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A friend who recently moved to Karachi from Chicago told me sometime in October that her mother was in the process of packing their summer clothes and having their winter clothes made, where could she find the appropriate (thick) fabric to shield her against the cold of the weather? Slightly taken aback, I responded that I wore the same as I did during the summer. All one had to do was throw on a thin sweater at most.
Having said that, I’d like to make one thing very clear: while the fabric used is the same, the overall wardrobe for winter is very different; one of the best things about dressing for winter is dressing up or dressing down in layers. My winter cabinet contains a plethora of scarves, thin woollen sweaters, cotton-based short and trench coats, woollen hats and whatnot. These little ‘add-ons’ give a certain flavour to one’s dressing.
Anyone who follows runway trends knows that the colour palette for winter is very different. In summer, the general mood is ‘light, fun and airy’ with pastel colours in hues of green, turquoise, baby blue, pink, yellow and whatnot, dominating the runway. However, winter colours are generally darker.
Ask any local bridal-wear designer what s/he envisions as an outfit for a December bride and they will most probably respond that her outfits will be bolder and more dramatic than a June bride’s. The colour palette for winter normally ranges from beige, black, grey, deep maroon, dark blue, sea green and the like.
With shirt lengths definitely becoming longer, a return to emphasising the waist as opposed to the hip-line, and jeans growing skinnier to the point of replacing tights, the trends that define winter 2008, according to what was shown on the runways of Milan, Paris, London and New York, are:
Minimalism: Or rather, the less-is-more fashion philosophy. Characteristic of what Prada, Calvin Klein, Jil Sander and Narciso Rodriguez have all been standing for. This trend concentrates on keeping it simple: think plain long shirts with a minimum of decorative elements in your outfit. For this look and overall for winter 2008, black is definitely the new black.
Long and lean: Believe it or not, but according to the international runways, dressing conservatively, albeit in style, is the new chic. Concentrating on a long, lean silhouette the lengths of shirts and skirts going from knee-length to ankle-length; this look is all about covering your body along with emphasising your curves while maintaining a long length on the garment.
The advantage of this look is that it tends to make you look thinner. Another option for carrying this look is to layer it with a long slim coat or wrap a scarf around your neck leaving one tail long and dangling. Designers who endorse this look include Marc Jacobs, Erin Fetherston and Derek Lam.
The country moor: Where designers on the one hand are celebrating minimalism, there are others who have gone crazy over plaid prints and tweed. It reminds one of Mark Twain for some reason but this look can also be carried off with a very light trim of fur or velvet around the neckline. This look was very dominant on the runways of Carolina Herrera, Richard Chai, and Michael Kors.
Curvaceous: Joy! Oh joy! After years of emphasising the stick-thin physique, curves are back in style! The womanly figure carefully carved into soft curves that emphasise not only what the South Asian feminine figure is known for – the curve of the hips – but also carve it into a new and stylish silhouette. Designers Bottega Veneta, Chanel, Lanvin, Prada, and Yves Saint Laurent are definitely pro-curves.
As a woman, growing up in Pakistan certainly has its advantages: men tend to give their place up for you, whether in a bus or the bank. If the tyre of your car is punctured, all you have to do is step outside and at least five men will appear out of nowhere offering to change it for you –– with an additional ten content to just watch.
You don’t really have to get in line since most public places either have a separate ‘females only’ counter or you are invited to skip through the entire queue. In a lot of areas and at levels in Pakistan, chivalry is definitely not dead, a fact that is highly convenient for the women in this country to exploit.
There is no denying that the social structure of our society is in the process of undergoing a massive change. There are more and more women working today –– and not just in the ‘appropriately accepted’ professions of teaching or nursing. Women today, in Pakistan, are more empowered, are confident about their newly-acquired place in the industry, have a greater level of independence and hence have a wider choice concerning almost everything in their life –– whether it be the kind of work they want to get involved in to whether or not they want to get married… and to whom.
However, altering Gandalf’s popular saying (from the Lord of the Rings series) to suit our need, “with great freedom comes great responsibility” and at times, great trouble as well. On the flip side of all of this is that women are still subjected to the same stereotypes that they, on their part, are trying to disprove.
