By Mohsin Hamid, Washington Post   |   January 6, 2008

 

LAHORE, Pakistan

 

 

During
the winter holidays, much of the Pakistani diaspora makes its way back
to the homeland. It is wedding season and -- for those with the means
and of a secular persuasion -- party season as well. Flights are fully
booked, airfares are astronomically high, and even circuitous
itineraries via places such as Istanbul and Muscat are in great demand.

 

Middle-class
families in Pakistan often tell a similar tale of numbers. Of my
parents and their siblings, 13 people in total, 11 live in Pakistan.
But of their 26 children -- my generation -- 15 of us reside abroad.
Pakistan has become an increasingly unsettled place, and many of my
peers have voted with their feet.

 

But
not always with their hearts. As my wife and I board our flight from
London to Lahore, evident all around us is a longing for home -- for
the friends and family who are central to Pakistani culture in a way
that many foreigners find so remarkable. (As an admiring American
roommate of mine once said, "All you guys do is hang out.") This
duality of Pakistan as a place both troubled and normal, a place
capable of producing a large diaspora while also affectionately tugging
at those who have left, is often lost on the world's media.
International news outlets tend to cast Pakistan as the one-dimensional
villain of a horror film, a kind of Jason or Freddie whose only role is
to frighten. Scant attention is paid to the hospitality, the love for
music and dance, or the simple ordinariness of 164 million people going
about their daily lives.

 

As
we take our seats on a Pakistan International Airlines Boeing 777, my
fellow passengers do not look to me like embodiments of the hearts and
minds of an important frontline state in the "war on terror." They look
like people excited to be headed home.

 

We
touch down early on the morning of Sunday, Dec. 23. One of my
brothers-in-law is getting engaged and a cousin is getting married, so
I am soon busy running from one family event to another, often followed
by late-night hangout sessions with old friends.

 

Naturally,
we talk politics. It is immediately evident to me how unpopular
President Pervez Musharraf has become. A year ago, many people said
that he was at least partially good for the country. But Musharraf's
conflict with the judiciary, suppression of independent television
channels and crackdown on pro-democracy and human rights activists have
embittered most of those who previously gave him credit for economic
growth and stability.

 

My
brother-in-law is much younger than I am, in his early 20s. He and his
friends are poster boys for the "enlightened moderation" that Musharraf
claims to want to promote. One is a computer programmer who works for a
small company in Lahore that designs particle effects (smoke from
explosions, blood splattering from gunshot wounds) for international
video game studios. Another is a film student working on a pilot for a
television show for his college thesis. But even liberal young
Pakistanis like them are keen to see an end to Musharraf's rule. I hear
again and again that Pakistan needs to give democracy a chance, and
that for that to happen, Musharraf must go.

 

I
accompany my wife's family to my brother-in-law's engagement. It is
customary for the prospective groom's family to go to the home of the
prospective bride and make a formal proposal for her hand. The lights
go out in the middle of our visit -- due to power shortages, Pakistan
suffers from rolling 30-minute blackouts -- and we have to wait in
darkness before the bride-to-be can make her appearance and rings can
be exchanged.

 

The
following day I am chatting with my parents when a friend calls and
tells me to turn on the television. At first, it seems that there has
been an explosion at a political rally attended by Benazir Bhutto, but
that Bhutto herself is unharmed. Later, the news channels say that she
has been injured and taken to the hospital. Finally, we hear the
announcement that she has died. I am surprised by the strength of my
reaction. It is the most upsetting event in the history of Pakistan
that I can personally recall.

 

Riots
soon erupt across the country, most violently in Karachi, where my
cousin's wife, a microbiologist, has just completed a medical ethics
exam. Her taxi is attacked by a gang of teenage boys who smash its
windows with sticks. The driver manages to turn around and escape, and
she spends the night at the nearby home of a friend, unable to make it
to her destination until the following day because of the violence in
the streets.

 

In
Lahore, things are calmer, but there are reports of shootings and
arson, and most people stay indoors. I venture out to my cousin's
house, passing along some of what would normally be the busiest
boulevards in this city of 8 million. I do not see more than a handful
of cars. Lights are out, the streets are empty.

