Nowadays it's very difficult to make ends meet, especially for people like me with fixed incomes. Even though I'm lucky that I've saved enough to get along, I feel sorry for those who retired ten years back and have to survive on their meager pension amounts.

I never liked spending on eating in restaurants, which is why I was not very popular among my rich friends. Some people tried hard to make me join their group in Karachi Club, but I knew I wouldn't like it due to most of them being chain smokers. They were the type who spend a hell of a lot on restaurant food.

Ever since I was in my teens, I used to try to save electricity as much as possible. I would switch off lights in empty rooms, and when I was in the managing committees of the buildings I've lived in, I used to switch off unnecessary lights in stairways and compounds. My neighbors never understood why I used to do so, as I wasn't getting any personal benefit out of it. 

With electricity prices so high nowadays, I keep scolding my grand children for not switching off lights in their bedrooms when they are outside. I always knew the poorer classes were indulging in electricity theft, which is why our maid servants can't understand why we get angry with them for leaving lights on. Where they live, they pay a thousand to the lineman to provide them electricity (whenever it's available).


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