In a lot of places, men are still not used to the idea of women working with them side-by-side and continue to either not take them as seriously as they would if they had been men, have an underlying belief that their competence extends only to the kitchen or simply cannot get over the fact that they are… women.
Day in and day out, one comes across umpteen incidents where one’s female acquaintances complain about being harassed at work by their co-workers. Unfortunately, standing up for one’s self and registering a complaint is risky as well. The oppressor tends to hold a grudge against the victim and may sometimes work towards making sure the ‘group’ of people working together isolate the victim completely –– in general, it creates a tense working atmosphere. That is something some employers are not willing to risk.
A male friend of mine who works in a local bank recently told me that the bank has an unwritten policy of not hiring women because they ‘create trouble’. He further went on to state that employees are not even allowed female visitors, especially if they’re not directly related to them or married to them, because the management is adamant that they do not want ‘distractions’ for their employees. I initially found it hard to believe that such ‘unspoken’ policies exist in this day and age, but sadly, they do.
The most common behaviours that my female acquaintances have complained about are related to small issues such as being stared at very intrusively by their male colleagues when moving around the office or working, constantly being ‘talked about’ at work amongst their colleagues and then being laughed at and perhaps the most common complaint is being consistently approached sexually by their colleagues.
Men tend to get territorial and one female acquaintance was very shocked to discover that a male colleague had categorically asked every other person to stay away from her since he had decided to pursue her exclusively. At times, when women have resisted and stood up for themselves, men have responded with punitive forms of teasing and with the sharing of “in” jokes told at the women’s expense. The sad part is that a lot of these women have had to fight major battles at home in order to enter the workforce, and once they do, they are up against an even more distressing ‘invisible’ enemy at their workplaces.
This is not to state that all workplaces aren’t conducive to having both genders work together –– while giving each other due respect. There are organisations where the matter of sexual harassment and discrimination is taken very seriously, to the point where the oppressor is not only reprimanded but is faced with dire consequences and the threat of losing his job if complained against and found guilty of harassing a female colleague.
Having said that, I am personally of the opinion that being the victim of harassment at times becomes a permanent state of mind and hence some women tend to read more into the behaviour of their colleagues than there actually is. Also, I firmly believe that if someone is being harassed, they should fight back. Those with a tendency to harass are very apt at finding vulnerabilities in other people and exploiting it to their advantage; the trick is not to let them. And if they attempt to, set them right.
After releasing his debut album, Tabeer, Shafqat takes his first step as a solo act.
Let’s just get down to it: Shafqat Amanat Ali, perhaps one of the most well-known vocalists in Pakistan’s current pop industry, has finally released Tabeer, his debut solo album and his first body of work in some five odd years.
The last time I met Shafqat was sometime last year, during a photo shoot for an interview featured in Images. Back then he was taking a step towards establishing himself as a solo artiste. In that interview, he’d spoken about his highly-popularised break-up with Fuzon, the act that propelled him to stardom, and his late father (Amanat Ali Khan sahib) and brother (Asad Amanat Ali).
Back then the impression I got of him was that he seemed firmly footed in what he considered to be his identity as a person; which he closely associated to his family and gharana. Although he had yet to record an album, during that time he was in talks with Rohail Hyatt on recording two albums, one of which I was told by the latter was supposed to be a more spiritual. “Somehow that didn’t work out,” said Shafqat about his plans of working with Rohail.
But whatever happened? “Well, Coke Studio started — it popped up at the last minute,” he responded. “So I went to Shani (Zeeshan Haider), which was the right decision according to Rohail who said ‘Aacha hua yeh album uss ke pass chala gaya, mein banata to thora dark ho jata. Shafqat needed a bright album because it was his solo album after a long time’.” Shafqat didn’t seem to have any hang-ups about being bumped off by Rohail seemingly at the last minute, and was quite happy with the work he ended up doing with Shani instead.
