The Cord

Hey there little bro

Happy birthday!

Although, I suppose

Big bro would be more apt

You were, after all,

Born a few seconds before

I remember how eager

You were to get out

To take that first

Breath of fresh air

And as you left

That cord

The one that held us together

Snapped

And blood

Oh my god

So much blood

It spilled everywhere

Yours

Mine

All intermingling

All wasting

All flowing out

And as the blood overwhelmed me

Blinded me

You began to look different

No longer the companion

I had known all this time

I remember screaming

Asking you to stop

But somewhere

I couldn’t stop myself

And in that moment

I knew things had changed

Several decades have passed, brother

And you’ve hurt me

More than I could have imagined

Though if truth be told

I’m sure I’ve done the same

No sooner than we had taken our new breaths

Than we were fighting over the same toys

Crying new battle cries

All the while

Rubbing the scar on our sides

The one that got ripped

When you pulled apart

Or was it I

Who pushed you out

The scar that still bleeds

From time to time

Sometimes

I look back to the days

Before we were born

When we were one

Playing

Laughing

Dreaming

For a future

That had looked a bit different

Because this future

The one that’s become our past

And our present

This wasn’t what we had dreamed of

It’s been far too long

Living in this hatred

And I’ll admit

I never understood

That ripping us apart

Was actually

Your first breath on your own

A breath I resented

I was angry at you for leaving

Since you tore me in half

Angry at myself

For not being able to stop you

But it’s been 68 years, little bro

68 years

You realize how long it’s been

Since we played together

Laughed together

Dreamt together

Of a future

That’s different from our past

And our present

But I get it

Too much has changed

The hurt is too deep

I don’t ask for love

I don’t ask for the old days

But perhaps

An end of the hatred

An end of the hurt

And a moment

Where both of us

Can wish ourselves

A happy birthday

And actually mean it.

Journey to Pakistan – Fear

The final chapter: I was afraid. Not all the time, but in amounts small enough to remain undetected, yet big enough to leave an impact.

It’s been over a month since I returned from my visit to Pakistan, and I’ve been procrastinating when it came to writing this particular post, partly because I don’t want to hear the voices saying “I told you so,” and partly, because I don’t want to see looks of disappointment. Because writing this down – penning these words down – would mean finally admitting to myself the presence of one particular emotion that was present in this trip.

Fear.

Now, I’m not ignorant. Not entirely. I knew I was visiting a country that has been mercilessly targeted by terrorists, and is a long-term enemy of India. I expected a certain amount of fear to present itself in various aspects of the trip: in the eyes of my parents, in the words of cautiousness from my relatives, in the streets of Karachi where people preferred to drive than walk; in the need to lock car doors and put up window shades at night; in the presence of army troops in the city; in the cancelling of cell-phone networks on tempestuous days; in the blast that occurred not too far from a public demonstration.

While these incidents were new to me as an outsider, they were also expected. I was prepared for that. But it wasn’t the fear in my parents or in the city that bothered me: it was the fear in me.

I was afraid. Not all the time, but in amounts small enough to remain undetected, yet big enough to leave an impact.

Considering that this was the most awaited trip of my life, I wasn’t expecting this reaction. I was afraid of not being appropriately covered; I was afraid of the prospective immigration officials; I was afraid of being left alone for even a second.

Basically, I was afraid of being an Indian in Pakistan.

For the last eight years of my life, I have lived away from home. The last two years have been the most liberating of my life – where I could go where I wanted, whenever I wanted. Perhaps it’s my luck that Bombay is a safer city when compared to others, but I’ve never had to think twice about walking on the streets, or travelling on public transport. Fear is not an emotion I feel too often out here.

But in Pakistan, with no cell phone reception [because I had an Indian network] during the entire trip, and an ID document that could potentially be more problematic than helpful, this was not the case. I felt like a little child, afraid to be away from known faces even for a second.

