Karachi 2025

By my most recent standards, this trip to Karachi has been a long time (okay, maybe a month or two) coming. Four weddings (as in four different couples) lining up across three weeks made it an easy date to fix, even though these three weeks would be more than the usual two we tend to come for.

Of course each wedding had at least three events, with some pushing it to four. It seems we now have Nikkah Parties separate from Rukhsatis, and I even attended a Qawwali Night (although admittedly that wasn't the first time for me). So opulence abound, but it was all good fun.

Well until the stomach bugs got me. I guess wedding food over here is like playing Russian Roulette, and I was bound to pay for attending twelve-plus events at some point. Thankfully (?) I was taken out earlier than later (yes, that's both ends), and I like to think I came out stronger for the remainder of my trip.

Speaking of food, it seems that Karachi just keeps getting better and better when it comes to the social food scene. I have mixed opinions about this, given it both relies upon and is an indication of the widening inequality... but it's still kind of impressive to see I suppose. What's also great is how well local brands and businesses seem to be doing - no one goes to KFC anymore, choosing to spend Rupees at Kababjees Fried Chicken instead.

So another good trip, if a bit too long and busy. Oh and yes, sadly there was also a funeral... in case you were wondering.

Empire - Live

The only non-boardgame podcast I listen to is Empire, hosted by William Dalrymple and Anita Anand. I don't really have anything to compare this podcast to, but the conversational style seems to be unique (and dividing) amongst history podcast enthusiasts, and is exactly why I enjoy it so much. That and the robustness and depth with which the hosts explore a topic.

Seeing them live was rather like listening to the podcast and so there weren't really many surprises here. This being an event, the topic had to be standalone ("Booze and Brews") which although not personally relevant was fun and interesting nonetheless. And in typical Asian fashion the event started and ended late (although it did run at a generous length) and we even had a costume change.

There really isn't much more to add to this review - if you are interested in more the first place to check out would be the podcast itself. Both that and watching them live come thoroughly recommended.

Karachi 2023

Given the relief at having been able to visit Karachi post COVID, it's shocking that it has been a whopping 48 months since that last visit. The delay has been for a number of reasons, not least that we only visit in the winter so as to avoid the unrelenting sun, and the 2022/23 winter window was missed for a few windows. Needless to say that this trip was overdue and I was very much looking forward to it.

Not much had changed despite the gap, and yet it felt as different as any of the trips I've taken. Kids are now adults, cousins are now grandparents, aunties and uncles even more full of the love that only people that age can offer. Conversations were of a different quality as all involved become older, or perhaps just more patient and mature.

It also felt very busy socially - not a day went without an invitation to a very welcomed home cooked meal somewhere, and surprisingly we only went out a few times to eat, what with quite effective political boycotts ruling out the usual fast food treats. On that note I don't think I've ever drunk as much Pakola as I did this trip.

I was happy to return after the two weeks I was there - that particular limit seemingly hardwired into my brain. But I did definitely feel a loss on my return too and have never looked so forward to our return trip, hopefully in a more appropriate time frame this time.

Karachi 2021

If you would have asked me earlier this year if there would be a Karachi post dated 2021 I'd have scoffed at the idea - even 2022 seemed precarious. So it was with part disbelief and part trepidation that I boarded my flight to the city, a good twenty months or so since our last visit. That was a record gap in recent times.

That said things were looking good. I knew others who had been travelling, and of course the global situation was much better than it had been. Except that a new corona variant, later to be named Omicron, had been disclosed by South Africa the day before I was flying out. Yikes.

But away I went, looking forward to a visit long overdue.

On landing, it was pretty astonishing how little people cared about the virus. It was partly a resignation to having to get on with life, but more than once I heard the phrase "There is no COVID here". Frankly I was getting ready to contract the disease. As usual, I went to offer prayers in the local mosque, and that first visit turned out to be my last after facing the mask-less shoulder to shoulder congregation there.

But then the weddings started, and although I have no qualms being the odd one out, keeping my mask on during these events helped others, not me (although considering the rapid spread of Omicron in the UK, perhaps I was the risk here).

