| Pakistan update #4: Sliming herb, critically electroform lights, and stopping Talibanization |
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2008-09-06, 11:58 I haven't been blogging much, and my only excuse is that I've been consumed by reading the scary new book Descent Into Chaos, by Pakistani journalist extraordinaire Ahmed Rashid, which makes the Taliban and Al Qaeda problem facing Pakistan and Afghanistan sound more daunting than I'd thought. This product belong to bleary series small night lamp.Circuit advanced, modelling beautiful, use safety credibility, most critically electroform; this taste mark weigh power 3W, practicality shine lighting power equivalent to 7W flament lamp's big guns. And in case you aren't convinced, it adds: "Light gentle, longevity much long." Another product we found, which is inspiring me to to be more blunt in my writing, is Hakimi Ubton: Sarah spotted this herbal remedy, which is an "Effective treatment for ugly spots on face and skin diseases." I believe it will retain all beautiful spots on face. Daily use of HAKIMI UBTON Removes Completely all Pimples, wrinkles, and Bad spots of "FACE". It says to please mix the herb with water or oil, "and after that please absorb it in your face. Do not wash the face but leave it and go for sleeping." And then it says you have to "get up early in the morning"—it's very demanding. I think my favorite product here is SLIMING herb:  INDICATION: Having read Gary Taubes's convincing book Good Calories, Bad Calories, I'd have to say the problem for many overweighted person is not that they do not want to control food consuming. Rather they eat too many carbohydrates, especially refined flour and sugars, and this throws their metabolism out of whack. Anyway, getting back to SLIMING: DIRECTIONS: SLIMING herb is found across Asia, I discovered, and even has its own website. I would think that this is just a simple case of bad English, but given the green color of the box, the website, and its widespread distribution makes me suspect it's all a ploy to get relatively rich foreigners to buy it just for a laugh. I didn't cave in, though, and instead took a photo of it. But I felt guilty about taking the photo instead of buying it from the shop where I saw it, so I rushed and the photo came out blurry (not to be confused with bleary). So I got the replacement image above through Creative Commons.
Marketing here is sometimes not so subtle, and tries to put you in a headlock until you will submit to buying anything—even "satisfying music for all ages," that is "a breath of fresh air," issued from the self-proclaimed "MOST CREATIVE MAN IN THE WORLD," Shah Jhaan, who in addition to holding that title is also a writer, comedian, singer song writer, composer, and coreographer. Then there's the MIRACLE CURE, "the one and only in Pakistan"—or at least the only one made by Dr. Khurshid Akhtar. At least he claims a worthy goal: "Please help Dr. Khurshid in making Pakistan hepatitis free."
This brings me full circle, to another ad, of sorts, which I saw on the wall in the same neighborhood (the upscale enclave of Zamzama). I didn't get a photo of that, either, so in the spirit of the widespread movie and music piracy here, I stole a photo of the poster from another site.
The MQM, or Muttahida Quami Movement—a political party with strong backing in this part of the country, and which supports secularism—says that this Talibanization is real. The MQM had a press conference about the posters, and while they never said they put them up, they didn't say who did—and it left the impression that they were responsible, and it was all part of their political campaign. The home minister of our province, Sindh, said in response: "There is no evidence of Talibanisation in Karachi... Illegal, terrorist activities will not be tolerated in Karachi or Sindh as long as I am home minister. I mean business." I'm going to look into this some more. |
