Independent Skies Magazine 16th Issue

sixteenth issue

| 2 | Independent Skies Magazine | Issue 16 Aug 2013

4. A reflection on life ChrIStopher ChAkwAnA

12. GoA of PAKiStAn SunItA GIll Adv

8. trAvelinG life FernAndo Márquez

16. whAt hAS to be done?

19. the rAin continueS Sonto JozAnA


our lives whatsoever, we just move about an spiritual-ly empty lot. We make plans and even plan months and years ahead, yet we forget that we are mortal beings and that our days are num-bered. We act like we have keys to this life, we are guar-anteed that next week we will be alive, yet in reality to-morrow is not promised to us, the fact that we are alive today or tomorrow is be-cause of God’s grace. Whilst we plan life is it is happening, yes because remember life is what happens when you are


At times it just takes the death of someone re-ally close to you, especially a friend a peer for you to reflect on the seriousness of life. Often we spend a great-er part of our lives chasing things that are of no any val-ue, things that make us ap-pear better than our friends, our siblings, our workmates, yet forgetting to reflect on the seriousness of life, you will find out that at the end of the day the things we spend a major part of our time chasing, do not bring any spiritual fulfilment on

busy planning other things. In this makeshift called life we tend to forget to ap-preciate the smaller pixels that build up the bigger pic-ture called life. You know just sitting in that funeral service of my former class-mate and friend, hearing all those beautiful testimonies of his life and on how he had made a positive impact on people’s lives really got me thinking about what I have been doing with my own life. You know funerals have this way of knocking sense into people’s lives, well at least

A reFleCtIon on lIFe | ChrIStopher ChAkwAnA

A reflectIOn On lIfe

Christopher Chakwana

for those few days during and after the funeral. Going back to the beautiful testi-monies that were said in the funeral service of this fine gentleman; my friend, made me question one thing, well my question is, did all these people, me included ever bother to show apprecia-tion for the wonderful stuff he did in our lives or were we too busy to notice him doing all the fabulous stuff when he was alive, we just took it for granted that it was entitled to us after all, he was our friend, church

mate or sibling what more could he have done. Of what use is showing this ap-preciation now, when he is already gone and not there to see or listen to it? An oc-casional whatsapp message, facebook inbox or text mes-sage would have done the trick, to call and check up on him, to call and say hi, how have you been and thank you for inspiring me in a, b, c ways. To find out how he is doing and most prob-ably celebrate his personal achievements, most of all to be there to be his friend.

now all that is left are the constant eulogies that we sing in his absence, of what he did in our lives. the death of this friend also allowed me to reflect on my life; its direction or what its lacking. Just hearing the beautiful things he had done for peo-ple in his church, all of which were true considering I re-ally knew the kind of char-acter he was, just then, sit-ting on that church bench, it suddenly hit me, I am going to die one day, scary right?, well I know the whole me being locked up in the cas-

| 6 | Independent Skies Magazine | Issue 16 Aug 2013| 6 | Independent Skies Magazine | Issue 16 Aug 2013

ket scares me, but what I mean, as in one day my life and yours too will end. Will people celebrate my life and feel the loss of losing some-one so dear to them, or will it be just my family mourn-ing, mainly because they have biological links with me and the mourning will merely be out of a sense of duty. Will all the people I have encountered in my twenty something years of existence from my high school days, teaching days and varsity days have some-thing positive to say about me ,or will they just stammer and say something more ab-stract like “chris was just a complicated character that was misunderstood, may his dear soul rest in peace, or will they write a long epitaph whose length fill a volume of bond paper as thick as an oxford thesasaurus .You see life should be lived with an

A reFleCtIon on lIFe | ChrIStopher ChAkwAnAA reFleCtIon on lIFe | ChrIStopher ChAkwAnA

impact, it should not just be about “me, myself and I, but it should be about me and the community, I mean after all we are Africans, the spirit of ubuntu comes in to play,

“umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu”,

I am because we are.

In my view ones success amounts to nothing if that individual has not made any positive impact on people’s lives. remember, it is never really about the song’s lyr-ics, it is about the way the choir tune their voices and their right emotional appli-cation in giving that melodi-ous feel to the song, it is nev-er about the useless rhyme in the poem, but the emo-tion and message that the poet conveys to the reader of the matter that is being

discussed. Maybe I am con-fusing you, after all these are just random thoughts, anyway all am saying is that life is not about just living and sucking all the earth’s oxygen. life is about mak-ing change in the world, it is about doing something meaningful that leaves peo-ple’s lives in a better state than when you had found them. It doesn’t really take too much effort like building an Ark like noah, or writing a great inspirational speech like Martin luther King, or you staying in a prison for a long period and forgiving the people that incarcer-ated you like what nelson Mandela did, no!!!!, it just takes you using your time and effort in making the people around you smile and feel better about them-selves. It takes you speaking words of encouragement to those that need them, spar-

