Karachi Voice

Owing to the prevalence of dry North-North Westerly winds, the atmosphere in the afternoons and evenings in the city have become dusty and haze-laden. On Thursday, the Meteorological Department recorded minimum temperature 20.5 degree Centigrade and maximum mercury-level 36.5 degree Celsius with 35 per cent humidity. The Met office said that dry weather with hazy conditions would prevail in the city for another day on Friday with minimum temperature expected to range between 18 degree Centigrade to 20 degree Centigrade and maximum mercury level would range from 34 degree Centigrade to 36 degree Centigrade. An official of the Met office said that the prevailing haze and dust-laden weather conditions in the city would be cleared in a couple of days with resumption of normal pattern of South Westerly winds, which bring with them regular input of moisture.

They say that today's youngsters are the Nation's future... but what if these kids suffer from Childhood Trauma? Yesterday I was sitting with a friend of mine, debating on our pathetic lives and how each day of our lives is composed of home to office and office to home routine. Then we shifted on the subject of who's getting married who's not getting married. Soon enough we were talking about the children around us. During the discussion I realize that we - as single adults, worry about our own little lives and how tense our work environments are or how hectic is the nature of our job. We live our lives on a day to day basis complied up to a maximum of a 30 day cycle. By the end of each 30 days we worry about our paychecks, then we sometimes worry about the size of our paychecks. We are slightly happy in the first 15 days and tensions start to pile up as we move on to the second half of the month. Our entire lives are composed of these 30-day chunks. A few of these &

The character of Saddar's Empress Market, the city's oldest and most prestigious marketplace, is being eroded with the passage each day. The hands of the clocks on each face of the clock tower, which once dominated the market, have disappeared, and the clocks themselves are in a state of total disrepair. The paucity of funds for their maintenance had been going unnoticed and now nobody has a clue regarding the whereabouts of the precious hands of these 100-year-old clocks, a senior city government officer told The News on condition of anonymity. Shopkeepers also complained that they rarely hear about maintenance and cleaning of this market, despite the fact that they pay taxes regularly. One shopkeeper, Imran Guru said that they had lost customers; now, the value of the market was also declining and its paint fading. Iftikhar, a visitor to the Empress Market, said that the City Nazim should maintain a separate department to secure these few heritage buildings to promote tourism

Shahra-e-Faisal seem to be jammed as far as the eye could see. Usually at this time of the day the other side of the road is jammed, but it looks like the sun came out the other side today :) It is however  still unknown as to why it is jammed, but those who take Sh. Faisal towards FTC should take some other way around.

Photo Credits: Farheen Aqeel.

This is a good message in a good way :)

One day standing in my gallery, I saw a couple of guys (when I say guys I mean, two bearded men, wearing namaz cap and shalwar above their takhnay, in short "mullas") climbing a ladder up the electricity pole right in front of my house. I asked them what the hell they are doing... Yes I asked them "Abay OOOO kia kar raha hai" they looked at me as if I commuted a sin or something by asking that... they replied "masjid ke liyay hai bhai sahab". I told them that you are going to "steal" something and then provide it in the mosque!!??? They kept quiet. I told them that I'm going to complain at KESC they smiled and said namazio ke liyay kar rahay hein yea!... I thought to myself... only if anyone here had a little sense! The Karachi Electric Supply Company (KESC) has recently launched a campaign, titled “name and shame” against electricity theft, KESC CEO Naveed Ismail revealed at a press briefing on Saturday. He further said that the KESC had req

Hello All,   Here is the complete situation.   In my last email I explained the situation of an orphan girl getting married and Rs. 80,000 required for her marriage. I am very thankfull for the possitive replies I get from many of you.   In last Ramadan I told you all about a fruit seller that he is in a loan and with all your supprt 70% of his loan is now paid off. The remaining amount is Rs. 40,000.   So a total of Rs. 1,20,000 is required for both above mentioned things, and a good collection have been done too. Please help from even Rs. 100 in this good work as it will be repaid to us from Allah with a great deal of profit in this life and the next life.   Thanks for the support. Again I assure you all that I know these people personally and will handover the money to them with my own hands under full responsibility that your money will be used for the task I have mentioned. I know there are a lot of frauds but I have personally researched about these people. There a lot

Blame recession cuts. Pizza Hut is reportedly slicing the "pizza" from its name. The fast food chain will now be known simply as "The Hut." The chain, which has recently expanded its menu beyond pizza to include pasta, could not immediately be reached for comment Friday. Media and advertising trade publication MediaWeek characterized the name change as an attempt to transform its stores into hip hangouts. There are more than 10,000 Pizza Huts worldwide. The new "hut" stores will be more than simply places to place a delivery order, according to MediaWeek . They will include televisions that broadcast CBS programs such as "Wheel of Fortune" and "Entertainment Tonight."   The company has tried to become more hip and youth friendly in recent months. In April, it introduced the Pizza Hut "Twintern," an employee who uses the online service Twitter to update customers about store events and pop culture news. This isn't the f

