We were all shocked when Benazir was killed but how many were surprised? She had already faced an assassination attempt just a couple of months earlier in Karachi; Musharraf, Shaukat Aziz and Aftab Sherpao had barely survived multiple attacks. The year had been the most turbulent in Pakistan’s history, with the judicial crisis, May 12 and Lal Masjid. The only surprise would have been the year ending with a whimper.

The penultimate episode of the recently concluded season of Mad Mendeals with how the main characters react to JFK’s assassination. A television series may not be the most reliable barometer of how historical events unfolded, but I was struck by Mad Men‘s revisionism: people do not remember where they were when JFK was murdered; rather it was the shocking killing of Lee Harvey Oswald that made Americans lose faith in their country.

I felt something similar with Benazir’s assassination. I don’t recall the moment I was told she had been killed but I remember the aftermath clearly. I will never forget the faces of the family that had abandoned their car and sought refuge in our office. I still remember standing on the roof and seeing Gizri in flames. I can tangibly feel the fear of driving through an abandoned, almost post-apocalyptic Karachi at 2 am and wondering if I, and everyone else from Newsline, would get home safely.

There were times in 2007 when I had almost given up on Pakistan. I was in Islamabad during the Lal Masjid crisis, watching clouds of smoke engulf the city from my apartment balcony. For the only time in my life, I felt the force of a suicide blast; I was just a couple of blocks away from the attack on the Chief Justice’s procession. Thoroughly disgusted with the city, and filled with so much fear that I have never returned, I left Islamabad on a Friday, the same Friday that the Lal Masjid reopened. On the way to the airport, I felt the tremors of another suicide blast, this one at the seminary.

I felt a similar disgust as Karachi burned in the days after Benazir’s assassination. Instead of quitting the city  — was there anywhere safe left in the country? — I sought refuge in black humour, laughing at the incompetence of the government hosing down the scene of the assassination and envying Bilawal, who I can still recall being bullied at school. Most of all, I dedicated myself to work. There was an issue of Newsline to re-write and just a few days in which to do it.

Life went back to normal, or whatever it is that passes for normal in Pakistan.