View allAll Photos Tagged Grieving
Blaenavon 40's weekend
People were dressed in costumes
just walking about.....not staged in one
place. The trick was getting a photograph
without anyone in modern dress
walking into the frame.
I tell you, it wasn't easy ;-))
Paris, Cimetière du Père Lachaise, 7.2024
Tribute to Dead Can Dance album's cover 'Within the realm of a dying sun'
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Within_the_Realm_of_a_Dying_Sun
"Le convoi poursuivit en direction d'un champ de tombes où gît quelque part mon mauvais sujet de père. J'avais de la peine à situer l'emplacement, depuis si longtemps que je n'étais pas venu. Nous passions près de tous les morts de notre petite ville pourrie, connus, inconnus, de ceux dont le nom avait été gravé dans le marbre, de ceux dont la cendre était dispersée dans le coin de la fosse commune. Ceux-là, jusqu'à leur nom avait été enlevé, mais ils ne me semblaient pas à moi plus abandonnés que les autres."
>>> Lukas Bärfuss.......in: Les hommes morts (2002)
"The convoy continued on towards a field of graves where my bad father lies somewhere. I could hardly place it, it had been so long since I'd been there. We passed by all the dead of our rotten little town, known and unknown, those whose names had been carved in marble, those whose ashes were scattered in the corner of the mass grave. Even their names had been taken from them, but they didn't seem any more abandoned to me than the others."
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The Wasp (Janet Van Dyne) is a character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by Stan Lee, Ernie Hart, and Jack Kirby, the character first appeared in Tales to Astonish #44 (June 1963).
Janet van Dyne is usually depicted as having the ability to shrink to a height of several centimeters, fly by means of insectoid wings, and fire bioelectric energy blasts. She is a founding member of the Avengers and the one who gave them their name as well as a longtime leader of the team. She is also the ex-wife of Hank Pym and the stepmother of Nadia van Dyne.
The Wasp has been described as one of Marvel's most notable and powerful female heroes.
"A hundred years from now, when we're all dead and buried, there will be only two things that we're remembered for... what we did. And what we looked like. Our uniforms are as much a part of our legacy as anything we'll ever do." — The Wasp
Janet Van Dyne is a fashion designer and socialite who acts as the winsome super-heroine known as the Wasp. In order to avenge the death of her father at the hands of an extradimensional creature, she was exposed to the size-altering Pym Particles and was biologically modified by Dr. Hank Pym, a.k.a. the tiny adventurer Ant-Man. As the Wasp, she became Pym's crime-fighting partner, having the ability to shrink in size, fly with synthetic wings and fire energy stings. Alongside Pym, she became a founding member of the Avengers, being responsible for suggesting the name of the group.
The Wasp eventually married Pym, but their relationship would turn out to be a tragic experience after she became a victim of domestic violence. Having weaponized the pain of her hurtful divorce, she has become one of the most prominent, efficient and empathetic Avengers' leaders. During the Skrull Invasion, the Wasp had her powers tampered with to serve as a final attack for the aliens in the form of a living bomb. Her apparent demise was followed by the end of the war. She was later found lost in the Microverse by the original Avengers and has resumed her superheroic career.
More recently, the Wasp has been part of multiple activities in the super-hero community. She was a member of the Unity Division, an initiative aimed to integrate mutant and human super-heroes, and became a secret Agent of Wakanda, working closely with the Avengers again. Additionally, since witnessing Pym's apprent death, she has acted as an inspiring and motherly mentor to her stepdaughter, the new Wasp.
History
The Winsome Wasp
Janet Van Dyne was born into a wealthy family. Her uncle was textile magnate Blaine Van Dyne, and his wife was talented fashion designer Amelia. Her father was world-renowned scientist Dr. Vernon Van Dyne, while her mother was a vibrant and creative woman who unfortunately sustained an incapacitating brain injury in a car accident when Janet was a child. Trapped in a vegetative state for years, Janet's mother sadly withered away and died.
As a young woman, Janet Van Dyne lived the life of an opulent socialite, having grown an interest in pursuing an education in fashion design. Usually accompanying her father in scientific meetings, she met Hank Pym, a young and unconventional scientist who experienced frustration by getting ridiculed for his uncanny shrinking formula. Interested in Pym, she invited him to dinner when they first met. He initially rejected her advances due to being focused on his research and on mourning his late wife, but eventually started to go to casual friendly dates with Van Dyne. Simultaneously, Pym secretly implemented his work on himself, acting as the tiny super hero Ant-Man.
When Dr. Van Dyne perfected a gamma-ray beam device to contact another dimension, he accidentally summoned the horrendous Creature from Kosmos. Killed by the monster's biologically-produced formic acid, his lifeless body was horribly discovered by his daughter, who called Pym for help. As Ant-Man, Pym investigated the murder and was astonished by Van Dyne's bravery in wishing to avenge her father. Pym could not help but compare Van Dyne with his strong-willed wife. Deciding to reveal his secret identity to Van Dyne, Ant-Man also shared his intentions of having a partner in his adventures. Grafting synthetic wings and antennae that would protrude from her shrunken-down body, Hank Pym transformed Janet Van Dyne into the wondrous Wasp. Together, Ant-Man and the Wasp eliminated the extradimensional alien, the first of many feats that their partnership would give them.
As a crime-fighting duo, Ant-Man and the Wasp fought many villains, including recurrent figures such as Egghead and the Porcupine. The Wasp, with her savvy and cheerful attitude, proved to be crucially beneficial to Ant-Man's career, as she exhibited masterful competence as a super-heroine. Additionally, in between their adventures, she constantly expressed her wishes of becoming romantically involved with Pym, but kept being rejected by the gloomy widower. With a rising reputation as a charismatic celebrity, the Wasp also frequently entertained fans, hospital patients and even Hank Pym by telling them diverse fantasy stories.
Avengers, Assemble!
On patrol duty, Ant-Man and the Wasp eventually received an intercepted transmission cast by the Teen Brigade about a conflict involving the monstrous Hulk and the God of Thunder Thor. The fight had been in fact orchestrated by Thor's trickster brother Loki. Teamed up with Iron Man, Ant-Man and the Wasp clashed with the Hulk until Thor arrived with the defeated Loki, revealing the mischievous origin of the whole ordeal. With Loki defeated, the accidentally formed group of heroes unanimously agreed to found an official team. The Wasp came up with their colorful and dramatic name: the Avengers. As Avengers, Ant-Man and the Wasp were based at Avengers Mansion in New York City, but also maintained their activities as an independent duo, living at Pym Laboratories in New Jersey.
Deciding to augment his powers to be more useful to the Avengers, Pym designed a growth formula, revamping himself as Giant-Man. With his new abilities, Giant-Man went into action against the high-speed robber known as the Human Top. The Wasp assisted Pym with his training, which granted him success in capturing the Human Top. A vengeful Human Top grew jealous of the relationship between Giant-Man and the Wasp, gradually becoming obsessed with her gorgeous figure. Around this period, in order to improve the Wasp's performance in the field, Pym developed a "Wasp's sting" -- a compressed air wrist gun which fired long-range blasts.
Having adventures both on their own and as active Avengers, Giant-Man and the Wasp faced multiple adversities, clashing with enemies such as the Masters of Evil, Kang the Conqueror and Immortus the master of time. Emotionally, the two partners struggled to deal with their affection for each other. The opposite actions of an excessively playful Van Dyne and an emotionally closed Pym constantly ruined any chances of a calm relationship. In order to make Pym jealous, Van Dyne teased him about getting married to the social register Sterling Stuyvesant.
She regretted her actions after the duo combated the macabre Magician. Tensions escalated after Van Dyne felt rejected for accidentally damaging some equipment for one of Pym's projects. Deciding to leave Giant-Man, the Wasp abandoned their partnership. However, she was captured by the Atlantean barbarian Attuma. As Giant-Man came to her rescue, their combined size-changing abilities tricked Attuma into believing all surface dwellers had such powers, causing him to flee and rekindling their partnership.
Their relationship experienced another dramatic complication when the Avengers focused on the Maggia crime syndicate. Their secret leader Count Nefaria invited the Avengers to his castle under the auspices of a charity gala. With his true intentions revealed, the Wasp was critically wounded by a gunshot. Rushed to a nearby hospital with her lung punctured, Van Dyne's only hope lied in a Norwegian surgeon named Dr. Svenson. The Avengers were shocked to learn Svenson was actually a Kallusian alien hiding from their foes, the Yirbek, on Earth. Brought to America, Svenson performed the surgery on the Wasp, successfully saving her life.
Not long after, the Avengers defeated their archnemesis, the Masters of Evil and discussed the future of the group. The Wasp decided to take a leave of absence alongside Pym after her recent brush with death. Although they were not Avengers anymore, they maintained their partnership as a couple of independent vigilantes.
The Human Top's obsession with the Wasp escalated to the point that he kidnapped her in hopes of forcing her to fall in love with him. Tracking Van Dyne through her Wasp's cybernetic relays, Giant-Man reached the Human Top's hideout. Defeated by Giant-Man with the Wasp's help, the Human Top was handed over to the authorities. The stressful situation helped Pym to profess his love for Van Dyne, and they finally embarked on a romantic relationship. After this episode, they went into their first full retirement, got engaged to each other and dedicated their lives to scientific research.
Pym took on a job involving a deep-sea drilling operation to assess the origins of life on Earth, having Van Dyne as his assistant. Their operation caused earthquakes in Atlantis, drawing Namor the Sub-Mariner to attack their platform. Considering the savage Atlantean marching to New York City could be a threat, the Wasp decided to seek the Avengers out. En route, she was one more time captured by Attuma, who believed her to be a spy trying to stop his most recent plans to invade the surface world. The Wasp managed to break free and alert the Avengers, but in turn was restrained by the exotic Collector. The Avengers ultimately thwarted Attuma's plans for conquest.
With the Wasp missing, Pym contacted the Avengers for help and rejoined the group, rebranding himself as Goliath. Unexpectedly contacted by the Collector, the Avengers were challenged to come and get him at his secret hideout, where they battled through his various weapons as well as his minion, the Beetle. A defeated Collector teleported away with the Beetle.
The Wasp was freed, but Goliath found himself permanently trapped in his giant-sized form, a result of a long time with no practice with his powers. Deeply depressed, the freakishly gigantic Goliath pushed the Wasp away and even left the Avengers Mansion. However, when the team was captured by the Black Widow and her employees, the Swordsman and Power Man, the Wasp and Goliath fully returned to Avengers duty, easily trouncing their foes, who succeeded in escaping though.
Realizing that his old university professor Dr. Franz Anton could be a solution to his problem, Goliath secretly went to South America with hopes of a cure, where he found that Anton was a prisoner of the Keeper of the Flame. The Wasp and the Avengers tracked down Goliath and escaped with Dr. Anton. When Goliath finally asked Dr. Anton for aid, he told the hero that only one man could possibly help: Dr. Henry Pym. Pym slowly overcame his depression by getting used to his condition, much to Van Dyne's delight. However, their relationship experienced another minor turmoil after Pym decided to rudely dismiss her as his assistant, hiring biochemist Bill Foster to replace her.
As a public figure, due to her activities both as a socialite and as an Avenger, Van Dyne became the obsession of a new villain, her friend's ex-boyfriend Arthur Parks, the Living Laser. Seeking to win the Wasp's love, the Laser attacked Goliath at his lab, but the man-mountain easily defeated his foe, who then turned over to fellow Avengers Captain America and Hawkeye. The Living Laser broke free and made the Wasp and the Avengers his prisoners. Learning that the Avengers were in trouble, Goliath tracked the Laser down to his base. However, by the time he arrived the Living Laser had already absconded with the Wasp, trying to overthrow the nation of Costa Verde. The Avengers launched an attack against the Laser's forces. During the course of the battle, Goliath allowed himself to get captured. Previously regaining his shrinking powers with Foster's help, he was able to free himself and the Wasp. The Avengers then crushed the Living Laser's invasion.
When examining the robot Dragon Man as part of his initial studies on artificial intelligence, Pym was approached by Dragon Man's former controller, Diablo. Wishing to have the creature restored to life, Diablo took both Goliath and the Wasp prisoners. By threatening the Wasp's life, Diablo forced Goliath to build an army of Dragon Men in a plot to take over the world. The Avengers came to help, but Goliath was forced to fight his comrades as he did not wish the Wasp to get hurt. However, the Avengers' newest ally Hercules defeated Dragon Man and saved the Wasp, taking Diablo prisoner and destroying his castle. During this crisis, Van Dyne turned 23 and, as a consequence, fully inherited her family fortune, effectively becoming a millionaire.
Reinventing himself as Whirlwind, the Wasp's stalker previously known as the Human Top decided to get revenge against his old enemies. Taking on the false identity of "Charles Matthews", Whirlwind worked for the now millionaire Van Dyne as her chauffeur. This allowed him to know in detail when to strike the Avengers Mansion. Whirlwind made his move by using a shrinking ray to reduce the Wasp and Goliath down to ant-size and toss them into Pym's ants' habitat. Without any control devices and having their size-changing powers negated, the couple was forced to fend for themselves against the insects.
Eventually, Pym got to a miniaturized cybernetic control center and created an ant-controlling headpiece which allowed them to escape their death trap. Whirlwind was forced to flee when confronted by the other Avengers, but managed to keep his secret alter ego unrevealed. In order to get their minds off of this recent drama, the couple decided to take a short vacation trip to Las Vegas.
After many enemies, the Wasp and the Avengers met their most formidable foe in the form of Ultron, the living automaton. Masquerading as the macabre Crimson Cowl and manipulating the Avengers' butler, Edwin Jarvis, Ultron attacked the Avengers alongside a new group of Masters of Evil, which included Whirlwind. Helped by the Black Knight, the Wasp and the Avengers were victorious against the Masters. Ultron, however, managed to escape after revealing his true identity.
The humanoid machine continued to plot against the Avengers by sending a creation of his own to infiltrate Avengers Mansion: a synthetic man with ethereal abilities. Shocked by the lifeless and unearthly apparition inside her quarters, the Wasp verbally expressed the terror caused by such an inhuman "vision". As the other Avengers came to her rescue, the android was incapacitated and then analyzed. Adopting the name the Vision after the Wasp's reaction, the artificial man overcame Ultron's programming and led the Avengers to his former master's hideout. Ultron was apparently destroyed, but the mystery behind his hate against the Avengers remained.
During their investigation, the Avengers came upon the ruins of one of Pym's former laboratories, where Pym had access to records of himself creating Ultron, a consequence of his interest in artificial intelligence for studying Dragon Man. Ultron, having a fast-evolving intelligence, rebelled against his "father". As a final act during their fight, Ultron erased Pym's memory about his existence and left the devastated site. Later, Van Dyne found her debilitated partner, but only after all traces of Ultron had vanished.
Ultron's attack proved to have a deep impact on Pym's psyche. This was aggravated by a combination of his emotional repression and the chemicals he had inadvertently been exposing himself to, which triggered a schizophrenic episode. His memories of Hank Pym were submerged and his inhibitions were pushed to the fore. Developing a new identity as the chauvinistic Yellowjacket in order to antagonize Goliath's insecure attitude, Pym forged himself into an assertive lover to the Wasp.
