Afia from Karachi Company!!!

People often wonder – as I do so myself – of the things that shaped me into the person that I am today. Defiant, carefree, brazen maybe even controversial. Of course, events had a lot to do with it but also the people who waltzed their way in and out, leaving a mark in their own special way. Friends, lovers, foes. I was always unlucky in love but very lucky when it came to friendship. Platonic companions who taught me how to live with a balance between sanity and hedonism. Girls these days may seem a dime-a-dozen with their aped shock-the-world attitude but back when we were all supposed to be ‘sweet’, ‘haughty’ and ‘innocent’ – such girls were not only a rarity but also heavily penalized for their unabashed demeanors. Yet, I chose to befriend such girls and learn from each and every one of them. Alisha (the promiscuous and unconventional girl from the States in Pakistan for the first time). Afia (the over-ambitious girl determined and destined to leave the mediocrity of her Karachi Company home for a life of glamour and decadence). And then there was Jenny (A best friend in college who personified class and poise yet possessed the street-smart astuteness of a girl raised in the projects of Compton). I could dedicate a section to each of them in this piece but it wouldn’t be fair. And since there is just too much ground to cover, we really should tread along. Shall we?

Why Yes!

Before I had ever met my Jenny from the block and a few months after having dealt with the mysterious disappearance of my best friend Alisha; there came into my life an inspiring, go-getter called Afia from Karachi Company. We had met on the #Pakistan channel on mIRC. For those of you who don’t know what those acronyms mean, I’m revoking your FOB membership card. Also, just to make it very clear, I wasn’t really trolling the chat-rooms for women – my elevator doesn’t stop on the lesbian floor – I was simply chatting with random people on the main screen. A certain nick called Pakizah caught my eye and we immediately bonded over our shared habitual sarcasm when it came to misspelled nicks that typed ‘Madam-can-I-be-your-boyfriend’ on the main screen. Pakizah was hilarious and I was instantly drawn to a girl who was enjoying typed praises from all the men in the chat-room. Every five minutes a loser with an equally sad nick like ‘L0V3RofallFR13NDS’ would profess his undying love for Pakizah along with a pitiable rose crafted on the keyboard: @}—‘,---

Her replies: ‘LOL, ROFLMAO I need a man with money not a cyber-café loser!’

Apparently a chat-room regular, she was savoring each click and tap of her cyber popularity. As snooty as she seemed, the boys remained relentless in pursuing her.

And I had to agree, all these acne-layered boys who probably sat in their shorts and shalwars hoping to meet a Lara Croft on the internet, were not worth our time. So I chatted with Pakizah instead and pretty soon, we were typing ‘hahaha’s’ and ‘LOL’s’ as we made fun of the losers on the main screen together. So honored was she to have met a female like herself, she gave me 3 free passwords. Ok, for those of you who weren’t around during those days, internet access in Pakistan was bought from shady offices called Supernet or Cybernet that sold hours. Pakizah on other hand boasted of a list of passwords with several pre-paid hours. Later, she told me how easy it was for her. She would flirt with the boys in chat-rooms, call them a few times to let them hear a girl’s voice. Then, carefully she would craft a sob story of how she lived with conservative parents who wouldn’t allow her to talk on the phone so the only way she could communicate with them was over the net (emails/chat/ICQ). The men – now already falling in love with their first girlfriend – gave her their passwords along with sappy and mushy Blue-Mountain cards with animated hearts and corny ring-tone-ish ballads beeping in the background. The words ‘Missing You’ shimmying across her email inbox with such desperate longing only to be deleted. But the passwords she kept for herself. In a few months, the boys would realize that they had just been conned and they would eventually change their passwords. Still, the fact that Pakizah’s stash of pre-paid passwords were never depleted should be indicative of how many boys in Pakistan would kill for a ‘garrfrand’. As for Pakizah, I loved her already and we decided to stay good friends.

In the beginning, we exchanged a few customary emails, then one day we decided to talk on the phone. The minute I heard her voice, I was shocked.
‘Hello Padash, hoe are you, I am Afia from Karachi Company. Pakizah is my nick-handle on Pakistan channel’.
She sounded nothing like I had imagined. A mousy voice drenched in a strong Punjabi accent. While her cyber persona had invoked an image of a badass and sultry Angelina Jolie-esque vamp, all I could picture now was an Anjuman Cholie in a long, oiled braid. Still, even with this anti-climactic discovery she sounded interesting. Her words were almost endearing when inserted statements like ‘This is me only, love me or hate me, I damn care’ would pop up out of the blue! Later that day, I was meeting up with some school friends for bowling at Hot Shots and the next thing I know, Afia shows up like a stalker to say ‘just hello, hi’. My friends instantly began to scrutinize this local girl with judgmental eyes while wondering how I could know such a paendoo girl. Still, in an effort to be courteous, I sat down with her and engaged in polite small-talk. Afia too was well aware of the disapproving looks and sniggers being flung her way but she really did ‘damn care’ as she continued to rant and rave about herself. Instantly, I knew that Afia was no ordinary girl from around the corner. She was a woman with much bigger dreams for herself than what her Karachi Company life offered.

As the weeks rolled by, Afia and I became closer. It was almost refreshing to meet a friend outside of the private and elitist walls of UCI where everyone looked and acted the same way. Aptly referred to as Burger Central by the lafungas who hung outside our gates for hungered peeks of girls in tight tops and jeans instead of the boring white and pallid shalwar kurta uniforms. Afia would shamelessly confess that she wanted nothing more than to be a burger herself. An IT student at Quaid-e-Azam University, she would proudly wear jeans and T-shirts bought from local, knock-off stores and would then devise ways of infiltrating into the world of burgerdom herself. Whenever we talked, she wanted to know about dance parties, restaurants and the celebrities (or their kids) that I went to school with. A world alien to her, she wanted me to describe everything in detail and then she would admit her utmost desire to experience it herself one day.

