When I first met Hira Tareen at the beginning of the year, she was one in a crowd of pretty young faces trying to make it in the industry. At first impression, Hira didn’t seem like she had figured out what she really wanted to do. She had acted in a few drama serials (notably Mataye Jaan), had a show on a radio station, was modeling for some up-and-coming brands, and more noticeably, had been walking the ramp for a number of designers.

When I asked what her plans for the future were, she said something about starting a design company with her sister and doing photo shoots for designers and making graphics and ads for businesses.

That she had the talent to become ‘somebody’ in the industry was apparent. It’s not easy, in our finicky entertainment related industry, to establish yourself as a DJ when the brunt of the work in your resume is walking the ramp; similarly you might see quite a few models jump into acting, but there are few that are good enough to continue with it. As Hira herself said, “People here don’t really have a lot of patience with newcomers.”

Fast forward to the present time and Hira Tareen is still doing much of the same but with one crucial difference: she is converging on a focus.

Hira has now all but shied away from acting in drama serials (even though one or two might still be airing); she still walks the ramp, but she’s building on her experience as a model with a show on Style 360 where she critiques couture and tries different outfits to workout the perfect combination; as an RJ, she is now being lauded as Pakistan’s first female DJ (a strange honour, but an honour which got her on the list of 10 women who are making a difference in Pakistan and consequently the recipient of a Changemaker award from Change Clothing). She is also a brand ambassador for Pantene, had a part in Seedlings, the film that received a lot of recognition at the New York Film Festival, and wonder of wonders, she is actually going forward with building that company of hers. The plans might have slimmed a bit — H&Z productions is currently only producing fashion shoots like the one for this feature — but the important thing is that Hira’s ambition is finally beginning to go places.

Back in January, on a nippy evening in a cramped Espresso, Hira was hard pressed to answer what exactly it was that made her tick. What came through was that she certainly wasn’t a fit for the nine-to-five crowd. Instead she wanted to see “how people respond to who I am”. Having grown up in Dallas, Texas, she graduated in Communications and Advertising in 2001 from the University of Texas at Arlington, but found herself leaning more towards modeling and music in her interests. She had been to Pakistan a few times before, but in late 2011, she took the leap and moved to Pakistan permanently to explore her potential.

In Hira’s words, “I’m experimenting in Pakistan. I’ve met tons of people who can’t materialise their ideas, but if I can go somewhere with even three or four, I’m happy. Maybe it’s because of the confidence that growing up in America gives you. You’re taught that you can do so much.”

That idea of a renaissance soul ties in perfectly with a girl that “always has ideas about things popping into her head.” Yet despite becoming an increasingly familiar face in the entertainment industry, or a person who possibly has aspirations to become its most well known face, Hira isn’t nearly as much of a diva as you would expect. Shy and maybe even slightly dorky at times, her answers are almost always accidentally introspective: “I want to be different. And I’m trying to do different things. The plan is that after a while I’ll figure out where I want to go, what I want to keep doing and what to take further.”

Back in January, Hira told me about how it was tougher to get noticed here than she had expected it to be. When I asked her how that made her feel about moving to Pakistan, she brushed off any hint of regret with a peppy affirmative, saying, “I can’t remember a day that I’ve been bored here.”

What is the plan now? “Well, I’ve done a lot of stuff now, so instead of focusing on quantity, I am going to look more towards quality. I want to do something different, different from anyone else out there.”

Can Hira Tareen cross the threshold and go from being almost famous to becoming the next big star in the industry? Sure she can. She’s not a diva (which is both helpful and a hindrance), she’s got brains (definitely a plus) and she seems grounded enough to not let success get to her head — she could, after all, pull her weight thanks to the work she has already done. It might be that all she needs now is to take that ambition, combine it with a slightly narrower focus, and search for her big break — she’s almost there, she just needs that one ‘role’ to cement it for her. As I see it, in the end, it’s not about whether she can or can’t, but when.