What I’m Wearing in Pakistan

I feel safer here in Pakistan on this trip than I ever have before. Which is strange when you consider that there is crap going on in the north of the country, but it’s true. I feel like people stare at me less, or that the stares are different somehow. And I’m not just saying that because my mother reads this blog, either.

For example, my clothes. The first time we came here in 2004, I brought a couple of outfits from America but I never ended up wearing them. I just felt more comfortable in Pakistani clothes that every other woman is wearing, and even in those I felt like I stuck out a lot, attracted a lot of attention, and was extra-careful about what all the people around me were doing. Looking back on pictures of me out around Karachi during the first few days of that trip, I look terrified. The second time, I brought almost no clothes from America, and while I wasn’t scare anymore, I don’t remember feeling much different about sticking out like a sore thumb.

This time, I brought two pairs of jeans and a few shirts because I thought that at least around the house I wanted to be comfortable, since that is my daily uniform back home. But somehow I’ve ended up wearing jeans paired with a Pakistani shirt and dupatta when we go out probably as many times as I’ve worn shalwar kameez. We’ve even gone on several walks around the neighborhood and it feels totally normal and at ease. Somehow things seem different this time.

I was talking to M about it and we figure there are so many variables that could be the cause. This is my third time here, so many of the neighborhood folk already know about me – maybe I’m not such a freakshow. I also might be carrying myself differently since I was kind of skittish before and I’ve been doing this a lot longer now. I may be more familiar with wearing Pakistani clothes so that I no longer look as if I am drowing under yards of fabric.

But I don’t know, it seems to me that Pakistan – at least Karachi – may have changed a bit too. I just feel much more at ease than I ever have before. Which is strange since people back home have asked me if I feel like my movement has been restricted these days, or if I have to wear a burqa everwhere we go, but it’s in fact the opposite. (Although I do have the burqa for any big-ticket item shopping. We call it our “Discount Coupon.”)

I’ve heard before that there is a line that cuts Pakistan in half North/South between Islamabad and Karachi and that if there is some issue happening in one half, it doesn’t spill into the other half. As if it were some pendulum – when the north is undergoing soem turmoil, the south actually does the opposite. Perhaps that is where some of the difference lies?

But I do know one thing that has made a different – this website and you people. Talking about all these issue for the past year has really made me so much more comfortable than I ever was in this sometimes Pakistani-flavored life of mine. I started writing this stuff in case any girl ever needed help, but it’s turned around and helped me more than I ever expected. Thanks to all of you!

Picture Policy

I put up pictures on this website of myself and my family. I blur the faces. In this day and age, you can never be too careful, and I share A LOT of information about myself and my life here. Too much, in fact. I’ve already been tracked down once by one determined soul to whom I gave too much information, and I’m trying to be even more careful these days.
I also put up pictures that include other people, and I don’t always blur their faces. I have a policy for this: There are two categories of picture of other people. The first is pictures of public places where I cannot be responsible for who is captured in the picture and I cannot be made to ask every single person in a public place for their permission to use their photo on my website. I do this both in America, when taking pictures inside a desi restaurant, and in Pakistan when taking pictures outside a flower shop. This is pretty common – you have the right to protect yourself from having your picture taken and published, but not in public places where you can’t have any expectation of privacy. That’s why it’s fine to publish photos of people who’ve caught a ball at a World Series baseball game even though there may be lots of people in the picture behind the lucky catcher. That’s also why I have a 1984 edition of my then-local newspaper with me in the front page picture  – I was in a public place, at a local parade, so they could publish whatever pictures they want.

The second category is everything else, any pictures of people in non-public places such as their homes, or any one-on-one pictures such as at the bottom of this post about shopping for mehendi supplies. In these cases, M or I tell the person why I am taking their photo. (Like he did in this video as well.) We say that the picture is for  “reporting” or that it will be in the newspaper. Three times the person has asked for more information about where and M has tried to tell them how they can find it. On two of those occasions, the people didn’t have a computer and on the third the guy didn’t know what Google was, but that his son would know. M told him to tell his son to go to google and the search terms he could use.

