Change Can Be Dangerous
By Syed Kamran Hashmi
Westfield, IN
Let us walk into a modern house located in an affluent neighborhood of Pakistan. Its modular contemporary design catches your attention at the first sight: walls plastered with grey-brown rocks, shiny pieces of marble punctuated in between, an arch running across the facade, and a terrace on the first floor looking over the street. The combination of dark and light tones, neat and clean surrounding, and the manicured yards enhance the beauty of the house while the stillness and silence of the colony adds to its mystery, making you wonder about the people living inside. The whole structure is covered by a boundary wall that converges at a large garage door, the metallic beast built by local craftsmen after spending hours to figure out its design, its color, and its compatibility with the rest of the architecture.
Walking past the covered yet open garage, let us get into the house. Press the entry door with a gentle push of your little finger and it will swing open without a screech, squeak or a squawk as if it is not made up of solid wood fixed with metallic hinges but soft rubber. Step into the foyer and watch its neat imported tile floor shining like a mirror, a chandelier hanging on top. Look at the drawing room on one side, tufted formal sofas covered with luxuries cushions, walls embellished with hand-textured paints, a hand-woven rug stretched from one corner to the other. The drawing room sits across a giant television lounge where a large flat screen monster faces you, it is surrounded by a casual sectional, their colors coordinated. Get inside the family room and turn again where a European design kitchen awaits you with its imported stainless steel appliances, granite counter tops, tiled back splash and rust-proof German faucets.
At the farther end of the kitchen, there is a door, a small flimsy figure, which allows you to step out into the back alley of the house. There, you will see a narrow, old and rusted spiral stairs. Climb it up. With every movement it will cry so hard and sway so much that you will feel it is going to crumble down any moment. If you are able to make it to the top, at the second floor a dirty metal door mocks your presence. As opposed to the main entrance, this one opens with a loud thud followed by a shrilling yelp which continues till the door stops moving. The room inside is dirty, small, dark and crammed with children. There are not as many pieces of furniture in this places as many kids rolling on the floor, their clothes dirty, their nose runny, their hair rusty and tousled.
A small burner stands on its corner, an old Indian style bathroom is tucked behind it, a tube light flickering on the wall. Technically speaking, the walls are painted but instead of white they look gray, or yellow, both because of low quality and poor maintenance. The floors too are plastered with cement, cheap marble chips embedded inside. The room gets hotter from the outside temperature in summer and colder in winter. In other words, it burns in summer like an oven and freezes like a refrigerator in winter. How else do you think a servant quarter should be finished?
Although, it’s the same house it portrays the picture of two different worlds stacked upon each other, and even though their physical distance is minimal the two of them are poles apart. Their difference is so stark that you feel as if you have a travelled in time, entered a new universe and are looking at aliens, not humans. It’s a world of ignorance and poverty, where good food only means what has been left over by the people downstairs and good education means the ability to read the newspaper, write names and count basic numbers.
If you talk to the owners, people like you and me, professionals, middle class, educated, they will tell you, on a serious note how they help the whole family by allowing them to stay in the same house. They say the ‘help’ does not have to pay the rent or the electricity bills, no expenditures for gas or water either. On top, most of the times the whole family eats from our groceries. They are protected and well cared for. Can a job provide more perks than these? To me, it’s like asking a circus animal how carefree his or her life is in the studio, a life full of luxuries and privileges where one does not have to worry about being hunted down by the beasts.
Furthermore, they will tell you how important it is for the state to provide justice to everyone. That the ideals of education and social welfare cannot be ignored. However, the welfare of people living in the same house carries an entirely different meaning for them. Similarly, with equality and justice, they mean they should get the same rights as the Prime Minister, but somehow the rights of the servants are not included in this transformation. The picture of better Pakistan is selfishly focused to cater their needs, their shortcomings and their insecurities. It’s a picture in which the ultra-rich and powerful are stripped of their current privileges and are either tried for corruption or sent to jail, their powers transferred to the middle class only.
They cannot imagine a little improvement in our justice system, a step towards economic independence, will be detrimental to their lifestyles. People who they treat as slaves, the circus animals, will be first set free to get education and political representation. So, if they want their maid to wash their clothes, clean their house, iron their shirts, make their bed, feed their kids and bathe their dog, they must pray things never change
