Lahore: Much party, very food, such historical, wow. Went down with RF and his colleague MH and colleague's wife MR on Friday morning, in their car and with a driver they hired. It's about a 4.5-hour trip door-to-door if you don't stop. But for people here that is a journey, so we took a couple of lengthy breaks. The contrast with the States is funny: For most of the country 4.5 hours is a reasonably quick trip, only worth stopping if you're with kids, you're tired, or you're really not in a hurry.
Having a driver becomes worth it in Lahore itself, where traffic is insane and driving is really stressful.
Lahoris party really hard: we were out on Friday night until 7 AM the following morning. Saturday was mildly rough, but we got it together because my colleague who is in charge of our conservation projects there had agreed to take us on a tour. Hangover forgotten immediately after we met up with him, it was so amazing. The Lahore Fort (featuring the world's largest picture wall), the Summer Palace, the Wazir Khan Mosque and the Shahi Hammam: all fabulous in their own right, and fascinating and encouraging to visit in their varying stages of renaissance, with the guy who's leading the effort. We are doing it right: documenting in exceptional detail, recreating traditional modes of construction and decoration, and only then painstakingly restoring the beautiful structures, mosaics, frescoes, stonework, etc. The Shahi Hammam is the only project that's complete so far and we just won an award from UNESCO this year for our work on it. A good reminder that my job can be very cool.
Saturday night we ate on top of a building overlooking the fourth-largest mosque in the world and a big swath of the city. It was the prophet's (PBUH) birthday on Monday, so many buildings here were draped in lights. Made for a spectacular view. Then we went home and went to bed to recover from the night before. RF and I occupied a single futon mattress with separate duvets on the floor of the empty second-floor apartment of MR's aunt's house. Very basic accommodations but perfectly comfortable, and free. And she cooked a balls-out desi dinner for us on Friday that was very good.
Sunday we took it easy in the morning/mid-day. RF and I walked over to a local restaurant with another colleague of his and ordered what turned out to be absolutely delicious desi breakfast of fried bread and some kind of chickpea thing and tea. Then we caught a taxi to the polo grounds for the birthday party of one of the guys from the earlier half of Friday. RF wanted to bring him a bottle of vodka as a present. A motley crew of fashion-forward Lahori elites and cousins, nieces and nephews were sitting and standing around some blankets with a picnic laid out that would look familiar to any outdoor event-goer in the States. A high-school event-goer, as the vodka was in plastic water bottles. At one point they wanted to decant another bottle of vodka into a water bottle. As the spare gora, I went along for cover. Racial profiling here is universal.
As we were leaving the group to walk to the car for the decanting, a middle-aged guy with a nice jacket and a huge Hermes belt buckle arrived and exchanged some words with the birthday boy. The woman we were walking with translated for me: That's the chief of police, and he says make sure you don't get seen and actually just leave the parking lot to do it. Yes. So we bought a bottle of water at a snack stand, went into the parking lot, got in the car, and I sat in the back while birthday boy decanted in the front seat. Then out we got and back through the gates like it ain't no thang. All in all a hilarious high-school/college experience. I am 30.
We left soon after because we didn't to be late for the day's main event. After reuniting with MH and MR, we drove (were driven) out to Wagah, the only legal border crossing between Pakistan and India, to see the ceremonial closing of the gates. The ceremony is completely bananas. Soldiers in outrageous get-ups do a crazy series of high-stepping marches and fist-shaking and screaming at the Indian guards on the other side of the gates, while hype men with drums get the crowd chanting patriotic slogans ("Pakistan! Zindabad!" or "Long live Pakistan" being one). It goes without saying but the Indian guards are doing just as much high-stepping and fist shaking. A lot of it is truly mirrored, for example, when pairs of guards take turns flexing and making scary faces at their paired counterparts. Then they lower the flags while everyone goes nuts and that's it. Apparently, the rest of the day the guards all hang out because they have nothing to do.
Totally worth the 1.5 or 2-hour round trip for the 15-minute event. RF and I were positive celebrities as basically the only white people (goree, singular gora) there. People literally came over to us and asked to take selfies. RF obliged, I did not. Not sure why not, because what's the harm? Anyway that's a funny experience. I'm less of a novelty in the part of Islamabad I occupy.
Sunday night we partied again with the crew from earlier Friday/polo grounds birthday party. It was really fun: The most famous guy in the group hosted about 12-15 people in his house (he lives in a suite in his parents' house; very common here; Mom and Dad were out of town so, as one of the other guys said, "The mice come out to play"), and we just danced and laughed and drank for six hours. At one point our host started tearing people's shirts off. This was a predominantly gay group, and so it was inevitable that this should also happen to me. Didn't want them ripping my shirt, so I said he could rip one of his shirts off me. He took me into his room, dug through some things, and gave me a shirt to put on. Then we went outside and to the middle of the dancing, and he ripped it in half. I'm telling this story mainly because I found out the next day that the shirt had cost $400. This is...a different scene from any I'm used to. Closest analogue is the TB rich-middle-aged-gay-men scene in DC but these guys are richer and generally inherited their money.
