In Lahore we stayed at a very interesting little hotel called "Regale Internet Inn". We found it in Lonely Planet, and although its name sounded strange, the Lonely Planet wrote good things about it and I was happy to see the word "Internet", suggesting that I can write blog posts from the place.
The hotel is in a dirty little alley which is hard to find, and at the time we got there it was completely dark inside - I'll tell you later why. But the place itself and the guy at the reception were really friends. The room was quite cheap (about $2.3 per person per night) and we got free drinking water, cooking and washing facilities, and also for the first night the receptionist offered us a little dinner (some shawrma) too :)
To let you take a look into our lives I'll describe a day in the hostel:
- Sleep until 9AM. Our room is pitch dark as it has no windows, the fan turned to the max to make the heat bearable.
- At 9:00 the electricity goes: the fan turns off.
- My 9:02 we sweat a smaller lake so we got to get out to the rooftop terrace where it's at least a little cooler. At this time everyone comes out to the terrace for the same reason, it's impossible to stay inside.
- We chit-chat until 10:00 when the electricity comes back, the fans turn on so sitting in the terrace becomes quite comfortable. And which is even better, the flies leave because of the wind generated by the fan. There are a lot of flies and they are very annoying. If you want you can have some more sleep, there is going to be electricity for 4 hours now.
- At 14:00 the electricity is off again, for two hours. At this time it's better to walk around in the city. All these shortages are centrally timed in Lahore by the way, probably because the power plants can't provide enough electricity for the whole day or something. At the other parts of Pakistan we didn't see any shortages.
- If it's very hot on the street (It is very hot on the streets) we took refuge in the little rooms for ATMs because they are air conditioned, and they run from batteries even during the shortages. They are like freezers scattered in the city :)
- From 16:00 to 20:00 it's blogging time.
- From 20:00 to 22:00 power's off again, you can use candles or gas lamps to make some light and it's a nice opportunuty to share thoughts with other people. It's impossible to sleep still, even on the rooftop the weather is just moderately bearable as there's no wind.
- At 22:00 power's back again, so there is light and you can sleep too, as the fans turn on again, and they work until next morning 9AM :)
One day I was sitting on the rooftop terrace with an American girl, sweating and staring at the clock at 9:42, waiting for the fans getting back to work after 18 long minutes, a homeless-looking guy sat by us. It turned out that he actually owns the place and he told its whole story which was quite amusing.
The guy's called Shams Malik, his family started a newspaper in Lahore in 1927, which goes from father to son since then. Now he's in charge for it. In the 90s the building hosted their editorial office. In 1997 this guy decided to start an internet cafe, because although most Pakistanis had no idea what the Internet was, he realized that there's a demand for Internet use from the foreigners coming to the country. So of the 32 computers he had in the office he separated 6 and put them in another room. This became the internet cafe. He tried to find a good name for it: I don't know how he got the word "Regale", it might have been just some name he made up or the name of his newspaper. He though about "Regale Internet Café" but he was afraid that if he uses the term "café", he might attract some locals wanting to have a tea, which was not his intention. So he picked the more neutral word "Inn", so the place became "Regale Internet Inn", the first internet cafe of Pakistan.
Foreigners started coming, but as the place was called an "Inn" some people wanted to stay overnight too. In the end the guy had to say "Well, okay, you can stay, but leave the place by 9AM because the journalists come to work at that time and work starts." So this went like this for 3 years, but then in 2000 he moved the office to a new building and the old place became a dedicated inn and internet cafe, plus, because the guy tries to support performers of sufi music, he invites bands three times a week to the rooftop terrace - even some quite famous bands among them - who make small concerts for the guests. The only condition is that there must be at least 10 people listening. By the way, having seen the size of the terrace I think much more than 10 people wouldn't even fit there.
About 200 people visit the place in a half-year season, but of course many of these stay for more nights. There were about 10 poeple staying for a half year in the hotel, also a British guy spent there 5 years so there are permanent guests too :)
The guy also told us that this inn is just a hobby for him, that's the reason why it's so cheap too, because he's not making it for money, it's just a good opportunity for him to meet foreigners. He doesn't want to renovate it either, because he thinks it has everything an average backpacker needs, even if it's not the cleanest place on Earth. He also runs his newspaper and by the way he's a millionaire anyway, he used to work with the current president of Pakistan. So much for homeless-looking Pakistanis, don't judge books by their cover :)
Unfortunately I didn't take a photo of the guy because I'm always too shy to ask people to take their photos. But at least I've found an article about him.
