MinnesotaMel

Lahore- a first few surreal experiences

I arrived in Lahore Pakistan more than a week ago, and the time has flown by already. I have had normal settling in experiences so far and also some surreal experiences.

Surreal KFC visit: One day in my first week here, I had a late night crazy long conference call and did not leave the office until 8 pm. I was hungry for dinner, and knew there was no food in the house I wanted for dinner. I asked the driver where we could stop to get dinner. He suggested KFC or McDonalds. I opted for KFC, thinking it was a bit better for me and would feel a bit more “home cooked”. Little did I know that the whole experience would be surreal. First of all, how often does one pull up into the KFC parking lot in a fully armored SUV with a driver? Second, everywhere we go we are followed by a police truck of bodyguards and they also roared into the parking lot. Third, two of those police guards followed me into the shop, guns raised for my protection. The look of the clerk behind the counter and the other patrons was classic “what on earth?” It did not make the service any faster though :) In the end I got a two piece chicken meal with French fries, a roll and seven up (no diet soda :). It smelled heavenly the rest of the ride home, and the chicken was a golden brown fried color. I took my first bite of the chicken, and it was a crunchy, fried delivery mechanism for spices. Completely unexpected spices…imagine the KFC spicy chicken of the US stores times three! It was delicious, but unexpected in its spice level. I liked it though, which is more than I can say for the French fries (like eating small pieces of cardboard) and the roll-like substance. Will I go back to KFC? Yes. Will I get a chicken only meal? Yes, unless there is a Pakistani side dish menu that I missed in that surreal take out experience. PS: did I mention that KFC will deliver and thus I can probably avoid the gun-wielding visit in the future?

I arrived during Ramazan, which means that some people are fasting throughout the day and waiting to break their fast (Iftar) each evening. In honor of this tradition, we hosted a series of Iftar events for our friends and colleagues. One evening I attended an Iftar for the American Business Forum members. I arrived a few minutes late, and all of the businessmen were already there. I am very glad I had done some reading about some of the local businesses- it allowed me to be a bit knowledgeable about some of the more local companies. The consumer products companies were easy to chat about- Levis, Apple, Coke, etc. I also knew a lot about GE, but the other chemical and less well known companies are still a bit of a mystery. It was interesting that the consumer product companies were run by very outgoing and gregarious people, while some of the other businesspeople seemed to be less outgoing. They were really quite fun, in a teasing way. They enjoyed teasing each other about their wives being the bosses of the house. One of the beverage company people was the most vocal of the bunch. He does not drink, and spent a lot of time talking about the sales of soda during Ramadan (the strongest sales month they have!). Later we speculated that more people turn to soda because they have turned away from booze for Ramadan. It seems like a possible reason. Anyway, we started talking about the topic “It just takes one person to change the world.” It led to some great discussion of various international and domestic people who live by (and some who have died by)that motto. It was a great part of the conversation.

posted by MinnesotaMel @ 4:31 AM