The Painful Partition

Everybody must have read about India - Pakistan partition in 1947. It was one of the most painful events in our history. But just to make it clear it was equally painful for the people across the border. Now this post is not gonna be a history revision. It will be based on my discussions with one of the best people I met in EM LYON, and yes they are from Pakistan.

So it all started in second or third of September. I entered my lecture theater, after almost 2 years. You know how it feels to enter a classroom with a pen and register in your hand like a student after almost 2 years of finishing up with your graduation. So coming back to the topic I like always spotted a few Indians and chose the last row to sit. Soon after the class started, while I was busy on facebook, irrespective of it being a Macroeconomics class, I  saw two guys who looked Indian constantly raising hands for doubts. Seemed pretty nerds to me in the first impression. I ignored thinking I am not a nerd so why care. Probably that was the  mistake I did which i realized last night. 

After almost 2 or 3 weeks I decide to at least see and greet them, thinking what if they might be from somewhere close in Indian. And when I went and asked "Hi, this is Anuj, you from India?", to my utter surprise they replied "Hi, Zeeshan here, I am from Pakistan". All my former judgments immediately got erased from my mind. For they came from a country with which we have a had very sensitive relationship. Weeks came and went those "Hi's and byes " turned frequent and started to find these people really interesting. 

Fast forwarding 2 months from then, when i invited them for my birthday, to my surprise they were there to share the joy, like we do it with our family in India. That's where the actual bonding started for me. Come on, you know how important my birthday is for me. Now just one night, before they were about to leave, which is today, they invited us for one last dinner (in EM LYON). What was supposed to be a quick meet for us with them turned into my life's most amazing discussions I could ever have!

The topic actually started by me raising a question "How does Pakistanis feel when there is an India - Pakistan cricket match?". And I was expecting an answer like "We go crazy and all". But to my surprise except for the world cup there is no such rival feeling in them as quite a lot of us possess in India. For us cricket is life, but why bring political differences into a game. From there on when we started sharing our experiences of day to day life, life seemed no different on that side of the border. Its the same people who think like we do, live like we do, then why the difference?

I know it might seem a non patriotic post for a lot of people, but its my space so I really don't give a damn to what you think. Coming back to the topic of discussion, we actually realized how people in Pakistan are craving for peace as we are. By the end of discussion, which lasted almost over 2 hours, we realized how much love and affection everyone around is filled with. The only thing that is making things worse is media and the corrupt politicians. 

The media has to show something interesting to gain viewership and politicians have to eat money and get votes. The most interesting point one of my friend came up with was, why are France and Germany like friends or something when Germany practically fucked up all of Europe in world war 2. At least that was what my history book said. Rather with Pakistan all that we had was stupid partition and fighting for a land, without which we are surviving in a pretty decent way for past almost 60 years. Someday somebody will have to take a high road. Or two friends will have to become dictators in both the nations and ease out the unresolved issues. 

Nobody is gonna come in plate and serve you peace, if somebody can fill this in our politician's heads we can be really lucky.