Arts & Culture – The LUMS POST

“Well, what else are you going to do?”: Dr. Mohammad Moiz on Drag, Activism, and Spirituality in Pakistan.

26Nov

By Zoha Fareed ChistiNo Comments

Arts & Culture, Features, Profiles, Top Story

“Well, what else are you going to do?”: Dr. Mohammad Moiz on Drag, Activism, and Spirituality in Pakistan.

By Zoha Fareed Chishti '23 The GPS tells me I have arrived at the destination-- a house, in a closed-off street in Gulberg, where Dr. Mohammad Moiz (aka Unrellently Yours, Phuddina Chutney, and Shumaila Bhatti) was getting ready for their drag-comedy show happening later that evening. I call Moiz to confirm whether I am at the right destination. “Brown gate, colorful tyres on the wall?” they ask me. It is the right house. I, along with a friend, am escorted into the house, and up the stairs, to a room. Moiz, already in a bright orange lehenga-choli, is getting their make-up done as we enter the room. They apologise for the state they are greeting us in: the room is scattered with makeup products, and there is a certain sense of hustle all around. Even wit...

“There’s Chicken in my Daal!”: The Struggle of Being Vegetarian and Pescatarian On-Campus

19Sep

By adminNo Comments

Arts & Culture

“There’s Chicken in my Daal!”: The Struggle of Being Vegetarian and Pescatarian On-Campus

By Mahrukh Murad Dev Kumar ‘23, a rising junior at SDSB and a practicing Hindu, is a lacto-vegetarian* with a knack for staying cautiously optimistic. He shares, “When I moved to LUMS, I realised the cons of being vegetarian in Pakistan.” He quickly experienced his usual variety of vegetarian food options abundantly available in his hometown, Karachi, being swapped for daal and sabzi at PDC.According to Dev, “My main ethos of being a vegetarian is to be non-violent towards nature and mother earth. [In my religion] there is a concept of not fighting anyone for your own sake. Interestingly, the first misconception that I heard from my friends [about being vegetarian] is that 'it's in your religion' and 'you are bound to eat vegetarian food'. However, this is a myth. There is no restriction o...

Forming Community, In Conversation with Anime and Manga at LUMS

4May

By Aiza Nadeem12 Comments

Arts & Culture

Forming Community, In Conversation with Anime and Manga at LUMS

By Aiza NadeemA viral tweet recently referenced, “you are faced with more peer pressure to watch anime than to do drugs,” and the popularity of anime today is a testament to that. The formation of an Anime and Manga society at LUMS seemed inevitable, yet it is the labor of a group of individuals devoted to the arts. The Executive Council (EC) members of the Anime and Manga at LUMS (AML) who met with The Post described how the advent of the society was based purely on a shared love of anime. “Everyone watches anime, whether they want to admit it or not,” says Shahir Shamim ‘22, Treasurer AML. They did not imagine that what they would initially dismiss as a joke would blossom into the society it has today. At the society, they wish to create a space where both anime-enthusiasts and first-tim...

Creativity in Times of Adversity: Social Media Eateries and the Women That Run Them

25Jan

By Rida ArifNo Comments

Arts & Culture

Creativity in Times of Adversity: Social Media Eateries and the Women That Run Them

By: Rida ArifFrom budding freshmen to alumni, many female entrepreneurs have decided to make use of the pandemic to take the plunge into food-related start-ups. This seems to be an anomaly considering the industry of both home-businesses and commercial restaurants are dominated by men; in 2018, Food & Wine magazine reported that only 6 percent of women owned restaurants or ran kitchens. Similarly, a 2015 report by the Federation of Small Businesses in Scotland showed that the majority of home-based business owners are male (66 percent). These gendered statistics show that the following women are defying the norm to establish their eateries and are using social media and even the lockdown to their advantage. Aleeha Shah ‘24, started her baking venture, Aleeha’s Pantry, during quarantin...

