Guest Post: Four Culture Shocks Of Karachi

So I got married last month, and invited a few of my friends from the U.S. to attend. Two of them, Sarah and Lindsey, came to Karachi and then continued their travels to India after my wedding. I asked them to write something up for the blog. So far, only Lindsey has obliged. Without further ado, here are her thoughts:
_____________________________________________________________________________________

Having recently returned from a trip to Pakistan and India (10 days and 1 week respectively), Ahsan has asked me to write something up to reflect an American's first impression of these countries. Now that's he's back from his honeymoon and can actually get on my case to do it, I finally have written something up. Since this isn't a personal blog, however, I'm afraid I can't share my favorite things from the trip - Ahsan's wedding, AKS's family, the friends, etc. Conversely, I thought I'd spare you the usual self-important rant about the four evil p's of developing countries- pollution, poverty, population and political violence. Having said that, I give you my four biggest culture shocks of Karachi (in no particular order):

1) Servants
As an American, I have only two references to make sense of servants- slavery and the butlers of über-rich assholes. However, my observations of servants in Pakistan didn't fulfill either of these criteria. At least with the families I stayed with, the servants were treated affectionately; they attended school; and they didn't seem to resent their jobs. Nevertheless, I felt really uncomfortable to be served. As such, I developed a compulsive need to signal to the servants that I was capable of doing my own housework, and that if a proletariat revolution breaks out, I'll get their back. Of course, I was also very wary of insulting my hosts by breaking some unspoken rule of social interaction. The end result was that the servants found me enormously amusing. Every time they caught me sneaking off to wash my dishes or make my own tea, they would burst out laughing and animatedly chase me out of the kitchen. Correspondingly, they became even better hosts: preparing my favorite food and beverages at every meal, decorating the salad with flowers, bringing me custard apples and tea every time they caught me alone in the house, etc. Unfortunately, language barriers prevented conversations beyond the level of "Brazil football good?" and "Bush president bad!" but I was really glad that I met them and they remain one of my most memorable experiences.

2) Nationalism:
Since I spent time in Pakistan and India during some of the peak points in the recent brinksmanship over Mumbai, I got a first-hand look at South Asian nationalism in action. As a student of political science, I know that I should not be surprised by nationalist appeals by governments or faulty logic in a population's reasoning. Nevertheless, I often found myself pondering questions like: How can anyone actually believe that Israeli jets had invaded Pakistani airspace during the crisis? That the Indian government had perpetrated the Mumbai attacks to frame Pakistan? Or for that matter, that 9/11 was a conspiracy by U.S. Jews?

Moreover, I was still surprised by exactly how similar and transparent each government's appeals were as a diversionary tactic from their failures to deal with massive domestic concerns like poverty, crime, crumbling infrastructure and corruption. The phrase 'hysterical twins' comes to mind, but perhaps given the cultural ties between the two countries, 'hysterical Siamese twins' is more accurate.

3) Whiteness=weirdness
Being a blonde-haired, blue-eyed American girl in Pakistan: Ahsan had warned me that I was likely to be stared at. Still, it was really weird. From men taking pictures with their camera phones, to the odd silence that would come over a store whenever we walked in, to the heart attack I nearly gave Ahsan's servant when he realized that he was making a bed with an asleep white girl in it, Sarah and I seemed to have at least two dozen eyes upon us every time that we were in public. My favorite moment came in a restroom with two little children. Upon seeing me, one little girl panicked and hid behind her mother's leg, the other walked directly towards me with her arms extended as though I was the messiah.

Except for one man who grabbed my ass in a market, however, being white was far, far more of an oddity in India. In India, street children would literally grab my arms and hair or follow us while incessantly repeating "hello money," men would simply sit at our table in restaurants without invitation, and there are dozens of Indian families who now have pictures of their whole clan with the random white girl that they saw at some cultural monument. I found this odd because I imagine that they have far more white people in India than Pakistan. Anyone have a good explanation for this discrepancy?

4) 'Third World' mentality:
People often complain about how business is done in the developing world. There is certainly a lot to complain about: blatant bribing for privileged treatment, bureaucrats who don't give a damn about your convenience, outdated social values, dishonest merchants and overt sexism. However, I just wanted to say that I think there are some practices that we really ought to adopt in America. For one, I really liked that it's culturally acceptable to complain about poor service without being considered an asshole. Second, haggling over prices is excellent. Although it was a pain in the ass to know that all prices were enormously exaggerated on account of my skin, I would love to be able to walk into a J Crew and say, "this price is ridiculous, I'll give you half." Third, in many ways, Pakistani culture just seemed more reciprocal, more tit-for-tat. If you treated someone well, they responded with extreme politeness. When you weren't treated well, Ahsan would say something in Urdu and then I would feel vindicated.

I know I'm leaving some important things off this list. All in all, however, I really enjoyed the trip. The people were overwhelmingly interesting and friendly, the food delicious (except for your cultural obsession with cilantro), the clothes comfortable, the traffic became fun once I got over my fear, and being a part of the wedding was one of the coolest things I've done in my life.