Blogs

Aal Is Vel It is in an aircraft 28,000 feet in the air that I find out a COVID-19 test is required to be allowed back to Mumbai from Kolkata tomorrow. The enlightened medical experts in the state of Maharashtra deem it necessary for ‘outsiders’ within India to have a piece of paper stating I…

When the first reports of Afghan families selling or marrying their adolescent daughters for food or debt settlement flashed up on my TV, I was somewhat skeptical. Widely followed mainstream media outlets Inc., especially western, have in the past covered such headlines for sensationalism, exaggeration, and profit, especially when it is out of poor and…

Who Cares It’s Deepawali, or Diwali, the festival of lights for almost 1.5 billion people of the world population, almost 15% of us. I remember it as a festive period growing up in Tanzania where we joined our Hindu friends in lighting up firecrackers and eating delicious sweetmeats full of ghee and sugar. Our neighbors…

Ulfat – Zanzibar I meet Ulfat some three years ago, in her grandmother’s pitiful house somewhere in Zanzibar. It has taken me a ten-minute walk in waterlogged muddy lanes to reach her house. My shoes are soggy with muddy water, and they make a rude sound as I walk. Good thing I am wearing shorts,…

Have Sheesha, Will Smoke Emirates flight EK 726 from Dar es Salaam to Dubai is almost full. The crew (most of them) look like human beings now, unlike recently, when they donned the awful-looking COVID protective gear as if some unconvincing aliens from another world. The flight takes off and lands on time with Emirates…

Yes, I Am Mad The die is cast. The impossible has happened. My nightmare is real. I have navigated through some pretty turbulent airs in my life and been through some tough situations. Some life-threatening as well. This event is unique, however, and no matter where I turn and what rationale I try to use…

Mshenzi – Uncivilized Mjeenga – Illiterate I’ve just finished my early morning exercise routine and am looking forward to a robust cup of Tanzanian coffee and skin-still-on roasted cashews – khorosho (closest taste to this probably after death. In janna?) when my cellphone rudely farts. It’s one more maddening WhatsApp video forwards of the rites…

This Blog was published in 2018 – I rerun it now due to the current events in Afghanistan. It’ll give you an insight into the challenges that CAI personnel went through in intricately building up the current compliant infrastructure that is now teetering. I have visited Afghanistan 41 times since 2007. The number of CAI…

I and fellow Trustees Shaida Hussain and Sohail are traveling to Sierra Leone, all the way to the west coast of Africa, to hand over a CAI donor-sponsored school to a poor community. Since I’m time-constrained with travel, I thought I’d repost this entertaining – to me – Blog, initially published in January 2017 again,…

There was a time in my adult life when I had to fret about keeping my travel itinerary straight. Where am I going next? Have I have met all the visa requirements? Will I make the connecting flights without bursting my hernia? Is the fare within my increasingly stretched budget? Now, I worry about all…

An Eventful Morning Walk I do a brisk seventy-five minutes (approximately four miles) walk after morning salaat four times a week here in Dar es Salaam. It is quite a pleasant walk, especially now, the non-summer days of East Africa, when the mornings and late evenings are super pleasant. Two refreshing cups of Swahili kahwa…

Mullah Mchungu is in a sour, combative mood. He sits on his ancient recliner provocatively clutching his walking cane, glaring at me through newly acquired eyeglasses that look as antique as the guy himself. This and the goofy, dazzlingly white, permanently smiling dentures give him a comic demeanor. I’m not sure if I should be…

Maaha Zainab, my 20-year-old is visiting from Orlando; it’s her second visit to Tanzania after a gap of some ten years. She takes on to the country like a thirsty bee to elephant dung in the dry season, when water is sparse and elephant dung offers abundant moisture. These bees then go on to pollinate…

CAI has many donors who prefer to remain to be anonymous, staying on the sidelines but stepping in when there is a cash crunch to see a project through. These are people, some of whom I have not met, ever, drawn to help CAI projects after reading my Blogs or looking at the photos/videos of…

Moosa And Me – A Reunion Forty-eight years ago, when I am sixteen, Moosa comes into my family’s life. He, too is sixteen, a young, healthy, and strong African lad. He works as a house boy at home and does what is told with a ready smile. Since we are the same age, we kid…