CAUTION! DRIVER ASLEEP! Interesting note on the back of a car :) 

I've been noticing traffic in Karachi for a long time now, and I think there is one solution "proper traffic laws" that can improve the situation of almost all over Karachi by training its people collectively. My though is that by implementing the law on the road, masses can be trained and when masses are trained the whole society improves. So here is my theory... I'm sharing these thoughts with you so that we can somehow make it work. OBSERVATIONS: A couple of my observations about Karachi Traffic are There are lanes, but no concept of lanes. There are speed limits, but there is never any limit to speed. There are three lights of signals, but only recognizable signal is the beamer from the on coming vehicle. There are left turns and there right turns, but most preferred are the "inappropriate turns". Going "wrong way" is the right way of driving. Use the indicators when done switching lanes or turning Honking is just like warm greetings, t

Train mein safar ke doran Durood-Shareef Parhtay raha karein So apparently the minister of state as "advised" the fellow countrymen to keep praying during commute via Pakistani trains. He says the railway tracks are quite old and the trains are totally inadequate. This guy says that he is a helpless minister and won't quit, although he will be playing his part at the level best to "inform" the nation about the corruption. He continues to mention that fact that the last incident in Hyderabad was due to negligence of the railway staff and that he has asked the Deputy DS to start investigation. I usually and never post about this types of news, but this one was such a disastrous, funny, yet scary and somewhat paradoxical item that I had to post it. Because in the final sentence the man goes on to say ... "there should be no minister for the railway, instead an honest man should be appointed to run the department"! I'm sorry to say, but these are

The title is scary, I know. It is true that it seems more complicated than it really is. A few days back, I came across some of the news items in my RSS reader. Three of those are listed below. KESC Initiates Captive Power Policy The first company to join this programme is Engro Polymer & Chemical Ltd (EPCL), which signed an agreement with KESC recently to supply 18 Megawatts power supply to the KESC by mid-year 2009. This was yet another breakthrough that was carried forward by a second agreement signing between International Industries Limited (IIL) and the KESC. According to this contract, IIL will supply 4 MWs to KESC within the next two weeks. Islamabad pays Rs 31 bn KESC debt Pepco spokesmen Tahir Basharat Cheema confirmed that the government had adjusted Rs 31 billion against the main portion of loans that the Pepco had gotten from the federal government at interest rate of 18 per cent. “Due to this very step, not only the KESC has been given relief but the loans the Pepco

Here is a post I thought I'd never make, Global Warming! Yes, an issue well heard of. It all started last night, when the lights go out around 2.30 in the morning so I couldn't sleep and when I woke up I realized that today was Sunday so I can lay like a cow on the bed for as long as I could :) So, I finally left the bed around 3 in the afternoon and opened the door to my balcony and suddenly I felt like I opened an oven. I closed the door and went downstairs, had a good brunch and checked my email on my cell phone during brunch while also thought to give a peak at today's weather. Turned out it was 42 Degrees Centigrade outside, I clicked "update weather" and I was down to 41 Degree Centigrade. It was bit of a shock for me to see such a temperature before even the month of May, so I started worrying about what it is going to be in the summer - typically known as "JunJulai" :) Anyway, I start Googling, came up with some good material on global warming (o

Here is a video which beautifully highlights the essence of Karachi, the Bus Art, Rickshaws, Pan, the Graffiti everything! For everyone who love Karachi and every bit about it. Amazing video Enjoy :)

It has been a lovely weather in Karachi today, cloudy skies with relatively pleasant temperature and a nice breeze. One of those days when you can really enjoying just being in Karachi, we should cherish these days, as a large part of the year in Karachi is either clear sky with sun shining on our heads or once in a blue moon, it rains! cats and dogs! (Yea I know, there can't be a blue moon when its raining cats and dogs and the phrase "cats and dogs" was last used in the 18th Century) :-) Enjoy! PS: I found this weather widget on the BBC website, shows the latest weather observations of Karachi. You<br>must have a browser that supports iframes to view the BBC weather<br>observations

I saw this car at bahadurabad today, very interestingly what it says is "Mairay Maan Baap ap per qurban, Ya Rasul Allah SAW". (sorry for the poor quality picture, it was dark at night) :) This seems to mean that the person is willing to sacrifice his / her parents in the name of our beloved Prophet Muhammad (saw), unless it means that "Only my parents are a big fan / devotee of Your's (saw) and not me", it is quite an irony to see the big sub-woofer stuffed at the back of the car with some very good quality speaker system. I'm pretty sure that none of the Tilawat-e-Quran needs a big sub-woofer system to be played on. As we know that a sub woofer is used to produce bass, which is a low frequency below 150 hz down to 20hz or low, while the vocals are best when the ranges b/w 500Hz and 2 Khz are high (arrange your media player equalizer to see the results) Although, I did not hear it playing music so I can not blame the person for being a lier or a show off ma

