Beauty as it should be than what it is defined as by Society …

Sunday, September 14, 2014 Heba Moeen 0 Comments

When you ask people the definition of the word, ‘beautiful’, almost everyone would have different responses, however, if they are asked to define a beautiful woman, there is no doubt that their responses would be quite universal. From fairness creams to beauty soaps and various other beauty products, the image of a beautiful woman is quite over stated, with fanatics defining what she should actually look like.

Thanks to local opinion leaders on television launching their own products who also indirectly claim that fairness is the acceptable norm or is portrayed as the declaration of a woman’s beauty. Such a mindset hinders societies from progressing and drags them towards decadence each step at a time. No matter how dark skinned the endorser or the brand owner is himself/herself, Photoshop is always the best friend in such circumstances considering an appeal to emotion. Why would anyone who is dark herself want to project the sign of beauty as being fair skinned? Instead that person should shun such thoughts and endorse the darker tone of skin as the reflection of a beautiful woman. Being brainy is what constitutes being attractive but invain.

India, for instance, witnessed one such brave transformation where the organization, ‘Women of Worth’ launched a campaign titling it, ‘Stay Unfair, Stay Beautiful’ with actress Nandita Das being the face of it. “In a country where 90% of people are dark, it is sad that we grow up with such an inferiority complex about it,” says Das.



Therefore, beauty is a woman’s confidence, it’s her mind and soul, and something radiated when she is happy from within, rather than being an appearance or gadget defined through the lens of societal pressure. In a study carried out by Dove in 2010, it was revealed that only 4% of women globally would define themselves as beautiful, the brand thus embarked on a worldwide journey to uncover their beauty potential and make them realize their own true worth, thus empowering them altogether.

In what became the Viral Campaign of the Year, Dove invited a group of women and an FBI sketch artist to participate in a study of the image of women’s actual self versus the perceived self. When the same women were asked to describe themselves so that the sketch artist could draw their portraits, their own verbal descriptions revealed their insecurities and an understatement of their own images which were projected as being less attractive. However, based on the observation of a stranger, when the same portraits were drawn, the difference was quite notable with the stranger descriptions being comparatively better and vibrant.

This concluded that women are usually overly critical of their appearance and do not realize how good looking they actually are. The video was translated in 25 different languages and uploaded on 33 of Dove’s Youtube channels with almost 135 million views from 110 countries.

With the world progressing with such creative ideas to explore the real meaning of being beautiful why are we still living in a shell that still has outdated meanings and synonyms to define women? One of the first few steps towards empowering women is by making the same gender realize the concept of beauty and how women should be perceived as attractive than being judged according to what they should look like.

For all the aapa’s and baji’s out there who are promoting their products based on obsolete marketing tactics for the ideal Kaali mai to become gori, gori to make their dreams come true, please do realize that you are selling self-loathing nightmares to undermine their image.

Beauty is what lies within; in the form of confidence, education, determination and strength and not something that can be judged based on the first impression regarding looks and appearance.


0 comments:

16th MAP (Management Association of Pakistan) 2014

Monday, September 08, 2014 Heba Moeen 0 Comments




The 16th MAP Convention hosted a thought provoking session for managers and thought leaders representing various sectors. It was organised by MAP Convention while the founding partner was EBM, the theme of the convention was ‘Re-think Management’. It aimed at reinforcing management practices and leader styles for the success of businesses in the long run.

Organizations carving their journey through evolutionary business patterns have always been at the forefront of business success stories as a result of which they eventually make it to the Fortune 500 companies, be it adapting to the rapidly changing business environment or fostering employees through empowerment, inculcating the sense of ownership in every individual is what results to accomplishments in the long run. Shedding light on such matters, the MAP convention contributed towards a positive day.

Management Association of Pakistan is a 50 year old body created to assist the business community as their think tank of ideas so that the best management practices could be implemented for generating productivity and future growth. Each year this convention gathers businesspersons and from across the country and executes a thought provoking session thus inviting local as well as international speakers.

