Brown Watch

On my way to Pakistan for Easter break at the end of March, my watch (yes, my watch) got stopped at security. I took it off to put it in the scanner, and as I was gathering my things, I realised that it was not there. I panicked and looked at all the Bresis (British desis) around me suspiciously. When I asked the quite clearly Muslim, Brown Bresi (because they all look alike for some weird reason! I mean really. They do. I often see couples who could pass off as each other if they changed clothes, which is quite sick) where it was, he told me to get it from the main security desk.

Horrified with my ingrained racism against my own diasporic race, I went to the desk to pick it up. It was manned by lots of Bresis. When I asked for my watch, they asked me the most ridiculous of questions.

Bresi: Where did you buy this watch?
Me: In Lahore. In Pakistan.
Bresi: When did you buy this watch?
Me: Sometime last summer. Probably August or September.
Bresi (holding watch from me suspiciously and concealing it): What brand is it?
Me: Swatch.
Bresi nods: Yes. Now why did you buy this watch?
Me: Why did I buy the watch?
Bresi: Yes, why did you buy the watch?
Me: Are you serious?
Bresi: …
Me (now exasperated and feeling more racist than ever against Bresis): Is this because it’s a Brown watch?

The watch was meekly handed over. On my way back, I requested to be seated next to Pakistani passport holders. I mean really Bresis! When will you become normal people?

And now here’s a rather terrible but relevant poem by an exasperated person who is aspiring to be a Bresi. They’re quite clearly trying to copy my style as you can see, but falling flat on their face. [Please note use of the singular they− I  am not referring to multiple people and deliberately concealing the gender of this wretched soul. Do you think it’s a male or female? I think it’s wonderfully androgynous.]

Rejected and Deceived

Rejected and deceived,
We are told not to enter because
We will never leave.

This is the sin
Of being a Paki.
This is the crime
Of being brown.
This is the retribution
Of being victims of the Taliban.

At home I’m an infidel,
One who refuses to conform
To this Shariah created
By the Wahabis,
Sitting comfortably on thrones
In Saudi.

They are the ones who are responsible for this,
This militant brand of Islam.
They are the ones who are pouring money
Into tribal ignorance.

They are the ones.

They are the ones
Encouraging these men to behave
In a manner so horrifying,
So violent,
That it makes you want to kill them
In return.

Paki:
Filthy
Dirty

Get out of my country.
Leave.

Psychics?

“You need to let go of the past! You are too rigid. You need to move on,” he said as soon as he displayed my cards. “Put it behind you. You need movement.”

There were many things he told me, the tarot card reader who sits in a gypsy van at the Brighton Pier, that were eerily accurate. Or was it because they were ambiguous? Isn’t that what this is all about? Like horoscopes that can apply to a variety of situations? Or is it because we want to read into it; we want to believe that the person sitting across from us is like a celestial human being?

The truth is that I am a rigid person. I am indeed a person who was (at that point since this was in December) hanging on the past, enraged by it, irritated by my inability to deal with many things that I thought I had left behind despite the fact that I had moved away and changed my life. But… aren’t we all always haunted by our pasts in some way or the other? I know I am not alone. I know he could have said the same thing to many other people and it would “fit” for them too.

What I do know is that if any of the shamans I have encountered in my life are to be believed at all, my life should have taken various multiple turns by now depending on who I believed to be most accurate I guess. (Does that make any sense?) One man did my entire astrological chart three years ago told me things that I hope not to be true. He told me I wouldn’t be published until my 30s (not that they’re far now!) and that I would get married soon. That was then. Still not married (thankfully) but still not published. Another person told me I would get married twice; the first would end in my early 20s. Well… 27, almost 28 in fact, has proved that wrong. Out the bin quack! Oh, and apparently I’m psychic (some “cross of venus” nonsense), something that I have convinced a few people of. I know the trick… it’s not about being psychic at all− it’s about memory, it’s about knowing information they think you don’t know. And it’s fun to fool people for sure (especially students). This is especially easy in Lahore since it is a city filled with gossip where no one can have any privacy and everyone is connected.

Irrationality is part of the human condition. I wish I didn’t believe that to be true, but I think this because I too have fallen victim to this. It’s all too easy to believe that a series of coincidences have some spiritual purpose or force behind them: people don’t realise the strength and power of self-fulfilling prophecies. Perhaps like Macbeth’s witches, we are our own demons.

PS: I’m only writing this because I wish to understand why so many intelligent people I know fall victim to this nonsense!