June 13 2006 - off to Pakistan

Once again I was off to Pakistan.
Nothing is ever ready on time. We were still packing minutes before I left the house.
As I made my way to my seat I realised a middle aged Pakistani woman was sat there and I politely pointed out that I was given this seat. I called the air stewardess who told the lady to move quite firmly but still she would not budge. The air stewardess explained that we must sit in the seats we were given and not just anywhere regardless of where our family was seated. I did claim my seat eventually and sat next to the young guy who i realised was not right. Someone else came and the young guy was moved to another seat.

I asked the guy if he knew the woman ahe he said "she is my mum". I smiled and thought 'thank god I did not call her an old bat or worse'. His name was Asad and he was travelling to Gujar Khan. He took a copy of the The Mirror, a tabloid newspaper, from me but declined the broadsheets I had with me. We made small talk.

The first 5 hours passed slowly but before long we were ready to land. Suddenly, a hand touched me and an old lady said in Pashtu "can you help me get my things down from the compartment?". i agreed and added "how did you know I spoke Pashtu?" She said "I heard you speak it on your mobile before that flight took off" I grimaced as I realised she may have heard some rather loose banter with a friend. Pashtu was once a secret code language that none really understood. There were so few of us in the UK. It was the language that no-one really understood but things had changed and we had to be careful what we said lest something undesireable slipped out.


When she got her stuff the old lady pushed past me and told me to hurry up. I was shocked as she charged passed me and pushed me against a seat. She would have been good in a rugby scrum.

I got my luggage fairly quickly and passed through the customs who asked if I had alcohol. I laughed and walked off.

Dawn was breaking and once again I heard the hustle and bustle of life in Pakistan. The sky soon filled up with Black kites waiting to scavenge or rob other birds of their food. The beggars rushed up to me and my cousin tried to give them some ruppees. "No, we dont want ruppees, we want pounds!" they exclaimed insulted. Even beggars have standards.

We were just about to head on to the motorway when a police van tried to pull us over. Our driver did not slow down let alone stop. The police van could not make it onto the motorway because they could be be booked by the motorway police. Our driver did not want to stop as like the Black Kites, the Pakistani police were also scavengers and robbers.

The motorway was a pleasant journey. It was going to be extended from Islamabad to Peshawar but so far only went to Burhan, a town near Hassan Abdal. Work on the motorway had started many years ago. Progress was slow. The road was clean and devoid of traffic. It cut through rugged forested hills which were surprisingly green. This side of the Margalla hills was consideredtobe quite barren and deforested but the opening of the motorway showed a different side.


Not far from home we stopped for tea. As soon as I got out, heads turned. I was wearing western clothes and had obviously arrived from somewhere. I had to put up withall the staring faces andit was very uncomfortable. They were assessing me and it did not feel nice. In Pakistan people will just stare ar you directly while in the west people would walk past you as if you were not there.



Once home I met my aunties and cousins who had a thousand and one questionsto askme even though uit hadonly been 18 months since i last saw them. Then i realised I needed to sleep for a while. I lay in the bed and thought to myself that it's so hot and sweaty. I ignored the noise outside and eventually nodded off.