By NAVEED GILANI Aristotle in his treatise on a perfect life uses the term eudemonia (of course, a Greek word) as the ultimate end for which we do all that we do. This term loosely means ‘happiness’. It’s more accurate translation would be ‘human flourishing’ but for the purposes of this piece I will stick… Read more »

By NAVEED GILANI “Gham nadaari boz bekhar” was the Persian title of one of Patras Bukhari’s Urdu masterpieces. In the days of Patras, Persian had great influence on Urdu literature. The title simply means; “if you don’t have any worries buy a goat”. It was an amusing account of how the life of a simple… Read more »

By NAVEED GILANI “All our dreams come true – if we have the courage to pursue them”  – Walt Disney Walt Disney’s dream was to bring happiness to the children of the world no matter how many continents away they lived from the make believe world of fantasy land. As a child I used to… Read more »

By NAVEED GILANI On 21st July 2016 I set out to tick another one off my elusive bucket list. “Hazaaron khwahishein aisi kay har khwahish pe dum nikle, bahut nikle mere armaan magar phir bhi kam nikle” (a thousand desires such as these that each desire takes a lifetime. I have had many a desire,… Read more »

By NAVEED GILANI Many years ago I had written a small piece called ‘my bald spot’ after my youngest, Danny, discovered a bald spot on my head. That was the beginning of my entry into the proverbial ‘middle age’. Now, I am pushing the upper limit of this period of my life and just about… Read more »

By NAVEED GILANI “I was taught by my respected chief and predecessor Col. George Everest, to assign to every geographical object its true local or national appellation…but here is a mountain, most probably the highest in the world, without any local name that we can discover…….I have determined to name this noble peak ……….Mt. Everest”… Read more »

By NAVEED GILANI My beloved father, a Topchi (Gunner) by training, served proudly and honorably for 29 years in the military. First four years in the Royal British Indian Army and the later twenty five in the Pakistan Army. Retiring at the rank of Brigadier he was commissioned in 1943 when the British had already… Read more »

By NAVEED GILANI Yuichiro Miura, at age 80, is the oldest man to have summited the Mount Everest.That too, for the third time!It was in May 2013. I read the news with much admiration and a whole lot of envy. But that’s not his only achievement.He had first thought of climbing the summit when he… Read more »

At the fag end of the present government’s tenure I am going through a rather personal tribulation which, I am now thinking, may also prove to be a ‘game-changer’ for me. It has forced me to look at my beloved country from the eyes of the millions of hapless citizens from whose perspective the picture… Read more »

Program: Power Hour on CNBC