And so slowly over time I became more and more comfortable with the situation, almost believing the hype in that there was no COVID in Karachi. I'm not sure why - perhaps the population does have the superhuman immune system they claim, or perhaps herd immunity had already been achieved. It's even possible that all at fatal risk had already passed away - the lack of testing and post mortems don't help with that. The point is that it felt safe - at least subjectively and anecdotally, and in such an environment it's tough to keep making a stand, particularly as my frequent LFDs were coming back negative.

The COVID situation was a story of two halves though. The fancier places - malls and the like - insisted on seeing proof of vaccination before entry and security were constantly reminding people to cover their faces properly, nose and all - there were no "medically exempt" badges here. I must admit I enjoyed how the rules being taken seriously, at least in terms of enforcement.

So yes, a pretty successful and well needed trip overall. In fact what I believe is the first time, I actually felt that the trip should have been extended - particularly when coming back to 50k new infections daily in the UK. It's quite amusing to realise that I felt safer in Karachi than I do in London these days.

Karachi 2020

Uncannily it's exactly a year ago that I wrote about my last trip to Karachi, cementing the fact that we have now visited so regularly that our flying dates have been optimised. A case in point - despite having been quite chilly during our stay, it was due to be 34c the day we left. Phew!

Other observations: I have now visited Pakistan three times in a rolling year, which is almost certainly some kind of personal best. Despite that, I still don't see a downside to visiting so frequently. A case in point - two deaths in our close family during and around our stay.

Each year we see changes in both Karachi and the people who live in the city, and every year the rhetorical question arises of whether we could actually live here or not... the question becoming a little less rhetorical with each visit, a little like how our flippant jokes about being chucked out of the UK are becoming less and flippant.

Otherwise it was business as usual in the Karachi sun.

A Failed Plan

Well, it was always going to be a long shot.

The ticket sold to us allowed an hour transit in Dubai on the way home. Although the question was raised if it was even possible to change planes in that much time, the fact that we've done shorter transits and that they wouldn't have sold the ticket in the first place convinced us we'd be okay.

Of course we didn't consider Karachi itself but even after waiting almost an hour for a missing passenger we still thought that we would make our connecting flight. And to be fair the pilot made good time with us only really landing 15 minutes late. However on exiting the plane we were welcomed by a service representative who explained that we had been de-boarded mid-flight and had been placed on the same flight the next day (as there was only the one per day to Stansted). Of course, our destination being London did mean we were able to easily take the next Heathrow flight, but by that point we'd may as well have taken the PIA.

A first world problem for sure, but still annoying (but maybe because we have to submit to PIA's whims again). Interestingly the experience has also made me realise that Karachi International is probably second to Heathrow when counting which airports I've used the most. It's a thought that leads me to many more, but that's something for a further post.

Karachi 2019

This might be the coldest I've ever been during a visit to Karachi. I mean sure, it's in the shade, but still. I'm wearing socks and everything.

Otherwise it's business as usual: crap Internet, a daily routine largely consisting of frequenting the mosque and visiting relatives, and the meeting of new members of family while the missing of those who are no longer with us.

I love it for the two weeks (max!) that I stay here.

A Quick Stop

Perhaps as expected, flying to Karachi tends to be logistically a mixed bag. On the one hand, despite the lack of options the PIA direct flight from Heathrow used to actually be rather convenient as it flew during a Friday night. The only real issue is that it was a PIA flight - between the lack of any visible standard and the danger of flights being late (or not flying at all) it's never the most convenient of carriers. The other option is to fly indirect, usually via the Middle East, but that adds both cost and time to a flight that would otherwise be a breezy seven hours.

However with Emirates now flying from Stansted, the idea of taking those indirect flights does become more attractive. The only downside in this case was the transit time - a minimum of four hours at Dubai airport wasn't ideal, and so we decided to make a day of it and take an even later flight to Karachi, giving us the day to check out Dubai.

And so it was that I ended up with a lazy brunch, a Jummah in the Sustainable City, and even a BBQ in a park with friends I hadn't seen for years. So far so good, and Stansted-via-Dubai might even end up being the plan going forward.

