You know you grew up in Pakisan in the ’90s if…
Just got this amazing forwarded email from a friend, and although not applicable to only Karachi, it applies to the whole of Pakistan. I am posting it here because most of the people here would be able to relate to it.
You know you grew up in Pakistan in the 90’s when:
- Evenings on STN/NTM were the highlight of your day.
- The Jetsons, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Captain Planet were dubbed in Urdu.
- If you were lucky, you had a dish, and you’d watch Disney Hour dubbed in Hindi on Zee TV and write to the host Vishaal. And you never missed “Hum Paanch” (Pa-Pa-Pa-PAANCH! ) or Tu Tu Mein Mein either.
- You played “Kings” in school (the game where the first person to yell “Kings” would try to step on someone’s foot. Then that person would try to step on someone else’s foot and so forth).
- Playground feminism took form in the shape of “Queens” (essentially the same thing as “Kings”) and “Kish,” that weird jumping game that involved two teams and a loop of elastic (usually made out of a few shalwars’ worth of
elastic tied together, snuck secretly because the mums would get sick of their daughters wasting a perfectly good roll of elastic.)
- Guys only ever played cricket and football, depending on what world cup was going on at the time.
- The only co-ed sport that was ever played was dodgeball (called Dodge the Ball) and girls were actually pretty good at it.
- You played Dark Room, Tilo-Express, Oonch Neech, Chor-Sipahi and Chupan Chupai.
- You decided conflicts not by rock-paper-scissors , but by Pugan-Pugaai, In Pin Safety Pin, or Akar-Bakar-Bambay- Bo.
- 5 words: Assoo-Panjoo- Haar-Kabootar- Doli.
- Anyone owning a real Barbie or Hot Wheels was a source of envy and admiration.
- “Bil Patori naasa chori aadhi mithi aadhi kori I’m sorry I’m sorry” means something to you. As do “ZAAAAAYYYMEEENAAAA !!!” and “Mein kon hoon, mein kya karoon, mein kiss ko khaaon” and “Ulloo ulloo hello, ulloo ulloo hello.”
- You wished you were Imran or Moattar from Ainak Waala Jin.
- You had nightmares about Bil Patori and Haamoon Jadoogar.
- You drank Frost juice with Super Crisp chips. And then when you were done, you’d chuck the juice box on the floor and jump on it to burst it.
- “Idiot,” “Shut Up” or “Badtameez” was your first cuss word.
- There was never a line at the canteen. Instead everyone drove the canteen wala mad by screaming at the top of their lungs.
- You were cool if you could finish a whole pack of Crunchies or Slanties without showing any signs of weakness, including drinking water afterwards.
- You picked out only the chips from your mum’s Nimco.
- You remember RC Cola and how no one liked it.
- It was taboo for guys to drink Mirinda/Fanta because it was a GIRL’s drink.
- You idolized Imran Khan even though he was retired when you were 2 or 3, and wiped your face with your Pepsi bottle or Frost juice because he did it in that ad.
- Wasim Akram’s “mein cigarette nahi peeta” ad made half ur generation vow to never smoke (the other half just missed out on good stuff).
- You had to ask “Ma’am/Miss may I come in” before entering a class, and you had to stand up to answer questions during a lesson.
- Cordless phones were the coolest things.
- You went crazy when your dad bought his first ever mobile, and you wouldn’t shut up about it to your friends.
- You carried around a cordless phone in your bag/pocket pretending it was a mobile phone, because heck, they both looked the same back then didn’t they?
- You begged your parents for a walkman and then bought tapes of Junaid Jamshed, or if you were really cool, Junoon.
- You went to a Junaid Jamshed concert in a PAF building or a Junoon concert in PC.
- You remember Fakhr-e-Alam hosting the Top Ten on NTM and his “Bhangra Rap” was always #1.
- #2 was “Jaadoo Ka Charagh” by Awaz and #3 was “Dohlna” by Shehzad Roy.. #4 was “Mann de Moaj” by Hadiqa Kayani, the only cool female-singer in Pakistani (and that was her only song for a long time, till she sang Dupatta Mera Malmal Ka.”)
