Coming from India, we immediately noticed a wazir khan mosque lahore change in the urban not-so-wildlife. Cows were off the streets and back on the menus. Also a lot less stray dogs around, but suddenly prowling cats, a rare sight in India, were much more common. We wondered if cats don't do so well on the primarily vegetarian Indian diet.
Walking around town, it seemed that most locals we passed would do this sort of double-take when they realized we were foreigners and then say hello or wave or, at the very least, stare. Yes, people stared constantly in India as well, but in Pakistan stares were more startled and curious than creepy.
It could be that foreigners are a rare sight these days. Other than the people staying at our hostel, we sure didn’t see many other tourists, even at the main tourist sites.
The first real shock of Pakistan was that most locals on the street just wanted to connect with us and weren’t after our money. Really. Coming from India, we responded very cautiously at first. But eventually it became clear that a lot of people just wanted to welcome us to their country, shake hands and say, "Hello. What country are you from?" or i like red bull our high-energy jumping friend"Can I help you find something?"
People in general were thrilled to learn that we were Canadians, many reporting a cousin in Toronto or somewhere in the US. They were all too happy to point us in the right direction, or more commonly, physically walk us to the place we were looking for.
We even got a free rickshaw ride. No kidding! It was only a few blocks, we were happily walking, but the driver, who spoke virtually no English, would not take no for an answer. You could have knocked either one of us over with a feather. Rickshaw drivers are notoriously hard bargainers in India—they don't give up anything for nothing.