Livin' La Vida Loca

One of my personal goals for this summer was to share Karachi via color and light to everyone who may want to witness it the way I am. I look at things in a wave of familiarity and newness, and I wanted to artistically document each and every thing I saw.
Finding the courage to take out my camera in a country plagued with theft and fear has been hard.

Today, in a burst of boredom, I took my camera and decided to do two things with it.
(1) Play with light and focus in ways I never would have been able to on a film camera and (2) Take pictures of the things in my grandparents house that make me feel like I really am living at home.


This bell is located inside the birdcage of our beloved parrot Kasuku. It's one of the few toys inside his cage that he actually bothers to play with. It's his way of warning us that he's in a bad mood, that there's a cat near his cage, or even that he really would like some ice.



This candle sits on the t.v. stand in the downstairs lounge. My aunt and grandmother have such an artistic flair for the little things that make a house a home.




This assortment of blown glass candy seriously confused me the first day I was here. My stomach still suffering from jet lag, I found the candy in a random 3 a.m. burst of hunger. I was somewhat disappointed, to say the least, to find that they were inedible.





The napkin holder. In true Pakistani fashion, people eat with their hands. Because of this, perhaps, most dining areas have a sink placed outside so that washing prior to and after meals is much easier. This napkin holder, hung right beside the sink is subject to various kinds of abuse as every member in the household tugs and crinkles the napkin hanging on it.




Everywhere in Karachi dust lurks. It's on your book after an hour of leaving it abandoned on the side of the coffee table. It's inside your coffee mug in the morning when you retrieve it from the cabinet. It's also melted to these candles, which I found rather amusing, and kind of beautiful as well.



Lighting fixtures in my grandparent's house are as varied as the room they're inside. This one matches the gorgeous chandelier inside our formal sitting room, also known as a parlour. When I was a small child, the parlour was totally off limits. The sparkle and glamor of the parlour has not been lost in the years in which the parlour is no longer off limits.




This wall ornament, I find absolutely hideous. No joke. Whoever decided placing a Japanese themed anything in a house oscillating between both the rich colors of Pakistan and the details of an East African heritage was a good idea, was seriously deranged in my opinion.