At this point it must be mentioned that the person I met for this interview was very different from the one I had met at the afore-mentioned photo shoot. The Shafqat I had encountered then was somewhat talkative and willing to open up about his influences and perceptions on different subjects. The one I met later was extremely travel-weary and well, fasting…which was what I assumed contributed to his relative lack of energy.
He had just come back to Pakistan after releasing an album in India and the requisite tour. We were also surrounded by a TV crew hoping to shoot some behind-the-scenes footage of Shafqat-in-action right before he released his album locally, with Sania Saeed his manager coordinating the activities of everyone involved — mine included.
“In fact, we had to pull out a few songs and tracks from the album which were very dark and very sufiana. We thought we shouldn’t do it because that’s not sellable in India,” he said, talking in terms of commercial viability. Later on during the interview, Shafqat went on to say, “I don’t really think about the reaction I would get from people or my fans when composing music as what others think is not important to me. What is important is that I create music the way I want to.”
Both these statements come across as a bit of a contradiction.
He got up in the middle of the interview and showed me a bundle of Indian newspapers on the recent coverage he’d received in India. One of the papers carried an advertisement of Shafqat’s album covered in stamp ink. With a hint of a smile (and Sania carefully manoeuvring the cameraman’s attention towards the paper) he explained how the officials at an Indian airport were using the paper for the boarding card stamp. As Shafqat got his card stamped and began walking away, one of them realised who he was and called him back. Needless to say, Shafqat left with the newsprint as a souvenir. I was appropriately pointed out the stamp and the inscription on it.
Coming to the content of Tabeer, it is predominantly composed of spiritual songs, some of which are covers of several popular numbers (Khairiyan de Naal, Lal Meri Pat, etc). The overall content is very different from what one had seen Shafqat work on during his tenure with Fuzon. I wondered whether this was how Shafqat hoped to define his own sound. “It is not unintentional at all,” he responded to the varying personalities in his music. “Whatever I had composed for my previous band, after disbanding I had taken everything back with the idea of releasing it.” The move would have exploded the ex-band members into further controversy, and realising that Shafqat decided not to go ahead with it. “I have given something totally new to the listeners in this album.”
But what about the fate of the unreleased songs that he’d sung with Fuzon on what was then supposed to be their second album with him? Shafqat plans to release those songs, perhaps two or three per album, to balance them out with his newer material.
The album Tabeer is more about establishing his own identity. “These were the songs that I always thought I’d do someday, and when I was approached by the Indian record label Music Today, I thought I’d sing those songs.” An example is Khairiyan de Naal, his first single from the album. “It’s a borrowed line from Tufail Niazi’s folk song of the same name.” Even though he took the main chorus line from the original folk song, he wrote and composed the rest of the song around it.
Shafqat’s also sung Pagalpan inspired by Sindhi folk music for the album. “I had heard some folk songs in Shani’s studio and they had a beautiful melody. After making several curves and changes, I decided that we should have it in Urdu.”
But this isn’t where the covers end. Shafqat has also covered Rang Le, a very popular qawwali in the Amir Khusro kalam. When Shafqat and Music Today were through discussing the album, the latter sent him a bundle of papers containing the shairi that they wanted him to compose. “We couldn’t pick more than one because I didn’t want to make it into an Amir Khusrau album. So I picked Rang Le because it’s a very traditional track with a lot of romance in it. I thought we should compose it in a different way, ‘with a pinch of jazz’ (as mentioned on the album jacket). We tried it and the Indians just loved it.”
The Indian sensibility and proliferation in Pakistan’s pop music industry is increasingly becoming a norm. With the country unable to provide a healthy environment for full-time musicians to grow in, given the current state of affairs — we haven’t had proper, outdoor ticketed concerts (the bread and butter of most musicians) in almost two years — making it in India has literally become the Pakistani pop star’s dream.
Having said that, disappointingly so, most of the albums that have been released earlier this year, except for perhaps Ali Azmat’s Klashinfolk, have had a very strong, very dominant Indian pop music touch in their overall compositions. Our pop music has a very distinct, non-filmi sound and it is what sets us apart. But when our acts literally do more than just sell their souls across the border, one can only watch in bitter disappointment.
