Karnal
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At the end of those long, hot Lahore Summers of my youth, I would emerge from the river, my skin glistening like diamonds in the afternoon sun. Bullock drivers, betel-chewing railway porters, public servants returning from lunch on their bicycles, all would stop and stare as I emerged from the river Ravi clad in nothing but my long, black hair.
I would reach the bank, throw on a thin cotton kurta. and light a Peter Styvessant blowing a plume of smoke towards the bridge - a thousand lonely men aching at the sight of my ripe wet body, my international passport to smoking pleasure.
I never suffered any racial abuse. Why? My life has always been devoted to giving and recieving pleasure. Yes, I would have many of those bullock drivers in the reeds of the river Ravi. Those men showed me the gentle ways of love.
And I would have gang after gang of railway porters, tucked up in the back of the Parcels shed in Lahore Siding. Those men taught me the ways of work, money and sweat, the ways of business and getting on.
I would have a few of those public servants too, one of whom would issue me with a brand new Pakistani passport. Another would put a stamp in that passport, the image of a crown with the words, "permitted to enter the United Kingdom and her territories".
I have always enjoyed entering new territories, and quite a few have enjoyed entering mine. But I shall always remember Lahore and its men, the city and the dreams of my youth.
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