No-nonsense Travel Guide to Nightlife in Islamabad

Since the internet is full of nonsense account of foreigners telling their own kin about nightlife in Islamabad Pakistan, I compiled my own travel guide to nightlife in Islamabad Pakistan.

What does nightlife mean?

I consider nightlife to mean all those activities that a visitor to the city can enjoy at night time, in order to liven up their stay there.

Things to do at night in Pakistan

The activities available for travelers in Pakistan are more or less the same for any of the cities of Islamabad, Karachi, or Lahore. But I will stick to Islamabad because travelers mostly land here.

Nightlife in Islamabad in one paragraph

Nightlife in Islamabad involves camping, shopping, watching movies, attending festivals and concerts, private dance parties, and eating out with buddies and family. As there isn’t much of a hookup culture in Pakistan yet, getting an interesting female company to hang out with you, at a short notice, is nearly impossible.

Details of nighttime activities in Pakistan

This is my list of fun nightlife activities that any travel tourist to Pakistan can pick and choose, to enjoy:-

Travel to Margalla Hill view spots and camp there overnight

You can drive up to Margalla hill, especially Shah Allah Ditta Caves and Laosar Bauli on top of it to find excellent camping spots to relax and enjoy overnight. The Margalla hills are safe and there are plenty of secluded spots on top the mountain that gives you excellent views of Rawalpindi / Islamabad both at the same time and also Khanpur Dam far away. Try to get there half an hour before sunset to capture the gorgeous views too.

You can take your camping gear, especially your tent and burner to make your own coffee, first thing in the morning.

This is an excellent camping spot above Shah Allah Ditta Caves Margalla Hills.

The only problem with this plan is that there isn’t any stream of water flowing beside you and you’d have to bring your own 5 liters bottled water to the top that you can easily get from any convenience store in the city of Islamabad.

The mountains surrounding Talhar village inside the Margalla Range is another nice place to camp overnight but you’d not have beautiful views like Shah Allah Ditta Caves have.  To get to Talhar you’d have to branch off from a turning close to Monal.

Driving up to Pir Sohawa and Monal areas is not the greatest idea, because it is usually crowded with restaurant-goers and general tourists and you’d have to make a beeline to crawl to the top.

Go to a restaurant or Café and chit chat with your buddies and family

Going to Restaurant and Café is huge in Islamabad at night. Families love to spend top dollar on expensive food and try out new joints serving bizarrely named snacks with coffee. This is the Pakistani thing to do, considering the family is everything in Pakistanis society.

Top Cafés to go are Café Mocha and Chai Khana in the F-6 Sector of Islamabad. As far as restaurants are concerned, China Town F-8 and Roasters in F-7 are the top choices, because they have been maintaining top quality in their food, for quite some time now.

Also, the ladies coming to these joints are easy on the eyes, if you know what I mean. You might be able to chat someone up there if you are lucky.

This does not apply to white foreigners, as Pakistanis adore white people. It is a significant bump up in the society to have a Caucasian partner in Pakistan.

To find a partner of the opposite sex to go with your dining, you’d also have to join dating Apps or request your colleague for an office Get Together in the evening – wink, wink!

Go Shopping in Islamabad

The Shopping centers and Malls in Islamabad like Safa Gold Mall F-7, Centaurus, Jinnah Super F-7, and Supermarket F-6 are heavens for gift and souvenir shopping in Pakistan for foreigners. Just don’t forget to haggle on the price.

PRO TIP 1

The real price of the souvenir item is 50% what the shop keeper has told you on your first query

The only problem in going shopping in Islamabad, especially if you are a white Caucasian person, is the unwanted attention you’d get if you are there.

Do keep in mind shopping is the favorite pastime for bored housewives who drag along their kids for a jaunt to their favorite Mall every odd day, so you’d not find anyone to build a rapport with there.

So, get your gifts and souvenirs’ from these markets just after sunset, before the madding crowd gets there.

Go to Art and Music Festivals in Islamabad at night

Music festivals in Pakistan are nothing like what you see in the western world. Here, the festival means one solitary performer is shrieking on jarring music composition, while the disinterested crowd is having Biryani, Chicken pulao, and paan on the food stalls around the mosh pit.

Every now and then a genuine concert does come up, like Coke, ARY, and EAT festivals that are worth your time.

Then there is a growing culture of arranging EDM festivals in Islamabad that is gaining traction after the Levels Festival and H2HF Music Festival, last year.

At times Art, literature, and Heritage festival becomes a very interesting evening.

If you do see any of these festivals on your allevents.in iPhone App, over there and see around, you might enjoy the peculiarity and energy of the event.

PRO TIP 2

Take a Pakistani with you to show you the ropes as far as what to expect in a particular scheduled event.

If the event is somewhere in DHA, then you needn’t be worried about its quality. Otherwise, be wary, be very wary. Some event organizers’ take your money and the star attraction never shows up.

Watch a movie in the Cineplex

The best Cineplexes to watch a movie in are Arena in Bahria town Phase 4 Islamabad, and Cine Gold Bahria Phase 7, but they are a bit far.

Islamabad has a tiny Cineplex close by in Centaurus Mall but you have fight your way through a crowd just to get there.

