Two years back Seema Boesky, a well-known American, published a story in The Wag Magazine giving her impressions of her several meetings and discussion with the Pakistani Royal Couple regarding the sale of a penthouse apartment in Belair Luxury Complex located in Manhattan, New York.
She termed the said apartment as a jinxed apartment as all its previous buyers were killed in mysterious circumstances. Like the myth of Friday 13th, Western society is plagued with superstitions and Ms. Boesky's remarks could be a chain of a similar thought process.
Whether jinxed or cursed, nothing has adversely affected the market value of the apartment or its neighborhood.
524-E, 72nd St. Manhattan, New York 10021.
Belair Luxury Apartments Imagine the prices of these luxury precious apartments where only millionaires dare to live. One bedroom apartment in the said 183-apartments residential complex situated on 524-E, 72nd St, the posh eastern side of Manhattan, NY 10021, is currently for sale and the asking price is US $ 899,000.
A penthouse apartment similar to the one owned by Pakistani royals in the same Belair Luxury Apartments, Apt. # PH-1A, was sold on June 17, 2008 for $ 3,313,500. Pakistani couple purchased a penthouse next to this apartment overlooking the East River at a time when the real estate market was red hot and booming. The market has slipped down by 30% since. The royal couple must have paid a price much above this level and the exact price can be found from the New York County office in Manhattan where the property is located.
Myths aside, standing in the nearby Roosevelt Island one can distinctly see a particular apartment different from the others in many ways. A Pakistani with "back-home" feelings can better appreciate the distinction of the maroon granitedressed penthouse and the message it radiates like `how loyal to their royals are the people of Pakistan'.
They toil in the sizzling heat of the summer, they brave bomb-blasts, they face ruthless dictators, they stand for hours for a bag of flour and get bruised or sometimes killed in the queue, they run from pillar to post for a kilo of sugar, they murder their siblings for want of food, they live without any medical care, they send their children to madrassas as they can't afford schooling, they live in abstract darkness due to power load-shedding, they lack shelter or live in shanty hovels But they have still managed to keep their royals in high spirits by affording them luxurious living in habitats costing over three million dollars.
The woes of Pakistani poor souls are not over. They are now comforting another royal in the heart of London, not far from Marble Arch and Oxford Street on the Edgware Road. Oh poor spineless subjects! The land of the pure was not librated for you but for a chosen few.