Using his villainous new alias, he fabricated a story in which he believed he had defeated Goliath in battle, shrinking him down to size and leaving him to die at the hands of a spider. The grieving Avengers clashed with their teammate's "murderer", which ended with the heroes defeated and Janet Van Dyne as Yellowjacket's prisoner. When the Avengers came to the Wasp's rescue, much to their shock and surprise, she informed them that she intended to marry her obnoxious captor.
A bizarre wedding ceremony went through, and the catering staff had been unknowingly replaced by the Ringmaster and his Circus of Crime. Seeing Van Dyne in peril at the hands of the villains, Yellowjacket at first cracked under the pressure but then used Goliath's growing powers, revealing to his teammates that he was Hank Pym all along. The Circus of Crime was easily defeated by Avengers easily turned over to the authorities. With Pym's mind seemingly restored, the just-married couple was able to enjoy some happiness.
During their honeymoon, Pym deduced that his growing powers were partially responsible for his schizophrenic episode and decided to retire as Goliath in favor of maintaining his Yellowjacket identity, using his shrinking powers once again. With the end of their honeymoon, the Wasp and her husband accompanied the Avengers on a mission to rescue the Black Widow in the Caribbean, which turned out to be a trap set by Egghead, who continuously targeted the Avengers, seeking revenge against his old foes Hank Pym and the Wasp with no success.
Another ghost of the Pyms' past manifested in the form of a failed attack executed by a recovered Ultron. Following some other missions alongside his wife and the Avengers, Pym was eventually offered an assignment by the government to study in Alaska. Since he accepted the proposal, Yellowjacket and the Wasp permanently left the Avengers and resumed their activities as researchers.
While visiting the Avengers Mansion, the Wasp was shocked to find it occupied by the Liberators, an all-female group commanded by the warrior woman named the Valkyrie, who had managed to convince her associates to turn against their male teammates. The Wasp assisted the Liberators in interrupting a conflict between the Avengers and the Masters of Evil. With the Avengers overpowered, the Valkyrie was revealed to be the villain Amora the Enchantress and was fended off by the Liberators.
Later on, during one of their investigations, the Pyms lost contact with their research colleagues, being forced to become Yellowjacket and the Wasp to search for them. In the frigid Arctic, they found an atypically tropical environment. Unexplainably, Yellowjacket knocked the Wasp out and sent her back to safety. She contacted the Avengers to go to her missing husband's rescue.
Inside the dense jungle, the Avengers were attacked by the Kree Accuser Ronan, who had captured and devolved Pym and the other scientists into primitive beings, an experiment to facilitate his intentions of dominating Earth. Pym's affection for the Wasp prevented him from causing her any harm in his devolved state. Although Ronan would probably come out victorious by subduing all the Avengers, he was forced to abandon his plans upon learning the Kree Empire was under attack by Skrulls. With his base destroyed, Pym was restored to his former self and, alongside the Wasp, once again uttered his intentions of permanently retiring from his super-hero activities.
The Pyms eventually returned to New Jersey, where Hank kept on performing his studies as a chemist. Unfortunately, his experiments caused him to become permanently trapped in his ant-size form. After an arduous journey back home as the tiny Ant-Man, he learned that, in the days he was missing, Charles Matthews had taken advantage to get closer to Janet.
As she rejected Matthews, Pym managed to get her attention and reveal his recent and unfortunate condition. As Pym's lab assistant once again, Janet helped him to develop a cure. However, the pair was attacked by Matthews in his secret Whirlwind identity. Escaping Whirlwind, the Wasp also found herself trapped in her shrunken form from testing an antidote for her husband. The villain returned to the Pyms' house and the tiny couple had no choice but to abandon their home. With the building burned to the ground, the press assumed that the Pyms were killed in the fire.
Shrunken down as insects, the Pyms struggled to survive, being captured by a mad scientist called Boswell, who was a servant of his own mechanoid creation, the Para-Man. Ant-Man and the Wasp escaped, destroying Boswell's laboratory. However, in the process, Janet was mutated into a monstrous wasp-like creature as a side effect of the ineffective antidote. Behaving as a killer wasp, she attempted to murder her own husband. In order to defend himself, Ant-Man used his helmet to connect with her biology, reversing the transformation.
In their quest for help, the Pyms were then met by the nefarious Doctor Nemesis, who cured them only to blackmail Ant-Man into stealing technology from Avengers Mansion by holding the Wasp hostage. As Ant-Man rebelled, Nemesis was defeated, and the Pyms returned to their normal size and to their calm lives as researchers. Although retired, the couple of adventurers found themselves back in occasional super-hero activities, such as when protecting their ally Rick Jones from the Living Laser and the Lunatic Legion.
Pym's constant frustration as a failed scientist led to an erratic behavior that worried the Wasp, who in turn consulted a psychiatrist for help. Willing to revive their happier times, she decided to restore their super-hero careers. Claiming to have grown bored of her leave of absence, the winsome Wasp contacted the Avengers and asked to go back to active duty. Although Pym preferred to stay a mere scientist, he initially agreed to accompany his wife in the Avengers as Yellowjacket.
Almost immediately after their return, the Wasp was gravely wounded in an attack orchestrated by the Toad. At the hospital, she became an easy target for Whirlwind, who once again obsessively attempted to kidnap her. Failing after being met by the Avengers, Whirlwind tried to approach his victim as Charles Matthews. Finally, after years of deceit, Charles Matthews was outed as Whirlwind by Yellowjacket. With Beast's help, Whirlwind was defeated, which was followed by the Wasp's recovery.
The Wasp's excitement to resume her activities as an Avenger sporadically conflicted with Yellowjacket's apprehension and instability as a super-hero, although he remained with the team and the duo faced many dangers together. This led Yellowjacket to become interested in improving their super-abilities. However, before he could achieve his intentions, his instability escalated to the point that the Wasp found his laboratory in their home in Cresskill completely destroyed, with him nowhere to be found.
An amnesiac Hank Pym, in his Ant-Man persona, infiltrated Avengers Mansion and attacked his own teammates, being unable to recognize the newest Avengers due to his delusions. As the Wasp intervened, he was restrained and his recent mental issues exposed to the other Avengers. Returning home with the Beast, the Wasp was attacked and captured by Ultron, who in sequence apprehended Pym as well. In a Stark International's facility, Ultron set his macabre plan in motion by convincing a paranoid Pym to transfer the Wasp's consciousness into a metallic android body. Falsely alleging that the Wasp's life was at peril, Ultron in fact wished to activate a robotic bride for himself using Janet's brain patterns. The Avengers interrupted the process before its completion, but Ultron managed to flee, leaving Pym behind and completely insane.
Nevertheless, the Avengers succeeded in restoring Pym's psyche, and the couple took residence in a penthouse in Manhattan, where they came upon an injured Spider-Man and were subsequently attacked by the thermodynamic Equinox. During the ensuing battle, Yellowjacket was apparently slain, much to the Wasp's despair.
The grieving Wasp and Spider-Man were then met by Dr. Sorenson, Equinox's mother, who wished to activate a device to stop her son's rampage. In the Baxter Building, the trio was attacked both by Equinox and the malfunctioning building's defenses. Assisted by a pretty much alive Yellowjacket, the Wasp surprisingly knocked Equinox out with an upgraded version of her wrist sting. Yellowjacket revealed that he had engineered an improved Wasp serum that allowed her to convert the energy liberated during her shrinking into a powerful bio-electric blast. The process had been fully triggered by the stress of Janet witnessing her husband's apparent death.
Investing in her career as a fashion designer, Janet established links with New York City's posh high society. In her first exhibition, in Park Avenue, the criminal Porcupine and his lackeys attempted a robbery. Assisted by Nighthawk, the Wasp and Yellowjacket defeated the assailants. During the attack, one of the models wearing Janet's outfits, Carina Walters, simply vanished, sparking the heroes' curiosity.
The fate of Carina Walters was revealed only when the Avengers and their allies, the Guardians of the Galaxy, found her as a partner to the Guardians' enemy, Korvac. In between these events, the Wasp decided to move the female android created by Ultron to the Avengers Mansion as to keep it away from her house. There, the robot was activated. The Wasp and the other Avengers followed the artificial woman in an attempt to locate Ultron. Receiving the name Jocasta, Janet's robotic duplicate was influenced by her template's morality and turned against her creator, ultimately assisting the Avengers in destroying him.
Wishing to impress the Wasp with a birthday gift, Yellowjacket started to recraft Doctor Spectrum's Power Prism as a piece of jewelry. Before he could neutralize the artifact's dreadful properties, a curious Wasp tampered with the gem, being possessed and becoming the new Doctor Spectrum. Defeating some of the Avengers by deceiving them with the Wasp's form, Doctor Spectrum was incapacitated by the Vision. The Avengers then focused on how to separate the Power Prism from Janet Pym's body without injuring her. Their mission led to a battle against the Squadron Sinister and the former Doctor Spectrum. With the Avengers victorious, the Wasp was safe to celebrate her birthday party.
The Trial of Yellowjacket
Following Korvac's execution at the hands of the Avengers, Henry Gyrich reduced the Avengers' active roster under the National Security Council's orders. The Wasp was selected to compose the new formation, but Yellowjacket was not. For the first time in her career, the Wasp would act without Pym. Regardless, the couple dealt with the separation easily, as Yellowjacket was interested in focusing on his research. The Wasp's tenure with the Avengers was relatively tranquil for her, although she gradually grew distant from her husband. She also served with the Defenders under the Hellcat's request, a period when she was reunited with Yellowjacket in super-hero adventures.
When Avengers Mansion was invaded by a runaway inmate from the Solomon Institute for the Criminally Insane named Selbe, the Wasp was the one who stumbled upon him. Contrary to the other Avengers' opinions, she believed that there was something oddly unusual about the institute. With the disturbed Selbe hospitalized again, she secretly went to investigate the situation by herself.
Realizing the Wasp's intentions, the Avengers contacted Yellowjacket for help. In turn, Yellowjacket recruited the new Ant-Man to assist in the mission. The Wasp, trying to help Selbe escape, was captured by the institute's owner, Dr. Solomon. Yellowjacket and Ant-Man rescued the Wasp, learning the mental institution was actually a criminal academy run by the peculiar Taskmaster. The villain was defeated with the other Avengers' intervention, and the insect-themed trio was freed. As a consequence, Yellowjacket found himself closer to the Avengers again.
With Pym away when attending an electronics symposium in Tokyo, the Wasp was attacked at their home by one of Ultron's mechanical creations. Fleeing to Avengers Mansion, the Wasp had the Avengers' help in saving a captured Scarlet Witch and a mind-controlled Iron Man from Ultron, who was destroyed one more time. Soon after, under Captain America's decision to limit the number of active Avengers again, the team suffered with the resignation of several members. To keep the team functional, Hank Pym rejoined as Yellowjacket, once again working alongside his wife.
His comeback as an Avenger nurtured his wishes of thriving as a super-hero. As a nefarious consequence, he aggressively mistreated the Wasp, jealously believing himself to be diminished by her more successful career. At the same time, when the Avengers battled the Elfqueen, Yellowjacket blasted the opponent in the back during a lull in the fighting while Captain America wished to talk her down. The combat was ultimately solved by the Wasp's efficient actions. Charged by the Avengers for reckless behavior and having his credentials temporarily suspended until facing a formal court-martial, Yellowjacket experienced increased frustration, which triggered another nervous breakdown.
In order to prove his worth before his court-martial, Yellowjacket secretly designed a robot to attack the Avengers Mansion. His creation could only be defeated by him, and he expected to be seen as a hero in the eyes of his teammates. A few days later, the Wasp infiltrated his laboratory, feeling worried about his activities, and protested upon learning of his plan. Pym lashed out, brutally striking his own wife.
During his court-martial meeting, his plan went awry, since it was the Wasp who disabled the robot after Yellowjacket was overpowered by his own creation. Moreover, as the Avengers learned about his humiliating attack against the Wasp, Yellowjacket was expelled from the Avengers, leaving their headquarters in shame. Renouncing his name, Janet Van Dyne focused on her work as a fashion designer while arranging for a divorce. Pym soon approached her in their former house in Cresskill with absolutely no success in restoring their marriage.
After a short period of vacations in the Dominican Republic, the Wasp fully returned to the Avengers, proposing herself as the team's new chairwoman. In her first mission as the leader of the Avengers, she painfully had to confront Yellowjacket, who had been blackmailed by his nemesis Egghead into invading a Strategic Air Command base. Knocked out by the Wasp, Yellowjacket was arrested and sent to jail, being unable to link the attack to Egghead and prove his innocence.
Next, the Avengers were summoned to the planet Ba-Bani on Moondragon's request. As a peacemaker in Ba-Bani, Moondragon demanded their help to stop a rebellion. Soon, the Avengers learned about her elaborate deception to trick them, as the behavior in Ba-Bani had been telepathically staged by Moondragon, who in turn forced Thor to attack the Avengers. Joined by Drax the Destroyer, the Wasp effectively led the Avengers to put an end to Moondragon's irresponsible mind-controlling rule.
Considering the inclusion of new Avengers after the crisis with Moondragon, the Wasp invited several super-heroines to her home to discuss possible memberships, as she was interested in having more female teammates. The meeting was interrupted by Fabian Stankowicz a.k.a. the Mechano-Marauder, who was easily defeated by the Wasp and her friends. As a result, the sensational She-Hulk accepted the Wasp's offer to become an Avenger, and the two became good friends.
Another offer was made to the new Captain Marvel, who became an Avenger-in-training on the Wasp's recommendation. As for her personal life, Janet Van Dyne caught the interest of her teammate, Iron Man, who saw in her many similarities to his lifestyle. In his Tony Stark playboy identity, Stark easily approached her, since they frequented the same upmarket spaces. Within weeks, they embarked on a vibrant relationship, without the Wasp knowing Stark was actually her long-time ally Iron Man though. Stark's scheme led Captain America and Thor to call him out. Upon learning the truth, Van Dyne disappointedly decided to interrupt their up-and-coming love story.
Around this period, after escaping prison, Whirlwind replaced the Wasp's chauffeur in order to get closer to her again. His failed plan attracted the attention of the Avengers not only to himself but also to the new Masters of Evil, who had been reformed by Egghead. Days later, as Pym faced his trial for treason, Egghead sent his Masters of Evil to break into the courthouse and stage a situation in which Pym would be seen as a villain.
The Avengers failed to prevent Pym's abduction, and a horrified Wasp witnessed her ex-husband leave with their enemies. However, the Shocker, one of the Masters, was captured by the Avengers and revealed Egghead's involvement. Pym's reputation was partially cleared, and the Wasp led the Avengers to save him from the Masters of Evil. With Egghead killed in action and the Masters of Evil apprehended, Pym was proven innocent of being a traitor. At Avengers Mansion, Van Dyne and the Avengers decided to probe into Pym's psyche with his consent in order to look for any potential mind control, but found none.
