Step 10: Watch your back

In the centre of Lahore, cars and rickshaws dashing and honking either side, is a large cannon. At night it is lit garishly with a string of fairy lights, a beacon on the central reservation. Zamzama, as it is known, was given its literary mention in the first lines of Rudyard Kipling's Kim:

"He sat in defiance of municipal orders, astride the gun Zam-Zammah on her brick platform opposite the old Ajaib-Gher - The Wonder House, as the Natives call the Lahore Museum. Who hold Zam-Zammah hold the Punjab; for the great green-bronze piece is always first of the conqueror's loot."

Kipling's words were written over a hundred years ago, when the word Pakistan didn't exist, and yet this region has always been the trampling ground for conquerors. Before the Taliban, before the Soviets, before Partition, before the British conquered, before The Great Game against which the novel was set, before the Mughals, before Alexander the Great, there were the Indus people, who lived on the land in 8000BC and rivalled the Egyptians for their strength and modernity. In terms of civilisation, we were barely in nappies.

A reminder of this is that "Wonder House", the Lahore Museum. Towering over Zamzama, it's the pride of the city. In this afternoons beating sun, a group of schoolboys played a makeshift game of tennis on its front lawn while a gang of giggling sari-ed girls hand in their mobile phones as per the rules and slip through security. Inside are the treasures left behind by the conquerors. It's as well to remember that this area of the subcontinent was once Buddhist, it was once pagan, it was once nothing at all. It was - and still is - home to the brown-skinned, the light-skinned, the blue-eyed, the tall, the short, the sharp-featured. Conquerors have left their genes, and their pottery, their language and their architecture.

A couple of impromptu tour guides appeared in the form of a group of teenagers who take a particular interest in the tourist, and after flattering offers of marriage (which we both concluded would never work while I wouldn't convert to Islam) we took some pictures and headed off our separate ways.

The area now known as Pakistan has been the Punjab, India, Afghanistan. But no matter where borders have been in this land, it has served as a gateway from the Indian subcontinent to Europe and the Middle East and vice versa. He who holds Pakistan holds the key. Conquerors have trodden through Balochistan, the Punjab, and up the Kyber pass for centuries.

And so the situation Pakistan finds itself in right now is not much different. in the West, the Taliban fight and seep through the border to the Fronteir Provinces, and in the West, India looms upwards, Pakistan's nuclear nemesis.

"People terrorise us from all directions," a girl from Peshawar told me today, "and they think we are the terrorists." She explained that the village in which she had lived had been hit by drone bombs and several people she knew well had been killed. There was a railway line near her house, she said. Her side of the tracks was Pakistan, and the other was Afghanistan. Afghans would hop over, and come and settle in the surrounding villages. Their children were born there and has Pakistani ID cards. The Afghans had brought good things and bad things, she said, but mostly bad. People said they brought diseases and sickness. And some of them brought the seeds of radicalism. People were not afraid, she said, because they could die any day, of anything. The threat of conquest is alive now as it has been in the area for centuries. This war may be a rally cause as we send "our boys" to die in Helmand. But for the Pakistanis and Afghans living in Peshawar, it's nothing new under the sun.

In any case, the coalition forces in the West may be facing an unwinnable war, but Zamzama stands on firmly Pakistani territory, no longer conqueror's loot but the property of the government, a monument to remind Lahoris - and the smattering of foreign tourists - that for what it's worth, Pakistan is, after centuries of interference, its own nation. And until radicals sit astride it, waving old Soviet kalashnikovs, Pakistanis will have something to be proud of. A century after Kipling, these "Natives", as he would have it, own their own monuments, their own museums and perhaps one day their own political autonomy, free from the outside threat that exists at the edge of their border.

Step 9: Stay out of trouble

Pakistan is a city of confusing incongruities. Last night I found myself sitting on a rooftop in Lahore's red light district, smoking shisha as I sat beside a statue of the Virgin Mary, in the shadow of the great domes of Badshahi mosque, which shone an eggshell blue in the moonlight.

The restaurant, called Cooco's Nest, is run by artist Iqbal Hussain. Himself the bastard offspring of a prostitute, he grew up among the brothels of the red light district. His sister was also in "the profession" and he used to go out and sleep on the pavement when she brought customers home. Cooco's Nest was set up orginally to provide an alternative means of revenue for the local women, who, it is said, cook the food. In any case the array of succulent kebabs, naans, parathas, biryanis and curries is impressive, and the taste heightened by the fact that plates are barely visible in the sporadic, flickering candlelight.

All cities have red light districts. Lahore's is slightly different in the sense that it has another quirk to boast: one of the largest communities of hijras in South Asia. I remember seeing hijras begging at stoplights in Delhi - alongside the women that stood there with their scarred, raggedy babies, begging for rupees in tattered saris. The hijras found their own turf, and when they approached your rickshaw or car it was fairly confusing to hear their deep voices and see the grey patches of stubble on their chins. If you refused them, they often chanted some incantation or otherwise stroked and caressed you for the purposes of humiliation (especially men).

