They were just glimpses, all of them. Short, brief images that flashed before my eyes like an animated movie of some sort. Glimpses of private moments that were somehow meant to dissolve in the darkness. And yet their permanence is remarkable, almost like a grease stain that ruins the little red number that you love so much. I try hard to piece together the flashes, the naked bodies

copulating, wilfully and uninhibited, the sagging flesh making a supreme effort at maintaining its dignity ...or whatever's left of it.

Deja-vu City...destination? Cooco's Cafe...

When I first thought of visiting Heera Mandi, the puritanical desi within me was scandalized to no end. After all, it's not a place where shareef girls from even shareefer families are supposed to go to. Not a very cool thing to do, 'morally speaking.' But certainly a very hip and thrilling thing to do when you're young and screaming to be different. So it was just after the clock struck twelve that we piled up in the car and made our way to Lahore's infamous nightlife...

The tiny, meandering lanes that only promised desolation and something that you'd rather not look in the face finally led to a bizarre structure, if there ever was one. With the words "Cooco's Cafe" boldly painted on the establishment, the rustic Cafe seemed very French and Mughal at the same time. A few bulbs here and there were the only defence against complete darkness but given the

place and time, it sort of went with the whole thing. You must understand, the ambience was massively appealing, just the way adrenalin pounds through your bloodstream at the prospect of a rendezvous with your lover in the wee hours of the morning...

Excited and slightly nervous, I entered the Cafe with the people who had made this possible for me. Ganesh's idol smiled at me invitingly from a wood-worked niche in the center. I smiled back. It was from Ranjit Singh's mansion, I was told. Nothing seemed prettier than that elephant-god as I outlined the contours of his face...More wood-work and more beauty. A renowned artist's paintings were scattered about on the walls, portraying the women of the Mandi. Women that were human beings to him but fresh meat to others. Mothers and daughters who were performing trivial, everyday activities. Sitting, talking, working and finding the time to feel pensive and perhaps even apprehensive. But each one with a different story, a different kind of sadness. Years of misery and pain trailing behind them. And if you looked carefully, the hint of condescension was all too obvious in them. They were not ashamed of their roots, it seemed. Could I honestly say the same about myself? Probably not. Self-righteousness can be quite a bitch don't you think? Especially when it hits you in the gut...

Humbled and completely out of my element, I followed my friends to a narrow, spiral staircase. What lay at the end of it, I couldn't be sure and somehow I had lost my nerve to ask them Lahorites. Guilt is obviously not that easy to get rid of..."This cafe was previously a brothel," someone pointed out. "They raided it a while back and now its a cafe. Raids are very common here." Every

once in a while some stud in a high-profile job would feel like doing the 'proper' thing and large-scale raids were carried out for purposes of evacuation. Wagging tongues and double-standards require reinforcement every now and then. Proof of their own chastity and Heera Mandi's vileness. "So now the really expensive ones are in posh locations like Defence and Gulberg...oh yeah and even Model Town," a friend elaborated, climbing up at an astonishing pace...it's funny how your status in life determines everything

that you do. Even the people that you pay to screw...it's just so hysterically funny...

The steep ride ended with the entrance to a small balcony where you could sit and eat under the stars. And what lovely stars they were...just like luminous sugar crystals. I don't think I've ever seen the stars shine with such brilliance as I did that night. It was almost as if they were angry and disturbed all at once. Divine wrath, I suppose...or something like it.

Now I'd rather not do the cliche’ thing and go on and on about how completely mortified and horrified I was to see the Mandi from that balcony and how it rendered me speechless. But I will say this much - the delusions of grandeur that I had about Heera Mandi are no more. For something that happened like an ultra-quick slide show, it has had an incredibly profound effect. There were

women in every apartment, by the dozen I can only presume. Old and young, new and ancient, plastered with blush and cheap lipstick. Beautiful and ugly but sadly real. Some with their children and siblings in tow sitting by the open doors and windows. I read somewhere that the Mandi's doors remain open at night. There is no fear of being robbed, only the anticipation of a potential

customer, the sounds of a thriving business and satiated clients, the smell of starched kameezes and rose-attar...Men would come and men would go, some in their unregistered corollas and others in tongas, to rent and to replace. One apartment, two rooms. One for the transaction, other for service. Laughter and the prospect of sex in one, bodies heaving together in the other. Moving rhytmically with frustration and joy, even if for a moment. To forget and to remember...

"Saaya bhi saath jab chor jaye, aisee hai tanhai," crooned Nusrat Fateh Ali from the speakers as the freshlimes were sipped with a dash of table conversation. Common things in a simple city. Sex on the roof on one side, or its visibility at least. Praying in the Badshahi Masjid on the other side, or the idea at least. Ordinary sights all to be taken with a grain of salt, or the possibility of doing so, at least.