Bad smell, huge mass of disoriented people – young and oldn well mostly old – litter, noise, unwanted pushing. . . That was Islamabad airport when I entered this morning at 9 am to catch my Karachi flight. What has gone wrong with place in just few months? I realised that it had been over three months since my last visit. But still, has plane-riding population grown Hyperbolicaly or has PIA introduced cheap meal-less tickets like United Air of USA? Whatever, I thought and proceeded to the window for getting your tickets printed if you've already bought online. You're issued a Passenger Name Record number (commonly called PNR). I had stored it in my blackberry. Tried to get but gosh, it was lost! Another fifteen minutes sorting it out with an extremely lazy man sitting on the window. He seemed tired and disinterested. But why, the day has just started, I thought. The next was getting inside the port building, get boarding card and board on the plane. The ticket checker on the gate suddenly got apprehensive of me and asked my personal identification. Don't know why, but I suddenly thought of My Name is Khan, who introduced himself: "My name is Khan and I'm not a terrorist". All the passengers were comfortably getting in and taking their boarding passes. Why me then? I felt like screaming: I'm wearing a sari/bindi and I'm not a spy! Got the pass and proceeded to the lounge. Unbearable smell of sweat. Heads, uncountable. Felt like throwing up. Ran towards the rest rooms only to find ladies packed in that narrow rest room. Chose to have a chit chat with the care-taker of the toilet. Yes, we do have care-takers in public toilets. We lack basic courtesy to flush, clean and dry the toilet after use. I heard we're Muslims and half of our faith lies in cleanliness. I hope I wouldn't die before seeing it happening! The care-taker, Theresa (we have a tradition of keeping minorities especially Christians on certain jobs), looked visibly disturbed. On enquiring she told me, its a Jaddah flight taking people for Umra – the voluntary pilgrimage to Mecca. Here we are. I recalled my father who once came back from Juma prayer and lamented how wasteful Muslims are when it comes to use of water in ablution. He also was wary of people doing ablution and not drying the area after that. I also recalled the condition of the toilet of a mosque when I had to use it once. Is there something genetically wrong with Muslims? Or what exactly? Please help me understand. I'll switch off my cell 'coz the hosrtess says so!
Baaghi 
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