Following a welcome address by Mr. Masood Hashmi, Vice President MAP and a speech by Wajahat Hussain, President and CEO of UBL, the day commenced with an engaging session by Tony Buzan, the inventor of Mind Maps. Not only did he make the audience realize the dull norms of performing our daily tasks but also the need to innovate our thinking style. He emphasized upon the use of colour in our daily lives despite us being adults and the need of daydreaming, the lack of which limits new business ideas and blurs creativity.

As people age, their creativity depletes which Buzan explained by giving an example of children who are 95% creative all the way to adults whose creativity reduces to just 10%, what’s in between is the gradual decline in one’s creative thinking. “This is why the world is getting depressed, the average creativity is growing down and average life expectancy is growing up”, he said while explaining the concept of this decline being considered ‘normal’ because if this is normal then it’s not natural and hence a depressing concept. In a nutshell, not day dreaming is not natural and oddly enough our brain’s utility is less than 1%.

The relationship of creativity with age is therefore something as follows:

KG Children: 95% +, Primary: 75%, Senior School 50%, University: 25%, Adults: 10%, and it has been going down …

Discussing further, Buzan explained the evolution of mind, the journey of which started with the Agrarian era almost 10,000 years back and is now leading to the Age of Intelligence, a time period swamped with information. Stressing upon the need of organizing through mind mapping he said: “Mind mappers are taking democracy to the next stage, the former president of Mexico mind mapped everything and facilitated a positive change in the first time in 70 years.”

Later the CMO of PTCL, Furqan Qureshi presented the gradual technological advance and it’s impact of society talking of which the need to be equipped in terms of the right technology for communication was talked about.

The panel discussion based on ‘Leadership through Leading Minds’ comprised of Nadeem Naqvi (MD, KSE), Dr. Zeelaf Munir (EBM), Sirajuddin Aziz (President and CEO, HMBL), Kimilhide Ando (CEO, Pakistan Mitsubishi Corp), Ali Hasnain (Head – Retail Banking UBL), and Asif Juma (CEO, ICI Pakistan Ltd). Each individual shared their opinions based on their experience and expertise the conclusion of which rested on the notion that a leader is s person who is able to observe the best capabilities in his/her employees and creates avenues of growth of them.

“Transformational leadership is about making the employees think and believe they can do the inconceivable,” voiced Ali Hasnain while Dr. Zeelaf supported the discussion by adding, “One should be mindful of the rapid development and should be able to recognize the emerging patterns of change. We, therefore, need to identify as to who it is that we will be leading. The rising generation, must focus on creating change that is sustainable, devising new ways to live and work that fit with the needs of this world.” “Research shows that companies having high representation of women perform better. One such recent study reports that fortune 500 companies with the highest representation of women board directors attained significantly higher financial performance, on average, than those with the lowest representation of women board directors,” said she highlighting the prominence and importance of women’s significance in corporations.



 “There are no textbook solutions; a leader should be good at combining the employees’ strong competencies and should lead those who are professionally better than him,” elaborated Kimilhide Ando while detailing the role of a leader.

The day was further made interesting amidst the host, Dr. S. A. Rub’s enthralling poetic outbursts, not only did he entertain everyone by reading out some verses but also made the audience repeat after him.

One of the best presentations was given by Lucy Cornell (http://youtu.be/55NwZv2hmbo), 1the Chief Inspirational Officer of Voice Coach. Capturing the audience with her excellent training capabilities she made two way communication very evident. Discussing the historic speech by Martin Luther King of Stone Mountain Georgia, she guided the audience about the inflection and charisma in order to create a visceral connection, “You need to have commitment, courage and energy. Your voice follows your intention; you can still be inspiring without yelling and simply connect to the feeling of it,” she elaborated, “If it’s all emotional then it’s noise.”

The next panel discussion focused on HR management and concluded that those in the organization are not mere employees but people who need to be valued and publicly given credit for contributing towards the organisation’s goals. Sharing their expertise for this discussion were

Etsko Schuitema (founder and leading partner, Schuitema Associates), Naila Kassim (Engro Corp.)

Pouru Sidhwa (Director HR, GSK) and Lucy Cornell.



The productive day was later concluded with a session worth exercises by

Dr. Zsuzsanna Fajcsak, (Founder and Director, Alive International) and  Naeem Zamindar (Chairperson

and Founding Volunteer Teacher, Art of Living Foundation).



