Report
on:
THE BIRTH OF A GENIUS
by
Fariha
Shah
BBA
3
CONTENTS
Preface
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his
Pulitzer Prize Winning piece is based on documented fact. It has been
thoroughly researched by the marvelous author and great pains have been taken
to ensure the validity of the material and content. It highlights the
transition of a genius, from the time of birth till today, when the brilliance
within has burst forth and blinded the world with it's glory.
Acknowledgements
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irst of all I would like to acknowledge my wonderful self, without whom
this report would have been excruciatingly impossible. Thank you Fariha, for
being such a greeeeeeeat individual, such an awesome personality, such a
wonderful child, teenager and adult. For providing yourself the opportunity to
share your wonderfulness and awesomeness with the ordinary mortals surrounding
you. YOU ARE THE BEST!
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acknowledge the fact that my parents spent 19 ecstatic
years with moi, the most amazing daughter on the planet. They are soooo lucky.
I'm sure they acknowledge that. I would like to thank them for taking the risk
of having me...but hey, it was such a sure shot deal. With me you couldn't help
but win. Thanks anyway, Mom and Dad
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hile we're at it, I would like to thank our
lord, God, on behalf of all my friends, who still can't believe how lucky
they are in having such an exalted personality, such as me, as a friend. If
they object to this statement, they are just being modest. Shy bunch of friends
I got.
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nd a very
special thanks to our computer applications teacher, Mr.Shahood Alam, for
providing me with the rare opportunity of extolling my innumerable virtues for
all and sundry. Thank you, sir.
I Inc.
A
brief revelation
The Beginning
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t all began
all those years ago when Allah decided that life on earth was getting too
boring and he needed to spice it up a bit for his mundane, boring creations.
Thus determined, dear ol'God got to work and created one the most incredible
examples of human intelligence, charm and magnificence….. That’s ME!
;Born a Virgoan, on the
15th of September '77, I descended to planet Earth with a lot of unreasonable
expectations. First of all I wasn't too keen on being sent to a war tom nation
in the first place. ...and then to top it all off, I had to be born a ...ugh!
…FEMALE!!!
That
really ticked me off. I mean really!
Just because I dumped my broccoli on Gabriel once.. mind you just once. But
Angels are real big exaggerators, besides always being on Gods good side...I
didn't stand a chance after that.
Ah well... I will survive!
The Day After
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t was amazing. It's true that the
Lord Almighty is the most forgiving and the most merciful... besides having
surveillance cameras all over the heavenly dining hall. He knew that the
broccoli defence did not take place without any provocation, and keeping that
in view, as a small token of remorse for punishing me, he declared the day I
was born on to be a religious festival.. i.e. Eid. I was born after the moon
had been sighted and the 1st of Shawal had been declared by out underused and overpaid,
Rohat-e-hilal committee.
Now I was a
beautiful baby. I mean, really. Boy, was I cute! I was so
cute...so cute… but well enough about myself. Let's get back to the story.
Yeah, so I was born. And I was cute. I had baby blue eyes, a cute little nose,
ten really awesome fingers, ten adorable little toes, some hair (I think), and
the rest of me was adorable too. At least that's what my grandmother keeps
telling me.
I got lots
of presents and monetary rewards for deigning to come down from heaven… none of
which I ever got to see after I was old enough to appreciate them. But that's
alright. After all my parents deserved to have a share of the spoils.. ..They were
family after all.
And thus I began...
The Initial Phases
The Infancy
As an infant, I was once again adorable
beyond belief. Friendly, co-operative, always took my meals on time and never
bothered my mother. I was a veritable angel; loved by all who knew me.
Physically,
I kept changing. The color of my eyes changed atleast seven times, going
several shades of grey and blue before maturing to a vintage green. My angelic
head retained it's golden halo and my tiny limbs geared up to meet the
pressures of every day life. Major activities during the day were rudimentary
exercises of the vocal cords, flexing the limbs and joints by attempting to
scale the sides of that cradle thingy, and charming the pants off of any
visitors that happened to venture by.
By the time I reached the end of my
infancy, my social skills were quite enhanced. In addition to that, I held the
title for the best Vocal Cords in the business.
And then my infantile existence reached maturity, and
I was thrust into the cruel and insensitive world of Children!!!