Thankfully though, none of the above can be said for the album Tabeer...and Shafqat agrees, “I recorded the entire album in Pakistan while they wanted me to record it in India. I refused and insisted that I’d record Tabeer here because Pakistani musicians and recordings had their own distinct sound. Whatever is released had to be prepared and made in Pakistan. That was my major concern,” Shafqat says resolutely.
Shafqat was nominated in the best lyricist category at this year’s The Musik Awards (TMAs) for the Fuzon song, Neend Na Aye Teray Bina. One had even heard rumours that Shafqat planned to sing the song and release it himself as well. When asked, Shafqat shook his head saying he had no intention of doing anything of the sort, and that if someone really wanted to hear his version of it they could look online since most of the second album that he recorded with Fuzon had been leaked on the Internet.
“Do you know how he wrote that song?” Sania said, adding that he asked for a piece of paper during a flight and scribbled some of the initial lyrics on it. The subsequent song was completed on bits and pieces of paper procured from flights, hotel rooms and what not. It turns out that Shafqat does this quite often in a fit of inspiration — he’ll write on anything that is readily available for him to translate his creative energy on to.
– Photography: Arif Mahmud/WhiteStar
No, the above question and answer does not constitute any part of the famous (and convenient) knock-knock jokes. It’s an English translation of a dialogue most repeated in the famous Indian horror film, Dushman (1998). In it, the actress, Kajol’s twin sister (also played by Kajol, duh), is raped and murdered by a psychotic serial killer who works as a postman during the day.
I’m not much of an Indian film buff but the voice of the actor, who played the role of the postman, Ashutosh Rana, as he stated his profession in the film time and time again, haunted me till long afterwards. So what if the film was a complete rip-off, frame-to-frame, of the Hollywood flick An Eye for an Eye (1996)? Dushman was a massive hit and propelled Ashutosh Rana into becoming Bollywood’s then celebrated villain. We genuinely believed the postman was evil and, for a very long time, my older sister and I would jump every time the doorbell rang. Then came the Internet. Unfortunately, the World Wide Web became popular in Pakistan the same year the film was released, so it’s haunting impact, suffice to say, was not long-term. The postman boogeyman became to us what the headless horseman became to the American society after automobiles took over: obsolete.
It’s sad but true, the once popular daak babu who was romanticised in countless South Asian films as the bearer of good news (“apka beta ghar aa raha hai” your son is coming home) or bad news (“apka beta jang mein ladtey ladtey shaheed ho gaya” your son has died fighting war) or literally as the messenger of love, conveying (forbidden) love notes to and from sweethearts that the stereotypical zalim samaj is trying desperately to keep apart. The same loved daak babu who was the catalyst in the storylines in the films featuring him is now officially dead. He was dying when they discovered the telephone, on dialysis when corporate courier services were introduced and completely buried when the Internet became popular.
At the end of it all, what does the postman mean in popular culture today? The answer is: absolutely nothing. Ask any youngster breathing coffee froth at a café today if they’ve ever interacted with a daakia and the most likely response will be: “Daakia, who?”! The word does not exist in modern lingo anymore. More so, if you ask anyone for an address to send a document on, you can be sure that you will get one with an @ symbol in between ending with a .com/net/org/whatever. The document in question will automatically be presumed to be on digital e-‘paper’.
I’m expecting those who grew up on Sohail Rana’s songs for children to take serious offence to this piece of writing. After all, the song Daak Babu was an integral part of Sohail Rana’s children’s songs collection and there are many who have been forced to sing it over and over again in school music classes. Unfortunately, Daak Babu was introduced to me when he was literally the only one singing his own song hoarse of which only a faint murmur reached my ears.
However, in an attempt to educate my 10-month-old niece in this very important rite of growing up in Pakistan, my mother managed to scavenge a Sohail Rana cassette and we played Daak Babu to her, fully expecting her to understand the significance it has played in the lives of the generations before her. You can be sure that the only people smiling and clapping in the room were my sister, my mother and I. My niece simply yawned and dozed off. She prefers the more upbeat, adulterated and remixed Indian songs.
Take a hint, Sohail Rana, it’s time for a remix. As for daak babu, it was good while it lasted; I expect to meet you in a museum very soon.
