an itinerant observer

Mehmet was a no-nonsense kind of guy, and he made that very clear from the get-go. When I first met him, I liked that about him, not quite knowing why.   “No smoking inside the cabin; no flushing of toilet paper down the WC; no air-conditioning past 10 PM unless you are willing to pay extra...." The instructions he rapped out to me in the sailboat’s cabin, in lieu of introductions or pleasantries, in heavily accented, broken English, were akin to a machine gun’s staccato. That was not surprising given he used to captain the Turkish battleship Ottoturk, during his 30s and 40s. Opting for the lighter workload and better lifestyle, he had become captain of the much smaller sailboat Sofya. I spent three days on Sofya, the summer she sailed me across Turkey’s southern coastline, along the Mediterranean. The time I spent with Mehmet, getting to know him, was a reacquaintance with myself.   This is his story.   ******************** Mehmet was rugge...

Earlier this year an unanticipated event occurred.  The event was coined “To Innovation and Beyond” and was hosted at Aga Khan University.  This unprecedented collaboration between Aga Khan University and Habib University  brought together students of Science and Engineering with Students of Medical Sciences. The event essentially saw problems identified by the Final Year Science and Engineering students of Habib University that needed medical expertise to move forward. These problems mostly began as classroom projects, where the students aimed to solve real-world healthcare problems but lacked the knowledge that the students and practitioners of medical science could offer. An event of this magnitude did not just come about overnight. There was a devoted core team behind the effort. From Habib University this dedication was led by Dr. Waqar Saleem, Dr. Saleha Raza, and Mr. Jawwad Farid. The enthusiastic team from AKU consisted of three faculty members Drs. Asad ...

It’s Sunday morning and I’m lost in the graveyard, again. Although I’ve been here several times now, over the past month or so, the disorderliness of graves confounds my ability to find the one I seek. I’m ready to kick myself, again, for I am unable to adroitly navigate this graveyard. I mean how many graveyards does one get to recurrently visit in one’s lifetime? Can’t be several. Being too much of a male about figuring out directions on one’s own, or perhaps just being stubborn, plain and simple, I refuse to ask the grave digger-cum-gardener for guidance.    “How many times will you have to come here before the track becomes as familiar to you as the lines on your palms?” I ask myself, somewhat rhetorically. I backtrack to where the narrow excuse of a path splits; and this time I make a left turn, towards the boundary wall of the cemetery, in hopes of finding that grave. I read several names, dates of birth, dates of death, and of course epitaphs, on tombst...

I am a Medical Officer leading a team of two students, a nurse, and an in-house doctor for what seems to be a typical ward round. We are seeing some patients that have just been moved under the care of our team in an Oncology unit. While on round, one of my patients needs the nurse, who promptly leaves to attend to the call. As we move on, the students also leave for a class. The in-house doctor soon requests leave as well. I'm beginning to take all this as a sign of something insightful to come. I am left to see the next patient by myself. I see her as any another patient who needs medical attention until we get into a conversation that is both remarkable and, as I foresaw my day to be, insightful. In a mere 45 minutes, my encounter with this patient will leave an extraordinary impact on the way I interact with other patients. And so the 45 minutes begin... I inquire about her well-being and get a vague response from her. As I'm taking notes in her file, she br...

It was a lazy Sunday afternoon when I came across the store. “Ai’s Cream!” the banner outside screamed in bold red letters. Scrawled underneath was illegible (to me) text 诶 艾 ' 娜 西艾伊 诶 , also in bold red, that I assumed referred to the English above it. There was no way for me to confirm it.  But, I was intrigued all the same. The name, as well as the store, seemed to be an anomaly in Hikkaduwa, the well-known beach resort along the southwestern coast of Sri Lanka, where I was sojourning for a week. Perhaps the Chinese have infiltrated Sri Lanka too, I mused. I had been told by my much better half that there were two reasons for being in Hikkaduwa then: (i) For Relaxation and Rehabilitation (or R and R, to be hip); (ii) Our friends accompanying us (or us them); in fact, they were the ones who had decided the itinerary.  Also, worth mentioning here is that it was a self-imposed vacation away from home, kids and work - an ‘away vacation’ happening a second time ...