14 Rules of working in Pakistan

I listened to this video when it was released, and I loved it. After having worked as an advisor to the CEO of a tech company for the last two years, I went back to this video, and now I am loving it even more, so much so that I am taking notes from it and writing them here. 

1. Don't care for credit. You will be rare, you will be valued like so. If you are heading an institute of your own, then it makes sense to care for credit, otherwise as an employee, let the credit go for those who seek it. You get things done. Everything is possible in Pakistan, if you don't care about who gets the credit. 

2. The cost of success is to be toleratent of envy, injustice and lies. You will constantly be bombarded with if you are on the path to success. 

3. Hamdardi → Khairat. You want to do charity for someone, give him charity, don't give him a job. IF he's eligible, let him apply on the basis of egligibility not victimhood.  

4. Qualified/Suitable → Job. If someone is capable for a job, don't withhold it. Don't get caught up in language, cast, creed etc. 

5. Relatives → Stipend. If your relative comes to you for financial help, don't give them a job, and also don't give them charity. Give them a scholarship. Pay their MBA fees, pay for their course, pay for their English language learning etc. Do muzarba with him in a way that their skills go up. 

6. Status → Friendship. If a person of status of influence cross path with you, befriend him. Don't give him job. He will help you get unblocked in life.

7. Paisa painkh, tamasha dekh Things that can get unblocked by giving "some money", get it done. (This is the author's point of view, I do not agree with it)

8. Be scared of people's Egos. People will tolerate everything, love you, care for you, but kill you if you hurt their egos. 

9. Value Intelligence. It's rare to find Intelligence and Hardworking together. Intelligent peopel are usually not hardworking. If you come across intelligent people, don't entangle them in "hard" work, let them do what they want to do. 

10. Save the person. One person cheats you, you make one policy, another cheats you, you make another policy. In the end, after working with 100 people, you're left with thousands of policies; an innocent sincere hardworking person comes to work with you, and he feels suffocated because of all those thousands of policies. If sincere people fail to follow rules, relax the rules, or ignore the rules, but save the person. 

11. Selfish Leaders. If someone comes to you, and says 'I don't care about your vision/mission/impact. Tell me what salary I will get, how much and what work I will have to do.' Value such people. They're rare. You can hand over the entire company to them, and since they're moving towards a goal, they will take your company to that goal. The person is here to make trade with you, not be your disciple. 

12. Don't be a critic. Do the work, stop critisiing other people and their jobs. And when you're criticising other people, you're not listening to anything new. 

13. Don't listen to appreciation. If a kam-zarf gives you appreciation, it's worse than humiliation. 

14. Honesty. If you're honest in Pakistan, you're a rare gem. Honor your commitments, if you do that, you will be valued like a diamond. Your quality should be with your name, and not with the compensation. 

QA Engineer walks into a bar. Orders a beer. Orders 0 beers. Orders 999999999 beers. Orders a lizard. Orders -1 beers. Orders a sfdeljknesv.

— Bill Sempf (@sempf) September 23, 2014

On my fifth trip to France I limited myself to the words and phrases that people actually use. From the dog owners I learned “Lie down.” “Shut up,” and “Who shit on this carpet?” The couple across the road taught me to ask questions correctly, and the grocer taught me to count. Things began to come together, and I went from speaking like an evil baby to speaking like a hillbilly. “Is thems the thoughts of cows?” I’d ask the butcher, pointing to the calves’ brains displayed in the front window. “I want me some lamb chop with handles on ’em.”

— David Sedaris. Me Talk Pretty One Day

Random Encounters

Read somewhere on facebook:

A: I need an advice. I have been offered a PHD position at University of Kansas and I am kind of confused to decide, so I need help!!
J: Depends on your preferences. The option is worth considering...

Recommendation

4 out of 5 dentists recommend this WordPress.com site

Found this written on a graphic design blog :D these dentists - they'd recommend anything, but it has to be good!

Milk

Friend:

netherlands main har cheez processed lagti hai

milk has like 1 year expiry

me

hahahahahahaha

Friend:

so i started buying the more expensive one, which expires in 5 days

Contradictions

I am so so so tempted to make this a blog post, like others. With my commentary, arguments, step by step shredding it and taking it apart. But a part of me wants to just make it an overheard like thing - just the quotations. So you can see what I see. I know this is a failed experiment. Perhaps it's a bug in me, perhaps a feature? People usually don't see what I see. Not saying I am misunderstood or something :P Just saying, I see things other people don't.