So determined to transform herself into a celebutaunt, Afia would spend hours repeating dialogues in American movies while imitating accents. I remember when she wouldn’t stop saying ‘As if’ like a broken record after having memorized all of Alicia Silverstone’s quips from Clueless. Still, I encouraged her as much as possible while slowly beginning to detest this tragic culture of elitism in Pakistani society. Afia, became hope for me – or even an experiment unraveling before my eyes– of how this unjust and pre-destined system could in fact be changed. Sure, the noveau riche could one day, swivel a party invite from a contact, private schools for their children and maybe a country club membership from a bribe but would they ever be truly accepted by the so-called true elites? These born-rich, English medium, US educated, Cuaba smoking and Cognac drinking snobs that seem to clout the social scene and the decision-making in Pakistani gentry.

You see, mimicking American accents and British slang from movies and music videos, only allowed Afia the ability to mask her background on the surface. But to enter the social and elitist scene of Islamabad, she had to offer something of potential use in return: a well-connected patriarch, a glamorous name for others to drop or a simply a colossal bungalow to entertain in. Still, naïve to that fact, she would spend hours asking me to detail the self-indulgent lifestyles of spoilt, daddy’s girls of Froebells and UCI. It would invoke in her, a strange excitement, as she would imagine the possibility of being chauffeured in expensive cars to parties where youth danced, smoked, drank and conversed in flawless English. All superficial fantasies in hindsight but had I not met Afia at that age, I would never have known what others outside of our little bubbled world perceived us as. How they would stare from afar and maybe even wish to one day touch: this fate of being born in a privileged family and all the glamour that came with it.

Luckily Afia had discovered the internet at just the right time to help her achieve her dreams. In cyber-space, a person’s class and social status didn’t matter. One could envelope their fabricated personas into whatever they hoped to be. So Afia spent hours trolling the internet for connections or coat-tails to sneak her way past the velvet ropes of the upper class. At first she began talking to boys who lived in the affluent sectors of Islamabad; F-10, F-11 or F-420. These were boys who may have been privileged but were socially awkward at the same time. They existed invisibly or as social misfits in their schools. Lack of self-confidence usually brought upon by a nerdy appearance, obesity or an irksome stutter. They too were able to live out their fantasies of being studs and gods in cyber-space since one really couldn’t see what they actually looked like. A match made in heaven for social-climbing and materialistic girls like Afia. So while the world struck up conversations on mIRC with asl? (age, sex, location?) Afia usually typed in ‘What school do you go to?’ or ‘Where sector do you live in?’ She also made frequent appearances on channels such as #Froebells and #UCI to cruise for similar prey. I have to admit, I was amazed at this girl’s determination. She would ask me if I knew of a boy called blah blah at my school. I would confirm that he was a pimpled, overweight boy who never left a corner in his classroom. ‘Purfect’ she would then hiss like a business savy exec closing a lucrative deal. After all, she got rides in expensive cars, meals at expensive restaurants and gifts bought from vacations abroad. The boys in turn began to return to school with raised self-esteem. Amazing what having a ‘garrfrand’ can do to a boy’s ego at that age. For my friends and I, lunch at Pappasalis or dessert at Hot Spot was part of a commonplace routine after school. For Afia, it was a novel experience she had only heard others talk about. Slowly, I began to appreciate what I had long taken for granted.

Soon, Afia moved on to bigger and better things when she began to frolic around the city with certain species we like to call ‘Uncles’. Married men who too had discovered chat-rooms from their glass-castle offices in Blue Area. Chatting with a girl like Afia, gave them the ego massage they had long bid farewell to somewhere after their fourth kid, the last patch of hair on their head and the seventh inch added to their own waistline. Afia was young and hot and thus the perfect candidate for a casual fling or a clandestine rendezvous for these bored but wealthy men. And for Afia, they were men who didn’t have to ask their fathers for money. They were the fathers with the money. Thus began Afia’s escapades with her countless sugar-daddies.

Now sometimes she would meet a man that sounded interesting on paper but when she found a richer, wealthier man the first one had to be ditched. It was a similar experience with a boy called Akbar whom she passed on to me. Desperate for a boyfriend at that time, I embarked on a 9-month relationship with the boy. Most of you may have already read about him in my previous piece (Happy Effing VD to you too!). An opportunist by nature, each man Afia met was an open door or a free ticket out of the middle-class. Each ‘uncle’ she canoodled with sparked a new idea for a possible escape from her current life. She thought about becoming a model, she desired to be a fashion designer, a business executive, a socialite begum of a rich industrialist and once she even toyed with the idea of becoming a fashion photographer. Sure, a little confused but she was inspiring nonetheless. A girl almost the same age as I who savored each chance and chased every opportunity only to make something of herself. I could get all the same things at the snap of a finger but instead I was too lazy and uninterested. I will never forget when she excitedly disclosed to me about the married Ad exec she was having an affair with. He was fearful of his suspicious wife so she suggested an internship at his agency. That way, not only could they carry on their illicit hanky-panky in his mammoth office but she could also walk out with a fictitious yet lionized description on her resume of projects she worked on and all the ‘wonderful’ tasks she had accomplished at this agency.

