Oh joy.
The Karachi Literature Festival is Kamran’s wet dream. Every year, we basically stop work for two days and Kamran sends off the entire newsroom to the festival to report on who wore what and who’s writing what. His idea of a treat involves getting me to cover the opening ceremony. At 9 am. Saad had flown in for it last year, with his then-girlfriend, a glamazon called Nina who worked with him in Dubai and asked me every half hour if we were ‘just friends’. Luckily we’d sat in the row of people who’d all laughed when Karen Armstrong said that we should see the good in the people around us. ‘I’ve had sex with most of the people here,’ Saad announced, far too loudly. ‘I’ve already seen the best of them.’ Nina whipped her head around. ‘What. Do. You. Mean?’ The ensuing fight lasted through the festival, with Nina pointing to every girl there – single, married, nine months pregnant –asking if he’d slept with her. He told me later they ended up breaking up on the cab ride to the airport, which made for an incredibly awkward two-hour flight.
The literature festival is one of Karachi’s biggest cultural events, so everyone turns up. It’s free, there’s the chance to meet reclusive authors, listen to poetry, discuss books and get into long, passionate arguments which aren’t being fuelled by alcohol. If only it wasn’t for the blasted diplomats who turn up in droves: every year, the literature festival schedules at least two – or five – sessions on Afghanistan or Kashmir so it becomes ‘newsy’. And the diplomats always put up a chunk of money, which means we have to sit through their unending speeches at the opening ceremony which usually features a variation of this quote: ‘Reading and books are how we will defy the extremists that want to destroy our way of life.’
The place is buzzing. There are tons of people, which is rare for 9 am in Karachi unless the sale of clothing is somehow involved, which case all bets are off and you will in all likelihood get to see women elbowing and clawing at each other.
This year’s event is a bit more sedate. We’re seated beneath bougainvillea boughs in the vast gardens of the Beach Luxury Hotel, which is quite nice really. There’s a gorgeous view of the sea and the hotel itself is modernist and retro and has a cafe called 007. Except there’s never a James Bond-esque character there, just a bunch of retirees discussing just how bad things are in Pakistan.
A foreign journalist sitting next to two blonde women looks up from his BlackBerry and exclaims: ‘This is just like Islamabad. With the sea!’
I hate living in Karachi, but for the city to be compared to Islamabad – one of the dullest, most out of touch places in the country - is ridiculous. I’m about to say something when the last ambassador – Russian? German? French? I’m going to have to get his name from the photographer later – stops talking and people applaud.
‘The literature festival is now open!’ exclaims the master of ceremonies, who in the past decade, has worked as a PR rep, a journalist, a foreign affairs talk show host and is now an official ‘emcee’ at most high profile events.
A girl standing next to me makes a sudden rush towards the café, where the authors are holding court. One of them is waxing lyrical to a crowd of society aunties about the bougainvilleas in his old house. ‘They were the colour’, he says, with a strategic pause, ‘of blood.’ Another is chain smoking and looking bemusedly at the bougainvillea author, who now has a tortured expression on his face as someone tells him about the violence in Karachi. Another, who specializes in writing fictionalized accounts of major news events, is signing a towering pile of books. His latest, an account of the Osama bin Laden raid in Abbottabad, is getting turned into a film. ‘Oh, working on a film is amazing. It’s such a privilege. But I’d rather be here with people who really appreciate my work,’ he says, smiling at a young teenage girl, who squeals and scurries off.
I figure I have enough material for a ‘mood piece’, one of those descriptive pieces which are like introductions to a story which never begins. Kamran loves mood pieces. Though there was almost a mini-mutiny in the newsroom last week after sending out a 2,000-word mail insisting reporters should produce more of them as readers enjoy them so much. ‘Haan, log bohat enjoy karrahe hain ‘kafir kafir Shia kafir’ ke naaray lagate hue,’ grumbled Shahrukh, the crime reporter.
I start frantically calling the office driver, hoping he can get me out of here in the next five minutes when the sky with no warning whatsoever turns deep grey before erupting into a noisy shower. How is this happening? The speeches were all about the beginning of spring. It isn’t supposed to rain. I’m wearing white, and this will soon turn into a one-woman wet t-shirt contest. I look around, trying to figure out an exit strategy. All around me there’s the tottering of heels as people run to the rooms where the sessions have started. Bougainvillea author is actually standing, arms outstretched, taking in the rain. I think about what his book must be like and shudder.
End up joining the horde. My choices are attending the fifteenth launch of the same book about Afghanistan, one on ‘post-9/11 writing’, ‘The rise of the left-wing’ (do we even have such a thing?) and one on Faiz Ahmed Faiz’s poetry. At the door, the photographer is wringing out her shawl. ‘This must be what it feels like to be a flood victim,’ she says, ‘and Kamran said this would be FUN.’ She looks at me and says. ‘Err, I think you may need a shawl. Do you know your t-shirt is soaking wet?’
Okay, this session was a bad idea. Two old men – so old that I’m surprised they’re not hooked up to oxygen tanks – are reminiscing about all the times they met Faiz. ‘I gave Faiz the idea for that poem,’ offers one, wiping his face with a handkerchief. ‘I gave him the page from my notebook to write it on’ counters the other. I head to another session, where a self-proclaimed Marxist is reading a speech against large corporations off his iPad. Someone sitting behind me squeals. ‘Isn’t he adorable?’ ‘Chootiya’, mutters a young boy sitting next to me. I’m inclined to agree.
I head to the session on post-9/11 writing where the authors are bitterly arguing about US policy in the region. ‘Look, this isn’t our war,’ says the author who is touting his account of the Osama bin Laden/Abbottabad raid at the festival. ‘We are liberal, secular people living in a state that was founded for people of all religions. So this is really just a spill over of Afghanistan in the 1980s. Look, we’re at a literature festival. You don’t have literature festivals in failed states. This isn’t Somalia, for Christ’s sake. Once the US leaves Afghanistan, we’ll be back to normal.’
‘Oh, of course,’ says the moderator, flicking back auburn highlights with a bejewelled hand. ‘I mean, we really were meant to be a pluralistic society. These people – the so-called Taliban – I mean, how do we even know they exist?’
‘This is really all Zia-ul-Haq’s fault,’ screeches the feminist poet who has wrested the mic from a volunteer. The audience sighs contently, and someone breaks out into applause. If there is ever anything I can count on at Pakistani cultural events, it’s that Zia – dead for longer than most people can remember – can still be blamed for everything.