- You were really sad when Awaz split up. And later you took sides between Haroon and Fakhir, and if you liked one you had to hate the other.
- You remember waking up early in the morning on Saturdays and Sundays (back when they weren’t weekends) before school to watch English cartoons on Star Plus (before it got taken over by the Indians).
- You still hold a grudge against the Indianization of Star Plus after all those years.
- You remember celebrating when they changed the weekends to Saturday and Sunday because it meant Friday was a half-day.
- You remember crying because of it if you were older, since the schools would make you come on Saturday for a full day anyway.
- You played Sega-Mega Drive, Atari and Super Nintendo.
- You played Mario Brothers like there was no tomorrow.
- You remember the Nintendo game where you had to shoot ducks with an actual gun-shaped joystick and thought it was the most amazing thing ever.
- Your life was never the same again when your first Windows 95 was set up in your house.
- You played Dave 1 and thought level three was the hardest thing in the world. Then you upgraded to Lion King (probably from a Power Games CD bought out in the street).
- You shafted Polka Ice Cream when Walls became popular. And yes, admit it, you used to wait for the Ice Cream wala in the afternoon and bought Paddle
Pops from him.
- Walls wasn’t as good as the Challi Walla (end there were rumors that people loved them so much because there was chars in the masala).
- The boys watched Captain Majid (some daring girls did too) and the girls watched Jem (so did some guys, for that matter, and hid their interest under the pretext of making fun of their sisters).
- Cartoon Network showed good stuff like Johnny Bravo and Johnny Quest before crap like Cow and Chicken ruined everything.
- You had “kutti” (pinkie finger) with your enemies and “sulli” (index+middle finger) with your friends.
- Our idols were either the guys from Alpha Bravo Charlie or the guys from Teen Bata Teen.
- It’s “copy,” “rubber,” and “dustbin.” Or rather, “duss-bin.” And “desk” was once “dex.”
- Your childhood was over when they made you stop using pencils and start using fountain pens. And you always made a mess filling the ink.
- You watched Small Wonder, even after it was dubbed in Hindi by Star Plus.
- You wanted to be on the Crystal Maze, The Legends of the Hidden Temple and such game shows.
- The coolest clapping games were “Cham Cham Cham,” “O Pillar,” “Zig Zag Zoo.”
- You were on the top of the food chain if you were made monitor (and you very easily abused the power too, by chucking chalk and dusters at people).
- Sit/Stand, Murghi, and sitting in the bad-kid section was the usual punishment. And the good girls would sit with the bad boys in a vain attempt to civilize them.
Add your own thoughts!
excellent stuff yaaar!
it brings back old memories
bachpun ki baat he aur hay. no hassles of projects / deadlines etc etc :D
who was captain majid ???
We have seen similar lists on KMB before, but its worth reading it.
If I remember correctly, it was “Bin Batori Naasa Chawri” and Zakoota said “Mujhe kaam batao. Mein kya karon? Mein kiss ko khaon?”
do u remember that “ayaaaaannnn!!!” from umer-o-ayaar?
HELLO !! i was born in 1982 !!! and all these are applicable to me always .. but dreaminn Ainak wala jin…. NNNNNn nO way !! my dreams got +18 atleast)
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=4420551694
A group on facebook with the same name…pretty much has the same list plus u can discuss
Oh my God!!! you reminded me of those days. You missed one:
“You raised money for Imran Khan’s cancer hospital by begging and harrasing people to buy the fund-raising tickets. You also got at least one Imran Khan badge or cap or t-shirt by selling those tickets”
we also use to call scale as “futta” :D
also, some bad boys in school, sometimes eats up ur lunch.
Here are some from me
- You Switch to CNN or BBC (radio) to know about how many people were dead in Karachi violance
- You go to Snoopy to have the best ice creame in town.
Brilliant stuff, Simply true within each words.
After reading this i can’t stop my self for hours realizing those times.
Here is my addition to this “You hate to watch tv at 9:00 pm when all the elders keenly wanted to watch the Khabarnama”
Mr. Khurram Farooq
Awsome piece of writing man
Dude U rock!
