Meal-time

One of the perks of living in a mega city like Karachi is that you become Tarzan-like. Not in a tree-swinging sense exactly, but in a more pragmatic way akin to what a real Tarzan would be like - deft at avoiding being the next meal for nasty predators.

Unfortunately, I was a little more optimistic than my usual cynical self the other day when I was just about to board the bus ride home late in the evening.

A couple of birds of prey swooped down on me for a tasty morsel as they scented my tantalizing late-out-of-the-office-carrying-a-lapotp perfume. Luckily, I had just given in my laptop for repairs so there was a little more than my outdoor-low-profile-attire folded up inside.

Also seeing that I seemed like a small-fry after all with small change, they didn't make the effort to take anything more than my super-cheap cell phone without pointing their stingers.

But the encounter taught me a number of lessons for living in the jungle and staying alive:

1. Always pay up your dues for sadaqah on time and pledge nazaral maqam (I hadn't)

2. Stay alert and go out of your way to not look like a target - no ambling around in your office shirt with a shiny laptop bag late at night around dark alleys

3. Keep some dummies - a broken/ dummy cell phone and a spare wallet with loose change should be okay to hand out since they don't hang around to inspect their loot if you don't seem the type that's worth it

Buzzards with handguns usually come flying on a crotch-rocket and land close. One of them offloads and tries to get the better of you from behind. Luckily, that doesn't always work with me as I instinctively pull out and confront them face-to-face.

This usually leaves the assailant slightly phased and unsure. However, you don't want him to panic into ever using that machine in his hand, but you're not completely at his mercy either. As long as he knows that you can handle the situation, convince him you're not loaded with goodies and give him just as much as you need to get them to fly off.

Then go home and count your blessings.

Not your typical mail

Old empty buildings with lonely neglected hallways even more sullen by unlit high-roofed interiors, deserted by the throngs that once made their pilgrimage to these sites day after day, seem like an unlikely to place to find yourself halfway across the world in the fastest time possible. But when its Friday and express couriers only include weekdays in delivery time, Pakistan Post's Express Mail Service (EMS) doesn't sound so bad when they tell you take it'll take four to five days or sooner, and on being questioned, respond that doesn't exclude weekends even when you know they're lying to you. But you're willing to give it a try, especially since you are saving almost a whole big blue note off the price of the regular local courier services and leading three letter companies which charge even more. The typical male staff, talking through a stuffed mouthful, or sneering away at you resentfully take your package and do the favor of processing it, then give you back your typically misspelled receipt to take and get lost. You don't really expect to ever be able to actually track that package, rather you settle back to hope it reaches its destination in one piece within a fortnight. But surprises abound when the website actually gives you a tab on your package, and once more when you realize its now in the hands of the Australian Post, enroute to final destination by Tuesday. Of course, no one ever picks up the phone on the given customer service number, though I would have just loved to have been able to thank them.

With Flying Colors

My God, sometimes I just reflect my true colors all over again, and that really gets my juices flowing. I could have given myself a migraine had I been the travel agent who booked my itinerary over the course of close to four grueling hours yesterday evening.

But Mustafa Bhai at Tahiri Travels, a small but successful agency right behind every head office on I. I Chundrigar road, showed plenty of patience, resilience and commitment to satisfying my every whim.

As usual, I was after eating my cake and having it too – juggling event dates, seasonal fares, airline schedules, and office leaves – till I finally managed a tentative date with a complicated timetable and told him to take my documents home incase I just decide to take my life by storm and fly out that very night.

(Note to self: don’t even consider any airline that’s not Emirates if a broad range of flight options, i.e. precious time and flexibility, is more valuable than x amount more airfare).

A midnight call to tell him tonight’s off didn’t have him bothered him either. No wonder he has a ‘Best Supportive Agency’ on his wall. Mustafa Bhai at Tahiri Travels also certifies my personal Tough Customer Approved rating – which is about as difficult to get these days as a nomination for a Nobel Peace Prize.

