We are 8.000.000.000 humans inhabiting this world today. A bit more even and growing bigger. But the Globe has always maintained the same radius. As a result, people have been found to be closer together, more shoulder to shoulder, at least physically. A hundred years ago, the majority of the global population was rural and attached to the land and animals. But land mechanization, industrialization and economy of scale, with the promise of forgetting some vital calamities, ignited the process of filling and expansion of cities, which had never dreamed to be so popular and hosting 60% of world’s people. They have become over time more relevant sites, besides not providing the key elements for life. That life that needs to find its own new way to continue in a landscape built by humans, trying to escape the dominance and care of Nature.
Asia, with more than half of the world’s population and half of it in its cities, is the exact representation of that. It means prosperity and inequality; opportunity and congestion; history and concrete; tradition and youth. And more than that, they are real, they are lived. If one stops to think for a second, so much dynamism can be dazzling, and actually disorienting. Would not it be just nice to see in pictures a glimpse of that vast reality?
From Istanbul to Hangzhou, from Astana to Colombo, in the heart of Asia lies Lahore. Flanked on one side by the waters of the Ravi, on the other by a line drawn on the map in 1947, Lahore has always been a reference. At first it was Brahmins, then Muslims, Mongol khans, Timur and his troops, Mughal architects, guru Nanak and the Sikhs, poets and students, Qawwali music groups, the British East India Company, black and white filmmakers and Pakistanis from all over the country. All of them have sculpted the city's character; forging a charming reputation and a sense of self-pride.
The second-largest city in Pakistan today has two faces: the modern designed metropolis that is home to nearly 14 million dwellers; the old city that tries to guard the ancient treasuries. Speedy urban highways with their U-turns, tall uniform buildings, monsoon humid parks, modern luxury shopping malls and a cloud of energetic pollution besiege the old Lahore. Crossing any of the gates of the walled city, the 21st century slows down and comes to merge with the past. A blend of chaos and harmony. Narrow streets get easily stacked and noisy by eager drivers trying to gain some minutes of the day. Colorful mosques and mausoleums are surrounded by pale brick and serpent copper cable. Courtyards or havelis invite for a peaceful stop. One misses a syncretism once more present in Lahore, which makes the Badshahi Mosque, the Wazir Kahn Mosque or the Minar al Pakistan stand out within a more monotonous diversity. Bazaars like the iconic Anakarli offer all kinds of goods, street food, fruits, shays and conversations. Timidly changing, their public spaces remain masculine. Women have begun to populate Punjabi universities, but still not much in the workplace. Generations live in close proximity to each other. Elders pass on tales and values orally; youngsters capture some of them and share with the help of 5G. As elsewhere, the future has arrived bringing a new version of the city. But one thing is certain: Lahore will prevail. Because, as the locals say Lahore, Lahore hai. Lahore is Lahore.
September 2021