Bottling Happiness in Lahore and California · Global Voices
Sahar Habib Ghazi

California-based Pakistani blogger Noorulain Noor writes a hauntingly beautiful blogpost about her desire to bottle her happy moments from California and her childhood in Lahore, Pakistan.
If only there were a way to bottle up happiness. Then I would grab some from the air, pluck small droplets of it, gingerly, and pour them in a bottle.
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I would have all kinds of bottles containing all kinds of happiness then. The happiness of walking barefoot on a beach at Half Moon Bay, far enough from the icy water of the Pacific that it doesn't touch my feet, but close enough to smell the ocean. The happiness of jasmines blooming on ordinary streets of Lahore, full-mouthed, drooping, their fragrance almost tangible. The happiness of the cool stone floors of the Lahore Fort and that of taking my shoes off and feeling it strong and stoic under my feet. The happiness of running across the roof-top in fierce monsoon downpours in the summers of my childhood and that of eating sliced oranges on the same roof-top on dry, sunny winter afternoons. The happiness of looking at the Golden Gate Bridge from a distance, the topmost spires hiding behind floating clouds that sometimes look like scattered petals of a jasmine plucked from Lahore. The happiness of having looked at the Badshahi mosque, no clouds covering its minarets, but majestic all the same. The happiness of my baby's untamed giggle and mother's startling poetry.
Follow Noor's blog, Gol Gappay, Little Things That Matter as she vividly remembers her past in Pakistan, while writing about her current life as an immigrant in the US, balancing work and motherhood, and conquering her kitchen.