While some men merely gilded her resume with make-believe internships, others took Afia out for lavish feasts at exclusive country clubs. Places she had only wondered about from the other side of the members-only bougainvillea walls, she now sashayed around alongside the city’s crème de la crème.

Besides being impressed with Afia’s drive to design her own future and destiny, I also admired in her the honesty with which she lived her life and the unapologetic way she lived it. Affairs with married men, sizing up potential dates by their take-home salaries, courting men for dinners and lunches and carrying on pretend ‘relationships’ for free internet passwords were all laurels under her belt. And so jaded had I become with the female clones that cat-walked along the walls of UCI with their droned whining and their priceless accessories, that I welcomed her into my life more and more. I secretly detested those bratty girls who knew nothing but to sneer down at ordinary, inadequacy and difference. So self-righteous they pretended to be with their noses stuck up in the air because in their world, class was synonymous with conceit. On the other hand, I found Afia’s honest confessions both refreshing and exciting. I immediately realized that these were the kind of friends I felt comfortable around and wanted to have in my life. That is why our friendship, even though we belonged to two very different worlds, continued to last.

Now of course, Afia was only able to conveniently pursue her dreams and her antics because she enjoyed a certain independence which other girls in her neighborhood didn’t. She could drive her father Suzuki FX to university or to her cyber dates. Once when we shared ice-cream at Yummy 36, she told me her story. She was the youngest of three children. The eldest of the siblings was a cherished brother whom the entire family had pinned their hopes and dreams on. He was schooled in private institutions while Afia and her sister would take a wagon to Model School. Still he was their pride and joy and so when it came time to study further, their father used all his savings to send him off to England. Sure Afia was resentful of the favoritism and envious of such blatant sexism but she hoped that her cherished brother would one day return home to whisk them off to a better life. One which came with a kothee in F-10. After he graduated, the brother informed his Karachi Company family that he had met a British Pakistani girl and was getting married. The family called and asked if they too could be a part of the wedding but he argued that it was too expensive and all he wanted were their blessings. Discouraged, they still decided to support him. The girl apparently belonged to a rich family and immediately the brother moved in with her family and began working for their father. After that, Afia’s family got a total of four abrupt aerogrammes from him and eventually he faded away from their lives. Afia’s family concluded that although they were happy for him they belonged right here in the mediocrity of Karachi Company themselves. Her parents then immediately busied themselves in saving up for their daughter’s wedding but Afia decided she was going to do what her brother had once promised. She immediately assumed the role of a son in the household. Driving her family around the city, bargaining with plumbers and electricians and negotiating with landlords. She also promised them that one day, she would bring home enough income to not only support them but shower them with comfort. So headstrong had she become that she even argued with her father about pursuing an IT degree over Home Economics. She had decided early on that it was a more lucrative career choice. All her decisions, she made for herself and then dreamt of success, which she struggled each day to make a reality.

I could go on and on about my friendship with Afia because we managed to become extremely close in those two years. How she stood by me after my failed relationship with Akbar and when I wanted to end an affair with a married politician myself, I conveniently passed him on to Afia. (‘Happy Effing VD to you too’) Afia’s men weren’t limited to just rich businessmen. She was later escorting high-powered celebrities around the capital’s party circuit; politicians, television artists even diplomats. Unfortunately, no names will be mentioned as I remain sworn to secrecy for a true friend.

Our friendship didn’t always remain hunky dory either. We had our share of arguments. Nations have warred each other on merely being different, so it was inevitable that the two of us – as different as we were – would one day squabble. A brawl in particular strained our relationship to an irreparable point. Afia had always asked me to invite her to a UCI dance party. Although I would often spend time with Afia to escape the superficiality of my classmates, our friendship was essentially of the furtive and covert kind. She took me to a different world when I wanted but then I would return to my cushioned life built on the fortune of being raised with comforts. What I was accustomed to and what Afia fantasized about. Still, towards the end of my A-levels, I decided to finally invite Afia to a friend’s party. Usually, I would be lucky to have received a invitation myself but since this was a friend’s party, I managed to get an extra one for Afia as well.

She was ecstatic and immediately borrowed an old top of mine to wear. The party was no different from any other party where we swayed to bubble gum beats and smoked our menthols to assert our roles as popular girls and high school elites. It was not till much later when Muzna, the host of the party and one of the most popular girls in school huffed over to my corner and emitted a theatrical and deliberate shudder.
‘What’s wrong darling?’ her friends fawned over her.
‘Gate crashers yaar what else’ Muzna scowled ‘So many cheapsters have snuck in.’
“Uff I cant stand stags. Why cant they just stay on their Vespas where they belong. Isn’t the guard doing his job?”
“He is but you know how they are, they still sneak in. Not just boys. Girls too. You should see this third-class, Bollywood type dancing like a whore. Bitch thinks my party’s a damn mujra.”
The girls cackled and pointed at the girl. Spiteful comments were then flung conspicuously her way as she tried her best to ignore them while dancing by herself.
‘Oh my God! What the hell is she doing?’
‘What a paendoo loser yaar!’
They howled and soon some of the boys even joined in “Dude she winked at me! Where did this weirdo come from anyway?”
I stood there with my ‘friends’. People who had made me popular by association. Girls who had allowed me the privilege of acceptance in high school. Who I would never dare upset. So as they mocked and ridiculed Afia – who really did look out of place on the floor with her filmy dance moves – I pretended I didn’t know who she was either. In truth, I hid behind the other girls petrified that Muzna would find out that I was in fact the culprit who had invited this ‘wierdo’ to her party. For the rest of the night, I avoided Afia. When a couple of friends decided to leave the party early, I immediately tagged along before Afia could spot me. It was a weird feeling of both embarrassment from my peers and guilt from Afia.