Hijras profess to be known as neither male nor female, but a 'third sex'. Some are transgender, some born men, others androgynous. Some do 'reassign their gender' - once the castration process was done without anaesthetic in a public ceremony of rebirth. Today, most are less hysterical, opting as they do for backstreet surgeons.

Traditionally the courtesans or 'dancing girls' at the courts of princes and maharajahs, they are now often the dirty secrets of the 'upstanding' men of society, many of whom are already married, but some of whom have even married their alternative paramours. They refer to themselves as 'wedding performers' but in reality - some of them prostitutes, others dancers, some beggars, or a mixture of all three - they have no employment prospects and are shut away, shunned by society.

But Pakistan is becoming slowly more open to the idea of accepting the 'third sex'. The government are in talks to add a third 'gender' option to the national ID card, and are looking to change law in order to protect the hijras' employment and economic rights.

There was a great article in The Guardian and some spectacular photos that can be found here.

"No one is gay in Pakistan" laughed a friend of mine over tea a couple of days ago. She winked. "But if there were..." She proceeded to tell me that most educated members of society accept homosexual relationships. Not so with women. A heterosexual affair results, at best, in social castration for women. A homosexual affair, for a man, results in little more than the odd whisper and giggle behind society's closed doors. A homosexual relationship for a woman doesn't bear thinking about. Having just been to fashion week, I can attest to the fact that flamboyant gays are alive and well , surviving and thriving in Pakistan.

On the rooftop of Cooco's nest, amidst the catholic statues, Buddhist busts and pagan visages, Pakistan's contradictions reign. We stub out our last cigarettes, pay the bill and head out, past the dimly lit doorways and hidden caverns, through Lahore's underground, and one of Pakistan's most open secrets.

Step 8: Visit some local landmarks

Now that Michelle has gone home, I'm behaving like a proper Pakistani woman and staying in the house all day. It's not generally accepted for women to be seen on the street alone in Lahore. This serves a double function for me as it means that, firstly, I won't get robbed and secondly I won't get mobbed. Generally the latter is not a problem but, unlike India, Pakistan is not the most popular of holiday resorts and thus I am the only white face for miles.

Staying indoors is a joy if you are living in a house like the one in which I'm staying: spacious, airy, full of beautiful artworks and books, with outside mosaiced terraces and a manicured garden. If the trade-off for being holed up is that someone brings me tea and toast in the morning, makes my bed, rings a bell for me to come down to lunch and dinner, and brings me chai every couple of hours then it's one I'm willing to shake on.

It goes without saying that the vast majority of people in the country do not live like this.

But here, the wives of the jet set are taken by their drivers - who are available at all hours of the day and night - to each other's houses or to spas or shops. Or they call each other and arrange to meet at one another's houses so that they venture out in groups, which in a liberal city like Lahore is acceptable. It's a little frustrating relying on the availability of friends, but few here seem to plan their weeks in advance.

I was invited to a photo shoot yesterday at twilight at a haveli in a walled part of Lahore known as the Old City. The mansion was owned by a Pakistani entrepreneur, and was tucked behind the cinema he owns in a little winding street dotted with cigarette and paan stalls and hazardous with rickety bicycles and motorbikes that zoomed by in the darkness.

A haveli is an "enclosed place": a piece of the outside world captured by walls. This one was 300 years old and lit gently by spotlights so that the scarlets and aquamarines of its brickwork, arches and mosaiced courtyards stood stark against the purple sky. Each room was like a little cave, full of trinkets and paintings, Mughal swords and Persian rugs. I felt like I should have had a guidebook and paid 300 rupees to get in. If I was going to be shut in all day, I would be shut in here.

And here the social scene gathered - the dregs of fashion week journos, photographers and models, and the permanent fixtures of Lahore: the social butterflies. Like kids in a sweetshop, photographers grabbed their SLRs and dashed off to explore all corners of the place. Others sat on the rugs or reclined on scarlet couches drinking tea and chain smoking.

The next mansion we went to that evening was of quite a different architectural style. Marbled floors and winding glass staircases, huge modern artworks hanging on the walls, enormous sculptures and vases, a glass wall looking out on a vast manicured lawn, complete with swimming pool, giant granite boulders, and a copse of imported eucalyptus trees coloured ivory in the uplighting. Downstairs was an oak-panelled library complete with wooden globe and antique leather armchairs, which I'm sure had been professionally infused with the smell of academia. Upstairs, a huge white art gallery that wouldn't look out of place in Shoreditch. Bathrooms the size of tennis courts with green room mirrors and showers that could fit a whole football team at once. Great if you like to dance under the faucet. Everywhere, bowls were full of fresh flowers and gas fires burned over pebbles. Indoor water features bubbled, plasma TVs hummed and music tinkled gently in the background as Pakistan's TV stars, politicians, philanthropists, businessmen, designers and journalists clinked glasses, airkissed, and talked about current affairs.