Karachi 2018

My annual trips to Karachi are quite well established now, up to the point where I actually start itching to go back 10-12 months after my previous trip. This one was a couple of months overdue due to South Africa, but it did coincide with a couple of weddings so it worked out pretty well.

I find it to be a humbling habit, somewhat rooted, and that not in a "I wish I could save them all poverty porn" sense. I'm not a tourist here, I'm family. This makes it personal not just because there's blood involved but also for the more pragmatic fact that the life I see around me could have been my own if my grandfather had made different decisions in his own life all those years ago.

Things are always relative and perhaps this is why I don't have the same sense of ambition or success that others back in the UK have - I already have these things in a way, no matter how they were earned (or not). My peers aren't necessarily the people I live and work with in London, but my cousins, relatives and the 25m other people who reside here in Karachi. In the same way I find myself also more conservative and traditional, whether it's the manner in which I dress or the fact that I prefer squatters to commodes.

It's a cliche but despite the poverty and hardships people do seem more happy and content here than they do elsewhere. One can accuse them all of living in ignorance of course - how can they miss something they've never had - but us who spend the time to visit do know what's out there... and yet there's much more of a sense of peace where choices are much more limited.

Karachi 2016

This year's trip to Karachi marked a little bit of a failure on my part; my intention was to visit at least annually going forward, as Pakistan becomes a bit more of a staple destination for me. And yet it has been a whopping two years since I last visited, having missed a trip earlier this year (I was in Vegas instead).

The trip was different for a couple of (related) reasons. Firstly, I had some Canadian (ie English speaking) cousins there with me. These are a bunch who, although I had only seen earlier in the year, I haven't been in Karachi with for almost 20 years. The trip was also different due to the scarcity of time - a wedding took up most of the first week, which left things compressed during the second, if not lacking altogether - I already feel that I need to return in order to make up for the shortcomings. Oh and the resulting late nights meant that I didn't really have to deal with any jetlag issues on my return to the UK.

New things then? Well there are a few. Careem and Uber are now relatively well established, giving us a level of independence and freedom we might not have had before. It remains to be seen how long the initiative lasts.

I saw a fair few Chinese in the malls, a sign of the ongoing investment coming in from the country. So far the effect is a positive one.

Clifton is becoming more and more built up as I visit. You don't have to squint too hard to imagine being in a place like Dubai instead. Again, a positive sign... and again, it remains to be seen how long it lasts.

The rest of Karachi appears to be relatively stable in its ongoing decline, and yet there is a renewed sense of hope as cracks start to show in the incumbent rotting of the place. That said, I was woken each day by a young girl shouting down each street asking for food. Change will take longer than the one year I hope to leave before my next visit.

Karachi 2014

It's telling that on my last trip to Karachi I had only posted a handful of travel articles. As my trips back home become more and more frequent (it had actually, amazingly, been less than a year since I had last visited, which is a record in itself), I appear to have less and less to say as my time there becomes more and more run of the mill and less special. This in itself isn't a bad thing - on the contrary actually: I like being a part of the furniture there and being able to skip the sometimes awkward stage of regaining familiarity with relatives and the environment.

That said this trip was different, mainly because I was travelling with my wider family this time instead of just my folks. This meant that the trip was largely tailored to the kids in our party: I have never been to as many Karachite attractions, museums and fairgrounds in two weeks as I had on this trip - heck I didn't know Karachi even had as many attractions, museums and fairgrounds in the first place.

In fact the whole trip was pretty exhausting, and that not necessarily in a bad way... it was just different to what I was accustomed to. In any case, as part of my intention to return more frequently there'll be plenty of chances to have a more low key visit in the future.

On Return

There's something about Pakistan that makes me sleepy, all the way till we arrive at Heathrow. I could blame the weather, or the attitude, or how I have nothing much to do there except sleep, but I think it's more than that - possibly something about finally being able to relapse to the true state of being a relaxed and lazy so an so.