-loved Fresh Prince of belair with will smith on it
-Watched CNN with some censor when some image of a nice lady comes ( blurry image)
- remember the cartoon from chachaji (mustansar hussain tarar) in the morning
- Watched Gulz and Guyz
- Drank mini pepsi and Slims in Rs5
You used to ride those big KTC buses, such as number 17 bus which used to go to Saddar.
You used to go to ABC, NCR or Petroman for getting a diploma in computer science.
You used to hear things like “What is today’s score”, referring to the # of deaths of supporters of MQM across the city by the govt forces of Benazir Bhutto, Nawaz Sharif and extrajudicial killings by the Police.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/story/0,,2160288,00.html
http://www.amnesty.org/ailib/aireport/ar97/ASA33.htm
Source: http://eteraz.wordpress.com/
http://www.bbc.co.uk/urdu/pakistan/story/2007/09/070903_wani_bijrani_scp_ns.shtml
Brilliant, Fantastic, Wonderful….. It’s amazing to remember good old days which we all miss very very much….
Let me add few more things :
We used to have “Jhandiaan” (Paper flags) on 14th August, we used to sang National Anthem in school assembly. We used to have SLIMS inside Bunkabab/Burger to make its taste better. We used to buy AMROOD, BEIR, BADAM and MOOLI outside school gate in afternoon or during break. I really miss kite flying as well and night tournaments during Ramadan -:)
I really miss everything as now life become quite different after having so much fun during childhood.
lmao :D:D
you’ve struck a chord! :D
Good stuff!
ohhh myyyy Gooodddddddd!! u just made me realise how different our lives are now…i miss those days! we also used to play girls cathcing boys! i feel like sitting in a time machine and going back in time!
Brilliant, Fantastic, Wonderful….. It’s amazing to remember good old days which we all miss very very much….
Let me add few more things :
We used to have “Jhandiaan” (Paper flags) on 14th August, we used to sang National Anthem in school assembly. We used to have SLIMS inside Bunkabab/Burger to make its taste better. We used to buy AMROOD, BEIR, BADAM and MOOLI outside school gate in afternoon or during break. I really miss kite flying as well and night tournaments during Ramadan -:)
I really miss everything as now life become quite different after having so much fun during childhood.
boring!
tareek zamanay ki bataiN.
True, I was born in the late 80s, so grew up in the later half of the 90s and I can relate to all most many of the above. With specific to games, at school we also use to play Tip-Top and Khukho. And in computer games, I was (and still am) nuts about Prince of Persia. Back in those days you had a 3D version of it. There was other stuff besides Dave too, I think it was called Keen. And I was champion at Name-Place-Animal-Thing! I also remember that 9:00 kharbarnam on PTV was something the whole family watched, and then after or between that we’d have dinner, and after that it was bedroom curfew for all the kids. I actually slept at 9:15 back then! And we had VCRs in those day, I remember we watched Lion King and Beauty and the Beast on VCR.
Are you kidding me?
There is no mention of the curfews, unrest, and lawlessness in the city which became part of our daily lives as we entered in the 90’s.
No crap but get real guys.
aath aney ki qulfi jo school kay baher milti thee, baraf wali , which my mother has always prompted me not to eat and i have done that many times
Kataray bhee miltay thay.
tournaments in ramzan have their fun.
lol @amin, didnt u try using a piece of cotton cloth in between ur eyes and TV ? :D
life has been a lot changed now. fast and furious
Ah the nostalgia.
Why isn’t Roboman mentioned, in which you always finished all your lives in level 48 (50th was last) after playing it for 14 hours straight. There was no save feature.
We only got 30 minutes allowance to use the PC, except when mumma wasn’t home. When she wasn’t home, we’d play Roboman.
Everybody used to have a ‘radiation-filtering screen’ over their monitors. People added MPEG-II cards to their PCs to watch VCDs, well until the Rive TNT came with a built-in MPEG-II decoder.
Anybody who bought a Pentium II was much respected, else everybody else bought a Celeron. People didn’t know AMD also makes CPUs.
