Farewells!

By definition Farewell is an act of parting or of marking someone's departure, which I do not intend to explain.


As March ended, it culminated the affiliation of a brilliant officer with Hashoo Foundation: Ms Shrifa.  Now, as April is ending, Mr. Ameer has set out for a challenging career opportunity. In professional environment the setting for farewell is different than we had at college. The short homage ceremony is planned and enjoyed, and people continue with their jobs.


At Sharifa's moment, loads of tears were released. Managers, officers and interns lined up with their own cascade. I saw male colleagues' inevitable urge for building an obstruction around the pool in their eyes. Some men went up to the extent of mimicry, to show as if they were crying and successfully saved their "dignity" by not letting tear pour out of their eyes. With Ameer it was quite the reverse. Ameer seemed to struggle with constructing a barrier around his eyes as he listened to the emotional tributes from his colleagues. Meanwhile, the rest of the staff appeared happy on the variety in lunch and tried to give an impression that the departing officer will be missed by putting on artificial and imposed sad face.


Their colleagues said that Sharifa is hardworking, focused and ambitious lady with strong determination who went against all odds to be a working woman. Ameer was labeled with responsible, proactive and respectful gentlemen. The epic moment was when  Kamal refered to Ameer as a USB that could fit in every computer system (department and programs) without getting corrupt or damaging the host's file.


I realize that farewell is just part of life, and continues as long as we live. You join a school or college and in the end its a farewell. You are part of a society, forum and group and in the end there is a departure. The tears, cheers and goodbyes are stitched to human nature. To be honest I shed tears at many of my goodbye moments. Because the takeoffs took me further away from good people. The emotions are for the good things you fear loosing.


Hence, it is the trace of your existence that remains with people and all other things dematerialize. Best of luck my first batch of working colleagues. :)

CD Hashoo F. (Ali) presenting appreciation token for Amir,
 in presence of HF Staff 

Past: Lahore

Sabir in his first year in Lahore, Residence: a cubic with Naseer bhai

This is in Makah Colony, near Firdous Market. Sabir was relatively new in Lahore, it was my 3rd year. Here, we stayed with Naseer bhai, a very respectful and helpful brother. 

Those days I did not let grow my hair longer than 1/2 a inch. Memories are sweet :)

Public Service Institutes' an adventure

Image Source here

Aspirant of government service? Well, a visit to the hub of Pakistan's public service institute makes me rethink prior goals set.











Margilla Hills, the serenity, magnificent buildings and cordial interaction with security forces: Welcome to the Pakistan Secretariat, Islamabad. I love this place.

Once inside, I expect a young lady at the reception, with everlasting broad smile to say formal welcome. Stop right there Mr. Shah. How dare you imagine of a modern impressive work force inside the nation's daily grind center. My subconscious spoke. And for a while the world around me appeared very similar. Yes I have been here before, a voice from within shouted. It is the post office in my village. But wait I am in Islamabad!!! Ah the uniformity and standardized culture of our nation's public service institutions has taken my breath away.

While I am inquiring about the concerned office and officer over a narrow wooden reception desk, an old aged man dressed in Shalwar Kamiz, almost stretching on the guazed chair gives me the direction as he points towards the ceiling saying 2nd floor.

Shining tiles, 3 adjacent elevators without traffic (I wish we had this at our university although we had 1 but it remained packed at rush hours), clean corridor and the office, bang we are inside.

Two men sat over a table with PC on it. A fragrance I am well acquainted with, that of a library room. A thick and warm air with mixture of smell of bundle of books. The office walls are packed with files, hundreds of thousands of piles. The loose cupboard doors are open and inside it one sees the profuse files protruding through the door. The leftover bundles get piled on top of the cupboard reaching the roof top. Still leftover along with new ones put on a layer of dust as they rest peacefully on the floor .

By looking at the varying shade of the files you can easily tell which files are there since the creation of the country and those added recently. This is so depressing, at university library at least we had colorful tags at the books to capture our attention, but here its the unlimited white, gray and brown layers of files.

An intelligent young man wearing wasket over a creamy kameez, siting on the traditional office chair across a table covered with green shawl under a transparent glass with pages surrounding him is our final encounter (me and a colleague). He is very polite. He takes a minute to start dialogue when he gets interrupted by the office assistant. He very carefully and slowly starts writing a note which is probably addressing another colleague to complete an agreement made earlier. Once back to us we have to remind him what he was talking about. He accedes and before proceeding gets confused with all the files and pages on his table. He again inquires if they are ours but then remembers himself and puts them  in place.

