Pakistan seems to be at the brink of chaos on many days. In addition to frequent news about extremists -- the Taliban, al-Qaeda, and local militant outfits like Laskhar -- now a cricket team gets targeted by armed gunmen who apparently (given how well prepared they seemed) were planning to take the teammates captive and kill them off. If you know how popular cricket is in Southeast Asia, you know this is serious. Many people in Pakistan, esp. cricket fans, are not happy. Newspapers in Pakistan declared it the requiem for the sport. Sri Lankans were the only ones who agreed to play there, and now no one will want to come. It's as if suddenly baseball was banned in the US.
If you want the latest on the cricket attack, go to Pakistani newspaper The Dawn at http://www.dawn.com
Also, in case you imagine Pakistan as a backwards, uncivilized land, I encourage you to read this article about the arts and culture in Lahore, from the Smithsonian Magazine. A city I dream to visit.
Letter from Lahore: Reinventing Pakistan
Welcome to Lahore, where an explosion of art and media is offering a vibrant alternative to the strictures of religious conservatives and is transforming one of America's most important and most ambivalent allies
By Mohsin Hamid
Smithsonian magazine, July 2004
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/pakistan.html
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
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