Family

It was with some trepidation that I set out on Monday. I was going to be visiting family that I hadn’t seen in a really long time. What would they look like? Would we have anything to talk about? The weather did not help.  It’s 104 degrees with 47% humidity - weather that will bake you while making you feel that you are drowning. And the roads, though a little better than what I remember, still feel like you’re traversing a moonscape in certain parts of town.

Still, all of this was forgotten with the very first visit to my cousin’s home – a small apartment in a densely populated area of Karachi (not that there are many sparsely populated parts of Karachi). I hadn’t seen him or his kids in eight years, but it felt like I had just been there a few months back. There was backslapping and joking. Shock on my part at how much older my nephews and nieces had become. Disappointment on my cousin’s part that my wife and munchkins were not with us. But in all, a great reunion.

And this same story played out over and over again, at every home that we visited. There would be a look of surprise on the part of the host (social visits here are usually unannounced, and no one in my family knew that I would be visiting Pakistan), then there would be hugs all around, some initial small talk, and very soon we’d be gossiping as if we had just seen each other a few weeks back.

The day was long as we wrapped up our last visit, but it has been fulfilling.

Home

I was not sure what to expect when I arrived at my childhood home, which my parents recently sold and are now temporarily occupying as renters. I was afraid that in the last eight years all signs of familiarity would have vanished, and that I would struggle to remember the way things were. Today, however, was my first day home, and it has been such a pleasant experience. Everything is just as I remember, with a few minor variations in furniture, or in the configuration of the potted plants, or perhaps in the pictures of the grandkids that are on the walls.

My room is the same as it was from when I first moved away to go to college in the US. There is the picture from when I was in 3^rd grade and which my parents still insist on keeping. The medal I won in my school’s art competition in 1985 still hangs on the wall, clearly inscribed with the words “The Sports Shop” in case I needed to recall where the medal was purchased. There is also the random 500 piece puzzle that I put together as a child, which my father decided needed to be framed and hung for display to all. Mercifully, my parents replaced my furniture with something a little more mature.

The funny thing is that I instinctively knew how to turn the door knob just so to prevent it from coming off the door, or which power switch controlled which light and in what sequence I liked to turn things on. I knew which curtain to keep open to allow in the best daylight into the room without making the room too hot. And I remembered the secret closet hiding place I used in my teen years, and which I was smart enough to empty out a long time ago.

Since my parents just recently sold the house, they are still working on disposing of much of the junk that has accumulated over the course of several decades. What is left for sale includes toys that I used to play with. The Lego sets, the puzzles, my magician’s kits, as well as some ancient electronics that are still fully functional. It was this last that I am going to have to figure out how to take back to the US with me, as I’m sure that these are now vintage and would fetch a smart price if I were to try and sell them.

Meeting Khursheed, our butler-driver-handyman-chef all-in-one was fun too. He hasn’t aged or changed, but was offended that I didn’t bring the wife and kids, especially since he has not met the latter yet. Soon, I promised him.

Between the slow return to familiar surroundings, exploring the neighborhood by foot, and eating fresh desi food, my first day back has been an amazing experience, and one that I so badly wish I could have shared with Saeeda. Still, I’m excited for the rest of the week, when we begin visiting family.

Going Home

It’s been eight years, which is far too long. Eight years since I’ve been back to Pakistan. Eight years since I’ve visited my extended family. It’s funny though, because even that term – extended family – has no meaning for the people of that region. There is no such thing as “extended” because you’re always just “family”. So to have been away for eight years is entirely too long, but I’m headed home now.

A work conference in Turkey provided the best excuse possible to take some vacation and book a four hour onward flight to Pakistan. So here I am, on the plane, about to land in Karachi. I’ve barely slept in the last week because of work and travel, but I’m still strangely alert and excited, even by the small stuff. Such as the all-Urdu chatter in the plane, reminding me of a language that I barely speak now. Or the uniquely desi (but inexplicable) need for my fellow passengers to immediately open the overhead bins the moment the plane lands, despite the seat belt sign or the fact that we have to continue taxiing for another 15 minutes. Or the uniquely desi aversion to deodorant, a fact that I am reminded of as my eyes tear up and my nose hairs begin to singe once the pilot turns off the air conditioning. But then the plane doors open and the line starts inching slowly forward, and all is forgotten.

