Critique the film A Prophet directed by Jacques Audiard

Investigate the movie A Prophet coordinated by Jacques Audiard The movie A Prophet coordinated by Jacques Audiard investigates the life of a French Algerian who is stood up to with brutal jail life that frequently denies an individual of his mankind. Specifically, the writers of this film endeavor to show how an individual can be constrained into the contention between ethnic or strict groups.Advertising We will compose a custom paper test on Critique the movie A Prophet coordinated by Jacques Audiard explicitly for you for just $16.05 $11/page Learn More critically, it investigates the collaborations between people in a domain where antagonistic vibe and contempt shape people’s conduct, choices and perspectives toward others. Also, one can say that this film is identified with such a procedure as globalization, that mergers the limits between states or nationalities. By the by, this procedure doesn't wipe out the isolation between various gatherings. By and large, A Prophet is a film that looks at the impact of disparity or force battles inside the cutting edge globalized society. By seeing this film from this point of view, one can all the more likely comprehend the characters, their conduct and relations with others. The principle character Malik can be viewed as a person who doesn't have a chance to turn into an undeniable individual from the network. He is one of those individuals who experience the ill effects of financial disparity. One of the most striking subtleties that stand out is that Malik is an unskilled individual at nineteen years old, and he can scarcely hope to discover business. Generally, this model shows that Malik involves a very low status inside the network. Besides, his absence of training denies him of any chance to accomplish any advancement. Such an individual is bound to perpetrate a wrongdoing and in the long run become detained. It is conceivable to state that A Prophet depicts the encounters of numerous youngsters in France, particularly on the off chance that they are the relatives of settlers. This is one of the central matters that ought to be remembered by the watchers of this film. Furthermore, the film mirrors a portion of the thoughts communicated by Arjun Appadurai who presents the idea of various scapes (Appadurai, 1990). For instance, one can talk about such a term as ethnoscape, that incorporates evacuees, visitor laborers, sightseers, outsiders, etc (Appadurai, 1990, p. 52).Advertising Looking for paper on craftsmanship and structure? We should check whether we can support you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More This thought can be utilized to portray the development of individuals across national outskirts in the globalized world. It is exceptionally hard to state what sort of spot Malik possesses in this ethnospace on the grounds that he isn't completely coordinated into the French society. This circumstance can be incompletely clarified by his sources. Aside from that, this film shows how ethnic contrasts influence the dissemination of intensity inside the jail. Specifically, Malik comprehend that he needs to pick between two restricting groups, in particular Corsicans and Muslims. The primary issue is that he wouldn't like to be associated with this battle, however he needs to do as such so as to spare his life. In realities, such problems are experienced by numerous individuals who live in the advanced globalized society, which turns out to be exceptionally isolated. In this way, A Prophet mirrors the complexities of the cutting edge social orders where social or national limits are frequently eradicated. In addition, one can talk about the presence of the financescapes which is likewise one of the thoughts examined by Arjun Appadurai (1990). This idea can be deciphered as the attitude and stream of capital on the planet in which the nation (Apparurai, 1990). Specifically, the film exhibits that this attitude of capital is inconsistent; all the more critically, this imbalance can be halfway clarified by the ethn ic, racial, or strict contrasts among individuals. Despite the fact that the creators of A Prophet don't underscore this issue in their film, this film shows that individuals speaking to ethnic minorities, for example, African outsiders and Corsicans don't have numerous monetary open doors in the general public. In this way, this film exhibits that various scapes can be intently intertwined with each other. One of the issues that are frequently talked about by researchers is the possibility of Orientalism or the investigation of Eastern societies which was created in the nineteenth century (Said, 1979, p. 47). By and large, it purposely distorts the traditions, qualities, and conventions of the Asia, Middle East just as Africa.Advertising We will compose a custom paper test on Critique the movie A Prophet coordinated by Jacques Audiard explicitly for you for just $16.05 $11/page Learn More This development of Eastern societies prompted the production of numerous generalizations abou t Arab individuals or different foreigners from Africa (Said, 1979). Aside from that, these generalizations influence the choices of strategy creators, administrators, or legislative authorities who can influence the lives of numerous individuals. This is one reason why numerous African-workers can be segregated. The film A Prophet centers around the issue of separation in contemporary France. For instance, Malik chooses to change his name to Jean-Philippe in light of the fact that an individual with a French-sounding name has more open doors when looking for work. Along these lines, Malik needs to surrender a piece of his character so as to ascend the social stepping stool and achieve achievement. This is one of the subtleties that watchers ought to consider while breaking down this film. Surely, A Prophet can't be viewed as a film that is just planned for investigating different parts of globalization, monetary disparities, or racial separation. The movie producers needed to conce ntrate on the encounters of Malik, his reaction to jail life, and his endeavors to hold his mankind. All things considered, this film can give watchers profound bits of knowledge into the cutting edge life in France or some other nation with huge worker populace. It is regularly contended that globalization can make the world increasingly interconnected and homogeneous (Ferguson, 2006). In any case, contemporary social orders despite everything stay heterogeneous. For instance, this film shows how troublesome it is for an individual to stay above ethnic or strict clashes. Malik, who follows the request for a Corsican hoodlum, is seen as a trickster by other Muslim detainees. The difficulties looked by this character exhibit that strict or ethnic affiliations despite everything play a significant even in the globalized world. This is the reason it isn't allowable to state that globalization has made present day networks struggle free. Almost certain, it has offered ascend to differen t threats among individuals. This is one of the principle issues that influence the life of a cutting edge community.Advertising Searching for exposition on workmanship and plan? How about we check whether we can support you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Find out More By and large, A Prophet empowers the watchers to comprehend the complexities of the globalized world which has gotten very interconnected. Specifically, it shows that individuals, living in globalized networks can be estranged from others due to their ethnic or strict contrasts. All the more significantly, these distinctions can clarify various types of imbalance in contemporary social orders. Malik, who is the fundamental character of this film, is a person who needs to spare one’s life and coordinate into the network where the value of an individual is evaluated by his/her race, nationality, religion or ethnicity. This is one of the fundamental issues that this film investigates. Reference List Appadurai, A. (1990) Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy. London: Theory, Culture and Society. Ferguson, J. (2006). Worldwide Shadows: Africa in the Neoliberal World Order. Durham: Duke University Press. Said. E. (1979). Orientalism. New York: Knopf Doubleday Pub lishing Group.