Finally taking responsibility for his past mistakes, Pym rejected the Yellowjacket equipment for good. Before he permanently left Avengers Mansion, Van Dyne came to terms with her ex-husband, finally completing her grieving process and being able to hope for future joy. In time, Van Dyne and Pym were able to form a friendship.
Following Pym's departure, the Wasp had to cope with the death of Jocasta and the resignation of Iron Man, who had succumbed to alcoholism. Fortunately, the challenge of being the Avengers' chairwoman helped her feel alive. Her competence and cheerful attitude as an empathetic and savvy leader to the Avengers made her a publicly beloved heroine and an influential figure. In addition to many successful missions, her keen social skills also proved to be highly beneficial to the Avengers, as she tactfully managed to reduce government bureaucracy by being in direct contact with the White House.
Comprising the group of super-humans summoned to Battleworld by the Beyonder, the Wasp and some other Avengers took part in his Secret Wars experiment. Upon arrival, the Wasp was cautious about Magneto, who was also among the abducted heroes. As the Avengers clashed with him, she was captured. Apparently seduced by Magneto, Van Dyne revealed she had played along to find out his plans. Evading Magneto and his new allies, the X-Men, she escaped in an alien aircraft and took refuge with the outcast Lizard.
Unfortunately, the Wasp was mortally wounded by the Wrecker when the Wrecking Crew was dispatched by Doctor Doom to retrieve the Lizard. Left in a death-like state, she was ultimately revived by the alien healer Zsaji, being then transported to Earth as the war ended with Doctor Doom's defeat.
On Earth, while the Wasp was part of the Beyonder's experiment, the Vision, who had been recently repaired by the Titanian intelligence I.S.A.A.C., suspiciously took control of the Avengers. Upon her return, the Wasp decided to step down as chairwoman in favor of the Vision's leadership.
Bored with a sudden lack of responsibilities, Van Dyne momentarily found in her teammate Starfox a good partner to enjoy frivolous parties in their free time. During one of their escapades, they found themselves in the Eternal city of Olympia by following their kidnapped party hostess, Sersi. The other Avengers tracked them down and went to their aid as the Eternals were attacked by Maelstrom.
Enjoying her life to the fullest, Van Dyne took another vacation period in the Caribbean, where she met her old friend Tinky Weissman and the charming Paul Denning, the latter secretly being the hitman known as Paladin. As the Wasp, she learned the identity of Paladin's target in the Caribbean: Weissman's partner, the nefarious Baron Brimstone. Although initially believing the Baron to be a victim, the Wasp realized his vile and criminal intentions and teamed up with Paladin to stop him. During the fight, Paladin revealed his true identity and occupation to the Wasp, and she decided to maintain their romance regardless.
Around this period, Van Dyne became a shareholder of NEVELL Industries. When a trade union leader who was against NEVELL was murdered, Joe Robertson, the editor of the Daily Bugle, sent Peter Parker to cover the story. As Spider-Man, Parker reached Van Dyne to help him investigate the case. They came to the conclusion that drug-lord Vince Granetti might be responsible for the killing. While Van Dyne bureaucratically dealt with the situation, Spider-Man came for Granetti, being attacked by his employee, Paladin. Paladin left Spider-Man under Granetti's orders to convince Van Dyne to sell her stocks. As they met, he asked her to stage a fight to protect his reputation, and she flirtatiously played along. Then, the Wasp, Paladin and Spider-Man teamed up to put an end to Granetti's criminal activities and blackmailing.
The Vision's tenure as the Avengers' chairman turned out to be a failure, since I.S.A.A.C.'s influence caused him to seize control of the entire world's computer systems, leading the National Security Council to revoke their security clearance.
After the Wasp returned from her vacation, the Avengers asked her to return to her position as chairwoman, which she gladly accepted taking into account the Vision's previous machinations to make her renounce. New teammates were now placed under her supervision, such as the Black Knight, who would develop an unrequited crush on her, and Hercules, who would chafe at being given orders by a woman.
After many missions with the Avengers, the Wasp tried the possibility of keeping her flight powers at almost full human size with the Black Knight's assistance. This came in handy when she found a prowler inside her house in Cresskill. The robber acquired Pym's gear, becoming the new Yellowjacket. The Wasp knocked the villain out and got her arrested. Meanwhile, Hercules gradually increased his hostile feelings against the Wasp, as a result of her commands for him during battles.
The most serious test to the Wasp's leadership ability came when the Masters of Evil, now under Baron Helmut Zemo's leadership, struck against the Avengers by gradually undermining their operations. As part of their plan, the Wasp was put in direct combat against Moonstone, followed by a fight against Yellowjacket, the Screaming Mimi, and the Grey Gargoyle during a prison break attempt when she was aided by her lover, Paladin.
The culmination of the Masters of Evil's act was Avengers Mansion being conquered. The Wasp and Captain America attempted to furtively infiltrate the under-siege mansion, but their plan was foiled by the undisciplined and disrespectful Hercules, who got beaten into a coma by the Masters after going into open conflict with them. Being the only free Avenger, the Wasp found herself hopeless. She was then contacted by Ant-Man, who learned about the crisis.
At the hospital where Hercules was admitted to, Ant-Man and the Wasp were unsuccessfully attacked by the powerful Masters Titania and the Absorbing Man, who had been sent to finish Hercules off. Next, it was up to the Wasp to assemble the Avengers again and mount an assault to retake the mansion. Joined by Captain Marvel and Thor, the Wasp stroke back, rescuing the trapped Avengers, who in turn put an end to Zemo and his Masters of Evil.
Overtaken by the pressure of the siege to the Avengers Mansion, Janet announced her resignation as the Avengers' chairwoman, going to reserve status. Her need of having time for herself was not fulfilled, though, as she was abducted by the goddess Artemis under the orders of Hercules' father Zeus, who blamed the Wasp for his son's condition. The Wasp and the rest of the Avengers stood against Zeus on Olympus until the gods saw sense and ended the hostilities. After making amends with Hercules, the Wasp returned home safe and sound and said a final goodbye to her old teammates.
West Coast Avengers
With Iron Man leaving the Avengers' West Coast branch as a result of having his technology usurped and acting erratically, the wondrous Wasp offered her support to the team. This meant to be working alongside Pym again, who had become associated with the group. Although their leader Hawkeye was initially distrustful of Janet's intentions, she was welcomed to the group after a trip to the Grand Canyon.
The drama of rejoining her ex-husband escalated when he was targeted by a legion of his very first enemies in Central Europe. The initial attack comprised Pym getting access to intel that his late wife was alive. During the fights, Janet closely assisted Pym, who in turn managed to restore her prosthetic antennae, allowing her to control insects.
As one of the masterminds behind the operation was revealed to be the traitorous Quicksilver, the Avengers were briefly captured by the new Doctor Doom in Latveria. When captive, Pym and Janet grew closer, although she was explicitly adamant about sustaining their divorce.[148] With Quicksilver and the villains defeated, Pym decided to dedicate his energy to saving his debilitated ex-wife, earning the Wasp's support and admiration for that.
Less involved with the Avengers compared to the past, Janet focused on being a businesswoman for Van Dyne Industries, although she would still experience astonishing adventures, such as when she recognized and disabled the Red Ronin robot in a Stane International hardware exposition.
In the West Coast Avengers missions, the Wasp proved, as usual, to be an efficient and reliable player, frequently being a voice of reason in the team, even advising her teammates on personal matters. Although she did well, the same could not be said about her teammates, especially the Vision and the Scarlet Witch, who had their lives ruined by the successful machinations of Immortus, costing them the lives of their twin children, a tragic event that the Avengers could not prevent.
The Scarlet Witch's vulnerability made her an easy prey to Immortus, as she eventually succumbed to villainy and associated herself with Magneto and Quicksilver. The Wasp was momentarily captured by Magneto, but saved by the other Avengers, who then managed to fend Magneto off. Next, the Avengers went to war against Immortus, who was defeated after the Scarlet Witch broke free from his influence. Although the Avengers returned home alive, they were forever scarred by the tragedy.
By chance, when dealing with a flat tire, Janet and Pym came upon a wheat farm secretly run by Ultron and found some of his robotic creations. Some of the Avengers tracked Ultron down, but were kidnapped and technologically forced by Ultron to attack their own teammates. Freed by the Scarlet Witch, the Avengers prevented Ultron from causing a massacre in the Rose's parade. Immediately after this incident, as the West Coast Avengers had their roster reformed; both Pym and Janet decided to resign from active status, each one going their separate ways.
In Hollywood, Janet contemplated working as a screenwriter, but it did not work out as expected. As the Wasp, she returned to the East Coast as a reserve Avenger, and, in times of need, reassembled with her former friends to combat evil. She even teamed up with Pym and the Hulk to overcome one of Loki's pawns, the mad Knut Caine.
Monster Wasp
Out of the Avengers, Janet was slightly afflicted by tormenting thoughts about Pym and their troublesome relationship. To remedy her frustration, she went into a high-society life, ostentatiously enjoying her fortune. However, no ordinary life could match her previous experiences as an Avenger. Instead, she decided to reactivate her fashion career; her comeback was celebrated with a first-class ball, which was party-crashed by a gigantic Pym.
Janet was subsequently introduced by Pym and Bill Foster to Project B.I.G., an orchard engineered to produce super-sized crops, which also counted with enormous insects. Sometime later, the immense bugs went berserk and attracted the attention of the military. Defeated and apprehended, Pym was sent to a mental institution run by the government, while Foster and Ant-Man worked on a solution for the mutations afflicting Pym Particle subjects. Janet herself experienced an exponential size growth and a mental breakdown during a therapy session with Dr. Rossin.
Pym was set free with Captain America's intervention, and the Avengers attempted to restrain the rampaging giant-sized Wasp. As Pym learned who the authors of the recent incidents were, namely creatures from Kosmos and Erik Josten, the villains were defeated. Janet recovered, rekindling her ties to Pym and the Avengers.
Added to her difficulties with Pym, Janet unexpectedly went bankrupt, learning days later through her lawyer that Tony Stark was responsible for sabotaging her finances. Janet openly confronted Stark for cleaning her out, and the Avengers realized, considering other incidents as well, that Stark might be an enemy.
This was confirmed when he attacked the team as Iron Man. In order to protect Hercules, Janet took a repulsor beam fired by Stark and was mortally wounded. Attempting to heal her injuries, Pym redundantly exposed Janet to the procedure that originally gave her super-powers. The process triggered a profound transformation, with Janet being morphed into an almost completely wasp-like form. In perfect health, the monstrous Wasp joined the Avengers in their war against Stark. Corrupted by Kang the Conqueror, Stark was replaced by a teenage version of himself from an alternate past before perishing in battle. Following this fundamental crisis, the Wasp rejoined the Avengers full-time.
Coping relatively well with her new form, the Wasp exhibited an outstanding performance in missions for the Avengers. However, despite her apparent comfort, Pym was worried about her condition and inadvertently tagged the Wasp with a transceiver in order to monitor her. Having learned about his intervention, an enraged Wasp called him out and expressed her desire to be the only person in her life to take care of herself. Soon after, the Avengers were contacted by Nate Grey, who alerted them about Professor X's insane transformation into Onslaught. The Wasp was among the Avengers who sacrificed themselves to absorb the energy of Onslaught, but not before making amends with Pym.
Heroine Reborn
In reality, the heroes were shunted to an alternate dimension created by the unconscious actions of Franklin Richards. In this pocket reality, the Wasp worked closely with the Avengers. Although the Avengers had not fallen in the battle, the world mourned their apparent death for months. Upon the eventual return of the heroes to their home reality, the Wasp maintained her human appearance and rekindled her romantic relationship with Pym.
The founding members of the Avengers soon reassembled in the Avengers Mansion to reform the team in face of bizarre mystic crises all over the globe. Their adversary was revealed to be Morgan le Fay, who cast a reality altering spell, reshaping the whole world into a medieval setting and transforming the Avengers into her personal guard, the Queen's Vengeance. In this brand old world, the Wasp was "Pixie", but was able to see through Morgan's illusion alongside a few other Avengers.
Forced to fight their brainwashed allies, the Avengers were successful in defeating le Fay and restoring reality back to normal. Back to the mansion, the Wasp announced her leave of absence with Pym, as she wished to rebuild her investments.
When the Destiny Force within Rick Jones was triggered again, Immortus schemed for his destruction. Using his abilities, Jones brought forth champions to protect him. The Wasp and Pym, who had gone back to his Goliath identity, found themselves part of a diverse team composed of Avengers from various moments in time. Annoyingly, one of their teammates was Pym himself, removed from his Yellowjacket era. The Wasp took leadership of the time-displaced Avengers, who were unusually assisted by Kang in defending Jones.
Travelling through the timestream, the group met different moments and possibilities of their history while counter-attacking Immortus and trying to prevent the Time-Keepers from wiping out different timelines to incapacitate the Destiny Force. In the end, by assembling dozens of Avengers, Jones ended the threat of the Time-Keepers and the heroes returned to their proper time.
The Wasp soon returned to full active duty as an Avenger after Pym was attacked by Ultron in his laboratory at Nugent Technologies. Coming to the Avengers in person since her communicard had been damaged, she was led to a Wakandan adamantium plant, where the Avengers fought Alkhema and learned Ultron had made a move to raze the nation of Slorenia. When searching for Pym, the Avengers were attacked by an army of Ultron replicas, who abducted those considered to be his family, including his "mother", the Wasp.
Ultron's scheme to create an artificial society was shattered by the Avengers as he was destroyed by Pym himself. The Wasp and Goliath stayed with the Avengers after their last conflict with Ultron. Stepping up to active status again, the Wasp was further appointed as chairwoman when a new roster of Avengers was formed, personally inviting her friend the She-Hulk to the team once more.
Working as a super-hero with the Avengers again, Janet soon realized the fragility of Pym's mental health since, in one of their first missions, traces of his Yellowjacket personality emerged. Unbeknownst to the Avengers, the Pym Particles in Goliath's body spawned a replica of his body, which was manifested as Yellowjacket.
Expanding the Avengers' operations, the Wasp led the Avengers in many different battles facing diverse threats, but none compared to a world-level invasion staged by Kang the Conqueror. As part of his first and very serious strike, the Wasp witnessed Kang destroy United Nations Headquarters.
Dealing with several crises around the globe, the Wasp and her Avengers had the additional preoccupation of facing the resurgence of Yellowjacket, who had kidnapped and replaced his Goliath counterpart. Unable to maintain his corporal integrity, Yellowjacket was tended by the Wasp.
At Avengers Mansion, he revealed the truth about Goliath and asked the Wasp to rescue him before both of them vanished. Helped by Triathlon and the Triune Understanding, Janet communed with both Goliath and Yellowjacket, assisting Pym to merge his conflictual psyche. Concurrently, Kang's actions were unstoppable and, among so much destruction, the Wasp had no other choice but to surrender to his will, formally signing Earth's submission to the conqueror. In time, the Wasp and the Avengers reassembled to assault Kang, putting an end to his invasion, though with difficulty.
