October has been a horrifically violent month in Pakistan. The militants have targeted the rich and the powerful establishment, and the vulnerable poor. They have targeted women and children indiscriminately. They have attacked schools and universities. They have attempted to cut through the social fabric that binds Pakistanis in the hope that fear will consume the population and paralyse it.
Yet in the midst of bomb blasts life continues, admittedly not quite as ‘normal’ even by Pakistani standards. Children go to schools that resemble foreign embassy security with barricades and barbed wire, and people have begun avoiding some public places like shopping malls and restaurants as when it comes down to it “it’s just not worth the risk”.
After the terrorist attacks in New York, London and Madrid western politicians and commentators frequently spoke of “our way of life being under threat”. The people of Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad feel no differently. Pakistan may be a country full of contradiction and chaos but it also one of creativity and culture. And this week at Pakistan’s first-ever fashion week at the Marriott Hotel in Karachi, under the watchful guard of paramilitary troops, Pakistani designers and models captured the defiant mood of a city which, so far, has remained unscathed in the recent wave of militant attacks that have hit other cities across the country.
‘This is our gesture of defiance to the Taliban,’ said Ayesha Tammy Haq, the CEO of Fashion Pakistan Week. ‘There is a terrible problem of militancy and political upheaval … but that doesn’t mean that the country shuts down. That doesn’t mean that business comes to a halt.’
Here’s a look at the variety of styles and models that hit the runway:
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