Emerging Voices on Asia Blog - Author Archive

The Emerging Voices on Asia blog is for young Canadians’ perspectives on our linkages with a changing Asia.

About Maria Kari

Currently in her second-year of law school at the University of Manitoba, Maria is originally from Vancouver. Since her undergraduate years at UBC, Maria has been working as a freelance writer and has had her work published in various publications including The Nation, NPR, Rabble Magazine, and Pakistan's Express Tribune. Along with keeping up with her NCA blogging, Maria can be followed on Twitter and Tumblr.
How to Speak of a Place; a Place with Over 8300 Mentally Ill Languishing on Death Row?
Posted on April 18, 2013 15:23 / Author: Maria Kari / Tags: death penalty, health, mental illness, Pakistan
During my law internship in Pakistan, a group of us organized a conference on mental illness and its role in Pakistan’s criminal justice system. Our target was the judiciary and lawyers, and our focus was on Pakistan’s notorious Death Row, which has the world’s second largest population of inmates (following the United States).Despite our mediocre Urdu skills, we three foreign interns were sent to the Lahore High Court to invite lawyers and judges to our conference.By then, I had enough know-how of Pakistani culture to know that promises of a...
“Here Are Only the Pursued, the Pursuing, the Busy and the Tired”
Posted on January 23, 2013 11:30 / Author: Maria Kari / Tags: gender, Malala, Pakistan
Getting to Pakistan to do a legal internship in the summer did not come easy. There was heavy disapproval by family and friends who were concerned about the security situation. I had personal concerns, as well. Would it be beneficial to my legal career if I went and worked in a system so different…and so unruly? On top of that, I had watched the country change into something hungrier, poorer and more corrupt. As much as I loved the people and place, I certainly harboured a fair share of fears and misconceptions.Yet I went. And on my first day...
Desiderantes Meliorem Patriam - "They Desire a Better Country"
Posted on August 27, 2012 10:08 / Author: Maria Kari / Tags: Islamabad, journalism, law, media, Muhammad Jinnah, Pakistan
“Sure, relations are strained with the West. What else can be expected after such severe breaches of trust from both sides? But is it fair to portray the 180 million people living in this nation as a monolithic entity capable of only terror? No. Here’s an idea. Give us the microphone. Give us - the average, nine-to-fivers, homemakers, and hard workers - a chance to show you what we are made of. Maybe you will be surprised to find it is just cells, blood, bone, hope, loss and dreams…like you.” - Email from a student in Lahore, ...
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