Underneath your clothes

Chase up is actually a wonderful store. So is Cambridge, but it’s off my shopping route since they charge more than a 1k for a pajama (that’s actually worth it) and an arguably full price for damaged pieces at their factory outlet in Saddar.

With more branches that are thankfully representative of the new millennium unlike other clothes stores, customer service at Chase up ranges from less than nice to very nice.

But at Rs. 199 for a beautiful shirt that’ll last you at least a few months, I won’t bat an eyelid at the counter guys that can seriously do better. They also get my three star rating for exchanging a shirt that was discovered to be large-size after unpacking, my mistake, without so much as a sneer.

No shoestrings attached

So it’s a common tactic to reel in customers with a half-off sale on items no one wants (except the one to prove some items are nice that’s out of stock). But Urban Sole, and its partnership with Pierre Cardin is my idea of quality shoes that stand out from other offerings in the market. The customer service could be hand and foot, but their shoes are simply worth ignoring the price tags and dropping the grudge for claiming to have sold out your prized sale item that you suspect was a ruse: stylish + practical = bright designs, quality materials, finishing and comfort that just falls short of heavenly.

Ornamented yet Maddening Institute

The fact that no hospital has a gift or flower shop for visitors who’d like to cheer up their patients is the least of concerns. Spotless floors and pretty paintings are good enough for me any day. But with herons in your rock garden and elevator music (a first for Pakistan), you’d expect them to treat their private patients with some dignity at least. That’s why it’s so disappointing when a hospital known for its high standards and on the corporate panel of a number of leading organizations in Karachi so easily frustrates hospital visitors and patients that aren’t really such tough customers at all. For example, the family of a foreign patient from Dubai who just had a tumor removed isn’t being crabby when they scream at a male nurse who barges in to her private room when she’s getting a change of clothes. Or when her family visitors have to get a second opinion – not from a doctor, but from a front desk receptionist, since his colleague insists that she’s left the premises even when the only way that was possible would be through astral projection or other science fiction. Or when they refuse to serve dinner to the patient who’s just been operated and admitted since her family made the mistake of settling dues before dinner time. Or when security is only doing his duty when he becomes an automatic voice response system and keeps repeating ‘no I can’t allow you to wheel the patient out the gate’ into the taxi waiting right outside without even considering if he can make an exception to hospital policy of having the vehicle circle around and come inside. Okay, the last part wasn’t bad policy, though a couple of words vaguely resembling courtesy would have been a little softer. I guess I could have broken into a sob and a string of expletives, if only those damn herons weren’t so magnificent, and the hospital staff hadn’t had such impeccably clean shoes.

The Long Road to Amusement

There is an easier explanation to why someone would risk it all to hit the town. I mean driving at worrying speeds down a pitch-dark highway with colossal trucks and buses that put a brick on the accelerator and flash blinding high beams in your mirrors to overtake. Not that you have a clue when the asphalt suddenly turns to dirt road, a road block without any warnings suddenly comes up, or your tires fall in to a ditch. You just keep squinting into the darkness and drive.

It’s certainly not for the food. Everyone knows that your street’s corner restaurant tastes better. And that the presentation’s falling apart. And that you wait an hour and a half for your order to arrive, and another quarter for the rest of it. And it doesn’t really matter if you can actually gulp it down.

It may be for the ambience, that you’d like to believe exists. Because now you don’t have backrests, should you be one to prefer to sling back on a cushion of the charpai while having to stretch across a giant sized kitchen table to consume your meal. Not that it doesn’t have it merits – it makes the waiting so much more luxurious.

Obviously, it’s because of the driving need (and I mean literally) to go somewhere. Or be able to prove to your better half you’ve made the effort to go somewhere. Of course, if you managed your life effectively enough you could’ve booked a seat in the cinema two weeks ago to go to tonight’s show (and been heading the department you work in). Or you could’ve gone down to Zamzama and visited an increasingly popular (crowded and/ or expensive) grill/ cafe. But that doesn’t get more than three stars for effort. And that’s about all the ideas you can muster for a vanishing Sunday evening.