The day dad stood up to mum

Fin.

The day dad made us go to Pakistan.

My grandma is a tank. She is scary. Sometimes she beats us with her stick. My cousin Umar says she looks like this:

But that's because he's scared of her because he eats with his feet sometimes and she doesn't like those kind of manners.

So when dad told us that she was going to Pakistan, we were all like:

But when he told us that we were going with her, we were all like:

When we got to Pakistan, Uncle Naseer came to pick us up from the airport. He brought his family along for the ride. Granny had already gone ahead with cousin Imran on his motorbike. She was driving.

Uncle Naseer and Aunty Teepee were ecstatic to see us! They smiled and kissed us and hugged us lots, and their three little children shyly shook our hands. Then they ushered us into their car, a 3-seater Peugeot.

There were ten of us.

The car was so tiny and so unable to take all our weight, that whenever we got to the smallest of bumps in the road, the car couldn't make it and we had to all get out and push.

Bonsai

I bought a bonsai tree for my "bf". I say "bf" because I am Pakistani girl and so we don't do conventional dating. We are not allowed to have sex or to kiss or to hug or to hold hands or to to touch or to make eye-contact for a prolonged period of time. So our courtship goes a little like this...

So yes, I bought him a Bonsai tree. He likes Japanese things and was really touched by the gesture. That's an understatement...He LOVED it! In fact he was so excited by it that he suffered a sudden onslaught of broodiness and declared that the tree was like our first child, and that we would nurture it together. "Yes!" I cried, encouragingly, "It will be our baby! It will be a representation of my skills as a mother!"

I had the better part of the deal. Bonsai was meant to stay with bf, and I was merely to ring it and sing it lullabies every night. Bf lives in the South of the country; I live in the North. The distance would have meant I'd never, ever have had to change a nappy.

Unfortunately, on my latest trip down South, I forgot to take Bonsai with me. This means that the tree is still with me. I've had it for two weeks. And now it's dying.

How do I know it's dying? Well, two weeks ago it looked like this:

And now it looks like this:

The leaves are yellow and are shedding like dog fur in summer.

I don't know what I did to make it so sick! The only thing I've done is keep it by the window so it gets enough light, and immerse it in a bath once a week, as I was told to do!

In my panic I googled "Bonsai yellow leaves help!" and found the following:

Over-watering may kill the Bonsai.