اك شعر جو دماغ میں مستقل آ رہا ہے

آپ كی یاد آتی رہی رات بھر 

مخدوم محی الدّین

چاندنی دل دكھاتی رہی رات بھر

فیض احمد فیض

Müjhay 'Eman' Ho Gaya

This is Eman Khatri, my 12-year -old friend.

I got to know her because I know her siblings.

There's the multifaceted eldest sister, Sadia, who wanted to be so many things - ranging from a Scientist to an Astronaut to a Writer - but has, recently, 'settled' on another (temporary?) phase called Girls at Dhabas. She also helped with the images you see on the staircase of T2F if you go there ever. Originally the main images were painted by her younger sister, Fiza, who is a lovely artist. Currently in the USA , she may arrive any day/month/year in Karachi.

Eman is a lovely girl, full of fairly intelligent questions, and understands the answers much more than you'd imagine. Among other things, like reading books, she is very fond of Qavvaali. Her favourite Qavvaal is Subhan Nizami. She's been asking me to take her to a place where she could listen to him.

The answer lay in phoning Subhan and asking that I'd like to come over to his place with a few friends and listen to him for a while. Sunday was the date he chose and we (Sadia, Hadi, Eman, Vishal, Farieha) spent a lovely afternoon there.

When I told Subhan that Eman was his fan he smiled and said to her what she'd like to hear. She said "Ishaq mayñ tayray kohé gham" - surprising him (and tall of us). Subhan kept saying that this was amazing. Here is his rendition that afternoon.

The First One

He sang quite a few pieces and then, at the end, I asked him to recite "Man khaaké kafé paaé" … and heard Eman asking for the same piece at the same time.  Here it is.

The Last One

"How do you know these qavvaalis so well, Eman?"

"I listen to them on the Internet!"

•

What a girl you are, Eman.