By S A J Shirazi

Salman Rashid’s “Jhelum: City of the Vitasta� is a worthy, lively, and very well-researched book that entertains as well as informs. It richly succeeds in uncovering the truth about the name of the ancient town and smashing unfounded legends while bringing an evolution vividly to life in the process.

Where has the name Jhelum come from? Salman Rashid writes,

Local ‘historiansà¢ÃƒÂ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚¬Ã¢â€žÂ¢ were assiduously applied to the task of inventing history. Sometime since the first European historian did his research in the area and the present, ‘Jhelumâà¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚¬Ã¢â€žÂ¢ had become the name of Alexander’s horse. I was surprised to discover locally printed histories carrying on and on about famous horse that dies at Jhelum and gave the town its name. All of these so called histories have been printed in the last thirty or so years which implies that this industry of pseudo-history became fashionable in the recent past.

Asma Mirza

Time was changing when I opened my eyes to this world; everything seemed to be going ‘online’. But still it was not that bad – we still were living our offline lives too. It was time when stamp collection, reading books in their ‘hard copy format’, gaming (offline) with hands and feet involved, making scrap books, collecting dolls, coin collection were few of the more common hobbies instead of chatting, surfing online and downloading music.

I inherited not the coin collection hobby but the coins themselves from my sis (and probably my parents too since she cannot collect coins issued years before her).

I remember years back when someone would come from any foreign land me and my siblings’ would surely ask for some coin tokens to add up in our collection. And it used to be great time of pleasure for me to open up my sis’ stamp and coin collections whenever she was away, as a feast.

Adil Najam

The Pakistani community here in USA is abuzz with talk of Canadian Broadcasting Service’s (CBS’s) new comedy series Little Mosque on the Prairie.

Everyone seems to have an opinion, but few seem to have actually seen it yet (since it appears on Canadian TV and the first episode was aired this week). We at ATP wanted to change that and give you all a chance to view the first episode of the comedy program and comment on it. The show – for its subject matter as much as anything else – is causing ripples across the world’s media and has generally, but not always, generated good reviews.

The program’s website describes the program:

Little Mosque on the Prairie, an unabashedly comedic look at a small Muslim community living side by side with the residents of a little [Canadian] prairie town. At its heart, Little Mosque on the Pararie is a humorous look at relationships, family, love, the generation gap and balancing Muslim beliefs and traditions in a pararie setting.