128MB RAM was killer.
Also, there were rounded-box style cars, not the space saucer like shapes with menacing fronts like we see now. Anyone with a front-wheel-drive car was considered somewhat lowlier than those who had rear-wheel-drives.
The only trucks we saw were Bedfords, Nissan, Mazda or Isuzu. The only buses were Bedford or Mazda T3000.
Kerbstones were not concrete, but rather of Yellow stone. The only lane markers in Karachi were on Sh-e-Faisal. Rashid Minhas rd., Karsaz rd. and Shaheed-e-Millat rd. were narrow affairs with over-growing bush from both sides. Not once a year would you find them jam-packed. Gulistan-e-Johar was a desert.
Cartoons films like Bionic Six, SWAT Kats, Diplodo, Teddy Ruxpin, Thunder Cats, Sky Commanders etc. (some of them of 80s but cast in 90s here) are not mentioned.
I also remember going to the rooftop to adjust the FM antenna, since cable TV was unheard of. People who dish antennas were most of the called as indulging in their neighbourhoods.
Since there was a strike (in Karachi) twice or thrice per week, all the weekends were on.
Daily Awam came first with colour print images, showing all the gore in full detail.
Global warming was the buzzword (instead of terrorism). The term Islamic bomb became very famous. Pakistan nuclear power wasn’t clear to the world. There was much talk everywhere about CTBT, NPT etc. Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan was the hero of every student whose hero was already not Imran Khan.
Peanut Khana aur khilana, jismey momphalli ka dana !
- You got really excited the first time that NTM came on the air and you could finally channel surf. *Click* PTV. *Click* NTM. *Click* PTV. *Click* NTM…..and so forth.
- You used to sit with the whole family and watch ‘Knight Rider’ and ‘Airwolf’ and thought that they were the greatest shows ever….till Automan and Manimal came about and rocked your world.
- You heard (and believed) a rumor that the younger sister on Full House had died in an accident
- You used to rent cartoons from the movie walla that had been taped off American television. You would see the amazing toy ads that would come in the middle of the cartoons and wish you were an American :)
very nice post. this captures most of my bachpann!! who remember SLIMS my parents wouldnt let me buy ‘em but I simply loved them and was the favorite snack at school slims + burger + chutni = yummy
This is all actually on a group on facebook created by Hijab Shah… so yea.. credits are due:P
Someone just copied it all in an email and started forwarding it I guess…
Oh you should also check out the group “You know you’re from Karachi when…” on Facebook!! You’ll LOVE it=)
Are you kidding me?
There is no mention of the curfews, unrest, and lawlessness in the city which became part of our daily lives as we entered in the 90’s.
No crap but get real guys.
90 reminds me MQM’s bloody Raj,Iron gates in each mohallah and “Baktar Bands”.
And by the way, I see people here hiding there age by saying that they were enjoying childhood in 90s. ;)
Speaking of Facebook communities, I wonder how many joined the community,”Unlike 99.99% of the Facebook population, I was born in the 70s.” ? *grin*, Ahmed, did you? :-)
Any one remeber Smurfs, Bionic 6, Automan or Thunder cat. These where usually telecasted by NTN/STN.
who me 70s no way man I am still too young in my twenties now and Facebook sae koi wasta nahee hae orkut kafee hae :)
And you forgot to mention the ONLY 2 good things that happened to Pakistan in the 90’s:
#1 Won the Cricket World Cup &
#2 Successful nuclear test…
Rest is a shame.. Don’t even talk about them.
When India was evolving as the biggest software giant and we were busy fighting with each other on religious and ethnic grounds..
The idiot establishment was busy dissolving elected governments and the leaders and politicians of the country were busy looting country’s wealth.
The intellectuals were immigrating to other countries and the stupid ‘awaam’ was re-electing the same crooks over and over again.
90’s was the worst decade in Pakistan’s history. Instead of talking about the 90’s, let’s have a Quran Khawani to mourn the JAHALAT of our nation.
Ahmed, I am also in “20s” but too late 20s :D
straight talker, I am not proud of nuclear test but 92 worldcup is something to feel proud.
