Look, not every story is going to be about Zuma, Gordhan and Fees Must Fall.

Variety is the spice of life, so let’s talk about 18-year-old Pakistani tea vendor Arshad Khan.

A few days back he was just another vendor earning his living in Islamabad, but after one photo went viral all that has rapidly changed.

A photographer named Jiah Ali took some photos of Arshad a few months back, although she only uploaded them to Instagram on October 15.

This is the post where it all began:

Here’s QZ with the ensuing madness:

By the end of the day on Oct. 17, #ChaiWala (tea seller) was the top trending item on Twitter Pakistan. It wasn’t long before Twitterati across the border in India began swooning. For a region grappling with a deteriorating security situation between India and Pakistan in the aftermath of a deadly terrorist strike and a retaliatory “surgical strike,”this was some relief, even if a temporary one…

Khan, reportedly one of 18 Pashtun siblings and a native of Mardan in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, is soaking it all in. “Some 40 to 50 girls have visited me since morning,” Khan told Samaa TV on Oct.18. Asked if he is open to acting in movies, Khan, without as much as batting an eyelid, said, “Sure I will.”

Time to make those 15 minutes of fame count, buddy.

He was quickly signed up to an online retailer as a model, although he shaved off the stubble:

And then, of course, came the criticisms and outrage:

Others perceived a class divide in people’s attitudes toward the photogenic Khan. “What I would and do have a problem with is the accompanying surprise that he is a chaiwala. That this is a man from an obviously lower-income background and is yet so good looking,” columnist Farahnaz Zahidi wrote in The Express Tribune newspaper. “Like all things good in life, somewhere the upper tier bourgeois of Pakistan have come to believe that even looks and god-gifted attributes are co-dependent on money and affluence?”

Come now, you didn’t think there would be a feel-good story without some outrage?

Quite the story all in all, and how bazaar.

[source:qz]