Morning Good Readers, it's 2.00am here and I'm in Lahore, which is the pearl of the Punjab.
My writing only limits the breadth and diversity of the land of the pure. In a way this has reinforced my identity but furthermore made me more perplexed as what it is exactly that defines Pakistan. Last night living it down at a GT (get together) where half the guys were taking hash (the resin of the marijuana plant) and the rest dancing with the girls to some rap made me astounded as to the ways of the Pakistani elite.
People to the core of their opinions are anti-America but this trip has only reinforced my conviction as to the extent that the American imperialism has coopted the third world. The desire to get into the prosperity cycle has consumed so many Pakistanis that minor political disputes such as the Iraq war pale in comparison to the middle class urge to upgrade from RC Cola (the poor man's cola) to Coke Cola. Global brands have proliferated to such an extent in the trimuvirate of the Pakistani cities (Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad-Pindi) that the battle of the fast food franchises is now the talk of the town. The Pakistani consumer has become so sophisticated so as to discern between Nando's and Subway (which is failing because of cultural inhibitions towards cold food in Pakistan) or KFC and Pizza Hut. Pakistan's top jar is rapidly Westernising and the globalising drive, the inherent need to afford the rampant materialistic desires seeping in from the first world, has become the priority.
This is not a nation on the verge of Talibanisation for the plains of Pubjab need the woman to sow the crops and tend the flocks whereas the rugged mounts of the Hindu Kush did not have any such demands on it's women. This is a society fissioned by the different continental plates, truly "Middle Asia". Islamic values cohere the society, Indian popular culture permeates entertainment and Western ideas flow to contribute to the cacophany of images, cultures and peoples that lends credence to the idea of Pakistan as historically a syncretic nation.
I have been talking of my own narrow prism but I would venture forward and hazard that this is an inherently stable society. The martial races have been subdued and integrated by martial law and there is a general consensus towards building the nation. Ties are acknowledged across the border but as my visit yesterday to Wagah border confirmed we collectively as a nation respect and acknowledge the iron nature and permanence of the division. There is a social structure in Pakistan naturally but the inherent egalitarianism found in Islam ameliorates to an extent and allows people to co-exist in a fundamentally unfair soceity where the sons of the elite race in their mercs whilst their drivers cry silently in their hearts for mothers lost to cancer. Pakistan is indeed in a stage of transition in that it is finding the right balance of Islam between the one extreme of intolerance that arises from too much religiousity and the other that leads to social instability. Islam provides respect, faith and generally a patronage system where the extreme inequalities of wealth are somewhat avoided by personal upkeep and donation to the mosque.
People assume Pakistan is volatile, that may be so but they forget the binds that hold this society together. Muti-faceted to say the least but at the same held together by mutual co-dependencies of master-servant, ethnic cornubations and religious affiliations.
I will write more as this is but a mere first draft for the moment. Zack |