The next day as expected, I got a call from Afia. She wasn’t her usual chirpy self. Instead she began her tirade right away.
‘Stuck up bimbos. You are a snob too. What do you guys think of yourself. No one talked to me, no one danced with me…I damn care.’
I wanted to inform Afia that her perception of our world was heavily twisted. That here, people did not socialize at social gatherings. Mingling was reserved solely for familiar faces and conversations were reserved for gossip about mutual acquaintances. Everyone was to represent a surname here even if they were oblivious to that fact. Instead, I shot back. ‘What else did you expect Afia? This is how we are, this is how I am! You cant just become a part of Islamabad’s in-crowd by simply donning a designer T-shirt which must I remind you, came from me. And these boys aren’t your horny married men who will come running when you flirt with them, they have class. They have standards! They don’t date girls from Quaid-e-Azam University or Karachi Company! Did you even see the way you were dancing? You looked like a fool!’

Wont go into much detail but eventually we made peace. Our friendship however was now at an eternally different place. Irremediable. When each word, each thought, each gesture became formal, calculated and deliberate. Fear of being judged by the other during conversations, honesty and comfort now took a backseat. So we spoke only of what the other wanted to hear. Or what we thought they wanted to hear.

After my A-levels, I left for college. Afia and I stayed in touch through sporadic email exchanges. She was genuinely excited for me and wished it was her who was starting an all-expense-paid life in the West. I was glad that even though our little incident had tarnished our relationship’s innocence, it still did not discourage her from chasing her dreams. She still ‘met’ men with important names and notable job titles. A year later, when her agency offered to transfer her to their Germany office, she jumped at the opportunity. She was finally leaving a home and a life she had longed to flee from. Her emails now gushed with optimism. She loved her job, she had bought a cozy flat in Frankfurt and was even able to send home a big fat paycheck to her proud parents. I too was genuinely happy for her.

We met again last year in LA. I was going up for my 28th birthday. Afia had informed me that she too was going to be in LA for work and we instantly planned to meet up. Though we both had other plans, we decided to meet every night for 4am breakfasts in her room.

Meeting Afia was surreal. She looked nothing like I had last seen her. Dressed in a dapper Dolce & Gabana suit, she looked elegant and sure in her short, power bob. Her make-up meticulous, her Blahnik’s intimidating. She welcomed me with a big smile from the top of the lobby’s balustrade as if she was a princess and The Omni, her castle. I had arrived at her hotel after a night of clubbing, a brown paper bag in my hand full of greasy diner food.
‘You look marvelous darling! I love the transformation.’ She exclaimed as we hugged and kissed each other’s cheeks.
‘So do you?’ I reciprocated the compliment, meaning it.
‘I sure hope so. I paid a hefty sum for these.’ She grabbed her two round breasts ‘They don’t lie when they say beauty and perfection comes with a price and a plastic surgeon.’
We spent the next few hours catching up on life on her bed as we stuffed our faces with French fries soaked in Tobasco.
I couldn’t believe how much she had changed. She had become so European even in the way she dangled her clove cigarette. Not a single trace of Karachi Company in the same girl who had once fanaticized about this life. I sat before her in my tube-top and leather pants. How much we had both changed. The protected little daddy’s girl living life out of her shell, perfectly content with her modest bed and breakfast. My clothes worn more for sex appeal than the brand stitched meticulously on the back. Afia on the other hand was enjoying a stay in a five-star luxury hotel as she commented about how much she adored Europe and how unimpressed she was by America. Her parents had even managed to leave Karachi Company and were now living in a nice house thanks to their youngest daughter who had once decided to assume the role of both daughter and son. We had breakfast again a few times after that and then we even shared a limo to the airport together. She giggled lovingly at my NYU sweatshirt, ripped jeans and a backpack as I slid into the cab with her royal highness. Her three pairs of matching Burberry luggage, and her designer suit to travel in. Channel shades on her nose and a chiffon scarf wrapped around her neck as if she was on her way to high-tea at a country club instead of an international flight.
‘God you have become so American!’ she joked. ‘You always did have that hippie streak in you!’
‘God you have become so Euro’ I laughed back ‘You always had that diva streak in you.’
And so we celebrated the fact that we were both finally content in the women we had now become.

I will always admire Afia for everything she taught me. The brash and carefree lifestyle I live today is attributed to what I once learned from that ambitious girl in an orange T-shirt and knock-off jeans I met a long time ago outside a bowling alley. Afia taught me many things but most importantly, that one should always dare to dream. She is a walking example of a person who managed to leave her middle-class life to achieve what she had always set out to accomplish. Her past no longer matters because today, she rubs shoulders with the same people who may have never looked at her twice. When we are young some of us struggle some of us don’t have to. But come tomorrow, its all fair game and that certain classmate, that peculiar acquaintance and that boring cousin we thought would never amount to much may end up being the one we send our resumes to. Even in a nepotistic nation like Pakistan where mostly those born sucking on Cerelac in golden spoons are able to pay their way through a VIP ride.

I don’t know what Muzna or my friends from UCI are currently doing. I have a hunch they are all running a tired boutique bought by husbands and fathers. But I know very well what my Afia from Karachi Company is doing….or should I now say my Afia from Europe!

Homeless Hoes!!!