On one particular event at my friends’ wedding, I called over a friend and asked him if he knew every person at the event. He said yes. Then I asked him if I was the only Indian present. Giving me a what-kind-of-a-question-is-that look, he said: “Yeah. Obviously.”

Obviously. I knew the answer ever before I asked the question. But just hearing that said aloud was unnerving – it made me feel vulnerable in a way that I have not felt in a very long time. I have travelled to a lot of countries across the world, and it usually doesn’t take long to forget where I am and just enjoy the holiday. But on this trip, I was very aware at every given moment that I was an Indian in Pakistan, and for some frustratingly unknown reason, that thought would not allow me to unwind in the way I had hoped. I couldn’t even place a finger on that emotion – I’m only now starting to admit that perhaps it was fear.

Part of me wanted to let everyone around me know that I was from India, but a tiny, rational and cautious part of the mind kept butting in and stopped me.

I think it was the part that read our history books; the part that followed media reports; the part that felt alone during cricket matches; the part that had heard of the horrors of partition; the part that had seen movies like Veer-Zara, the part that listened to every single anti-Pakistan comment ever made in my presence.

In other words, it was the part of my mind that has succumbed to 23 years of anti-Pakistan ideology.

For someone who has always prided herself on standing apart from the majority – from being able to see things from a variety of perspectives and not take hatred at face value – this was a disconcerting realization.

So, I’m going to say it once and for all – the trip was a let-down. I went to Pakistan, and I was afraid. The fear came in such small doses, that I could barely even identify it. Yet it was there. I didn’t get to enjoy being in Pakistan, because I was too busy worrying about being an Indian on enemy ground.

 Fear is not good for enjoyment. It’s probably going to take several trips for me to rid myself of that fear. And I’ll know I’ve managed to leave that fear behind when I’m able to go to Pakistan and just be in Pakistan, and not be an Indian in Pakistan.

******* 

I hate that I'm ending the Journey to Pakistan diaries on such a dismal note, but I felt that the blogs would be incomplete if they were all just merry and joyful - because they'd be ignoring a big part of the reality. 

The trip didn't turn out the way I expected - for a myriad of reasons (some good, some bad). But do I regret going to Pakistan? Definitely not. Am I going back? Definitely yes. 

The Journey to Pakistan will continue - it may just take a break for a few years.

Journey to Pakistan - Cricket Mania

For those of you who know me, this will be old news. But for those who don’t, be prepared to cover your ears………..

I don’t care about cricket.

Yes, you read that right. And yes, in this country, where heart rates depend heavily on the Indian cricket team’s run rate, that’s almost as good as blasphemy.

And being who I am, I decided to take the blasphemy a step further. At the age of 8, I decided to cheer for Pakistan during an India Pakistan match. Was it because I was insanely in love with our neighbor? No, I didn’t know anything about the country at that time. But I’ve always had the uncontrollable urge to support the underdog, and in a room filled with Indians spewing words of hatred for the other team, I felt it was only fair that someone should cheer for them. And so I did, for several years and several matches.

But as much as I enjoyed cheering for Pakistan and soaking in the scandalized looks around me, I never cared about the result. It didn’t matter to me whether India won or Pakistan – as long as I had a good time watching the game. Even at the 2011 World Cup Semi-Finals, where for the first time I was genuinely cheering for India, I didn’t care about the result. I was too busy having the time of my life trading insults with my Pakistani friends. Which is why, towards the end of the game when the winner was almost decided, I wasn’t expecting to see the looks of anger from my Pakistani friends, as their eyes silently warned me to stop the insults now.

The naïve 21 year-old in me was definitely surprised. Here I was, thinking of it just as a game, when in reality, to every other person in the room, it had been so much more.

******

Someone asked me the other day if I would rather me normal or weird, and without the blink of an eye, I said weird. Where’s the fun in normal? But for all my rebelliousness, I’ve often wondered what it might be to feel – for even just a moment – what everyone around me seems to feel – what it might be to be normal.

I got that shot at normalcy a month ago, when my trip to Pakistan coincided with a one day cricket match between India and Pakistan.