Yellowjacket and the Wasp stayed active together as Avengers for sporadic missions. They also took opportunities to explore their romance. In Las Vegas, during one of their tours, Pym proposed to Janet, who rejected the idea of being married to him again. The couple was interrupted by a vicious Whirlwind, who was knocked out and detained. Back to the Avengers, the Wasp tried out the growth properties of the Pym Particles, occasionally going on field as Giant-Woman, although she clumsily faced difficulties in transitioning from different sizes. Additionally, her relationship with Pym struggled with her resentment for his past actions and behavior, leading her to seek comfort with her teammate Hawkeye. When Pym learned about his ex-wife's affair with Hawkeye, their relationship was gravely damaged.
One day, when discussing her new relationship with Hawkeye, Janet offhandedly remarked on the Scarlet Witch's lost children, igniting a mental breakdown that caused the Scarlet Witch to turn against the Avengers. Ruined from within, the Avengers experienced several deadly incidents, such as the Wasp being put out of commission by a rampaging She-Hulk. In a deep coma in her micro-sized state, she was tended by Pym.
Recovered and appreciating his care, Janet decided to give another opportunity to the damaged relationship with her ex-husband while the Avengers, being completely destroyed by the Scarlet Witch, disassembled permanently. In order to live a civilian life, Janet accompanied Pym to Oxford. Living in England with Pym proved to be a poor choice for Janet, as the couple realized that they led totally incompatible lifestyles. Their damaged relationship came to an end when Janet abandoned their apartment in the middle of the night. When trying to contact Pym, Janet was surprised by a young woman in their apartment, which inspired her to cut off any ties to Pym. Unbeknownst to Janet, Pym's lover was in fact a Skrull in disguise, who had just succeeded in adopting his identity.
Back to America, Janet refined her studio to create super-hero costumes. As the Wasp, she was summoned alongside other super-humans in a similar fashion such as the Beyonder's secret wars. One of her fellow allies was Pym, whom she still found herself unable to reconcile with. The kidnapped group, being expected to fight to the death by their mysterious kidnapper, were tactically commanded by the Wasp when coming across threats. In a dramatic turn of events, Pym seemingly disintegrated all of his peers, including the Wasp. This provided him with direct contact to their aggressor, the Stranger. Pym then revealed that he had actually shrunk the other heroes down rather than eliminating them, tricking the Stranger. With the help of the new young hero Gravity, who gave his life to ensure their escape, the group was able to return home to Earth.
Supporting the implementation Superhuman Registration Act as a hero who had always been open about her identity, the Wasp joined Iron Man's Pro-Registration Super-Hero Unit. Hosting a reality TV show named America's Newest Superhero, Janet used her popularity to advocate the registration. The ideological differences with Captain America and his opposing Secret Avengers led to a brutal super-hero Civil War. The Wasp was distraught when her long-time friend Bill Foster was killed in battle when opposing Iron Man's forces. At the end of the war, a victorious Iron Man reformed the Avengers under the Initiative program.
Iron Man and Ms. Marvel recruited the winsome Wasp to their a mighty team of Avengers. In their first operation, the Avengers retaliated against the Mole Man and his biological aberrations, who were subsequently stressed out by bizarre weather and geological phenomena. During the battle Iron Man had his armor infected, transforming himself into a cyborg version of Van Dyne. The Wasp realized the Avengers, once again, faced Ultron and, with no other choice, resorted to contacting her ex-husband for help.
Ultron easily outperformed the Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D., causing chaos all over the globe with Starktech's weather control technology. Wearing Janet Van Dyne's appearance, he hacked broadcast systems to announce organic life's doomsday. The Avengers decided to act unpredictably by sending one of their own, the god of war Ares, to disable Ultron from within at microscopic size. The plan was successful with the Wasp rescuing Ares from a terrible fate at the last minute. Fighting Ultron did little to remedy Van Dyne's ruined friendship with Pym.
Still, he decided to present her with a new growth formula that would allow her to change sizes easily. This new ability came in handy when the Avengers fought a symbiote infestation in Manhattan. The gigantic Wasp was momentarily infected by the aliens but was soon cured by the Avengers, who pinpointed the source of the attack in Latveria. In retaliation, the Avengers invaded Latveria, defeated Doctor Doom and arrested him.
In addition to evil threats, the Avengers also clashed with the outlawed Avengers who avoided registration. The two opposing groups found, however, a common enemy when investigating a Skrull spaceship in the Savage Land, evidence that Earth had been gradually infiltrated by the aliens in the past years. As Skrull sleeper agents were activated all over the world, a invasion was set up. The Avengers were taken back to New York City by Reed Richards to confront the Skrulls in a final battle, when the Wasp learned that Pym was in fact the Skrull warrior named Criti Noll.
In a desperate and suicide attempt to change an imminent defeat, Criti Noll activated his contingency plan: the Wasp. The growth serum given to Van Dyne earlier had been tampered with in order to transform her into a monolithic, explosive bio-weapon on command. To minimize the damage of the Anti-Pym Particles, Thor scattered the Wasp's physical form, supposedly mercy-killing her. Her teammates avenged her death by defeating the remaining Skrulls. Following the war, the real Pym was rescued. In order to honor his late wife's memory, Pym adopted the alias of the Wasp and formed a new team of Avengers.
In fact, the Wasp was not dead, but actually trapped in the Microverse. For a long time she fended for herself, evading enemies with aims of calling for help. She ultimately signaled Avengers Tower using her Avengers' Priority Card. The emergency beacon was received and pinpointed by the original Avengers, who traveled to Microverse to retrieve her. There, they found the ruthless ruler of the area that the Wasp was in, the monstrous Lord Gouzar.
The Avengers escaped Gouzar by subduing his forces, but were followed by him to Earth. In an epic battle, the dictator was knocked out and sent back to his dimension. Returning home safe and sound, the Wasp invited the Avengers, past and present, to celebrate her comeback.
The Wasp's return took place shortly after the war between the Avengers and the X-Men. In order to improve the tense relations between the two groups, the Avengers assembled an uncanny team comprising human and mutant members, the Unity Division. The popular Wasp was invited to join the ranks of the new initiative, based at Avengers Mansion. She confessed to expect dramatic challenges, which were somehow proved true by Rogue's malicious attitude as a mutant Avenger. On the other hand, in team leader's Havok, Janet found a charming teammate. Attempting to improve mutant perspective and collecting funds for the team, Janet designed the "Unity" label, comprising emulating aspects of mutant fashion.
With the detonation of the Terrigen Bomb, latent Inhuman abilities were triggered all over Earth. As a consequence, the Wasp and the Avengers came upon an Inhuman-related incident regarding a gigantic man surrounded by a devastated area with his family and neighbors missing. Based on his explanations, Janet theorized that his Inhuman wife had the ability to transfer matter, enlarging objects by exchanging their mass with others, which would then be shrunken down. The Wasp then arduously returned to the Microverse one more time by being boosted by the Scarlet Witch. After overpowering Lord Gouzar, she rescued the distressed victims.
The Avengers Unity Division met one of their biggest foes in the form of the Apocalypse Twins, mutants who, after being traumatized by their caregiver Kang the Conqueror, intended to obliterate Earth and recreate it as a mutant planet. Their ideals of supremacy caused some of the Avengers, including the Wasp, to mistrust the activities of their mutant teammates, damaging the sense of unity of the group.
The divided team tried to stop the villains independently, facing their vile Horsemen of Death in the process. Although the Wasp performed well against the Sentry for instance, the Avengers could not prevent the Apocalypse Twins from being successful in their genocide. With Earth destroyed by the Celestial Exitar, all mutantkind resettled in Planet X being ruled by Eimin.
As the sole human who had survived the whole ordeal, the Wasp became a fugitive resistance warrior alongside Havok, whom she married. Having only Hank McCoy as an ally, the couple struggle to survive for years, being the only ones who knew about Eimin's true story and unable to time-travel due to a Tachyon Dam device. Moreover, Janet had a child with Havok, named Katie.
One day, when fighting X-Force, Janet was apprehended by Magneto, but not before destroying the Tachyon Dam. The hopeless war could change after Thor and Kang the Conqueror, alongside the latter's Chronos Corps, joined forces with Havok to depose Eimin and restore history. In order to protect Katie from being erased by alterations in the timeline, Kang caused her to be lost in time and space, out of her parents' reach. Meanwhile, the Wasp rejoined her husband in a ruse orchestrated by Eimin. After bringing the fight directly to Eimin and causing her rule to fall, Kang sent the memories of the surviving Avengers to the past in order to prevent Earth from being destroyed.
Back to the past with the knowledge of what would transpire, the Avengers set their plan to stop Exitar in motion. During the mission, the Wasp even managed to convince the Sentry to protect Earth. However, Kang showed his true colors by taking advantage of the situation to absorb Exitar's celestial energies and conquer Earth instead.
Assisted by Immortus and his Infinity Watch, the Avengers defeated Kang at tragic costs: Havok was left severely disfigured and Katie was forever lost in time. For weeks, Janet tried to come to terms with the loss of her daughter with no success. After Havok recovered, the couple was approached by a benevolent Immortus, who, wishing to ease their pain, revealed that Katie could be conceived again but also that a plagued future was coming in the horizon.
Immortus' predictions were confirmed when the Red Skull, after turning Genosha into a mutant concentration camp and ascending as the Red Onslaught, telepathically broadcasted hate all over the world. Avengers and X-Men alike joined forces to defeat the Red Onslaught. During the fight, a magic spell cast by the Scarlet Witch and Doctor Doom accidentally inverted the moral axis of numerous heroes and villains, and the Wasp and other Avengers became tyrants.
Alongside the other inverted Avengers, she dishonestly incapacitated many other heroes. However, she was betrayed by a villainous Captain America, who wished to use her Pym Particles to remove any opposition to his plans. She was retrieved by Havok and the inverted X-Men led by Apocalypse, who stormed the Avengers Tower.
The X-Men planned to detonate a gene bomb which would kill every non-mutant person on Earth. Havok tried to convince his allies to spare the Wasp's life. As the catastrophe was prevented, Havok tried to escape with the Wasp, claiming to have defused the bomb. Realizing his deceit, the Wasp turned on him and rejoined the inverted Avengers to prevent a potential reinversion of the affected heroes and villains. Nevertheless, a reinversion spell was cast, and the Wasp returned to her former self. However, Havok did not, by being shielded by Iron Man. To escape from the heroes, the evil Havok took the Wasp hostage and disappeared.
Somehow, the Wasp managed to break free from Havok and soon rejoined the Avengers, once again working side by side with Pym. Pym exhibited a brand-new extreme intolerance against artificial intelligence, as shown when the Avengers opposed the Descendants and Pym coldly turned them off. Matters escalated when Starfox sought for the Avengers' help since Ultron had taken control of I.S.A.A.C. and Titan, with infectious transmuting spores that carried the Ultron Virus.
The infected Avengers, including the Wasp, were transformed into robotic beings. During the clash, Ultron was stopped by merging with Pym into a single being that fled to space in terror after realizing his contradictory existence. At the Avengers Mansion, Janet organized a funeral for her ex-husband. Being the executor of his estate, Janet decided to treat Pym as legally dead. As part of his testament, she inherited Pym Laboratories and provided Ant-Man with one of Pym's microscopic labs, keeping his legacy of his work alive.
⚡ Happy 🎯 Heroclix 💫 Friday! 👽
_____________________________
A year of the shows and performers of the Bijou Planks Theater.
Secret Identity: Sarah Rushman
Publisher: Marvel
First appearance: Tales to Astonish #44
(June 1963)
Created by: Stan Lee (writer)
Jack Kirby (artist)
Grieves with Ryan Gross and Mouse Powell with Danny T performing at Meow Wolf's music venue in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
One of my favorite memories from 60 years ago was blueberry picking
in my grandmother's back yard in New Hampshire.
Everything has been a blur today after learning of the devastating tragedy here in Connecticut.
Little did I realize when I took this photo last summer in Rockport, Mass, that it would become a symbol of mourning for the tragic lives lost today at the elementary school. With a heavy heart I'm going to bed to send peaceful prayers to all those affected.
"A precious child has died, long before it was time,
long before life was fully lived, explored or enjoyed,
the loss fills me with confusion, and devastates my spirit,
within me, I struggle to make sense of the senseless,
to understand, what cannot ever be understood."
~ Abby Willowroot ~
Oh, the insanity of this horrible, inconceivable loss of innocence. I cannot begin to imagine the devastating hurt of the families involved, and all the lost opportunities for chances to share in
life's simple pleasures.
I'm numb with pain.
Grieves with Ryan Gross and Mouse Powell with Danny T performing at Meow Wolf's music venue in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
© 2010 of Julian M Kilsby
© 2010 of Julian M Kilsby
MUA/Hair: Gemma Sutton
FB FAN: www.facebook.com/pages/Gemma-Sutton/114954503747?ref=ts
Makeup use: www.limecrimemakeup.com/pages/Get-the-look.html#
Designer: Kaori's Latex Dreams
Model: Emily Grieve
Grieves with Ryan Gross and Mouse Powell with Danny T performing at Meow Wolf's music venue in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
I am doing a self portrait a month, trying to chronicle what that month brought/meant to me!
January
January is for you. I am not a spiritual person but for some reason, ever since you left, owls have appeared. Maybe you were trying to reach us. I can barely make it through the day without being reminded of you. I wanted to convey that you're not with me anymore and I feel like I'm grasping at emptiness trying to feel you. You left just your remnants. Goodbye, Nick. Happy flight.
I could not can control myself when I photographed this family, Our editor is asking this grieving father for the name of the girl, her age, why complain, but the father did not move his eye from watching his daughter in this critical condition, and he did not respond to us.
But the mother was stronger than him , and used to give the girl a little water, but because of severe malnutrition the girl can not drinking water .
My god whenever i imagine that i am this father ...
لم استطع ان اتمالك نفسي عندما صورت هذه العائلة ، كان المسؤل يسأل هذا الأب المكلوم عن اسم البنت ، عمرها ، ماذا تشتكي ، ولكن الأب لم يحرك عينه عن مشاهدة ابنته وهي في حالة حرجة ، ولم يرد علينا .
لكن الأم كانت اقوى من الأب ، وكانت تعطي البنت القليل من الماء ولكن بسبب سوء التغذية الحاد لا تستطيع البنت الشرب فتقوم الأم بإخراج الماء من فم البنت .
والله يا اخوان كلما تخيلت نفسي مكان هذا الأب ، لا اتمالك دمعتي اللهم احفظنا واستر علينا اللهم امين
| Grieves | Austin, TX | Venue: Emo's |
I first heard of Grieves in 2007. He handed me a demo disk while on tour with Atmosphere/Greyskull/Mac Lethal at a venue in Dallas I put the CD in my car and was honestly blown away by the calibur of his lyrics and the ill beats. He's one of the only rappers who really got my attention by handing me a disk. Since then hes become one of my favorite hip hop artists and someone I would call a friend, which is rare these days.
This is the song I first head on the demo disk that really showed me Grieves' talent.