Find night clubs, dance parties, alcohol or dating

Registered Night Clubs

Registered Night clubs can only be found in the basement of 5-star hotels like Marriot, Serena, and Pearl Continental (PC). Here you can get your alcohol legally if you’re a non-muslim foreign passport holder, but there are annoying catches like, you’d have to be booked into the hotel to get in.

Then the price of alcohol is 20% higher than the normal price. You’d not be able to take your alcohol to your room. You cannot have a non-Muslim friend with you go in. So, it’s a huge nuisance.

Night Clubs inside Diplomatic Enclave Islamabad

British Club, French Club, Coolabah Club of the Australian Embassy, the UN club, and Canadian Club are all located in the Diplomatic Enclave of Islamabad Pakistan. These clubs are very popular in the ex-pat community, just because they drink, dance, and make merry every weekend far away from the prying eyes of the Pakistani people, behind huge fences.

The outgoing and single Pakistani women love to go to these clubs, every opportunity they get. Guys can forget about it.

If you have a passport of Canada, France, the USA, England, or Australia, going to these clubs that double as night clubs, is a very good option.

Unregistered Night Clubs

There are about two dozen unregistered night clubs that regularly arrange dance parties at their premises, but they are mostly in secluded forests high in the Margalla Mountains.

There are some basement parties inside Islamabad neighborhoods’, but they are mostly on specific invites and the crowd is their own tight circle of rich kids.

PRO TIP 3

To get to any of these private parties, you’d have to ask the richest Pakistani you come across or the party going girl, to get you an invite to get in. There is no third category.

Night entertainment in Pakistan is limited to the rich, corrupt and powerful, and their lady friends only. There is a clear demarcation who deserves to enjoy music and clubbing here.

Most of the rich Pakistanis love to associate themselves with foreigners, especially if they are white.

Then the rich and powerful love to frolic with attractive women that stay associated with them for the get-out-of-jail-free pass these people have acquired over years of bending a mutilating the system.

Find the Crazy unregistered night clubs

Such under the radar parties have everything you can think of, hard drugs, party drugs, mixed dancing, alcohol, music and alternative forms of physical liaisons, etc.

 To get into this crowd will require you to be able to give something in return, like contacts, women, drugs, or investment.

It all starts with the rich Islamabad businessmen in their huge bungalows in the F and E sectors of Islamabad. So, you’d have to find one.

Drugs in Pakistan

Hard Drugs

Hard drugs like heroin, cocaine, meth, etc. are easily available to those that are powerful and connected enough to fly above the law. There are several drug dealers in Islamabad with socialite women as their brokers, and only serve the elite that controls Pakistan.

Drug parties happen quite often with packets of drugs spread out on tables for these people to enjoy the bounty of their harvest of the wretched souls of this country.

Many of these parties even have Drug enforcement officers of foreign countries enjoying with the party crowd, with Pakistani women in their arms.

Psychedelic drugs used to be imported disguised as medicine into Pakistan, but now seeing the mind-blowing profits, importers have started manufacturing knockoff copies inside Pakistan. Their drug dealers usually hand around private schools and universities to get kids hooked on to them.

PRO TIP 4

Do not do hard drugs unless you are in one of the parties I have mentioned, otherwise, the authenticity of the drug cannot be certified and people have died from spurious ones.

Soft Drugs

Soft drugs like Hashish are available at every street corner cigarette shop. Or you can ask your rickshaw driver to get it for you.  You’d be lucky if you get the real thing from Tirah Valley Pakistan.

PRO TIP 5

Hashish of the best kind is the one that has a greenish tinge to the brownish goo and it comes from KhyberPakhtoonKhwa

Alcohol

You can get alcohol legally from outlets in all 5-star hotels like Serena, Marriott, and PC in a shop that is inside their compound. That is, if you are a non-Muslim, and have a foreign passport. There are no specific bars that serve alcohol.

You can also get alcohol from any of the shady hotels in Rawalpindi / Islamabad from the reception desk. These would be bootlegged alcohol, so can’t say much about their originality.

You can also call up Murree Breweries directly and ask for your pint, as they are allowed to sell to Non-muslims.

PRO TIP6

Just to ask some Pakistani that regularly drinks alcohol to get you a bottle.

These regular drinkers in Pakistan, that is quite a number, know have their army of bootleggers to supply them the booze of their choice. This way you will not only get a reasonable price but will also have genuine quality

Hooking up casually in Pakistan

There is no hookup culture in Pakistan, period!

Having said that, dating Apps do work in Pakistan, and you might get lucky with the ladies if you have tons of money to spend on them.

PRO TIP 7

Casual hookup in Pakistan is expensive and a pain in the neck, unless you want to spend money online on dating apps. So, bring your own lady to Pakistan.

Although Islamabad has quite a pool of non-committed girls that would love to befriend a stable foreigner, they would not like to be seen with one in public. As long as you can wrap your head around the hypocrisy of Pakistani society, you could have a very good casual encounter here.

To find a genuine, quality Pakistani girl to hook up with will take time, patience, and spending money, which cannot be categorized as hook up. For such girls, you’d be lucky to have them in your office or area of influence in Pakistan.

Conclusion

So, if you enjoy the kind of nightlife that involves clubbing, partying, drinking alcohol, hookup, drugs, and music and you plan to visit Pakistan for a short time, then get working with your contacts in Pakistan now and ask them straight up what you want, well before you land here. Just make sure you are willing to pay up for the services.

If you want help with any of these contacts, do comment below and I’ll see what we can do.