Here was my chance, I told myself. This was the match that I had been waiting for; a match that would go down in history as the one where I genuinely and whole-heartedly supported India against Pakistan. I could picture myself vividly, sitting in a room filled with Pakistanis, shouting and cheering for India, pushed by that rush of patriotic adrenaline that had always escaped me. It was all perfectly planned out in my head. I even packed a blue t-shirt in my suitcase specifically for this match [because apparently, Pakistan has called dibs over the colour green. Weird. I always thought the Indian flag had more green than blue, but maybe that’s just me].

And so the day of the big game arrived – with me sleeping through the first innings, of course [which turned out to be a good thing because we got thrashed and were only saved by Dhoni]. In any case, I donned my make-shift blue jersey, and headed over to a friend’s house to watch the match.

As with everything else on this trip, it didn’t go the way I had expected.

First of all, I walked into a house filled with very few familiar faces, and instantly my stranger phobia kicked in. I hesitantly hovered between two rooms, torn between wanting to see the game and sitting with the familiar friends who were having a dance rehearsal for the wedding. Finally, I decided to take the plunge, and plopped myself onto a seat in front of the television in a room full of strangers, feeling more awkward than cheerful.

That was minor setback number 1.

Next, I realized I was in the presence of a few adults, and I instantly zipped up my jacket to cover my t-shirt. Contrary to popular belief, it wasn’t because I was scared to sit in the room wearing blue, but more because my shirt had a picture of a pig saying “Are you Suar?” And I really didn’t think it was the best moment to offend anyone with pig jokes [Pakistan IS an Islamic country, after all]. And so my dreams of cheering for India while ‘bleeding blue’ came crashing down.

That was minor setback number 2.

Now, in my head, I had decided that India was going to win this game – after all, their least favourite supporter was supporting them in this game. How often did that happen? As the people around me slowly began to realize there was an Indian sitting in their midst, and as I started feeling more relaxed, it became easier to shout cheers and frustrations. For every 10 voices screaming “no!!!!”, there was one voice echoing “yesss!!!” and vice versa. For a change, instead of getting scandalized looks, I basked in the looks of curiosity, amusement and incredulity. Once again, I started exchanging insults with my friend – an old tradition between us. And sitting in that room filled with Pakistanis and supporting the Indian team as the underdog, I slowly started to enjoy myself, and the game – which we eventually lost.

That was minor setback num……..Ufff!!! Why do I even bother?

Yes, we lost that match. No, I still didn’t care. I enjoyed myself thoroughly, and wasn’t even slightly upset that all my cheering had been for nothing. The image I had built in my mind didn’t come true, but I got to experience the thing that I have always wanted – supporting the underdog team from both sides of the border. I would hardly call that a setback.

Maybe I’m just not cut out for that fanatic passionate cricket cheering. But honestly, I just enjoy the process of cheering and jeering without caring about the result so much that it doesn’t bother me. To me, cricket is, and probably always will be, just a game. And if my state of happiness does not depend upon the run rate of the batting line-up, I could live with that.

Yes, I am suar.

Journey to Pakistan - What's Pakistan Like?

For several years as far as I can remember, I have wanted to go to Pakistan. It was the country I was told was supposed to be the enemy, the people untrustworthy, and more recently, a land reaping terrorists. I wanted to see this for myself. It was probably the most anticipated trip of my life, a trip where I had decided beforehand that I would write pages about – a trip, that for some unknown reason, I’m unable to put in words.

You went to Pakistan? How was it?

I don’t know how to answer the question. I thought it would be an exhilarating, mind-blowing, and awe-inspiring experience.

It really wasn’t.

It was the same faces, the same clothes, the same streets, the same houses, the same music, the same wedding celebrations. Granted, the women on the streets were fewer, and the pyjamas of the men roomier, but for the most part it was the same.

It was sort of like visiting home.