P.S. I don't see dead people. And formatting (underline, italics, bold, parenthesis etc) are added by me. I don't actually remember exact words, so reproducing them from the memory.

A girl:
"I hate it when guys think that they have to protect the girls"
The next day, the same girl, while telling me tips of safe-living on campus:
"So we shouldn't travel alone, specially at night, and specially girls."

A girl:
"In Pakistan, people are not educated. They think chips (lays etc) are only to be consumed by individuals. They don't treat them as family snacks. We want to educate them, so buy the family packs, and the whole family would eat the chips with dips and sauces. Also, in Pakistan, guests would take offense if they're served chips. We want to educate them so they find it acceptable to serve chips to guests too."
"So you want to 'educate' them to eat junk food?"
"They already eat junk food! Are Samosay healthy? Pakoray healthy? Dahi Baray healthy?"
Can't resist the commentary. Basically, she wants (her organization wants, and she, like many other people, has to be good at what she does, so she has to buy the philosophy the organization sells) to change the culture of the people from unhealthy to another (more) unhealthy option, but one in which her company would make money. Why? Well, they're 'leaders who are working on exciting problems to change the world for the better'. For the stock owners.

When I went shopping with a bunch of Pakistani friends. It was one of the first shopping trips you make after going to a new country. The groceries are in the list too. I would look at every goddamn edible's label and make sure it was kosher. And there was another guy, who said something like, 'oh aap tou bari research kartay hain, main tou nahin karta itni' (Oh you do a lot of reasearch, I don't)
When I saw him shopping, he would look at the all the nutrients and macro nutrients and calories on every thing he got. Even the fruits he has been eating for years. And would calculate how many of those nutrients he was getting from other foods, then he would pick those.

This one may not sound ironic, well, because yo u have to know some information for something to sound ironic. I could just tell you, but it won't grounded in your knowledge base, so you won't protect it, and apply it to new information as you would what you now know, in fact, this would be new information to you too. Now, after this much BS, I don't feel like recalling the story here! Some other time.

There are so many more! Just wanted to get these off my chest. Don't even remember others. There are so many other stories I want to share, but they aren't ironic enough to be called Contradictions. But they will surely come on the blog.

Chicken are decent people

Here's another question I have. How come when it's us, it's an abortion, and when it's a chicken, it's an omelet? Are we so much better than chickens all of a sudden? When did this happen; that we passed chickens in goodness? Name six ways we're better than chickens... See, nobody can do it! You know why? 'Cause chickens are decent people. You don't see chickens hanging around in drug gangs, do you? No. You don't see a chicken strapping some guy to a chair and hooking up his nuts to a car battery, do you? When's the last chicken you heard about came home from work and beat the shit out of his hen, huh? Doesn't happen... 'cause chickens are decent people.

— George Carlin

Per Ardua Ad Astra

The insignia of the Royal New Zealand Air Force is the kiwi, a flightless bird.

source: http://www.futilitycloset.com/2013/01/17/per-ardua-ad-astra/

Stealing Slippers from Masajid

So while coming back from work a friend (Farrukh) started talking about another colleague, who had his 5000 bucks slippers stolen from masjid, the second time. And when he complained to the Imam sahab, the cleric simply gave him a pair of slippers from the spare ones which are there to be worn to the washroom.

So hearing this, Arshan told of a story of a guy who had come to a buzurg (a wise, pious man), and told him that he was afraid his slippers would get stolen from masjid. The buzurg told him one thing. He said that whenever you're entering the masjid and leaving your footwear outside, always make a prayer to Allah that whoever steals your stuff, doesn't earn gunah ('Jo bhi mera maal churaye ga, woh us per halal hoga, haram nahin hoga.'). When I heard this, I said yeah cool, but this seems like a very difficult thing to do. Because you can't even get the sucker in next life then! But then, Arshan explained what the priest meant...

