It's important to have a non-nostalgic view and say, let's look forward, because if we don't, all we'll hear are voices telling us to go back.

India to someone who lives in Lahore is like Queens to someone who lives in Lower Manhattan - it's not far away, and yet it doesn't exist.

It is remarkable indeed how we human beings are capable of delighting in the mating call of a flower while we are surrounded by the charred carcasses of our fellow animals.

Contemporary culture in Pakistan, just like in America, is continuously hitting us with scary stuff. And so we are utterly anxious. I think that it's very important to resist that anxiety, to think of ways of resisting the constant inflow of negative feelings, not to become depoliticized as a result but to actually work actively to bring into being an optimistic future.

Our countries are weaker: they cannot protect us from imported goods, they can't protect us from climate change, they cannot protect us from epidemics. These things cross borders. But the kind of cooperation that would protect us from those things was completely lacking and because of this there's been a backlash. People feel vulnerable.

I think there's a natural link between the fact that our self is a story that we make up and that we're drawn to stories. It resonates, in a way.

So much of our conversation about love is possessive. "You are mine. And if you stop being mine, I will hate you." And so exploring non-possessive ideas of love and friendship is important. Which is not to say we should just break down monogamy, I'm not taking a simplistic point of view. But, in addition to these examples of possessive love that we already have so much of, let us also explore what examples of non-possessive love and affection mean.