You might have seen this hoarding all over Karachi by now. Today I thought I should blog about it and see what people think about what it could be. At the top of my head, it stuck me as www.bestbuy.com , some of the teasers do say best buy as well. But some say great vale and some say things about experience. I think the chances for it to be bestbuy.com is pretty great, most of the signs leads us to think that. Specially the color scheme is exactly the same. If not then it will most probably be something digital or onlinr, I suppose. To save me from embarrassment I'd like to hear what you people think of it. :)

In reference to my previous post , I would like to add yet another point. It is not just the media who is stupid enough to not highlight the good points of the country and city, it is everything everywhere from internet, blogs groups and what not. We are so stupid that we don't even realize that we ourselves tell the world that we are (a). stupid, (b). Illiterate (c). at fault, and living in a (d). politically and economically unstable country which is supposedly (e). hub for terrorsim!?. What is up with you people! I will try to make my point clear by using a very recent example from the website Karachi Metblogs (KMB). I, myself was once an author on KMB, but before I tell you what I am about to say, I should tell you why I joined the blog. I found so many good posts, open-minded people posting everything about Karachi, posting about events, places, and restaurant reviews etc (which were sometimes very useful too). But the reason for me to quit was that "some" of the ne

I have recently received an email about someone who went out of country for a while and have experienced how the world is portraying Pakistan. I agree to all the concerns, thoughts and the proposed plan of action, highlighted by my brother. I am reproducing this email on my blog so every one can read and understand it. I do feel guilty of not highlighting these issues while they were in my head for a long time. A few points are how the mega-media of India and around the world is portraying Pakistan as center of terrorism, while we prove them to be right via our "miniature" media. We have more than 80% international channels on our cable TV and the ones which are supposedly ours, feels / sounds no different than Indian media. On the other hand, just a few years back people of Pakistan were making an issue if a woman appears on television with dupatta on her head, today if you see how the cloths have shrunk up to a considerable minimum you would be amazed to see that there is

I got this email about pieces of Quran Majeed (The Holy Book) at Boat Basin -Karachi. I'm not sure about the authenticity of this email or the people responsible. But I do know that I have received this email quite a few times in the recent past. So I'm posting it so more and more people could know and probably get a solution for this matter. Just a thought, we Muslims are off for boycotting everything and make a fuss about anything that insults Islam and / or any Holy figures in that matter. Take the issue of Hazrat Muhammad (SAW) illustrations , when there was boycott of every Danish product. Or take the Puma shoe for instance! I say what happens in your own neighbourhood is of no concern to you? No one is there to "act upon" or "act out" on everything that goes wrong in our won city? Our own Prophet Muhammad (SAW) said something - the essence of which is that you don't have to expect or advice someone for doing or not doing something unless you yourse

As we are enjoying the mild weather in the winters of Karachi, it gets quiet at in the night times and feels a little bit more cold than the day. You can hear sounds from far far away, hear leafs falling and being blown all around the street, enjoy the atmosphere and the wonderful sightings of Karachi. In the meantime, you also sometimes don't feel so irritated when the lights go out for hours and hours a in a day hour after hour. But when it does come into subject in groups of friends at the dhabba (chai wala), the most common comment this season is "Garmio mein kia haal hoga, jab sardio mein yea haal hai". Yes we are all worried about what it will be like in the summers when the heat will increase and the air conditionings all over the city will be turned on. If there is shortage of electricty in the winters when the load is minimal (compared to summers) then it is surly hair-raising and sometimes heart-beat-slower to think about the situation of load shedding in summer

There has been a bomb threat at Business Avenue at Shahrah-e-Faisal. The building has been evacuated and emergency measures has been taken. Bomb disposal squad is searching for the threat at the moment. The picture was taken at 3 in the afternoon which shows ambulances in front of the building and people waiting outside for any confirm reports. One of the pedestrians humorously told that this is just a rumor spread by someone who needed a day off! Other statements highlighted that the treat was made in 11 in the morning some said the building was evacuated around 2 in the afternoon. People standing outside are getting a bit bored, some anxious and a some grumpy! One young individual said "I don't know what they are trying to do, either let us go home or let us go back to our offices" There are still no confirmed reports of the threat or the threat being neutralized. If you get any updates, please share. Also lets pray that noting really happens, I'm sitting in the bui