I couldn’t help but feel a little cheated. After all the horror stories and warnings and cautionary tales, I think I had expected Pakistan to be different. After all, Pakistan was the enemy. THE ENEMY. Why on earth would our enemy be the same as us??? How could the other side of the border feel like home? How could my friend’s mom and grandmother and cat feel like my own?

It’s easy to write about an experience that stands out – that’s different and exotic. But when something feels so normal that it almost feels like a part of your regular life, how do you write pages about that?

Yet people ask me what Pakistan is like.

It’s a country struggling under terrible governance, antiquated patriarchal laws, and a corrupted system that serves only the elites;

A nation that prides and tries to protect its sovereignty;

A force of people slowly realizing the power of their own voice and their ability to speak out against injustice;

A breed of parents that want to keep their children safe;

A mass of youngsters that want to improve the future of their country, so that they may be able to live peacefully in the place they call home.

What’s Pakistan like?

India. 

Journey to Pakistan - The Precursor

1 Dec, 2012

I’ve finally got it – approval from Pakistan, from the airlines, and my parents. As in, I’ve got my visa, ticket, and the green signal. At the moment, there are so many emotions running through me, that I can only give a passing glimpse of each:

·         Exhilarated: You know how people have a bucket list – a list of things they want to before they die? Well, I’ve never formally written one, but I’m sure visiting Pakistan would have been near the top of mine. And it’s finally happening!!!!

·         Grateful: For my parents, who absolutely hate the idea of me going to Pakistan, yet went out of their way to ensure that I got my visa. It’s not easy to do something for others when your mind is telling you to do the opposite.

·         Awed: Guess who put the stamp authorizing my visit to Pakistan? The Ambassador of Pakistan to Kuwait himself! I got to meet him personally, and was quite blown away by his friendliness, cordiality and professionalism. On a side note, he also gave me a new quote to ponder over: “The creation of Pakistan was based more on pro-Islam sentiments than anti-India sentiments. Unfortunately, that was not the legacy that was passed down.”

·         Nervous: Of that immigration line. Call it paranoia, but I’m actually afraid of going through the immigration: what if they pull me aside? What if they decide to grill me because I’m Indian? What if they decide to lock me up simply because they feel like it? Guess the India-Pakistan rivalry didn’t manage to escape me entirely.

·         Frustrated: I was asked not to tell anyone that I am going to Pakistan, until after I return. That’s like me deciding to get married to the man of my dreams and then being told to keep hush about it until after the wedding is over. Actually, it’s much worse than that. Going to Pakistan has been the one thing that has been at the top of mind and tongue all year, and being restricted from sharing this excitement with others is frustrating.

·         Guilty: Okay, so I didn’t declare my travel plans on Facebook, but I couldn’t help myself from telling my close friends about the trip. And now I feel guilty for doing that.

Anxious: I’ve been building up this trip in my head for so long, that part of me is worried it won’t live up to my expectations.

·         Excited: I’ll finally get to meet my best friend and her mom, in their own house, in a city that I have heard so much about!

·         Curious: Do I have to be covered from head to toe out there? Do I carry sleeveless kurtas? Will they put me behind bars for wearing a t-shirt and jeans?

·         Hopeful: That this trip will help me understand myself a lot better, as clichéd as that sounds.

*****

14 December, 2012

I received a call from the PIA office regarding my ticket. There was a bit of a mix-up, but after a little clarification, I was given the green signal to go ahead and print my ticket. It was finally official. I entered my classroom, and the first thing my friend asked me was: what’s with the big smile? And being the mature 23 year-old that I am, I started jumping up and down, ignoring their amused glances as I squealed loudly that I got my ticket.

*****

15 December, 2012

After a night of drinking and dining with one of my close friends, we found ourselves sitting at a familiar location, gazing out into the sea. Having the sudden urge to talk to our friend in Pakistan, I made the call. In response to her “hello,” I screamed loudly into the phone: “I’m coming to Pakistan!” even as my friend gave me an “are you mad” look, before shaking his head and grinning away.