Because I’m home.

Product differentiation vampires

Nuha came down with a fever yesterday evening.  Ever since we had the scare of our lives last year when she went into febrile seizures, we've been apprehensive whenever her temperature rises.  Today there were a few instances when it hit 103 degrees, so Saeeda made the call and I took her into urgent care.

There wasn't anything to worry about - the doctor found a mild infection that needed an antibiotic, so I decided to pick up the prescription at at the nearby Walgreens.  It was while the pharmacist was completing the transaction there that he asked me a question I was not prepared for.

"Would you like that flavored?" he asked.

Puzzled look on Faisal's face. We're talking about antibiotics, not lattes, right?

"Uh.  Is that an option?"

"Sure - we can make it cherry or strawberry flavored."

Cool, I thought.  I wish this had been around back when I was a child and my mother was shoving the world's worst tasting concoctions down my throat.  Back then, you measured the potency of a medicine by how badly it burned your throat as it went down.  The more gag-inducing the medicine, the more likely it was to annihilate whatever was bothering you.

"Um, ok, sure," I said.

"That'll be $2.99 extra."

And just like that, it was oh hell no time.  First of all, I was annoyed that some executive thought it cool to make flavoring an option for children's medicine rather than keep it standard and making life easier for parents all over the world.  Second, the economist in me was annoyed that Walgreen's expected me to believe that adding a spritz of flavoring could possibly cost almost $3 extra for a generic medicine that didn't cost that much to begin with.  Finally, I was incensed that this whole idea was a play on a vulnerable parent's susceptibility at a time when sick children were likely to be waiting at home.

I decided to decline the offer for a tastier antibiotic, and mentally made a note to never become a product differentiation vampire as a marketer myself.

Housework x10

People told me that having a second child would more than double the work for us.  That the second child would create one of the toughest transitions I would experience as a parent.  I listened politely, because I didn't entirely believe them.  And for the most part, I feel that I was right - yes there's more work to do in the two weeks since Ziyad made his entrance, but it's no tougher a transition than when we had our first.  What has broadsided me is the amount of housework.

All my wife and I do now is pick-up stuff and put it back in its place.  We turn around, and our entire universe is instantly thrown into chaos.  So back we go again, redressing naked dolls, replacing refrigerator magnets (why do we have so many?), and re-organizing the DVD shelf (why does my Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Xbox game have a copy of the Potty Power: How to Train your Toddler in 5 Easy Days DVD?). We're in hell, assigned the Sysiphean task of rolling the proverbial boulder up the hill, only to watch it roll back on us.  And Hades (our daughter) mocks us.  You see, the corollary to having a second child is that one of us can no longer clean up while the other distracts the cause of the mess.  We are now constantly busy and distracted - while one of us tends to a chore, the other is busy with Ziyad.  Which means that Nuha has the run of the house.

Used to be a time when if there was silence my wife and I would breathe a sigh of relief, knowing that either a) Nuha was asleep, or b) she was keeping herself busy with her toys.  Now, when there is silence, it is cause for immediate alarm and a reason for the Khan household to move immediately to code blue.

Nuha left to her own for 10 minutes as I clean dishes:

The tormentor, mocking me (hint: I'm the one in my undershirt, dishtowel on my shoulder, and a haggard look on my face):

Two weeks later

So Ziyad has been home now for two weeks now, and it's amazing the transformation that has taken place in such a short period of time.  For one, he is a better feeder than his older sister ever was at this age, which means that he is filling out his newborn clothes at a rapid pace.  Nuha was a tiny baby for a long time - Ziyad is adding heft quickly.

I'm not sure why I thought child number two would provide us with the same experience as the first one, but already the differences are starting to make themselves clear.  Ziyad is a mellow baby, crying occasionally, but mostly only for food.  Putting him to sleep isn't hard, whereas Nuha required all sorts of rocking and walking.  Our parenting style has changed too, from the classic over-attention and fussing to a more relaxed "he'll be fine" attitude.  I remember how when Nuha was born Saeeda would hang at the edge of our bed all night long, drifting asleep for 5 minutes before darting awake to see if Nuha was ok.  Now Saeeda's reaction is to feed Ziyad, putting him to sleep, and slap me awake if Ziyad starts to cry so that I can do diaper changes/swaddling/rocking to sleep.  This whole having to parent thing is a lot of work.