The idea of moving in with the in-laws is anathema to most women. But when you live in a mansion such as this, you could spend a week without even seeing them. The usefulness of having the grandparents around as full-time babysitters is not to be sniffed at, not least when it means that the working women, of which there are increasing numbers, don't have to worry about arranging childcare. Though in some ways women are closeted, in others they are freer than those in London.

There are no clubs in Lahore. Instead, people throw parties in their homes which is perfect for those who want to show off, but also for those who fancy the odd illicit tipple. Pakistan is officially a dry country, and alcohol is taboo for Muslims. Buying alcohol can land you with a stretch in the clinker, and I'm not talking about tumblers and ice. But in a realistic world, there's a thriving black market for wine and whisky among the wealthy and well-connected.

Shut me in this Lahore compound with a library and a well-stocked bar and I'll be just fine.

Step 7: Get invited to all the right parties

Michelle has deserted me for New York. Like a true Lahori scenester she slipped away into the night having just come back from an after-party. She threw her stuff in a suitcase, put on her East-coast friendly clothes and transformed herself back from a good Muslim into a good Manhattanite.

So today I went to a different party. And every second guest, it seemed, was Spongebob Squarepants. I am staying with Nuscie, an NGO worker and part of the fashion week team. I had no sooner arrived in her home when her cook came in holding a mobile phone out to me. I was invited next door for a bite to eat.

I had barely opened the gate when I was greeted with the high pitched squeal of a CD of children's songs. It's at times like these I realised what a saint my mother was for listening to our crackly cassettes over and over in the car. The thing about playing this music, I thought, is that it's not edifying for anybody. It drives the grown ups into a fit of derangement, which in polite company can only be expressed with the furrow of a brow. The children won't dance to it, interested as they are mainly in stuffing grass in each other's mouths and running around the garden for no particular purpose. They are cajoled into dancing by the parents who insist the pain must be worth something.

Today's party was a Spongebob Squarepants themed bash for a toddler. There were Spongebob banners, Spongebob party hats, a giant Spongebob cream cake. I ate a pile of rice and daal off a Spongebob paper plate. Chatting to the host, I asked if his two year old son liked Spongebob Squarepants. He admitted it was his own penchant that swayed the theme.

"Who doesn't like Spongebob?" he asked sheepishly.

I don't have any particular aversion to a googleyed bath accessory in a pair of trousers if that's what aids children's mental and emotional growth. I was taught the alphabet and days of the week by a giant yellow bird, a furry green thing that lived in a rubbish bin and various other puppets with dementedly large eyes.

But the Spongebob party wasn't for the children who ran around merrily tripping over their small saris. It was for the people who dressed them, the conspicuous consumers: the parents. Using your offspring to keep up with the Joneses is an age-old tool, but children's parties of this opulence and expense can only be rivalled by Spongebob's native land, the U.S..

Such an event, held under the shadow of a deodar tree, highlights the strange and complex relationship between Pakistan and the U.S. The government struggle to demonstrate their allegiance to America while placating the Taliban. Many detest the US for their rough treatment and suspicion of the Pakistani government. But for the aspirational classes, they are the culture to emulate.

For one, they need the business. I did manage to meet some adults at the party, in the form of two designers who run a label called Muse which creates Parisian-style designs (think Zara) with Pakistani-inspired embroidery. They said they had no intention of dominating the Pakistani market. Despite events like Pakistan fashion week, the industry here is too nascent to be of any interest. They advertise their clothes here, they say, because there is no hope of impressing foreign buyers if their garments fail to sell in their own country. But their hope is to crack the Western market because (despite the kind of disposable income lavished on the Spongebob party) that's where the cash, as well as the Kudos really is. Pakistan has come a long way, but not yet far enough to keep its artistic talents from aspiring beyond the border first.

From my window now I can see the last guests leaving: a bunch of men load a giant elephant and a racing car ride onto the back of a lorry. Spongebob is littered all over the floor. I bet they'll be eating that yellow cake for weeks.

Spongebob Squarepants: American ambassador to Pakistan.

Step 6: Keep your friends close

"This is Pakistan!" shouted a partygoer as the dancefloor was plunged into darkness. The speakers that had been thumping out the Black Eyed Peas fell still, the strobe lights that had been refracted through chandelier glass to all corners of the room vanished. A cheer erupted from the blackness, then fell quiet while someone scuttled off to power the generator. Power cuts are a part of daily life in Pakistan, though I'm told they are a great deal less frequent than they were a couple of years ago.

In the murky chaos, a large Pakistani man approaches.

