Some might find the scenes described as reprehensible, disgusting and downright creepy.
It also wouldn’t matter which side of ideological divide you found yourself in – men dancing suggestively with one another would offend both the self respecting liberal and mullah.
But to be honest, it is a bit of a rampant problem.
During my time at Pakistan’s premier business school, and alma mater of our previous Prime Minister, this was a recurring occurrence.
There would be post-exam “parties” and post-convocation concerts and beach plan parties and the ever present break time “dholkis.”
During these spontaneous celebrations, women were not allowed to dance. There was no ruling against it; instead, it was a social consensus. The way it worked was that if any girl got up to dance, all the others would shame her into sitting down, and if she dared continue, she would be labeled as ‘loose’, ‘gushtee’, ‘kunjaree’ ‘bay-sharam’ ‘bay-hayah’ etc etc.
Strangely enough, the lack of female presence on the dance floor lent an unbridled sexual explosion to the men. Perhaps to make up for the lack of women, the dancing men would become spectacularly unabashed. There would be vigorous chest wiggles, multiple partner grinding, one partner sliding his open palms slowly down the front of the other, grabbing hold of one’s own body and emitting loud hissing sounds while impersonating a snake slithering along the ground, coordinated thumkays, cat calls, whistles, drooling, licking, kissing, baring, sharing and everything else in between.
I am not making this up.
The question that arose repeatedly in my mind during these sweaty, testosterone choked extravaganzas was: Why?
After much mulling over the facts, there is a simple answer.
A dearth of entertainment.
I mean, what the hell is there to do?
(I think this problem of not having anything to do is fuelling two epidemics at least – the insane use of drugs by Pakistani youth, and the rise in religious Puritanism and so-called extremism. if you don’t have a range of activities, you find one and just go ape-shit with it. But I digress, unwillingly this time.)
The one source of entertainment most of us have access to is eating out.
(The form of entertainment everyone has theoretic access to is sex. But as the starved gyrations made clear, and as I argued in a previous blog, that form is also not available to everyone in the country.)
But even eating out has its controversies. In fact, in true Pakistani fashion, eating out has become a method of class differentiation.
Now I know people with intelligence would argue that no, eating out isn’t about class in Pakistan alone – there are swanky and rundown eateries all over the world.
But what makes us unique is that we use a particular gastronomic term to help establish differences in class – Burger.
To the uninitiated, burger is meant to define… well what does it define?
Is it a social and class difference, or is it a cultural marker?
In essence, burger is meant to signify someone who has burgers. Since the term has been around for donkey’s years, I am guessing that it originated during a time when burgers were a new-fangled concept in Karachi* and therefore referred to people who could afford to have them.
* (I switched from talking about Pakistan to Karachi because I now remember that burger is used generally in Karachi. During my time in Lahore I don’t remember it having the same level of usage, or acceptance.)
But defining who is a burger and who isn’t is notoriously tricky.
For starters, the opposite of burger can be logically understood as a bun-kebab. But it isn’t. The appropriate antonym is in fact ‘maila’ which translates into dirty. There is also “mummy-daddy” which may or may not be synonymous to burger. But the point is that the dichotomy of ‘burger-maila’ means that there is a difference beyond class that signifies who is a burger and who isn’t.
So we understand this difference to be cultural. Thus being a burger means employing a certain attitude towards life, having certain habits, speaking in a certain language, or in a certain accent, living a certain lifestyle etc.
But cultural definitions are notoriously difficult to outline. For some burgers are those that drink expensive brands of bottled waters, for others those who drink any form of bottled water, and for others still burgers are those that know why drinking bottled water makes a difference.
It is also difficult to demarcate it according to where you live – there are as many people who can fit a definition of burger in Gulshan and Nazimabad as there are those who can be described as mailas in Clifton.
And every time you set a certain definition, someone who falls victim to it will cry out against it.
So if burgers are people who studied abroad, you will have a lot of foreign educated folks claiming that it’s not true, they’re not burgers. Fine, so we will make it about those who eat out in Zamzama, until you hear that eating at Pizza Hut or for that matter Copper Kettle is really not the same as eating out at Okra.
Speaking in English can be a sure shot way of defining who is a burger and who isn’t. But even that got me thinking – only 8-10% of the country has Urdu as their mother tongue. So if we expand our definition, Urdu speakers would also be burgers.
Why?
Because ultimately a burger is a way of pointing out someone who has more than you, someone who is part of the exclusive elite parasites we all hate.
Now maybe you find the Urdu argument above weak. But it would mean that you would also be known as a burger then, because this blog ain’t written in Ghalib’s language.
But I know for a fact that people detest being labeled as burgers.* In fact, most of the people I know go to great lengths to point out that they are not burgers. They will point to the Indian movies they watch, or the desi eateries they frequent, or the fact that they are friends with their menial laborers, or drivers or cooks, or that they know dirty jokes in Urdu, or that they don’t have an aversion to eating ‘un-hygienic food,’ or that they don’t live in Defence, or that they got into fist fights, or that they don’t listen to what their parents tell them all as evidence that they are not burgers.
*(One example of bucking this trend was the ‘street-gang’ BUDDOK, which allegedly stood/stands for Burgers-United-Dopers-Drinkers-Of-Karachi.)
Yet I have spoken to others, not in our strata of society, who would define burger simply as someone who wears pants, or studied in a co-education school, or gave their O’ levels, or drives a car.
And friends of mine who refuse to be known as burgers are people who have their own personal room in their houses in a city where 60% don’t even have formal shelters, let alone a house. They have their own TV and AC while most of their city-mates find the cost of rotis unbearable. They don’t ever vote, and generally support the army. They have, and know how to use, computers beyond the level of signing onto MSN. And even if they didn’t study abroad, they did study at universities which are the most exclusive in the country, even if they were full of hip-shaking homeboys.
So does it even matter?
If you think it does, consider this fact.
The best burgers in Karachi are at Chips and Mr. Burger - Desi outlets.
So therefore, does defining someone as a burger serve any purpose other than ripping open cleavages within our society?
Do we really need to pull apart, especially at this time in our history?
No we don’t, but the reason I wrote this blog is this.
WE ARE ALL BURGERS.
You, me, and everyone we are friends with.
Because in a country with 70% of the population living below the poverty line, we who have access to computers and are literate are the burgers. Even if you traveled in a bus, or have relatives in Baldia, or like cricket more than football, you are a burger.
You and I are part of the people who wield all the power, who have all the money, who live the good life, who have what so many others don’t. Yes, you know people who are outrageously wealthier than you, but that doesn’t mean you are not a burger. You are. Don’t deny it. In fact, stop denying it. Even if you dream in Urdu and not English, you are a juicy, warm, luscious, cheese soaked garnished and spiced burger.
So please.
Every time you have a problem with the country, stop to think about how you’re part of the problem. Cuz you are.
Every time you are bemoaning about how corrupt and lousy our elites are, stop and look at the mirror. Cuz you’re bitching about yourself.
Every time you think this country is going to the dogs, check to see if you’re barking, cuz its all going to you.
No, you are not middle class. You are not upper-middle class. You are not middle-upper-middle-class.
You are a burger. I am a burger.
And we need to shut the fuck up and realize this fact.
Stand up, and take responsibility. It’s your fault. And you can put it right.