Leadership and Management Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Initiative and Management - Essay Example ader will show the route by presenting and hardening procedures and frameworks that guarantee that authoritative cooperative energy is consumed in a way effective enough to catalyze most extreme creation and achievement of hierarchical objectives. Without unfocused initiative, the executives procedures additionally become confounded or inadequate. This is on the grounds that it takes sound administration to present and support sound approaches and hierarchical practices which advance proficiency, polished skill and solid work force government assistance. The opposite is additionally obvious that sound administration arrangements likewise catch, hold and support basic abilities and aptitudes by following the standards of economical ability the board, for example (Nienaber, 690-1). As per Patti, both individual and expert aptitudes are basic for powerful administration. Individual abilities produce savvy instinct judgment and are exhausted as expert aptitudes. In spite of the fact that promptness, genuineness and reality are close to home abilities, a period cognizant and administrator will undoubtedly infuse reliability, trustworthiness and polished skill in his administration style of running certain or every single authoritative procedure that are under him. So fundamental is close to home and expert aptitudes to viable administration that proficient abilities and successful administration can't exist without individual abilities. This is on the grounds that prudence and qualities need to begin at individual level before they become hierarchical qualities. A supervisor who needs close to home abilities or qualities can't infuse them into the life and procedures of his association essentially on the grounds that one can't transmit what he doesn't have (Patti, et al, 263). Authority style impacts powerful administration and authoritative destinations since values that help in the accomplishment continue from initiative. Viable authority styles encourage, impact, inspire and lead representatives to embrace hierarchical and proficient culture and approaches. These methodologies are converted into successful administration. For example, administration

Definitions Paper free essay sample

What characterizes development, plan, and imagination? How would they investigate to each other? This paper will incorporate the conversation to the inquiries, including their business suggestions. As indicated by the Merriam-Webster word reference 2011, development is characterized as the presentation of something new. Development Is the joined work of structure and reiterative together that has made a noteworthy Improvement to an item or administration that Is useful.According to Business resilience. Com ( configuration Is characterized as Realization of an idea or Idea Into an arrangement, drawing, model, shape, example, plan or detail (on which the genuine or business creation of an Item Is based) and which accomplishes the things assigned objective(s). Configuration looked into with inventiveness and development can be the conceptualized procedure of utilizing imagination to make a creative result. As indicated by Objectifications. Mother 2011 inventiveness is characterized as Mental trademark that permits an individual to think outside about the crate, which brings about creative or various methodologies too specific errand. We will compose a custom paper test on Definitions Paper or then again any comparative theme explicitly for you Don't WasteYour Time Recruit WRITER Just 13.90/page Imagination is the missing connection in any circumstance that can either have an undesirable outcome or can be the fire to the flame on the cake, without the mock the cake Is Just a cake with a light. The business Implications identifying with Innovation, structure and innovativeness In the working environment or business when all is said in done all have a huge job In Improving business operations.Innovation identifying with business Implications are Improving items from current items and even administrative work or occupation dutys that can be changed to current market. Inventiveness joins development by concocting the idea that wasnt there to improve it, extraordinary or simpler in comfort and serious market changes. Configuration identified with business suggestions carry how to and item from the innovativeness to an outcome in replacing or improving an items presence. A case of advancement, plan and innovativeness of a business suggestion would be communications.Writing letters were diminished to email and testing; pagers were supplanted by telephones that do everything. Another model would be the individual that imaginatively thought to place a little TV and DVD player In the vehicle for amusement that was structured and introduced a fruitful Innovation. Advancement, structure and imagination are immensely significant components that fill in as a group that compensate for the development and inspired development of the economy, societies and adorably improving, joining and making new items, administrations or utilitarian ways.

Professional Code of Ethics Essay - 2475 Words

Ontario's engineering professional Code of Ethics (Essay Sample) Content: Ontarioà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s engineering professional Code of EthicsNameInstitutionOntarioà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s engineering professional Code of EthicsThe Ontarioà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s engineering profession is overseen by the 1990 Act of Professional Engineers R.S.0., Chapter P.28 plus its subordinate guidelines the Reg. 941/1990 and Reg. 260/08. The Ontarioà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s engineering Act outlines the professional engineering practice as well as establishes PEO (Professional Engineers Ontario) as the governing body in charge of regulating the professional engineering practice and governing organizations and persons execution work, which falls within the jurisdiction of PEO. The main obligation of any organization regulating professions is to safeguard the society from unfit, unqualified, incompetent practitioners. Practitioners are required, as a responsibility of their authorization to carry out engineering professionally, to abide by the Code of Ethics provided in Section 77, O. Reg. 941/1990. The code of ethics entails a collection of rules and principles, which define the forms of professional behavior, which are considered inappropriate or appropriate by the occupation. Practitioners have to abide by these rules and principles in overseeing all their professional duties. Decisions and choices made by practitioners must reflect the values and principles set out in the code. This paper is going to evaluate the critically articles in Section 77, 0.Reg.941/1990.Article 77(3) of Regulation 941 states that engineers must commit to high standards of professional integrity and personal honor to attain their professional responsibility. Professional responsibility denotes to engineersà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬ responsibilities to behave themselves in conformity with the ethical, technical, legal canons of the occupation, along with the higher responsibility of care linked to professional status. Every time individuals perform in their capability as qualified engineers, they have to be ready t o be answerable for their behavior in executing their duties to the public and their profession. Accepting this obligation is part of the devotion made by every person when acknowledging the exclusive privilege to practice given by the professional engineering license.Appropriate professional conduct incorporates practicing within oneà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s capability. For instance, Article 77(1) of Reg. of 1941 requires engineers to carry out their assignments with fairness and be loyal their associates, employers, subordinates, clients and employees. Practitioners have to understand that, for ethical bases, they must not accept assignments unless they reasonably and honestly think that they are experienced to perform the assignment (DeVita 2012, 