Brad Goodman wrote:
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Perhaps u should also read this from Harsha Bhogle
Friends in Pakistan
My memories of Pakistan were coloured too. By the war of 1971 when, as a ten year old, I heard Indira Gandhi say that Indian air force bases had been bombed and when our little Gnats outdid the mighty Sabres. Or so we were told. By the stories my mother told me of fear in Lahore in 1947 and of returning on one of the army trains. India hadn’t yet been partitioned but they already spoke of “returning”. By the fact that my grandfather wore chest pads that my grandmother stitched as he cycled to work in Lahore. I had also heard of how people in Amritsar went to Lahore to see a big city and of how my father, on his way back by ship from Paris had stopped over in Karachi and had been very kindly received by people having only recently migrated from Hyderabad.
In 1997 I got the opportunity of finding out for myself. I would visit the Anarkali Market near where my mother lived as a child and I would bring back some chilgoze for her. And I would visit the other Hyderabad.
We weren’t in a hotel there; neither was the team. They stayed in the cantonment under the hospitality of the Pakistan army and we stayed as house guests. Our hosts took us to dinner to the Hyderabad Club, showed us how drinks could be poured out of a kettle and after a few had gone down told us “bhai, sirf aapke nahin hamaare bhi pachas saal hue hain azaadi ke“.
Lahore could have been Delhi. Same cars, same roads, same clothes, same chaat. And the Pearl Continental was outstanding. Walking by the shops, wondering how different the prices there would be from those in the markets, I was pounced upon by a man from one of the antique shops. “Aap wahi hain na, jo Sahara Cup me aate hain” he said and I appreciated the “aap” which is how it was in my Hyderabad. “India se aaye hain?”. “Ji haan” I started but before I could continue he had taken over the conversation “Phir to aap hamaare mehmaan hue. Chaliye Lahore dikhate hain aapko”.
And so I found myself with a complete stranger in a country I had apprehensions about. I had heard about the fine cloth they sold and wanted to buy some for my wife. We went to four shops in each of which I was introduced as “India se hamaare mehmaan hain” and neither of which I could leave until I had partaken of their hospitality. I had the mandatory chaat and a ‘special’ ice-cream before we found the shop we were looking for. A very polite man showed me all he had, recommended fabric heartily and while doing so asked “Kaun jeetega? Hamaare to waise chalis pachas hazaar hote hain match pe?” “Itne?” I asked a bit bewildered. His answer floored me. “Sochiye aap, agar ham hi itne lagaate hain to bananewalon ne kitne banaaye honge!” The next evening the fabric I selected, with a dupatta acquired from elsewhere was delivered to my hotel room. I had paid on trust
The Gaddafi Stadium was packed the next day and while walking around between commentary stints, I ran into a policeman on duty. He asked me the inevitable “India se hain aap?” When I said yes, he promptly reached into his pocket for a little trinket, thrust it into my hesitant palm and said “dene ke liye mere paas kuch nahin lekin yeh chhoti si cheez yaad ke taur pe le jaaiye. Apne logon se kahiye Pakistan me bhi dost hain.”
We have a tendency to judge Pakistanis on an all-or-nothing basis, so that if they show some positive elements that means (in our minds) they must be very good only, and it is the fault of yeevil yindoos for making brothers into enemies. Mahabharata tells us that no one is completely good or completely evil. That doesn't mean that we can't talk about good and evil people at all. It requires a basic sense of moral judgment to decide this, and I am afraid that in my observation and experience, Indians taken as a whole are lacking in this particular capacity for judgment.
Pakistanis (and ashraf-type Muslims in general) like to feel large-hearted and generous, and I know Pakistanis that I consider genuinely so, not just acting. At the same time, if there is a challenge to their implicit supremacy they will become depressed and / or murderously angry. See here, for example:
A Modest Proposal From the Brigadier
"We should fire at them and take out a few of their cities—Delhi, Bombay, Calcutta," he said. "They should fire back and take Karachi and Lahore. Kill off a hundred or two hundred million people. They should fire at us and it would all be over. They have acted so badly toward us; they have been so mean. We should teach them a lesson. It would teach all of us a lesson. There is no future here, and we need to start over. So many people think this. Have you been to the villages of Pakistan, the interior? There is nothing but dire poverty and pain. The children have no education; there is nothing to look forward to. Go into the villages, see the poverty. There is no drinking water. Small children without shoes walk miles for a drink of water. I go to the villages and I want to cry. My children have no future. None of the children of Pakistan have a future. We are surrounded by nothing but war and suffering. Millions should die away."
"Pakistan should fire pre-emptively?" I asked.
Aman nodded.
"And you are willing to see your children die?"
"Tens of thousands of people are dying in Kashmir, and the only superpower says nothing," Aman said. "America has sided with India because it has interests there." He told me he was willing to see his children be killed. He repeated that they didn't have any future—his children or any other children.
I asked him if he thought he was alone in his thoughts, and Aman made it clear to me that he was not.
None of the people who were so nice to Bhogle will probably bat an eye when it comes to supporting 26/11 type attacks or any type of gazwa against India including nuclear attack. Indians are still confused that as soon as they became Pakistanis, Muslim Punjabis lost no time in killing and raping en masse the neighbors they were calling uncles and aunties till the previous day.
On the Indian side(and hopefully this is not OT as it is derived from an observation of Pakistanis), we have to accept that both sides exist in the pakistani personality (whether it makes sense to us or not) and learn to make the choice between being channels for Pakistani ass-roughs to express their large-heartedness, while being careful to never to threaten their sense of superiority (by such hostile acts as being more successful or just standing up erect), versus taking what might feel like a cold-hearted business-like attitude whereby we decide that the ego strokes we get from this kind of love from Pakistanis is not worth the harm we are doing to our personal and national selves by falling into the role of their ego-bunny.
Question for Bhogle should be, "it's nice that pakistanis have made you feel so good; but are you willing to acquiesce in the harming of your country and your less-privileged compatriots just so that you can continue to feel good in this way?"
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