On March 3rd, Brian and I traveled to Pakistan for a conference called "Social Intervention 2012: A Better Tomorrow for the Coming Generation". This is a collection of our experiences before, during, and after the trip and a report on the public intervention artworks that follow.

Friday, March 16, 2012

Letters to the Future Generation from Pakistan

We now have collected nearly 200 letters. I have randomly pulled some examples and have transcribed them from handwriting exactly as they are written. I apologize in advance if I have misspelled names. If you find mistakes, please let me know and I will correct them a.s.a.p. In the meantime, here are some of the letters that were written during a 20 minute session at the Social Intervention Conference:




Dear Future Generation,
Assalam-o-Alaikum. I am Khizna Batool, 18 years old. Lives in Karachi and student of Department Social Work in University of Karachi. I always wanted to see Pakistan a peaceful, educated, and developed country. I want to see every single child of Pakistan educated and successful. I want to reduce poverty and unemployment. Students of Pakistan are very talented and hardworking. The only problem is we don't have any platform, we don't get reward of our hard work. Therefore, I request to my elders who have power to give us that platform. So that InshaAllah we'll do much better for Pakistan. Thank you. Khizna, Karachi, Pakistan





Hey, Dear Friends:
I would like to say to you that I want you to see the world as a positive place. I know we daily face problems and we do go through things which are beyond our thought. But it is the human power that we can come out from any problem we face. I would wish that please love your family, friends, etc, your trees, your poet, your house, your school, and among all love each person you see on the street or surround you because they are also a part of you. Try keep smiling in this life and remember one thing that there is nothing in this world that you cannot achieve because after every failure is a success. The famous ruler or the famous warrior all went through failures in life but still they left a remark. I would like to see the future world with no selfishness. I wish each person care for each other. Because caring each person can bring the world close and we can easily challenge the difficulties of the world. If we unite ourselves. There are many things I would like to say but I only want to wish that please love each other without any discrimination. Keep smiling.  :-)  Farhana Abbasi

Dear Generation,
I am a girl from Pakistan and my name is Bushra Subhani. I really hope that we Pakistanis will going to have a really bright future InshaAllah. We will work hard, fast & will make our country stand with pride in front of the world. We will prove that we are not just a third world country. And we will prove it! And the world will see!
Sincerely,
Bushra Subhani, Student of Psychology





To My Dear Future Generation,
Assala-O-Alikum
My name is Asma Zafar and I am 22 years old. I am live in Pakistan, and would tell you we Muslims are not terrorists, we have a peaceful nation. After some time when you read my this letter, so you know I am love you alot and pray for you success and victories of life, may you achieve everything in life. With best wishes. Love you, Asma Zafar, 6 of March, 2012.

Dear Future Generation,
I love you! and I want you to be loved by everyone. Relationships are very important. Respect your parents, your siblings, your friends & everyone around you. Always aim high & keep trying. Never get yourself disappointed. With the challenges around you. Do not be materialistic. You should try to get the best in your life but by FAIR MEANS. You have to face much more challenges that we faced like corruption, law & order situations, terrorism. Try to identify your friends & enemy. Illiteracy is the biggest enemy. Get yourself educated for being BETTER HUMAN BEINGS, rather than just Money Making Machines to live a happy life. See the people who have less facilities than you. Aim high, there is no virtue in easy victory. Love you, Syed Muhammad Ali.  6/3/2012

Dear future generation,
As the world is moving toward technological trends and people are forgetting their relations. Therefore, I want you all to remain attached to your relations, religion, spirituality as well as moral values. No one can live a happy life without them. Technology should only be given importance when it's useful for humanity & it doesn't detach us from beauty of love, relations, purity, sincerity, peace, ethics, moral values. You should recognize the harmful impacts of misuse of technology as we have not yet recognized and we are facing it in form of wars, bomb blasts, killings. We are loosing our loved ones due to it. Plz Plz don't get mad & love human beings & respect humanity apart from any status. Leave prejudices. Spread peace, education, love.
From, Sidra Asghar, Karachi, Pakistan





Letter to the Future Generation:
Say "No" to nationalism and "Yes" to humanism.
From,
Qurat-ul-ain Tahir
Karachi, Pakistan


Dear Future Generation,
The world is a beautiful place, despite the political uncertainty, turmoil and instability, despite the wars and the civil riots and crime, the world is still a beautiful place. It has wonderful people, beautiful places, kindness and hospitality and I hope that when this letter gets to you, it will still be as beautiful. It's not how things appear, but how we "see" things, the world is how we perceive it to be and I wholeheartedly wish that in your time, everyone will be able to see this world as a beautiful place. I'm sure that once we all choose to acknowledge the unrest, gradually it will cease to exist. I hope that we leave for you, a world free of discrimination, of war and of tragedy, and collaboratively we'll be able to give you a life free of uncertainty, instability and negativity. Finally, a humble request to you, is to be optimistic. Be positive and happy and by loyal to yourself. I'm sure you'll be able to overcome everything that you feel is going wrong by collaborative and united effort. Best of luck, NIRMAL BILAL, Karachi, Pakistan

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