I'm going to find out more, I guess, as my paternity leave started on Monday.  That day was fine, as Nuha was in daycare.  Tuesday, however, was not so smooth - elder sister was home, had the run of the house, and decided that having mom and dad's attention diverted away from her is not that cool a thing.  Lots of throwing things, screaming, and generally pushing boundaries.  By the end I was exhausted, as I was tasked with keeping Nuha away from Saeeda and the baby.  I might have to rethink growing the family to five kids.

Ziyad Khan enters the world

It's funny how different this pregnancy has been from when we were expecting Nuha almost three years ago.  Back then, everything was new and brought with it tremendous uncertainty.  Conflicting advice would send us scurrying to the internet to determine tie-breakers.  We considered everyone to be an expert. "What to Expect when Expecting" - that Bible of Pregnancy - made us dread the most benign of Saeeda's symptoms.  And a trip to Babies R Us would always leave me paralyzed and disoriented.

This time around, however, we've been able to focus much more on us as a family, and on preparing for an arrival that will completely change the way we interact with each other. Granted, this "preparing" has sort of crossed over into territory in which I am not comfortable.  For example, this past weekend Saeeda, having run out of things to organize, acquired a label maker and decided to label the entire contents of our spice cabinet.  When finished, she proudly declared that I would now finally be able to find the right spice when I needed to do so.  I stopped short of informing her that finding the right spice had never been the problem - it was what to do with the spice after I had located it that was the problem.

But for me, "preparing" for the new arrival has meant spending more time with Nuha.  With busy lives and crazy schedules, I've relished the recent, rare weekends where she and I have just goofed around in the park, chasing after each other, hunting down daffodils, making fun of other kids too scared to try the big slides, and generally making a mess of the nice clothes Saeeda always picks for Nuha.  We've spent time meticulously apply band-aids to each other.  Me, because of small blisters suffered through all-around clumsiness, and she because ... well, who doesn't want to sport five, multi-colored Dora the Explorer band-aids on their leg?  Sure, I've had to suffer some worried looks from Nuha's day care teachers, each wondering what damage I'm doing to my child.  And sure, Saeeda has had to stealthily rip off one bandage a night, having had to wait until after Nuha has fallen asleep.  But so what?  

In general, I've worried that the attention and love that we've provided will soon have to be diverted, and that makes me a little sad because of the tectonic shift Nuha's world is about to suffer.  This morning, after Saeeda had gone into labor and we were preparing for the trip to the hospital, I snuck into Nuha's room to dress her.  We would be dropping her off at a friend's house, and I needed to quickly make sure everything was ready to go.  I paused at Nuha's bed to watch her sleep, with curly hair splayed in a mess on her pillow, mouth in a smile, her trusty stuffed giraffe and cow clutched tightly in either hand.  As I started to move her, Nuha, still asleep, instantly started yelling at her mom to leave her band-aids on.  I couldn't help but smile.  How nice would it be if my biggest nightly concern was anger at my mother ripping off unnecessary band-aids?

We dropped Nuha off at 4:30am this morning, silently offering thanks for having developed close friendships that allowed us to substitute for having family around.  Driving quickly, we were at the hospital by 5am, and checked in within another 10.  Saeeda was in bed with nurses swarming around her almost immediately, but we soon realized there was a slight problem - Saeeda was too far into labor for the administration of any medication whatsoever.  In the 20 minutes of pushing that followed, Saeeda convinced me that no matter how much CrossFit I partake in, I will never approach a level of resilience, endurance, or stamina to hold a candle to what she proved she was capable of.

And just like that, Ziyad Khan entered the world.  Mother and son are now doing well, with Ziyad as alert and quiet as Nuha was when she was born.  I'm leaving them in the hospital room to go pick up Nuha in a bit, and to introduce her to someone who I hope will become her partner in crime and best buddy for life.  Saeeda and I cannot be more thankful or grateful for the prayers and well wishes of all of our family and friends.  Success as parents, I think, will now depend on how well we can transition from 2-on-1 to man-to-man defense.