The Childhood
Maturing into a child isn't really that
bad…if they all don't start treating you like one.
Entering
upon the disgusting and awful world of children, I discovered that not only
does your perceived value go down, all the advantages you ever had due to your
small size disappear with one felt blow. Now it was good to be big, the bigger
the better. It's a dog eat dog world out there, and I realized the bitter truth
that I didn't even measure up to a poodle. After being a senior citizen in
Infantland, I suddenly became the youngest in THE CHILDHOOD.
That's pretty close to Sherwood, except Robin's never
around.
For
the most part, it took me a while to realize that I was still tops...I just had
to make sure every one else knew it too. So I was nice to the Big ones and
asserted my authority on the new arrivals. It was a good balance.
ACADEMiC PROFiLE
Starting academic life didn't prove to be much of a
challenge, considering the fact that I was a born genius. Besides every time
the going got tough, we just packed up and left.
You may
think that this was due to the undying devotion bestowed upon me by my
wonderful parents... but no. It was also in great part attributed to the
undying devotion bestowed upon me by the Pakistan Army. Like, was I popular or
what!
My earliest
memories with children have certain horrifying undertones. At the age of five I
had my skull cracked open by a vicious brat, who was simply jealous of the fact
that I was so brilliant and fantastic. I demonstrated and extraordinary amount
of courage and didn't actually start crying till I reached up and discovered
that I was bleeding. It took all of two seconds for the fact to register and
then Niagara Falls changed course and started flowing down my face. Ah well,
you can't keep down the great for too long. Within two weeks, I
was back in form and I exacted a revenge that will be remembered by all till
kingdom come. I wish I could tell you about it, but the details are
confidential.
At the age of six, I got lost in a mall. At
seven I celebrated my birthday thrice. At eight, we shifted to Lahore from
Kotli(Azad Kashmir). I joined third grade at Cathedral High School. At nine,
the most controversial thing that happened was that this guy went to this girl
and said "I love you!". The world was in an uproar. The principal was
informed. The offender was penalized and the lady in question had to be
pacified greatly before she stopped sniffing. It was the biggest news of the
year and the talk didn't stop till the annual mela, at which I managed to make
myself the centre of attention… and I am not going to explain how!
At ten the call of the army moved us to this huge
remote city, Dera Ismail Khan. Now this city was right on the banks of the Indus river. My last
unconfused, non-ambivalent years were spent under the shadows of it's
Eucalyptus trees. For the first time in my marvelous life, I had an intimation
of what retirement would taste like. I had a best friend. The school had the
best aaloo key samosas on planet earth, with this amazing orange colored
chutni, that was just heaven. It was also a period of change and learning. In
5th grade we used to wear dupattas only on Islamiat days... and never talked to
boys. In 6th grade, duppattas became a regular feature … and NEVER talked
to boys. Major memories include drastically flunking a math exam and hating the
Urdu teacher.
7th grade
found me enveloped in a chadder which used to find ways of slipping no matter
how many pins I stuck into the blasted thing. Most vivid vision entails
actively hating the algebra teacher, the Urdu teacher, the Islamiat teacher,
the Pak Studies teacher… etc. We now fought with the boys. In h grade things
changed for the worse. Us shareef, shareef larkiyan's started receiving notes
like..
"Meet me outside the chemistry lab
after class.....
your secret admirer”
This led to a series of investigations,
accusations and writing analysis's, a' la "Murder She Wrote". But the
misguided individuals were never apprehended.
Nature intervened once again, and with the
blessings of the Pakistan Army, Abu was packed off to Chitral. You may say
"Oh how wonderful! The northern areas are sooo beautiful.. blah blah
blah.."
Well, it might have been fun… had we been there.
According to the Chitralis I couldn't study in 9th grade there "Woh
jee...humarey larkey kharab ho jain gey.."
Talk about nerve...humph!!
9th grade found me in Karachi. DHA Phase 4
was anybody's nightmare… I hated all the teachers. But then so did everyone
else. You had to wear those awful looking scraps of cloth and there were
regular tests….. AAAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGHHHH!!!
I cannot
recall hating a school as much as I hated DHA in those initial months of
displacement. My only sanctuary was the library… ooooh whatta library. They had
the most vast collection of books on planet earth... and that kinda kept me
sane. Retreating from the real world is a lot of fun… if you know how to
do it. Another redeeming quality was the very well equipped canteen.