 

The
following night, many of us notice that the moon hangs low in the sky,
reddish-orange and perhaps three-quarters full. The missing crescent
seems to be not on the left or the right, but at the top, giving the
moon an odd shape, like the bulge of a pregnant woman's belly.

 

Bhutto
is assassinated on a Thursday. By Saturday, stocks of food and petrol
are running low. Shops are shuttered in protest at her killing, petrol
stations are closed for fear of arsonists, and trucks and trains that
carry supplies up and down Pakistan have stopped running after coming
under attack.

 

Sunday
brings a measure of reprieve, as the riots seem to be coming under
control. For me, there are two very unexpected sources of hope during
this period. The first is from Nawaz Sharif, Bhutto's longtime
political opponent and leader of the anti-establishment Pakistan Muslim
League-Nawaz (PML-N). He arrives at the hospital immediately upon
hearing of her death and is so visibly upset that he cries out again
and again that this is Pakistan's "darkest day." The spontaneous
humanity of his reaction, the depth of compassion and grief (from him,
of all people), seems to resonate with and unite a vast swath of
Pakistanis across the political spectrum, as does his subsequent
announcement that his party will boycott the elections out of sympathy
for Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party (PPP).

 

Even
more surprising is the first press conference of the PPP after Bhutto's
death. Her widower, the newly designated PPP co-chairperson, Asif Ali
Zardari, has an extremely unsavory reputation. Yet instead of
exploiting resentments in Sindh (Bhutto's home province) against the
Punjab (the province where she was killed), he delivers an eloquent and
-- dare I say it? -- inspiring defense of the federation, of democracy
and of Sindhi-Punjabi brotherhood. He offers an olive branch to the
army, saying that the PPP's quarrel is with Pakistan's ruling party,
not with the country's soldiers. He admonishes the rioters, tells
Pakistanis to express their anger by voting in the elections, and
expresses his gratitude to Sharif while asking Sharif's party not to
boycott the polls (a request Sharif quickly accepts).

 

By
Monday, a sense of relief seems to be spreading through the country: On
television, in newspapers, in conversations at the market, people are
expressing cautious optimism about a future that only four days earlier
seemed so bleak. There is enormous sympathy for Bhutto and her party.
She was perhaps never so popular in life as she is now in death.

 

Meanwhile,
Musharraf and the party of his establishment, the Pakistan Muslim
League (Quaid-e-Azam), have perhaps never been so unpopular. Television
images of firefighters being directed to hose away evidence from the
assassination scene, and government statements that Bhutto died not
from bullets nor from a bomb but from falling on the sun-roof lever of
her SUV, add fuel to the many conspiracy theories circulating about who
really ordered her killing. Election posters bearing the bicycle symbol
of Musharraf's party are being torn down all over the city.

 

Two
friends come to see us. In October, when Bhutto first returned to
Karachi from self-imposed exile abroad, they had ridden in her convoy.
Their car was immediately behind Bhutto's vehicle, and they saw the
blasts of that initial unsuccessful suicide bomb attack on her. But
they keep speaking of what preceded the carnage: the rapturous
reception she received from her supporters. They tell me it was
beautiful, with all the singing and dancing and cheering of a carnival.
It was a Pakistan they had never seen before, full of diversity and
hope, with people from all four provinces and even the religious
minorities out in a show of joy.

 

Little
more than a week has passed since Bhutto's death, but life in Lahore is
almost normal again. I am amazed by Pakistan's resilience, by this
nation's power to pick itself up and carry on. But change is in the
air. Opposition parties are uniting against the Musharraf-led
establishment. Elections, even though they have been postponed until
Feb. 18, seem poised to deliver a powerful rebuke to the current
regime, unless of course they are rigged.

 

In
the United States, there will be newspaper columns and television talk
shows dedicated to "loose nukes" and the "war on terror." Here in
Pakistan, one can see signs of people coming together. Scare stories
notwithstanding, it is possible (although by no means certain) that out
of this tragedy the world's sixth-largest nation may succeed in finding
its voice -- and with that the chance for a better future.