ing a minute to those that are alone that merely need to be listened to, in brief just making a positive lasting im-pression on people’s lives. to me living a life that has a positive impact on people is a life well lived. Above all, life should be lived in close connection with the creator. constantly thanking him for the little that you have, the precious life that He grants you every day, trust me it’s when you have encountered people that lead worse off lives than yours that you will see that God is at hand. I talk a lot; let me stop here lest I confuse you even much more about the images you had built in your small little minds about life. In conclu-sion stay strong no matter how difficult it becomes, fight on and never give up on life!

Christopher Chakwana


PArKvIeW Green fAnGcAODI


Another aspect about traveling is that you don’t have to go far to live the whole experience of traveling, you don’t even have to get out from your city to travel, traveling is not going far away, traveling is learning and know-ing something new and differ-ent in another place, in a place that is out of your daily routine, a place that is out of your com-fort zone.

Most of the people are not aware of the real magic and beauty of their own cities, mostly because the daily routine does not let them take the opportunity to travel, to learn, to do something different.

One of the most valuable aspects of traveling, is that when you travel far away from your home you really learn to appreciate it, and I tell you this because I’m the living example of this as-pect. When you go abroad you see and even feel the differences between your destination and

trAvelInG lIFe | FernAndo Márquez

Traveling... What comes to your mind when you hear that word?

When I hear travel, I begin to imagine all the places that I can reach, that I have visited and most important, that I want to know.

Since I was a little child my mother initiated me in the joy of traveling. I think that I got in my first plane before I was one year old, maybe year and a half. The thing is that the love for traveling, is something that you obtain when you are born, more so than it being something that you obtain through your life. These emotions that you feel when you know that you are go-ing to travel, when you arrive at the airport, when you get on the plane, when the plane arrives at its destination, when you step for the first time in your desti-nation: it is magical.

The purpose of traveling is not only to rest, or to be on a vaca-tion, traveling goes far beyond that. For me traveling has a lot of purposes added to the ones mentioned earlier, for me the purposes of traveling are dis-covering; new cultures, new places, new food, new friends!, new animals, new plants, new hobbies, and new homes.

The whole travel thing is about knowing new things, but most important of all, is about know-ing yourself, learning more about yourself, learning some-thing about yourself that you didn’t know, or haven’t discov-ered before. Traveling is about learning more than the things that they teach you at school, it is learning about life...

I’m actually 20 years old, I have a lot more to discover in my life, but the trips that I have made so far, have taught me things that are more important than the things I have learned in school.

Traveling Life“I travel not to go anywhere, but to go.

I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move.” - R. Louis Stevenson


your home, and I tell you that even in the most beautiful des-tinations that I’ve been to, there is always something that I can’t replace and that is being home. One of the most enjoyable as-pects of traveling is returning to your home and laying on your bed. Has it happened to you? I bet that it has.

I have traveled around my city; Mexicali, my state; Baja Califor-nia, my country; México, I have traveled to the US, and Chile in the American continent, I have traveled around many countries in Europe such as: Germany, France and Greece, I have been in the Middle East; Turkey, but I tell you that it doesn’t matter if you travel all around the world or how far you travel, the most important thing of traveling is that you get to learn, enjoy, lose your fears, and to learn to toler-ate and to be with all kinds of people.

Life is a constant journey, just take the opportunity and when least expected you will find yourself traveling and learning.

Fernando Márquez


trAvelInG lIFe | FernAndo Márquez


GOA Of PAKIStAn

Author By:Sunita Gill Advedited By: Ali Ahmad, Matthew lee, reviewd by: Almustafa M. Khalid


Is really Goa In Pakistan?

Minorities of different parts of the world experience difficult life as defacto second-class citizens. they are discriminated and oppressed with violent. local governments & individuals of the dominant culture often violate minority rights that are protected by the constitution. the reason why govern-ments oppress the minorities is perhaps be-cause they feel unsettle when the minority are coming of power and causing segrega-tion within the country. Such circumstance is amplified in Youhanabad, particularly, as it is the biggest christian populated area in Asia and is called the “Goa of Pakistan” due to some similarities and peculiarities.

