Looking for a village to call my own
This story was first featured here
Every good story starts a long time ago in a far away land. Mine started in a land called Pakistan. A land enriched in pride and passion. I later moved to United States and thus created a dual identity. It wasn’t until later in my life as I started to tell stories that I realized the richness of life I had experienced.
Pakistan was a place where passion ruled everything. Independence day called for flags on every corner. People prayed with passion, loved with it, and fought with it. Options for study were practical and so either you became an engineer, businessman or a doctor. When I arrived in LA I realized that such restraints didn’t exist. I was in a land of Rock and Roll, where ideas held more sway than practical thought.
As I freed myself from the constraints of practical thinking, I realized that being a storyteller was my path. Recalling my grandmothers tales from my youth, I started to write. As I wrote and later filmed, I started to find a compromise in my dual identity. A boy who had grown up watching cricket, going to elaborate weddings, and the teenager that was captive to classic rock and the car culture of LA started to see eye to eye. But it wasn’t until later that I would realize what all this meant.
After college I started to travel across the world. Soon, I started to not only let go of my dual identity but I found myself without borders, belonging to every town I entered. Weather it was a small town on the coast of Italy where I was welcomed with a sandwich at 3AM or Paris where strangers became friends as we shot a short film.
In my travels I started to realize that while we are vastly different, we are all more similar. We all have the same red blood running through our veins. We cry when we are sad and we laugh when we are happy. Being a human didn’t change no matter what culture I visited. So why do we have prejudices based on skin color, sexual orientation and other nonsensical things. Religion became a big question mark as I traversed through Muslim, Hindu, Christian lands. There were moments I sat back and realized that prayers were a unifying human expression, prayers were beautiful, and religions never instilled hatred. Then why are we so divided?
I found that my identity as a storyteller and a world citizen transcended all others. My films became a reflection of the global identity that I encountered. Traveling taught me to understand the world in a deeper more meaningful way. It erased the boundaries others had drawn for me. When you carry your home with your every footstep all around you are your neighbors and every home is a part of your village.