No pun intented

I always wondered what he looked like when he used to whistle on the streets but too scared I would shut my eyes and go to bed early, although he used to be just a street guard but since my mom always told me that he would come up and eat me I used to get too scared and sleep instead. That was just a tactic that my mum used for me to go to bed early. I forgot all about it when I grew up though.

But this memory refreshed in my mind when I looked at wall chalking on every wall in Karachi, even if it was private property the art was pasted on it. I wondered who these people were actually showing us karachiites their artistic maneuvers that they used for advertisement.

I know wall chalking issue is huge here in Karachi but apart from all the fuss and politics and an idea of a great assignment, the mystery still remained deep within my head: who were they?

Kind of like that chaukidar (street guard) this particular person was a mystery to me, although I had no fear whatsoever regarding this artist, I only wanted to see who the person was behind this act of valor.

Not to mention I did after all finally saw my one and only childhood fear or the boogeyman: chaukidar. I saw him dressed in Pakistani traditional dress code, he did not seem like a monster because I thought he probably worked for “monsters inc.” but I was wrong. He was not a monster, just a regular fellow riding his bicycle and blowing his whistle to keep the crime out of our streets, not so bad at all.

But this artist guy just would not show up, I stayed awake for nights but no show. One day when going to my rheumatologist, it finally occurred to me that I did not really have to spend my nights awake because I got lucky as, I finally saw the Van Gogh, the free thinker, the revolutionary who thought that he owned every fragment of the walls on the face of Karachi, who smothered these walls  with paint and left them pigmented, who else could think of such an exceptional strategy then the one and the only: the great graffitist (all hail for decorating our city with unsolicited graffiti) you don’t believe me, see for yourself:

 

 

photo courtesy: Urooba Azhar