Irreversible ft. Mr. Lif www.youtube.com/watch?v=vS3iAka49bE
© 2010 of Julian M Kilsby© 2010 of Julian M Kilsby
© 2010 of Julian M Kilsby
MUA/Hair: Gemma Sutton
FB FAN: www.facebook.com/pages/Gemma-Sutton/114954503747?ref=ts
Makeup use: www.limecrimemakeup.com/pages/Get-the-look.html#
Designer: Kaori's Latex Dreams
Model: Emily Grieve
This is a closer look at the statue situated on the Ullapool War Memorial. The statue is of a grieving lady with a wreath and interestingly she looks out to sea. I thought the detail was superb against a lovely blue sky.
Five Days
A trip to Karachi in March has never on the cards for me. The month I spend there every January at Rashiqay’s was the routine now for years. Last year I had come though because my cousin, the only relative in our family who lived in Karachi, his father died. This year my father died and I wanted to leave Lahore and be somewhere quiet for a few days.
I landed in Karachi on a Friday and headed out on a Monday morning. I had decided on Ormara, a fishing village 5 hours from the city. I knew it well. I had been there a few times when nobody knew it existed, courtesy of a friend’s husband. Those trips were amongst the best of my life. Endless stretches of virgin beaches, gorgeous shells that adorn my bathroom sink to this day, unreal sunsets and the best part, the absence of human beings.
The beaches are coved by cliffs that are eroded naturally by wind. The drive is through the largest national park in Pakistan, Hingol. Which itself is endless stretches of the earthy mountain ranges of a range of colours, shapes and sizes. The highway is like an abandoned stretch for hundreds of kilometers. Usually one passes any number of trucks going between Karachi and Gawador or Quetta. This time there were hardly any.
My friend’s brother had kindly allowed me to use one of his cars. Everyone was a little on edge that I was having the driver drop me off and then come back 5 days later but I told them it would be fine. I got the info on the hotel from some friends who had stayed there. It was 2 stars at best, they told me, a number of small huts facing the beach. There was no electricity till 7pm and no hot water.
The hotel had one restaurant that served a daal and a veggie every day. Chicken could be ordered. Breakfast was eggs and parathas. “Take a kettle,” was the best suggestion I got. Then you could drink tea in the room and heat a quarter of a bucket if you needed to. The temperatures were hitting mid-80s, (28). Everything was perfect. I decided on a 7am departure to beat the traffic in the city which was almost always insane. I figured we would be there by noon.
It was the first time in my life I didn’t mind getting up super early for a trip. In the two days I had, I collected a bunch of dry snacky stuff so I was prepared. Nuts, chips, chocolate, dates, honey, hunter beef, bread, fruit. Yum! I planned on an egg for breakfast and the veggies for dinner.
On my way out of the house I asked the guard who I had started calling “Chacha” for some reason – paternal uncle – where the aloe vera plants were. He pointed me to them outside the house. I plucked two long leaves. He kept looking at me while I stuffed them into a plastic bag.
“They’re excellent for sunblock,” I said. “The other ones really burn my eyes.”
He looked like he was sorry he asked. Or looked I guess. He hadn’t asked.
Exactly three minutes from the house, I saw a man collecting garbage from the street. I see people collecting garbage more in Karachi than I have ever seen in another city in my life. Old, young, kids, men, women, it was a huge way of making some sort of living. It was also one of the hardest ways of earning a buck. The dumps were disgusting. Dogs urinated there all the time as did men.
I had read that there was a phase in his life when he was young man, that Ghaus Pak (ra), Hazrat Abdul Qadir Jilani (ra) went through people’s refuse to find food. I had been so shocked when I read that that I always kept ration in my car to give to people who collected and sold refuse.
Three minutes in I see the guy so I gestured to the driver to stop.
“I have to give him something,” I said.
He pulled over. I rolled down window a quarter ways and handed him a note. When I clicked the button for the window to roll back up, it didn’t move. I looked over the driver who was now on the road again. The car wasn’t ours. The last thing we were going to check was the windows.
“It will be ok in a little bit hopefully,” he said smiling.
I spent the next 10 minutes playing with the button. Finally he pulled over. I pressed “down” to see if maybe that would make it move in the opposite direction as well but that didn’t work. When the sound of the wind became too loud as our driving speed increased, I told him we had to find a solution. We pulled over and wrapped the window with plastic and scotch tape and went on our way.
After about three hours into the trip we finally saw Hingol in the distance. I looked at him excitedly, “Its coming. It’s going to blow you away. You’ll see,” I said. “Actually pull over. I need to take the first shot.”
There was literally no one and nothing around us for miles in any direction we looked. He started slowing down. It would take about a 100 meters before he came to a complete stop. As he did that I saw something on the other side of the road. I couldn’t tell what it was till we came closer and I realized it was an old man. He was just sitting on the road cross-legged.
His being where we happened to stop, in the middle of nowhere, was uncanny. I felt it was a windfall, that I was supposed to give him something, so I leapt of the car before it even came to a complete stop. The old man got up. I crossed the roads towards him.
“Baba,” I called out, my voice effusing familiarity, “Kya haal hai Baba?” How are you?
He just raised his hand as if he was patting my head in the air. I pulled out a note from my pocket and handed it to him. He looked pleased as if I had done a right thing. Then as I moved away, he gestured with his hands making them into the shape of someone holding a morsel towards his mouth.
“You want something to eat?” I asked.
“Water,” he said.
I asked the driver to take out one of the liter bottles from the trunk. Then I looked at my stash of food and brought him all my cheekos and guavas. There weren’t that many to begin with.
“You want some fruit?” I held up the bag for him to see in case he didn’t speak Urdu.
He nodded. I smiled at him and got back into the car. When we left him I felt bad I hadn’t given him the hunter beef. It had crossed my mind but I wanted it for myself. I sighed deeply. Was there ever going to be more evidence of my being an ass?
Once again I was recognizing, beyond doubt, that whatever good I did, I did because I was literally granted the ability to do it. Otherwise it was always the same story; my nafs and me trudging up and down the road of life, not knowing if we were coming or going.
Hingol looked a little different. I had been there last almost 10 years ago. The wind had eroded the ranges over the years. They were still stunning but they didn’t have the fine clarity of shape, the sharp points of the jagged ridges like before. I smiled. Like me, Hingol had aged. The face of the “sphinx” still remained but the rest of it was smaller. The Princess of Hope seemed exactly the same.
The driver was indeed blown away. Every time I looked over at him, he had a smile plastered on his face. It was exactly like the smile plastered on mine when I played Frisbee. Just one never-ending smile that was there literally the whole time. It was the only reason I told every single kid I met to play it.
They always listened to me smiling, most likely charmed by my excitement, and then forgot what I said a moment later. I also kept forgetting that as soon as you told them to do something, even if it was magical, a lever in their brain got pressed and a signal emoted, “Never doing that!”
For exactly that reason, I was especially enjoying the years in my niece, Sameena's, life where she was still obedient. Well, not entirely but at least when it came to the things that really mattered to me, which were all faith-related, she did what I asked.
It wasn’t much. I told her to pray every night or in the morning or actually anytime of the day by saying just a few words. “Allahu Rabbi,” Allah is my Lord who raises me, “Allahu Ma’a-i” Allah is with me “Allahu Shahid-i, Allah is my witness, “Allahu nadrian allayya” Allah gazes upon me.
The first was the most meaningful to my life as well. I said a tasbeeh of it every day. I used to think in my late 40s, how much “raising” is possible but I have learnt to my absolute delight, lots! The other three I had taught her because of a story I had heard of Hazrat Sahel Tustari (ra) whose tafseer is of a 1,000 verses of the Quran. It had been one of my readings last Ramadan. After, I had googled his name to see what else I would find.
There were only a handful of videos referencing him and in all of them was the same story. When he was 5 or less, his Uncle would get up for Tahajjud, the prayer before Fajr. He would come and stand beside him. His Uncle would then say “Go to sleep.” One day he taught him the three lines. Hazrat Tustari (ra) started saying them. When he was 15 years, he asked his teacher a question, “What makes the heart prostrate?” The teacher was stunned. Then he only said,
“When the body prostrates, it rises. Once the heart prostrates, it remains in that state forever.”
I had told Sameena the story. I made her repeat it several times, the meanings of the words she uttered, the story about what happens when the heart prostrates. I want her to ask something beyond her years when she hits 15. Something her heart quests for and only lies in a secret from God.
It was the same reason the only thing I made her do with me was to forgive herself every single day for that she was unable to do and also ask for forgiveness every single day. First from God, then to make absolute certain it was granted, His Beloved (peace be upon him), making it clear to her that his prayer would guarantee the acceptance of her repentance.
The days that she does that, her head bent, her eyes closed, her hands clasped together, repeating every single word I say without a question, she looks like the epitome of obedience to me. The delight it gives my heart is indescribable. Sometimes I throw in random things to see if I evoke a reaction. Like the last time when she had not spoken to me for a few weeks after my father died and didn’t mention him, I made her say,
“Please forgive me for not asking Mony if she’s alright after her Papa died.” She didn’t react but then she sent me tons of emojis with love and hearts.
After I unpacked at the hotel and had lunch with my driver, where I had devoured more of the chicken karahi I had no intention of eating, than he did, (it was that good), I decided to go for a swim. God bless Sami, who had told me to bring long pants and a full sleeved top.
Previously when I had come to the village, we had stayed at the naval base. Even the public beach was practically private so it didn’t matter what we wore. I imagined the same. But there were other guests, although not many, plus the hotel staff which was all male. There were also a bunch of random dogs of the same breed hanging around.
On the drive over, for no reason I had googled the words “sand therapy.” I wondered if there such a thing and if I could do it to myself. Lo and behold, of course there was. The Mandarin Oriental in Kuala Lumpur had begun one in 2019 in their spa.
It was called ‘‘psammotherapy,” using a therapeutic heated sand bed to melt away aches and soreness. When the sun hit its high, I noticed that I could only half see the dogs and I wondered why. Upon close inspection it turned out that the dogs had buried themselves in the and were already enjoying “sand therapy.”
I’m not a dog person. It was almost hard to admit that these days when people’s relationship with the particular animal has certainly discovered new peaks. For that matter I don’t like being around any animal. Well, any animal that can touch me. I got to used to cats at Abida’s but then cats act like you don’t exist so it’s great. I love birds but they’re scared of you. I haven’t seen any fish in the water around me for ages. They don’t come near you either. Seeing the dogs, who looked so relaxed and the opposite of hot under a burning sun, I have to admit I felt a certain regard for them.
I donned my full black gear and went out, my eyes on the ground. The water was perfect. The beach at Ormara has the most gradual gradient that I ever seen in my life. You could easily be a couple hundred meters into the water and it might reach your hips, if that. I swam and floated around for a while before heading back.
I decided to take a shower outdoors to avoid getting the room sandy. My friend Saneeah had been taking cold water showers to stimulate the vagus nerve. I had been humming to stimulate mine. I hate cold showers but the fact that there was no hot water immediately available made me amenable to them. It was warm outside anyway.
After I had a cup of tea I asked the manager to send someone from his staff with a bike to take me to one of the cliffs Sami had recommended for a walk at low tide. I hadn’t been on a bike in I don’t even know how long. On the way as I held on to the seat and my bag, I saw a man and a child collecting garbage.
“Look,” I pointed at them to the kid who was driving the bike.
“There’s even garbage collectors here. Is there even that much garbage?” I said to myself as I looked around. When we reached them I told the driver to stop.
“Do you have any money?” I asked him.
“Yes,” he replied. He pulled out his wallet and I took out the largest note he had.
“Bhai!” I called to the man. When he came over, I handed him the money.
He looked at it, then looked at me and said, “Allah aap to Imaan de.” May God bestow your heart with faith.
I was so stunned by the word he used, I thought I didn’t hear him right.
Leaning towards him from the bike I said, “Kya? Aap na kya dua di hai?” What did you just pray for me?
He raised his hands and repeated the words, “Allah aap to Imaan de.”
My jaw literally dropped. “Bhai,” I said fervently, “Mujhe ye dua zindagi mein kabhi kissi na nahi di.” No one in my entire life has ever prayed for me for this.
His expression didn’t change and he raised his hands “Allah aap to Imaan de.”
The emotion I felt can only be described as a lift-off. It was mix of elation and more elation and yet more elation. Like him, I repeated my words and just kept thanking him like a maniac.
Imaan is the jauhar, the jewel, the gist, the core, the essence of believing in God. It lies not in simply acknowledging Him. I had just written a piece in which I had shared what I had read and what I had heard about Imaan. Let’s just say it was pretty difficult for one to reach the stage and state of being of the ones addressed 72 time by God directly “Ya Ayyoha Alladina Aamino” O ye who attained to faith!” If someone’s prayer could transport me there, I don’t believe I could ever want anything else in life.
The bike ride to the cliffs was amazing. Sami had a gray rock with a shell carved into it, like the shell had lived in the rock and then suddenly disappeared. It was a fossil. It was gorgeous and perfect and I was dying for one.
As I walked around slowly, my head scanning the rocks on the ground, I saw two men sitting on the side chatting. They looked young. That’s the beauty about traveling in Pakistan. Everyone’s a kid compared to 50 year olds and the young are chilled everywhere the world over.
I looked up at them and, for no reason, announced, “I’m looking or a rock with a shell in it.” I don’t know why I told them that. They didn’t have a reaction. Instead they pointed to a duck parked in front of them and said, “You should take this. Otherwise dogs will eat it.” It was the perfect tit-for-tat to a random comment. I didn’t have a reaction either.
On my way back I saw my bike rider, Amir, speaking to them. When I passed them again, one of them asked, “What is your Youtube channel?”
I smiled. I had barely mentioned it in passing to Amir. I told them to come over and bring their phone so I could open it for them. I don’t know what they expected but it was not Sufi kalam. Of course I went off on a tangent about the Saints and who they were and the narrations and why they were chosen.
They looked at me intently. I couldn’t tell if they knew any of the names but I were to guess, it seemed unlikely. “We’ll listen to it later,” one of them said. Mobile data had to be used carefully. He clicked the “Subscribe” button though to make me happy.
I find men from two provinces in particular are very friendly to me. Pathans and now Baluchis. They never make me feel weird about dressing up like a boy, not being able to tell if I’m a boy or a girl, till I tell them. Even when they ask, as they did on this trip, “Bhai ho ke behen?” - Brother or sister? - there’s nothing stinging about the tone.
Punjabis are different. Pathans are like, “Cool.” And the Baluchis seemed to be like, “Who cares?” about everything. One man I saw was eating or snorting green stuff in packets, that was a drug for sure, as if it was a bag of peanuts and anyone could have a taste.
When I got home I had a plate of mixed sabzi and went through my photos. They were lovely but I could foretell I was going to average 100 shots a day so I wondered how I was going to make an album of no more than 50. I wrote a little and slept.
Day Two – The Shells
The next morning I decided to swim early instead of the afternoon. Time had come to no longer exist. I wasn’t wearing my wrist watch and the only other way to tell what hour it was was via a machine. All of mine were turned off.