"Where are you from?" he asks. It's a question that commonly precedes hello here when you're white. I explained I was from London. "London!" he hooted. "I live in London!" He proceeded to tell me exactly where on the Edgware Road his flat was situated. He then spoke to Michelle. "New York!" he cried. "I went to college in New York!"

It's the same reaction we've had from many of Pakistan's upper crust. If they haven't lived where you've lived, they have an auntie, or a son there. If they haven't been to your university (and they probably have) they have a student friend. So many Punjabi accents are flecked with an American twang or English intonation. Many of their owners have never left Pakistan.

There are some Pakistanis, I am told, who "enrich" their accents to adopt airs and graces. But a far better explanation, and one that frightens many here, is that the educated classes are leaving in their droves. Doctors, dentists, lawyers, politicians, writers, thinkers, artists - many are fleeing a country which has disappointed them. They are left with an untrustworthy government, a leader they are sure has his hands in the coffers, failing education and healthcare, and terrorism. Since Pakistan was formed as a nation over sixty years ago, they have been living behind barricades and in constant fear of their lives. It's a situation that can become all too normal, as a conversation I heard in the car a couple of days ago illlustrates:

"Aren't they living in Dubai now?"
"Oh no, they came back in the end."
"Why?"
"Well, of course, they have a livelihood here. It's your life or your livelihood, and you have to choose. But you also can't have a life without a livelihood..."
"Didn't he get kidnapped?"
"Oh, don't be silly child, not kidnapped. He was only held at gunpoint."

Almost one in 50 Pakistanis - 3.25 million - are expatriates living abroad, mostly in the US, UK and the United Arab Emirates. Around 1,800,000 leave Pakistan every year. Most are poor migrant workers, but not all: considering that a good chunk of these are from the educated classes - a tiny layer of the total population - Pakistan has something of a brain drain situation.

There's little faith in the country's reputation abroad, a situation which the jet-setting club are all too aware of. I've been interviewed this week by three different Asian TV networks, CNN India being one of them, and they all ask the same question: why do foreigners equate Pakistan with terrorism? They already know the answer, but I'm the horse's mouth.

Prominent Pakistani journalist and politician Ayaz Amir recently wrote the following.

"Adversity and facing up to it are part of the human condition. But the consistent ability to make simple problems worse and invent new problems all the time is a distinction that sets us apart from many other countries in what used to be called the Third World"

The same attitudes are evident lower down the social scale. One survey of working class Pakistani expats in Dubai yielded the following results:

Social Capital: What ordinary folk think
	(98 immigrants Dubai)
Proud of being Pakistani				16
Pakistanis at Fault				72
Work together				22
No trust				69
Faith in state				12
Faith in leadership				7
Pakistani education valuable				19

Pakistan is a country with self-esteem problems. From the questions asked me this week, it seems convenient to blame the foreign media creating a terrorist narrative. In truth, Pakistanis are the most generous and hospitable people I have met on my travels. But the blame for their country's immediate connotations does not just lie abroad: it seems from the statistics that many Pakistanis agree too.

In the meantime, someone hit the generator and the music powered up again. And believe me, conflict or no, Pakistani clubbers can dance until dawn and beyond.

Step 5: Find somewhere nice to stay

One of the best things about making new friends in a town where everyone is "just passing through" is that you get to nose around the inside of a lot of hotels. So when we arranged to go antiques shopping with a journalist I'd met the night before, I jumped at the offer to pick him up from the place he was staying.

The car wound its way through the same mini-army barracks stationed at the gate of every compound, and past some of the grandest private houses in the city. Each had a perimeter to make you gulp and a guard outside who would turn your skin inside out to search for explosives before pressing the button to let you in.

There was no guard outside this house. It took more than a button to open the gates as in a slapstick performance Khorram struggled to push both open for long enough to allow the car to zoom through. Inside was some sight: a huge art deco building on two stories, with steps on all sides leading up to an open veranda. A large stucco balcony stretched around the first floor. Its windows were huge. It was like Mandalay built by the British Raj but styled by Frank Lloyd Wright. It was magnificent.

Yet not one pane of glass remained - some were entirely covered by rotting yellow newspaper stuck on with sellotape. The white walls and columns were crumbling and grey; the mosaiced paths were chipped and potholed.

Around the building were three or four acres of garden, all of it scraggy where it once might have been manicured. The lawns seemed vaguely intentional and geometric, though the dry grass had long ago grown over any borders. The remains of a vegetable patch could be seen towards the servants' quarters, which also looked to be an empty shell, but it was difficult to tell. A woman in a red sari sat and stared vaguely at us from a distance. Along the drive were the stubs of wrought iron lamps which - once leading the way trumphantly for visiting diginitaries, perhaps - were now headless, useless and rusty.