(Printed as “Biz tailor
“)
Some tailors never get it right; whereas others are beings whose perfection in their work is like a jealously guarded secret by whichever auntie discovered him first. They’re privy to the intimacies of a woman’s body and perhaps understand quite simply the manoeuvrings that employ women’s minds.
If you’re under the assumption that the female breed is a complicated species, ask a tailor and he’ll simplify them for you. Or, better yet, visit a tailoring shop and see how he chooses to deal with them. Their skill goes way, way beyond the simple cut and stitch, and benefits include a daily insight into every fear, concern and insecurity that enwrap most women whether they like it or not. In a culture where going to a shrink is considered literally being mad, for most women, visiting a good tailor is like going for therapy. The only difference is that instead of a couch, the tailor offers the changing room and it’s much, much cheaper.
I personally loathe going to a tailor to have my clothes stitched. I lack the patience that comes naturally to most women when having their measurements taken. My brain goes dead when trying to figure out what kind of neckline, type of shalwar, bale, button — the list is exhaustingly endless — would go with the outfit I have ‘envisioned’ on myself. For me, retail works best. I know those clothes lying to be picked on the hangers in the outlets are stitched by tailors, but I don’t have to meet them, greet them, explain anything to them and best of all, I don’t have to have them ‘molest’ me to get my outfit right.
This brings me to a very important point about tailors: they (almost) have complete access to ‘examine’ your body. Women will do anything for an outfit that looks like it was made on them, and in a culture where modesty is approved and expected, inhibitions are really shed at the tailor’s. Taking their dupattas off for the occasion, women will have the tailor measure every crease and curve that dared form itself on their being. Such importance is given to the ritual that I have, on occasions, while accompanying friends to their sewing messiah, heard one comment that has haunted me to date “Abhi mujhay aapki body samajh mein nahin ai hai, jald aa jaey gi” (I haven’t understood your body yet, but I will soon).
Sounds sleazy? Imagine being there: the tailor says it while holding his chin thoughtfully in the manner of Socrates coming up with a whole new philosophy on life and existence. The whole affair is quite platonic, though.
Some of the most amusing moments come at the time when the tailor has seemingly finished working his magic: the outfit is ready and you are itching to try it on. Sensing anticipation, the tailor will take his time taking it out of its hiding place from under mounds of fabric that doesn’t seem to clear its way out of his shop, ever. Just short of having a drum roll in the background, he will then unfold it to show what he has created — it will be snatched from his hands and off it is to the changing room.
If the outfit is perfect, the tailor can expect heaps of work and promises of assistance being extended to his future generations. If not, then all hell breaks lose. They say hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. In the subcontinent it should be changed to ‘Hell hath no fury like a woman whose clothes were ruined by the tailor’. And I mean that in all seriousness.
With the levels of fuss that is created, you would think that someone close to the ‘victim’ has died. Women mourn the loss of fabric in the same manner. They had spent this entire time envisioning the outfit on them and their dream has been shattered by the incompetence of the tailor.
Finding the right tailor is like trying to figure out what undergarment fits best: you have to try each and every size, model, brand before finally coming across one that fits you like it was moulded for you. What suits one woman may not suit another. Once women find what tailor fits them best, they will give him an undying loyalty worthy of any nuptial alliance. Remember, undergarment sizes also change every few years and as your body changes, so does your tailor. Stick to one, and it will begin to feel like you have someone else’s clothes on.
I love Karachi. I love the buzz of perpetual activity in the air, the freedom to live as you want as long as you’re not disrupting society. But sometimes, it can simply get too much. The activity, the buzz, the constant running around to get everything done on time, battling with perpetual traffic in the middle of the road and construction work that doesn’t seem to end, can take a big toll on your capacity to take stress. And as great as this city is, living here means that every single sense you own is on a constant alert mode.
