Adil Najam

We are what we eat? Hopefully, not entirely. But certainly in part.

One of the first posts (1 July, 2006) on this blog to get a healthy reader response was about food. We asked our readers to nominate places where they thought one could get the Best Pakistani food Outside of Pakistan. Nearly two years ago now (September 24, 2006) we compiled some of the ideas our readers had given us to create our v0.01 list. It is past time now to update this list. So, here is our next iteration at a list of some of the Best Pakistani Food Outside Pakistan.

Adil Najam

A recent cover story in the prestigious journal Science reports that the scientific view of the Indus Civilization, of how it compares to its other two contemporary civilizations (Mesopotamia and Egypt), and of what might have happened to it is undergoing a stark and important reconsideration. That scientists consider it to be “Boring No More” and, indeed, the emerging new understanding of the Indus Civilization suggests that it might have been “a powerhouse of commerce and technology in the 3rd millennium B.C.E.”

I must confess that I am late in reporting about, and nearly missed, the June 6 cover story by Andrew Lawler, titled “Unmasking the Indus” (Science, Vol. 320, p. 1276-1285). I have been traveling out of the country, nearly non-stop, for the last seven weeks and only just got to the stack of Nature and Science (two of my favorite magazines) that had piled up in the unread mail. Of course, one look at the cover – which depicts a “bearded, horned terra cotta mask, about 5 centimeters in height, found at Mohenjo Daro, Pakistan” – had me hooked on what is unusually detailed (10-page long, with 6 sub-reports) and gripping report on the exciting new knowledge and understanding of the Indus Civilization that is beginning to emerge; knowledge that is beginning to question our long-held assumptions about what the civilization was, or was not.

Owais Mughal

While browsing youtube I came across this very thought provoking documentary on depleting water resources of our cities. Even though the documentary talks about Karachi in specific, the problem of potable water and conservation is equally valid for any other city and town of Pakistan. According to current estimate, Pakistan is world’s 6th most populous country taking over Russia for that spot in 2006. With all this increasing population, lack of development of potable water resources, WATER is set to become the most precious commodity in coming years. It will truly become what in literature, people have been calling ‘aab-e-hayaat’.