i lived in karachi for 4 years and was always awestruck by its diversity. it’s a huge melting pot of religions and cultures, languages and ethnicities, old and new immigrants, commerce and history. it’s constantly teeming with political tensions, economic disparities, and an ever increasing population boiling over its city limits. it’s violent and overwhelming and gritty in the way that nyc was when i moved here in the early 1990s. i wish i had been more familiar with karachi’s architectural side. for more on that, here is farooq soomro, the karachi wallah.