Living on the Edge

This is not about the "living on the edge" reality show. This is about real living on the edge. By edge I mean the two extreme points that every thing on earth have, (except the earth itself as it is round).

In the modern era everything is reaching its limits, or maybe close to it. The rich are getting richer and at the same time poor are getting poorer. This type of situation may occur when we have insufficient control on the flow of money. The country with corrupt government has their rate of corruption at its peak whereas the developed countries are busy in maintaining their rate of development. We have people who are travelling in latest automobiles and aircraft, using smart phones and laptops while at the same time we see news of people living without electricity for more than 24 hours and people dying because of hunger.

In case of religion we have the same story. When the month of ramzan is here, there are many group of people who are busy in the recitation of the Holy Quran, collecting and giving out zakat and donations and at the same time we have people who are avail the opportunity of late night talk-time/sms packages and daily iftar deals at fast-food restaurants. There are also companies who advertise their product with half-naked women in their advertisements and banner i.e. Boutique ads for eg. for marketing of their eid collections suits. Other than ramzan also we have increased number of jamaats that are going out in order to spread the words of allah. On the other side of the picture due to development of media we have increased number of tv channels showing movies of all types.

All the positive sides of the picture are because of the development in the private sector and the negative ends relate to the ignorance or non-implementations of the policies of government sector. These can get better if the flow of money can be controlled by the people who are given responsibility to do so. For that we need to choose correct people for the task to be performed. We can put sensors to eliminate vulgarity and nudity. I hope and wish all the best to the upcoming new government that they work hard to have a positive start in their tenure of the new 5-year session.

Written by:
- Ahmed Ahsan Khan.

Friendship

In your recent years or so you must have lost some of your very close special friends. People who were very close to you may have disappeared from the screen of your life. The relationship of friendship is simply very amazing. A single quality friend has much more worth than many so-called friends. Its amazing when Strangers become friends but its very sad when friends becomes strangers. You might never have thought that you would loose contact with your close friends. But its part of life. You make new friends now and then. The best thing about friendship is that you build up your golden memories with them which stays with you throughout your lifetime. Now when you sit back and think about those precious times which were spend with them like late night gossips, walking on the road and watching movies together to name a few and you smile and when somebody asks u the reason for your smile, u just say NOTHING! Its a funny little feeling like that.

Friendship is one of those beautiful relationship in which you don't hesitate to share any small secret of your life. There is no formality. Its a relationship in which you fight one second ago and then everything comes back to normal in just a blink of an eye. I have experienced some very good friendships in my life and I personally think its once in your lifetime that you get true friends in your life and once you get it, should not leave their hands. If you leave them, you might never get it back. Its actually very hard to find who is your true friend and who are just good actors. No valuable stuff is free of cost. At least not in this costly world. Not even true friendship. You need to sacrifice sometime out to find that. As one of the famous saying goes on to say "a friend in need is the friend indeed".

Have a nice day.
- Ahmed Ahsan Khan.

Stepping into the new era - Part 3 Message to the Critics

Now come to the critics of our country. People always try to criticize our country on issues like politics, education and poverty of the country. I want to tell them that if they really love their country then they should stand up and try to make a difference. This is our country and we are to this country as a cell is to human body. It is we who break laws, we are the one who break traffic signals, and we are the one who bribe the traffic police in order to get away from the traffic fines that otherwise we had to pay. I never said that we are the perfect nation. As mentioned above there is many room for improvement and it seems like we, the people of the country, have the potential to make this country a perfect one and shine to the world as a star shines in the night sky.

People don't avail their right to vote. More than 50 percent of the populations don't vote, according to the 2008 election statistics, only 44.55% of the population casted the vote. The people who don’t cast their votes are the one who have the correct knowledge of the current situations of the world and their country. If they don't vote then they don't have the right to criticize on the current situations of the country. They are the literate lot of the country who if cast their vote can certainly make a difference by choosing correct leaders for their nation. I agree that we have low rate of education. But it does not means that it stop us casting vote. As far as education is concerned it is also increasing day by day. The numbers of students’ intake in the universities across the country have increased by more than 200 percent in the last decade. These universities are providing some quality education to their students.

The point I want to raise here is that for any nation to prosper, its every single entity should work its 100 percent best towards contributing to the welfare of the country. The rate of development has been slow. Agreed. But this is not the end. This should be the start of the development and if every person of this country starts to take responsibility then we can overtake any country of the world. In order to improve our country we should always improve ourselves first. The start should start from I.  

Have a nice day.

Written By:

Ahmed Ahsan Khan

Stepping into the new era - Part 2 The way forward

The people of Pakistan have increased their living standards in the last decade. The increased number of vehicles with signal free fast flowing roads tells us the story all by itself. We have access to the latest hi-fi technology of the 21st century including I-phones, laptops, mobile phones and you name it. In the last decade we have increased our internet users of the country from 0.1% of the population in 2000 to 10.4% of the population in 2010. We have international brands across the country like Nike, Adidas, LEVI'S, Crocs, GAP etc. The internet provides us access to the latest books, news and information of the world. Though the numbers of people using it are very limited but it is gradually increasing every single day. We have one of the cheapest telecommunication services of the world, including cellular service and internet service. 68.8% of the population has mobile phones due to the work done by the private telecommunication companies like Mobilink, Telenor, Ufone, Warid,  Zong etc.

During my stay at South Africa I visited many shopping malls of different kinds. Every mall has its own interior design and architecture. And most of the shops were owned by either their local brands or international brands. As per my opinion malls are one of the most important tourist spots for shopping purpose. I visited a couple of malls here in Pakistan including Park Tower, Atrium and Dolmen City mall. When we went into the mall, it reminded me of the malls in South Africa. It had most of the international brands which we can find in any other mall outside the country including Nike, LEVI'S, GAP, Crocs etc. There were some local brands too like JJ's, Khaadi and Gul Ahmed. The interior of every shop was speaking for its own uniqueness. It was a good experience visiting the malls and it shows that we can provide some life time shopping experience for our public. The thing is that we need to maintain our assets which we have developed and go further from there.

Let's now talk about another latest tourist spot Port Grand situated in Karachi, located on top of the sea, where the waves of the Arabia Sea hit the logs that support the floor of the port grand. When we entered its premises, it reminded me of waterfront mall in Cape Town. Port grand was a great place to visit. A good tourist point that we have developed at the coast. The restaurants were also very nice. After walking around and spending some money in the shops we went upstairs in the open air to have dinner. The feeling was like sitting on top of the cruise in the late night under the moonlight. Food is one of the most important part of human life and to enjoy food in the night sea breeze is something a man can dream of.

Continued...