11). That they may become capable without unwarranted delay, expense or risk to the employer or client, or that they will take part in a competent professional engineering to do work, this is beyond their skill. Practitioners who continue upon any ot her foundation are being dishonest with their employer or client.According to Anscent Engineering corporationà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s consultant, inability to meet these conditions leaves engineers exposed to examination by their colleagues as well as their professional body, pursuant to section 72(2) (h) of the O. Reg. 941/1990, and "incompetence" (section 28(3) of the Act). It must be observed that ineffectiveness can denote to a shortage of skill, knowledge, or judgment, as well as, also the anguish from a mental or physical condition, which can inhibit the employment of oneà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s expert judgment.In evaluating their own standpoint, professional engineers must be alert of the indispensable variance between "competence" and "qualification." Dictionaries describe qualification to refer to an accomplishment or quality that fits an individual for some task, or the office. This encompasses the awarding of certification and degrees by technical organizations (Michael 1991, 156). It is a oneti me, constant thing, which cannot be diminished or lost by the time. Conversely, competence refers to a feature of having appropriate skill, experience or knowledge, for various purposes. Competence, therefore, is a vibrant quality, which links to the existing task, activity or assignment (DeVita 2012, 11). Practitioners must always evaluate their proficiency to embark on a proposed task before assenting to do the task. This involves establishing the pertinence, depth and the extent of their practical experience and theoretical knowledge in the profession to permit them to offer a service, which will be suitable for the, public, client or employer.Section 77 (3) of O. Reg. 941/90 covers discretion, rendering it obvious that professional engineers must not disclose any information confidential to their employerà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s or clientà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s business operations to third groups unless implicitly or expressly the employer or the client sanctions it, or the law stipulates so. Open com munication amid practitioner, employers or clients is vital to effectual delivery of proficient services. Employers/clients need to understand that all communication among themselves with their engineers is entirely safe. They are permitted to presume this is the case, with no need of making any appeal to confidentiality maintenance. They are as well entitled to presume that the confidentiality duty will outlive the professional directive that commanded it, as well as continue indeterminately after the expiry of relationships or contracts.In preparing information for mechanical publications, experts should be especially careful to evade inadvertent release of confidential material, and must seek consent or approval of the involved parties before presenting any client-specific material for publication. Expert engineers are similarly projected to evade the usage of material for the profit themselves a third group, or to a customerà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s or another expertà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s drawback. En gineers are anticipated to decline a commission or employment that would necessitate revelation of such data.Proprietors manage to safeguard their copyrighted entitlements as confidential data whereas personnel are permitted to utilize the skill, knowledge, and expertise, which have been attained during work. Employed engineers can be apprehensive of the obligation upon them while changing engagement within their discipline. It is mostly deemed that engineers might utilize in the novel job any general expertise or knowledge obtained in the previous position, so long as it lies within the a state-of-the-art grouping. Nevertheless, engineers are not permitted to utilize in the novel position data obtained in the previous job, which is of a patented nature and deemed to lie into the group of "trade secretsà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ .For instance, a consulting engineer in an interview stated that an engineer working for firm X that is in the mineral exploration business. The engineer is accountabl e for compiling as well as analyzing information concerning drilling resulting to the establishment of mineral resources. The engineer, during the period of employment, acquires experience and skill in evaluating information for sites in this specific geological configuration. The practitioner similarly can obtain confidential data concerning mineral resources on the land operated by X. The engineer then quits company X, as well as, joins a rival company Y that goes on to purchase land neighboring the property centered upon the engineerà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s awareness of confidential data. Although the engineer could employ the specialized skills and knowledge he or she learned at company X to perform site analysis, exposing the confidential data to Company Y is an infringement of a remarkable responsibility to previous firm.As practitioners, during the progression of their tasks, may feel the need to discuss pieces of the tasks with other people; however, this will be an infringement of Arti cle 77(3) of Reg. 941 that stipulates the need for confidentiality. Therefore, engineers must request clients to specify which disclosures require to remain secret. It might well be advisable for qualified engineers to render this distinction well-defined to their customers in certain circumstances. This condition should be incorporated in the contract for employment or services contract. At times, an employer or client may desire to keep confidential a hazardous situation. There should not be a doubt; nevertheless, as to how professional engineers should act as all qualified engineers are obliged to deem the practitionerà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s responsibility to public wellbeing as paramount (Bebeau 1995, 34).For example, a professional engineer may be requested to sign documents, which inhibits the engineer from talking about the details of the engineerà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s reports with anybody except the clientà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s lawyer or the client under any circumstance. The fundamental danger is that an y dialogue concerning the reports with others can constitute a violation of contracts. The practitioner finishes the tasks, and within the reports strongly endorses some actions be undertaken by the customer with regard to the adversative environmental impact triggered by the customerà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s operations. After some months, no action has been undertaken by the practitioner and the client, apprehensive regarding the partakersà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬ lack of reaction, feels indulged to convey the snag to someone. The professional engineer must consider if the vital duty (Section 77(2) (i), O. Reg. 941/90) requires the professional engineer to inform authorities concerning the customerà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s environmental effects in violation of the secrecy contract. It is wise to indicate such exceptions within any secrecy assurance offered (McLean 1993, 20).PEO recommends that professional engineers who are aware of a proprietorà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬s patented information as well as t...

Type 1 Insulin Dependent Diabetes Mellitus - 1900 Words