Khorram stubbed a cigarette out and l us through a side door (the front door hadn't opened for years). Inside, a vague half-light was provided by whichever shattered windows weren't boarded up. An unmade bed, some grand and rotting chairs, clearly missing from the rest of a once-ornate set, were scattered around the rooms. Ceiling fans which hadn't moved in decades hung mournfully from the ceiling. A winding staircase, each step looser than the next, led upwards to another set of dialpidated rooms, with washed-out murals on the walls. On the landing was a huge Afghan rug, rolled up into a useless, dusty grey obstruction. The only sign of habitation were the biscuits, congealed parathas and cigarette stubs on various tables scattered around, and Khorram's suitcase, the contents of which were exploded all over the floor.

It was like a Pakistani palace art squat.

Khorram explained that he had been invited there by the son of His Highness Mir Ali Murad Khan II, the last prince of Kairpur, an area in Sindh, South East Pakistan, but once a state of its own with Mir Khan at its head. During partition, Khairpur had voted to join Pakistan, but in 1957, as the country grew, the new Pakistani government reneged on its promises not to interefere with the province's education system or industry. Slowly, Mir Khan watched his hard-built infrastructure deteriorate along with his crumbling soveriegnty and fortune. He retreated further and further into his two loves: ecological conservation and his Muslim faith. After running the government's wildlife advisory board, he retired to his 'royal bungalow' in Sindh and now sees few guests from the outside world. Properties such as the one in which we were standing are virtually forgotten.

This one, according to Khorram, is sometimes visited by Mir Khan II's son. A lone servant is still technically hired here, though he has mostly ceased to turn up as the master is never home. There is hardly a need to keep the home fires burning.

The house itself is similar to the way another journalist described Pakistan when we met for tea a couple of days ago. "Everyone wants a united country," she said. "But I don't understand how it can happen. Everybody is leaving." Even now, over sixty years after partition, many Pakistanis feel as if they
have watched their Indian neighbours change, develop and join the world stage economically, politically and culturally, while they have not developed beyond militarised streets and a sectarian rifts that cripple the country's ability to progress.

Many of the middle classes, ashamed of the state of the land beyond their own front doorsteps and, indeed, afraid for their lives, are simply leaving. Pakistan's brain drain is an increasing concern. There is a real fear that the princely home hidden in Lahore might not be the only grand property left for dead.

Khorram is staying here in the cold and damp while he writes an article on the (formerly) royal family. In the early afternoon as the sun streamed onto the balcony with its blistering paintwork, we stood smoking a cigarette in silence. A lime green cockatoo swooped through a pack of eagles and landed on the bare branch of a nearby tree. It was easy to imagine the house in its former glory - there were enough ragged clues to its previous character. There was not a hint about its future.

Step 4: Don't forget to say your prayers

We blew off tonight's fashion week after party to experience a different kind of worship. The shrine of Baba Shah Jamal is a sacred Sufi site - visited every Thursday night by a throng of devotees.

A motley crew bundled into two cars from the red carpet - a fashion designer, three journalists, a photographer, and a famous Pakistani TV star. We fell out into the mud on a dark side street tucked behind some crumbling buildings, immediately blinded by the neon lights from jalebi stalls. In the distance drum beats grew ever more intense, and the smell of incense mixed with hashish came from each direction in smoky waves. We clambered through the shadowed faces of the crowd, pulling scarves over our heads. We made our way past beggar women sitting on the wet marble steps, their twig thin arms reaching forward in supplication. Leaving our shoes with the attendant (who chucked them in a heap with the others, giving me the distinct feeling that our exit would involve a jumble-sale-style riffle through the enormous pile) we entered the building. Us women crept under a piece of tarpaulin to go through our designated entrance
.
Through the arch was a huge marble precinct with a huge above, covered in neon lights. Around it, pilgrims lit small candles in ceramic bowls. A gaggle of small girls reached up to touch my white hand, presumably as a dare. They quickly lost interest when they recognised our friend the TV star, and sat on the floor staring at her adoringly in silence.

Beneath the dome is the tomb of Baba Shah Jamal. It's a men only zone, but outside a woman prayed fervently. Her forehead every so often touched the grate in front of her, which is covered in small padlocks, placed in order to secure each supplicant's request. A quick peek inside at the men, who were bowing down in reverence in front of the marble slab, covered in a blanket of fresh red carnations.

We headed out, trailed by the TV star's small adoring fans, and then, their mothers and grandmothers to witness the real event.

Women were, once again, to keep their distance and so, standing on the steps we peered down into the courtyard where a crowd of men had gathered, teeming in from all corners, sitting down, walking around the perimeter, smoking hashish and swaying. A blanket of fragrant smoke rose - it was a shared affair. Boy carried trays of long jalebi sweets above their heads, passing them around so that the intoxicated might quell their sugar cravings.

