The last bit of quick sightseeing on Sunday was a stop at Liberty for some fabric shopping. I rummaged through those big piles and ended up buying about 25 dupattas for Kavi’s party for about $40 (if I’m doing the math right). They’re so beautiful — I bought two of that silky one with the stars, so I could keep one for myself.
I also picked up a few shalwar kameez packages — they’ll need to be made up by a tailor to my measure, and I’m hoping I’ll have time to get that done before I leave, but if not, I can either get it done on Devon (for a lot more), or I can attempt to sew them myself. I do have shalwar kameez at home, but all of mine are fairly fancy — they’re meant for weddings. It’ll be nice to have some everyday ones; they’re really very comfortable to wear in this climate.
In general, it’s a ‘modest’ culture — even the men tend not to wear shorts so often, and I honestly don’t know if shorts would keep you cooler on a sunny day than loose shalwar pants. That’s a little tricky, though — it means there isn’t so much temperature pressure to push social norms, so if women (or men) want to wear skimpier clothing, they’re mostly going to stand out a lot.
The LUMS campus is very progressive / Westernized — while the majority of students are in traditional shalwar kameez, there are also lots in form-fitting jeans, sleeveless tops, and even crop tops and short shorts.
But from talking to the women here, they generally wouldn’t be comfortable dressing like that outside of this large, gated campus. They wouldn’t expect to be attacked, and probably not even harassed / catcalled, but they’d likely get a lot of stares in the streets of Lahore. Have a hundred men starting at you is unnerving, even for someone like me, who tends to push those boundaries.
But here on campus — I just wandered over to the dining hall to get a cup of cardamom chai, wearing an above-the-knee sleeveless form-fitting dress, and no one blinked. Or stared. I smiled at the men as I passed, said good morning, they did the same, it was all very pleasant. When I walk around in the evening, I see men and women sitting close together and snuggling, I see women walking alone, everyone seems comfortable and relaxed.
So why is LUMS so different?
LUMS was founded with a LOT of money from big organizations (including the US government, see plaque), as a business college, aiming to draw people from all over the world. It now gets undergrads from all over Pakistan, including financial-aid students from middle and low-income communities that are likely more conservative than the wealthy (who have always been more able to flout social norms), and LUMS seems to just have managed to reproduce its norms with new members.
There are other progressive bubbles in Pakistan, from what my students tell me, and what people do at private parties is often very different from what they do in public.
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So the short version of this — if you want to wear skimpier clothes on the LUMS campus, it’ll be fine. Ditto, I think, if you’re in a private home. In the tourist areas, I suspect white people will be mostly ignored; brown women may get a second look or two. I had several men ask me where I was from, and when I said Chicago, in my American accent, they nodded and smiled, in a sort of “Oh, that explains it,” kind of way.
One of my students said that when she dressed less conservatively in Lahore, it wasn’t that men were hostile, exactly, but more that they seemed confused.
“They don’t know what to do with me.”
Fascinating.
My kids are still living home, so I wouldn’t want to be away for too long, but once they’re both out of the house (probably about six years), if LUMS invited me to come teach for a month, or a semester, I’d be delighted. We’re spending so much time teaching (Liz Hand and I have the students working 12 hour days this week), that we’ve only been able to get in a little sightseeing and cultural experience. There’s so much more to explore…
(Salam Award Workshop students, I know some of you are reading these posts now — please do chime in and correct me if I’ve gotten anything wrong! Or just add your own thoughts / perspectives.)
Lahore, Pakistan.
