This tale opens fifteen years ago in a hovel  in the slums of Malir, a few miles away from the Karachi airport. Fatima was mourning the loss of her husband, who had left in her care their four young children.

While the ailing Fatima tended to her three young daughters, her 18 year old son went searching for work to support her family. One day, he did not return.  For days, Fatima waited on edge for any news, and finally, it came.  Her son had been
beheaded in a brutal act of sectarian violence.

Within a few days, Fatima received a  threat demanding that she leave or that a fate similar to her son's would befall
her and her daughters.  Overnight, she packed up and left, moving in with some friends temporarily.  She was able to rent
her home out for 400 rupees (approximately $40 in those days) a month.  She had wanted to sell her home, but a robbery
at her house had resulted in the loss of the deed to her house -- if she were to have brought up the issue of sale, it might
have meant forfeiting the property entirely.  She settled for the rent, and ultimately found a place in the even worse area
of Sorab Goth in Karachi.

Her tenants in Malir, getting wind of the fact that Fatima did not have the deed in her possession, began making
unreasonably burndensome demands on her, including embellishments to the house.  They refused to pay a higher rent
rent, which stayed fixed at 400 rupees a month, which they were paying until 1996, when it was worth only
about $10.  Also, the tenants refused to come to Sorab Goth to pay the rent, forcing Fatima to go all the way to
Malir to collect -- and oftentimes, they would simply turn her away, telling her to come back another day.  The
journey itself placed enormous burdens on Fatima.  She was again threatened while in Malir by persons who
demanded that she never return if she wished to live.  So, even her meager rent receipts stopped.

One of her daughters received a marriage proposal, and Fatima began collecting for her daughter.  However,
soon after the wedding, the groom's mother demanded 15,000 rupees from Fatima as part of "compensation"
for keeping their new daughter-in-law in her home.  Fatima was forced to capitulate.

Her landlord in Sorab Goth tried to kidnap and rape her remaining daughters.  Soon, however, he himself
was arrested when a huge arms cache was discovered in his part of the house.  Fatima and her daughters fled
this house as well, since there was a possibility that the police might implicate her wrongly.  Fatima then fled
to another apartment, where the landlord raised her rent to a level she can ill-afford, leaving her little for food,
clothing, and other essentials.

However, this woman continues to fight, with dogged determination.  She carries on, sustained by the one
elixir that remains when almost all is lost:  hope.
 

 *Name has been changed.
 

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