Youhanabad is the suburb of lahore, Paki-stan. It inhabits a population of 200,000 people. there are about 6,000 households in total, 280 households which belong to Uc-142 of Youhanabad. It is under the rule of the Punjab Government. Youhanabad in-habits the largest population of christians in lahore. However, Youhanabad encounters an assortment of problems because the po-litical parties and institutions officials, who are christians, are corrupted and hypocriti-cal. Youhanabad residents suffer different levels of social and infrastructural problems including discrimination, illiteracy, poor pub-lic health care system and personal hygiene awareness. Among the problems above, unemployment is the most fatal. It results

in high drug addiction rates and crime rates when the youth are out of work.

there is a large number of ngo & church-es work in Youhanabad. Despite that there are at least one private school; two to three churches and one Ngo office on an average street to help the poor, these institutions fail to solve the illiteracy problem. the tragic re-ality is that the international aids have fallen into the hands of officials for their person-al sake and for the welfare of their families since these funding are their main sources of income. Among these christian organi-zations, the overseas donation which is col-lected for the purposes of educating the poor children, setting up development proj-ects for women empowerment has gone corrupted. In addition to the corrupted fund, the sky-high school fee of the private sectors and the ngo’s schools push the poor further away from education opportunities. Since poor families cannot afford such ex-pensive education, they send them to work as child labor instead. this is the origin of the crime.

there are a lot of foreign visitors in You-hanabad every year; among them are mis-sionaries, student volunteers and UNO offi-cials. However, they do not make any great impact on the situation of Youhanabad. Due to illiteracy, majority of the youngsters suf-

GoA oF pAkIStAn | SunItA GIll Adv


fer in unemployment and drug addiction. They deal with trafficking drugs, commit-ting murder, banditry and robbery. com-mitting street crimes have become a norm. the brutal reality is even children are get-ting involved in these organized crimes. Although there is a police station close to Youhanabad, people do not trust the police since they are equally corrupted. One of the examples is that some police officers have their own shares of profit from the drug dealers. therefore, residents of Youhanabad attempt to solve conflicts and problems through compromising privately or going through court. People show no respect to the police force and the legal authority. As a compromise to live, they apply their own law.

Youhanabad is now a slum. Small gangs dis-turb the daily life of local residents. recent-ly, the Metro Bus Station was destructed. The local government closed that specific station for 4 months in respond to the in-cident which results inaccessibility prob-lem within the community. People in You-hanabad are marginalized. Minorities lose their rights, although they are the citizens of their own country. Depriving them from education leads to destruction of their com-munity. there are 314 children in the age group of 4-10 years old are of age to attend school. the poor families instead of send-ing their children to school, they ask them to either play in streets or to work in order to cope with the increasing inflation. In You-

hanabad, there is no public school system for the labor class. Uneducated women re-sort to work for wealthy families as domes-tic helpers.

Youhanabad is an industrial district as well. In Youhanabad, there is a place called nalla. the neighboring glass & garments facto-ries deposit industrial waste in nalla. Punjab government fails to provide proper facilities for the residents in that area. there is an ob-vious absence of government dispensary. Because of poverty, young people can ei-ther work on short-term jobs or to sell drugs as a land mafia member for a living. Cor-rupted christian political leaders used these youth at edge for their own ambitions when it comes to the time for election. there is a need of prompt action from the provincial government to solve the poverty and unem-ployment problem.

In 2013, Mian Muhammad Shahbaz Sharif is elected as the chief minister from the seat of PP-159 & Youhanabad comes under this political party. there are also two provin-cial ministers selected from Youhanabad on minority and reserved seats. therefore, it is crucial for newly elected leaders are to ful-fill their promises and make a change in the dire situation of Youhanabad. Otherwise, the tragic situation would stumble on itself once again. In the past, the minority minis-ters were busy in putting on political shows like christmas cake cutting ceremony in-stead of employing practical development

work. they fail to solve the labor problem when workers are underpaid as their wage does not match their hard-work. Youth start taking drugs and stray from their path as an escape of this tragic reality. this is a social structural problem. can the future govern-ment put this to an end? the bye-elections are coming up in novem-ber, it is our time to decide for the future. the local authorities are able and they can develop and influence at a local scale. How-ever, they lost their supporters as their com-petitors illegally buy votes from the people. consequentially, the elected leaders fail to make any progress in Youhanabad. the dis-honest parties can still succeed using the same strategy for years because they knew the poor families need the money to take better care of their children. this situation is alarming and needs quick response from the government to provide for their basic living. the hypocritical christian political leaders are busy showing up in cake-cutting cere-monies and pleasing the higher authorities to keep their seats on the board, but none of them seems to bother addressing the real issues in Youhanabad.

GoA oF pAkIStAn | SunItA GIll Adv

The government

sticks to the old

strategy.Chief Minister of

Punjab promised to

makes Youhanabad a

modern village.