The excitement was contagious, I suppose.

*****

26 December, 2012

It’s the eve of my trip. I want to blog. But I can stop feeling ultra jittery and hyper.

*****

27 December, 2012

If I were the kind of person who believed in destiny, I would say that someone up there is trying really hard to piss me off. My flight has been delayed. Again. And it’s starting to annoy me.

But I have no plans of giving that guy up there the satisfaction of getting to me. I’ll take whatever he plans on throwing at me, and I’m going to make sure this trip happens. (Unless of course the flight gets cancelled, in which case there’s not a whole lot I can do.)

In any case, the silver lining to this whole mess is that I’m no longer jittery. Trust me, a few hours ago, I couldn’t sit still. I was literally shaking in anticipation, nervousness and excitement. I sat down to write, but couldn’t sit still long enough to get any words down that didn’t sound like “wheeeeee!!!”

But rest assured, I can do more than that now.

After 23 years of wondering, 5 years of pestering, 3 years of dreaming, 1 year of planning, 1 month of freaking out, 3 days of overwhelming excitement, and two flight delays, the day has finally arrived: I’m going to Pakistan today. Assuming Pakistan International Airlines doesn’t have some ties up there.

For anyone who knows me really well, they’d know that I’m not a very hopeful person. Sure, as far as the rest of the world is concerned, I’m the most optimistic and positive person you’d find. But when it comes to my life – I’m really scared to get my hopes up. I’m the kind of person who’d rather keep a check on my hopes and be pleasantly surprised, than allow my hopes to soar free only to be crushed by disappointment.

So in a typical ruchi-world, I’d be sitting here contemplating every possible thing that could go wrong from this point forth (because let’s face it – there’s a lot that can). But this time, instead of dwelling on all that, I’m going to try and be something I never am – I’m going to be hopeful. I’m hopeful that this trip actually happens; I’m hopeful that I don’t give my parents reason to worry more than they already are; I’m hopeful that I get to reconnect with some old friends; I’m hopeful that I finally get to see the country I’ve always wanted to visit.

Because at the end of the day, there’s not much else I can do. 

[Like I said, someone up there is trying to piss me off big time. My word doc closed without saving. So I just had to re-type my blog. ]

Discovering Pakistan

I’m obsessed with Pakistan. And no, I don’t mean I want to throw missiles at it. I’m obsessed with wanting to visit the country, with wanting to change people’s perception of that nation, and more importantly, I’m obsessed with the notion that just because I’m Indian, I’m not going to blindly hate Pakistan.

Of course, that kind of obsession is nothing sort of blasphemy in this country. How dare I pick Pakistan over India? Well, don’t force me to pick then.

It’s not easy for someone to understand why I’m so obsessed with our neighbouring enemy, because it’s not something I understand myself entirely. So in an attempt to understand, I decided to re-visit my life.

*******

I was a kid. I can’t even remember how old, maybe seven or eight. I just remember a typical match between India and Pakistan, where my entire family gathered around in Bangalore to cheer for India. I remember looking around at them, taking in their passionate love for India, and even more, their passionate hatred for Pakistan. And I remember thinking to myself how unfair it was that there was nobody around to support Pakistan. So I loudly proclaimed to everyone around that I would support Pakistan in the match, quite enjoying their looks of shock and outrage.

And that’s what I did. For that game and every game that was played thereafter. I think I was just supporting the underdog. But I had no idea that I was starting to walk down a path that I would never turn away from.

*******

Five years ago, I stepped onto the York University campus, having arrived fresh from India. Walking around, I came across a statue of Mahatma Gandhi at the library, and instantly felt a surge of pride. Then, walking outside, I came across another statue that made me stop suddenly with a frown on my face. It was the statue of Mohammed Ali Jinnah. I didn’t understand what it was doing here. Wasn’t he the man responsible for the partition of India and the subsequent massacre? Wasn’t he the biggest villain in Indian history? What were these people thinking, placing his statue – a considerably large one, at that – on campus?

