When taking back some prints to one of the newsagents on Streatham High Road last week, I got talking with the owner a bit more about the Road and my project. We were talking about history when I learnt that the name of his shop “Indus” was actually chosen for a reason, which had not been apparent to me.
I was utterly unaware that there is a 3,180km-long river called “Indus” which originates in the Tibetan plateau and merges into the Arabian Sea near Karachi, Pakistan. In ancient times this river was known as Sindhus river and, hence, one of the provinces along the river was given the name Sindh. Sindh is a prosperous province in the southeast of Pakistan, and historically this province is home to the Sindhis, a socio-ethnic group of people with their own language- Sindhi.
Being Sindhi and living thousands of miles away from his family and cultural roots, the name of his shop represents one of the links to Sultan’s roots and, moreover, it represents a subtle hint to the ethnic diversity of Streatham High Road.
