Finding my voice

We were asked to write in class.

How would you describe yourself?

Flawed. Patient. Hopeful.

How has this semester been like for you?

This semester I am learning how to not lose hope. Life has been kind but I have struggled with a growing disillusionment with the way the world works. The coursework has forced me to return to writing and believing that words can and do matter. I have finally arrived at a placed where I find peace in being alone and am trusting myself with my choices.

Share your influences.

Roald Dahl

Joanne Kathleen Rowling 

Dystopian fiction (e.g. Ender's Game)

Democracy Now!

Karachi

War movies (e.g. Grave of the Fireflies)

Documentaries

Write without thinking.

Force. He says to not force the words. But how I force what I dare not even touch. My words are not tangible; I cannot hold them, embrace them, or stroke their edges. I can only see them appear on a page. Like scattered raindrops inking the white bank age, except they are not as transparent. They carry a blueness that resembles sadness. I carry the words. I carry the sadness. I am asked to unload it onto the page.

beginning-middle-end

In the last week of March, our focus was on getting the intro right. We had some examples to build on and were pitched with ideas in order to get started with writing our own intros.

From the reporting that has been published on Pakistan Ink so far, I've picked out a few which I really like:

1. Hassan's story - "In Pindi Drain, A Search for Scrap Finds Dignity"
2. Hajrah's story - "Balochistan Talk Cancelled: LUMS Student Body Stands Firm for Academic Freedom"
3. Sohaib's opinion piece - "Remembering the Tragedy: the 2009 attack on the Sri Lankan Team"

What I find interesting about each of these openings is that they trust their reader's intelligence and imagination. Instead of cashing in on sensational openings, these writers have poised the articles in a way that asks questions of the reader. Sana, too, began with a similar set of questions in her piece. 

In class we discussed a classic example by The Miami Herald's Edna Buchanan. Before proceeding to read the rest of the contents of the story, all of us had speculated about Gary Robinson and why on earth was the man hungry on the day he died. What was his hunger for? Did his hunger and his death correlate? How did he die? Why does his hunger matter if he has died? How do we know he was hungry?

Questions like these led us to share possibilities and very few of them came even close to what the reality was. It sort of reminded me of the epitaph I had written in Grade XI, for my Literature in English class. If you really want to them, they are still available here: "Students' Writing Epitaphs". The link redirects you to where a part of me still resides.