Swiss eye

This column is not about Pakistan’s good offices to soothe Saudi- Iranian tensions, or managing tensions with India over Pathankot. Nor it is about those internecine quarrels over the CPEC or the ever-present and daunting challenges of terrorism, extremism and sectarianism. It is about human feelings, especially of the families of the foreign diplomats posted in our country. And it has been made possible because one of them decided to share her observations and feelings, on the record.

Regula Bubb and her husband, the previous Swiss ambassador to Pakistan, left Islamabad in the summer of 2014, when Operation Zarb-e-Azb was being launched but the Imran-Qadri dharna had not yet besieged the Red Zone and the Diplomatic Enclave. She was back recently for the launch of her book ‘High-life in Pakistan’, encompassing four years of an exciting but challenging “stay among people with incredible resilience, warmth and generosity”.

The ‘trailing wife’, as Mrs Bubb describes herself, is not an exception. She confesses that everyone who is leaving for another posting does it with a heavy heart, worrying for wonderful friends and the challenges they face ahead. A lot more has happened since Regula Bubb’s departure but her pictorial testimony accompanied by a touching narrative is full of insight about how diplomats view this ancient land and its mixture of people.

The author tickles the readers with her impressions of real Pakistan, away from the sanitised and cordoned existence in the Diplomatic Enclave. Like a visit to Karachi, “a city of 20 million by the seaside but boiling in heat and hospitality.” Or Lahore, “a very lively and wonderful city offering invitations to sumptuous and leisurely garden lunches”.

Many diplomats stay homebound on account of frequent security alerts and cumbersome procedures. Mrs Bubb considers these as challenges to her indomitable spirit of discovering what she calls an amazing country. Between Afghan refugee camps, historic monuments, breathtaking Northern Areas, the Cholistan desert, Swiss funded community development projects, auto and textile plants, she has seen it all and generously used her vintage and digital cameras to record it. About a hundred of those photos have been reproduced in ‘High-life in Pakistan’ published from Lahore.

And she has observed and commented on numerous social and political issues. Things Swiss are of special interest, like the case of a prime minister who had to leave the PM office for not writing that famous Swiss letter. One of the high points would be the reappearance of a young Swiss couple abducted while travelling in Balochistan. They managed to escape after nine months of captivity and approached an army post, naturally to be feted in the Swiss Embassy with a chocolate cake.

Throughout the book, there are references to the status of women in a male-dominated society. The author welcomes the passage of a bill providing severe punishment for anti-women practices.

Malala Yusufzai, Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy and Hina Rabbani Khar get special mention for outstanding contribution in their own way. Over time, Regula discovers “talented fashion designers combining the sensuality of the east with the elegance of the west”.

Once out of the diplomatic zone, Regula finds out how daily life is disrupted by frequent power cuts and resulting protests growing in their ferocity. Demonstrations are also triggered by sudden developments like a blasphemous film by a Western filmmaker. There are then restrictions on diplomats’ travel as her husband’s office goes about arranging clearances required for various trips. Not a very good way to ‘sell’ your country to those who have chosen Pakistan for a diplomatic assignment, she observes.

Indeed, the incidents of terrorism and violence notwithstanding, most diplomats and their families in Pakistan get depressed over the obstacles to their plans to see the country. Agreed that some of the restrictions are to keep the envoys out of harm’s way. However, if we all agree that the security situation has improved as a result of Operation Zarb-e-Azb and other measures, it is time to review the regime governing foreign diplomats’ travel within the country.

The author cannot help but record that foreign diplomats in Pakistan are served endless quantities of food. They are also persecuted by unending speeches at formal occasions. Nothing escapes the trailing wife’s attention. There is the bling of a newly built house of a feudal lord in interior Sindh, who talks passionately about the coming general election totally detached from the basic needs of his constituents. And the fact that Dr Abdul Malik is the first Balochistan chief minister to emerge from the educated middle class and not from the traditional ranks of tribal lords.

While making a tour d’ horizon of developments with neighbouring countries, she takes note of a truly generous gift of $1.5 billion reaching the coffers of the treasury and the value of the rupee going up, making people wonder about the donor’s identity. Once that mystery was more or less resolved, she heard some mumbling that there are no free lunches, let alone free feasts in foreign policy!

As the time to leave approaches, Mrs Bubb would complete her writings from “behind the veil, regarding various facets of this multi-layered society that gets everyone setting foot in this fascinating country immediately involved”.

Email: saeed.saeedk@gmail.com