Type 1 insulin dependent diabetes mellitus is most commonly diagnosed in children and adolescents but can sometimes be diagnosed in older age. It is defined as a chronic condition in which the pancreas does not produce insulin which is needed to allow glucose, known as the bodies source of fuel, to enter the cells. Type 1 diabetes does not have a cure but can be managed with proper treatment of insulin therapy. Type 2 non-insulin dependent diabetes mellitus is commonly caused by genetics, obesity, poor decisions in diet and exercise. It is defined as the bodies inability to break down glucose by resisting insulin and affecting the maintenance of regulating glucose levels in the body. Glucose does not move into the cells so it builds up in the bloodstream causing increased blood sugar levels. Type 2 diabetes does not have a cure either but can be controlled with proper diet, exercise and maintaining a healthy weight. If the previous interventions do not work then patient may need medi cations and insulin therapy. The symptoms of type 1 diabetes are sudden with onset and may include excessive thirst, frequent urination, bedwetting in children who previously didn’t wet the bed during the night, increased hunger, unintended weight loss, restlessness, and other mood changes, fatigue and weakness, blurred vision, in females- a vaginal yeast infection. The symptoms for type 2 diabetes may not be detected or may be absent making it difficult to diagnose. Symptoms includeShow MoreRelatedTypes Of Diabetes Mellitus : Insulin Dependent ( Type 1 )1778 Words   |  8 Pages Maggie Roman MED 2056 Cohort FT31 Diabetes Mellitus Mrs. Annabelle June 29, 2015 The human body achieves homeostasis through the coordination of organs and different systems throughout the body. 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Problems, Issues or Disease Progress of Diabetes Mellitus Diabetes mellitus refers to a chronic human health condition characterized by prolonged high sugar level in the blood. A group of metabolic disorders like, seizures, lethargy, and jaundice among others, which occur when chemical reactions abnormally alter the normalcy of the body’s metabolic processes, causes this condition. Diabetes occurs mainly because of two issues; due to inadequate production of insulin by the pancreas, and dueRead MoreDiabetes : Diabetes And Diabetes903 Words   |  4 PagesDiabetes mellitus, often simply called diabetes, is one of the most common diseases in the world with approximately 7.8% of the American population or 24 million Americans suffering from the disease (Cuppett). Of this proportion, about 5.7 million people do not actually know they have the condition (Cuppett). This disease is characterized by the body’s inability to effectively produce or utilize insulin (Cuppett). There are three types of diabetes in which a person can be diagnosed with, type 1

Symbolism and Irony in The Tell-Tale Heart Essay - 2249 Words

Symbolism and Irony in The Tell-Tale Heart In Edgar Allan Poes short story The Tell-Tale Heart, the author combines vivid symbolism with subtle irony. Although the story runs only four pages, within those few pages many examples of symbolism and irony abound. In short, the symbolism and irony lead to an enormously improved story as compared to a story with the same plot but with these two elements missing. The Tell-Tale Heart consists of a monologue in which the murderer of an old man protests his insanity rather than his guilt: You fancy me mad. Madmen know nothing. But you should have seen me. You should have seen how wisely I proceeded . . . (Poe 121). By the narrator insisting so emphatically that he is†¦show more content†¦. . (121). The disease in this case is obviously a severe case of emotions, nervousness among them. Thus, even in the story the narrator realizes that he is overcome by emotions, and as such he must confess the repulsive murder of an unarmed old man. William Bittner mentions how Poe fancies the agony of conscience that leads the murderer to confess (180). It is neither the police nor a witness that dooms the narrator; it is the narrator himself who instigates his own demise. How ironic, and terrifying, it is that a madman who has no need for reason finds it impossible to carry on without justice. In the same sense, The Tell-Tale Heart is a study of terror. Poe formulates the story so that the madman narrator paints a vivid and remarkable picture of the fright of his victim: Presently I heard a slight groan, and I knew it was the groan of mortal terror. It was not a groan of pain or of grief--oh, no!--it was the low stifled sound that arises from the bottom of the soul when overcharged with awe. I knew the sound well. Many a night . . . the terrors distracted me. (122) This leads Arthur Hobson Quinn to surmise that the intense picture of terror was so graphic because the narrator himself suffered causeless terrors in the night. Quinn further infers that the narrator has a deep sympathy for the old man, even though the narrator is scheming to kill the old man (394). The study of terror is Poes style throughout the shortShow MoreRelatedRole of Realism in Edagar Allan Poe ´s The Tell Tale Heart and The Cask of Amortillado1014 Words   |  5 Pagesâ€Å"The Tell Tale Heart† and â€Å"The Cask of Amontillado† written by Edgar Allan Poe are dark short stories relevant to murder, revenge, and mystery. Poe writes both stories in a Gothic style in order to deal with ideas of realism. One may ask were the murders and punishments justifiable in either short story? One may also ask did Poe accurately depict realism in each story? Realism, defined as a technique in literature that accurately represents everyday life, is questioned in Poe’s works: â€Å"The Tell TaleRead MoreThe Tell Tale Heart By Edgar Allan Poe819 Words   |  4 Pagesthe Tell-Tale Heart, Edgar Allan Poe uses irony, imagery, and symbolism to show that a guilty conscience can greatly alter ones perceptions. Throughout the short story published in 1843 Poe successfu lly shows to what extent a guilty conscience and heart can do to someone. While trying to prove his sanity the narrator dives into the abyss of insanity itself. The narrator commits a heinous murder and is then driven to insanity by the ticking of the dead mans heart. Irony, imagery, and symbolism showRead MoreThe Tell Tale Heart By Edgar Allen Poe1703 Words   |  7 PagesIn â€Å"The Tell Tale Heart†, by Edgar Allen Poe, the narrator both experiences guilt from killing the old man in which he cared for and also the constant plea of proving his sanity. The narrator one day decides that he should kill the old man in which he cares for, due to the fact that he had an evil eye. Though insane and bizarre, the narrator thinks that he is not crazy; he just has heightened senses that allow him to hear things that no human could ever hear. The telling of the story from whateverRead MoreThe Cask Of Amontillado By Edgar Allan Poe707 Words   |  3 Pagesthe carnival season, Montreso r meets with Fortunato and decides to implement his plan carefully through irony. Poe s story describes the murderer s mind which has lived as a memory of Fortunato s death for fifty years. Poe uses different types of irony and symbolism in the conversations between Montresor and Fortunato which are discussed in the following paragraphs. First, Poe uses dramatic irony in the story. 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Poe and Hawthorne’sRead MoreAnalysis of The Tell Tale Heart by Edgar Allen Poe Essay942 Words   |  4 PagesImagine the sight of an old mans eye, vultures, pale blue, with a film covering it. (Farooq). Could this make one’s self so insane that one would murder a man because of it? This is the event that occurs in Edgar Allen Poes The Tell-Tale Heart. Every night at midnight, the narrator, ventured into the old mans room without making a sound, to observe the very eye at which made his blood run cold. The old man did not suspect a thing. During the day the narrator continued to go about his dailyRead MoreGothic Literature: A Rose For Emily, The Tell Tale Heart, and Daddy976 Words   |  4 PagesIn William Faulkner’s, â€Å"A Rose for Emily, Edgar Allan Poe’s â€Å"The Tell Tale Heart,† and Sylvia Plath’s â€Å"Daddy†, are endowed with many features that contribute to their gothic form and success. Faulkner’s,† A Rose for Emily† is characterized by a powerful imagery, plot and setting which are interwoven to create a gothic feeling. The story unfolds in Jefferson, the living fragments of a land that is plagued with civil war. Among the remains of Jefferson is Emily’s house which appears to be the summaryRead MoreThe Tell Tale Heart Analysis1071 Words   |  5 PagesName: Kabita Budhathoki Class: English 1302-63501 Professor: Derec Moore Date: 10/5/2017 The Tell - Tale Heart The Tell-Tale Heart is a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe which reflects the story of an unnamed narrator about his internal conflict and obsession. This story demonstrates the imagination power of a person and how imagination can affect an individual’s life. Here in this story, the narrator commits a murder of an old man with whom he used to live with an unclear

