After watching a few tutorials on how your intro should capture your reader through its first line and failing to come up with such a line, I'm going with just a plain introduction. Honestly, my life is as dull as dry dust. I know intros should be about life journeys, hitting rock bottoms, reaching peaks and all sorts of interesting things. But my life is boring. As boring as my intro.
Growing up in Pakistan, there was nothing much to do. Life was monotonous. I was lucky enough to be born in a doctor's household. Atleast, I don't have to struggle for meals.
That's me and my brother iny father's village. I'm the one in the brown. Still unaware of what's to come.
I underwent the traditional education system in Pakistan. I was taught from the start, what is good or bad, what's acceptable in society and what's not. My friends and enemies were pinpointed by my school. But the methodology was dubious. Now, at the end of 2021, I know it wasn't teaching, it was indoctrination. Like every kid, I started the same. Boring and uninterested in what's happening around. It is always easier to follow than to think. Schools and colleges in Pakistan further nurture this approach. Don't question, don't think, be the sheep you should be and join the herd. The school was boring. Wake up, go to school, learn some facts, memorize them. Come back from school, revise and reproduce what you have crammed on the paper in the examination hall. That's it. That's all it takes to be the most brilliant student in class. I also was this brilliant student. Always first in my class.Honestly, I was nothing but a photocopy machine. Ignorant and imbecile.
That's me from March 2021. Last day at college.
Life went like that for quite some time.
It was when I was in 7th grade I felt like something was wrong. We are the best nation in the world, strongest army and intelligence, we have won every single war then why are we at the back? When we talk about Superpowers or great economies, why does America, England or China come to mind but not Us, Pakistan? If the history book is telling us that we have outperformed everyone then why are we at the bottom? These questions I had in my mind but no one had the answer to. By that time, I had understood the dynamics of our society, I knew I can't go to my teacher and ask her this. Just for background, Youtube was banned in those days in Pakistan and the internet was too slow and novel. Life moved on numb and oblivious. This question pricked my mind from time to time but I forced it back knowing that it was useless to even think about it.
Things always happen late in Pakistan. Years later in 2012, youtube was unbanned in Pakistan. There is a surge in content from people of different backgrounds. People started shifting from television to the Internet. I finally had the means to find the answer. To confirm if this was all the truth or just a deception. I started reading on different websites, articles and blogs by different Pakistani and foreign intellectuals, one after another, bubbles popped and I was left blank. The identity, which was injected into me from my childhood, Was it just a sham? The reality threw me to the ground with a ton of fundamental questions. Who am I? What am I doing here? Who is running all of this? Am I just a pawn? Is this all real? In short, I had an identity crisis. I spent hours thinking about all of these questions. Finally, I came up with the solution, OBLIVION. I told myself these questions ought not to be answered. I'm sure I wasn't the first one to come up with this answer. 18 years of my life wasted in oblivion.
Fast forward to September 2021, I took my MDCat exam and managed to pass it. Now I'll be joining my Med School in February 2022 to pursue medicine. After taking my exam in September, I had a lot of time on my hand to think about all that stuff that I had long ago locked up in my mind. I decided to turn to the internet for the answers.I read books, listened to long podcasts.These past few months were a month of clarity and self-discovery.
Somehow during all of that, I came across blockchains and cryptocurrency. It is funny how the world is striving for the democratisation of the internet when Pakistanis don't even have a democracy for the people. I found out about it recently. Yet, I found this concept mesmerising. No censorships, no barriers, no CEOs and no owners. The continuous flow of data would make it more difficult than ever to curb and control media. I hope that this technology brings a positive change in human civilization and we all live to watch a brighter tomorrow. A tomorrow with no censorship and freedom of expression.
I'm Sameer Almas. I'll be joining Med School in Feb 2022. And that's my life as a pro-democracy liberal in a far-right authoritative state. But I'm optimistic about the future and I hope the coming technologies like blockchain will prove to be a beneficial change in the future.