Saleem Ali gets his drag transformation, becoming Begum Nawazish Ali, the hostess of a popular Pakistani nighttime TV show. (Photos by Imran Khan)
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JOHN-MANUEL ANDRIOTE
Friday, April 04, 2008
The
image
of
the
beautiful
young
man
with
cascading
brown
curls,
the
luminous
brown
eyes
of
an
icon
and
lips
made
to
be
kissed
flickers
through
the
web-cam
during
a
video
phone
interview
with
a
surprising
Pakistani
celebrity.
Two
or
three
times
the
image
flickers
out
completely
as
our
connection
is
lost
when
the
electricity
goes
down,
once
again,
in
Karachi,
Pakistan.
“You
never
know,
I
could
be
the
first
gay
president
of
Pakistan,”
says
Saleem
Ali,
the
man
on
the
other
end
of
the
capricious
line.
I
learn
quickly
that
brave
and
ballsy
is
the
preferred
style
of
this
27-year-old
son
of
a
retired
Pakistani
army
colonel.
In
fact
Ali
is
nicknamed
BB
—
not
for
brave
and
ballsy,
though
he
might
well
be,
but
for
his
early
drag
act
impersonating
his
childhood
heroine,
the
late
Pakistani
former
prime
minister,
Benazir
Bhutto.
While
he
was
in
11th
grade,
the
16-year-old
Ali
became
a
local
star
in
Karachi
by
impersonating
Bhutto.
“People
used
to
call
me
Ali
Bhutto,”
he
says.
He
quickly
points
out
he
was
not
mocking
the
real
Bhutto,
but
expressing
his
admiration
for
her.
“Benazir
Bhutto
was
not
just
a
politician,”
he
says.
“She
symbolized
democracy,
stood
for
the
rights
and
needs
of
the
underprivileged.
She
stood
for
everything
positive.”
On
a
personal
level,
he
says,
“As
a
young
man,
Benazir
Bhutto
gave
me
confidence,
gave
me
hope,
made
me
believe
in
myself,
in
my
country.”
He
once
had
the
opportunity
to
do
his
impersonation
for
Bhutto
herself
at
the
home
of
a
pop
star.
He
was
warned
in
advance
that
people
might
pressure
him
to
do
the
impersonation,
and
he
should
resist
because
she
was
rumored
not
to
have
a
sense
of
humor.
“Benazir
Bhutto
said,
‘I
hear
you
imitate
me
very
well,’”
he
recalls.
“I
said,
‘Yes,
I
do.’
I
had
to
oblige.
The
minute
I
started,
Benazir
Bhutto
burst
out
laughing.
She
had
tears
running
down
her
face
and
said,
‘I
haven’t
laughed
this
much
in
a
year.’”
Ali
adds,
“I
think
her
death
was
a
major
blow
to
all
of
us
in
Pakistan
—
notwithstanding
race,
ethnicity,
gender,
sexual
orientation.
It
was
a
major
setback.
I
feel
very
sad
about
what
has
happened.”
DESPITE
HIS
ADMIRATION
for
his
namesake,
Ali
was
determined
that
Bhutto
imitations
wouldn’t
define
his
life’s
work.
A
doctor
friend
with
ties
to
a
TV
network
told
Ali
he
envisioned
something
bigger
for
him,
that,
in
fact,
there
was
a
diva
within
him
who
needed
to
be
brought
out.
Thus
was
born
the
Begum
(“Lady”)
Nawazish
Ali
who,
in
2006,
became
the
“hostess”
of
what-is-now
Pakistan’s
most
popular
nighttime
TV
talk
show.
“The
Begum
Ali
was
my
soul,
my
spirit,”
says
Ali.
He
describes
her
as
an
extension
of
himself,
“an
expression
of
me
as
a
woman.”
Two
nights
a
week
in
Pakistan,
and
now
10
days
a
month
in
India,
the
handsome
young
man’s
face
is
transformed
into
the
radiant
glow
of
the
well-educated,
middle-age
socialite
Begum.
The
show
on
Aaj
TV
has
taken
Ali’s
conservative
Muslim
homeland
by
storm.
The
storm
has
recently
spread
to
India,
Pakistan’s
not-always
friendly
neighbor
to
the
east.
“India
seems
to
really
adore
and
worship
Begum,”
says
Ali,
adding
that
he
has
a
higher
purpose
in
mind.
“I’d
like
to
see
my
acceptance
in
India
as
a
bridge
between
the
people
of
India
and
Pakistan,”
he
says,
sipping
a
very
large
vodka
martini
and
puffing
a
cigarette
on
the
other
end
of
the
video
call
nine
time
zones
and
a
world
away.
Ali’s
one-hour
show
in
Pakistan
features
Q-and-A
conversations
between
Begum
Ali
and
a
“who’s
who
of
the
Pakistani
literati,
glitterati
and
chatterati,”
as
one
of
his
admiring
interviewers
described
the
guests.
Ali
says,
understatedly,
that
the
show
“has
a
strong
political
undertone.”
The
Begum
poses
questions
to
guests
that
Ali
says
a
real
woman
could
never
ask.
He
sees
the
role
as
making
him
a
sort
of
Superman.
“It
gives
me
the
right
kind
of
charm
which
helps
disarm
my
guests,”
he
explains.
Ali
says
this
charm
is
essential
to
his
popularity
in
“extremely
anxious
and
confused”
Pakistani
society.
“People
have
created
these
facades,”
he
explains.
“There
is
this
holier-than-thou
syndrome
where
they
have
to
prove
they
are
prim
and
proper.”
As
the
Begum
Ali,
he
says,
“letting
myself
get
completely
liberated
helps
my
guests
in
their
liberation,
and
they
feel
comfortable
coming
out
of
that
shell
and
opening
up.”
ALI
HIMSELF
HAS
never
really
lived
in
a
closet.
From
a
young
age
he
was
open
with
his
parents
about
his
wish
that
he
had
been
born
a
woman
—
though
he
is
clear
he
has
no
interest
in
having
a
sex
change
now.
“The
fact
that
I
am
a
man,”
he
says,
“I
can
get
away
with
so
much.”
In
Ali’s
view,
Pakistani
culture
is
very
accepting
of
sexual
diversity,
even
if
that
acceptance
is
more
tacit
than
open.
He
attributes
it
to
the
struggles
that
all
Pakistanis
face,
regardless
of
their
sexuality.
“We
have
all
the
basic
problems,”
says
Ali,
“broken
roads,
no
electricity
in
major
cities
for
two
or
three
hours
a
day,
political
crisis,
extremism.
We
are
all
victims,
all
oppressed,
all
trying
to
find
basic
human
rights,
basic
human
dignity
before
we
can
branch
out
into
wanting
special
privileges
as
a
gay
person.”
An
American
in
Pakistan,
Greg
Pappas,
who
arranged
the
interview
with
Ali,
holds
a
doctorate
in
anthropology
and
has
had
a
longstanding
interest
in
Pakistani
and
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