Tag: Pakistan

Lahore’s walled city contains some truly extraordinary “built heritage”; two of its mosques ought be on any globetrotter’s “bucket list” and its fort is one of “our” planet’s grandest.

This “old city” is, however, neither a “museum” nor a “theme park”.

Most of it is very “real”, complex, busy and not-immaculate – an urban place in which many people live, work, shop.

It will surprise any visiting westerner who had preconceived Pakistan as a “forbidding” or “unfriendly” destination, and/or as one in which only males are highly-visible, in public.

On Lahore’s streets, adult women are abundantly present, most of them do not hide their faces, and it is not the least bit unusual to see an obviously-confident woman, venturing out in her own right, unchaperoned.

As we enjoyed our drum-driven welcome, we visitors/tourists had a little “forest” of our phone-cameras, blazing. (& yours truly’s camera-as-such)

Also blazing were at least as many phone-cameras in local residents’ hands.

Mutual curiosity and bonhomie were abundantly evident.

This little “event” proved enjoyable to all persons present, including those who were not photographing it.

Over the course of seven fascinating hours, we saw a great many people in Lahore’s “walled city”.

Fellow members of our own group aside, not one of them was another “Western” tourist.

For the foreseeable future, I imagine, very few Westerners are likely to walk through Delhi Gate, and then experience one of the world’s most interesting urban precincts.

Presumably, that explains why our arrival was treated as one deserving of a “formal”, official welcoming ceremony!