10Dec

By adminNo Comments

Arts & Culture

Writer’s Block

By Maryam Narejo To paint a picture, it’s a pleasant Sunday morning and you have an assignment due in a couple of days. You sit down on your desk, open your laptop to write your essay, and before you know it an hour goes by while your fingers hover over the keyboard. You are contemplating what to write while self-doubt slowly creeps into your thoughts. As terrifying as this scenario sounds for a creative writer, it has become all too familiar in an online semester. Writer’s blocks occur when a writer feels truly stuck and cannot continue their work. They have several causes such as stress, pressure, anxiety, burn out etc.One reason a blank page can often seem intimidating is exhaustion. When the mind is tired due to overwork, one can get caught up in the details and end up procrastinating ...

Play, Plague, and Public Hate: On Fawad Khan’s “Light’s Out”

4Oct

By adminNo Comments

Arts & Culture

Play, Plague, and Public Hate: On Fawad Khan’s “Light’s Out”

By: Muhammad Hammad Bilal‘Lights Out’ is a lyric piece written by Manjula Padmanabhan, and directed by Fawad Khan into a comic-ironic exposition of the clash between absurdity and reality. In the play, a married couple tries to physically stage the misgivings, isolation, fetishes, and criminal thoughts lurking in the perceived normalcy of the middle class. It is jolting in its familiarity. ‘Lights Out’ revolves around a couple which, while entertaining guests in their apartment, is witness to a crime taking place outside their household. Wife Laila (played by Kiran Siddiqui), and husband Rahat (played by Ghazi) go berserk as the virtuous and obedient wife screams at her husband to call the authorities to deal with the scenes of brutality playing off-stage. Rahat and Laila’s frenzied exchan...

18Nov

By adminNo Comments

Arts & Culture

Frescoes in the Time of Smog

By Syeda Aiman Zehra and Hammad Bilal“Aik nukta, everything starts from it and ends at it,” says curator Madam Noor Jehan Bilgraumi as we embark on a journey she started in LUMS. The nukta she speaks of is the same nukta that we see at the center of many of the art pieces she has installed around campus—from the VC’s house to his office to the faculty lounge to the walls and domes of the HSS building. It is the same nukta that she sees in the heart of the university—the Academic Block—where the campus community finds itself at least once a day, passing by, taking shortcuts, rushing to classes.Two years ago, Madam Bilgraumi paid a visit to LUMS to see the building her dear friend, Habib Fida Ali had designed. What she saw was a bare courtyard at the center: “No one wanted to cross it, the c...

13Sep

By adminNo Comments

Arts & Culture

Eastern Music Classes at SSE

By Muhammad Hammad Bilal Started by a group of three students — Sagheer Muhammad ‘19, Usama Mustafa ‘19, Abdullah Mashhood ‘16 — the Folk Music series is devoted to training students for Rubab, Bansuri, and Eastern Vocals. A first of its kind, it converges on reviving and instilling the lost elements of eastern music among the members of the LUMS community. Muhammad, who hails from Gilgit, experienced the dual symphony of music and teaching throughout his career. “It was a dream of mine to study with Niaz Hunzai, a prominent musician, and after receiving his tutelage, I was committed to passing it on,” says Muhammad. “The music of language is so complex and fulfilling. The best way to live it, for me, would be to practice it, and to practice it would be to pass it on.” Along with Muhammad ...

11Nov

By adminNo Comments

Arts & Culture

Metropolis Rendered

By: Muhammad Hammad Bilal and Heer CheemaIn the discerning words of Mr. H.M Naqvi: “Cities are not wrought from just brick and mortar, but are informed by stories”. This idea underscores the crux of the “Rendering the Metropolis on the Page” talk that took place on 2nd October 2018. The session was as much a thought- provoking look at literature that defines cities, which in turn define literature, as it was a genial discussion between two literary enthusiasts. Mr. Bilal Tanweer and Mr. H.M Naqvi’s rapport lent itself to transforming A-10 into a receptive hub of ideas. Comfortably seated, books in hand, Mr. Tanweer, Assistant Professor of Literature at LUMS, and Mr. Naqvi, award-winning author and Visiting Professor at HSS, treated the audience to readings from their works: “Love in Chakiw...