[ONLINE] DRONE VICTIMS TESTIFY BEFORE CONGRESS

“When the sky brightens and becomes blue, the drones return and so does the fear,” the thirteen-year-old told members of Congress at a briefing organized by Representative Alan Grayson, a Florida Democrat, yesterday. Zubair wasn’t always so anxious. Not even on that day when he was out collecting okra with his grandmother, siblings, and cousins in preparation for the Eid holiday.

“As I helped my grandmother work in the fields,” he said through a translator, “I could hear the drone hover overhead, but I didn’t worry. Why would I worry? Neither I nor my grandmother were militants.”

Read the rest of my article over at the Boston Review.

[ONLINE] MALALA AT HOME

"Malala has achieved near universal acclaim — but it isn’t just the Taliban reserving admiration. While the militant outfit has renewed its efforts to bring the poised and passionate teenager down by force, in her home country of Pakistan, Malala has long since fallen from grace. She was still bloody and bandaged when her story began to come under attack. Many in the country poured over the photos of her helicopter rescue and hospital stay for clues of ulterior motives and alternative realities. Some saw fault in reports of the hospital she was taken to and changes in the location of her bandages as proof that truth was not at it seemed. Indeed, the nation erupted into a chorus of commentary on the impossibility of her survival but the context of the attempted killing, that was the real question."

Check out my article for Medium about Malala's surprising reputation in her native Pakistan.

[ON AIR] A FUNDING DINNER SERVES UP HOPE IN DETROIT

With Michigan's once proud motor city laid low by bankruptcy, citizens are stepping in to fill the gaps left by the state. Take Detroit Soup, for example, where diners get to vote on which community project they want their meal to fund. Listen to the story below, or find it at Deutsche Welle here. [soundcloud url="https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/114382790" width="100%" height="166" iframe="true" /]

[ON AIR] LIVING ON BORROWED LAND IN ISLAMABAD

For decades, people from nearby villages have been flocking to Pakistan's capital Islamabad in search of work. They've set up camps on what looks like vacant land, but city administrators have labeled their makeshift settlements "illegal encroachments" that don’t fit into urban plans set out for the city. I report on how this conflict for Deutsche Welle's World in Progress. Read it here, or listen to it here, or below. [soundcloud url="http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/114277428" params="" width=" 100%" height="166" iframe="true" /]

[ON AIR] HOW SMARTPHONES BECAME VITAL TOOLS AGAINST DENGUE IN PAKISTAN

"Two years ago, an estimated 20,000 people in and around the city of Lahore contracted the deadly tropical disease. This year, the region has recorded just a few dozen cases of dengue fever, which usually involves a high fever, horrible headache, and severe bone and joint pain. What triggered the sharp decline in dengue cases? Fortuitous weather patterns may have helped to keep the mosquito population low. But many leaders also credit a mobile phone app — and the public health campaign that uses it."

I report for NPR's All Things Considered about this remarkable effort which many credit with preventing another deadly dengue epidemic in Pakistan's Punjab province. Tune in below, or read the article at npr.org.

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[ON AIR] PAKISTAN STUDENT CREATES A SHANTYTOWN SCHOOL TO BRIDGE SOCIETAL DIVIDES

Pakistan is a country with stark inequalities. Even middle class families can hire domestic help to do everything from mowing their lawns and ironing their clothes to cooking their meals.Those who provide these services often live in shantytowns in the shadows of the big, gated houses where they work. Seeing this stark divide for himself prompted one young person in the country’s capital to create change. “I really did not expect something of that sort to sit right in the middle of one of the most expensive sectors in Islamabad, because I’d never seen the village from the inside before,” says Haroon Yasin. I report on his efforts to turn things around and bring communities together for PRI's The World with support from the Pulitzer Center on Crises Reporting.

