#but anyways im wondering if any of his great-grandparents or whoever were originally from bannu/surrounding areas and thats why they kept

[molkolsdal]

thinking about the identity crisis i went though as a kid cuz my parents had told me very simply that my mom was pashtun and my dad was punjabi and they were both from peshawar and that was that. understandably they had simplified it so much for me cuz i was a kid, but whenever other brown people asked where i was from or "what are you" and i mentioned punjabi and they'd be like oh wow where? lahore? and i'd just be like nope lol peshawar and they would press me about how my dad could be punjabi if he was from peshawar and i just didn't have an answer. when i got a little older, i started saying well borders are manmade, you don't necessarily have to be from one ethnicity cuz you're from a certain area (and i was right! i just didn't know at the time why i was right).

as i got older and i found out more about our family background, it all made more sense to me as i came to know that the punjabi side of us was allegedly from a great-great-great grandfather from gurdaspur who had moved to bannu way back when. but as my interest in linguistics and anthropology and history grew, i realized that my old explanation of "borders are manmade" was true anyway!!! prime examples being speakers of Hindko and Derawali, as well as the Hazarewal community in general. anyways, i could go on about this, but it's all just so endlessly fascinating that i wouldn't know where to stop so i'll stop now.