There have been many instances where people didn’t want their picture taken at all, and still others where people said they did not want to be part of any “reporting.” You don’t hear about those, of course, because I respect people’s wishes and don’t put them up here. So far I’ve thought it to be a fine balance, but of course I am open to constructive criticism.

Birthday Mac n’ Cheese

Today is my birthday, but M gave me my birthday present early – two days ago.

It was a box of Macaroni and Cheese. Two boxes, actually. And I couldn’t have been happier.

He brought them all the way from America, where he’d taken them out of their packaging and hidden them in ziplock bags where I wouldn’t find them during the packing and re-packing stages. He wasn’t sure if he’d be able to find them in Pakistan, although we’ve since seen some in a store here.

Thursday night was a difficult one here, with lots going on including the baby’s two cousins being hospitalized for travel sickness (the baby is doing just fine so far, thank God.) So I’d spent a lot of the day in limbo and most of the evening home alone (well, with my BIL and FIL – but not M, whose side I like to stay firmly planted next to.)

I’d put the baby to bed around 10 and fell asleep next to him without having any dinner. At 1:30 in the morning, M came in and woke me up, holding a steaming plate of mac n’ cheese. He’d brought it for my birthday present but the day had been so difficult he wanted to give it to me early. He’d figured that by my birthday, I’d be pretty tired of eating nothing but Pakistani food and would really enjoy a little taste of home. He was right.

Apparently he’d messed up the first box, cooking the macaroni in milk for more than an hour. Then he looked up the directions online and found you’re supposed to boil the macaroni in water, of course. He said the milk was so thick here, there was no need for the butter called for in the recipe (and again he was right!) By the time he brought it to me, the macaroni may have been a little (read: a alot) overcooked, but to me, it was delicious!

Who knew that one day I would think a one dollar box of macaroni and cheese is the sweetest birthday present ever?

Interview with the Flower Guys

The video I told you about the other day, from when we went flower shopping:

Translation of the conversation:

M: I’m taking a video.

Flower guy 1: (unintelligible)
M: Please smile.
Flower guy 2: Don’t give it to the police station.
Flower guy 1: We’re already infamous.
M: Don’t worry about the police, it will be used for reporting.
Another flower guy: Yes, sir! Yes, sir! Please come in! Please come in!
M: What’s your name, brother?
Flower guy 2: Kashif
M: Are you making a sehra? (Veil of flowers for bride or groom)
Flower guy 2: Yes. Take some of my dad.
Flower Dad: No, no, no.
M: Salaamu Alaikum (Hello) How long have you been working in this store?
Flower Dad: Since I was born.
M: How many years? Sixty years?

News To Me

Apparently I look Australian.

I went to a beauty parlor with a cousin of M’s today to have mehendi put on my hands and feet for the wedding. At first, we were almost the only ones in there, but after a while there were lots of women, even a few kinds, and lots of chatter. Some of the women who came afterwards hadn’t heard me speaking in Urdu, so I guess they didn’t know not to talk about me right in front of me. They decided I was from Australian, and they wondered what I was doing all the way over there since I was staying in Defense (the nicer part of the city with all the big houses.) Then they decided that it was nice that such a good beautician was doing my mehendi since this was the first time I was ever getting it done. Wrong on all counts.

Pictures From the Mehendi Shops

Pictures I promised you before:

The view from outside the shop, with garlands hanging on the awnings, salesman sitting at the front, and some people who were shopping for birthday stuff, I think. She was holding a tiara that said “Happy Birthday.”

This is the view looking into the very narrow shop, with the walls lined with different kinds of decorations for all the upcoming holidays - including Christmas.

The salesman (left) and a cousin of M’s (right) completing our sale. M asked the guy to smile but this was all we got.

