Bhai, some good news at last! I’ve heard, urrhti urrhti, kay mareez economy is getting better. It’s being wheeled out of the ICU and going to a general ward. Gulu cose drip is still dripping, but everyone’s agreeing kay signs and systems are all hopeful.

Suna hai, IMF is giving us another injection to type us over until the next injection. I hope so their injections are better than my Covid ka injection, because after getting four of those injections, I still got another about of sarrhial Covid. I’m sure kay IMF kay injections are not like my do number kay Covid injections, but still, let’s hope so we don’t get another about of poverty after this injection. Fingers crossed, baba.

And, apparently, Saudis have promised to invest five billions in us. Pehlay tau, I hope so the investment is in dollars, or better still pounds, and not in becharay rupees and, second, I hope so it is going to be in malls and motorways and airports, not in madrassas and mullahs and abayas, like they’ve been for these many decades.

And also, while they’re giving, tau please, instead of lectures and sermons, could they also give us some Beyonce kay concerts and Messy kay matches and Formula One ki races, like they’ve decided to give themselves? We would also like. Haan.

Good news on the economic front makes Butterfly reminisce about the good old days

Also, we did sullah with the Iranians? Haw! After all these years of kutti. The Iranian PM came. And stayed for three whole days, ghulloing milloing and making nice. They say that the visit was also for our economic recovery. Guvmunt gave local holiday in Karachi and Lahore so, as Janoo says, businesses could close and loose millions to celebrate the aanay vaala economic bloom.

Mummy says back in the sleeveless, beehive days of the ’60s and ’70s, before we donned abayas and grew beards, we used to be besties with the Iranians. Raza Shah and Queen Farah Deeba used to come every year for the Horse and Cattle Show in Lahore. And she used to wear YSL ki frocks and Dior ki hats shats. With bear legs! Imagine! Fifty years ago!

And everyone would come to see them and clap as their cars went by and flutter jhandas of Pak-Iran dosti and people would wave and not send her death threats on Facebook for wearing kaffir clothes or tell her that her nikaah was broken, because she beared her legs in front of Muslim men.

And visiting Tehran was like going to Paris. All the latest fashions you saw there and people sitting in cafes smoking shoking and dancing in clubs and speaking French and waving their hankies gaily and saying ‘Au reservoir’ when they drove off in their open-topped cars. Just like the real French.

And aur tau aur, even in Kabul, where Mummy-Daddy went on a driving holiday in their Chevrolet with Aunty Pussy and Uncle Cock-Up back in the early ’70s, there were Afghan girls with jeans and bobs, strolling about in universities. And sitting on the grass and discussing politics vaghera with boys. Socho zara! And what’s more, you could go in a car all the way there and all the way back without getting shot, without getting kidnapped and without being killed. Tabahi, no?

You must have noted that I’ve been saying kay suna hai about our soon-to-be economic recovery, because, to tell you the truth, dekha tau nahin hai. It’s like all those olden times ki stories of miracles. You believe because you believe.

Economists are also predicating that inflation is going to come down to 13 percent only but, meanwhiles, we’ve got to grin and bare it at 25 percent. So, I’m grinning and baring, because I’m so bored of sighing and crying. And, in any case, 25 is better than 40! Even my Class Seven ki maths tells me that.

Aur kya news hai? You know, the Queen marhooma, who wasn’t allowed to speak because she wasn’t a politician, used to ‘talk’ through her clothes choices. Like, when she went to Europe before the Brexit vote, she wore a blue hat with yellow flowers (same to same colours as the EW jhanda) to say, kay bhai, I’m a ‘Remainer’ even if that shoda Boris isn’t.

And Melania dressed as a white hunter from Out of Africa, when she went on an official tour to Kenya, to say kay you might think you’re independent and all, but don’t forget I’m still your sardarni.

Haan, so Maryam Nawaz attended some function in a policewoman ka fancy dress. I hope so it didn’t mean that she’s now going to give danda to us all. Fingers crossed, baba.

Published in Dawn, EOS, May 5th, 2024