Pleasantly surprised by Karachi.

The city seems to have improved immensely since my last visit to karachi five years ago. Gone are the noisy Auto-Rickshaws, other road users are not as aggressive as before and the best thing is honking has been reduced to a bearable level. The city is cleaner. Roads and bi-ways and bi-passes are in working order and cut down driving time from A to B in most cases. There are hardly any beggars in sight but let me say that I have not yet crossed The Bridge since my arrival a week ago. They are probably still found at their fixed abodes for which they pay a premium to the powers that be. Economy is booming outwardly. Plots of 1000 s.yards in Defence or Clifton are in the range of 1 crore to 3 crores. A good house on a 1000 yards is anywhere between 3 to 7 crores which is roughly US$ 500,000= to US$ 1,200,000=...lot of money for a poor country but there is no shortage of buyers. People actually follow the traffic signal and stop at red lights. Each signal has a funny way of telling you the amount of time available to cross in seconds.Some watch maker must have made a packet at this new shebang. There are more cars from the small Suzuki to large Pajero to luxurious Mercedes. Motor cycles, bikes and Gadha GaRi are limited to certain areas.
Weather has been great and marriages are breaking all kind of records.Food served at these weddings is out of this world,although food is officially not allowed in weddings, but no one seems to have heard about this restriction. I have already been to a few functions related to weddings and have partaken great food.People talk about higher cost of living and so on but consumers are shopping with such gusto as if ther is no tomorrow. Overall, I have been happy to see improvement in the city and people’s outlook, they are far more optimistic than ever before. May Karachi regain it’s glory and be the Roshniyon ka Shaher as we remember her.amen.