Dear Warda Shabbir,

The other day, someone asked me if I had seen a true feminist and a happy one. My unapologetic, single-word response was: many. It requires more time and a comprehensive effort to desensitise people to the misconceptions often associated with the term. A friend's reluctance to be identified as a feminist artist sparked my introspection about the consequences, which later became part of Bano's book. You introduce yourself as a feminist ecologist, embracing every connotation that comes with the expression. Every curious woman eager to understand the meaning of life and the existence of this world is a feminist. As I say, borrowing epistemological expressions from Platonic debates, anyone living in the real world as opposed to the ideal can be a feminist. Feminism is not gender-specific. All you need is self-awareness and awareness of your surroundings, understanding your own existence and circumstances.

Allow me to use your name as an example with an acknowledgment that it is indeed not easy to be a feminist, an artist and stress-free at the same time,........

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