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[ONLINE] WHY I'M NOT GOING BACK TO PAKISTAN...JUST YET

I’ve been struggling to make a decision on whether to go back to Pakistan. I wrote a little about my feelings about working there as a freelance journalist. Read the full piece at Medium, but here's a taste: "I was supposed to fly back to Pakistan this week. To climb down the stairs off the plane and into night air heavy with diesel exhaust and so much else — rotting mango peels, kabobs frying in their own fat, little white jasmine buds strung into a necklace and sold by a street kid for spare change. I was due to settle into that cacophony of smells, the chaos of afternoon traffic, the kisses from doting aunts and call it all home. Again. Except, I never got on that plane. I just couldn’t bear to go back."

[ON AIR] RUNNING OF THE BULLS IN THE U.S.

I report for Radio France Internationale on a Pamplona, Spain-style running of the bulls outside of Petersburg, Virginia. Tune in to the story below: [soundcloud url="http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/107741153" params="" width=" 100%" height="166" iframe="true" /]

[A TALK] DISCUSSING EDUCATION IN PAKISTAN AT THE PULITZER CENTER ON CRISES REPORTING

I gave a talk at the Pulitzer Center for Crises reporting about my work on education in Pakistan. Esha Chhabra, another Pulitzer Center grantee, starts off by talking about polio in India. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvR9DFx36rw&w=560&h=315]

[ON AIR] THE MADRASSAH MYTH: WHY PAKISTAN'S PUBLIC SCHOOLS MIGHT BE THE PROBLEM

  Tune in to my story for PRI’s The World about religious and not-so-secular schooling in Pakistan, which I reported with support from the Pulitzer Center on Crises Reporting.

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Here’s an excerpt:

Dr. A.H. Nayyar is a retired professor who’s studied the effects of this dramatic shift [away from Pakistan’s once secular curriculum]. He said, “They had lessons on Islamic principles and Islamic practice and Islamic history in books on English, in books on social studies. And in some cases, also in books on mathematics.”

More troubling, said Nayyar, is the very radical and militant view of Islam that was inked into the country’s national public school curriculum, and into the hearts and minds of students.

“There were lessons in textbooks which actually told students, and still continue to do in the latest books, that jihad is enjoined upon all Muslims and getting ready for jihad, not just by fighting yourself, but also if you can’t fight supporting it by providing it money and help and so on and so forth, is supposed to be duty of each and every Muslim,” he said. “No wonder that jihad has now become so deep-rooted in Pakistani society.”

[ONLINE] REFLECTIONS ON RAMADAN IN PAKISTAN

"Although the month is one of spiritual reflection, the factors at play aren’t ones that most would add up to enlightenment. In fact, in my first Ramadan in a Muslim majority country — and one stuck in the sweltering and sweaty prelude to monsoon season to boot — I’m finding that the Holy Month doesn’t bring out the best in people." Read more about my first time fasting in Pakistan in a piece for Medium that can be found here.

[ONLINE] TOO FEMALE FOR FRIDAY PRAYER

My latest piece for Medium looks at something that’s always troubled me. The exclusion or segregation of women from mosques. Here’s a taste: "Being a back-room congregant takes its toll. It’s hard to feel fully accepted in a place where you are deliberately made to feel invisible — even if you go there to get closer to a God you believe sees you as an equal among equals."

[ON AIR] PAKISTANI MEN TRY TO PICK UP WOMEN ONE TEXT AT A TIME

Pakistan doesn’t have a lot of places for young love to blossom. So some men turn to their phones to try and pick up women. It’s certainly not the best way to woo someone, but attempting to “make friendship” through misspelled and clichéd text messages has become a sort of national phenomenon. Some are lighthearted about the matter, but these text messages can pose serious consequences. I report on the phenomenon of "friendship texts" in Pakistan for PRI's The World. Read the full story here or tune in below. [soundcloud url="http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/101193230" params="show_artwork=false" width="100%" height="166" iframe="true" /]

[ONLINE] BROOMSTICKS AND BACKACHES: ON SUPERSTITIONS IN PAKISTAN

“Well there’s only one thing I can do. I have to find two sisters who’ve married two brothers and have one of the sisters press her heels into my back seven times after sunset.” Intrigued? Read my story for Medium on superstitions in Pakistan to find out what this is all about.

