Students from India and Pakistan exchanged letters, pictures and stories of their countries with each other. When a few Pakistani students came here to meet their pen friends, they were astonished to find out the similarities between the two cultures. S Mallik reports
Till a few days ago, India was a bad country with ‘savage’ citizens for Noor Natinoormir. This was not his own opinion, but he was made to believe so by some people around him. The 13-year-old did not hesitate a bit while he told this to us. But then he smiled and added, “When I came here I realised I was wrong. India is just like our country and everything is almost the same — food, music, culture.”
Noor is a student of lahore Grammar School who recently visited India as part of the Students Exchange for Change, an initiative by Routes 2 Roots NGO. What started as a workshop by the NGO to foster love and friendship between borders culminated in a student exchange programme. Students from India and Pakistan visited the two countries to trace the differences and similarities between the two cultures. The 16 month-long workshop started with exchange of letters between students of the two countries. “We wrote about our country, our thoughts and shared many things about ourselves and every time we received a reply, it was from a different person. It was very exciting to know about different people and their lives. It was through these letters that we began to understand that Indians are very much like us — their emotions, their eagerness to know about our country and their interest in our festivals,” said Qurat Ul Ain Nasir, a standard eight student from St Mary’s Academy, Rawalpindi. Students also sent each other photographs of the place they live in, their families and friends. They were also asked to write about the other country and finally students were selected on the criteria of their fluency in English and how prompt they were in dealing with tough situations.
Thirty visiting students from Pakistan turned out in their pathanis and salwar kameez at an event organised at the High Commission of Pakistan. Eight-year-old Sidra Akram was the youngest participant of the exchange programme and the best moment of her life was meeting her pen-friend Prachi. “We exchanged two to three letters and I was fortunate that all the letters that I exchanged were with Prachi,” she said. Abida Mustafa of Dev Samaj Modern School, Delhi, was apprehensive about going to Pakistan and wanted to return from the Wagah border but the urge to meet the friends she had interacted with over a year was stronger. “I was really scared about how the people and the situation would be. The things that we see in television make you fearful of the place but now that I have been there I tell my friends that Pakistan is just like India with real people,” she said.
Masab Bin Nasim had seen and heard about India but the experience of being here was special. He could find similarities in the lush green fields and in the cultures and traditions. “People should stop saying that we belong to different countries and that we are different. May be our religions are different but that is no barrier to friendship and love. We should all realise that the problems that we face are the same and we have to unite to find a solution to them,” said the 16-year-old. Sayeda Fatima Sikandar of lahore Grammar School wants people to understand that India and Pakistan was one country before the Partition and therefore share common values. She said, “The way we talk, the way we express ourselves is the same. In Pakistan we have movie theatres screening Bollywood movies all the time. I wish these exchange programmes are conducted more frequently.”
For the High Commissioner of the Pakistan High Commission, Mohammad Abdul Basit, it was a moment of pride to have children from both the countries exchange views and thoughts. “What we, as grownups, have failed to do, these kids are doing. Change can be accomplished by a single gesture and the future of both these countries lies in the hands of the youth. If they are able to bridge the gap between the two countries, we will have a strong future and prosper economically, academically and culturally,” he said.