A shared anniversary

In Pakistan my advancing years work to my advantage rather than vice versa, as my knowledge and experience is valued

Sharing a birthday with the day the idea of Pakistan germinated was not something that would have been at the top of my mother’s mind on March 23, 1947, and the coincidence that led me to spend over 20 years living and working here was almost 50 years in the future. The country celebrated Pakistan Day with considerably more fanfare and razzamatazz than I celebrated my birthday. Troops paraded, jets and helicopters whizzed around, schoolchildren twirled and decorated floats passed by. Generals and politicians looked on; with the prime minister looking like he wanted to be elsewhere from the number of times he consulted his watch during the event. It all passed off peacefully — the first such parade for seven years — and the rest of the day was spent in quiet reflection… and birthday cake.

In the continuum of history 68 years is a tiny blip in time. Pakistan is still in real terms a very young country. Much is expected of it and it often falls short of assorted marks, deadlines and goals. In developmental terms it appears to act much as the child that it is in terms of statehood, and cynical observers such as myself chronicle the serial foot-in-mouth moments with a wry glee.

Yet, despite all the predictions of failure at the level of the state Pakistan endures and shows no real signs of toppling over in the foreseeable future. Perhaps and for that reason there is cause for celebration. This is not the place for yet another polemic on the ‘resilience of the people of Pakistan’ that is anyway more to do with the stunned numbness that comes from being repeatedly hit on the head with a house brick — no. More, it is a place to put on display — parade, if you will — where Pakistan and I have got to as we hold hands, me growing older by the year and Pakistan still a toddler.

We are reasonably comfortable with one another. We have our moments, our arguments, our frustrations, but by and large we rub along well enough. The occasional wedding aside I have not heard shots fired in anger for many years. I live in a city with low crime levels that is clean and orderly and has a quietly thriving economy. If I am ill there are good medical services close to hand — a major consideration once 70 starts to creep up on you.

Our daughter is getting an excellent education, my TV, internet and phone all come down a fibre-optic system that did not exist two years ago and I have a job that I enjoy. And therein lies one of those unseen and unheard advantages of life in another country and culture.

There are some crucial differences for me as I grow older between living in my home country, the UK and Pakistan. And the advantage of age is one of them. Most of my contemporaries in England are nowadays retired, perhaps doing a little work here and there to supplement their pensions, but very definitely not in full-time employment. There is the usual range of state benefits that comes with living in a developed country — none of which are available to me here — and terrorism is an occasional rather than a daily event. So why not up sticks and go back to live there, then?

It is a question I get asked at least once in any conversation with any of my fellow Brits — as well as people from other Western countries. And the answer, Dear Reader, is that in Pakistan my advancing years work to my advantage rather than vice versa. My knowledge and experience is valued. I am not on the scrap-heap and yes, still head-hunted from time to time. There is no sense that I am somehow ‘past it’ having gone past the milestone of 65, after which one is virtually unemployable in the UK, and there are still professional horizons for me to reach towards. I can still be ambitious, not quite with the same vigour as of yore, but ambition still flickers deep in there somewhere. So Pakistan has extended my shelf-life, pushed into the future my sell-by date and given me a longer lease of productivity than Blighty ever would. Think I’ll stick around. Tootle-pip!

Published in The Express Tribune, March  26^th,  2015.

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