[ON AIR] A TECH SAVVY MEASLES VACCINATION CAMPAIGN

Measles is a fully preventable disease, but it’s claimed the lives of hundreds of children in Pakistan since the start of the year. I report on a high-tech immunisation campaign that many hope will prevent future outbreaks for Radio France Internationale. Tune in to the story here.

[ON AIR] INTERVIEW ABOUT DAVID CAMERON'S PAKISTAN VISIT

British Prime Minister David Cameron met with his newly-elected Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif to discuss the ensuing NATO troop withdrawal from Afghanistan as well as enhancing trade between their countries as bomb blasts killed more than fifty in Pakistan. I speak with Radio France Internationale about Prime Minister David Cameron's visit to Pakistan. [soundcloud url="http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/99328076" params="" width=" 100%" height="166" iframe="true" /]

[ONLINE] PAKISTAN'S BURGERS GET FIRED UP...AGAIN

"While 'burger' is a relatively new term, the class of Pakistanis equally comfortable in Karachi’s bustling open air markets or London’s raucous Oxford Street have been around longer than the country. In fact, it was largely the elite “burgers” who returned from schooling in England that made the first appeals for independence from the British Raj.That history is one that many Pakistanis have seem to have forgotten even as they live out their founders’ dreams of sovereignty."

I write about Pakistan's young, educated, elite class of "burgers" and their role in the country's political sphere for Medium. Read the full article here.

[ONLINE] THOUGHTS ON THE DUPATTAH

"A dupattah can serve a lot of purposes. The long stretch of fabric has, until now, been an integral component of the long tunic and baggy trouser ensembles women wear across South Asia. But the nearly essential accessory can do a whole lot more than just hang from the shoulders. In the region’s hottest months, it’s often used to dust off sunglasses or dab at a perspiring forehead. Old scraps of the gauzy fabric are used to make the homemade cheese, paneer, and, in a pinch, a dupattah can serve as a halfway decent stand-in for a towel. If one happened to take a serious spill or fall off the side of a mountain, it might make for a life-saving tourniquet or rope. And although I once used mine to tie closed a lockless door on a particularly questionable overnight train in India, I mostly think of the dupattah as three yards I could do without." In my first post for Medium, a new website by the founders of Twitter, I write about why I can't live out my disdain for the three yards of fabric that is considered a must-wear accessory to many South Asian women. Read the full piece here.

[ON AIR] A NEW INITIATIVE FOR PAKISTAN'S DROP OUTS

In this story of DW's World In Progress, I report on a program developed by the NGO Plan International which offers those who dropped out of school a second chance. In just two years, students who dropped out of primary or middle school are brought up to speed and readied to take the all-important tenth grade matriculation exam. While the program has been largely successful in the low-income Islamabad neighborhoods where it was piloted, some students succumbed to the same pressures that forced them to give up their studies in the first place. Tune in to my story by clicking here to find out more.

[ONLINE] HOW LARGE-SCALE VIOLENCE DIFFERS IN PAKISTAN AND AMERICA

"Although violence and the emotional toll it takes can never be wholly accepted, it's come to be expected in places like Peshawar. Insecurity is a shared experience for many in cities across the country; a part of the collective understanding of what it means to be Pakistani. Indeed, resilience has become sort of a national trait. Even as appalling instances of violence take place in America, they are still just that: instances of violence, each one isolated from the next, cast in individual molds. The Boston Marathon bombing is not the Aurora rampage or the Sandy Hook shooting. Indeed, American tragedies are held to American standards of individualism, distinct and rarified. That's precisely what gives their shockwaves such profound resonance, even in places where death and destruction have become a constant lull, ever-ready to erupt into mayhem." In this article for The American Prospect, I explore the difference between ruthless assaults on innocent life in Pakistan and in the US. In the former, violence seems to be a part of a far-reaching social network, while attacks on American soil, I argue, seem to be rooted in the country's unbridled individualism. Click here to read the full piece.