After last week’s ho-hum beginning, I didn’t exactly leave everything by the wayside to catch the latest going-ons in Haniya and Ibaad’s lives. But once I got around to watching it, I have to say this second episode was a huge improvement over the previous one.

For one thing Samuel Huntington was thankfully left to rest in peace as there were no more overt nods to his tired old ideas about the clash of cultures, and we were spared the moralizing. Implicitly though, his ideas continued to be evoked as Haniya moved in with Yamina and Adam. This arrangement, however, was not a happy one, as Adam begins to get irritated with Haniya, and she ends up moving to New York to stay with her grandmother.

Here, I’m probably one of the few weird ones who actually empathized with Adam, well, ok, semi-empathized. Being an over the top OCD myself, I was totally with him when Haniya left her dirty dishes behind, and later compounded the issue by leaving her glass in the bedroom – certainly didn’t earn Haniya any merit points in my book! That said, Haniya shouldn’t have allowed Adam to get away with selling her parental home that easily. Given that she is an adult and a co-owner of the property, not sure how Adam went behind her back and arranged the deal—a little too simplistic. But, I guess, this, along with his boorishness with Haniya and his passive aggressive behavior with Yamina, was the easiest way to paint him as a negative character very quickly. I wish though that we would have been shown at least some glimpses of the charm that had initially attracted Yamina, surely there must be something redeeming in his personality.

Concurrent with Haniya’s move, Aabi has also settled in to his new routine in New York. Sharing an apartment with his friend, Adeel, he has now started his Master’s coursework at Columbia. What I really liked here was that even as the main story was taking place in New York, we were also shown the parallel track of Aabi’s parents in Karachi, carrying on with their daily lives, making plans for their only child as parents are wont to do. The episode ended with Haniya and Aabi’s first meeting in class.

What I enjoyed about this episode was that the story flowed evenly without any hiccups along the way. There was no dragging, no overly long scenes, and the time lapses were shown very smoothly. The relationship between the sisters was quite sweet, although Haniya, Sarwat Gilani, looks and acts much older than Yamina, Sanam Saeed. Junaid Khan with his charm and easy going demeanor seems to be a miscast as the much harder and harsher Adam. At this point Sarwat Gilani is strictly ok as a young Haniya, but I think as time passes and her character matures she will prove to be a good fit. What a pleasure it is to see Sajida Syed again, as Haniya’s grandmother. It did surprise me though to see the grandmother bringing up bad memories of her daughter-in-law forcing Haniya to move to Chicago. Don’t people generally try not to say bad things about dead people? Or was this just one more way of showing how bad the daughter-in-law with Western values was? Adeel Hussain didn’t have too much to do today, but he too, like Sarwat Gilani, will grow into his character as Aabi. Already we are beginning to see glimpses of a much softer Adeel Hussain as compared to his outing in Mora Piya.

Finally, indulge me for a moment longer as I drool over the cinematography. As a New Englander I am used to autumnal colors, but seldom have I seen fall foliage take on such rich and vibrant hues. Every shade of red, orange, yellow, brown, and green seemed to glow with a life of its own. New York has seldom looked better. Shehzad Kashmiri you are brilliant.