What is this life if, full
of care,
We have no time to stand and stare. (William Wordsworth)
We have no time to stand and stare. (William Wordsworth)
Now we have all the time to stand and stare in Pakistan thanks to the brilliant perverted minds of the people and respectfully differing from you Mr Wordsworth but it seems people in Pakistan have found what’s really worth, at least to them that is. We stare at everything! Be it women, girls, chicken in your brother’s plate, merchandises in shops and the cars rolling on the road. So what is this staring all about?
Yes it is perfectly true that people stare at things which they do not
have like a property dealer will stare at huge wads of money, or Malik Riaz to
some agricultural land close to the major cities of Punjab. Interestingly in
the mentioned cases, the fact states, that’s it’s not the scarcity of possessions
which makes them stare, it is but the greed to gain more! Like Pepsi says “Dil
Mange More!” such a greedy tagline isn’t it?
Take the example of a Poond. Here staring is actually deprivation but
there is no desire to gain. A poond would look at a girl and crane his neck to
its cracking point, if needed, and continue looking at it till the girl turns a
corner and vanishes from those beseeching eyes, but still our poond knows that
its far beyond his reach. But then another girl will emerge from a bus or
rikshaw and the same loop will begin, like you can’t just get enough of it! Din
mange more, eh?
Then there was a time when we used to keep our clothes clean. A fear
once resided in our hearts that our mother will blast the Jesus out of us if we
were to stain our clothes with the most meagre stain of ketchup or a drop of
salan (soup). Then came along Surf Excel and introduced the most brainwashing
taglines of all “Dagh tou achay hotay hain!” Now thanks to that everyone can
just get as filthy as possible under the cover of learning and gaining
experience. So much for Dagh tou achay hotay hain! But if Dagh tou achay hotay
hai tou Badnaami k dagh kya hotay hai? An idea that mulls up in every brain,
either consciously or unconsciously!
So are our brains being hijacked by the advertising agencies? I know many would eagerly say yea to that, just in pursuit of making out that he/she had known all along, what my article was all about, but there is another question to that! You had known it all along, congrats, but what have you done about it? Poker face! Why? I thought you knew everything!