Well, finally a sweet chit chat and a professional scrutiny of the documentation. He is good at it as he is good at seeking opportunity for 'free lunch or stay' through contacts. By now we are cursing ourselves for being indulged in an affair with the public sector institution and pray and literally get ready to "pay" what ever it takes to get us out of the affair. And, a 10 minutes meeting gets extended to 1 hr 30 minutes gup shup.

Did I say 2 mice ran into us during our discussion? Okay, they backed off as if saying sorry for interruption but its already 4:30pm. Nevertheless, interesting statistics: Government of Pakistan has so far spent Rs. 50 Million to clean sweep mouse population from the vicinity of Parliament house and Secretariat. The black fat creatures still rule.

Image Source here

Kudos to the resources, man power and 'authority of the offices' at the Pakistan Secretariat but only if the substandard culture, mindset and office management system changes. We will be the best in the world.

The attendants of the future generations are the “bosses”

Sabir has returned home late.  He is down and right away starts complaining about the attitude of Riaz Ahmad towards him, who is Director at Preston University Islamabad . He was feeling great these days, after suffering chronic health issues that led to halt his academic career for almost 2 years he has finally joined Islamic Art and Architecture Program at Islamic International University, Islamabad. Nevertheless, he is exploring options for B.Tech his primary field of interest.


That day Sabir was on academic expedition, when the Director of Preston University encountered him in a queue for admission inquiry. The director after taking him to his office asked about his query. So far so good says Sabir. “When I said I am enrolled in Islamic International University the director started shouting at me” confused faced Sabir was describing the event.  “I apologized and asked for the reason behind his sudden outrage” carried on Sabir. The Director’s arguments were:

“You have often visited our campus with your friends, with Afghanis, Iranis and Pathans… I know you are not going to take admission…” [Sabir was there for the first time ever and he had asked me that morning to send him the addresses of the institutions].

Not comprehending what the Director was talking about he again clarified his motive and asked for a prospectus to purchase. “The director ordered the security guards to take me out of his office and the campus” now almost feeling the pain as he kept telling. “He ordered them not to let me in again”. He asked me desperately “WHAT should I do… What should we do?”

I quietly went to the hall, where Nawaz was already sitting. I asked if he (Sabir) had been to the campus earlier. His reply was no. Given the fact that we shifted to Islamabad from Lahore in November 2011, Sabir had no chance to apply or visit any institution except International Islamic University where he got enrolled.

“He accused me of visiting their campus with friends, with Afghanis and Pathans” growing shock on his face was evident as he kept telling me the details. As we sat in the Hall for dinner, he again inquired “What should I do”. I made sense of his inquiry; it was a plea against the unprofessional, rude and illogical attitude of the director. Sabir was discouraged; his eyes told so. He was discouraged at a stage where he is fighting against his demoralized will to carry on with academics.

Earlier this week a news article pierced through my heart when I discovered that Kamran Khan a 13 years student torched himself to death due to circumstances pertaining to poverty. I left office by 5pm and after attending to my grandma who is still recovering from her malady reached home by 9pm. While I was traveling towards home the images of the 70% population including ourselves, kept appearing in my mind. People pressed by hardships and suffering of poverty, terrorism, politics, social injustice and violence.  

Once at home, under the darkness of the power shortage crisis, Nawaz and I started to share situation in our country that day.  Sabir had not yet returned home after leaving for university in the morning. The topics earlier that week had not been on fortunate incidents and progresses but on the unfortunate circumstances surrounding us including the Kohistan carnage, Minority issue and forced conversion and alike.  I told Nawaz about the fate of the unlucky mother who set priority to the basic necessities of life like food and shelter ignoring her son’s uniform requirement that resulted in her son’s death.  We placed hope in the present day universities and colleges who claim to provide the nation with highly qualified professionals and leaders by advertising their well reputed faculty. May be, one day we all together, the educated lot will do the difference.

It was at this point that Sabir came home and straight away with evident dismal condition shared his account. I thought the only hope of the society is fading; the attendants of the future generations are the “bosses”.

It is pertinent to note that in a time of disparities from almost every institution and section of the society including religion (which is being used to create hatred on the ground of sectarianism and extremism), politics, economy and development it is only education that will sow the seed of hope in the generation to come. But, behavior of the patrons of prestigious universities like the one above will curb the only hope left for the youth.  In every civilized society the above incident is condemnable and would require unconditional apology from the subject and he would be held accountable.

For Sabir it had taken long time to construct the confidence and belief in him, which the director gave harsh blow.