New Delhi, June 16 -- As one grows older, identity becomes a curious thing.

When I was young, the answers seemed obvious. I knew who I was: A Pukhtun, a Muslim, a Pakistani, a fighter pilot. A son of a particular family, tribe, and place.

Age, however, has a habit of complicating certainties.

The more I travelled, read, and met people from different walks of life, the more I realised that identity is seldom a single stream. It is many rivers flowing into the same sea.

I am Pakistani by nationality, Muslim by faith, Pukhtun by culture, Yousufzai by ancestry, and South Asian by civilisation.

And perhaps, after a lifetime of wandering through skies, countries, books, and ideas, I have become something else as well: a traveller of questi...