As I gingerly ambled through Lahore’s alleyways, I was conscious of the fact that too many pairs of eyes were fixated on me, the only Sikh in the bazaar. And then this woman in a black burqa walked up to me. I couldn’t see her eyes, but was sure she was coming straight towards me. So far I hadn’t spoken to anyone in Pakistan in a veil. And I disappointed her. Upon return, after I was free filing some despatches from the Pak sojourn, a friend suggested that I must take the reader by his hand and walk him through the Lahore’s gullies. “People are dying to smell Lahore, to soak in the Anarkali bazaar,” he said. This was my attempt in The Indian Express.
Bindi goes with burqa, Sufi with Kaanta laga
S P Singh
Dateline Lahore
She was in a burqa. I could only guess from her eyes that she was smiling as she approached me in the crowded Anarkali bazaar. “Sat Sri Akal, Sardar ji,” she struck up the conversation. Next, she came to the point – “Bindiyan lai ke aye ho, Sardar ji? (Have you got any bindis?)”
It broke her heart to find that I hadn’t brought any. “You get everything here, but no bindis. Next time, you must bring those.” She sounded like a walking Lonely Planet travel guide.
Islamic Pakistan, the Land of the Pure, is a melting pot of cultures where many a bindi lurks behind a burqa, fallout perhaps of India’s saas-bahu soaps. In the foreground of Lahore’s railway station is a huge plastic model of Chagai Hills where Islamabad proved it could match Pokhran blasts. Opposite it is the Noori mosque, with huge loudspeakers atop to bring you the call of the faithful. Between this display of nuclear and holy might, a yellow taxi negotiates the traffic blaring out a rather familiar tune: Kaanta laga. This is the might of the culture.
Love is in the air if only for a few days. When I mention my father’s birthplace Hujra Shah Muqeem, Punjab Housing Minister Raza Ali Gilani embraces me and makes innumerable phone calls at my hotel tying up arrangements to take me there.
Senior journalists among the delegation for the World Punjabi Conference gathered so many experiences in the first 48 hours that tales went dime a dozen. Post-dinner conversations invariably got stuck at stories of how roadside tea vendors refused to charge money, how Indian delegates were embraced by passers-by, how Lahoris wanted to host them for dinner.
Journalists didn’t have to go out looking for a story. They were the story. People had many questions to ask them, and many things to tell them. “Food Street is a must-see,” a computer engineering student was doubling up into a travel guide’s role.
With traditional haveli-style facades nicely lit-up on both sides, and chairs laid out in the fashion of European sidewalk cafes, Food Street is the hub of Lahore’s night life. Till 5 p.m., it’s open to traffic, then within minutes it smells different. “You must try the Haji Sardar’s fish, everyone does,” a passer-by played the benevolent guide. We did. And soon found that everyone indeed does. Chief Minister Amarinder Singh took a walk there, but didn’t try the fish. “Next time perhaps,” the attendant at Haji’s tells me. That’s hope.
Beef, taboo in East Punjab, is out of grace here too. In polite society, it’s considered cheap to offer beef.
Cultural battles are on everywhere. Khalid A. Sheikh’s Lion Art Press on Shahrah-e-Quaid-e-Azam sells copies of Koran in one section, but you have to pay at the other counter which also sells the latest Bollywood movies, pirated of course. Beadon Road has a Farhat Saree Centre. In the hi-fashion Gurberg area, Lahoris proudly ask you whether you compare it favourably with Paris.
Musical evenings at Al-Hamra, the hep art centre with five auditoriums, extend as deep into the night as 3 am. If Iqbal Bahu and Suraiya Khanum sang Sufi songs in a solemn style – “That’s how Sufi music should be,” Lahore’s SSP Ch Mubaraq tells me – a heavily made up Shahida Mini threatened to edge out any Bollywood bump-and-grind expert as she sang the pop version of Dama-Dam Mast Kalander. In Pakistan, you do bump-and-grind too with Sufi music.
Everyone has heard of India’s IT power. In Lahore, you have to hunt for a cyber café. Phones are costly, mobile telephony is a status symbol. And many delegates, when they called home, faced the same question – “Is Lahore just like our Amritsar?”
You couldn’t decide where to place the query on a scale of dumb-to-profound, but you have grown up as a travel guide.
“Pack in some bindis if you want to meet a damsel,” you are educating people now.
And pack in some hope too. With Pakistan, you always need some.
(February 8, 2004)