Idiomatic lessons!!

By Sidra Rizvi

News values, views values, the retarded mind of Shakespeare, the sad life of Mirza Galib, the struggle of Sir Sayed Ahmad Khan etc are generally the topics planned out for the students of Mass Communication in their first two years. However if the heading of my blog makes you think I learnt this in my two years here you are sadly mistaken.

The lessons that I have learnt are far more important and beneficial in real life than the quadratic equations that I am learning now can ever hope to teach me.

Back in the college days when we were faced with a choice of making a human out of the monkeys we were then, I found myself wondering which career to adopt. Journalism popped up in my head as a first option. ‘If you want to do Mass Communication, KU is the best place’ a teacher told me when I voiced my opinion. When she left a concerned friend pulled me to the corner and said ‘Sidra please don’t go there. My sister is there and her friends talk about new recipes of making “daal”’.

So braced for the worst I entered this alien world of Karachi University. Every woman that I saw, I asked myself, does she make ‘daal’ or is she as lazy at home as I am. But lesson # 1 was: ‘do not judge a book by its cover’.

Even though I came with a very open mind I was lucky enough to meet some of the most amazing people I have ever come across. I easily blended in with them and with a nod of my head tossed away the ‘myth’ that everyone at KU cooks.

Even though I had the company of very good people the timetable of KU particularly of my subsidiaries was very adamant on making my life as miserable as it could. This in turn brought me to lesson # 2: ‘How to separate the ass from the horse’.

Often while waiting in the lobby for a class I had to sit in the lobby alone. This was a golden people watching opportunity. I came across people of all shapes and sizes. Men so thin it was a wonder how they were alive, women with so much make up I was amazed they didn’t stoop under the weight. Eventually after a long research I managed to make groups and even sub groups of all the living things present in the ecosystem known as lobby. However let us leave that for a later topic.

When people watching took too much of my strength and I decided to give myself a break I would prefer to sit quietly in the corner and read. This activity brought me to Lesson # 3: ‘It does not take two to tango’.

The long hours that I spent waiting were at times an agony. I would sit in the remotest corner I could find, make myself comfortable and read. But soon enough my haven would be invaded when some girl or two would come twittering by and sit next to me ignoring the perimeter I made. And soon enough without caring that I was very contently reading they would turn to me and ask my name and respective department. I answered meekly and this they took as an invitation to talk further. Very soon the conversation would take the turn I dreaded the most. ‘Do you know what Zubeda Appa made the other day?’ or ‘I was so saddened by the current episode of the drama so and so’. I would nod silently wondering what was in my body language that gives a sign that I was available for conversation.

So it isn’t necessary that if you are a student in a university you will learn only what was offered as a course. Not at all. You learn very valuable lessons that help you throughout your life!