With Pakistan evicting some 600,000 Afghan refugees by the end of this year alone, this song, sung by Naghma in 2011 (I think?), is so real and relevant it’s heartbreaking. Song is at the bottom of the lyrics. The Pashto is in Green (one of my favorite colors, yay!). Immense thanks to T. A. S. for helping with translation of a couple of lines/words I was struggling with.
Below are the many different ways to address the person you love – in Pashto. Needless to say, I’m missing many words, so please free to suggest more. These are the ones I use with my nephews and niece. Yes, they’re not necessarily or only for someone you love romantically. They can apply to anyone. My personal favorite one to use with my (girl) friends is “jaanaan”; my personal favorites […]
I’m pasting the below from the old blog. Click here to read the comments there; they might be useful for a better understanding of this dialect business. A good Formspring question! Who says Peshawar and who says Pekhawar? It seems some accents in Pashto say the -sh- as -kh- like I heard a song with dushman as dukhman. Tell us about Pashto dialects/accents 🙂 Thanks. There are two (main) dialects […]
On refusing to give your kids names in your language and instead giving them Arabic ones (nothing against this – I’ve a point; read on, please) because of the way your language is structured and your “pagan/haram/backward” language turns “proper, beautiful Islamic” (read: Arabic) names into wrong ones. Because ignorance and self-hatred and politics and minority statuses and so on. There’s a complicated history of the status of Pashto (and […]
I’m pasting the below from the old blog (you may click for the comments – some interesting stuff). I have not read some of these books and would love any and all opinions on them. P.S. I’d like for Pukhtuns/Afghans to write novels set in the Fatherland, folks. Seriously, white folks won’t tire of writing about us… I mean, look at the following list. Look at the orientalist attitudes so […]
This is going to be a series, and I am not going to promise it’ll be as regular as I’d like it to be. I’ve asked several Pashtun females to share their online experiences with me for this series — whatever stories they’d like to share, however, detailed or un-detailed, whether they use their real name or fake names or remain anonymous, whether they choose to expose the men and […]
Pasting the following brief intro to Samar Minallah from my old blog: Continuing our discussion on Pashtun leaders, both past and contemporary, we present to you – – – Samar Minallah. I’ve been meaning to write about her for over a year, but I think she’s so important that I’m afraid of not introducing her fairly enough. So please remember that these biographies of Pashtun leaders are intended to be […]
I’ve mentioned before that I’ve been working with Afghan refugees (and non-refugees here and there, too), translating for them for different things. Apparently, there’s a strong Afghan community here, most coming in as refugees. When it comes to Pashtuns, I prefer the ones of Afghanistan to those of Pakistan. In my experience, however limited, the Afghan Pashtuns are more willing to re-adjust to new environments, far more willing to learn […]
I almost feel bad for writing this because I think Pakistan’s choice to expel Afghan refugees out of the area is merely a clever tactic to divert people’s attention from the real problem facing Pakistan – militancy and what just happened in Peshawar. It thinks (and it looks like it’s right) that we are a stupid, mindless breed of people and will fall for their lie that our problems exist […]
Freedom from the Forbidden 