Mmmmmm......
I can't remember a school that was as demanding as
Phase 4 in all my academic life. Whereas studies had come easily to me before,
now I had to work at it. Suffice it to say, I didn't appreciate it.
Then life
settled into a routine. My brilliance asserted itself and I once again returned
to my state of continuous happiness. Being in an all girl school taught
me a lot of things… and I'll be damned if I could remember a single one. I had
friends, could go to birthdays, borrow books, and talking on the phone took on
new meanings. It wasn't a proper conversation if you didn't keep the line busy
for at least an hour...
Oh by the
way, in case you are wondering why we are still in Childhood, it's because I
firmly believe that you are not officially an adult till you can vote.
Therefore, my childhood is all there is.
The biggest nightmare we faced back in school were the
10th grade board exams. Feverish studying took place using all means
of modem communication. No subject was so tough that it couldn't be done over
the phone. The extent to which this theory was applied can be judged by the
fact that when the February phone bill was received by my unsuspecting
ghar-wallas, I was temporarily history.
10th grade holidays were fun. We
joined Abu in Chitral for the duration. And I took my favorite cousin along. We
had a blast. Chitral is a real funny place. You won't get PTV or STN, but you
can watch as much Star Plus as you want. Our lives were spent in indulgent
luxury. Ordering french fries, having coffee, getting hooked on Santa
Barbera, movies, MTV and the breathtaking surroundings. It was heaven on earth.
Managed to meet Princess Diana
in the meantime too. She was so impressed by my brilliant self that she simply
had to fly down to pay me a visit. Heh heh heh!!!
After that brief, pleasurable interlude
with Joy, we were forced to return to the heaving mass of pulsating humanity.
Abu's next transfer turned out to be Karachi. Back on home ground.
College
wasn't a tough decision. You went all your friends went.. and all your friends
went to Dha. That's DHA College for Women. Initially we all used to have fits
about being in a women's Institution but then it turned out that most of them
were.
Commuting
to a white walled prison, in the middle of the barren sand dunes of a desert
disguised as a residential area was the least of our worries. It was surviving
within that was the challenge. College was an experience. We were among the
conscientious students who rarely bunked classes… in the beginning. After the
novelty wore off, bunking was the order of the day. I mean a person's got to
eat too, you know. And if you thought that you could get anywhere within five
miles of the counter during break... well happy day dreams!
Therefore,
in the greater interest of feeding our bottomless pits, we sacrificed our
academic heritage. We tortured our innocent stomachs with concoctions such as
last-weeks-super-starched-corn-soup.... heavy on the starch. It couldn't be
called chicken corn soup, cause I never found any chicken. Com flour, on the
other hand, was in such abundance, that you could starch your duppatta in it.
There were brownies that tasted like dry sponge and patties that oozed with
grease. But eat we did.... through thick and thin, grease and starch we stuffed
like no homosapien has stuffed before... AND we enjoyed it!
It was an acquired taste... the DHA cafeteria. But we
had good stuff too. Hot, steaming samosas... plates of chinese rice (the trick
was too soak the rice with soya sauce.... anything would taste good after
that).
We learned the tricks of the
trade in the midterms and the preliminaries. We learned to communicate while
placed at strategic distances… and most of all we learned the importance of the
idiom
"Unity
is Strength"
In short, we learned all the necessary arts of
survival in the modem world... and we also managed to live in between. There
were concerts and talent shows and birthdays... well, funstuff!
The best
part about DHA was that the major portion of the population was interested in
the same form of escape that I employed.. ...READING. There was such a vast untapped
reserve of books out there, just waiting to be explored. My daily regimen
consisted of getting into college and then visiting all my contacts in all
three faculties, gathering information about the new merchandise. During this
period, JB's (Jumma Bazaar) proved to be a treasure trove in terms of acquiring
new books. Invariably I also always managed to be late for the first class
And then
one day it was all over. My brief stint in the sheltered world of DHA drew to a
close with the culmination of our 2nd year exams. The feeling I had when
leaving Phase 4 for the last time had been one of sadness, of having lost my
childhood forever. It was an end and a beginning. My heart had been heavy as I
had gazed at it's lonely corridors on that last day of school and felt a twinge
of fear that I shall never belong there again. It was a passing of sorts, a
parting...not just from those familiar surroundings, but from a familiar way of
life...all the rules that defined our conduct…all the regulations that we had followed
like law…now meant nothing. It was the acquisition of a freedom that I wasn't
sure I wanted.