This is from another shop we had to go to when the 1st one didn’t have some of the stuff we were looking for – a dhol (drunm) and some tamborines. This shop did have them, but we had to go to the backroom to pick out which color we wanted. This guy was back there making these trays that are used to display mehendi paste when you take it to the other side’s house. M asked if he could take his picture and how long he’d been working there. His father had owned the shop before him, and they had their shop in that location for 35 years, 30 of which this guy had been working there. 30 years of gluing up trays for henna paste – it’s amazing the things I get to see here!

Prepared to Party

We shopped for more wedding stuff too today, and I took pictures there for you guys. There are all these stores that sell decorations for various parts of the Mehendi parties. (The internet is really slow right now, but I’ll put those pictures up soon.)

The Mehendi party is the pre-wedding party. I’ve seen videos from family weddings from 15 years ago where the Mehendi party was when the bride’s family all came to her house and her sisters and other female relatives all sat around her and rubbed haldi – tumeric paste – into her skin to make it glow. They also painted intricate mehendi designs with henna paste on her hands, arms, and feet and participated in various traditions like feeding the brides sweets, waving money around her head that would then be donated to the poor in an effort to combat nazar, and covering her in bracelets and necklaces made of flowers.

Nowadays, the Mehendi party looks very similar in that all the same traditions are going on, but the purpose is really just to party down. All the Pakistani brides I’ve ever known go to a beauty parlor to have professionals apply thier bridal henna, and no one wants orange-glowy skiny from all that tumeric, so people generally wipe off the paste right away so that it doesn’t leave a mark (which it does very quickly – just ask my kitchen countertops.)

I’m not sure if groom’s families used to have Mehendi parties before, since the whole purpose was beautify-ing the bride and grooms don’t go for henna designs and whatnot, but now since it’s just a party and all about the singing and having dinner together, M’s family always has a groom’s Mehndi party or one combined with the bride’s family in a rented wedding hall. When we came in 2007 for M’s other brother’s wedding, they had a combined Mehendi party. This time the familes are doing separate parties and rather than renting halls, each family is erecting a tent at their respective homes.

An elder sister-in-law has a big role in these wedding functions, and after my mother-in-law, I’m almost supposed to be directing the show. I’m thankful that I already did some of this stuff at my other brother in law’s wedding – a kind of test run if you will. This time I hope to screw up less, but we’ll see. Of course, I’ll report back to you all the ways I messed up! Stay tuned for my foibles.

Flower Shopping

Almost as soon as we arrived in Pakistan, we were swept up into the wedding preparations. Weddings can be week-long events here, so there’s a lot to be done. One thing we did first was shop for flowers. There are so many flowers in a Pakistani wedding. We were shopping for the following:

- Flowers to decorate the car the groom arrives at the wedding in
- Bracelets made of flowers for the ladies to wear at all four wedding functions
- Flower bracelets to put on the bride’s family members when they arrive at our house as a welcome
- An insane amount of flowers that are strung around the bed to make bed curtains
- Huge necklaces made of flowers for the bride and groom to wear at the wedding receptions
- One small flower necklace for my kid to wear as if he’s a little groom too.
- Probably more I’m forgetting about

Here are some pictures from the rows of flower merchants. I also have a video where M interviews some of the flower guys, and as soon as I can figure it how, I’ll upload it. Either youtube is screwy in Pakistan or I have become an idiot here.

Combatting Jetlag

Pakistan is either 9 or 10 hours ahead of the time zone I live in, depending on Daylight Savings Time. That’s a lot of hours to adjust to. In order to lessen the effects of jetlag, we have a couple of things that we do.

First, we try to stay up later and later in the few days before we leave for Pakistan. That way we’re already gearing up for the switch. This is easier for me than for M, because even though his job is really flexible, he does still have to work fairly regular hours. And the baby, well, what can you do? Kids generally have an easier time adjusting anyway, so I don’t worry too much about him.

