I was still in school when my family migrated to the U.S. from Pakistan in 1975. My most cherished memory of Thanksgiving was when I was invited to spend the day at the home of my best buddy, Brian O'Connell, who lived on Lawrence street in Tappan, N.Y.

We were both aspiring guitar players, an Irish Catholic and a Muslim, with a religious interest in rock music.

We spent that Thanksgiving Day jamming to Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven and Leonard Skynyrd's Free Bird ( dedicated to the pardoned turkey) and we had the audacity to dream of becoming rock stars one day....

Fast forward to 1992. After leaving the U.S. to study medicine in Pakistan, I also started a rock band called Junoon (which means passion in Urdu) and later invited Brian to come join us in Karachi. Brian ended up playing in Junoon for more than ten years. He got married to a beautiful Pakistani woman called Ayesha, they had two beautiful daughters, Rachel and Alessandra, and oh, by the way...our teenage Thanksgiving Day dream (about becoming rock stars) also came true.

Thanks be to the God of Moses, Jesus, Muhammad and all the other prophets! (and may God bless Jimmy Page)

P.S. Why shouldn't nonbelievers partake of the turkey and celebrate and give thanks for the diversity of this life?

Happy Thanksgiving and may the Junoon be with you always!