Wanna-be's but never Will-be's: The Pakistani Diaspora

Credits: Mirsub Ali Fazlani. Yes, I know I wrote Diaspora wrong. Silly me.

This is a Guest Post by Feriha Jazeb.

Life is full of endless twists & twirls but how you whether through them defines who you really are.

Enough has already been penned and reported on the issue, but we just don’t seem to come out of this eloquence.It seems baffling at first, the substance that GENERALLY, we trend to think that dwelling in another domicile, being international, is appealing all the time, but yes, ethics cannot be confined to an entire race, culture or civilization (States are not Planets Of Hats). Those who are sweating to adhere with Brits (This is the good idea), you will feasibly fail instead of whatever preparations you try, but you can do a fairly good job if you are entirely focused.

Let's turn on steam at Pakistani people living abroad,who had implanted themselves as British citizens, would never dump their British nationalities. Although by their tone, language, convention and customs, they are Pakistanis but by passport they are British nationals. They are modernized and adapting to western society. They have compensated their cultural tradition, heritage and identity for a western custom (Black on the outside, white on the inside i.e; coconut). They remain un-uttered about their national pedigree, just to avoid useless trouble. After every effort they made to hook up with Brits they are still not accepted and are sabotaged by western society. They in fact are marginalized. For British society they are “too black” or “too Asian and back home (i.e.,Pakistan) they are anticipated as “too white” or “too western\"(chocolate coated westerners). As we look further into this behavior, we realize that they do have genuine reasons. Pakistani Diaspora being slurred in their workplaces; our students being slammed and contra-distinguished against in the developed world, Pakistani passport raises eyebrows at airports. I can personally uphold for the straight stuff that anyone who is not a local or a gora, is subject to serious injustice, and Pakistanis too are pierced in a meticulous manner.

Edward Snowden: Whistleblower

An example of a decent human being.

This is a guest post by Tristan Ryan.

Before I begin, I’d like to apologize for my sub-par writing 
skills. Although I’m not the worst out there, I don’t do this often, and what you get might be more of a rant or something very rough (perhaps both!) than anything. On top of that, I have my nephew in the same room as me playing with my dogs. I love him to death, but god, he can be distracting.

Anyways, if you’ve been keeping up with current events recently, you might know about all sorts of things happening in America and across the globe, from that verdict in the Trayvon Martin case that let another child murderer get away to Edward Snowden and his noble work to put information and power into the hands of the people. Today, instead of racial tensions emerging from the Trayvon Martin case, I’ll be focusing on our good ol’ pal, Edward.

I’ll give a quick summary for those who haven’t been keeping up with current events recently or just haven’t learned about this yet. Edward Snowden was an intelligence contractor and system admin for the NSA (National Security Agency) who exposed the USA and UK’s spy programs, called PRISM (US) and Tempora (UK) that were (and still are) violating the privacy of not only their citizens, but citizens of other people from other countries. When he leaked this data, a cocktail of people got pissed for a cocktail of reasons. The people and other governments got pissed for being spied on and having their privacy violated, and the governments that were spying got pissed for having their privacy violated (because they honestly seem to care about privacy).

Stuck in a rut: Pakistan's Political Scene

This is a guest post by Usama Guddar. (hey, I came up with the title).

With Raja Pervaiz Ashraf getting the premiership, I decided not to worry about Pakistan anymore. I was determined to move from here as soon as I find an opportunity. However, today again I feel like I should post something. It's all about the "selection" 2013. (Yeah you heard that right! Not election, I said selection)

Starting from the fiascoes of the PPP government to Nawaz Sharif's so called opposition party, to Pervaiz Illahi's becoming the deputy premier (that was an invention, btw) to Imran Khan fever among all the kiddos of the country, I have a lot to say. Lets not talk about PPP or Nawaz Sharif and confine ourselves to Imran Khan today. Allow me to talk about the "Jinnah" of this gumrah-kun nation.

Imran Khan rose up with such a momentum that we all thought he will clean sweep this time. Those music concerts, t-shirts posing IK as the revolutionist of the century and the heated speeches of him (not to mention those memes) are still up on my mind. To tell you how much our people got obsessed by him, those idiots started comparing him with Jinnah. I got this text from someone counting the similarities between the two. Jinnah was in the Hall of fame of his university and so do Imran. Jinnah did this and Imran also did the same. Guess they wanted Imran's photo on the currency notes instead of Jinnah's. Isn't it too much?

Automated Traffic Fines? Vehicle-To-Vehicle Communication

The Internet police have cracked down on peer-to-peer file sharing as a result of pressure from the music and recording industries. Vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication would be music to the ears of municipal police and drivers if it works the way developers plan.

The Transportation Research Institute at the University of Michigan, along with the U.S. Department of Transportation, began a project last fall to study the effectiveness of V2V communication in real-life situations. The $25 million in-vivo experiment follows the driving activities of 2,800 local residents who volunteered to have their vehicles equipped with the the transmitters and receivers. The vehicles will not only communicate with their drivers via audio and visual alerts, but also with devices installed at various street corners and intersections. The study is scheduled to last through the summer of 2013.

How It Works

Ray LaHood, the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Transportation, said smart cars could ultimately reduce traffic accidents by up to 80 percent. The dedicated short-range communication technology allows equipped vehicles to warn drivers of road hazards, of imminent collisions and can even tell a red light to turn green when no other traffic is around.

LaHood told Annarbor.com that the study will determine whether a federal mandate can be implemented requiring every vehicle on the road to be equipped with the technology. The biggest hurdle, besides the effectiveness of the program, is cost. But Consumer Reports noted the price is nothing compared to the savings on medical bills (which it estimates to be $99 billion annually) and the lives saved because safer cars of V2V communication.

Automated Traffic Fines

Researchers at Carlos III University in Madrid said the automated systems could work with existing V2V technology to send driving violations directly to the vehicle through municipalities. The ticket-administration program, known as Communications and Information Technologies (CITs), would allow drivers to report who is breaking the law, while allowing offenders to communicate with nearby drivers to ask them to act as witnesses. According to an Arizona car dealership, some cars are already being equipped with communication systems for emergencies.