Following were the sponsors of the MAP Convention:

Platinum Partner: UBL

Founding Partner: EBM

Gold Partner: Jubilee Insurance

Silver Partner: EFU Life

Associate Partners: Ptcl, Central Depository Company, ORIX, TCS, NAFA (NBP Fullerton Asset Management Ltd, SICPA, Habib Metropolitan Bank Ltd

Academic Partner: IOBM

Media Partner: Jang Media Group










0 comments:

Dunya News reveals Imran Khan’s Rebellious Secret

Friday, September 05, 2014 Heba Moeen 1 Comments




Dunya News took the courage to step ahead of the media clutter to reveal Mr. Khan’s secret once and for all. It wasn’t until today that the nation got to know his reality, thanks to the reporting team and the highly alert studios awaiting this perfect moment to trap the culprits.

Pervaiz Khattak and Jehangir Tareen were caught red handed on camera while smuggling breakfast to Imran Khan’s container; the TV channel’s BREAKING NEWS increased ratings as the entire nation stayed glued to their TV sets, gawking at the unbelievably shocking lines being flashed, the translation of which is as follows:

“Included in Imran Khan’s breakfast were omelette, milk, bread, butter, jam, and mangoes etcetera.”

However, it’s still somewhat unclear as to what they meant by a deadly combination of ‘jaam aur aam’ while accusing the politicians and signaling two meanings as the word ‘jaam’ could either mean jam or even a politician’s choice of the much needed energy drink. It was very inhumane of Imran Khan and his team to not to offer Dunya New's outdoor team some breakfast as it kept drooling at the sight of this extremely ELITE menu. “Who eats eggs, bread and butter in this golden democratic era of PMLN’s democrazy!?” questioned the reporter.

Meanwhile, PMLN has planned a nationwide protest as a result of this breakfast while fearing the cannibalization of their branded breakfast menu inclusive of Nihari Paey. “We are tigers with Nihari flowing in our veins,” said Mr. Sharif, “and therefore, breakfast should remain democratic, we will go to any extent possible to protect the identity of our Khoon League!”

Maulana Diesel on the other hand was found to have tampered with cooking oil by providing diesel to fry the eggs in (as told by eyewitnesses) while the bread was purchased from Mamnoon Hussain’s stall who sells dahi baray at a nearby Azadi camp in the evening. The green and red stall embellished with a crescent and star has got ‘future historic’ words printed in bold typography (Sans Serif), “GO NAWAZ GO”.

Dunya News' news casters were surprised to notice crockery being used for this special breakfast as it appeared to be against the decorum of a political gathering, provided they use their bare hands as plates, both news casters voiced their concerns at the use of crockery. Watch the breaking news.

It cannot be ignored that the omellette being served was prepared from eggs laid by special chickens of Bani Gala; this uniquely spectacular breed of corporate branded chickens have green and red plumage, PTI’s corporate colours and the eggs that they lay are also of the same colour combination. “These eggs have a hard shell like our opponent’s head but it’s very soft from inside like his brains,” mentioned an emotional supporter, although these words were censored considering the next level insult, Dunya News didn’t let go of this information either.

The number of eggs laid is directly proportional to the rate of ‘GO NAWAZ GO’ being jeered; rumour has it that the Azadi Poultry Farm is a conspiracy to attack the opposition with eggs one day. Using Princess Diana’s example to avenge people, PTI workers will be aiming opponents’ vehicles with Naya Pakistan eggs and sprinkling flour following which the climate will play it’s role (trust me, Princess Diana’s avenging style is real but it was at a time when she was just a teenager). Some have likened it to Zubaida Aapa’s ‘rebellious tips for an undemocratic democracy’.

The poultry farm that is abode to these favourite chickens has been breeding rebellious chicks, a collection of which could serve as a ticking time bomb as they have a transparent approach towards undomesticated politics.

Imran Khan has refused to consume any other type of egg as he insists on having PTI branded eggs only and prefers bread sold by the president as revenues of sasti roti (cheap bread) contribute to a certain province. However, the situation is expected to aggravate as the Supreme Court has taken suo moto notice of having breakfast.