The ceremony features the practice known as Dhol, and it is run by Pappu Sain, a man some know as a performer, and others as a saint. A tall, dark skinned old man, adorned with beads and embued with the authority that invokes silence with the twitch of a finger, he comes here every Thursday to play and dance with his followers.

The evening began as two drummers, brothers Gongu and Mithu Sain, drummed a frenetic beat in perfect time - a feat made even more impressive by the fact that one of them was entirely deaf. It was then that Pappa Sain's followers, who looked like Rasputins dressed in red and white, twirled, in a trance, holding their arms up, jangling heavy bells on their ankles. These were the dervishes. Members of the crowd stumbled, intoxicated, into the ring, but were immediately pushed out: this was for devotees only. My journalist friend from Karachi told me that these men were left at the temple as babies by people whose prayers to the saint were answered.

The crowd did not cheer: soporific, they stood and watched. But there was an electricity in the air which, even from the cheap seats, was palpable. Food was passed around from hand to hand - naan filled with a brown spicy sauce that I tried not to think too hard about as I placed it in my mouth. This is also a place, I was told, where people do not go hungry.

As we left, we s topped at the gift shop, or rather, a ramshackle stall lit by a single candle over the road where (as long as you don't get run over by a donkey cart first) you can purchase as much tin jewellery and holy bits of coloured thread as you like and probably still not pay over 100 rupees (80p). Or you could get a long string of pom poms as a present for a friend back home. They might not make Baba Shah Jamal answer their deepest desires but they might make the downstairs loo look cheerful.

In any case, it wa s home time, and, minding the donkey muck and holding up a friend who'd partaken of a little too much of the good plant, we picked out our shoes and found our way to the car. Though I think we'd used up all our blessings just managing to get home.



For photos that ar e a lot better than mine click here. I blame my pathetic offering on the fact that I am a woman and thus banished to the outer temple.

Step 3: Find the Beautiful People

The real purpose of our trip here is not to venture into enemy territory, though it is land I rarely traverse, at least not journalistically: fashion. February marks the first Pakistan fashion week officially supported by the government.

The eyes of the world are on London, not Lahore, which makes the glitterati a less lucrative target, but nonetheless precautions are being taken: Inter-Services Intelligence and the bomb squad have a background presence, and the venue was a tight secret until two days before the event. The Taliban and the models share one thing in common: they both bare arms, albeit in a different sense. As a result of this, and the fact that they also bare legs, chests and navels, the catwalk girls have received death threats. As journalists, we come with a police escort and our accommodation is top secret. Never have I given up so much in the name of fashion.

All anyone here talks about it how they don't want to talk about the Taliban, and thus, they talk about them more. And it's difficult to ignore: on Tuesday, opening night, Taliban number two Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar was captured in Karachi, while this evening brought the news that 29 people had been killed in a bomb blast in Peshawar, about 320 miles north west of Lahore.

Fashion week finds itself a particular target simply because it defies many of the ideals that fundamentalist Islam stands for: under Taliban rule, women have had, under law, to observe purdah - literally, being behind a "curtain" whether the veil or inside the bounds of the house. With a domestic purpose only, they have no need for education nor any other adornment. On the catwalk this week, amazonian Pakistani women with jawlines that could cut paper model skirts that end well above the knee, as well as sleeveless tops, and plunging necklines.

We visited the house of a model this morning as Michelle was making a documentary for AFP. There were tell-tale signs that she was not the most obedient of Muslim Pakistani citizens: empty wine bottles, guitar hero in pride of place, books on Indian erotic art and a pet dog, which at least she kept in the front yard as her mother-in-law, like most devout Muslims, believes they are unclean. She told us she had recieved death threats and been blackmailed; that half an hour before a show they had been told that a bomb had been planted underneath the catwalk. But, she said, the show had to go on. Fashion was clearly worth dying for.

Some of the clothes this week are the daft creations of haute couture: bright collars that rise up to cover most of the face, coats that resemble a cross between a mongolian warlord and a gap year backpacker, and one particular gown that looks more like something the very hungry caterpillar threw up. But others are functional women's work clothes, bias cut, fitted, showing off curves and skin.

“Now that women work like men they must dress like men,” a national fashion editor told me. “I wouldn’t go burning our bras though. We need those.”

There is protest of a more conventional sort. T-shirts emblazoned "Education not war" "Je ne suis pas une terroriste" and "Stay alive 2010". Pakistani fashionistas have not forgotten the tumultuous backdrop against which they strut. Except of course, the bloke in the corner who clearly had other tragedies on his mind when he decided to wear his "Long live McQueen" t-shirt.

But most of all, it's about the fashion, and why not? Textiles are Pakistan's second biggest industry behind agriculture and Western fashion has a perpetual appetite for Eastern design.