Although I am always able to easily return after two weeks in Karachi, there has been a slight change in my approach to Pakistan in this trip, including the desire to now go back more often. Linked with the disaffection I've begun to have toward travel in general (I noticed that I, quite gladly, had no real "tourist" holiday in 2013) I think that works quite well and suspect I'll be returning to Karachi sooner rather than later.

But for now I return to the UK and real life, and thus the rehabilitation of my sleep patterns, diet and the soles of my feet can begin.

Karachi Transport Wins and Loses

The good:

Having your own driver while shopping.

Riding pillion from Federal B all the way to Clifton and back.

The view from the rear facing seat of an extra large rickshaw.

The bad:

Awful traffic.

The risk of death while playing chicken at almost every intersection you need to take.

Having to flush your nasal cavity each time you take a journey through the Karachi smog.

The oh so ugly:

Having to sit on a wet seat on a Kala-peela Taxi.

A Game of Takhts

Maybe it's just mine but Pakistani society appears to have a very organised familial structure and formalisation of heritage. You have the usual and expected sub-continent patriarchy and attitudes toward progeny and communality, but as I get older and become more aware of deeper behaviours I've noticed family names, houses, lines, relationships, allegiances and sometimes even politics and power struggles.

Marriages have bearings on ties and inheritance as houses are joined and changed. Sometimes marriages are kept within lines to influence this. Some houses are great, and some not so great, but all have their characters, personality, history and are utterly fascinating. There are no shields or sigils though which I think is a shame.

And not that I would ever confirm having done so myself, but if you look closely you might even spot the Starks, Baratheons and Lannisters too.

Hyderabad and Tando Adam

If three years is a long time after which to return to Karachi, the 20 odd it's been since I last visited Hyderabad must be an epoch - and the even longer time I've been away from Tando Adam an eternity. The trend for relatives to relocate over the past couple of decades has reduced the reasons to go back - until now anyway. Memories of those past visits still remain vivid in my mind though, from the intercity bus trips to the way in which we oh so care-freely hung out with our cousins during our extended summer stays.

Hyderabad is more "Sindhi" than Karachi, but aside from that the Hyderabad I knew doesn't exist any more. Which is probably why our trips there now last a day and not the weeks it used to. We were back (and happy) in Karachi pretty early in the evening.

Changes

Time flows very strangely in a place you repeatedly visit over many years.

Three years is an odd amount of time after which to return to Karachi. On the one hand, it's not enough time for a lot to have changed much - the beloved Jinnah International and its immigration was was still the same, as were the all embracing golden arches waiting for us outside. the Karachi weather, traffic and people were all the same, including my relatives who, in their adulthood, all appeared more or less the same as they did the last time I saw them.

But look more closely and things have changed. We have new flyovers, new laws (oh my gosh, guys can finally ride pillion again), new technology (WhatsApp on iPhones? Jeez) and, of course, new babies. And in this particular revisit way too many missing faces too (which is the main reason we have decided to come).

I do usually visit more often (at least once every two years), but I missed a trip earlier this year so despite the circumstances I am glad that we made the decision to come. I do love Karachi and after day one I am still excited to be here and even a little bit disbelieving that I am too.

Dil Dil, Pakistan

I think I'm quite lucky in that I'm able to visit Pakistan so relatively often. We tend to visit every two years for around the same number of weeks (which just happens to be my own personal limit), and as such our experience of going back home can be quite different to those of others. Oh and that reminds me: nothing much tends to happen during my trips back so unlike with my other holidays there won't be any daily coverage. I know how some of you can't stand those.

Essentially it comes down to training. Like most people who were force fed the subcontinent during the school summer holidays, I had a horrid time over there when I was a kid. It was unclean, I couldn't talk to anyone, the food sucked... and of course there was the toilet issue. To be fair I had it better than most; most of our time was spent between Karachi and Hyderabad which were established and quite cosmopolitan compared to the villages and pinds my friends had to endure. Still, despite our relative comfort we did still have the infamous water and power cuts, and still had to swallow what seemed like deliberately awful tasting antimalarials each day.