The idea was, when people steal, the theft is always initiated by Shaytan's suggestions. And Shaytan always suggests things to a person which are most harmful, least beneficial. So for example, a student worrying whether he should study or watch a movie, will always be suggested by Shaytan to watch a movie; but a Student worrying whether to offer salat-e-tahajjud or study, will always be suggested to study. Anyway, when the next time a person who's need of money or slippers (or just wants to steal a pair of slippers) will come by,  Shaytan will try his best that he doesn't steal Your footwear, because then, he won't commit a sin! And so, Shaytan will lead him away to other slippers... This way your slippers are protected.

I think the same idea can be applied to other times as well. Just before bargaining, just say a little prayer to Allah, that if he charges me more than he should, I want that extra money to become charity from my side, not something that will come as wrong doing to him, I want that money to become halal (lawful) to him. If he does end up charging you extra (because you're gullible or inexperienced or something) then you are not robbed, instead, you've donated and earned so much more!

A walk in a partk

So once I was telling Wahaj on chat once about my morning walking/jogging I had started (and stopped) doing with Sharjeel; here's a small excerpt from the chat:

me: there is this mark
next to the munawwara part
first day we went to munawwara partk
but the next day the weather was to good to goto that part
so we went to this one
which we've been going to since then
Wahaj: in total you have tried to write park 4 times, but have failed to spell it correctly even once.

Saad, are you a gamer?

Social Science chick: Saad, are you a gamer? I am writing a paper and I need to do some research.
Saad: I am a player. Would that do? ;)

What Pakistanis miss the most

So, One of my friends, Wajahat* (bhai hamaray hee halkay k aik Rat hain yeh!) has gotten into graduate program. He is going to Greece/Germany/etc (note to self: put program details here!) for two years. He is a good friend, and of the only two that I meet often. And I am sort of feeling emotional that he's going. So while during one such emotional chat with him, he shared this wonderful piece of chat that he had with his sister:

Sister: sab sey ziyada kis ki yaad aayi gi?
Wajahat: hmmm...muslim shower...

*names have been changed to protect the identity of the people.**
**actually they're just changed to sound mysterious, that's all.

RATS

I and Asghar and Talal went to LUMS as friends. There my roommate, Russell Anas, became our close friend too. We were a group of many friends, but perhaps because on one or two occasions, someone's father just noticed us four, and decided to name us STAR (Saad, Talal, Asghar and Russell). A loving father, gave us a loving name. But, we being ourselves, changed it to RATS. Not because of the sequence of initials, but because the other meaning it gave. It was, and is, how we called our group. That kinda thing seemed childish. But well, we were all Rats, not just the four of us. And when Rats hung out together, there were Ratisms. So here are a few for you:

Russell: So you know she says to Asghar “Oh my god you’re the MAN!”
Saad: Look Russell don’t insult Asghar. He’s the ANIMAL.
Asghar:(sarcastically) No commentssssss…
Saad: See? Animals don’t comment.

— Rats

Why Brishna doesn't save her work

I am not a graphic designer, but I do have some designing experience. And my sister is a designer. She is not a pro yet, but she's on her way to be. In her school, they teach her stuff like story boarding in Illustrator etc. And well, anybody who has ever done something like that, or has written long essays on a PC, knows that when it crashes, and you lose all your work, it feels like there is no point to being alive anymore...

*dramatic pause*

As for me, I have developed a habit of constantly pressing Ctrl + S, with my left pinkie and its neighbor, so much so that while filling forms in those websites that require you to sign up, I constantly find myself closing the Save as html pop-up which opens up when you try to ‘Save’ a web-page. 

Anyway, when my sister had to leave her computer in the middle of some designing and I started using it, she always asked me to first save her work, then carry on. And when that happened a number of times, I asked her why she doesn't save her work every minute, like I do. To that she said that Z and S are so close, that when she tries to press Ctrl S, she sometimes presses Ctrl Z, which makes her lose her work instead of saving it. 

She didn't know about Ctrl Y.

She is in debt to me since then :)

Islamic Pick-up lines

Okay so the idea is nothing new. We've had numerous bloggers and comedians come up with the cheesiest of lines for our brothers in deen to say to their sisters in deen, so they don't remain sisters any more. And it so happens, today in the shower, in the half-asleep (more than half, actually) state that I was in, these lines just started flowing in :)

But these are for the already picked-up 'sisters' than they are for proposing marriages:

• When I looked at you, I almost thought the fajr time had passed!

• You look so pure, I feel I should make wuzu before meeting you!

I think I should post these for now, and let more come as they do. Note to self: Shower more!