Leaving
College didn't have a feeling of fear. It was more towards expectation,
apprehension maybe. To tell the truth, college was slow. Two years had gone by
without me even realizing where the time had gone. I now stood at a cross
roads...where to turn.
You always
plan all the things that you would do if only you have time. Well when you do,
I tell you, you can't remember a single one. After a lot of boredom, and all
the movies I could possibly watch, I entered a new phase in my life...self
sufficiency.
Employment
I got a job.
Yes, I know
what you're thinking. Who'd be mad enough to hire somebody fresh out College,
with no former work experience? Well it's wonderful what you can accomplish if
you know the right people!
Anyway, working at Standard Chartered Bank
was an experience. Sometimes I was treated as a child and sometimes no task was
big enough for me..... even if it was flying off to Lahore for the day.
If I had to write "A day in the life
of…" on this experience, the more interesting points would include the
daily squabbles I had with my boss, the fact that marketing had a hidden store
of coffee, which we did not reveal to anyone, and that me and my better half,
who was working on the first floor, used to go ballistic over Blue eyes and the
D'hamidi Partnership Advertising, two of whom had...oh my God.....
…PONYTAILS!!!
November of '95
was an interesting period in my life by all means. I accomplished a lot of
things.... completing the internship, flunking IBA, re-evaluating my
priorities.... etc.
About this
time of my life I can easily say that it was the best of all times and it was
the worst of all times. Some where in there, in my parents eyes, I grew up.
I don't know how and I don't know why. I know I was still the child I had been, but because of my entrance
into the big, bad world, I was assumed to have changed. In some ways, I felt like Alice in the
Looking Glass. Stuck on the other side, watching the world operate normally...
.yet not able to take part in it. Standing in the midst of the fast paced
world, yet not a part of it. All around me was chaos and confusion, and there
was no one there to call to for help.
.
Well, if there is a
beginning.. .there will ultimately be an end.
The culmination of this journey was in the hallowed domain of CBM........
The World As It Is
What do you do,
you ask, once you have failed to qualify for…. someplace!?!
Well, you can always come to The College of Business Management...
Wonderful surroundings, lush green lawns, a feeling of being one with
nature. Wondrous aromas reminiscent of mother nature always wafting in the
rarified atmosphere…what more could you ask for!
My advent into the hallowed domain of CBM was viewed with a large degree of apprehension by my
overprotective loco parentis.
Abu's basic worry was.....well....the Boys. Understandable! After all, I had spent nearly four
and a half of my formative years in all girl associations. He needn't have
worried.
The very
first day I entered class, the Great Divide had already been created. The All
Women Association on the right side of the class and everything else on the left.
It was a nice arrangement, although rather impossible...considering the fact that we had at the
time, four years to spend in the company of those ugh...Boys.
But well, nature took it's course and after
a ...well...sufficient length of time, the Queens of Disdain, designed to
bestow their attention on the other species existing in their presence. Not
that they could have cared less. Every one at CBM has this habit of being quite
mast in themselves. The world exists naught, but for their convenience.
Three semesters later, I feel as in am
astride a running horse or an inexorable merry-go-round ride, in which once you climb on, there is no way off.
A thought for the future
Life continues at it's own sweet pace…sometimes fast..... at times
very slow. It's got it's own agenda to follow and it will continue in it's
course regardless of all that transpires.
My
brilliant self will continue bettering itself, in the quest to be the ultimate
being in the universe. I require very little to make me happy. A little security...a bit of support...and
my marvelous, amazing, fantastic, wonderful... so on & so forth… existence will rise above the minor
complexities tied to the mortal form and become... Me!!!!
May all of you find it within yourselves, to be as
gloriously outstanding, exceptionally remarkable, and astonishingly humble as I
am.
Peace .....
***************************************************** I dare to dream... so sue me.. :p GemWorld Copyright © Fars - FS 2004 to inifinity
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