Homeless doc goes viral
He burned up the Web — but hunky med student still needs a place to live in NYC
The Internet’s favorite hot Pakistani doctor has finally arrived — and the Big Apple is ready to take a bite out of him.
“I was walking through Times Square, and a girl stopped me,” recalled Rehan Munir, who just landed in New York City for a monthlong rotation at Mount Sinai. “She said, ‘Are you that doctor?’ I said, ‘Which doctor?’ And she said, ‘The doctor who is looking for a place to live.’ I just laughed.”
Last month Munir — a 26-yearold medical-school graduate from Lahore — inadvertently became an international heartthrob after he placed an ad on Facebook’s Gypsy Housing page looking for a rental in Manhattan.
Instead of landing housing leads, his good looks and pedigree induced a collective swoon from the Internet. The post accumulated thousands of comments such as, “He’s sooo HOT!!” and, “Damn, I wish I had a room to rent him.” Media outlets across the globe wrote about the doctor who was sending heart rates through the roof. Marriage proposals poured in from Indonesia, Turkey and Norway. And Munir’s Instagram following swelled from 900 to more than 28,000.
“Nobody was actually answering my query of looking for housing near the hospital,” he lamented.
Since he arrived last week, numerous women have asked Munir for his number. An elderly woman took it upon herself to play with his hair in an elevator. And then a stranger on the street grabbed the medical student’s hand and tried to kiss it.
“I’m not used to the attention,” conceded the 6-foot-1 Munir. “It feels surreal. Back home, people just look at you, and they are never going to come up to you. Here they just come up and talk to you.”
At least they do when you have a medical degree and look like you were drawn by a Disney illustrator.
Not only is Munir an aspiring sports-medicine doctor, but he has modeled professionally for Pakistani magazines and companies such as Hush Puppies. He played with Pakistan’s national soccer team as a striker and speaks four languages: French, English, Urdu and Punjabi.
At the moment, the Renaissance man is staying with friends in Mid- town West. But he is looking for a permanent pad in Midtown or the Upper East Side.
The single doctor is not actively looking for love, though.
“I am actually trying to focus on my career, but if anything comes along the way, you can’t stop it. Basically, I’m not going to make much of an effort in that department.”
Admirers will have only a month to woo the hunky healer. Come September, he plans to return to Pakistan and apply for a residency program in the United States. A hospital in New York would be his first choice.
“I’m an international medical student, so I have to apply broadly. But I feel so welcomed by the people of New York,” he said. “I would love to call it home.”