2010

Travel Slideshows, The Huffington Post, November

Soaring above the skyscrapers, The Friday Times, August 6
On a muggy Manhattan evening last week,  a sound was heard in the skies of the city never heard before – Pakistan’s Sufi diva Abida Parveen…

Ithaca teen picks up trash for bar mitzvah project, The Ithaca Journal, May 28
Ethan Skutt is like any ordinary seventh-grader, but this 13-year-old middle-school student has recently developed different kinds of interest…

Ithaca College student organizes 5K run for kidney patients, The Ithaca Journal, April 8
It’s a busy time for all college students, but 22-year old Ithaca College senior Jonathan LaChance is working on a unique final project…

Home business comes naturally for Willseyville woman, The Ithaca Journal, March 24
Barbara Gile lives about a half-hour drive from downtown Ithaca.  “We have neighbors, yes, but I can’t see their houses from where I am,” she laughs…

Made in Tompkins: Carpenter Builds Thriving Business, The Ithaca Journal, January 5
When James Robertson graduated from Ithaca High 31 years ago, the last thing he wanted to be was a carpenter…

2009

Min Zin: Fighting Peacocks, Burmese Blood, The Friday Times, August 7 & 14
One stormy night in Rangoon in 1991, there was a loud knock on the door of political activist Ye Myint’s house. Ye Myint stumbled out of bed, rubbing his eyes…

Bua, the silver-haired storyteller, The Friday Times, March 6
There was a time when she possessed all of her teeth, though when that time was, nobody really remembers. In any case, toothlessness suits her, in a wise, gnomish kind of way…

2008

Theatre Review: The Continuity of Things in “Rock ‘n’ Roll”, October (unpublished)
Standing in the crowded foyer of the American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco, the venue for the West Coast production of Tom Stoppard’s Broadway hit “Rock ‘n’ Roll”, I was prepared to be exhilarated…

Pakistan burn victims turn beauticians, The Associated Press, August 18 
Saira Liaqat squints through her one good eye as she brushes a woman’s hair. Her face, most of which the acid melted years ago, occasionally lights up with a smile…

Pakistan trust formed to honor slain Red Mosque leader, The Associated Press, July 10
Relatives of a cleric who was slain during last year’s deadly military siege at Pakistan’s radical Red Mosque unveiled a trust Thursday established to help the families of others who died…

At 100 days, Pakistan government in disarray, The Associated Press, July 8 
Pakistan’s new coalition government came to power after February’s elections on a wave of public sympathy and hope. But some 100 days after formally taking charge, the coalition is in disarray…

Islamabad cops tells of bomb horror; death toll 18, The Associated Press, July 7
Police officer Absar Ali was talking with colleagues near the busy Islamabad market when the suicide bomber attacked, rattling Pakistan’s usually quiet capital…

Suicide attack in Pakistani capital kills 15, The Associated Press, July 6
A suicide attacker detonated explosives near a police station in Pakistan’s capital on Sunday, killing at least 15 people and wounding dozens…

1 year later, Pakistan mosque’s spirit lives on, The Associated Press, July 2 
A year after the deadly military siege of the Red Mosque, the radical spirit of the pro-Taliban stronghold lives on…

Pakistan: State of Emergency, PBS Frontline / World, February 26 (contributed)
A mysterious Taliban cleric is waging war against the Pakistani government in the beautiful former tourist spot of Swat Valley…

2007

Bhutto’s Assassination: Letter from Lahore, PBS Frontline / World Dispatches, December 30 
Thank you for your emails. I am OK and so is my family. It’s Friday morning and the whole city is pretty much shut down…

Students Rise in the Face of Emergency, North Gate News Online, November 9
One week after General Pervez Musharraf declared emergency in Pakistan, college students in Lahore are filling the shoes of the city’s detained professionals in protest against the second “martial law” their generation has seen…

Extraordinary Rendition, PBS Frontline / World, November 4 (contributed)
An investigation one of the darkest sides of the Bush administration’s war on terror – its secret rendition program…

“Pakistan is on the verge of destabilization”: Emergency in Pakistan, North Gate News Online, November 4
People in Pakistan awoke Sunday morning to find all private news channels blacked out from their TV sets…

Pakistan: Student Resistance, PBS Frontline / World Dispatches, November 2 (contributed)
Musharraf has encountered resistance from lawyers, professionals, and ordinary citizens, and from an unexpected place: students at a private college in the city of Lahore…

Food for the Soul: Ramadan in Berkeley, North Gate News Online, October 10
As soon as the bells of the Campanile strike the sunset hour, Marwa el-Sheemy drops her books and dashes out of the International House Library…

2005

Of soul-homes, sky-temples and safaris: Kenya Travelog, BootsnAll Travel Network, July 
When you’ve been living in a particular place for a number of years, you tend to forget that a world outside exists. You see glimpses of that world on television, in the newspapers, in books and pictures…

2002

Noori: a Rock-Reformation, Lahore Grammar School “Roshni” magazine, September 2002
I love Noori. They’re young, they’re hip, they’re talented, and they didn’t need long curly tresses and red leather pants to win rollicking rockstar fame…