Where, you may ask, have I been for the past few days?

Well. That would require a long answer in the form, obviously, of a blog post. So let’s start, shall we?

My Khala (Mum’s sister/aunty) Number 4  arrived from Pakistan last week Tuesday. She’s getting married to this guy here (well, technically they’re already married – they did it in Pakistan – but they’re doing the Mehndi, Walima and Rukhsati again over here) and my Mum’s been busy shopping and shopping and shopping and shopping some more. Most of the time, I am taken along (against my will!) and forced to endure the long hours of walking up and down streets, in and out of shops and staring at fabrics for potential clothes.

It drives a girl nuts, I tell you! (But some of the clothes are just beautiful, in which case I do not mind.)

The past few days we have been “practising” the Dholki at her new brother-in-law’s house. Yes, “practising”. We just  sing old songs at the top of our lungs, laugh hysterically when someone gets the lines wrong and fight over who gets to beat the drum and who gets to tap it with the spoon. Yesterday’s practise was quite funny because we organised a competition between the “Fatties” and the “Skinnies” (i.e. the Old and the Young. Awesome team names, I know ). We sang Barbie Girl, Balamory, Teletubbies and lots of other weird sings not at all appropriate for weddings! The Oldies all came out with these next level songs that came out centuries ago, and some girls from our group were helping them! Traitors!

Then we stuffed our faces with samosas and pakoras. Happy days!

Yesterday, THIS is what happened:

Yes, people. I went to the Safari Park. IT WAS CRAZY! MY DAD IS CRAZY! I’M NEVER GOING TO THE SAFARI PARK WITH HIM AGAIN! GAH!

*Composes self*

Okay. Now for an explanation. WHY is he CRAZY? Well, for one he MADE us all go. HE MADE US WAKE UP SO EARLY! IT’S THE WEEKEND, DADDY! LET US SLEEP! And he got us lost. Yeah okay, so it was technically Sister Number 1’s fault for not reading the map direction thingy that I printed out properly, BUT HE WAS DRIVING! AND HELLO, WHAT IS WITH THE DEPENDANCY ON YOUR TEENAGE KIDS?! WE DON’T KNOW WHERE IT IS!

Good God.

He also embarrassed us by calling the guy at the ticket booth “chief”. O_o I do not think he understands that, when we hide our face with our shawls, we are embarrassed. Or, he does understand and chooses to ignore it anyway! I would not put it past him.

However, despite all of that, it was a fun day! Sister Number 4 (the 4 year old little baby)  was TERRIFIED of the lions and the tigers, and literally hid under her seat so IT couldn’t see her. Then my dad laughed and told her to come to the front and he’d chuck her out of the window so she could be with them. She cried.

When we got to the baboons, everything went a little topsy-turvy. My daddy, being daddy, wanted to amuse (read: scare the shit out of) us, so he stuck some grapes he bought earlier on the dashboard and called the baboons (“Eh, Muhmmad Ashraf!”) over. Naturally, about TEN OF THEM jumped on the car and started horsing about. Daddy was teasing them with the grapes, putting them in his mouth and saying weird stuff like, “Le le, puttar! Le le!” One of the baboons BROKE the side mirror. Yes people, it BROKE it! They pulled the windscreen wipers up, and one of them mistook our car for the bathroom and WEED and POOPED on the roof! WEED AND POOPED!

Sister Number 4 started crying her eyes out, we were all screaming our heads off and dad asked us to pass the bag of grapes that we had taken off him and hidden. He proceeded to OPEN THE WINDOW and FEED THE BABOON some GRAPES! YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO OPEN YOUR WINDOW OR FEED THE ANIMALS!

We were, naturally, quite hysterical at this point. My dad gave in to all our yelling and tried to get the baboons off the car before they broke something else. How? Why, by stopping the car suddenly so it lurches violently and shakes all the baboons off, that’s how!

Finally, FINALLY, we got out of the baboon area and saw some more animals that did not climb on our transport and urinate all over it. He stroked a camel, and so did some of my sisters. I stayed well away. God knows how many fleas the thing had!

On the way back from the Safari Park, he took us to another city (hint: it’s where all the lads go on Eid. Has a famous road that is full of takeaways and restaurants) and bought us all chicken tikka which we ate on the (wet) grass in some park.

That was nice.

I just pray my dad doesn’t decide to “take” us anywhere else.

Lots of love,
Falak