*******

A few weeks later, a friend of mine, introduced me to another group of first-year students. I was really apprehensive and shy about meeting people in this new country, but one glance at the group and I sighed in relief. The dark hair, the skin tone and the unmistakable language gave it away. I felt myself relaxing without even trying to. Turning to the girl standing next to me, I asked – India? Without missing a beat or faltering in her smile, the girl who would soon become my closest friend in college shook her head and said – Pakistan.

*******

Towards the end of the first year, the Pakistani Students’ Association screened a movie on campus called “Jinnah.” By this time, my circle of friends included a mix of Indians and Pakistanis, so I was comfortable enough to admit that I really wanted to understand this subject more. Who was this Jinnah person really? And why was he called Quaid-e-Azam? I needed to solve this quandary before I could understand head or tail of Pakistan. Moreover, I told myself, if Shashi Kapoor – a famous Indian actor – was a part of this film, it couldn’t entirely be Pakistani propaganda, could it?

So I went to watch the film. And it turned out to be a film that left me feeling like I had just been punched in the stomach. It showed me a version of history that I could never have imagined even existed. It made me realize just how biased my own history classes had been. Of course, the film itself was far from unbiased. But it managed to imbibe in me a mindset that has not yet left me: that there can be more than one side to a story.

*******

Just before I started my third year, Jaswant Singh, an Indian politician, was expelled from the BJP party because he wrote a “controversial” book on Jinnah. His book was even banned in the state of Gujarat. Regardless of the contents of the book (which shockingly did not put the entire partition blame on Jinnah), that event really shook me. Banning a book? Firing a person for speaking out in a different light? Was this the same country that specifically gave us all freedom of speech in its constitution? I’m not saying Indians should forget all their history in a spur of the moments and turn 360 degrees in their thoughts, but not allowing people to voice out their thoughts because they went against the accepted public view was plain dictatorship. It didn’t exactly increase my faith in this nation.

*******

During my fourth year, I shared an apartment with the aforementioned Pakistani friend. One random day, I can’t remember why, but we were going over the map of India and Pakistan. And very soon, we got into an argument. We were pointing to the same area on the map, but she kept insisting that it was called Azaad Kashmir, while I resolutely said it was Pakistan Occupied Kashmir (POK). We were sure the other person was wrong, because this was a fact that we had both grown up with, so there was no way we could be wrong. Finally, Wikipedia solved our quandary. Both of us were right. It was the same area – just called by two different names, depending on the nation we belonged to.

*******

The end of my final year in college was marked by the cricket world cup, where India and Pakistan met each other in the Semi-Finals. The tension brewing on campus was quite palpable. My roommate and I decided it was time for us to act appropriately as rivals, and so divided up our house into Azaad Bathroom and Pakistan Occupied Kitchen.

Not wanting a massacre, the match was screened in two separate rooms on campus. Yet they were close enough for me to jump back and forth. Every time I entered the “Pakistani room”, I was met with waves and cheers and half-hearted jeers. I think it was in the midst of throwing insults at each other with big smiles on our faces that I realized I felt more comfortable in this room than the other.

*******

Just before I left Canada to join Teach for India, another Pakistani friend of mine said to me, “I know there will be at least one classroom in all of India where the children will not see or hate Pakistan as the enemy.”

*******

Since I was teaching Std. 2, I told myself these kids were too young to be discussing heavy topics like India and Pakistan. So I ignored the subject altogether.

Six months after I started teaching my Std. 2 kids, one boy came up to me with a drawing and started explaining it to me proudly – “Yeh India hai. Yeh Pakistan hai. Aur yeh India Pakistan par missile daal raha hai.”

I had no reply for him.

*******

My friend and I had been planning a trip to Goa for a while, yet it kept getting postponed for some reason or the other. Last week, he told me that it would have to be pushed further back, because he had just got his visa for Pakistan and was planning to visit there. He seemed really apologetic. So I said to him, “Dude. Chill. Goa or Pakistan? No competition.”

