The Lights of Lahore: A Cartography of Loss

This article was written by Farha Noor for Coldnoon.com

Ae roshnion ke shahar
Kaun kahe kis simt hai teri roshnion ki raah
Har jaanib be-noor khadi hai hijr ki shaharpanaah
Thak-kar har soo baith rahi hai shouq ki maand sipaah

Oh city of lights
Who could say in what direction is the road to your lights?
On every side stand the unlit city-walls of banishment:
Weary, in every direction, the exhausted army of ardour is sitting (Faiz Ahmed Faiz, trans. by V. G. Kiernan)

 

I went to Lahore in search of a dead woman – a woman who belonged, more in death than in life, to this city she decided to make her own. I went to know about the unknown, to throw some light on the darkness of her past. In belonging to a city in death, one often imparts life to the city itself. My journey to Lahore made me realise much more than I could imagine: that the search for the dead can often lead one to many more deaths, to being trapped within the apparition of an illuminated city that thrives on darkness. For me, Lahore now translates into an enigmatic sense of loss. It is a loss that is not mine, that would never be mine, that could never have been mine. I am an outsider, a mere traveller. Yet, it is this loss that reaches out, connecting dots on the map of Lahore, darker than any other line. It is this loss that I have gained. It is this loss I accidentally inherited as I went astray in the glittering alleys and gardens of the ruining city I thought I escaped.

150 women participate in motorcycle rally on The Mall Lahore

This Report was published on the Express Tribune

LAHORE: The Women on Wheels (WoW) project was launched on Sunday with a motorcycle rally for women on The Mall.

A total of 150 women motorcyclists, who completed training from the Special Monitoring Unit on Law and Order and City Traffic Police, took part in the rally.

Austrian Ambassador Brigitta Balaha and former Supreme Court Bar Association president Asma Jehangir also participated in the rally. Minister for Population Welfare Zakia Shahnawaz, Minister for Women Development Hameeda Waheedud Din, Special Monitoring Unit Senior Member Salman Sufi, Danish Ambassador Helen Neilson, American Consul General Zackary Harkenrider, UN Women Country Representative Jamshed Qazi and a prominent motorcyclist from Singapore, Juvena Huan, were present on the occasion.

Microfinance changes woman’s life

By Jawwad Rizvi

MICROFINANCE has changed the life of Bushra Bibi, a mother of eight.

Bushra Bibi has been making and selling vermicelli to earn her livelihood for the last 18 years.

Earlier, she borrowed money from a private moneylender at a very high interest rate for her business. However, she could not earn enough to support her children as most of her income went in paying the interest.

Bushra Bibi said she was married to Shafaqat Ali about 20 years ago. She started her married life with him in Rampura, a village near Jallo Morr. After some time, they shifted to Adda Chabeel, another village near Daroghawala area, she said. “Since my marriage, I have been making vermicellis at home,” she said, adding her husband was a carpenter and did not have a regular worker. Therefore, she said, she started the business of making vermicelli at home.