Light Within

Making sense of blogging and social media

Female cabbie
Tuesday, 22 March 2011

From New York to Islamabad female cabbies are still news anywhere. And in Pakistan female cabbie is ground-breaking.

Remember how the New York Hack - blog by female New York cabbie Melissa Plaut – created waves before it died just after her fat book 'Hack: How I Stopped Worrying About What to Do with My Life and Started Driving a Yellow Cab' deal. Then we saw a book by a Pakistani cabbie titled For Hire. Cabbies always have interesting stuff to tell.

But Zahida Kazmi, a brave woman who have opted to drive taxi in Islamabad to support her family of six children - is by far only example in Pakistan as per my knowledge. She bought a yellow can on easy installments by a government scheme in 90's [when Pakistan was a little different and more tolerant] and started driving to pick the passengers.

Generally speaking, women in Pakistani society are perceived working as a teacher, nurse, salesperson or politicians but to deviate from the norm takes a lot of courage. To become a cabbie - a profession meant for the rough and tough and not the dainty - is hard but Zahida Kazmi took on the challenge. For a woman to enter the realm of men can pose a serious challenge to their monopoly. By becoming a cabdriver she is fighting the odds for nine years now. She has travelled all over the Pakistan and passengers feel much happy and comfortable to travel with her. “I am old now and I get tired. It's hard for me to drive all the time but what can I do, says Zahida Kazmi.

Labels: Life

posted by S A J Shirazi @ Tuesday, March 22, 2011,

6 Comments:

At 11:05 AM PKT, Deb Sistrunk said...: I greatly admire Zahida Kazmi. Thank you for telling her story. BTW, she does NOT look old! She is a beautiful woman. :-)
At 11:33 AM PKT, jalalHB said...: Great!! I must commend Zahida for this challenging profession
At 11:51 AM PKT, S A J Shirazi said...: Thanks Deb Sistrunk. She is old as she started this in 1992 when she was 33. She is over 50 and driving is a tough job.
At 11:52 AM PKT, S A J Shirazi said...: Thank J. You are Islamabad and I suggest you take a ride in her taxi and know here better and write about your experience at Jaho Jalal.
At 3:58 PM PKT, Anonymous said...: Kismat ke kheel hein ye sab sir!
At 7:24 PM PKT, Doll said...: I appreciate this a great deal.