Malala free essay sample

For most Pashtuns it’s a gloomy day when a daughter is born. My father’s cousin Jehan Sher Khan Yousafzai was one of the few who came to celebrate my birth and even gave a handsome gift of money. Yet, he brought with him a vast family tree of our clan, the Dalokhel Yousafzai, going right back to my great-great-grandfather and showing only the male line. My father, Ziauddin, is different from most Pashtun men. He took the tree, drew a line like a lollipop from his name and at the end of it he wrote, ‘Malala’. His cousin laughed in astonishment. My father didn’t care. He says he looked into my eyes after I was born and fell in love. He told people, ‘I know there is something different about this child. ’ He even asked friends to throw dried fruits, sweets and coins into my cradle, something we usually only do for boys. I was named after Malalai of Maiwand, the greatest heroine of Afghanistan. Pashtuns are a proud people of many tribes split between Pakistan and Afghanistan. We live as we have for centuries by a code called Pashtunwali, which obliges us to give hospitality to all guests and in which the most important value is nang or honour. The worst thing that can happen to a Pashtun is loss of face. Shame is a very terrible thing for a Pashtun man. We have a saying, ‘Without honour, the world counts for nothing. ’ We fight and feud among ourselves so much that our word for cousin – tarbur – is the same as our word for enemy. But we always come together against outsiders who try to conquer our lands. All Pashtun children grow up with the story of how Malalai inspired the Afghan army to defeat the British in 1880 in one of the biggest battles of the Second Anglo-Afghan War. Malalai was the daughter of a shepherd in Maiwand, a small town on the dusty plains west of Kandahar. When she was a teenager, both her father and the man she was supposed to marry were among thousands of Afghans fighting against the British occupation of their country. Malalai went to the battlefield with other women from the village to tend the wounded and take them water. She saw their men were losing, and when the flag-bearer fell she lifted her white veil up high and marched onto the battlefield in front of the troops. ‘Young love! ’ she shouted. ‘If you do not fall in the battle of Maiwand then, by God, someone is saving you as a symbol of shame. ’ Malalai was killed under fire, but her words and bravery inspired the men to turn the battle around. They destroyed an entire brigade, one of the worst defeats in the history of the British army. The Afghans were so proud that the last Afghan king built a Maiwand victory monument in the centre of Kabul. In high school I read some Sherlock Holmes and laughed to see that this was the same battle where Dr Watson was wounded before becoming partner to the great detective. In Malalai we Pashtuns have our very own Joan of Arc. Many girls’ schools in Afghanistan are named after her. But my grandfather, who was a religious scholar and village cleric, didn’t like my father giving me that name. ‘It’s a sad name,’ he said. ‘It means grief-stricken. ’ When I was a baby my father used to sing me a song written by the famous poet Rahmat Shah Sayel of Peshawar. The last verse ends, O Malalai of Maiwand, Rise once more to make Pashtuns understand the song of honour, Your poetic words turn worlds around, I beg you, rise again My father told the story of Malalai to anyone who came to our house. I loved hearing the story and the songs my father sang to me, and the way my name floated on the wind when people called it. We lived in the most beautiful place in all the world. My valley, the Swat Valley, is a heavenly kingdom of mountains, gushing waterfalls and crystal-clear lakes. WELCOME TO PARADISE , it says on a sign as you enter the valley. In olden times Swat was called Uddyana, which means ‘garden’. We have fields of wild flowers, orchards of delicious fruit, emerald mines and rivers full of trout. People often call Swat the Switzerland of the East – we even had Pakistan’s first ski resort. The rich people of Pakistan came on holiday to enjoy our clean air and scenery and our Sufi festivals of music and dancing. And so did many foreigners, all of whom we called angrezan – ‘English’ – wherever they came from. Even the Queen of England came, and stayed in the White Palace that was built from the same marble as the Taj Mahal by our king, the first wali of Swat. We have a special history too. Today Swat is part of the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, or KPK, as many Pakistanis call it, but Swat used to be separate from the rest of Pakistan. We were once a princely state, one of three with the neighbouring lands of Chitral and Dir. In colonial times our kings owed allegiance to the British but ruled their own land. When the British gave India independence in 1947 and divided it, we went with the newly created Pakistan but stayed autonomous. We used the Pakistani rupee, but the government of Pakistan could only intervene on foreign policy. The wali administered justice, kept the peace between warring tribes and collected ushur – a tax of ten per cent of income – with which he built roads, hospitals and schools. We were only a hundred miles from Pakistan’s capital Islamabad as the crow flies but it felt as if it was in another country. The journey took at least five hours by road over the Malakand Pass, a vast bowl of mountains where long ago our ancestors led by a preacher called Mullah Saidullah (known by the British as the Mad Fakir) battled British forces among the craggy peaks. Among them was Winston Churchill, who wrote a book about it, and we still call one of the peaks Churchill’s Picket even though he was not very complimentary about our people. At the end of the pass is a green-domed shrine where people throw coins to give thanks for their safe arrival. No one I knew had been to Islamabad. Before the troubles came, most people, like my mother, had never been outside Swat. We lived in Mingora, the biggest town in the valley, in fact the only city. It used to be a small place but many people had moved in from surrounding villages, making it dirty and crowded. It has hotels, colleges, a golf course and a famous bazaar for buying our traditional embroidery, gemstones and anything you can think of. The Marghazar stream loops through it, milky brown from the plastic bags and rubbish thrown into it. It is not clear like the streams in the hilly areas or like the wide River Swat just outside town, where people fished for trout and which we visited on holidays. Our house was in Gulkada, which means ‘place of flowers’, but it used to be called Butkara, or ‘place of the Buddhist statues’. Near our home was a field scattered with mysterious ruins – statues of lions on their haunches, broken columns, headless figures and, oddest of all, hundreds of stone umbrellas. Islam came to our valley in the eleventh century when Sultan Mahmud of Ghazni invaded from Afghanistan and became our ruler, but in ancient times Swat was a Buddhist kingdom. The Buddhists had arrived here in the second century and their kings ruled the valley for more than 500 years. Chinese explorers wrote stories of how there were 1,400 Buddhist monasteries along the banks of the River Swat, and the magical sound of temple bells would ring out across the valley. The temples are long gone, but almost anywhere you go in Swat, amid all the primroses and other wild flowers, you find their remains. We would often picnic among rock carvings of a smiling fat Buddha sitting crosslegged on a lotus flower. There are many stories that Lord Buddha himself came here because it is a place of such peace, and some of his ashes are said to be buried in the valley in a giant stupa. Our Butkara ruins were a