The Splendid Nurseries of my Otherwise Barren City
I’m back in Karachi and commuting everyday to and from work. First things first, traffic is unbearable. My father comes to pick me 15 minutes before 5pm, because if he doesn’t—we will spend the next hour amidst honking cars and their even louder drivers. And we have. We do.
Whenever I look outside the window of my car, there is always some dust blowing—even google updates me on Karachi’s weather in that same way: “Today, widespread dust will blow.” I know.
One day, I decided to use the office van. There were four other girls. I seated myself in the passenger seat when no one else would, and put on the On Being podcast. The driver took a left from Jauhar chowrangi and I knew this was going to be an even lengthier commute. On my way, I sighted broken roads; motorcycles on footpaths leaving no way for the pedestrians (if there were any to begin with); mounds of sand and cement; huge scaffoldings (and so many!). The usual.
Then just as Sabir uncle (our van driver) turned towards the road that leads to Kaneez Fatima society, I saw something very rare in my city—the color green. There were so many plants, pots, flowers—jasmines, marigolds, sunflowers, red roses. The entire one kilometer (or so it seemed) road was housed with nurseries and babas who tended to them. Some plants were kept in shade, some were being watered, some enjoyed the sun so close to their necks.
Back when I was in Lahore, this was not special. There were always some flowers, some trees, some green wherever you looked. While here, in Karachi, the color of dust was color of the city. I heard myself being physically mesmerized.
Since that day, I started looking for nurseries on my way. And it helped that Baba took multiple routes. I saw a small nursery opposite Sir Syed University and another close to NIPA. Such surprise, such delight.
This is all to say: I don’t want to be surprised by this. I want more trees, more flowers, more air to breathe. I want less broken roads, lesser broken men repairing broken roads every day. These days, almost every road along my commute (15 kilometers, approx.) is either broken and unattended, under reconstruction, or under the guise of reconstruction.
Baba says monsoon season is near. And it won’t help. The roads currently under reconstruction will not have been hardened, cars will drown, people will die. Baba says that as a mathematical fact. Like a theorem. And I don’t argue because he has proof. He has too many proofs.
This weekend, I asked M what she’s going to do. Go to Bahria Town, she says, there are lesser people, better roads, more green. I want to lower my car window and look out without another face pushing in on me. Away from the dust making home in my eyes. Away from the perpetual honking. Sometimes, Javeria, I think, the chatiyal maidan talked about in Quran will be Karachi, she says. And the trumpet: cars of Karachi honking in unison, I add.