I once worked as a stripper. One of the many confessions which deem my past sordid enough to receive the barrage of emails from readers who tell me I’m going straight to hell. Well, at least I have guaranteed VIP access somewhere! And although I had initially wanted to write a piece on my experiences as a stripper, I decided to take a few steps back and write about the equally sordid odd jobs I did before my debut as Rosa the Latina Firecracker on a Pole. I don’t mean odd like waitress, sales clerk or even janitor. I mean jobs truly, truly odd like naked housecleaner (hence taking my clothes off for money was already on my resume when I applied for the stripper position), a masseuse specialized in the art of Indian Massage (don’t ask me what that is, I made it up because it paid my bills) and a nude art model (clearly my resume was stretching into a CV with such vast experience in nudity). But then I thought, I should probably take a minute to explain why a spoilt, rich daddy’s girl needed to work such odd jobs in the first place or any jobs for that matter. The simple answer would be because it was the summer of 2001 in the city of Philadelphia. One of the best summers of my life and my favorite cities in the world. But more specifically it was just one night that ignited it all. A night in May when I found myself homeless, penniless and clueless on the streets of Philly. Trying my best to not write as long-windedly as I talk, I’m going to write about just that particular night for now. But down, down boys, there will be plenty of opportunities to write about Padash’s work history in sleaze. Let me first lay the foundation of how it all fell into place. Shall we proceed?

Why Yes!

Sophomore year. It had ended just as perfectly as it had started. Life was great and I couldn’t have been happier. Great friends like Julie and Jenny, a great social life and boy did I look my best. Most of all, I was doing everything I had always dreamt of. Examples:
A) Club hopping: I now had a fake ID thanks to a cousin in Pakistan. Ghetto pieces of paper stapled together with the year 1977 printed next to random Urdu but what bouncer knows what a Pakistani driver’s license is supposed to look like. With protein shakes substituting brains, they dumbly stared at it for five minutes, turned it around a few times and then pulled away the velvet rope to beckon me in. They probably spent the next few minutes wondering if Pakistan was that small town near Texas.
B) Bed-Hopping: I was a beast on a journey of sexual exploration. I don’t really know how or why but I had begun to slowly loose weight in my A-levels. By the time I started college, I was loosing the freshman 15 rather than gaining it. Like a snake, I was shedding layer after layer of skin every week. Encouraged by people who noticed my body, I immediately enrolled in every fitness class on campus. Dance, yoga, spinning…you name it, I was there to sweat. Pretty soon, I was voted the top 5 hottest girls on campus by 5 of the 6 fraternities. The 6th frat voted me as the eighth hottest but then again the expertise of those judges was always questionable. Let’s just say that frat was rumored to be more interested in each other than girls. You know the kind: secretly think about jocks to perform for a cheerleader in bed. Anyway, those of you who have faithfully read my earlier columns know that I didn’t grow up with a lot of self esteem. I would never call myself ugly but I sure was 180 degrees away from sexy. Now all of a sudden, I was desired, chased and fantasized about. The feeling sure was addictive and I realized why friends like Aliya craved such attention. Walking into a room and being soaked in lustful stares. Noticing heads turn from the corner of your eye. Abrupt silence my compliments, curious whispers my praise. Sigh!

My plans for the summer were going to be just as perfect. It was all planned out. I was going to take a pottery class at Moore College of Art in Philadelphia and stay with my friend Donna and her boyfriend in his apartment on South Street. We would party and get drunk every night with underground drummers, guitarists and vocalists. Dad’s permission? Sure, I had to pull a few strings and dig deep into my bag of tricks but I had managed to accomplish challenges way more impossible than this. The fee for the class wasn’t the issue for my Baba but leaving his girl alone in Philly was a whole different story altogether. So first, I made sure to enroll in the class before he found out that my Khala who lived in Philly (hereby referred to as Khala 1) had already planned to leave for Pakistan a week after the class started. Once Baba found out, I acted just as surprised but made sure to share a feasible alternative (crafted long ago) before he even suggested a refund from Moore.
‘I can stay with my Muslim friend Aisha and her Muslim mother in their Muslim apartment in Philly!’
In truth, I knew no one called Aisha but the part of Aisha and her Muslim mother was played diligently by Donna and her older sister on the phone. It was quite easy really, the sister was instructed to begin every other sentence with the word “Akhee” and end with “Mash-a-Allah” and by the end of the phone call Baba was convinced that I was in safe hands.

A little about Donna’s boyfriend now. His name was Bo, a member of an underground band and sported just as many tattoos as piercings. A fact, which Donna’s catholic stepmother disapproved of. Still, the two had carried on a long-distance relationship ever since they had met and hooked up at a dive bar where his band had performed and Donna had immediately slid into the role of groupie and then girlfriend. She was now going to make up for the long-distance part of their relationship by spending three months living with him. She and I had known each other only a few days when she asked me to join her for a summer of debauchery and there was no way I could decline. It sounded like too much fun; live rent-free and be surrounded by cute boys in tight girl-jeans and dyed hair. Where do I sign up? To top it all off, I even had an offer from another friend to stop over in Paris for a week on my way home to Pakistan. She was a friend from A-levels who was going to be there at exactly the same time to study French history at the Sorbonne. She had painted a very enticing picture and I had immediately begun to fanaticize about eating crepes under the Arc de Triomphe, shopping at designer stores in Champs Elysees and hopefully meet a dashing Frenchman who would make love to me by the Seine. Enchante Monsieur!