Monday we woke up fit as fiddles, went back to the desi breakfast place, read the paper, waited for the fog to clear so we could get on the road, and drove back to Islamabad.
What a weekend.
Having a driver becomes worth it in Lahore itself, where traffic is insane and driving is really stressful.
Lahoris party really hard: we were out on Friday night until 7 AM the following morning. Saturday was mildly rough, but we got it together because my colleague who is in charge of our conservation projects there had agreed to take us on a tour. Hangover forgotten immediately after we met up with him, it was so amazing. The Lahore Fort (featuring the world's largest picture wall), the Summer Palace, the Wazir Khan Mosque and the Shahi Hammam: all fabulous in their own right, and fascinating and encouraging to visit in their varying stages of renaissance, with the guy who's leading the effort. We are doing it right: documenting in exceptional detail, recreating traditional modes of construction and decoration, and only then painstakingly restoring the beautiful structures, mosaics, frescoes, stonework, etc. The Shahi Hammam is the only project that's complete so far and we just won an award from UNESCO this year for our work on it. A good reminder that my job can be very cool.
Saturday night we ate on top of a building overlooking the fourth-largest mosque in the world and a big swath of the city. It was the prophet's (PBUH) birthday on Monday, so many buildings here were draped in lights. Made for a spectacular view. Then we went home and went to bed to recover from the night before. RF and I occupied a single futon mattress with separate duvets on the floor of the empty second-floor apartment of MR's aunt's house. Very basic accommodations but perfectly comfortable, and free. And she cooked a balls-out desi dinner for us on Friday that was very good.
Sunday we took it easy in the morning/mid-day. RF and I walked over to a local restaurant with another colleague of his and ordered what turned out to be absolutely delicious desi breakfast of fried bread and some kind of chickpea thing and tea. Then we caught a taxi to the polo grounds for the birthday party of one of the guys from the earlier half of Friday. RF wanted to bring him a bottle of vodka as a present. A motley crew of fashion-forward Lahori elites and cousins, nieces and nephews were sitting and standing around some blankets with a picnic laid out that would look familiar to any outdoor event-goer in the States. A high-school event-goer, as the vodka was in plastic water bottles. At one point they wanted to decant another bottle of vodka into a water bottle. As the spare gora, I went along for cover. Racial profiling here is universal.
As we were leaving the group to walk to the car for the decanting, a middle-aged guy with a nice jacket and a huge Hermes belt buckle arrived and exchanged some words with the birthday boy. The woman we were walking with translated for me: That's the chief of police, and he says make sure you don't get seen and actually just leave the parking lot to do it. Yes. So we bought a bottle of water at a snack stand, went into the parking lot, got in the car, and I sat in the back while birthday boy decanted in the front seat. Then out we got and back through the gates like it ain't no thang. All in all a hilarious high-school/college experience. I am 30.
We left soon after because we didn't to be late for the day's main event. After reuniting with MH and MR, we drove (were driven) out to Wagah, the only legal border crossing between Pakistan and India, to see the ceremonial closing of the gates. The ceremony is completely bananas. Soldiers in outrageous get-ups do a crazy series of high-stepping marches and fist-shaking and screaming at the Indian guards on the other side of the gates, while hype men with drums get the crowd chanting patriotic slogans ("Pakistan! Zindabad!" or "Long live Pakistan" being one). It goes without saying but the Indian guards are doing just as much high-stepping and fist shaking. A lot of it is truly mirrored, for example, when pairs of guards take turns flexing and making scary faces at their paired counterparts. Then they lower the flags while everyone goes nuts and that's it. Apparently, the rest of the day the guards all hang out because they have nothing to do.
Totally worth the 1.5 or 2-hour round trip for the 15-minute event. RF and I were positive celebrities as basically the only white people (goree, singular gora) there. People literally came over to us and asked to take selfies. RF obliged, I did not. Not sure why not, because what's the harm? Anyway that's a funny experience. I'm less of a novelty in the part of Islamabad I occupy.
Sunday night we partied again with the crew from earlier Friday/polo grounds birthday party. It was really fun: The most famous guy in the group hosted about 12-15 people in his house (he lives in a suite in his parents' house; very common here; Mom and Dad were out of town so, as one of the other guys said, "The mice come out to play"), and we just danced and laughed and drank for six hours. At one point our host started tearing people's shirts off. This was a predominantly gay group, and so it was inevitable that this should also happen to me. Didn't want them ripping my shirt, so I said he could rip one of his shirts off me. He took me into his room, dug through some things, and gave me a shirt to put on. Then we went outside and to the middle of the dancing, and he ripped it in half. I'm telling this story mainly because I found out the next day that the shirt had cost $400. This is...a different scene from any I'm used to. Closest analogue is the TB rich-middle-aged-gay-men scene in DC but these guys are richer and generally inherited their money.
Monday we woke up fit as fiddles, went back to the desi breakfast place, read the paper, waited for the fog to clear so we could get on the road, and drove back to Islamabad.
What a weekend.
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