ISLAMABAD: Social networking sites in Pakistan flooded with memes on Monday as people hit by a nationwide power outage searched for a way through the crisis, demonstrating their utmost sense of humor amid the blackout.
Electricity was turned off across the country during low usage hours overnight to conserve fuel across the country, leaving technicians unable to boot up the system all at once after daybreak, officials said.
The outage was reminiscent of a massive blackout in January 2021, attributed at the time to a technical fault in the country’s power generation and distribution system.
But Monday’s blackout failed to dampen the spirit of Pakistanis who took to Twitter to share some hilarious memes. Here are some of them:
“When we engineers tell you to turn it off and on again to see if it works properly, WE DIDN’T MEAN THE WHOLE COUNTRY,” Aon Sayyed, a Twitter user, took a jibe at authorities.
Another one was glad at not wearing clothes that usually require ironing.
People in some parts of the country experienced fluctuations in power supply. They too did not spare the chance.
“It returned!!!,” said Arifa Noor.
“And I was sprinting to the coffee machine when it left as abruptly as it had come… ufff.”
The mania apparently reached a point where the country’s energy and religious affairs ministries faced off each other on Twitter.
“The restoration of Warsak grid stations has been initiated and in the last one hour, limited number of grids of the Islamabad and Peshawar [electricity] supply companies have been restored,” the energy ministry said on Twitter.
But someone at the religious affairs ministry was quick enough to update their counterparts, saying: “Still waiting for electricity.”
While some Twitterati were concerned about diminishing power percentage of their gadgets, those who had their devices fully charged-up exuded confidence in their own hilarious way.
A Twitter user, Adeel Ghouri, gave a whole new twist to the breakdown, connecting it with the recently released Indian spy thriller ‘Mission Majnu’ that has widely been called out in Pakistan for its poor research on the Pakistani state and society.
“Mission Majnu’s Siddarth had come to destroy a [Pakistani] nuclear facility, but some Lahore resident misled him to a power plant,” Ghouri said.
“He has destroyed the power plant and returned.”
