Lahore is being beautiful these days. We have had plenty of rain during last 2-3 weeks and more to come. Here are a few pictures from last week’s rain. There is nothing better than feeling rain drops on your finger tips and the smell of rain :).

(more…)

As the Israel-Arab conflict escalates, more and more coverage is being given to it by International press and media. After some years of media progress, Pakistan is ready to pour its jounalists into International stage of war and politics.

The most recent advancement in this repsect is that we have two of our country’s well-renowned journalists reporting live from Lebanon these days. They are none other than Dr. Shahid Masood from ARY and Hamid Mir from GEO TV.

First it was Iraq and now it’s Lebanon for both Dr. Shahid Masood and Hamid Mir. You can watch them report the destruction, interview Hezbollah leadership, run as a nearby place gets bombed and give the NEWS on crisis, a Pakistani perspective for their respective TV channels.

Pakistani media is definitely going places…

I was reading in a news report today that a young motorcyclist was seriously injured by stray kitestring on his way to his college in Raiwind. He was rushed to Services Hospital and is reported to be out of danger.

When will we learn of the dangers of rope like kite string? I remember flying lots of kites as a kid but had never heard of such incidents. The “daur” as we called it could easily be broken by hand even by young children (around 8 – 10 years of age). If I remeber correctly, the strongest one at that time used to be called “dau number” (Number 2), which required some strength but still could be broken by hand. This was only about 10 years ago. Last year, I had the unpleasant experience of coming across the new breed of strings (daurs) that we have. Someone’s kite got cut and his daur was passing above our roof where I was sitting with my family including little cousins. Someone had got hold of this guy’s daur on another building further away and they both jostling with each other to try to get as big of a portion of daur as possible. Having it pass above our heads was making me feel very uneasy as it could break at any time and could injure any one of us sitting below. I decided to stand on a chair and break it myself and believe me when I say that I grabbed hold of the daur and literally walked to the other sided of the roof, a distance of about 10 feet and the daur just stretched with me. In the end I had to use scissors to cut it off.

There is no wonder then why this stuff is cutting people’s necks on the road. When will we do something about it? They ban basant, they ban kite flying…who is there to enforce it. The people selling the string have to make their living somehow. If they go to the lighter kind now, they will run out of business. How can we go back to the good old days of kite flying when we didn’t have to worry about all of this.

Pakistan Television (PTV), in tribute to the late Ahmed Nadeem Qasmi, will telecast plays based on his short stories. The plays would be aired in October. Every PTV centre will telecast two plays based on Qasmi’s stories on every Sunday and each play would be 50 minutes in duration. The plays would be based on the stories, Wehshi, Khanjar, Kapas Ka Phool, Sifarish, Gandasa, Insaaf, Matam, Khamba, Gull Rukh, Jalaad and Bari Sarkar. PTV officials said that prominent producers from every PTV centre would make these plays.

This is the last one in the series of posts regarding Masti Gate of the Lahore Fort. The previous ones were Installment #7 and #8. In this one, we move inside to the ground level of the gate. There is a rusty old metal door guarding the gateway and keeping in theme with that, the rest of the building is also very poorly maintained. There was however, some construction work going on on the upper storey of the gateway when I visited in 2005.

Seen here are some fresco motifs on the ceiling of Masti Gate.
(more…)

After a quick glimpse of the Masti Gate from Diwan-i-Aam, as we move closer to the gate, one cannot help but marvel at this amazing feat of construction. Its not just a gate, its a seperate building in itself. Though not well maintained by the authorities, one still cannot help but admire the diligence with which the different structures in the gate seem to perfectly blend in with each other.

Seen here is a balcony protruding from the Masti Gate to face the gardens in front of Diwan-i-Aam.

For today’s history tour, I move a bit deeper into the fort and will highlight a building that is not normally on the main attraction list of the fort. Even I hadn’t seen the Masti or Masjidi Gate of the Lahore Fort until my visit in 2005, although I had seen the fort quite a few times already.

So, here is the Masti or Masjidi Gate as seen from the hall of the Diwan-i-Aam. The Masti gate (a corruption of Masjidi gate) is named after the mosque which still stands outside the gate. Built in 1566, the gate only assumed its present name after the construction of the nearby mosque in 1641 by Empress Maryam Zamani, the mother of Jahangir.

So I was out of the scene for a while, perhaps slightly longer than what you say ‘a while’ and out of town too. But you never completely know what you’re missing until you get back; scorching heat wave, canal trees, Mall road and in-your-face lahoris. And the food; the latest discoveries had been ‘Chocolate Fudge Brownie with Ice Cream’ at Hot Fuzon and ‘Chappal Kabab’ at 7up phatak. It’s all here and thriving, only that I’d been missing. 10 days and I’ve already been through all of Lahore literally, can’t say if anyone can beat that though.

Guess the place to win our famed GuessWin trophy along with exciting prizes and free offers!

Do you know where this place is??

Better late than never; soccer’s getting serious attention & promotion in Pakistan thsese days. The latest development is commencement of NBP Punjab District Soccer Championship which starts from July 23.

Twelve district level teams; Lahore, Rawalpindi, Sargodha, Gujranwala, Sialkot, Multan, Bahawalpur, Khanewal, Okara, Pakpattan, Nankana Sahib, and Rahimyar Khan, are participating in the event.

Venues for the Championship matches are:

- Punjab Stadium (Ferozpur Road)
- Model Town C-Block Ground &
- Punjab University Old Campus Ground (Chouburji)

Punjab Football Association (PFA) is arranging this event under sponsorship of National Bank of Pakistan. City Nazim Lahore, Mian Aamer Mehmood, will inaugurate the event, while, Federal Minister for Sports, Mian Shamim Haider will be the chief guest for final match.