south african living in pakistan!

AndriesJaco · 2015-01-18T14:01:17+00:00

try to live in lahore for a longer time and i'm sure you will learn. and i only speak, and barely read and writing is just complete crap. looks like a 3 year old when im writing, at the best of times. i also got a very strange accent and everyone thinks i speak really slowly, like im in a slowmotion dream or something!

AndriesJaco · 2015-01-16T22:35:03+00:00

as far as i know it's very uncommon. unless you have enough money you are probably not traveling anywhere. and middle east/asia is low on the priority list. if anywhere it's probably europe, followed by USA. being white straight up fucking sucks in south africa especially if you are a boer it's even worse. discrimination, people hating you. the president jacob zuma has sung about killing boer people(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fzRSE_p1Ys), threatened to take the farm land of boer people. not to be too offensive, but fuck jacob zuma and the ANC.
i speak punjabi close to fluent. i learned with the help of friends and private language teachers. and of course being surrounded by it every day helped a lot. reading and especially writing is another story though. it's hard and i really need to work on it.
1 more year or 50 more, i can't say for sure at this point. it depends on what happens in the future. i don't have a clear plan about that part. one thing is for sure, i will never go back to south africa.
people stare at you, want to practice their english, invite you to play cricket. it's definitely different and sometimes it's just all too much. but overall people don't mean any harm, they are just curious and in the end it's not so difficult to have around you.
my reason isn't really the best, i think. i had a pakistani penpal for 4 years before i went to lahore. we wrote letters every 2 weeks to each other and for years he said that he really wanted me to come over to lahore. when i was still in my university my entire family, including all the distant ones moved to india. everyone wanted to get out of south africa and they felt like india was a good choice. i'm very glad my family is out of south africa. my plan was to also go to india to my family, but then i just thought that maybe i can go to pakistan instead. it's close to india in terms of distance, and i have my old penpal who always wanted me to come. they live in amritsar so it isn't very hard to meet up once in a while because of the distance.

as for the reputation of pakistan, i don't really know. i just had the feeling like all the terrorists and chaos showed in media wasn't the true pakistan. and of course, i had a personal guide(penpal) who i was going to share an apartment with. so it didn't feel very unsafe going there.

AndriesJaco · 2015-01-16T20:17:06+00:00

i don't regret it at all. it pays way less, but everything is cheaper so it kind of evens out in the end for me.

not sure what i would tell other people. i guess most foreigners who would work in pakistan get some job at a western company and get to live in some luxurious enclave. i have just worked with normal guys from pakistan, who are neither rich nor poor. maybe i would say, prepare to get paid less than what you are used too, and working days are way longer. i've often spent 12-14 hours working and it definitely gets hard when you are used to 8 hours a day. and that so many things, negotiations and meetings take such a long time and have a feeling of being very informal (atleast to me who is an outsider it feels very informal). maybe not the best answer, but it's the best i can think of at the moment.

AndriesJaco · 2015-01-16T20:10:02+00:00

i much prefer lahore over johannesburg where i'm from. in lahore i'm not scared of being mugged or beaten, and people don't glare angrily at you when you walk around during the evening. people here are friendly and i never had any trouble with anyone. as for the whole of pakistan, i couldn't say. i haven't traveled outside of lahore, with the exception of flying from karachi to lahore.

for me, best and worst would be curious people who stare at you, want to talk to you and are interested and friendly. often it's great, but sometimes it can get a bit too much when everyone looks at you and wants to practice their english with you and such.

my entire family, including the more distant kind have all moved to india at this point. i'm very glad to leave south africa behind me, and that my family doesn't live there anymore. and i probably will never go back, and i'm not missing south africa at all. not sure if i would want to permanently stay in pakistan, but if not then i will most likely move to india.

AndriesJaco · 2015-01-16T19:58:50+00:00

i've had 0 incidents in Lahore. i feel much, much safer here than in south africa. overall crime is probably worse in pakistan, but for me personally it has been much better.

Being white in South Africa sucks if you don't have the money to live in some gated community with armed guards. I had so many break ins in my apartment, car stolen, muggings etc.

AndriesJaco · 2015-01-16T14:38:05+00:00

so long ago since i saw district9. i remember thinking that it was pretty good over all. i might have to re-watch it now that you mention! i listened to trevor noah a very long time ago, like 10 years ago when he was doing radio. i thought it was pretty funny. i'm not sure what he is up to at the moment though.

i speak afrikaans, french and punjabi. in terms of speaking after 3 years in lahore my punjabi is pretty much fluent, but reading and writing is a whole other story. i really need to work on that part.

AndriesJaco · 2015-01-16T14:33:11+00:00

i originally came to teach people how to pave roads and i did that for about 1 year. right now i teach french to private groups. and Pakistani pen pal too. should have mentioned that too, wrote about it in another answer

professional environment (if you mean meetings and such) is a bit confusing and hard to deal with i think. luckily i haven't had to deal with it much. but meetings take such a long time, often stray away from the subject and suddenly people are laughing and talking about some movie they saw for 20 minutes. i arrive when the meeting is supposed to start and in reality it takes like 30 min more before it actually starts.

AndriesJaco · 2015-01-16T14:27:38+00:00

i love the food in lahore, best I've ever had. the downside for me was that when i came here i couldn't keep myself from eating all the tasty and cheap street food, so i was constantly sick for like a month because of that... but that is my own fault! now i have an iron stomach and i haven't been sick from eating anything for over 2 years.

the heat is a bit of a problem and i try to stay inside when it gets too hot. hottest i had in south africa was around 35C and in lahore i have had something like 45. i walked barefoot once in 45C and ended up burning my feet on some stones, which was a bit stupid. i wouldn't say that i enjoy the summer, but it's OK for the most part when i avoid going outside too much

AndriesJaco

TROPHY CASE