Nothing says “Welcome Home!” quite like a blanket media ban brought on by nutty violent religious protests. I crash-landed into the never-ending crisis zone that is modern-day Pakistan last week and my first days were narcoleptic but nice: filled with daal, chicken and sun-bathing regimens in the post-smog but pre-fog winter (#timing).
I came back to my house (Bridgebottom, as you’ll recall it’s named) as soon as I could, which I found still standing, much to my relief. Long-time readers will know that this is not a given. My UPS is known to catch fire with spontaneous aggression if you look at it the wrong way, my kitchen has exploded in my face, my gas cylinder and I haven’t been on talking terms since 2013 and the last time I was home one of my boundary walls collapsed onto my garden during a storm and took with it all my air conditioner units and plant life. Then I was robbed. Twice.
So yeah, I usually creep back home after some time away with a sense of foreboding. But this time my garden was verdant and welcoming; Bridgebottom was sparkling and warm; the kitchen greeted me with a sigh and some hunter’s beef; the internet was blinking and receptive. Even my favourite place in the world – my bathroom – greeted me with hot water and warm floors. I put down my bags and danced around my living room luxuriating in the space that you can only hallucinate in Manhattan apartments. I was home.
I always get alarmed when the Army starts hovering above civilian protests, its flying shadow looming over everything until it finally announces that it is deigning to not take over
It was about the morning after when I reached for my phone and realized that despite my whizzing internet and blazing electric supply, I couldn’t access Facebook. “That’s odd” I mused as I tried to post a “I woke up like this” selfie on Instagram. Still nothing. When I tried and failed to access Twitter I had an inkling that something dark had happened so I turned on the telly and that’s when I saw that PEMRA had banned everything that moved. It takes a while for travelers to catch up on local gossip, so forgive me for not knowing that people were going mad because of a clerical error on an oath. Apparently anything maulvis don’t agree with is considered blasphemy, but that sentiment has been brewing for a long time now, and as we all know violent mobs usually have more calculating villains behind them. In this country there happens to be a caucus of them usually, all with overlapping but universally warped plans.
My first reaction to the news that the country was debilitated by yet another self-serving dharna (good God when will those go out of fashion?) was the same one I usually have whenever something predictable happens: why didn’t anyone have a contingency plan to stop it? After Imran Khan sat on a container for a year screaming about everything except the Taliban – a farce I hasten to remind you that only ended when the optics became blindingly untenable after the Army Public School massacre – why did no one come up with a plan in case it happened again? Shutting down all the news channels and every social media platform really seemed like a heavy-handed, badly planned way to deal with something that could have been handled with a modicum of delicacy had anyone in the state (really, anyone!) been vaguely familiar with the term “contingency plan.”
As the latest dharna reached its climax, the government shut off access to social media
But no, the government was too busy trying to make sure Sharif the elder clung on to power. Meanwhile, I always get alarmed whenever the Army hovers over civilian protests, its flying shadow looming over everything until it finally announces that it is deigning to not take over everything. You know what? You don’t get marks for not arranging a coup every time something happens. Anyway, smarter minds than mine have already written miles about what happened and why, so I’ll restrict myself here to the big burning realisation that accompanied the whole thing: I am addicted to Facebook.
It’s awful. Only when PEMRA cut me off did I realise how frequent I look at my phone to check an update or scroll through someone’s pictures. Without the distraction of social connectivity, I feel lost and alone in a desert of solitude, my hand constantly dragging the update button down like a mad person’s, hoping that any second now a new post will pop up to alleviate my existential despair. When it came back I literally squealed with joy as every irrelevant detail of the lives of people I stalk came flooding back to me. Ah, I thought as I withheld my ‘like’ with cruel accuracy “Did you miss me, Crazy? Cause I sure missed you…”
Forget mullah marches and military coups, it’s Facebook that rules the world.
