There was something surreal about watching President Obama take the oath of office from a hotel room in Karachi, Pakistan. Several times, I wondered whether there were more suicide bomb barriers surrounding his dais or my hotel. Suicide bombers had nearly destroyed the hotel a year or two earlier, and the predictable reaction—to erect sufficient vehicle barriers to stop more than one simultaneous attack—had of course been implemented. And so I watched, from 13,000 miles away, as America took what I profoundly hope will be the first of many steps towards reestablishing its international reputation as a symbol of freedom, all the while knowing that I was under strict orders from our hosts not to leave the building.

All around me were little security instruction sheets, thoughtfully Xeroxed by the hotel staff and placed in every room. From the typical (“this water is unsafe for drinking; kindly enjoy the complimentary bottle of mineral water provided”) to the stern (“do not stand on balcony; snipers may be active”), the warnings combined to deliver the message that, thanks to the efforts of less than 1% of the population, Westerners are simply not welcome in Pakistan. 99% of Pakistanis we met were hopeful, interesting people, happy to talk to an American (and to ask us about our new president—more about that in a different post). But all I had to do was look out my hotel room window to realize that it is the 1% who rule the country.

View from my Karachi Hotelroom

As they so often do, this picture tells the story better than I can. The balcony is enclosed in a net, lest grenades be thrown up onto the landing. The wires above the pool are for god-knows-what security technique. (My guess: since they are either grounded or energized, probably an anti-eavesdropping measure which doubles as a mechanism for defeating radio frequency bomb triggers, although my mobile phone worked just fine underneath them, so perhaps not.) There were magnetometers, x-ray machines in the lobby, and nearly every entrance to every building was peopled by thoroughly un-reasuring armed guards. There were small trucks parked in the parking lots of both “Western” hotels, each filled with four chain-smoking Pakistani infantrymen, on top of which was mounted what looked like an M60 (.50 caliber machine gun). Two bomb-sniffing Labrador retrievers worked the parking lot. ID checks were performed endlessly.

I doubt that any experience since 9/11 has reminded me that this really is a war. Not a war which gives our government the right to abrogate our Constitution, but a war nonetheless. And until it ends, Americans traveling abroad had better remember that the actions of our own government (and in particular the recently-departed administration) catalyze reactions abroad which pose as grave a threat to our well-being as any other. (Until 2002, there had been no attacks against Western targets in Karachi. That all started after we reacted to 9/11.) In the end, no matter how hopeful I am that the inauguration of President Obama will set us off to righting our standing worldwide, we will remain “the enemy” for a long time to come.

As its title suggests, Shashi’s newest book focuses on the ongoing transformation of his homeland. (In an interesting aside, Shashi points out that the cover of his book in its US edition, shown below, bears an almost cliched illustration of a Hindu God—which I take to be Ganesh—holding a tiger in one hand and a cell phone in the other, but the Indian edition shows a real photograph of a Hindu Sanyashi—a monk—sitting on his bicycle, making a cell phone call.) In particular, Shashi related a couple of anecdotes which gave me some idea of just how profound the impact of modernity has been on India. One is worth re-telling: as recently as 1984, when the population of the country was approximately 650 million (it is now in excess of 1.1 billion), there were a mere 8 million telephone land lines. In 2007, India set the world record by adding 8.4 million mobile phone lines in a single month. In other words, India is adding more mobile lines per month than the entire country had a mere quarter century later. Think that might change the dynamics of the society a bit?

Skilled diplomat that he is, Shashi deftly parried the inevitable “China versus India” question by answering that the felt China had won the conflict, such as it is, some thirty years prior. (He points out that China began its economic expansion long before India’s 1991 liberalization.) One observation I wasn’t expecting: Shashi relayed that India is perhaps the only country in the world with any significant Jewish population which does not have a single recorded episode of antisemitic violence. Religious tolerance and pluralism, although certainly not an absolute (think Hindu nationalism), certainly does seem more the rule than the exception in India. As Shashi points out, where else could a Roman Catholic, Italian born Indian (Sonia Ghandi) resign her mandate in favor of a preternaturally well-educated Sikh (Manmohan Singh) who would then work with a woman President (Pratibha Patil), in order that he lead a country which is 80% Hindu? We Americans, who in 225 years have not managed to elect anyone as our president who is not white, male and Christian, could perhaps learn a thing or two from the example.