For those reasons alone, along with the fact that I hadn’t gone on a vacation in over five years, I simply needed to escape. Being a somewhat poor journalist, I couldn’t afford a lavish vacation in a foreign land (plus, the question of who would go with me?). Rescue came in the form of family living in Islamabad. This family, from my mother’s side, owns several restaurants and guesthouses scattered in convenient locations throughout the Punjab, so the question of where to go and where to stay was answered quite easily. The family decided that I needed to go to their guesthouse in the quiet, albeit beautiful, hill town of Nathiagali.
Setting off sometime early in the morning, I was told to brace myself for a good four-hour ride and was adequately prepared with munchies, camera, et all. It was interesting that after passing by the familiar route to the ever-popular Murree, the roads became less crowded, the trees became thicker and the route was scattered by shepherds ushering their goats up the hill. In the middle of the summer, where my family in Karachi was complaining of the 40-something degree heat and humidity, my sunburnt body was soothed by the chilly breeze that, my Islamabad-residing family informed me, was going to be a regular feature of my sojourn.
What was even more interesting to note, other than the radical change in weather, was that the little waterfalls along the way were frozen. And making snowmen seemed to be a local past-time: there were quite a few around, with snowmen ‘couples’ complete with garlands of flowers thrown around their necks. We were also visited quite a bit by local monkeys that seemed to wait for cars to pass to cross the road. The freedom with which the animals lived there was absolutely fascinating, and that fascination was something my family, who were quite used to the presence of the monkeys and regarded them as nuisance, could not relate to, but tolerated.
Set in the middle of the marketplace, the guesthouse overlooked the hills of Nathiagali with a complete view of the local mosque and homes scattered throughout and seemingly embedded in the hillside. My cousin introduced me to the concept of ‘poondi’ — a local pastime that involved sitting along the corners of the road staring at passer-bys. We took a short walk along the road towards where most of the other guesthouses were and I was somewhat surprised to discover that Abbotabad was just three miles away! It was amazing to know that you could simply move from one town to another simply by walking.
After setting our luggage in the rooms, I walked out into the balcony to be greeted by an entire family of monkeys lounging around. It turned out that a vacationing family had decided to leave food out for them and on sniffing it, they decided to camp out and have a kind of picnic. My cousin was very apologetic that she couldn’t arrange social activities for me to get entertained by on my trip, but I assured her that it was precisely this tranquillity and the company of monkeys that I had come to seek on this particular trip.
I was joined by another guest from Karachi who also preferred to do nothing but sit quietly and enjoy the silence and later we talked about how we never got that back in the city. Whereas I’m told that spending too many days in Nathiagali can tire a city person to complete boredom, I am of the opinion, that such ‘boredom’ and escape is absolutely necessary from time to time, if just to find and connect with the peaceful silence within you.
— Photo by Madeeha Syed
Charles Darwin, the author of The Origin of Species and the creator of the Theory of Evolution wrote about how humankind (and other animals) is perpetually engaged in a “competitive struggle for existence.” In his theory of natural selection, he is quoted as saying: “in the struggle for survival, the fittest win out at the expense of their rivals because they succeed in adapting themselves best to their environment.” All of the above holds true for the fashion industry — and not just locally.
To begin with, our fashion industry isn’t that old. We don’t have fashion houses that have been around for hundreds of years, we don’t have ‘signature’ looks or lines and no, our designers are not known on a global level — except maybe a chosen few. In short, we’re a very small industry, still in its infancy but the egos predominant in it would have you believe otherwise.
I distinctly remember at one of the initial fashion showings that I went to review as a journalist, there were around six major designer collections on display. Around three of them were very big names in the industry –– their work was acclaimed far and wide in the country (read: in Lahore and Karachi only) and you had to have been living under a very large rock if you didn’t know how big they were. After having researched the business of fashion, design and photography in the global industry and then viewing some of the works in the local industry, and after having heard so much, I was more than ready to be ‘wowed’ by those considered as the best. What I was confronted by were a couple of T-shirts with rickshaw art imprinted on them — think blue, white and black shirts with rickshaws and rickshaw-literature on them.
This kind of ‘design’ would work brilliantly with ex-pat Pakistanis because most of them are simply looking for avenues through which to connect with their indigenous culture, but not for those who are already here!
