1. “Wow! Your English is truly good!”
Folks are surprised that anyone from Pakistan, let alone a lady, can talk, read, and compose in fluent English. The planet expects us to be either the frothy-mouthed zealots or mini-mart owners they see on TV.
In Pakistan, nearly the entire school curriculum is taught in English, and also this has created generations of Pakistanis who navigate English with complete ease. My very first language is English, but I have Pakistani friends whose English is so well spoken which they make my musings appear to be the workings of a monkey that is epileptic a typewriter.
2. “Do you guys have actually TV / the internet / cell phones over there?”
Even we finished up accountable of this one once I went along to Pakistan on a holiday last year, following a gap that is six-year. I left my smartphone behind, thinking there was no point in using it. Cue each of my cousins constantly uploading selfies on Facebook and updating their Twitter accounts like there’s no tomorrow. Meanwhile, we felt just like a idiot that is total my old mobile phone that didn’t have even a camera.
This really isn’t exclusive to the big urban centers either — this occurred in the dusty town where I was raised.
3. “Pakistani girls are incredibly innocent.”
We have Cosmo in Pakistan too, and just because there is formally “no dating” doesn’t suggest there aren’t methods around that. Go to any university that is pakistani you’ll look for a dating culture to rival anything into the western. We have some pretty sex education that is kick-ass.
4. “Did you come over in a watercraft?”
I had actually flown to the UK, their next question was what it must have felt like for me to fly for the first time — at which point I’d gently break it to them that I’ve been flying since I was little when i’d tell people. That’s not because I’m ridiculously rich. It’s because Pakistan is very a big nation and traveling, especially these days, is quite affordable and frequently the most trouble-free option for travel.
5. “You’re from Pakistan? I love palak paneer!”
A Pakistani friend who learned in America shared this 
one beside me. When did palak paneer become Pakistan’s formal mascot that is culinary? That’s like meeting some body from the British and saying “I love jellied eels!” Firstly, you’d need to be from the mind to love jellied eels, and secondly, it is not a meal that really features in regular day-to-day British dining.
Pakistani food is hugely diverse, as the nation is really diverse. Go find your neighborhood restaurant that is pakistani it probably has a name like Lahore This or Karachi Something — and try two things there. I would suggest haleem and nihari as beginning points.
6. “Did your parents disown you for marrying of the own choice?”
We married outside of my tradition, and my moms and dads didn’t simultaneously combust into balls of fiery wrath. You’d be amazed exactly how many of my peers back Pakistan are now actually marrying of these own choice aided by the help of the moms and dads.
7. “Did you ever see Osama Bin Laden?”
Whenever you result from a crackpot nuclear nation and hot-bed of terrorism, you will get asked this more often than you’d realize. The answer is no. We’ve a big terrorism that is homegrown in Pakistan, that’s true, but Taliban heads don’t carry on whistle-stop trips of this country like some sort of jihad-loving Mick Jagger.
8. “Did you utilized to live in a mud hut / shantytown?”
No. We used to live in a actual household made of bricks and cement. A lot of people in Pakistan do, and if one happens to understand the classes that are upper-middle their homes are definitely palatial. In reality, a lot of people moving from Pakistan towards the UK take one glance at that country’s line upon row of cramped, poorly lit, cookie-cutter houses and wail, “How can these bad individuals live such as this!”
9. “How come you don’t wear that dot in your forehead?”
That dot that is little known as a bindi and you’re thinking about India, pal. Pakistani girls do wear these at weddings and parties, but also for their decorative value instead of any relationship with chakras or the sacred 3rd attention.
10. “I’d love to see Pakistan, but I’m too scared.”
You ought to be afraid. Because hoping to get a visa from the Pakistani embassy is this kind of Kafkaesque nightmare that even we left the building screaming, “I’m not carrying this out once again!” after trying to organize paperwork for my husband that is foreign and. The line of questioning involved such valuable information towards my application as to whether my husband had transformed into Islam or perhaps not, and what type of spiritual environment my youngster had been subjected to in the home, the answer to that will be needless to say, “None of your Goddamned company.” They managed to make it so hard and complicated that you’d think Pakistan was the world’s premier holiday location, therefore just the truly committed should be permitted to go.
Then even as we got here, because we had a foreigner within our party, my family got phone that is daily from the regional authorities to make sure said foreigners were still in our possession, and weren’t being provided an impromptu tour of Waziristan thanks to our friends into the Taliban. But seriously, if you’re able to get past the hellish ordeal of really securing your self a visa, tourists in Pakistan are this type of rarity that they’re treated like royalty. A beautiful country as yet untouched by mass tourism if you keep low-key and observe the customs, you’ll experience.