I arrived in Philly exactly a week after finals. From 30th Street Station I headed straight to Khala 1’s house in Bucks County. I was only to spend a week there but it was going to be the longest week of my life. You see, Khala 1 and her family live a very different life from mine. They run a local Dunkin Donuts with another partner and often forego unaffordable luxuries that I view as basic necessities. Their two young daughters obediently gave up their room to my highness and while my Khala and her husband spent most of their day at the shop, I spent my days lazing around. I would crawl out of bed somewhere around noon; just in time for a leisurely shower, hop on the Septa train to attend my one-hour class at Moore and then meet up with Donna and Bo in Center City. Later, I would reluctantly bid them farewell as they headed off to a bar and arrive back to Khala 1’s house at a ‘decent’ time but always with a different shopping bag in my hand. I would barely eat the food in front and retire to my room with snobbery because I truly couldn’t wait for the week to end so I could move in with Donna and Bo and party without restrictions. Baba had given me a thousand bucks for the summer, which was more than enough considering I had no rent to pay and the class was already paid for. The grand would merely be used as spending cash for clothes, a few meals, cigarettes, drinks (though men usually bought us those) and club covers. For the week in Paris, he had arranged a friend to give me another 500 the minute I arrived at Charles de Gaulle airport. So yes dear readers you have probably realized in an instant what took me an entire summer to discover. Here, I thought I was living life on my own terms but truly I was just another brat living a wild life fully funded by a father. I had no idea about the price of independence but I was about to find out very soon.

On my last day at my Khala’s, I had accompanied her along to the mall so she could buy gifts for family members back home. Watching her count her dollars and cents seemed petty and annoying at first but then I realized, I had no idea what it was like to not live the cushioned life I was so used to. When we came across a booth which was giving out a measly 5 bucks for a 30-minute survey, my Khala jumped at the opportunity. I could not fathom why anyone would wait in line almost an hour for a 30-minute survey. All for a measly five bucks. But Khala was adamant on getting her money. Just the same way she always remained stubborn on taking the bus home rather than a cab. On the way home, I noticed her content smile and probed further.
“You won’t understand” she explained “All the money we make at the store goes straight to rent, groceries and other stuff. These opportunities are for my savings.”
“So how much have you managed to save?” I asked sarcastically. 5 bucks to me wasn’t anything worth saving when a Big Mac meal cost more than that.
“I don’t know, its not in a bank. Any time I get some extra cash not made at the store I put in an envelope and don’t count it for a year. It’s always a nice surprise at the end of the year.”
The conversation left me baffled. I now despised myself because it finally dawned on me how despicable I may have seemed to not only her but her kids as well. How I had thumbed my nose down at things, which were all they could afford. When we got home, I saw my Khala lift the mattress of her bed and squeeze the five bucks into a white envelope. True to her word, she made no effort to count the bills inside. I, on the other hand was dying to know.

The next afternoon, I snuck into her room and counted her savings: 1500 dollars. When the guilt ate at me in class that day, I made my spur-of-the-moment decisions which usually get me into a heap of trouble down the road. I have always reacted spontaneously instead of responding rationally, but that’s just the way I was raised. Raised to believe that my actions had little consequences because there were always others to clean up messes that I left behind. After class, I headed straight to the bank and cashed out a thousand bucks. With only a hundred dollars left in my account, I thought I would still be ok. Besides, I would just find a job and work like everyone else. How difficult could that be, right? When I got home, I stealthily snuck the cash into my Khala’s envelope and never told her about it to this day. But that night I sat back and watched her hum as she packed excitedly for a trip home. A trip they took every three years as a family. The same trip I took twice a year.

The next week was as much fun as I had imagined it to be. I slept on a couch in Bo’s apartment and even found a job as a server at an Indian restaurant where I worked five hours in the evenings for tips. Donna worked at a jewelry store while Bo continued his side-profession as a barista at a graffiti laden café to tide him over till his fantasy record deal came through. After ceramics, I would head straight to my restaurant job where I served greasy curry alongside a very nervous South Indian girl under the supervision of three very horny and desperate men with guts in their third trimester. I’m not going to lie, the job wasn’t as easy as I thought but I was determined. After work, I would meet up with Donna and we would walk over to Bo’s coffee shop to hang out and drink free caffeine on the house. Once he closed the shop, we would head off to bar hop on South Street. We would smoke and drink at every dive bar where aspiring - inked and pierced – musicians bought me drinks and then kissed me. I was on my punk rock kick those days, so all my men that summer were the full-body tattoo sort. Yum! Tips made at the restaurant usually took care of the 3am breakfasts and then somewhere before sunrise; we would retire back to the apartment where I would try to ignore the sound of Donna and her boyfriend making love all night in a very sadomasochistic way.