Interestingly this same designer has another line for the ‘young adults’ of Pakistan. That line consists of plain clothes in pink and off-white that my grandmother would love wearing. It’s no wonder that neither of those lines are particularly successful ones. In a recent conversation, this designer confessed to wanting to delve into Islamic fashion as well. She has been around from the initial days of fashion design, and at an age when her ‘signature’ look should have been established, she is trying to design for a generation that she has no clue about, as well as throwing herself into a genre that happens to be in vogue globally. In short, even after all these years, she is still confused about which direction to take.
Interestingly, no one within the fraternity will ever mention that and most journalists will shy away from reporting this or else they will suffer grave consequences because this Great Dame of fashion has her influence spread far and wide, and will get the fashion fraternity to boycott that individual completely. She will bully that person and make his/her life miserable till they have no choice but to go into exile. Trust me, I speak from the experience of a friend who suffered a similar fate.
Well, that’s the majority of the fashion industry for you. Interestingly, the media is often criticised for creating these monsters themselves!
This brings me to another point: cliques. The fashion industry is full of them and if you’re thinking of having a career in fashion, you better be a part of one. They say there is safety in numbers and this is especially true in the fashion industry. There is absolutely no value for a designer who does not have his set of industry individuals supporting or endorsing his work. A stand-alone designer will not be able to survive unless he/she becomes completely anti-social, establishes a niche market and an aura of mystery around him/her so that, whenever he/she does make an appearance, it ends up becoming a big deal.
The more you expose yourself, the more you make yourself vulnerable for attack. It’s all about keeping appearances and one slip will not be forgiven or forgotten. Despite the cliques, it’s every man for himself and the only way to survive is either to join forces and sacrifice your conscience, lose self-respect, learn to backstab and copy designs (and then blame the designer of the original work for copying you before anyone notices!) or if you want to live respectfully, maintain a low profile and have your work speak for you.
(part of the cover story ‘Keeping up with the Joneses’)
Like everyone my age then, I resented the control my parents exerted over my life during my early teens. No parties, no staying out late, no expensive cellphones (in fact no cellphone till I reach the legal age limit of 18), no flimsy outfits (no flimsy outfits still) and no driving on my own. To top it all off, what I found extremely embarrassing was the fact that my mother insisted on having a get-to-know-who’s-house-I’m-sending-my-daughter chat with my friends’ parents. What frustrated me was that I knew my friends and I knew that they weren’t from a horrible family, so why did my mother have to get so ‘overprotective’ when I was ‘old enough’ to make my own decisions? I knew what was right and wrong.
Fast forward a few years, I can now understand the wisdom behind my mother exerting her control over my life. I don’t have the same restrictions, I can go to parties, stay out not-too-late, drive wherever I want and so on. The only difference bet ween then and now is I’ve learnt to weigh the pros and cons of every decision I make before I make it. I can go to parties, but sometimes I choose not to. And I probably wouldn’t have been able to make half the sensible decisions I make now in my life if I had been allowed to run wild when I was younger. The decisions my mother made for me while I was growing up helped shape the value system I have now.
What’s ironic is that my younger sister is going through the same frustrations I went through when I was her age. But what makes it worse for her is that whereas the parents of my friends had place similar restrictions on their activities most of my sister’s friends have been allowed ‘privileges’ not bestowed on her.
They sport the latest high-tech cellphones, the kind that costs one regular office clerk more than his entire month’s salary. They have a car and driver to their disposal 24/7 with no questions asked about their whereabouts. My sister’s friend once came over to spend the night and my mother was very surprised when she did not receive any phone call from the girl’s parents. Attempts to explain logical reasons behind restrictions placed on my younger sister don’t work as well as they did on me because let’s face it: her friend’s are doing it, so why cant she? I also know that with time she will understand.
What upsets me is the lack of concern shown by the parents of her friends. Love isn’t shown by giving your child everything that money can buy, it only serves to harm them in the end. If they are given privileges without having to ‘earn’ them, how will they expect to learn how to value them? If they aren’t taught how to choose what is best for them and how to set their priorities in an age in which they desperately seek guidance, how doyou expect them to when they enter into the adult-world?