It was liberating for someone like me who, despite not having a smart phone, schedules everything, even nothing. I easily average half a dozen reminders a day about the most minor to-dos. If I had dollar for every time someone said, “Your phone rang and I said, “It’s a reminder…”
It was Tuesday and the hotel seemed empty at that time except for a couple in a tent on the beach in front of us. In the dim light of the sunset I had thought it was a mother and her daughter. In the morn I saw it was a man with really long hair and a woman I assumed was his wife.
I walked into the water and marveled at how calm it was. Like a giant swimming pool, perfectly still. Even the waves that moved towards the shore were super silent and slow. It was one of the best swims I have had in my life. Being the only one in the water for miles was cool as hell.
In the afternoon I had planned to go to another beach where Sami had told me there were pools of water that were perfectly clear. I didn’t find the pools but I did find another beach about 30 minutes from the hotel. I asked the kid to drop me off there and come back in three hours. I had packed a sandwich and a thermos for tea. What I really wanted were shells. They weren’t the same at the beach in front of my hotel like they used to be several years ago when we came. I guess the presence of Man always depletes something in nature.
The drive to the other beach was fantastic. I took pictures I would have never been able to in a car, (everything has an upside), and wondered about this estranged province of my country; Baluchistan.
Everything about it is like a mystery. It’s like a secret that refuses to reveal itself. The endless mountains and cliffs made of earth blowing away with every breeze, changing every second, forming continually shifting faces and shapes endlessly.
It was as if every carving spoke, had a story to tell. One could look at a ridge and see what appeared to be silhouette from one side, only to see something entirely different from the other. That was mesmerizing. The mountains, the cliffs, the ranges, they were towering and majestic, awesome, but it was unforgettable that they were carved out of earth, not stone. They were humble not hard.
Everywhere I looked I felt a treasure was buried. As it is, no one knows what lies below the ground in Baluchistan, much like Afghanistan. The appearance of barren-ness hides precious elements; gold, granite, gypsum, oil, gas, marble and God only knows what else and how much of it.
When I passed by a couple of villages, I noticed that the houses seemed to made of a thick jute like sacky cloth, not even bricks or mud, which meant that light could not enter the space. They were tiny and had no windows. There was no water, no electricity, no gas, no schools, no hospitals. There was nothing for the people who lived there.
It made me wonder how many more years the people of the province would have to bear the injustice of being deprived. They were like the African Americans in the US. There was a fuss, only recently at that, when they were killed and then nobody cared again.
Yet the province has Gwador, one of a handful deep sea ports in the world. It is the most critical part of CPEC, which is China’s only escape from its endless conflicts with its rivals in the South China Sea. Not to mention shorter routes and more money. I sighed and prayed their savior would appear soon.
I had brought a special bag to carry the shells. But I wanted to wash them before I put them in it so I walked around the beach collecting the ones I liked in my hand, then went over to the water to take the sand out of them and put them in the bag. Each time I thought I was done, on the way back to the bag, I would see more I wanted. I must have made the trip back and forth half a dozen times. My favourites were the ones stuck together, whole, perfect. I had never seen those anywhere else in my life.
Soon after the kid came back to pick me up and I headed back to the hotel.
Day three – The Dogs
When I woke up the next morning I made a mistake. I decided to swim in the afternoon instead of the morning. I asked the Manager if he would find a way for me to get some shade on the beach so I could read there. I didn’t see any beach umbrellas so I suggested what we used to do when we came back in the day. Take 4 long sticks and tie a sheet on them. Very “Survivor” but it always worked. He managed to find an old beach umbrella and made a spot of shade for me where I took my Ipod, book and water.
Before that I ordered the same thing I ordered the day before, a desi omelette. When the guy from the restaurant came to give it to me, I saw he had a tray full of food for someone else. The eggs in it looked like Shashuka and delicious.
“What’s that?” I asked him.
“Gotaala,” he said.
“Mazar ka lag raha hai. Mein Chak rahi hun.” Looks yummy. I’m trying it.
I waited for a second to see if he would stop me and when he didn’t, I proceeded to take a spoonful and shove it in my mouth.
“Mmmm,” I smiled, “Bahut mazay ka hai. Kal mein bhi khaon gi.” I want this tomorrow.
He smiled too. Then he told me he wondered why there was guest in the hotel who was ordering an egg in the morning without a paratha and daal at night without a roti. I started laughing. I told him that like an idiot I had brought this loaf of bread for some reason from Karachi and was now having trouble finishing it.
“Tomorrow,” I pledged. “Parathas and gotaala.”
The bread wasn’t some sour dough from Okra. It was a small loaf of Milky Bread from Rehmet e Shireen. I had gone there to get some mithai to distribute. Every other person in the shop was buying the Milky Bread. Since I grew up on white bread, I was curious about it so I bought one too. It was good but the paratha looked amazing.
After, I went and sat on the sheet under the umbrella and put on my headphones, waiting for the wind to die down. It was then that I cried the first time. What evoked it was music. I still had to make my video for Hazrat Ali (ratu) and I had been listening to different versions of “Man Kunto Maula” to see what they would trigger in my head as to how I wanted to have Ustad do the rendition of the kalam.
For the first time, I had two narrations in my video, as opposed to one, so it was important to keep the length of it as a whole in mind. We had been delayed because, accidently and quite magically, Abida had come across the lines of the tarana in the lyrics and discovered that it was not just sounds but they had meaning to them.
The tarana is the part where it goes “tom tom tanananana nana nana re.” It’s where the song takes off. Any version you listen to. Abida told me that the words were actually a hamd, a song in praise of God. “Tom” each time meant something different. “I am You, I am Yours, I belong to You.” I was blown away by that. It was always the favourite part of the track for me but that was because the composition is beyond extraordinary because it is by Amir Khusaru (ra ).
I listened to a bunch of kalam and the weeping intensified when I heard “Dam hama dam Ali Ali” by Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. It was the track I had made my niece learn a few lines to when she was 7. I hadn’t seen her in so long and I was wondering when I would meet her again. She had loved learning it and we had loved singing it together.
There had been more dogs than usual on the beach. But now since I had changed my attitude towards them I didn’t mind so much. “Sand therapy,” I said to myself as I saw them bury themselves one by one. At one point I went back to the room to grab a water.
On my way back I noticed a dog going over to where my sheet was. “Yikes” I thought, the “love” draining my system. I didn’t want the dog to even step on the sheet. Next thing I knew, he had lifted his leg over my cushion.
“Oyyyeee Kutttttttaayyyyy,” I yelled out at the top of my lungs running. Dooogggggg!
Of course it was too late. By the time I got there, the cushion was soaked. The dog didn’t even move when I charged towards it, moving away at a leisurely place while I stared at the mess. Luckily I saw one of the hotel staff picking up the tents of those who had camped on the beach.
“Bhai,” I called him over. I told him with dismay what the dog did apologizing profusely as if I owned it. I wasn’t sure how he would react to anyone having to wash dog pee. He was completely unfazed.
“Give the sheet also,” he said as a precaution. I gathered it and he went off.
Later I was laughing to myself at how I had just screamed the word in Urdu for the animal. I sounded like Sultan Rahi, this Punjabi hero from the 70s on, who was in all the most famous Pakistani Punjabi movies. Whenever is saw posters of him as a child, he literally looked insane to me.
I hadn’t seen any of his films but everyone knew who he was because in any trailer, he was always screaming profanities at the villain like a maniac. Who in turn was screaming them back. I had seen Maula Jat, or I should say a part of it, because a newer version was coming out with the most beautiful actor Pakistan possessed, Fawad Khan. I figured it was good to watch the original before.
It was there that I realized how crazy the Punjabi movies in those retro decades were. Even the women were violent, toting guns and cursing out everyone, even the police, even if they were already inside the jail. They were always plus-size and the personification of vulgarity. When they danced it felt like they were trying to bring on an earthquake.
Sultan Rahi was the only hero for the longest time. There was also only one villain, Mustafa Qureshi. They both looked like they were in their 50s. Both wore wigs. In fact most of the male cast wore wigs. That itself was nuts. The Punjabi film industry was like the craziest ever. People loved it so maybe it was just the “mod-squad” that was like, “Wtf?”
But the one thing the industry had that no other in the world did was Madam Nur Jahan. Hence the songs were insanely good. The lyrics, the composition, the rendition. Madam sang each track like she was the lead actress. My favourite
soundtrack is Heer Ranjha and I discovered it very late in life. Maybe when the jewel of the crown is like the Kohinoor, it doesn’t matter what the rest of it looks like.
I missed the chance to swim because the wind just kept picking up. That made me sad but I was really happy with the aloe vera applications I was doing multiple times a day. I couldn’t tell what it was doing for my skin. The only mirror was in the bathroom and I wasn’t in it for long. Plus most of the time there was no electricity so no one was gazing in the mirror anyway. Otherwise, it was making my face feel so cool and soft, I applied it every chance I got.
After I got back for the day and I bathed, I applied some again. Later I found it’s the best thing to put on after a day in the sun. When I started running out I called the driver in Karachi and told him to bring me a little. Anything to not wear the sunblock I had. The bottle alone brought on vivid memories of stinging eyes.
The swimsuit, different from anything I had ever worn in my life was working out perfectly. The top, which was usually a tankini, was a full sleeved rashguard and the bottoms, always a pair of surfboard shorts, was like a legging. I had borrowed it from a friend who wears a burka. She was surprised I wanted it. I had told her the water might be cold. That was the reason I had the rashguard too. I thought I would be warmer. I was really lucky because I would not have been able to swim at all in my tankini and shorts.
I noticed that no men took off their shirts even when they went into the water. They wore shorts that were bermudas at least. If they went in at all that is. I didn’t see one person swimming in the ocean in the five days I was there. They would wade in, hang out in the water, even sit in it and then leave.
The women only wore full clothing, western or eastern. I heard some people from Karachi wore what they would in Miami but not mostly. Generally, the consideration, people showed for the culture of where they were was remarkable and impressive.
It made me know that going forward this would be my gear for sure. Not because I didn’t expect to ever be in places where I could wear whatever I wanted but because the upsides were notable. I didn’t once put on sun block which I hate because it smells weird and is a pain to get off. I didn’t worry about the stains it made on my swimsuit when it was white. I felt less cold when I got out of the water and no part of my body got burnt. Or even dark, making outlines everywhere. Thanks to Sami I had gotten a pair of water shoes and they were amazing. Yup, the suit had changed forever.
At about 4pm I decided to go back hunting for the water pools near a reef on a beach about a 15 minute bike ride from the hotel. I figured if I missed the ocean maybe I could dunk in one of them instead. It was Sami who had told me about it and showed me pictures. Once I got there for the first half an hour I was distracted by shells again so I began perusing the sand for whatever caught my eye. It made me appreciate the notion of the pursuit of beauty.
Why one could easily travel the world if they thought something existed that had to be possessed only because it was beautiful. God forbid if someone had told me that a certain kind of shell existed in Ormara that I liked, I would have stayed 15 instead of 5 days looking for it. When I had seen Sami’s rock that had the imprint of a shell on it, absolutely perfectly like the rock had been plasticine, I had felt deep envy. I definitely wanted one of those. And, lucky me, I had found a few on day one!
It also made me realize that I was probably a nightmare to travel with once the camera emerged. I literally wanted to take a shot of the same thing every two minutes. It’s like I couldn’t get enough of it and exercised no control around it. Many of my friends used to always say, “You can take as many pictures as you want,” but they never meant it. Even the drivers who I paid so I could stop where I wanted didn’t have the patience for it after a while.
The kid on the bike was different. Amir hadn’t really seen the village where he was working so he was discovering its breathtaking beauty with me. Every day when we went out I had to tell keep his eyes on the road, or the beach, as it happened to be most time. Every few seconds he was distracted by the water or the columns, the cliffs and the dry plateaus around them.
When I asked him to stop repeatedly, he didn’t mind. I guess he wondered what I was going to take a shot of next. I knew that because sometimes he would suggest I get off the bike and take my time to do it by approaching the subject.
On one of those rides back when the sun was setting and the waves were gently lapping up to the shore, I felt a pang of envy. Karachiites were lucky to have such a spot only five hours away. Not to mention the most amazing drive through Hingol for an hour and a half of it. I had felt like that when in Islamabad in the last few years too. The mountains, all kinds of them, one more beautiful and different than the other, were only a few hours away.
In Lahore we didn’t have anything like that. There was Islamabad four hours away and as lovely as it was, it was still a city. I did have my village which was almost three hours away but there the stay was different. It was definitely picturesque and relaxing but the area in which I moved was extremely limited. Perhaps that was my fault but once I was there I didn’t really want to drive more to go anywhere else.
But Lahore has what is its jewel inside the city. It’s not one park or another, many of which are undoubtedly spectacular. It’s a shrine, one of many; Daata darbaar, the shrine of Daata Ali Hajveri (ra). Most Lahoris have never even been. That would be the same as being from Karachi and never having gone to the beach. Ever!
He is the reason we have missed being devastated by wars where enemies basically walked into the center of the city only to turn around of their own will. Where we were not destroyed because bombs fell from planes and landed on the banks of the Ravi unexploded. I learnt that from the renowned Parsi author, Bapsi Sidhwa in her short story, The Gentlemanly War.
After when I asked my Mamu about it to confirm it was true and not fiction for her writing, he told me the part about how the Indians crossed the Wagah border and reached the Parliament House on the Mall, a few miles from our home, because we had sent our entire tank platoon expecting the attack somewhere else. When not a shot was fired at them and they cruised in, the commander updated his seniors on the situation and the General in charge told him to turn around “It’s a trap,” he said.
But it wasn’t.
It was a victory over the city that is the heart of the country. Later when he was asked why he made that call, he said he didn’t know why. But we do. It was because of someone’s prayer.
When I got to the reef initially I got distracted by, you guessed it, shells again. Then I remembered, “the pool.” I saw many little ones and even sat in one which had warm water for a while before looking for the larger one. Then I came upon it and it was perfect because it was right at the edge of the reef, so it was like sitting at the edge of the ocean. The view of the cliff opposite, Hammer Head, was serene. I named it Sami’s Pool. She found it.
I was following tradition. When I was studying in the boarding school in Murree, I remember one of my mother’s cousins, my Aunt and her family, her husband and my cousins came to visit. They had packed a lunch and we drove around looking for a chashma, a spring, to sit around and eat it. We drove for what seemed to be a while but couldn’t find anything. Then I saw one that nobody else did.
I told my aunt. She made her husband turn around and lo and behold, we came upon it. “Mony ka chashma,” everyone called it. So this was “Sami’s Pool.” There were so many little pools around it that it was perfect spot to come to with a few friends. Everyone could have their own spot to dunk themselves in and just lounge around. When I got home I showered and went to sleep early. In expectation that it might be super windy again I wanted to get up early and swim.
Day Four – The Rocks
The next day for breakfast I ordered the gotaala eggs and a paratha. The eggs were good. I was hungry so I ate a lot. When I headed to the beach, I saw an old man with two little kids sitting by this boat parked permanently in front of the hotel.
“Baba,” I said addressing him, “Baluchi ho?” Are you Balochi?
