Residents of “The City of Lights”
Karachi has it’s history dating back to 1729 when it was first founded as “Kolachi”, a fortified city. In the mid 19th century it’s importance increased with arrival of Britishers in the region. And since than has been an important city. Being a harbor city, it has dynamic aroma of diversity in air. People of ethnicities of whole Pakistan could be easily found here. Just like parents are considered responsible for feeding the whole family. Karachi is feeding whole Pakistan, and that also being a single parent. As said by Thor in “Thor:Ragnarok”, “Asgard’ not a place, it’s a people.” Similarly “Karachi is not a place, it’s a people”.
Being a Karachite myself, I can tell that hospitality, liberality, empathy, care, communion are built-in traits for us. As the blessed month of Ramazan has just left us. Therefore I am here to share an incident of 10th Ramazan 1442 Hijri (April 22, 2021). That day I was leaving for 10 days for Tableegh, everything was aligned, luggage packed and all set to leave after Maghrib. Suddenly I got a call from one of the senior regarding a meeting which she wanted to do immediately. After Asr, I left for the meeting expecting it to end on time and I will reach back home before Iftar. The meeting ended at 6:40 pm and Iftar time was 6:58 pm. The distance from office to home was around 40 mins. Despite the offer of Iftari from Ma’am, I left for home as I had to go for 10 days immediately after Maghrib.
Due to this delay in meeting, me urging to reach home, I got a chance to witness level of hospitality, affection, urge to serve the humanity of Karachites. At first I encountered traffic at National Stadium Road and University Road intersection. It was clear that this isn’t normal and something has happened ahead. Reaching to the point of incident I came to know there were Karachi boys, forcefully stopping people, handing them water bottles and dates as Iftari was just around the corner. By passing that, the 2nd traffic I encountered was at Ashfaq Memorial Hospital, the reason of traffic was same. By the time I reached NIPA Chowrangi, the call for Maghrib prayer started. At NIPA Chowrangi there were students of NED University, serving Iftari at road side. I stopped bike, did Iftari and went on towards by destiny.
Another incident I would share is of me coming back home at 7 am in the morning. This story is from November 2019. All of a sudden my motorcycle stopped running near Ayesha Manzil, apparently due to some problem with it’s spark plug. Having Rs 40 in cash in my pocket, and with no hope of finding any mechanic this early. I got off from my bike and started shoving the bike by road side. Again due to this event occurrence, I got a chance to bystand the unintentional hankering of Karachites to help the one in trouble. Among many offering me to help with petrol, money, puncture problem, one of them offered me that he could tow my bike all the way to my home (from Ayesha Manzil to Maymar). And that man actually did that. When he left me at home, I asked his name, he said “Taimoor” and left with a smile.
To conclude, I would say that lets start owning this city. If we the people here would own the city, none of these political jerks can fool us and make us wrangle. This city has countless problems which could be resolved by us being one.