Next, since we take late night flights, we try to sleep as much on the planes as possible, as if it’s a regular night for us. That’s easier when there’s a really long leg of the flight. In 2004, we had three legs, two of which were about 8 hours long. Last time, we had a long, 16 hour DC to Qatar leg that made a nice long, full night’s sleep possible.

Then, when we get to Pakistan, we sleep a little bit in the morning if needed, but then we just jump right into Pakistani life. That way we only have one day of feeling tired and after a full day of activity, we go to bed at the usual Pakistani time and wake up the next day almost completely adjusted. This gets harder with age, I’ve heard, so we may have a worse time of it as the years pass.

Last time, the baby had no issues whatsoever, but he was still taking at least one – sometimes two naps, so he had several daily opportunities to catch up on missed sleep. This time he’s doing pretty well too, but he’s woken up both nights in the middle of the night kind of ready to start his day. We’ve just treated them like “night wakings” and kept shushing him and telling him to go back to sleep. Hopefully by tonight, he’ll be totally adjusted and won’t wake up.

Although, our first official wedding function is tonight and it starts – STARTS – at 10 o’clock at night. So perhaps we won’t sleep very well tonight after all…?

Arrival

Our trip went very well. It’s exhausting traveling that far, though. And I’ve never been good at sleeping on planes. And all three times we’ve come here, there has been a TV screen in front of each passenger with so many movies & game choices, usually with almost-brand-new movies. Being so out-of-touch in my normal life, I can’t pass up the opportunity to watch movies I can’t get to the theatre to see!

This time I watched 500 Days of Summer, My Sister’s Keeper and another movie I can’t remember. Then I watched three movies with the baby: Cars, Up, and yet another one but I can’t remember that either – all I remember is that he interrupted it because he wanted to watch Cars again. I think he finally understood what all his classmates had been talking about, and he wanted to use his time wisely to bone up on his Cars knowledge.

We had no problems with immigration. Our previous flights had always arrived in Pakistan at 4 in the morning, and the immigration lines had taken a loooong time. But this flight got in a 2am, and there were almost no lines at all. M and I were split up into Pakistani passport & foreign passport lines, and M was done within minutes. The baby and I took maybe 15 minutes, but mostly because the line we were in was moving so slowly – the line next to us was moving much faster. When we got out, we got a porter to round up our luggage for us. It was easy for him because we’d used spraypaint to mark a large “M” on each bag. We’ve been using that trick for a few years now and I’ve seen other people’s bags with large, spray painted letters on them twice recently – both times on the flight path we go through a lot, so I think it’s people who’ve seen our bags and copied our idea, but perhaps I’m giving us too much credit.

When we got here, M’s family was waiting at the airport for us. There’s this one Uncle who ALWAYS comes, but he and his wife have gone to America for the beginning of his green-card process, so it was just the immediate family plus one other guy. M wanted to make sure there were enough cars there to take all of our luggage. It’s common to strap luggage to the top of cars here, but M thinks that attracts the attention of theives, so he has always made sure we travel from the airport to home without any exposed luggage.

After getting home, we went straight to bed since we’d arrived at 2am. M said he didn’t sleep at all, but I think I slept about 3-4 hours. One of M’s brothers and his sister had come to Pakistan the week prior, but his last brother arrived the same day we did at about 6am, so we got up when he arrived at the house. Then we began opening all our bags and distributing all the stuff we’d brought and ate breakfast.

Then it was time to head out and start making the rounds. We always make sure to visit M’s grandmother’s house on our first day in Pakistan. She’s 95! We tried to pack in a lot of visits to people’s houses, because people in M’s family seem to get offended if you don’t actually come to their houses. No matter how many times you see each other at parties and weddings – you have to actually step foot into their house. We actually fit in SIX different houses that first day. Sounds good until you find out that M has 86 cousins – on his mother’s side! There are a loootttt more houses to go!