In all the countries that I have travelled to to perform standup comedy – the United States being a regular destination – I have never been held up or interrogated at customs. Or I hadn’t, until I arrived in Pakistan last week. I spent six hours at Lahore customs, as I did not have a visa in my British passport to enter the country. The people who organised my gig had mistakenly assumed that because my parents were born in Pakistan and I too am brown, they would automatically let me in.
The customs officer asked: “Are you Pakistani?” Yes. “Where were you born?” England. “That makes you a foreigner.” I get called a foreigner in my parents’ country of birth, and I get called a foreigner in my own country of birth.
He looked through my passport, which is filled with US visas. He said: “Are you a spy?” No, I’m a standup comedian. “What’s that?” I tell jokes. “And will you be doing that in this country?” Yes. “Oh, is this the entertainment for the Taliban?” he asked, quite seriously. No, I replied.
He said: “What I should do is deport you, but if you give me $100, I’ll see what I can do.”
I paid it. I got in.
— “Halal comedy?” Shazia Mirza, April 12, 2010, in The Guardian
Previously: a Pakistani comedian from Karachi dressed as a Victorian automaton performing in a virtual space, improv comedy + Urdu, Saad Haroon.