Please! Oh please stay with Dunya News for more intellectually breaking news! It’s attempt at competing with the most watched sitcom, Bulbulay might have failed miserably but there's always a second chance.

'Naashta aa nahi raha ... Naashta aa chukaa hai! :)

1 comments:

Saudi Arabia regrets the Export of Faulty Nawaz Sharif and plans to have it recalled

Monday, September 01, 2014 Heba Moeen 4 Comments








 The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has regretted the decision to export Nawaz Sharif and it’s entire Sharif product line to Pakistan following which the economy has faced a sudden downturn as a result of senseless Nihari Paey in the democratic menu. However, Pakistan expects good news as this product came with a 2 year warranty, returnable to Saudi Arabia so that it could to be used as political scrap or democratic by-product in case of malfunctioning.

The country of exile origin has planned to have it recalled soon but fears pollution because of Sharif returning as it no longer seems to serve their purpose and comes with an entire package of failure and leech like attributes. The sequence of events have unfolded at a time when the ban on marrying Pakistanis has recently been imposed knowing that you marry one and he/she could come with an entire truckload of ‘khaandaan’ (family and extended family and pets, especially in case of the Sharifs … so unlike their family name eh?).

Moreover, all attempts of image building, personification and value addition have failed as witnessed regarding Nawaz Sharif, an example of which is the popular hair transplant, no matter what style ‘it’ makes with it’s fake hair it’s still regarded by the value title, ‘Gunja’ (further nicknamed, ‘Baldie’). Knowing that Sharif is undoubtedly a downward stretch to brand Pakistan, any extension strategy applied would not at all be beneficial and it’s in the best interest of the country to completely divest it thus taking it off shelf, considering that it always rots before it’s 5 year expiry duration.

It should be known that repackaging and relaunch turned out to be futile and extremely costly, that too to Pakistan’s economy. “I still remember that day. It was October 12, 1999 and Baldie started misbehaving. He kept on fooling with the plane’s remote control despite knowing that I was inside it. I had told him several times to AVOID touching risky gadgets but he just won’t listen,” fumed his assumed step dad, Mr. Pervez Musharraf while enjoying his Cuban cigar, “actually it’s not entirely his fault, information passes into his head through osmosis and evaporates through a much faster pace because of the direct penetration of sunlight. Interestingly enough, the hair transplant hasn’t helped; you see … packaging doesn’t always change the product inside.” Musharraf’s strategy of prioritizing Pakistan’s interest over self-interest wasn’t understood by this immature product.

Saudi Arabia is also considering a second option, that is, instead of getting the Sharif’s  back home, the officials might banish them and dump them on the island that emerged near Gawadar following a catastrophic earthquake. Since the island still exists unclaimed, it might serve this urgent purpose.

After killing an endangered Siberian Tiger in the election campaign last year, the Sharif’s indirectly communicated their selfishness that ended up costing humans lives too till this date. Time and again while proving that they are the Sheikhs’ pet rocks, Sharifs felt an obligation to serve the Saudi Prince at the cost of Pakistan’s economy, it’s people and it’s ENDANGERED wildlife, thus, allowing Price Fahd bin Sultan bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud to hunt down 2,100 birds including 123 unique bustards (true story, I’m not making this up). This resulted in a public backlash that started addressing these notorious Sharif’s by an obnoxious word, simply explained, to mention this word, one has to replace the ‘u’ in bustard by an ‘a’.

As Nawaz Sharif calls out to Pakistan’s big daddy, the great Army for help, this product is sinking in a ship being pulled down by it’s own weight, apparently gravity affects heavier objects more efficiently, nothing is always as light as Newton’s apple. The side effects of this government’s corruption, election rigging and endless stupidity have been the revolutionary protests still awaiting a miracle and some revolution, people repeatedly calling this product ‘Gunja’ (because of it’s absence of self-respect) and public jeering, ‘Go Nawaz Go!’.

Saudi intervention helped this family of failed product line reacquire governance once but things appear bleak now that it’s unnecessarily occupying shelf space, all attempts of cross subsidization have miserably failed. History has an interesting way to repeating itself but Pakistan is once bitten, twice shy and shy in a rebellious way this time.

4 comments: