Friday is once again, a strike, as called by the MMA i believe. What will you do tomorrow? Go to office? stay home and wait it out? Sleep? or Party?

My plan is to come to office, since it’ll probably be open, spend the day, and go back after maghrib when the ‘zor’ of the strike passes. Why? Because otherwise, saturday will be declared open (when we actually have it off), and i have many things planned in that day. Plus, not having two consecutive days off ruins the ‘mood‘ of the weekend.

Image Credits: The Nation (April 2005)

This is probably the first time I have seen entire August passing by with no sunshine. The monsoon usually ends by August 15. But I doubt it would stay that way during September. Be prepared for scorching heat next month. And while you are gulping that soda, do ponder over this. We received rains pretty late this season, and monsoon stayed longer than usual. Does that mean winter would also come late, and harsher? Are we on the verge of a major climate change?

These days, a lot of what we hear in the media, particuarly on some independent news channels both on radio and TV, is that there is a a lot of persistent lack of sensitivity in people and that the government is doing nothing but bad.

An incident id like to cite here took place on my drive to work on August 29 at about 8.15am on Shahrah e faisal.

While waiting at the PAF Faisal signal, I saw an ambulance with its beacons flashing onne car behind me, while I had 2 cars infront of me All of us in the extreme right lane.
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Our capacity for innovative scams is breathtaking. The latest scandal brewing in the city involves schoolgirls, private schools and marriage bureaus. Apparently over a dozen private schools have been passing on photos and personal information of their female students to marriage bureaus.

With all the creeps, weirdos and criminally inclined people in this city, the private schools should be named so that parents can know if their children are at risk. If the management at the schools are willing to hand over private information to marriage bureaus, what’s to stop them selling to people with more sinister intentions?

Recently, i posted on the start of the Red Top Taxi service, or rather the new different color taxi services in karachi. This is a follow up on that post, with…… *pictures*!!

So guys & gals, this is what a red top taxi cab looks like…

No points in guessing where this pic was taken at :D
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IIC is a difficult place for commuters at the best of times; at the worst of times it’s a nightmare. The new Sialkot airport, apparently being constructed with private money, got me thinking: why can’t Karachi’s millionaire row pony up the cash for doing something about the mess at their doorsteps?

There are plenty of options: carpeting the road; setting up a tram line along the length of the road; a hi-tech subway/overheard rail. Obviously the costs spiral upwards the more sophisticated the transport solution, but the desire to make a change seems to be missing altogether. I’m in the process of tracking down the various tycoons who have their offices on IIC and intend on putting the question to them directly, but I was wondering what Karachites in general make of it and especially what IIC workers think?

Talk about car problems and insane people, I also had quite an experience couple of days ago.

It’s a long story but in a nutshell, my car broke down in the middle of the road and a passing by mechanic offered me to fix the car within an hour. He did fix the car but it took him five hours and it cost me 5 thousand rupees. Later on I found out that these amateur mechanics roam around the streets to find people with broken cars and rip them off by performing shitty job. Needless to say, my car is still not completely in order and it’s at the repair shop right now. From this experience I learnt to never let your broken car in the hands of amateurs. Best thing would be to leave your car right there (maybe push it in the corner or somewhere) and get it towed to your repair station later.

Where i am standing & whats infront of me ?

Some people in this world are just plain crazy. Take this case for example. Last nite, i received a call from a friend about her car being taken away by the police. It was at a thana, and she wanted to know if i could get it out for her. The matter was too heated then.. and i couldnt.

Background info on friend: She has a new corolla, runs her own business, and looks rich.

Background info on incident: Near XXX shopping mall, her car scratched another car (a beat-up cultus) being driven by a aunty. The aunty got out and a war of words ensued. For the scratch, the aunty insisted that they take the matter to the police! (when i was told this.. i was like wtf?). My friend obviously disagreed, started her car, and took off.

Now comes the interesting part… the aunty actually TRACED her address from her car (even though its leased and registered in the bank’s name). Registered an ‘attempted murder’ FIR against her, citing that my friend “rammed” her car five to six times into hers, almost destroying it, and tried to kill her. (A point to note here is, even though the corolla was smashed into the other car five/six times, it only has a scratch on it). The police came and took my friends car away, and now the case has gone into the courts.

Guess what the aunty’s demands are…? Get my car completely repaired (price tag: >60k), or goto jail.

Update: Changed the title, thanks to Extiincts comment