magical place to play hide and seek. Once some foreign archaeologists arrived to do some work there and told us that in times gone by it was a place of pilgrimage, full of beautiful temples domed with gold where Buddhist kings lay buried. My father wrote a poem, ‘The Relics of Butkara’, which summed up perfectly how temple and mosque could exist side by side: ‘When the voice of truth rises from the minarets,/ The Buddha smiles,/ And the broken chain of history reconnects. ’ We lived in the shadow of the Hindu Kush mountains, where the men went to shoot ibex and golden cockerels. Our house was one storey and proper concrete. On the left were steps up to a flat roof big enough for us children to play cricket on. It was our playground. At dusk my father and his friends often gathered to sit and drink tea there. Sometimes I sat on the roof too, watching the smoke rise from the cooking fires all around and listening to the nightly racket of the crickets. Our valley is full of fruit trees on which grow the sweetest figs and pomegranates and peaches, and in our garden we had grapes, guavas and persimmons. There was a plum tree in our front yard which gave the most delicious fruit. It was always a race between us and the birds to get to them. The birds loved that tree. Even the woodpeckers. For as long as I can remember my mother has talked to birds. At the back of the house was a veranda where the women gathered. We knew what it was like to be hungry so my mother always cooked extra and gave food to poor families. If there was any left she fed it to the birds. In Pashto we love to sing tapey, two-line poems, and as she scattered the rice she would sing one: ‘Don’t kill doves in the garden. / You kill one and the others won’t come. ’ I liked to sit on the roof and watch the mountains and dream. The highest mountain of all is the pyramid-shaped Mount Elum. To us it’s a sacred mountain and so high that it always wears a necklace of fleecy clouds. Even in summer it’s frosted with snow. At school we learned that in 327 BC, even before the Buddhists came to Swat, Alexander the Great swept into the valley with thousands of elephants and soldiers on his way from Afghanistan to the Indus. The Swati people fled up the mountain, believing they would be protected by their gods because it was so high. But Alexander was a determined and patient leader. He built a wooden ramp from which his catapults and arrows could reach the top of the mountain. Then he climbed up so he could catch hold of the star of Jupiter as a symbol of his power. From the rooftop I watched the mountains change with the seasons. In the autumn chill winds would come. In the winter everything was white snow, long icicles hanging from the roof like daggers, which we loved to snap off. We raced around, building snowmen and snow bears and trying to catch snowflakes. Spring was when Swat was at its greenest. Eucalyptus blossom blew into the house, coating everything white, and the wind carried the pungent smell of the rice fields. I was born in summer, which was perhaps why it was my favourite time of year, even though in Mingora summer was hot and dry and the stream stank where people dumped their garbage. When I was born we were very poor. My father and a friend had founded their first school and we lived in a shabby shack of two rooms opposite the school. I slept with my mother and father in one room and the other was for guests. We had no bathroom or kitchen, and my mother cooked on a wood fire on the ground and washed our clothes at a tap in the school. Our home was always full of people visiting from the village. Hospitality is an important part of Pashtun culture. Two years after I was born my brother Khushal arrived. Like me he was born at home as we still could not afford the hospital, and he was named Khushal like my father’s school, after the Pashtun hero Khushal Khan Khattak, a warrior who was also a poet. My mother had been waiting for a son and could not hide her joy when he was born. To me he seemed very thin and small, like a reed that could snap in the wind, but he was the apple of her eye, her ladla. It seemed to me that his every wish was her command. He wanted tea all the time, our traditional tea with milk and sugar and cardamom, but even my mother tired of this and eventually made some so bitter that he lost the taste for it. She wanted to buy a new cradle for him – when I was born my father couldn’t afford one so they used an old wooden one from the neighbours which was already third or fourth hand – but my father refused. ‘Malala swung in that cradle,’ he said. ‘So can he. ’ Then, nearly five years later, another boy was born – Atal, bright-eyed and inquisitive like a squirrel. After that, said my father, we were complete. Three children is a small family by Swati standards, where most people have seven or eight. I played mostly with Khushal because he was just two years younger than me, but we fought all the time. He would go crying to my mother and I would go to my father. ‘What’s wrong, Jani? ’ he would ask. Like him I was born double-jointed and can bend my fingers right back on themselves. And my ankles click when I walk, which makes adults squirm. My mother is very beautiful and my father adored her as if she were a fragile china vase, never laying a hand on her, unlike many of our men. Her name Tor Pekai means ‘raven tresses’ even though her hair is chestnut brown. My grandfather, Janser Khan, had been listening to Radio Afghanistan just before she was born and heard the name. I wished I had her white-lily skin, fine features and green eyes, but instead had inherited the sallow complexion, wide nose and brown eyes of my father. In our culture we all have nicknames – aside from Pisho, which my mother had called me since I was a baby, some of my cousins called me Lachi, which is Pashto for ‘cardamom’. Black-skinned people are often called white and short people tall. We have a funny sense of humour. My father was known in the family as Khaista dada, which means beautiful. When I was around four years old I asked my father, ‘Aba, what colour are you? ’ He replied, ‘I don’t know, a bit white, a bit black. ’ ‘It’s like when one mixes milk with tea,’ I said. He laughed a lot, but as a boy he had been so self-conscious about being dark-skinned that he went to the fields to get buffalo milk to spread on his face, thinking it would make him lighter. It was only when he met my mother that he became comfortable in his own skin. Being loved by such a beautiful girl gave him confidence. In our society marriages are usually arranged by families, but theirs was a love match. I could listen endlessly to the story of how they met. They came from neighbouring villages in a remote valley in the upper Swat called Shangla and would see each other when my father went to his uncle’s house to study, which was next door to that of my mother’s aunt. They glimpsed enough of each other to know they liked one another, but for us it is taboo to express such things. Instead he sent her poems she could not read. ‘I admired his mind,’ she says. ‘And me, her beauty,’ he laughs. There was one big problem. My two grandfathers did not get on. So when my father announced his desire to ask for the hand of my mother, Tor Pekai, it was clear neither side would welcome the marriage. His own father said it was up to him and agreed to send a barber as a messenger, which is the traditional way we Pashtuns do this. Malik Janser Khan refused the proposal, but my father is a stubborn man and persuaded my grandfather to send the barber again. Janser Khan’s hujra was a gathering place for people to talk politics, and my father was often there, so they had got to know each other. He made him wait nine months but finally agreed. My mother comes from a family of strong women as well as influential men. Her grandmother – my great-grandmother – was widowed when her children were young, and her eldest son Janser Khan was locked up because of a tribal feud with another family when he was only nine. To get him released she walked forty miles alone over mountains to appeal to a powerful cousin. I think my mother would do the same for us. Though she cannot read or write, my father shares everything with her, telling her about his day, the good and the