He nodded. I looked over at the kids. They looked like they were five. Adorable age! I asked the old man to tell them to help me look for shells. The one who got the most beautiful one would get a prize, I told him to tell them. The little boys tailed me, picking up a shell every once in a while and asking me, “Shoki?” which means beautiful. Sometimes I said yes and other times no just to keep them interested.
When we were near the water, I placed them on a spot and gestured that we would race back. I let them have a huge head start and then signaled, “Go.” When I ran they started running too. One of them stopped half way but the other kid whizzed towards his father.
Once I thought I had left them to his safekeeping, I sprinted towards the water to swim. It was lovely. The kids had followed me thinking it was another race. They played in the water, splashing around in it and laughed. The laugh of a child when they love something is one of the most beautiful sights in the world.
After the swim I changed and decided to go sit on the beach and listen to music again. Amir had placed an umbrella on the beach and even though it didn’t create a huge shadow, it was good enough to lie on without stretching the legs. The dogs that were not present before turned up. First they fought one another and then ran away.
20 minutes into listening to my Ipod, the canines returned as a group. One of them started walking directly towards me. I was lying down. When I saw that the dog was literally coming to where I was sitting I sat up. When it kept coming closer, without breaking a stride, I was surprised. I picked up my shoe and gestured as if I would throw it at it. It always worked before. The dog was unfazed and kept coming closer.
When it reached me, I naturally went into my Maula Jat mode.
“Kuttaayyyy! Jao! Jao!” I yelled waving my hands around. Go! Go
Finally I put the shoe down and just looked at it, frozen. The dog came all the way up to my sheet and plopped just itself on the edge of it. I was so shocked I got up in a hurry and pulled the spread towards me, worried the dog was going to pee on it again. I grabbed my hat, my Ipod and headphones and stood up moving away hurriedly from the umbrella. The dog couldn’t care less what I was doing. When I looked at it I realized what was happening. It wanted shade and it was taking mine.
“Damn!” I thought as I trudged through the sand back to the hotel with all my gear. I guess the dogs owned the beach. And why not? They spent more time on it than anyone else. Taking my shade and space was a bit much. I guess I could have just sat there but then that’s not me. I would have been just staring at it like a nut and not enjoyed one second of being there.
It was my second last day and I had decided I was going to go for a walk in the cliffs on the other side to find more rocks that have the clear imprints of shells in them. It was the coolest present possible for a child. I usually took a sandwich for myself and some chips and a banana for Amir when he didn’t return to the hotel and waited for me. The medium cheddar I had brought had matured to a nice vintage from the heat and I was enjoying eating it with the milky bread.
While I waited for it to get a little cooler a the hotel I looked through my photos. I had over 300. As I went through them, finding them all amazing, I noticed I didn’t have any photos of a single person. Those who didn’t know me used to complain that there weren’t people in my photos so they didn’t like them much.
It wasn’t going to make much difference in Ormara. There were hardly any people to begin with. A person in my shot is at the periphery of it anyway. They accent the photo, like a butterfly in a garden, never appear as the central figure in it. Two countries which I have photographed extensively, Morocco and Syria, the locals never allow a shot of them. When I saw them being asked politely by foreigners if they could take a photo, there was always a firm “No.”
Baluchistan is the largest province of my country in terms of land mass, 40% but has a tiny fraction of the population. Of the 220 million in Pakistan, there are only 12 million Baluchis. My Mamu had once said if he was asked for a single suggestion for the bettering of the country’s future, he would have said, “Close the educational institutions for a year and have the college kids from each province spend that year working with and for the people of another province.” I would have loved to be in a team for such an undertaking and Baluchistan would be my choice.
It’s too bad no one thought to do it last year when COVID had all schools closed anyway for months. But then I guess people weren’t traveling around either. To that end I had noticed since I had entered the province that not one person had been donning a mask. Whether it was the staff at the hotel or the army personnel at the check posts, even the guests. Like much of Pakistan, Corona didn’t “exist” here.
Meanwhile the one time I checked Drudge through Amir’s phone, I saw that the “showdown” of forcing people to take the vaccine had begun elsewhere. A prison guard in New Mexico had been fired for declining to be jabbed and he had sued the prison. The article said that the vaccines could not be mandated since trials were still being conducted but the conversation about “vaccine passports” was intensifying.
The route the Federal Government and the UK were going to take was already hinted at. The private sector would be “encouraged” to allow either vaccinated or those tested negative for COVID-19 to enter their establishments. Since the testing route was not going to work for every weekend or all other times one wanted to see a movie or eat at a restaurant, the vaccine would ultimately end up being the only option. The most worrying issue being acknowledged globally was around inequality. Would it be exacerbated making an already terrible imbalance worse?
In Pakistan only the elite were discussing vaccines. That too only because of travel. The airlines were going to require a jab for sure. So if one didn’t mind staying put, in Pakistan the government was not going to be mandate it. They had never been able to make the public do anything.
A few years ago, for security reasons, it was decided that each person had to prove through a government-issued ID that they owned their phone sim or the number would be terminated. For months there was a huge fuss around it as people scrambled to establish their link to their numbers. Last week first in Lahore, because I thought the sim to get for Ormara was from Telenor and then in Karachi, when I found it was actually UFone, I had a sim in my hand in 10 minutes from two different drivers, one of whom I didn’t even know.
Then there was the push to widen the tax bracket. It was totally fair ask, since apparently of the 200 million plus people living in the country, the number of filers was 2 million. Of that 700,000 were only added in 2019 after the Prime Minister begged for an IMF loan which mandated the broadening of the net.
First he said the purchase of cars would not be allowed for non-filers. Then, to really turn on the pressure, he made the purchase of real estate impossible for non-filers. So what happened? No cars were bought or sold for months. The real estate market came to a screeching halt. In the game of who blinks first, in Pakistan its always the government.
I was one of the idiots who did become a filer even though I didn’t even have any taxable income. Even my accountant kept saying to me, “I highly recommend you don’t enter the system.” But then I was like, “I file taxes in the States because the Government requires it, income or no income. I should do it in my own country.”
Now I just run around in June collecting documents from banks, hating it the whole time and hoping I don’t get a notice, because if I do, then I will apparently also enter the other “system;” the corruption that rules the FBR. Meanwhile, three years on, the Government has yet to extract a single cent from over hundreds of billions that the Sharif Brothers and Zardari and others have in wealth all over the world.
Wealth, about which I had just read in Al Fath Ar Rabbani; “For the one weak in faith, it renders them arrogant, astray and decadent.”
While I sat in my room reading an excellent personal history piece in an old New Yorker, The Florida Shuffle, my bed facing the window towards the parking lot, I saw cars and their occupants coming and going. The hotel was cheap; Rs. 5,000 for a room facing a beach. With food for three meals for the day from the restaurant, it was less than $40.
That was nothing compared to going up to the mountains, where if one wanted to stay at the expensive hotels, because they were ridiculously beautiful, you could easily spend upwards of $300 a day with a car rental and food. If not more. Some people were just using tents on the beach which were only Rs. 1,500 a night. That meant anybody from Karachi could afford it, even students.
The fact that there was no internet, no electricity, no hot water turned out to be good. Environmentally speaking. When something isn’t available, it’s pretty easy for the mind to accept and adjust to it. Except maybe the internet. I think people can no longer live without it.
The more I thought about it, when something is available in abundance, the use of it is entirely unchecked. There is tremendous wastage. Whether it comes to light or water or food. I bathed over five days in water I might use in one long shower in Lahore in the winter. I used electricity for two hours at night at best.
I decided to have a cup of tea in the little balcony outside my room and stare at the water. There I had an idea. Summer was fast approaching and the ads for lawn were starting to appear everywhere in each city. Giant billboards of cloth made by dozens of designers trying to capture as much as possible of a large market.
I have a friend in Lahore who is a designer. I made a mental note to tell her to use the cliffs and water as the base to place her fabric over rather than the skin of a model. Have the biggest billboards and put a print just over the water with the cliffs looming behind it and to reverse it in another. Drape the mountains with the fabric and show the water as is. Or the sand. Or the sky. In my head it looked stunning. You wouldn’t even need the model. I laughed to myself; I had uncovered yet another way to minus people from the scene.
Day 5 – Saying Goodbye
When I rose for Fajr I stepped outside after the prayer to see the dawn. I wondered if I should stay awake till the sunrise which was still about half an hour away. Why not, I thought? I could always nap in the afternoon. I put on a jacket and stepped out onto the beach. It was a different kind of serene at that time of the day. I had been on the beach all by myself many times over the last few days but there had been dogs and birds. Now there was no one.
I took my Ipod and listened to Surah Yaseen and started walking, waiting for the sun to appear. When it did, it was difficult to tell apart in appearance from when it sets. Although when it sets it’s at its peak and when it rises, it’s as if new. It was Friday so lots of people were expected but not till after noon. I decided to have breakfast and head for a swim. The water was calm again like a pool. On top of that it was inviting only me.
After the swim I called Amir to clean the porch that I had made messy with sand and water. He was wearing a hat. It was the first time I had seen him in one, despite the intense sun, in which he had been driving me around and as soon as I saw him it clicked.
For a few days now I had been thinking his face was looking familiar to me. But then I thought, everyone looks like someone. When I saw him in the hat I knew who it was.
The indian actor in Ram Leela. For the life of me I couldn’t remember his name so I took his phone and googled it.
Ranveer Singh! Super famous and married to Deepika!
It spent a couple of minutes trying to find a normal shot of him where he wasn’t in extreme pose but then just gave up. l turned the screen towards him and said,, ““You look this guy. Right?”
He peered at the screen and then burst into a smile.
“Lagte ho ke nahin, khud batao.” Do you or don’t you. You decide!
He kept smiling. “Ji.”
I told him the guy was huge star in India. He didn’t have a clue who he was. It was beyond refreshing. No one in any big city in Pakistan doesn’t not know him. Especially after he had been playing the lead in the last few of Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s movies. I didn’t watch many Indian films but Bhansali was as stylistic a director as they came.
I didn’t like the last movie much because I felt he had the same scenes as some of his other ones, pretty exactly, which was strangely unoriginal but hen I realized I do exactly that in my writings. I repeat the same verse or insert the same hadith, sometimes even an incident from my personal life in several of my pieces. I wished he would make a biopic instead of the epic stories. I think he would like it. He’s very sensitive.
The day was going to be slow. Since the driver was arriving later, I wasn’t going on a bike anywhere. I would just take the keys and go by myself to one spot that I wanted to photograph again. The car meant I could take tea, something to snack on, sit on and chill out, when the sun was going down. Till then I thought I would read something else from the New Yorker.
I found a fascinating piece on Amazon, The Unstoppable Machine. It was riveting from the beginning. In 2017, Gates asks for a meeting with Bezos. He suggests Tuesday or Wednesday. Bezos’ assistant calls and tell him both days are open. Bezos turns around and says, “Make it Thursday.” Let the power plays begin!
After I carefully went through my colossal shell collection and chose the ones I would take to Karachi. It was then that I also happened to look into a window which had a reflective coating on it that made it a mirror. I was taken aback at how dark my face was. I kept coming closer and closer to it, tilting my face in all directions, then pushing my t-shirt below my neck to confirm if I was really that dark. Not burned, just a super dark shade of brown.
“Damn!” was my first thought. Karachi was fine but Lahore?
The elders in my family alone would be like, “What happened?”
“Oh well,” I thought. I still had one more swim day before me and it was in the morning so another shade yet was possible. The cool thing was I couldn’t see the dark circles around my eyes at all. That happens anyway when I travel. The “raccoon” eyes that I have in Lahore change and become hardly noticeable but this was different. The area was not only clear, it was super smooth.
“Maybe your whole face has become a dark circle,” my brain conjectured.
I laughed and reminded myself I had one more swim day left before heading to Karachi. I spent the afternoon writing. A large group of what looked like police cadets had arrived. There were 16 single tents on the beach. Meanwhile the driver called and told me he would be arriving by 6pm. That was perfect in terms of me driving the car somewhere to catch the sunset.
By the time I reached the sun was already over the cliff so I just walked around the beach and collected yet another kind of shell. I listened to a lecture by Sheikh Nurjan, which I was not expecting to do. It was about surrender. I didn’t get far. It was very intense and it made me cry a lot; The Immense Power of Nothingness.
“The real power is to be nothing. When you are nothing and you are reading the Quran, you have to know that Allah is not talking to you. Because you are nothing. You have to annihilate yourself. In your nothingness you will enter the ocean of Everything.”
That was the preface. Then he began the talk:
“And always it is a reminder for myself, this reality and this path is like a fine thread and has to be described by the Ahl il Baseera, the ones granted His Vision, for they taught the reality, they saw the reality and Allah burned its haqaiq, truths, into their soul. And each reality has its darajaat, ranks and an infinite journey towards the Lord of Power.
There are two doors to this reality. One is in your approach to the Divine, in which you think of yourself as something and you want to know about your something-ness. You begin to read religious texts and it seems like a dialogue between you and your Lord. And you pursue that way of thinking and you drift, some slow, some fast, each farther and farther and farther away from the haqaiq, the truths.
So the Auliya Allah, the Friends of God, came, by all their struggles, to guide people through a different door. They say the secret of reaching reality is to negate yourself at this door.”
Then he spoke the verse of the Prophet Yunus (as), Jonah, from tbe belly of the whale where he was in darkness for 40 days;
أَن لَّا إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا أَنتَ سُبْحَانَكَ إِنِّي كُنتُ مِنَ الظَّالِمِين
There is no god except You, Glory be to You! Indeed, I have been of the wrongdoers.
“He says, ‘Glory be to Allah for I am an oppressor to myself.’ So write on your paper that I’m coming through the door of an oppressor. I myself have caused all the problems. And the dua, the supplication, of the oppressor is not accepted. So you don’t have to worry about making duas. That is why you should read the dua of the Sultan e Auliya. Never a word about themselves, or their importance or of why this and why that.
Their wording is astonishing.
Ya Rabbi, I’m coming through the door of kufr (being ungrateful, denying the Truth). If I have a choice between belief and disbelief, I choose to come through the door of disbelief. Who am I to say what I believed was correct, what I did was correct. I’m coming negating myself that I don’t think I did anything right. I’m an oppressor to myself. I know my bad characteristics. Deflate yourself before Allah deflates you.
The one who went through the other door is inflating themselves. Continuously thinking about their importance, their relationship with Allah. They end up in an orbit outside the circle, inside which is Muhammad Ar Rasool Allah (saw) and Allah.
Then the tareeqa, path of spirituality, comes and teaches you, ‘Accept yourself to be nothing, coming through the door of nothingness. In your nothingness you enter into the ocean of everything. The one who came into the ocean, into the ocean of Muhammad Ar Rasool Allah (saw), then all the teachings begin to make sense. Otherwise it will always remain confusing to you.’”
It started getting dark so I drove back to the hotel. I checked my email once now that I was going to re-enter the world and saw the traces of madness waiting for me on the other side. Dysfunction I was able to escape for a few days. But how could I complain? The truth is that I had come to Ormara to cry. To grieve. To mourn the loss of my father that I felt like I was unable to do in Lahore.