Just before we hung up, he said, “Ruch, you realize we’re probably the only two people in India who would think that?”

I wish we weren’t. 

That Meeting Ground

I spoke to a close friend of mine today. We share a lot of things, yet the one thing we do not share is our nationalities. As we were discussing whether it would be better to meet up in Canada or Dubai, this thought struck me:

You live across from me
Across that street
Across that line
The one we're not allowed to cross

I can stand at my gate
Yet I cannot see you
I can wave to you
Yet have no idea if you're waving back
Even though you live across from me
Across that line we're not allowed to cross

I want to see you
I want to cross the street
I want to cross this line I can't see
But they hold me back
The voices, the anger, the resentment
They are not mine, yet they surround me
They won't let me cross
All I can do is stand at my gate and wave
Hoping, that you're waving back

I want to see your house,
The one I saw in pictures
I want to see your family
Whom I heard you talking to on the phone
I want to see your friends
Who you always spoke about
I want to see your neighbourhood
Which sounds very similar to my own
I want to see you

We're neighbours who cannot meet
Living in a suburb of rivalry
Looking for a common ground
One that is far from our homes
Where there are no voices, anger or resentment

But that meeting ground comes at a price
I can see you
But I still cannot see your home
The one I saw in pictures
I cannot see your family
Whom I heard you talking to on the phone
I cannot see your friends
Who you always spoke about
I cannot see your neighbourhood
Which sounds very similar to my own
I cannot see your country
Which sits next to my own.

The good, the bad, and the murky

Hero or villian
Friend or enemy
Freedom fighter or terrorist
Founder of a nation or destroyer of another
Victim or criminal
Martyred or punished
Pro or anti
Heads or tails

People say there are two sides to every coin. True. But when you flip a coin you should get only one side: either heads, or tails. So how is it that the two of us can look at the same coin, and you see heads, while I see tails?

That's when things get murky.

I'm right, you're wrong
We have no common ground
We stand on opposite sides
And from my side, I cannot see your heads
From yours, you cannot see my tails

In 1947 - two major events happened in the Indian subcontinent. Depending on who you ask, you might get two different answers:

A nation was carved apart by a butcher's bloodstained knife,
A new nation was born, eager to open its eyes to brand new life.

It seems like an obvious statement: they both refer to the same event. But again,

I'm right, you're wrong
We have no common ground
We stand on opposite sides
And from my side, I cannot see your heads
From yours, you cannot see my tails

If you studied history in India, you might have come across the name 'Mohd. Ali Jinnah' - the driving force behind the partition of India. He was the one responsible for tearing our nation apart; for forcing the largest human migration in history; for all the communal bloodshed that followed; and for creating a country that has done nothing but wage wars against India ever since it was born.

Yet if you studied history in Pakistan, you probably came across the name 'Quaid-e-Azam' - the man responsible for creating Pakistan; the man who fought for the rights of Muslims in a country that tyrannically oppressed them; the man who envisaged and executed the impossible; the most revered and respected man of our nation - the founder of Pakistan.

Partition or Creation
Jinnah or Quaid-e-Azam

And so, depending on which country you grew up in, you were instantly indoctrinated in the respective ideology.

Two opposite sides of the coin. And again:

I'm right, you're wrong
We have no common ground
We stand on opposite sides
And from my side, I cannot see your heads
From yours, you cannot see my tails

Stuck in these dichotomies in our beliefs, refusing to take that step around the coin and trying to look at things from the other person's perspective.

Why? Because seeing things from someone else's point of view would mean

admitting that I am not the only one who is right
admitting that there are alternative positions on the same topic
admitting that while the other person may not be my friend, he isn't necessarily an enemy either

admitting that there exists a middle ground - a no-man's-land infested with murky terrain forbidding in its appearance

admitting that it doesn't have to be
only friend or enemy
only victim or criminal
only hero or villian
only pro or anti
only good or bad.

Sometimes, it can just be murky.