Not only cricket, we were also champions of Hockey(94) ,Snooker and Squash in 90s.
OMG , we grew up….
*nostalgic*
i miss those simple days.
Ok I didn’t grow up in Karachi, but I was there almost every summer. So here’s my two cents: Playing NAME, PLACE, ANIMAL, THING late night, UNO, and Scrabble :)
hahahah! Very funny and certainly brings back memories. I grew up in Peshawar.
Amazing list.
Add to it
- Used to eat french fries with the choice of either mirchi or namak. (still do, but it start back then)
- We used to have mini-pepsi for 3 rupees
watching A team, mission impossible, Alfred Hitchcock mysteries,street hawk and 8 pm urdu serials with family
watching Pakistani movie show on every weekend
n yeah that mini Pepsi used to be really good…
ofcourse the bloody events were also a part of that time.. but the good things were also there
How nice was this morning news…
Ajj “HaRtaal ” hai ….. Schools are Closed!!!!
Nice post.. although ti is impossible to cop the whole 90z in a post :)
some more itmes few we should not be proud of,
- Rise of taliban and we as Pakistani were proud of them damn us.
- People being killed in the mosques in ramazan especially.
- rupee lost its worth the fastest in this decade
- New airlines other than PIA came in exhistance
- Motor way was build with billions of rupees and we were braging how cool it is.
- Kawasaki Bike was the coolest bike on road.
- Kargil war was one which was more of a media war than real war.
Polani you forgot to add following:
-The dictator Musharraf screwed up 1973 constitution by military coup and hijacked everything.
Are you pro Musharraf or it’s just you didn’t remember? *grin*
Well i forgot, as for my political affiliation i guess people here won’t be interested.
90% it matched with my 90s memories. also i want to add few
-you were considered to be the bad boy in a class if you had long hairs. Teachers made pony tail. you dont want to cut your hairs because of ego problem
-you were always afraid kay “TC mil jai gee”
-whenever some strict teacher period started pain start in your abdomen.
-Student make your life hell when you come back to school after 1 day leave. Students said “beta teacher batay gee”
-96 world cup we were all pupmed up but unforgetable day when in quarter final india beat pakistan in banglore
-Gulistan-e-jauhar was considered to be the farest place without population
-Street Fighter was the most popular game in video game shop. you spend your time by just watching at the “champions” game. usually a champion asked you” mushkil wala round nikal doo”
i think there are loads and loads of memories.
a nice post indeed, Reminiscing the good and care free time of my schooling.
adding one thing more is the 2 or 3 rps slims packet which was and still equally loved by all.
Very good post. Finally something worth reading.
thanks for reminding me of all this, I had forgotten every thing you noted down.
Priceless!!!
“And the good girls would sit with the bad boys in a vain attempt to civilize them.”
Teachers would make “good” girls sit besides “bad” boys… but it was all in vain.
A 486 was a super computer than … replaced by a P1 .
The Centurions were idols (Ace McCloud, Jake Rockwell, I dont remember the third name)
yeah when having 8mb RAM considered a big achievement.
wow, i just come out from my memories to write the comments. excellent post
superb.. Marvellous post
i read it thrice and every time, it took me in my school days.
i want to add
1: after school , school k bahar se wo theele walye se 5Rs ki fanta ya pepsi wid masala ad 2Rs ki makai :)
2: 2 rs wali ice-lolly(orange flavor was the fav of all)
3: Khukhoo, baraf pani was the best and popular games after school timmings
last but not least at all, waiting for the 2nd shfit of the school bus , and when a van mate shouted that bus is coming, so every body ran towards gate to secure awindow seat for his/herself :D
ahh.. i really miss man
i remeber in my school days one of my classfellow use to say “fanular” instead of ruller, futta.
and i was forced to sit with a guy, i hated the most…in an effort to make him civilized, as they did not know how much uncivilized i was.
and in ramazan kids use to say spit your sliva, otherwise roza tute jata hai, if something goes in the stomach…lolz
and boys were asked to become roasters by the class head, n if its she, she iused to demand for an egg otherwise she will beat him with a stick.