The only time I did end up crying here it was for my relationships with the living. That I wanted to love and love me back but it didn’t look like it was happening anytime soon. Although funnily enough, they too wanted the same thing. To love and be loved! Even while wanting the same thing we were not able to come closer to it. I still don’t know why.
There was always hope. Perhaps in the waiting and wanting, at least our intention was clear as day. And the reward of that intention as outlined by God’s Beloved (peace be upon him) himself was deliverance any way you looked at it.
“The Momin is the one who loves and is loved. And there is no goodness for the one who does not give love and receive love. The best amongst people is the one who gives others benefit.”
It made every single person in the Universe, in one sense, a Mo’min, the one who has Imaan in the heart. Knowingly or unknowlingly!
The Departure – The Last Swim
The large group that arrived the night before blared music till late. I turned the fan on and passed out. It drowned out any noise anyway because the regulator wasn’t working and it sounded like a helicopter.
In the morning after Fajr, I lay in bed wondering if I should step outside again when music started blaring again. That was a shock! It was one thing to “party” but early morning, what the hell? The lack of regard towards the other hotel guests was brazen. Later I heard it was apparently the “alarm” for the group. Like a 7am wake up call!
It was the first cloudy day I had seen in Ormara. There were many people on the beach already. I wondered if I should swim or not thinking the water would be cold if the sun wasn’t even out. I decided to walk to the water in my regular clothes. When the water lapped against my feet, it was warm and welcoming. It wasn’t even 8am. I hurried back and changed into my suit, wore my water shoes and came back.
Like the first day the water was super still. I walked in and kept walking till it was at my shoulders. When I turned around I couldn’t even find my bag that I had placed near the water so I had a towel to wrap myself in before heading to the room. When I lay back to float, my eyes turned towards the sky and I saw the moon. “Hi Moonie,” I said, my usual greeting for it.
A few days ago when the waves were slightly rougher, I had begun reciting my favourite surahs of the Quran in tajweed, the rules of recitation, to make them still. Like it would have been magic. They had only slapped my face more. Today when I recited the surahs, it felt like the water listened. And the moon listened and even my heart listened to my tongue, as if separate from it.
After having my last gotalaa with the driver and finishing off the milky bread, I got the Frisbee I had brought and looked for Amir. It was a perfectly still day, wind of zero km. I found him cleaning a room.
“Amir, come!” I beckoned him and started walking away. “And bring that other guy who cleans the rooms as well.”
He looked hesitant. And busy.
“Come,” I insisted, “I’m leaving. This will take a minute.”
He walked behind me as I went to a spot on the side of the hotel where it was flat and there were no people. I told both of them what I knew how to throw it. Use the wrist and the upper arm. Let go of the disc when the arm is stretched straight.
Amir was a natural. His throws were better than mine. Abbas was just as good. We threw it around a few times in a circle. Then they looked like they wanted to go back to the cleaning.
“Chalo,” I said parting ways, “Khelna zaroor.” Don’t forget to play.
After I made sure I had everything in my room, a thought occurred to me. I should go on the beach one more time and say thank you. I got the idea from my friend Zee. Whenever she sees something beautiful in nature and her heart leaps because of it, she immediately goes into sajda and prostrates in gratitude to God. I’ve seen her do it my whole life and always laughed like it was the first time. I didn’t wear the water shoes I had worn the whole time I had been in Ormara. I walked barefoot in the sand.
It was soft and cool. I walked near the edge of the water and kneeled. The sand touched my forehead and I said a prayer. Any break from routine in a surrounding of nature is a “refresh” button for the soul and the heart, the mind, one’s entire being. Clarity is always gained in some way even when one is not alone. I like that the most about being away from everything. Sometimes that clarity, that one feels is so uniquely theirs, benefits another. Then purpose is truly fulfilled.
When we used to stay at the naval base, it was always for three nights. On the last afternoon, we would always head up to the top of Hammer Head to have a tea and watch the sunset from the towering height. It was always a lovely change, a unique perspective. On the way there it would be light still so we would sometimes stop to take photos.
The navy likes to write on rocks. Mostly they write the names of God. But my favourite was always this one line on this one rock painted blue. It made me feel welcome having been there and welcome to return. It would become the thought on my mind whenever I left this piece of heaven, the only time I entered Baluchistan and interacted with Baluchis, who like their mountains of earth were soft and humble. And the line made my heart, which constantly has to stop itself from giving up on people, feel happy and hopeful, yearning, in regards to both Ormara and the ones I love in my life;
Phir kab aao gey?
When will you come back again?
www.youtube.com/watch?v=thrnJlbez-k
Do not worry
Do not grieve: beauty will rejoice with your grace;
the cell of sadness will one day become
in a fenced garden full of roses.
Do not grieve, sorrowful heart: your evil, in good will be changed;
do not stop in what disturbs you:
that deranged spirit will know peace again.
Do not worry: once again life will reign in the garden in which you sigh
and you will see very soon, oh, song of the night!
a curtain of roses on your forehead.
Do not grieve if you do not understand the mystery of life.
So much joy is hidden behind the veil!
Do not worry if, for a few moments, the starry spheres
they do not rotate according to your wishes, for the wheel of time
It does not always turn in the same direction.
Do not worry if, for the sake of the sanctuary, you enter the desert
and the thorns hurt you.
Do not grieve, my soul, if the torrent of days
turn your mortal dwelling into ruins, for you have love
to save you from that flood.
Do not grieve if the journey is bitter and the goal invisible.
There is no path that does not lead to a goal.
Do not worry, Hafiz, in the humble corner where you think yourself poor
and in the abandonment of the dark nights,
for you still have your song and your love.
From "The Gazales of Hafiz"
Collection Poetry Viewer 1981
Version of Enrique Fernández Latour
Mixed technique on wood.
31 x 78 cm.
No te aflijas ( para Nasrin Sotoudeh)
www.youtube.com/watch?v=thrnJlbez-k
No te aflijas
No te aflijas: la belleza volverá a regocijarte con su gracia;
la celda de la tristeza se convertirá un día
en un jardín cercado lleno de rosas.
No te aflijas, corazón doliente: tu mal, en bien se trocará;
no te detengas en lo que te perturba:
ese espíritu trastornado conocerá de nuevo la paz.
No te aflijas: una vez más la vida reinará en el jardín en que suspiras
y verás muy pronto, ¡oh, canto de la noche!,
una cortina de rosas sobre tu frente.
No te aflijas si no comprendes el misterio de la vida.
¡Tanta alegría se oculta tras del velo!
No te aflijas si, por algunos instantes, las esferas estrelladas
no giran según tus deseos, pues la rueda del tiempo
no siempre da vueltas en el mismo sentido.
No te aflijas si, por amor del santuario, penetras en el desierto
y las espinas te hieren.
No te aflijas, alma mía, si el torrente de los días
convierte en ruinas tu morada mortal, pues tienes el amor
para salvarte de ese diluvio.
No te aflijas si el viaje es amargo y la meta invisible.
No hay camino que no conduzca a una meta.
No te aflijas, Hafiz, en el rincón humilde en que te crees pobre
y en el abandono de las noches oscuras,
pues te quedan aún tu canción y tu amor.
De "Los Gazales de Hafiz"
Colección Visor de Poesía 1981
Versión de Enrique Fernández Latour
Técnica mixta sobre madera.
31 x 78 cm.
Grieves with Ryan Gross and Mouse Powell with Danny T performing at Meow Wolf's music venue in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Wine cup with the suicide of Ajax
Greek, made in Athens, 490-180 BC
Terracotta
Red figure kylix attributed to the
Brygos painter
Ajax lies with a sword through his back as his grieving consort Tekmessa rushes to cover the corpse. The hero's suicide is the climax to events depicted on the outside of this cup. After Ajax and Odysseus risked their lives to recover the body of Achilles, they came to blows over who should receive Achilles's armor. When the Greeks voted to award it to Odysseus, Ajax was so humiliated that falling on his own sword was the only way he could affirm his heroic status.
on the rooftop patio of one of Deep Ellum's restaurants before heading to his show across the street.
As promised in my 22 November Patreon post, albeit starting a day later than planned, I've been putting together a new series of photographs.
These are images I've previously taken that have a particularly seasonal relevance. Though, as warned, they're not really full of your usual Christmas cheer.
As many of you may know, I've a bit of a thing for graveyards, cemeteries, churchyards and other places of rest.
Reviewing photos I imported from earlier this year recently, I realised I've gathered a collection of photographs from various places of rest that capture mementoes of Christmas. Festive ornaments and decorations left by family and friends recently or not so recently.
So, I thought it was as good a time as any to edit a selection of these to share with you as a series entitled 'season's grievings'.
I'm still reviewing how many I have and editing them as I find them.
Given the topical nature of the series, I'm going to share them early-access for patrons-only on my Patreon, but only two days ahead of them becoming public and being posted here and elsewhere on the interwebs, instead of the usual week.
For the avoidance of doubt: these photos are shared respectfully. Both, for those who've passed and the families who decorated their final resting place.
I find these both beautiful and heartbreaking tributes to those now gone.
The second image from the series is now available early access to patrons. Become a patron.
In San Pier Niceto, on the Peloritani Mountains in Sicily, during the Holy Tuesday takes place the SS. Crucifix procession, whose roots are ancient. The Church of St. James houses and cares for the precious Crucifix, Which is brought to the procession by the streets of the country preceded by very young children, of both sexes, who imitate little Angels, Angels and Grieving young Nuns, dressed in elaborate dresses covered with many gold jewelery, sewn by handy hands that with pins, necklaces , Bracelets and many other gold jewelry applied to their little clothes, they make real works of art whose designs are reminiscent of Easter symbols. Gold for dressing is collected home from home by people who have to melt a "vote", gold that will be returned at the end of the procession. Everything begins during Lent when parents decide to dress their baby by little Angels, Angels or Grieving Nuns .The Little Angels are usually 3 or 4 year olds, the Angels are a little bigger, the Nuns are little young girls. Thus the preparations for the elaboration of the elaborate clothes begin: Parents during Lent are knocking at every door of the country, among friends and relatives, to borrow bracelets, brooches, necklaces and all the gold necessary for the composition of embroidery . The Little Angel's dress is white, short down to the knee, made up of a gold-plated bodice and a skirt with some golden embroidery; Arms are adorned by bracelets, the head is adorned by a collier, small wings (white dove feathers) sprout from behind. The Angels have a white tunic, on which sacred icons are embroidered in gold, the head is covered by a collier, wings lie on their shoulders. The Nun's dress is black, on which are stitched the crowns of the S.S. Rosary, on the head is placed a white veil, held by a rose crown. At 16:30 on Holy Tuesday, a tapping of bells together with the band's fanfare in the village, set off at the "Crucifixion Procession" of San Pier Niceto: at the foot of the Crucifix there are red roses, behind it are located branches of cypress (at the end of the event the faithful will carry with them a piece of cypress as a relic), finally the red ribbons are tied to the arms of the Crucifix, they will mark the procession of the procession until the arrival at the Mother Church, a century church to St. Peter the Apostle, where the celebration of the Holy Mass will take place (the reverse path will bring the SS Crucifix to the Church of St. James): in perfect order the faithful in religious silence, with votive candles in their hands, walk the streets of the country never crossing the red ribbons as they delimit the path of the Golden Little Angels, Angels and the Grieving young Nuns .
A San Pier Niceto, sui monti Peloritani in Sicilia, durante il Martedì Santo prende vita la processione per le vie del paese del SS. Crocifisso, le cui radici sono antichissime. La Chiesa di San Giacomo ospita e custodisce il pregevole Crocifisso, che viene portato in processione per le vie del paese preceduto da bambini anche molto piccoli, di entrambi i sessi, che impersonano Angioletti ed Addoloratine vestiti con elaboratissimi abiti ricoperti con tantissimi monili d’oro, cuciti dalle mani abili di sarte che con spille, collane, bracciali e tanti altri monili in oro applicati sui loro piccoli vestiti, realizzano vere opere d’arte i cui disegni ricordano simboli pasquali. L’oro per la realizzazione dei vestitini viene raccolto di casa in casa da persone che hanno da sciogliere un “voto”, oro che verrà restituito alla fine della processione. Tutto ha inizio durante la Quaresima, quando dei genitori decidono per “voto” di vestire il proprio bambino da Angioletto, Angiolone o Monachella.
Gli Angioletti sono solitamente bimbi di 3 o 4 anni, gli Angioloni sono un po’ più grandi, le Monachelle sono delle bambine. Così iniziano i preparativi per la realizzazione degli elaboratissimi vestiti: i genitori durante la Quaresima bussano ad ogni porta del paese, tra la cerchia di amici e parenti, per prendere in prestito bracciali, spille, collane e tutto l’oro necessario alla composizione dei ricami. Il vestito degli Angioletti è bianco, corto fino al ginocchio, composto da un corpetto ricoperto d’oro ed una gonna segnata da alcuni ricami d’oro; le braccia sono adornate da bracciali, la testa è adornata da un collier, da dietro le spalle spuntano delle piccole ali (piume di colomba bianca). Gli Angioloni hanno una tunica bianca sulla quale vengono ricamate delle icone sacre in oro, la testa è cinta da un collier, sulle spalle trovano posto delle ali. Il vestito delle Monachelle invece è nero, sul quale vengono cucite delle coroncine del S.S. Rosario, sul capo viene posto un velo bianco, trattenuto da una corona di rose. Alle 16:30 del Martedì Santo un rintocco di campane insieme alla fanfare della banda del paese, danno il via alla “Processione del Crocifisso” di San Pier Niceto: ai piedi della Croce vi sono delle rose rosse, dietro di essa trovano posto dei rami di cipresso (alla fine dell’evento i fedeli porteranno con se un pezzetto di rametto come reliquia), infine dei nastri rossi vengono legati alle braccia del Crocifisso, essi segneranno il percorso della processione, fino all’arrivo al Duomo, una chiesa cinquecentesca dedicata a San Pietro apostolo, ove si terrà la celebrazione della Santa Messa ( il percorso inverso riporterà il S.S. Crocifisso nella Chiesa di San Giacomo): in perfetto ordine i fedeli in religioso silenzio, con ceri votivi in mano, percorrono le vie del paese, non oltrepassando i nastri rossi poiché essi delimitano il percorso degli Angioletti d’oro e delle Addoloratine.
51 | February 20, 2008
My uncle shot and killed himself this morning.
When we were young, my sister and I would spend our summers with him and his wife. A year and a half ago, Rj and I, along with two of my sisters, spent a night with them. It was one of the most fun family nights I've ever had. I'm so glad that Rj got to experience Jerry on a more personal level before this happened.
Jerry was actually my great-uncle. He was in his 70's and had just visited with a doctor. The family is assuming the doctor gave him bad news. His suicide note said that 'some things are worse than death'. An autopsy is being done to help provide the family with some insight.
My heart is just breaking so much for my aunt. I cannot imagine what it would be like to discover Rj with a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. Especially not after having lived so many happy years together. Ugh. It just pains me so much to think about it.