.

In 2008, the Youth Advisory Council (MQM) launched, I was invited by Ali Rashid to join YAC, take part. I joined the facebook group and was grossly disappointed. Some of the people there were filled with hatred for anyone non-mohajir. (For the record, my mother’s side is Punjabi and my dads side is Mohajir and I grew up in Switzerland, no idea what that would make me)

YAC started its attempt to unite the youth of pakistan, bring them on one platform to “discuss” problems. In 2009, I decided to join YAC as an executive and became part of the “Central Executive Committee”, I designed their website to what its present status is at http://www.mqmyouth.org and I attempted to set a direction and helped with strategy. I believed that there are many more qualified, educated people like myself who are interested in politics and who are interested in bringing about change.

The launch of YAC proved one thing, that MQM was keen to listen. In my very brief interaction with Dr. Farooq Sattar, I concluded that MQM is hungry for knowledge, subject matter experts, people who don’t understand politics but understand their respective fields. They want to bring in people like us, so they can ask us what we think about certain policies or what we think should be done.

That my friends in the three years I was in Pakistan, NO ONE ever asked and I had met a fair amount of people.

So today, although I am no longer living in Pakistan, I still support MQM. I’m not a die-hard supporter, yet I appreciate the efforts that their leaders undertake to make life easier in Karachi. The work Mustafa Kamal did, shortened my travel period to work by 10-20 minutes, depending on the traffic.

When I meet buzzing, energetic people who are over all dismayed with the current political situation in Pakistan, I tell them one thing and one thing only.

Pick a side.

Research what they all have to offer, read up on their past, their present and where possible their future than pick a side. Whether its PPP, PML-N or MQM, when people like us start picking sides, thats when the politics will change.

When asked by a reporter on ARY Digital to Sherry Rehman as to why she left politics she looked up, straight into his eyes and said ” No one decides when to leave politics, politics decides when to leave you”.

The future of Pakistan depends on the actions we as Pakistanis take, we can either ignore everything or we can get involved. If we ignore everything, than I highly doubt Pakistan will ever change and the political dynasties will continue, the corruption will grow and very soon we won’t have a Pakistan. If we take part, who knows where Pakistan will be in the next decade. Our first step should be to drill in our heads that we are Pakistanis first and everything else second!

So I wrote an article about a year back for Wateen which got published. The topic was on luxury in Pakistan.

http://portal.wateen.com/Lifestyle/Luxury101/tabid/525/Default.aspx

Luxury in Pakistan

The awesome show called True Blood

During the summer break of TV shows like Smallville, Heroes, 24, House and the list can go on, one can get very, very bored. I searched around, googled here and there and came across True Blood. At first I thought, sounds quite boring, probably is some silly show on monsters. Read the description and I was right! I mean how silly does it sound that some Japense scientist developed synthetic blood that allowed vampires to not feed on human and how they try and settle into normal society.

Boring I tell you.

I made a mental note not to watch True Blood and continued searching for a good TV show fill in the summer gap.

One boring night, I was you-tubing for videos on new technology and I came across the trailer for True Blood.

I bloody loved it. This is one of the most awesomest show on vampires to be made. Its based around a girl called Suki Stackhauser and a vampire called Bill Compton and their very interesting love story filled with vampire romance and naughty, naughty sex scenes.

Suki Stackhauser can read peoples thoughts, she doesn’t know why and neither do I. Bill Compton obviously only comes out at night and contrary to vampire myth can enter churches.

It all really starts when Bill decides to settle into his old compton house where he used to live about 150 years ago. His integration or attempt to integrate into society, the way the town reacts and the fact the bars keep True Blood which is the name of the synthetic blood which also comes in the various blood-types depending on your mood.

Suki is attracted to Bill, because out of all the people in the world, Suki can’t hear Bill’s thoughts. See vampires they have no synaptic path-ways and brain waves, they are basically dead.

Without spoiling the show even further, the story evolves in the resistence of integrating of vampire and the pros and cons ( I make it sound boring ) but this is the best part of the show.

Wait for it.

Yes, its based in a little red-neck town in the state of Louisana. It isn’t based in New York or Los Angeles its in the middle of no where and the characters are amazing actors, the show is as realistic as can be assuming vampires are real (there not by the way) and each characters plays an important role in Suki’s life.

There tons of scenes of violence, seduction, romance, comedy, vulgarity and raw vampire-human sex. What I mean by this is, this show isn’t for kids, its definatly rated R.

Each episode leaves you dieing for the next episode and it doesn’t stick just to vampires, it introduces new super-human abilities and the supernatural based on myth.

Even if your not bored in life, you need to take time out to watch this show, I highly recommend it. 5 stars foracting, 5 starts for concept and 5 stars for set and5 stars for storyline.

Currently season two just finished and each season comprises of 12 episodes which are an hour long each. For those interested its by the creator of Six Feet Under. For the record Anna Paquin who plays Suki Stackhauser is INCREDIBLY HOT.

Having started to play travian which is an web based multiplayer game with hundreds of players I was introduced to Evony by my good friend Hassan. Hassan is rarely intrigued by games, however Evony is one game that has him hooked for hours.

So whats Evony all about?

In a nutshell in Evony you are an aspiring landlord, working your way up the rankings for total power and dominiation over your area. You have to mine iron and stone, chop lumber, grow food, build huts, train soliders and raid and plunder your enemies.  Sounds fun? It’s lots of fun! The game works on a complex economy and you continue to gain resources even whilst your offline. The game developers offer a 7-day protection initially and if your lucky to join an alliance, they will provide you with more than enough resources to get started.

You can also buy items that help you to get bigger and stronger faster and in some cases users actually end up buying items because they can’t find it in the game. Medals and Michaelanglo’s scripts are the most sought after. You can’t upgrade to a level 10 building without a Michaelanglo script and you can’t own more than one city if you don’t have the necessary medals to change your title from a noob to a Knight.

Because of the thousands of players and hundreds of alliances, Evony never gets boring. Even if you don’t spend money on the game, you can still get a decent 2 city empire, with the army generating capacity to bring fear in your enemies.

The game developers probably realised the build up of frustration of not being able to have 8 cities without paying dollars,  hence they came up with a simple, effective solution; a daily amulet. The amulet is itself gives you another item worth an average 24 cents which costs around 2.4 US dollars.

Overall contrary to the bad publicity they have recieved by some gaming critics about their advertisement methods and gold-mining techniques. I think the game is fun to play, provided you are in a good alliance. Going it solo might not be as much fun as being in an alliance. You make new friends, war together, raid together, plunder together and when the time comes die together. If your bored than I would suggest you sign-up on Evony and start playing.