bad. She teases him a lot and gives him advice about who she thinks is a genuine friend and who is not, and my father says she is always right. Most Pashtun men never do this, as sharing problems with women is seen as weak. ‘He even asks his wife! ’ they say as an insult. I see my parents happy and laughing a lot. People would see us and say we are a sweet family. My mother is very pious and prays five times a day, though not in the mosque as that is only for the men. She disapproves of dancing because she says God would not like it, but she loves to decorate herself with pretty things, embroidered clothes and golden necklaces and bangles. I think I am a bit of a disappointment to her as I am so like my father and don’t bother with clothes and jewels. I get bored going to the bazaar but I love to dance behind closed doors with my school friends. Growing up, we children spent most of our time with our mother. My father was out a lot as he was busy, not just with his school, but also with literary societies and jirgas, as well as trying to save the environment, trying to save our valley. My father came from a backward village yet through education and force of personality he made a good living for us and a name for himself. People liked to hear him talk, and I loved the evenings when guests visited. We would sit on the floor around a long plastic sheet which my mother laid with food, and eat with our right hand as is our custom, balling together rice and meat. As darkness fell we sat by the light of oil lamps, batting away the flies as our silhouettes made dancing shadows on the walls. In the summer months there would often be thunder and lightning crashing outside and I would crawl closer to my father’s knee. I would listen rapt as he told stories of warring tribes, Pashtun leaders and saints, often through poems that he read in a melodious voice, crying sometimes as he read. Like most people in Swat we are from the Yousafzai tribe. We Yousafzai (which some people spell Yusufzai or Yousufzai) are originally from Kandahar and are one of the biggest Pashtun tribes, spread across Pakistan and Afghanistan. Our ancestors came to Swat in the sixteenth century from Kabul, where they had helped a Timurid emperor win back his throne after his own tribe removed him. The emperor rewarded them with important positions in the court and army, but his friends and relatives warned him that the Yousafzai were becoming so powerful they would overthrow him. So one night he invited all the chiefs to a banquet and set his men on them while they were eating. Around 600 chiefs were massacred. Only two escaped, and they fled to Peshawar along with their tribesmen. After some time they went to visit some tribes in Swat to win their support so they could return to Afghanistan. But they were so captivated by the beauty of Swat they instead decided to stay there and forced the other tribes out. The Yousafzai divided up all the land among the male members of the tribe. It was a peculiar system called wesh under which every five or ten years all the families would swap villages and redistribute the land of the new village among the men so that everyone had the chance to work on good as well as bad land. It was thought this would then keep rival clans from fighting. Villages were ruled by khans, and the common people, craftsmen and labourers, were their tenants. They had to pay them rent in kind, usually a share of their crop. They also had to help the khans form a militia by providing an armed man for every small plot of land. Each khan kept hundreds of armed men both for feuds and to raid and loot other villages. As the Yousafzai in Swat had no ruler, there were constant feuds between the khans and even within their own families. Our men all have rifles, though these days they don’t walk around with them like they do in other Pashtun areas, and my great-grandfather used to tell stories of gun battles when he was a boy. In the early part of the last century they became worried about being taken over by the British, who by then controlled most of the surrounding lands. They were also tired of the endless bloodshed. So they decided to try and find an impartial man to rule the whole area and resolve their disputes. After a couple of rulers who did not work out, in 1917 the chiefs settled on a man called Miangul Abdul Wadood as their king. We know him affectionately as Badshah Sahib, and though he was completely illiterate, he managed to bring peace to the valley. Taking a rifle away from a Pashtun is like taking away his life, so he could not disarm the tribes. Instead he built forts on mountains all across Swat and created an army. He was recognised by the British as the head of state in 1926 and installed as wali, which is our word for ruler. He set up the first telephone system and built the first primary school and ended the wesh system because the constant moving between villages meant no one could sell land or had any incentive to build better houses or plant fruit trees. In 1949, two years after the creation of Pakistan, he abdicated in favour of his elder son Miangul Abdul Haq Jehanzeb. My father always says, ‘While Badshah Sahib brought peace, his son brought prosperity. ’ We think of Jehanzeb’s reign as a golden period in our history. He had studied in a British school in Peshawar, and perhaps because his own father was illiterate he was passionate about schools and built many, as well as hospitals and roads. In the 1950s he ended the system where people paid taxes to the khans. But there was no freedom of expression, and if anyone criticised the wali, they could be expelled from the valley. In 1969, the year my father was born, the wali gave up power and we became part of Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province, which a few years ago changed its name to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. So I was born a proud daughter of Pakistan, though like all Swatis I thought of myself first as Swati and then Pashtun, before Pakistani. Near us on our street there was a family with a girl my age called Safina and two boys similar in age to my brothers, Babar and Basit. We all played cricket on the street or rooftops together, but I knew as we got older the girls would be expected to stay inside. We’d be expected to cook and serve our brothers and fathers. While boys and men could roam freely about town, my mother and I could not go out without a male relative to accompany us, even if it was a five-year-old boy! This was the tradition. I had decided very early I would not be like that. My father always said, ‘Malala will be free as a bird. ’ I dreamed of going to the top of Mount Elum like Alexander the Great to touch Jupiter and even beyond the valley. But, as I watched my brothers running across the roof, flying their kites and skilfully flicking the strings back and forth to cut each other’s down, I wondered how free a daughter could ever be. 2 My Father the Falcon I ALWAYS KNEW my father had trouble with words. Sometimes they would get stuck and he would repeat the same syllable over and over like a record caught in a groove as we all waited for the next syllable to suddenly pop out. He said it felt like a wall came down in his throat. M’s, p’s and k’s were all enemies lying in wait. I teased him that one of the reasons he called me Jani was because he found it easier to say than Malala. A stutter was a terrible thing for a man who so loved words and poetry. On each side of the family he had an uncle with the same affliction. But it was almost certainly made worse by his father, whose own voice was a soaring instrument that could make words thunder and dance. ‘Spit it out, son! ’ he’d roar whenever my father got stuck in the middle of a sentence. My grandfather’s name was Rohul Amin, which means ‘honest spirit’ and is the holy name of the Angel Gabriel. He was so proud of the name that he would introduce himself to people with a famous verse in which his name appears. He was an impatient man at the best of times and would fly into a rage over the smallest thing – like a hen going astray or a cup getting broken. His face would redden and he would throw kettles and pots around. I never knew my grandmother, but my father says she used to joke with my grandfather, ‘By