hey there were PANDA (n other) sticker books too..
simply awesomistic!!! I feel like crying for some reason :(
OMG…i simply love this…it feels like yesterday only…there was ‘country country’ ‘FULL STOP’ and ‘King king’ aswell to add to the list of games:)
oh my God…most of it so true…so nostalgic…its hard to believe that times have changed so much….one more thing to add….
remember the chadda group? that strange mysterious group of oilyy skin guys that would suddenly appear out of no where?….God that was freakyyy…i wonder where they r now? :p
I heard alot abt the chadda group but never saw one, was it actually real or just a rumor.
sucking and licking Gola Ganda
with ur school tie tied around ur head was the coolest thing among bad boys of school.
Also hanging school bag with bag belt on ur head, that was fun too.
And also not forgetting the Commodore 64 fever.
:D
And also
lol @ chadda group
there had been many such kidna groups like hathora group etc.
lol. i remember they had a Ninja Turtle contest on STN. The first 1000 callers to call and name all 4 turtles would get their poster. I won! that was one of the most exciting days of my life:P
I’m not in Pak anymore, but don’t the kids today still play kish and dodge the ball and king king? i visited last year, and me and my friends (all in our twenties now) played king king for old times sakes. my foot hurt for two days :D
sigh*
lol. i remember they had a Ninja Turtle contest on STN. The first 1000 callers to call and name all 4 turtles would get their poster. I won! that was one of the most exciting days of my life:P
I’m not in Pak anymore, but don’t the kids today still play kish and dodge the ball and king king? i visited last year, and me and my friends (all in our twenties now) played king king for old times sakes. my foot hurt for two days :D
sigh*
Hmmm ! The Nineties were a great decade,(second only to the Eighties-I don’t know why I like the Eighties so much even when I was only born in 1985). I loved NTM and all the English cartoons and programs aired on it. Saber Rider,Thundercats,(I loved them more in English then the dubbed versions-that made them stupid) By the way a lot of that stuff was from the eighties-no wonder I like the eighties so much. PTV used to show some decent cartoon programs back then not to mention some good drama serials. I remember school being closed for a week coz of Qazi sahab giving “Dharna” at Islamabad against the Benazir govt. before the BB. govt. went down in 1996. And the political drama of PPP vs PML, where every other year the entire family (all the chachas,tayas,etc ) would rush to our native village in Taxila to cast their votes… well the excitement went away and now they don’t give a damn to any party or govt.I was addicted to TV back then-like I am addicted to PC now. The whole atmosphere of that era was something amazing. The Vital Signs were big. There videos were nice. The were others like Awaz, the Fringe Benefits, the Yatagan,…(endless list) not to mention the rising maestro- Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan.FM had just started… Then we got SPTV and it was gr8… (GOD I was hooked to TV back then…) No internet, no PC,…
Pakistan were World Champions in cricket, hockey, squash and football. India-Pakistan matches were really big, unlike nowadays. Saeed Anwar, Wasim Akram, Saqlain Mushtaq, Waqar Younis, Amir Sohail,…(remember M.Zahid took a 10-for on debut, back then he was the quickest)
Diana came to Pakistan and then when she died in France her death was broadcast live on Pakistan channels. Imran married Jemima and his fundraising campaigns for Shaukat Khanam Cancer Hospital. No Usama - Al Qaeda back then…
Lollywood enjoyed a little god period with some decent films like Jeeva, Sargam, Sangam, Chief Saab, Mushkil, etc (I am not into films but people say they were good so they must be good)
and oh yes the PTCL call had an infinite time. You talked for 5 minutes or 2 hours you were charged the same money for the call.
No cable operators back then at least not so openly available ones around our home in Rawalpindi, just dish antennas…
oh well !!! it’s gone - lost forever
oh and forgot to mention the atari-i was hooked on that too and then came the sega nes and mario bros.
and well all those games that kids played like-country country, unch neech,…
kahan chala gaya wo sub
aur mera tau school bhi ub wahan nai raha-(it shifted to another building)
not so many cars on the roads back then…
and it used to be a little cooler at least in the winters…