Let’s start from the beginning. I am a Pakistani-American. I was born in Manhattan, that makes me a US Citizen, and then when I was about 3 my family moved to Lahore. Our time there was brief and I don’t remember much on account of me being 4 years old but I have a few memories such as being the feel of my mother’s favourite Persian rug against my tingling feet as she suggested I walk to and from our 2007 box TV to get rid of my pins and needles. But my earliest formative memories were made in Bangkok, where my family moved when I was just 5 years old. I grew up attending one of the huge international schools in South-East Asia. My friends were from all over and just like me, third culture kids whose parents happened to land in Bangkok. I was fortunate enough to travel around South-East Asia and Thailand, go to elephant preserves in Chiang Mai or relax by the beach in Koh Phi Phi or Koh Lanta. At least once a week would buy fresh guava and chicken skewers and sticky rice from the friendly vendor across the street and play with her adopted street dog who she affectionately dubbed Lemon for the yellow hue of his coat. I’d excitedly should “เร็ว เร็ว” (faster, faster) at the motorcycle taxi driver who was taking me home to Sukhumvit Soi 34 after catching a movie at emporium mall with my friends. I shiver a little bit thinking about the incredibly lax safety procedures, but hey I’m still in one piece. My days were filled with torrential rains, Songkran celebrations, and incredibly bright colored taxis (my personal favourites were the half yellow half pink ones). IIt was the life. It was only when I moved to Westchester, New York at the age of 15 that I began to give my “identity” any sort of real thought. In Bangkok everyone was like me, even if we looked different, they may have been Japanese-Canadian or Burmese-French, they too were Third Culture Kids—we had that shared experience. But in New York I was confronted with the reality that, although I look like everyone else at my predominantly White Jewish School, we’ve lived vastly different cultural stories. And so I began solidifying my “self”. I’m short like my mom and got curly hair from my Jewish dad, I got my green eyes from Mustafa mamoo, and pale complexion from my grandmother. Although my mother is from a Shia Muslim family and my father is ethnically Ashkenazi Jewish my childhood wasn’t colored by either religion. I didn’t celebrate any religious traditions so I choose to call myself an agnostic. I’m not sure exactly what I bring to this course, a weird mish-mash of my cultural experiences. I bring a view that’s mostly influenced by central South-East Asia and the very large international community in Bangkok.
