Alina Khan Has Found Her Joy

The 26-year-old has had a whirlwind year thanks to a breakout performance in Pakistani cinema. But for Khan, worldwide recognition has given her something more important than fame.

- NEHA PRAKASH

The first time Alina Khan ran away from home she was II. Khan, who was assigned male at birth, spent the early years of her childhood in Lahore, Pakistan, exploring her female gender identity-dressing up, role-playing as a girl. But that left her ostracized by her peers, neighbors, even her own family, leading her to run away multiple times throughout her early teens.

At the age of 16, when the emotional and physical abuse at home became too much, she left for good, with no money and no plan. Eventually, she found shelter and guidance in the form of the "Khawaja Sira" community, a network of transgender individuals within Pakistan.

"People were constantly asking me why I am the way that I am," she says matter-of-factly in her native tongue Urdu, video-calling from a room in her manager's home in Pakistan. "At that time, I could not find a way to express that this was not something that I'm doing deliberately nor was this something I was making up. It was just me. There were no words to express this or no understanding of who I am or the identity that I have." More than a decade later, it's her critically acclaimed role in the film Joyland that's given Khan the tools to lay bare her truth and bridge that gap.

Directed by Saim Sadiq, Joyland tells the story of a slowly fracturing family unit in Lahore, as its members push against gender norms amid a conservative backdrop. The story's driving force is a budding relationship between youngest son Haider (Ali Junejo) and Khan's Biba, an enigmatic and self-assured transgender woman determined to make a name for herself as the headlining performer at a local theater. It's a job Biba feels will give her the legitimacy and stability she wasn't guaranteed as a transgender woman.