During university, trips did become more scarce but they also still happened. Eventually as family migrated to Karachi we stopped visiting Hyderabad altogether which made the whole thing more straightforward. The standard of life in Karachi improved over time while my own fussiness and impatience reduced with maturity, and all of a sudden I found myself actually enjoying my trips to Pakistan. Since graduating I've been at least once every two to three years. Relationships with family also matured as I discovered that it wasn't my language skills that were the problem but my inability to relate to them. I learned to adapt to and tolerate the instability of utilities (power cuts are now scheduled which makes things easier), and even squatting became second nature.

But overall trips more or less follow the same pattern. There's always a wedding or something to attend, after which the majority of time is spent doing the rounds and attending dawats (or dinner invitations). My father has twelve siblings, each of whom insist on feeding us - although unlike other people these are a pleasure to attend and not a chore at all. As time goes on the family of each sibling grows, as does the dynamics within, so it's always fun to catch up (I've given up trying to remember all the names of my nieces and nephews though). They also appreciate the trouble taken to get to see them so are always welcoming and comforting.

Next up, there's the clothes shopping. As some of you know, the majority of my clothes are Asian, and since we visit so often they all more or less are bought and tailored during trips to Pakistan. There are also other random things going on that never usually happen, but I'll talk about some of those in a separate post.

For those who ask how dangerous it is to visit Karachi, well to be honest there's never been a right time to go for a decade now. So yes, I guess we do take a risk, but as with most places of this type there are various ways to adapt to and mitigate those risks - I don't travel alone or too late, I stay away from obvious hot spots and leverage my innate pindu-ness (which most in the UK have witnessed first hand) to lower the chance of a kidnapping. That said, we did have an earthquake this time around which I couldn't really do anything about; having said that even though we were awake at the time we didn't notice anything happening (and I know I should be thankful but a part of me is a little disappointed at that). Oh and there were around five or six political assassination in Karachi during my stay there - once again, not that I noticed.

But still two weeks is and probably always will be my limit. This is less to do with Pakistan and more to do with homesickness, even though I do feel more at home in Karachi than anywhere else other than London. And so I don't leave with a heavy heart; instead I know I'll be back there sooner or later; not because I have to, but because I want to.

My First Rishwat

That means bribe. And giving, not taking.

I know we always hear the old stories about how you need to carry a few rupees while driving in India and Pakistan to pay off coppers who give grief to passer bys, but despite being in a car for most of the time while travelling in Karachi I never once got to see it done myself. Until today of course (which is kind of why I'm writing this post, but I suspect you knew that).

It was pretty much how you would imagine. It goes something like this:

1. A policeman pulls us over.
2. I'm told by my cousins to keep my mouth shut (the only thing that could give us away since I was in the habit of dressing even more natively than the natives).
3. The cop then hassles the driver for his documents.
4. The cop then creates a flimsy excuse for ticketing.
5. The driver "makes a phone call".
6. The cop sweats it out and then falls for the bluff and starts negotiating.
7. The driver ends up 100 rupees out of pocket.
8. We go on our way.

To be honest it wasn't that thrilling. Still at least that's one more thing I can tick off my todo list.

Made in Pakistan

The vast majority of my clothes are bespoke. They're all cut by hand and stitched by machine one at a time. Of course, I'm not talking about some fancy custom suits or anything; no these are my clothes of choice, the stuff I wear whenever I can, my shalwar kameezes and qurtas, made of fabric I pick myself and then sent to good old Jameel for him to put together for me and only me. A suit costs around a tenner to source and produce, so we're really not talking about big ticket items here.

Nevertheless this does mean that I appreciate hand made stuff. I've seen fabric being knitted and then dyed. I've witnessed first hand the cutting and sewing that goes on. I've personally thanked the tailor who has, with his own hands, created something to hide my modesty and keep me warm (well, ish).

On the other hand I do also have some mass market stuff - you know from places like Gap and the like. Despite my relationship with tailors and the like, I am desensitised to items which make a shop rack. As far as I'm concerned they just appear on the shop rack by magic.