God, just as you greet us only with a frown, when I die may God give you a wife who never smiles. ’ My grandmother was so worried about my father’s stutter that when he was still a young boy she took him to see a holy man. It was a long journey by bus, then an hour’s walk up the hill to where he lived. Her nephew Fazli Hakim had to carry my father on his shoulders. The holy man was called Lewano Pir, Saint of the Mad, because he was said to be able to calm lunatics. When they were taken in to see the pir, he instructed my father to open his mouth and then spat into it. Then he took some gur, dark molasses made from sugar cane, and rolled it around his mouth to moisten it with spit. He then took out the lump and presented it to my grandmother to give to my father, a little each day. The treatment did not cure the stutter. Actually some people thought it got worse. So when my father was thirteen and told my grandfather he was entering a public speaking competition he was stunned. ‘How can you? ’ Rohul Amin asked, laughing. ‘You take one or two minutes to utter just one sentence. ’ ‘Don’t worry,’ replied my father. ‘You write the speech and I will learn it. ’ My grandfather was famous for his speeches. He taught theology in the government high school in the village of Shahpur. He was also an imam at the local mosque. He was a mesmerising speaker. His sermons at Friday prayers were so popular that people would come down from the mountains by donkey or on foot to hear him. My father comes from a large family. He had one much older brother, Saeed Ramzan who I call Uncle Khan dada, and five sisters. Their village of Barkana was very primitive and they lived crammed together in a one-storey ramshackle house with a mud roof which leaked whenever it rained or snowed. As in most families, the girls stayed at home while the boys went to school. ‘They were just waiting to be married,’ says my father. School wasn’t the only thing my aunts missed out on. In the morning when my father was given cream or milk, his sisters were given tea with no milk. If there were eggs, they would only be for the boys. When a chicken was slaughtered for dinner, the girls would get the wings and the neck while the luscious breast meat was enjoyed by my father, his brother and my grandfather. ‘From early on I could feel I was different from my sisters,’ my father says. There was little to do in my father’s village. It was too narrow even for a cricket pitch and only one family had a television. On Fridays the brothers would creep into the mosque and watch in wonder as my grandfather stood in the pulpit and preached to the congregation for an hour or so, waiting for the moment when his voice would rise and practically shake the rafters. My grandfather had studied in India, where he had seen great speakers and leaders including Mohammad Ali Jinnah (the founder of Pakistan), Jawaharlal Nehru, Mahatma Gandhi and Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, our great Pashtun leader who campaigned for independence. Baba, as I called him, had even witnessed the moment of freedom from the British colonialists at midnight on 14 August 1947. He had an old radio set my uncle still has, on which he loved to listen to the news. His sermons were often illustrated by world events or historical happenings as well as stories from the Quran and the Hadith, the sayings of the Prophet. He also liked to talk about politics. Swat became part of Pakistan in 1969, the year my father was born. Many Swatis were unhappy about this, complaining about the Pakistani justice system, which they said was much slower and less effective than their old tribal ways. My grandfather would rail against the class system, the continuing power of the khans and the gap between the haves and have-nots. My country may not be very old but unfortunately it already has a history of military coups, and when my father was eight a general called Zia ul-Haq seized power. There are still many pictures of him around. He was a scary man with dark panda shadows around his eyes, large teeth that seemed to stand to attention and hair pomaded flat on his head. He arrested our elected prime minister, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, and had him tried for treason then hanged from a scaffold in Rawalpindi jail. Even today people talk of Mr Bhutto as a man of great charisma. They say he was the first Pakistani leader to stand up for the common people, though he himself was a feudal lord with vast estates of mango fields. His execution shocked everybody and made Pakistan look bad all around the world. The Americans cut off aid. To try to get people at home to support him, General Zia launched a campaign of Islamisation to make us a proper Muslim country with the army as the defenders of our country’s ideological as well as geographical frontiers. He told our people it was their duty to obey his government because it was pursuing Islamic principles. Zia even wanted to dictate how we should pray, and set up salat or prayer committees in every district, even in our remote village, and appointed 100,000 prayer inspectors. Before then mullahs had almost been figures of fun – my father said at wedding parties they would just hang around in a corner and leave early – but under Zia they became influential and were called to Islamabad for guidance on sermons. Even my grandfather went. Under Zia’s regime life for women in Pakistan became much more restricted. Jinnah said, ‘No struggle can ever succeed without women participating side by side with men. There are two powers in the world; one is the sword and the other is the pen. There is a third power stronger than both, that of women. ’ But General Zia brought in Islamic laws which reduced a woman’s evidence in court to count for only half that of a man’s. Soon our prisons were full of cases like that of a thirteen-year-old girl who was raped and become pregnant and was then sent to prison for adultery because she couldn’t produce four male witnesses to prove it was a crime. A woman couldn’t even open a bank account without a man’s permission. As a nation we have always been good at hockey, but Zia made our female hockey players wear baggy trousers instead of shorts, and stopped women playing some sports altogether. Many of our madrasas or religious schools were opened at that time, and in all schools religious studies, what we call deeniyat, was replaced by Islamiyat, or Islamic studies, which children in Pakistan still have to do today. Our history textbooks were rewritten to describe Pakistan as a ‘fortress of Islam’, which made it seem as if we had existed far longer than since 1947, and denounced Hindus and Jews. Anyone reading them might think we won the three wars we have fought and lost against our great enemy India. Everything changed when my father was ten. Just after Christmas 1979 the Russians invaded our neighbour Afghanistan. Millions of Afghans fled across the border and General Zia gave them refuge. Vast camps of white tents sprang up mostly around Peshawar, some of which are still there today. Our biggest intelligence service belongs to the military and is called the ISI. It started a massive programme to train Afghan refugees recruited from the camps as resistance fighters or mujahideen. Though Afghans are renowned fighters, Colonel Imam, the officer heading the programme, complained that trying to organise them was ‘like weighing frogs’. The Russian invasion transformed Zia from an international pariah to the great defender of freedom in the Cold War. The Americans became friends with us once again, as in those days Russia was their main enemy. Next door to us the Shah of Iran had been overthrown in a revolution a few months earlier so the CIA had lost their main base in the region. Pakistan took its place. Billions of dollars flowed into our exchequer from the United States and other Western countries, as well as weapons to help the ISI train the Afghans to fight the communist Red Army. General Zia was invited to meet President Ronald Reagan at the White House and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher at 10 Downing Street. They lavished praise on him. Prime Minister Zulfikar Bhutto had appointed Zia as his army chief because he thought he was not very intelligent