While visiting Lahore and Karachi, I found both cities were being perceived as unsafe. In Karachi, friends warned that I might die in a bomb blast in Lahore. In Lahore, friends warned that my cell phone might be robbed at gunpoint in Karachi. It was funny to hear Karachiites and Lahoris being bitchy about each other. Read more

In Lahore, The Delhi Walla pretended to be a Lahori. I travelled in an auto rickshaw. I rode on a bike. I boarded a city bus.

As in Delhi, I walked all over the town. I strolled in the Mall Road. I purchased an antique Shakespeare from a second-hand bookstore near Regal Chowk. I had fresh musambi juice at a stall in Hall Road.

I watched people play cricket opposite the Tollinton Market building. I saw a biker waving Pakistan’s flag. I stood outside the now-closed Pak Tea House, a legendary café once frequented by great intellectuals.

Outside the ticket stall at Shahi Quila, I purchased the Rs 10 ticket that is given to Pakistani nationals, and not the Rs 100 ticket for foreigners. Since we were all brown, the man at the counter didn’t take me as an outsider.

At noon, I walked in the shaded corridor of the grand Badshai Masjid and took a siesta in its cool prayer hall.

Later, I had Peepal leaves falling on me in the ground around Minar-e-Pakistan. I then took a rickshaw to Lahore Museum where I ordered Pepsi at the canteen. Next, I attended the 79th martyrdom anniversary of Shaheed Bhagat Singh at Shadman Chowk.

I also roamed around in the campus of Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS), Pakistan’s most prestigious business institute. I hung out with students who dressed, behaved and spoke like the baba-log Stephanians of Delhi University.

While taking photographs on the Mall Road, a cop stopped me and asked for my shinakht (identity). When he discovered that I hold an Indian passport, he asked, “Do you know the trouble between India and Pakistan and still you are so openly taking pictures?” I said, “But I’m your friend.” Satisfied, he let me take his picture.

At night, I passed by Lahore’s lovely canal. As part of the Basant season festivities, it was lit up with decorations. There were giant models of lotus flowers floating on the water. At one point I came across the figures of the whirling dervishes of Maulana Rumi.

In the end, I went to Bhati Gate and paid my haziri at the sufi shrine of Daata Durbar. Its sprawling courtyard had pilgrims sleeping, praying and sitting meditatively. I was among my own people.

Heera Mandi, Lahore’s fabled red light district, is almost dead. Most dancing establishments have shut down. The courtesans no longer pretend to be mere dancers. Read more

It is 7 am. The room is lined with old paperbacks. Tiger, the house dog, is looking out of the grill into the garden. Rosemary, the maid, is calling me for breakfast. But I’m listening to the sound of birds. Read more

I caught up with Mr Ali Sethi, a young Pakistani novelist, in the lawn of Delhi’s Ambassador Hotel during the last week of July, 2009. He was visiting India for a book tour of his first novel The Wish Maker. Read more

There are two kinds of Delhiwallas.  Those who have been to Khushwant Singh’s living room and those who have not. I have been to Apartment 49-E, Sujan Singh Park.

However, the author of Train to Pakistan hardly registered my presence. Only once, when I refused an offer of whiskey, did he turn to ‘check me out’.  Read more