The nation is grim, somber and irritated for decades after being at the receiving end of constant bad news. The faces have lost their color and wave upon wave of terrorism has shoved all deep into the monotonic horror filling our ears.
But then you enter a very regular mall, or a restaurant. You feel the spaces are packed. The swarms of people throng the areas and you try to breathe some relaxation in for a bit. How many would actually buy something is irrelevant. How many would actually eat a full meal is also irrelevant. The only thing evident is starvation for recreation and relaxation.
A common citizen was already an overburdened species under the financial constraints looming over their heads. Terrorism is surely the worst of the worries now.
Can they just be dragged on with life and denied all sorts of innocent pleasures of life?
How do we actually define the quality of life? Happiness must be taken into account and a carefree environment to have a few laughs is undeniably the stepping stone towards that. The families have long been split living their separate lives. An eastern way of sitting together and exchanging our life stories is limited to Eids that are spent among the extended families. Then what about the rest of the year?
Seems like it has been designed this way to first keep everyone relaxation-starved and then steer them to the eateries or to the places where they can be gulped down by the consumerism of the shopping malls.
Thanks to the revival of cinema that has brought back people to it. Although this too is limited to metropolitan areas where the Cineplex have sprouted up in recent years opening a window for people to vent their frustrations and worries. But why are they centered only in the bigger cities when a majority of Pakistan is still residing in rural areas?
Why not have clubs? Not just the night clubs but the ones that are interest specific and work all around the world. In case there is a fatwa awaiting this suggestion, no matter how everyone appears to despise these activities the recent dancing and singing at D-Chowk portrays a different picture.
Some of us do know many who used to visit the PTI dharnas not to make political statements but to have a good time. Where there were lights, loud music and many young people enjoying their evening out. The tactics can be debatable to be used for political maneuvering but the outcome proves that Pakistanis at heart do seek to come out of the perpetual dullness engulfing their lives.
The activity clubs can be focused on the activities that keep everyone engaged in the hobbies of their choice. There are a few clubs in Islamabad that are about paragliding and mountaineering as well as hiking, but this is limited to a certain faction of society.
There can be more societies providing everyone with a platform where ideas can be exchanged, discussed and nourished. They can be political clubs or they can just as easily be related to anything ranging from parapsychology to spiritualism. But we need something, to distract our collective mind from committing suicide. By shutting all doors to the outside world we have locked our own selves from within. The new ideas are nonexistent since there is no time spared from self-exploration and grooming.
Maybe it won’t be unjust to say that communities themselves have absolutely given up on creating opportunities to engage young and old alike. Things that can be done at community level have also been forgotten.
The only thing one comes across is cricket matches that are held between neighborhoods. The libraries, the chess matches, the rowing clubs or even laughter clubs, anything could serve as an antidote amidst the perpetual boredom the nation is under. Instead of waiting for the investors to land in again with more shopping malls and eateries it is better that we start building our routines more suitable to our work schedules and closer to our heart.
Geti Ara is a story-teller, journalist and a documentary maker