Not that Pakistan can yet compete: the technical glitches, mostly unavoidable due to Lahore's daily power cuts, are symbolic of a nation that has ideas out of synch with the still slow development of its infrastructure. The hanging threads that trip up stilettoes models, the clearly visible pantylines and the choreography that could do with a lesson from a synchronised swimming team - all of these are signs that the nascent scene still has a way to go. But it's a start, and it's a truly tenacious one.

Most of all, fashion week is about forging an identity for Pakistan. This, too, has a way to go: the red carpet out here was graced by a few hundred of the country's elite, blessed with ten carat diamonds and testbook etiquette. Hundreds of millions of other Pakistanis, in the Frontier Provinces, Swat Valley, under the oppression of the Taliban or poverty, or both, are far away from here, as the call to prayer reminds us as it floats through the marquee.

As another fashion journalist out here explained:

“I think we’ll really evolve when we have women on the catwalk with purdah too. It’s an irony that we’re OK with navels and arms now, but not with the veil. Eighty per cent of women in Pakistan wear the veil and many want to. They’d want to even if they had the option. They are pushing us away and we are pushing them away.”

It's far from a united effort. But the chattering classes here agree that disunity is a common theme in a country that cannot even trust its own government. It's a long way from the end of the catwalk to the ending of war.

Step 2: Get someone else to slaughter your chicken

This morning I was interviewed on Pakistani TV. They wanted to know why the foreign press reported so badly on Pakistan (like I know). It was one of those live feed things, where they call you up (in the middle of breakfast, as it happened, just as I was beginning to enjoy my omelette and parathas) and then they put you live on air. For a minute, all you can hear is the previous interview ending, during which time you try not to sneeze, or belch or suddenly develop tourette's syndrome. Then they suddenly start talking to you. By which time you've forgotten everything you want to say and just try to say 'err' as little as possible. I'll never judge anyone on the Today Programme again.


We headed out to Lahore Fort (Shahi Qila) after that - a beautiful 16th century remnant of the Mughal Empire. Opposite was Bashadi Mosque, which we entered with our shoes off and our headscarves on. Around us, men prayed whilst women wrapped their children up in shawls despite the heat, sellers peddled nuts and ice cream, and old men studied the Koran on wooden benches. It was vast, open and peaceful, and pilgrims rushed to answer the call to prayer, stopping only to grab the white girls for a photo. Somewhere in Lahore is a family portrait sitting on a the mantelpiece with a strange blonde girl poking up in the middle, and a few mobile phone shots alongside young Pakistani men (who all insist, in a thick Punjab accent, that they are originally from 'U.S.').

Michelle valiantly dragged her video camera around the city's markets to capture some street scenes for a brief she had been given for The Economist. Everywhere, people stood gawping, generally right in front of the camera lens so that a lot of wild gesturing ensued. A quick scoot to buy the inevitable scarf and jewellery and we were off again.

Iqbal, our driver, taught us some Urdu while we taught him some English. Inevitably, he will go home thinking that the English word for 'me' is 'chicken' and what we think is the Urdu word for 'wife' will be 'goat' or something similar. But it's not vocabulary we're likely to need time soon. Iqbal took us to his recommended lunch spot - a hidden gem in the city, apparently. Our parking steward (generously named as we were in fact the only car in the street) who also happened to be a rather grumpy dwarf, guided us into a space next to the chicken coop, where even then, our feathered lunch was bopping away, tied to the top of a cage, most likely unaware of its fate. Outside the restaurant was the chickens' second port of call: a man who sat cutting up the freshly killed poultry with a knife stuck between his toes and throwing it into the pan next door. In any case, our chicken masala was utterly delicious: we made sure not to look any of her relatives in the eye when we passed the coop on our way out.

A short drive home via several police checkpoints. Every time we stopped Iqbal would turn around to us and explain. "Taliban-check" he said. And then drove off. It seemed like the most honest description we'd heard since we arrived.

Night falls at 6 o'clock in Lahore in February, and the smell of dry concrete is in the air. Police sirens mingle with the crackling recording of the call to prayer, blasted from hidden speakers around the city. Apart from that, all is conspicuously quiet. Lahore is a night-town. People eat late - long after 9 - when the air is finally cool enough for the mind to clear. Which tonight is just as well as, stomachs full, we crawl into bed to sleep off our jet lag.

First step: leave the country

"Why are you going to Pakistan?" asked a colleague of mine at work the other day. Interesting considering he's an investigative journalist who has done a bit of work on terrorists in his time. He had a point though - I live on the edge of Whitechapel - one of the largest concentrated areas of Pakistani expats in the world.

Nevertheless, a week later I was picking my way through the cardboard rubble of a collapsed tower of Pampers boxes whilst being prodded by about a dozen different elbows and narrowly missing the swinging fists of more than one baby's tantrum. Once I'd worked my way through the human obstacle course, the man at the check-in desk looked at me and raised his eyes in apology. Behind me, several younger members of one family were being instructed to sit on their luggage and shrieking while their father, with a severe degree of concentration on his face, pulled the zip. All around was the low level gabble of Urdu. There was a kerfuffle when someone pushed their trolley into the back of someone else's calf, creating a near-catastrophic domino effect.