Today, I accompanied my father to a denim factory to see a friend of his. Although I've been to some factories before, I can't remember visiting or having access to one of this size and scale. Six thousand skilled workers and tens of production lines gives an idea of the capacity and output of the place, but more than that it was the machinery, both literally and metaphorically, which really impressed me.

Production was a mixture of manual labour and automated process. There were different sections for cutting, stitching, washing (it turns out that some jeans are actually quite literally washed with stones), quality assurance and packing, all in units of thousands at a time. Amusingly most of the cutters were men and most of the stitchers were women, but apart from that particular observation the workforce was mixed.

And they weren't just making do with what they had - no, they had access to industrial quality equipment, processes and management. Chain mail gloves for the cutters, health and safety notices including evacuation maps and fire handling equipment and multiple staff notice board listing union members and leaders were the subtle signs of professionalism here. More obvious was the heavy security and how power was all generated onsite. A lot of workplaces are quite proud of the ISO accreditations they've worked hard for, and it's easy to see why. I wonder how the standards here compare to those of factories in other countries?

I really missed my camera. There were so many shots screaming to be taken; not that I would have necessarily been able to - the looks we were getting were firmly placed somewhere between "dirty" and "curious". Similarly, I really wanted to talk to some of the people there, but I figured that was equally impossible.

And just like with my ethnic clothes, here before my eyes I could finally see the value being added to raw materials. This is where that twenty pounds (or at least part of it) went. How much to these particular workers, I'm not sure but I'm not sure I'll be taking stuff off the rack for granted any more. I even started wondering how many people were involved in the clothes I was wearing at the time.

Today was most definitely one of the highlights of my trip so far, both from an informative and enjoyable point of view. And despite not having anything at all to do with the factory, I couldn't help but feel a little proud of what Pakistan is able to achieve. Of course there's always room for improvement and I'm sure there was plenty of the bad stuff that I didn't see, but still, the potential and attitude was definitely there.

It certainly made me wonder how much the country was capable of if it wasn't bogged down with corruption and instability. And ironically just as I was thinking this in the car while leaving Korangi we happened to witness a car being held up by two motorcyclists. It's just such a shame.

Going Home: A Blessing, Not A Curse

So here I am, packed and ready to embark on a two week break to Pakistan. No, I'm not going for any particular reason; we visit every two years or so and it just happens to be that time again. But still, I am looking forward to catching up with family and just spending some quality time in Karachi.

But more than that, I'm also looking forward to visit for another reason. And so this is where the clichéd lecture begins. Apologies in advance.

You see, as patronising as it may sound to my friends and family over there, the biggest and most valuable thing I bring back from my regular trips to Pakistan is what I believe to be a good sense of grounding. Yes, I realise that I sound exactly like our fathers did back in the 80s and 90s, but it's only over time that you realise exactly why they wanted us to retain links with our second homes. Of course part of it was due to tradition and duty and a lot of it was due to family, but I think our parents also wanted us to see exactly how lucky we are.

While people over there are putting up with water and power cuts, we start citing our human rights when our broadband goes down. Corruption is institutional and indeed a tool to survive, while we lament after we miss out on a killer designer label sale. People over there celebrate when they finally get a television on which to watch the news; here we do the same but with a fancy handbag or watch (one of which would probably pay for fifty televisions). Some of my own family work over 12 hours a day; not for a promotion or bonus but just to hold on to a job that pays just enough to feed their families.

But the lesson here isn't to be thankful. I like to think that most people are grateful for what they have. No, the real point is that despite all these things they all still seem much happier than many of those who live under better circumstances. And bringing this a little closer to home there does seem to be a correlation between those who, like me, make regular visits to the home of their parents or grandparents and the content way in which they live their life over here. The priorities, energy and focus of these people all seem fundamentally different. Whether one causes the other, I'm not quite sure.

Of course we should all strive for better and I'm also not suggesting anyone to artificially resist the opportunities and facilities we have here out of protest. But it does raise an eyebrow when people with much less are much more content than we are. We're blessed that we have such an accessible way to see this stuff close up, and personally I think it's a mistake that so many of us pass up the opportunity.