Haan Mein Kamli Aan!
by Sidra Qasim | Oct 16, 2022
As someone who was born and raised in a lower-middle class family in a small city in Pakistan, and now lives in New York City, I have seen so many changes in my life. But one thing remained constant in all my experiences: gender inequality. Whether it is Okara, San Francisco or New York, women lack freedom and opportunities everywhere, and for women of color the situation is worse.
When I was younger, one of my father’s cousins said something during a family gathering that really shook me. “Women can't be trusted with making important decisions,” he said. “It’s just the way God has made them. They’re emotional and short-tempered, not as intelligent as men and they’re lacking in social skills.” In that moment, I felt like someone had taken away my dreams, my freedom, my ambition to be something. I felt like a caged bird.
I was confused and angry, and wanted to challenge his words, but I was raised to never talk back to elders, especially not to elder men. Once he left, I looked towards my mother and registered my protest with her. What was Uncle Mumtaz talking about? I asked her. I do not see any difference between men and women, other than a few body parts. Men have one brain, and so do we. My mother ignored me as if she had not heard me at all, and left the room.
Fast forward to many years later, when I landed in America. Now I’m amongst the most progressive minds! I thought to myself. This is it. Here, I can be whoever I want to be and no one will make me feel lesser for being a woman.
But I was not prepared for how wrong I was. Soon, my American dream met with reality, and was crushed. I was shocked to see how many times I was ignored in business meetings, as if I was invisible, as if I wasn’t also sitting in the room. Potential investors for my startup would always look at, and address my male co-founder. I was talked down to, corrected, overcorrected, uninvited to groups. It shook my confidence a million times. I couldn’t attend an event or meeting unless my co-founder accompanied me, until quite recently, after having lived in the US for four and a half years. Throughout this time I kept telling myself, I have seen this before, and I survived. I will get through this too.
These experiences ignited a fire in me to not be limited by what others think of me, but to take charge of my own story and craft it the way I want. All these experiences also made me very angry. For the last 36 years, there has been no time in my life when I did not have to fight back for my basic rights and dignity, for normal human interaction, for my freedom. I have carried anger about this for a long time, but this is the first time in my life when I am not ashamed of this anger. I want to use my anger to stand against the injustices that all of us experience as women, in our homes, at our workplaces and many times in our bedrooms as well (something I want to write about another time).
I cannot express how excited I am for Kamli, a place where we can be who we want to be and share our rage, love, support and millions of other emotions that never find a way to express themselves, but continue to live within us. A place where we can all say: “Haan mein kamli aan”.
- Sidra
