Benefits

Last week I was made head of our Lahore office - definitely not a promotion and the company pretty much had to beg me to take on the added responsibility. But, in spite of the lack of additional monetary compensation, there are two primary benefits to the new responsibilities. 1) I get a paper delivered to my desk every day. 2) The tea man now brings me a constant stream of tea.

I'm not sure if I've talked about the tea man before, but the position of "tea man" is pretty much a requirement for all Pakistani firms. It's an employment generation scheme which suits the huge disparity in incomes in Pakistan and feeding the egos of the tea recipients. At any rate, every office has at least one man who's sole purpose in life is brewing and delivering tea to the executives. Yes, it's weird, and goes a long way to explaining my landlady's disbelief that I actually know how to boil water (I have a tea man to do that! At the office at least.).

Things in Pakistan are not looking particularly good. Islamic fundamentalist youth are storming shopping centers and threatening video store owners, which must be a terrible quandry for the State Department since the videos are 100% bootleg. To condemn oppressive fundamentalism or the copyright infringers? They're of course taking the middle road, and staying silent. Who would have thought US copyright lawyers and the Taliban would be on the same team?

Meanwhile, the tribes in Waziristan are thrilled because for the first time in years their war drums are getting a workout. And no, I'm not using a colorful turn of phrase, they really are excited that they get to bang on war drums, something the Taliban hitherto had not allowed (too musical?). But the Taliban has approved a jihad against Uzbek militants in the area - something everyone can get behind, I guess...

At any rate, the uptick in fundamentalist activity has my middle class Pakistani friends and colleagues scratching their heads and shooting worried glances at each other while the government begs a crew of fundamentalist school girls to please stop kidnapping people and vacate the children's library. Chucking a bunch of schoolgirls in jail, regardless of their backing by stick-wielding men, is presumably perceived as too great a risk for sparking Ulema outrage. The big argument for the current military government is that it is the only force that can keep fringe elements at bay. Yet the Taliban operate with impunity, and they can't handle a group of militant schoolgirls. Hm...