Perfect right? Sure. But, all good things come to an end and true to the idiom this perfect arrangement came crashing down just after a week. First, I quit my job on a whim. The three perverts always yelled at the other waitress and her inability to speak English so one day, I lost my temper, rushed to her defense and informed them that they only had our tits to thank for their lunch rush. I even tossed my apron at them and walked out with gusto because I had already made enough to last me for the rest of the month and a half. So I thought! Then, the next afternoon on my way to class I was confronted by an old Italian lady whose tone meant business. She informed me that Bo hadn’t paid rent in months and if she didn’t get a check by the end of the week his stuff would be on the street. If the threat of eviction wasn’t bad enough she added urgency to her demands with “And don’t think I don’t know about the pot ya all are growing up in that apartment. All I need to do is make one phone call to the police and have all your asses dropping soap in the lockup.” Ladies and Gentleman, problems in our perfect little world had officially begun. As much as I didn’t want to be chucked out on the street, I didn’t want to end up being deported for drug-dealing charges either. Immediately after class, I shared this interesting twist in our perfect summer plans with Donna. Just as shocked as I was, she headed straight home to confront Bo while I headed off to a date with a biker. When I arrived back to the apartment I was greeted by the noise of smashed vases, tossed furniture and hurled curses. I hadn’t expected Donna to react this way over some unpaid rent but when I walked in I realized that rent was no longer the issue. Apparently Donna had walked in to loan her beloved the rent money only to find him in bed with another woman. She assumed it was some skank but when her yelling and screaming was answered by a punch in the face by the woman it was also subsequently disclosed that shaved-head skank was the mother of Bo’s four year old son back in town to reconcile with her baby daddy. An hour later, Donna and I were sitting on our suitcases outside the apartment building. It was around ten at night and we had nowhere to go. We were now officially homeless. At least for the night.

As I frantically tried to chart out a plan for survival, Donna smoked and nursed her black eye. Our first stop was refuge at the Cheap Art Café: a filthy 24 hour diner which doubled as a rest-stop for trannys and hookers who took turns to charge their cell phones. The menus here were photocopied papers stapled together and the food was apparently as shoddy as the clientele. Still, thanks to a similar crisis earlier in the year on a botched spring break I had taken a lot of mental notes of my best friend Jenny’s dexterity in such situations. There will be more on her later but she was my best friend; a walking image of poise and class yet raised in the projects and thus one of the most streetwise women I had ever met. So that night I found myself in the dignified role of calm trouble-shooter while Donna relied on me as her savior. First things first, we needed a place to store our suitcases. We walked the few blocks past the working “girls” (term used loosely to include both biological girls and chicks with dicks) to the Greyhound station. This was pre-911 so both Donna and I were lucky enough to find lockers large enough to store our suitcases for a few quarters a night. Then, we had to find something to do. Immediately, I took Donna to a local bar where the patrons were very ‘sophisticated’ (euphemism for extremely old). We were to hang out at the bar till closing and enjoy drinks bought by Viagra-popping men who probably thought we too were for hire. As Donna spoke endlessly about how deeply hurt she was by Bo’s infidelity, I tuned her out because I had work to do. I conscientiously flirted with the geriatrics around me who flashed their smiling dentures. Luck came in the form of a skinny, gray-haired man who closely resembled the Q-tip I had waxed my ear earlier in the day with. He offered to take us to a local after-party and we agreed. An utterly dumb and risky move, I know, but it’s what we did that night after last call even though we realized we could have ended up chopped up in a garbage can. The after-party was at an old woman’s house, peculiar but lovingly referred to as “Mama” by the attendees. Drugs were plenty and the diversity of the partiers ranged from old trolls to young and busty blondes to even a few muscled and effeminate men in tank tops. Donna and I sat on a couch, trying not to appear too uncomfortable while everyone around us did lines and bumps with straws and dollar bills. By 5am, Q-tip man (now beet-red from all the cocaine) came over and whispered, “I have a room upstairs if you wanna go and hang out. Let me give you a backrub.” I smiled politely and told him I needed to freshen up first. Instead, I grabbed Donna and ran out of the back door. We laughed all the way back to 13th and Chestnut and then passed time by walking around and watching the “girls” work the streets. At one point when a man slowed his car for us, I leaned in and jokingly tried to pimp Donna out. It would be meaningful to know our going-rate in the market of whores. Donna stood in the back screaming “Padash, what the hell are you doing?”
“How much for her?” I asked as I noticed his wedding band.
“I want you.” The man replied.
“How much for her?”
“How much you want?”
“That’s not a real woman by the way.”
“I know I can tell….”
Still he was a decent man because when I declined his rate, he drove away. Once again, dear readers, I realize I was being very stupid. The things I have done in my past, I am amazed, I’m still alive.

We even tried to befriend an Asian tranny called China. She was fabulous and flawless. A pair of perfect Double D’s, which I envied, collagen lips perfect for….eating lollipops (you perverts) and a skirt which hugged her thighs and buttocks as if sewn onto her flesh. As we watched her hop in and out of cars, we admired her sass and wished to be flies on the wall when she did her ‘bidnizzz’. There was just something about her that enticed us women even; a je ne sais quoi of a sort that I wanted to compliment her on.
“You’re gorgeous honey!” I smiled at her as I smoked a cigarette sitting on the curb.
“You really are” Donna chimed in “You’re outfit, your make up its all perfect!”
“What ya all need to do is get the hell up out of my face before I cut ya all biotches…!” China snapped. I guess she wasn’t very appreciative of compliments. Needless to say, our friendship with the fiercest drag queen in Philly ended before it could even begin.

At 6am Donna and I headed back to the Cheap Art Café for breakfast. We now craved nothing but a warm bed to sleep on. Anything soft enough for us to curl into and sleep. A local cyber café where I sometimes checked my email on the weekends opened up at 8am so at 7:55, Donna and I were promptly waiting outside for the owner to let his first desperate customers in. Donna sat and watched as I navigated search engines for a local hostel. We found one just a few blocks away with no curfew, cheap bunk beds and both a nightly as well as monthly rate. We arrived the next minute and made our way gratefully to the 2-person dorm, smiling sleepily and sluggishly at backpackers heading out to sight-see the City of Brotherly Love. Once in the room, Donna and I didn’t say much to each other. We just immediately stripped down to our underwear and curled up on our $18.99-a-night beds to fall asleep.