And I hadn't even left Heathrow yet.

The female steward next to me spoke into her walkie talkie. "We have a serious bottleneck situation here," she said. The crackle on the other end asked her which airline she was on duty with. She smiled. "Guess."

And so I found myself the only white girl on a Pakistani International Airlines flight to Islamabad, with not even so much as the promise of a glass of wine to calm my nerves in front of the in flight meal. I'd forgotten before I set out that Pakistan was a dry country. Brusing your lips with a beer can can cost you several years in prison, if you're one of the 97 per cent of Pakistanis who are Muslim.

Half-dozing and trying desperately to avoid the mouth-open-dribbling that is the inevitable result of sleeping upright, I peeked around me and saw, through the noisy rabble, huge families that nonetheless really and truly cared about each other. Older babies yanked up out of their travel cots (seatbelt sign bell or no) and passed around the cooing family as if they were born yesterday; brothers feeding airoplane biriyani to their younger sisters, some of them buzzing excitedly about the weddings they were going to or returning from. Call me idealistic, but the Muslim sense of family is something most of us have lost. I couldn't fail to feel warmed by the idea, an emotion that was not quelled even by the fact five minutes later there was nothing but whitener for my tea.

I still have not got used to the novelty of getting a croissant for a plane breakfast. It's almost inevitably chilled and slightly fridge-moist, and so chewy in the middle it takes about five minutes to masticate each morsel. These croissants are the same no matter where you go: Australia, Delhi, New York, South Africa, or in this case, circling Islamabad. I'll bet you won't get one anywhere near Charles de Gaulle airport though.

Islamabad airport is more than slightly depressing. My first experience of Pakistan was signs that pointed in precisely the opposite direction to where you need to go, as if the hoodlums from some backwater hamlet in Gloucestershire had gone out after dark and swivelled them all around. Unfortunately, the writing wasn't upside down. It was just that someone had forgotten that domestic departures was left, not right. Same goes for much of the gesturing I've experienced so far - point in any direction, it seems, when you don't know the answer. Five fingered directions I believe they call it in India.

In any case, I finally found my way to the departures lounge, in which I had barely planted my rear on a seat when a small man who had clearly inexplicably come to work dressed as Manuel from Fawlty Towers asked me if I wanted chai or coffee. Taken unawares, I decided 'no' was the safe answer. I would get some myself from the little kiosk, which happened in any case to be about ten feet from my chair. But no sooner had a reached the counter then he popped up next to me like a whack-a-mole and protested. I was forced to accept his table service. Same happened when I tried to buy a chocolate bar two hours later.

The tin pot plane that took us to Lahore rattled us around like Perudo, terrifying the Chinese businessman who shared it with me, along with a Pakistani Bono look alike. The sang a prayer he had written on a scrap of paper in his pocket, and whenever the plane took a particularly vertical dive, took out his passport and started stroking the different visas inside - US, Canadian, Indian - as if saying goodbye to moments of his life slowly in case they later flashed before his eyes.

In any case, we landed, and the balmy air in Lahore seemed already much friendlier than Islamabad's fug. Until we passed through about five military checkpoints in a ten minute drive. Saad, the driver who picked me up from the Aiport, reliably informed me (with a slight quiver in his voice) that we were only being ushered through because he had a blonde white woman in the car. I wasn't sure whether to take it as a compliment.

Pakistan can never forget the decades of military dictatorship they lived through until recent years. In fact, many take the beat 'em join 'em aspect. It might be that soldier's wages are decent (they aren't unless you've just come from being a ragpicker, apparently) or that the job is secure, or it might just be that without the army Pakistanis are aware that everything would crumble in a messy - and likely bloody - heap without it. It might also be Pakistan's Napoleon complex with India or otherwise the real fear of keeping the Taliban as they soak through the Afghan border on the other side of the country. Pakistan is clinched in a vice, and its army is the bolster that saves it from being totally crushed. And its presence is felt everywhere.

I met my friend Michelle at our hotel - we went to Columbia Journalism School together and worked at the Times of India before she went off to join AFP in New York. She, being the intrepid explorer between us, had already surveyed the lay of the land in her usual unorthodix way, and managed to ride on a motorbike with a strange man (who is, even now this evening, waiting outside the hote window for her) and jump in a boat with a crew of rowers training for competition on a canal by highways. She apparently told the taxi driver to stop on the verge of the motorway and just ran off.

I was told at a function later in the evening by a female Dutch journalist it wasn't a good idea to go out by yourself in Lahore, even though it was one of the safest cities in the country, only a short drive from the relative safety of the Indian border

"No kidnappings have happened recently," she said. "But then, no one wants to be the first one."

Great.