People cast their

vote or sell it.Consider all circum-

stances, is it right

to say Youhanabad is

the Goa of Pakistan?Author By:Sunita Gill Advedited By: Ali Ahmad, Matthew lee, reviewd by: Almustafa M. Khalid

| 16 | Independent Skies Magazine | Issue 16 Aug 2013| 16 | Independent Skies Magazine | Issue 16 Aug 2013

is restricted to Gujarat, the Western state where he has been chief Minister for close to 13 years. In usual circum-stances, bad governments would mean endearing op-position. But not in India. In-dian’s want neither but must choose between either. But what both sides are suffer-ing from is a lack of lead-ership; someone who can hear the people’s heart beat before it starts beating and someone who can channel the people to back the gov-ernment rather than have them aim for it’s head.

Having said that, people may not have much rea-son to thank Dr. Manmohan Singh for his captaining of the ship now, but Dr. Singh is a strong economist and short-term loss could mean long-term gains. removal of subsidies on natural gas and removal of price ceilings on petroleum products may be hitting consumers hard; but any 10th grade economics student will tell you that too much subsidization for too long can only spell disaster. In 1917, lenin asked, “What

turn on a television any-where in Mumbai, India’s financial capital; everyone isn’t watching the cricket team traumatize the oppo-sition. everyone is watch-ing a much more interest-ing game, its called politics. While television journalists scream themselves hoarse on live television, the real news ticks by on the screen below almost going un-noticed. It reads, “India’s growth rate down for the 4th consecutive quarter. now below 6%.” Of course, politics and economics are more than intertwined, as anyone will tell you. In-dia’s middle class is whis-pering (not so softly) that they want change. But the change they want isn’t what the government is ready to offer. Someone once said, “India’s main foe is India her-self.” A trip in an autorickshaw, Mumbai’s preferred mode of transport was once rs. 9. today, prices have reached rs. 15 - this sharp rise in a period little less than a year. Onions, tomatoes, cnG,

petrol, the price of every commodity is rapidly rising but not at the same rate as people’s wages are. In short, we are in the throes of infla-tion. If the economy is weak, the state of politics is a sorry plight. every week, scandals emerge on a plethora of dif-ferent charges, forcing min-isters to resign on charges of corruption, while some choose to hold on until their last breath. With the ruling party in such disarray, one would expect the opposition to capitalize on the situation and take the reins from the struggling government. But the opposition is just as bad if not worse.

Narendra Modi, ‘flag bear-er of Hindu nationalism’ (as his campaign slogan reads) has become the op-position’s Prime Minister in waiting. throughout his-tory, we’ve seen struggling governments replaced by what were then charismatic opposition leaders only to have them doing worse or as it happened with Ger-many, going insane. naren-dra Modi’s charisma sadly

What has

to be done?

India’s growth story is nearing its

end. What can revive it?

whAt hAS to be done?

| 18 | Independent Skies Magazine | Issue 16 Aug 2013had to be done?” and what followed were two of his-tory’s bloodiest revolutions to install communism in rus-sia. Although, today a revo-lution is uncalled for in India, it’s about time the alarmist at-titude changed. Whether we realize it or not, we’re in a po-litical limbo, one that we’ve put ourselves into. the way out of it is only through rekindling the growth story.

“can it be done,” one may ask. Sure, the momentum is lost, but we’ve kick-started things before. India must rely on its innovation skills and its steady policy structure to bounce back in the world market. Dis-trusting the people we have elected ourselves means that part of the blame must rest with us; it also means that we have to make better choices in the polling booth next time. India’s youth must contribute to the economy more, they must be convinced that their ideas which are so warmly wel-comed in Silicon valley and new York’s Wall Street can be just as successful if they were applied in India. If the trend doesn’t change soon, a strong and historically booming India may be confined to the “In-diatowns” in more prosperous parts of the world.


On a broken mirror,I saw a reflection of my former self,An empty shell of what I once was,

With cascading tears,I remembered how bad you treated me,

the hideous words you utteredthe words that, in me, stole the vitality

leaving me with nothing left but vulnerability,the many beatings you administered

leaving nothing but permanent scarsScars that are a reminder of many wrong deci-

sions once taken,Decision to love and give you myself,Decision to stay when everyone left,

I never regretted any of thesefor I have loved you

loved you with all that I hadBut all you ever did

was leave me crying, woundedtears cascading,

And even now in my eyes,the rain continues

By Sonto Jozana ( South Africa )

tHe rAIn cOntInUeS...

Scribbled Notes Section.

the rAIn ContInueS | Sonto JozAnA


liked what you saw?visit us

http://independentskies.com

Independent Skies Magazine 16th Issue

Documents

Transcript of Independent Skies Magazine 16th Issue