It was way past sundown when we woke up again. To rid that icky feeling of waking up in the dark, we instantly resumed the evening’s plans. Brought back our suitcases to the room, showered, changed and headed off to a bar. Good distraction from problems at hand by surrounding ourselves with liquor and drunks. The good thing was that we didn’t have to leave the room till the next morning so at least we had a place to return to that night.

“What are we going to do?” I asked Donna at the bar. She casually flicked her cigarette, sipped her drink and shrugged that she was going to head back to her father’s house in Delaware for the summer. Although she despised her stepmother and they had always hated her boyfriend but her dreams of a fun summer had somehow perished overnight. Giving up was just that easy for her. I was disappointed, irked, many things but not surprised. You see, Donna was a perfect example of the majority of students that I went to college with. Self proclaimed hippies who wished they were born in the sixties where drugs and sex were free and limitless. They reincarnated the times by adorning tie-dye, barely bathing, rereading highlighted passages from Kerouac and Kafka, quoting Ginsberg and Burroughs, getting stoned, liquored and hoping that they too were on an endless journey of discovery like the Beats. Only when you looked closer you realized, these so-called rebels were all privileged youth of American suburbia; private-schooled and now in the confines of a fully funded liberal arts bubble where words like “deconstruct”, “gender”, “hegemony” and “sexuality” consoled them that their defiant brains were actually being intellectually stimulated against the norm. Their futures, just as predictable as their present. After graduation, they were probably going to backpack across Europe; hostelling, couch surfing, dropping acid and sleeping with strangers. After six-month of unsuccessful self-reflection funded by Daddy Dearest they would finally accept that they couldn’t after all “beat the system” or “damn the man.” Almost immediately, they would trade in their tie-dye for white coats and follow their fathers footsteps to medical school and a six figure salary. Communists and Socialists would then become republicans. The change they were to make in the world now reduced to annual checks to ‘bandwagon’ philanthropy.

All exactly like me! I too now realized that as much as I harped and debated about leaving home to ‘discover the world’, ‘find myself’ and ‘live life on my own terms’; my argued independence and the above clichés were only reliant on Baba’s wealth. On my own, I couldn’t move a muscle. However, unlike Donna and my friends, I sure was going to try. I would be damned if I didn’t take this situation as a challenge and prove to myself that I could do it too. Especially when Donna casually remarked
“It’s not that bad Padash, what are you worried about? Just call your dad and he will immediately put you up in some place fancy hotel on Rittenhouse square. If that doesn’t work, just drop that stupid class, get on a plane and head back home early.”
I smirked and simply kept smoking. Neither were options for me. Option A meant confessing to my dad that I had lied and deceived him (I just wasn’t read to do that) and then Option B…well it meant the same thing. I was also invested in that trip to Paris at the end of the next month. Greed and selfishness don’t fade overnight!

When we got back to the hostel, Donna immediately met a beautiful but unkempt Dutch boy. By now, all the hostellers had gathered around the courtyard after a day of sightseeing to busy themselves with desperate attempts of flirtation with each other in broken English. For once, I wasn’t in the mood for men even though a group of boys insisted – almost with desperation – for me to join them for another beer. Yaar, I had the pick of Europe from Germany, France, Holland even an Irish lad but I still excused myself and retired to my room because I had other things on my mind.
“Come on, these boys are cute! Free beer, free weed, cute men…what else do we want? Worrying wont solve anything, might as well enjoy our last night here.” Donna tried to convince me and she did have a point.
“I really do need to clear my head and come up with a plan for next month. Room service at the Hotel Sofitel or going back to Pakistan early are not viable options for me. You have fun!” I still declined.

For the first few hours, I read in the room to distract myself. Later I walked back to the courtyard, which was now empty, to smoke a cigarette. Strangers from around the world were probably now exploring each other’s bodies on bunk beds. I, one the other hand wanted to avail this sudden renewed sense of strength and courage. Maybe I could do it. Maybe I could still spend most of summer here. Donna had needed me to save us the whole night and I had succeeded. That proved that I could be tough enough to survive here on my own without money. Besides, I had no one to blame but myself. I had made my bed and it was time to lay in it, even if it cost 20 bucks a night. So I went to the front desk, pulled out my check-card and extended my stay for the rest of the week. I was now down to a measly fifty bucks. That meant I had to find a job again to pay for my weekly accommodation. Whatever it took, I was ready.

And yes my dear readers, everything worked out in the end. I survived. Of course, finding another job at a restaurant was impossible because all the high-schools kids had snatched those up but to pay for my bed at the hostel each week, I had to think of something quick. Unless I wanted to end up homeless on the street again fighting over clients with China. And that my friends is how I became a naked housecleaner, an Indian Massage therapist and nude art model for the summer. With such truly odd jobs, I not only managed to pay for lodging but also my meals, septa tokens and club covers. In fact, I even managed to save up over a thousand that summer.

How and what, you ask? Well, I guess that can be explained in my next piece. For now, be assured, that after that night of homelessness in Philly, I stuck it through till the end. One tough biotch, aint I! Sure, I’m lucky the craigslist killer wasn’t going to med school at Upenn because, then, my next piece wouldn’t have a happy ending. I would be a robbed and left to die Indian masseuse.

The most important thing is that certain night and the summer that followed, shaped the person I am today. Strong, determined, fearless! It prepared me to know that fleeing my parent’s nest to discover the world is not the bed of roses I had imagined it to be. It came with a heavy price and that summer wasn’t the only time I paid it, but I paid it successfully each time. And that, my friends is what matters!