Lahore
02.02.2007
With the museum once again shut and the "permit" booze shop closed too, losing my beard and having a haircut was the one major achievement of the day, and an event I had long been looking forward to. It had been driving me nuts but I thought it prudent to keep it until the gunmen were safely behind me. Under pressure to get my stamps used, I finally got around to sending postcards at long last, another thing which had been put off for months. Whilst also bagging a rare chance to do a decent laundry, I contemplated some more dazzling stats about Pakistan, which I was shocked to read could technically be considered a failed state. With over 10 million unemployed (and remember no social welfare in this neighbourhood), bafflingly only 1 per cent of the population paid income tax whilst almost 60 per cent scraped by on just a dollar or 2 a day. And thats for those lucky to have the opportunity, half a million under 5 year olds die each year.
