Nov 2, 2008

The Grim and the Gore.

You know what?

I'm just going to stop reading newspapers.

Yes. I'm going to just stop reading them.

Especially Pakistani news. And even more especially the Metropolitan section of the paper. It's just too depressing for anyone's good. I wonder how the editors sleep at night after they've set the paper off to print. And I don't wonder anymore why my own father, a journalist for 27 years, has paranoid attachment issues with letting his family go anywhere without him being the chaperone.

I have a weird habit of reading things while I am eating. Mom says it is disrespect to food and I can't help it anymore. It's been more than 22 years of doing it and unless it's Electric Shock Therapy that I'm in for, I'm going to continue reading anything I can get my hands on while I'm eating.

For the past couple of weeks, I'd been missing out on the deep perusal of the morning paper (breakfast without it is incomplete like a square without its lines - excuse the pathetic similie) and this Sunday as I settled down to eat the Chicken Jalferezi I made, the horrors began.

PIA's suffered a loss 38.4bn rupees. Interestingly having 16 pc growth and 17 pc hike in passenger revenue and 10 pc increase in cargo revenue - all at the same time as its losses. Pakistan, the nation, is quite ruffled by the US attacks - which recur remorselessly, just like aftershocks in Quetta and its whereabouts. And although we can seriously admire Mr. President to talk about raising money for ginners and growers, we mustn't try wondering why he won't just stop booking quotas in everything from Hajj flights to Saudia Arabia's Pakistan House.

The news is bad everywhere. TV channels milk it, people lap it up and politicians will continue to harvest the ground which breeds it all.

I am quite deliberate about this.

I don't think I can take it anymore. Newspapers sure put your life into perspective when you're down making you understand that the universe does not revolve around YOU - but they also do something really really disturbing. It makes us understand that this revolving universe which we struggle to survive in everyday - is full of crap and it's never going to change.

If I wasn't a journalist's daughter, I'd have stopped my subscription to Dawn today.But I know I won't. Mom loves the word jumble too much and I'm a crossword fan.

Not to mention The Wizard of Id.

That comic strip is funnier than George Bush on crystal meth.

10 comments:

Unknown said...

you can't stop. i tried and guess what? the paper CALLED out to me...every single typed letter in those squeaky voices that Hllywood typically uses for shrimps in their animated underwater pictures. It's an addiction we just can't get rid of.

So we'll just have to absorb the continuous pain and anguish that the world seems to be immersed in and realise that happiness is something journalists can't sell as news, but grief and gore is.

And i guess the irony of the situation makes it better in a way. Good news (however small) must be a lot more common than bad, maybe that's why it's so rarely considered 'news'.

Unknown said...

by the way, the word verification i got was 'beyzar'. how's that for a little packet of funny joy?

Anonymous said...

hehehe, I can so identify with that habit of reading while one's eating...or was it the other way round? Err..

Majaz said...

Hira and Ms. Specs!

Fellow eater-readers!

Let's all join in on a solemn prayer. May the world be kinder on newspapers. Amen.

Mampi said...

Count me in the eater-readers. Now that i have kids who are emulating, I have stopped that habit to give sermons to my kids.
Nau sau choohey khaa ke.....

Majaz said...

*sly grin*

I hope they read this blog.

Anonymous said...

Another eater-reader here. At least during the breakfast.

I skip all the gory news though. Sports and leisure pages are all I need. And I make sure that I flip the page the moment I read PCB.

(You have been tagged, by the way.)

Anonymous said...

id pay a million bucks to see georgie on meth! :D

hed prolly go: 'oooohhh, bomb this bomb that, more bombss, moooorrrrrrreeee!! bring out the nukes, killl them pakis, wipppee out them yellow folkss, waaaa!! Crush them muslimsss! hail hitler!'

Unknown said...

other way around love
may newspapers be kinder to the world, amen.

Majaz said...

Saadat, that's exactly what I think I should do too. Merrily skip straight to the crossword.

Farooqk, you're batting a thousand. Lot of people would pay good money to get some of that action.

Hira, I don't blame newspapers as much as I blame the world.