Visit to Pakistan Summer 2006 - Part 2

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[SIZE=3][FONT=Times New Roman]I woke up and thought what shall I do today? I felt I must go somewhere. I had no idea where to start. I decided it must be the Kaghan Valley. The Kaghan Valley started at Balakot, a town demolished by the recent earthquake at an altitude of about 800m. That was higher than most places in England. The highest point in the Kaghan Valley was the Malika Parbat which rose to 5200m and was visible at the Lake Saiful Mulk in the north. [/FONT][/SIZE]
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[SIZE=3][FONT=Times New Roman]On the G T Road I boarded one of the many buses that plied from Peshawar to Rawalpindi and then back. The bus was playing a DVD of a Pashtu singer and with some hideously fat women as dancers. How they had so much stamina I do not know but as much as I cringed watching it, I had to admit it was enjoyable. [/FONT][/SIZE]
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[SIZE=3][FONT=Times New Roman]My stop came, the town of Hassan Abdal, the gateway to the Northern Areas and the Hazara division. The journey to Abbottabad was quite pleasant. The mountains to the north were the Himalayan foothills. The road rose slowly and then entered a beautiful pine clad valley. Abbottabad was a city named after a British Military officer, James Abbott. It was the British who developed this area and established a large army garrison here. It is by far one of the cleaner cities in Pakistan and quite green. It still has a very British feel with igreen gardens beautifully laid out and sloping roofs. The weather was much cooler here and rains were more plentiful. [/FONT][/SIZE]
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[SIZE=3][FONT=Times New Roman]It was Friday and prayer time was coming up. I was in a dilemma as I had a bag with me but did not know where to put it for the prayer. I prayed my Friday prayer’s with the Imam even in England except on rare occasions. I decided to eat instead and went to the Red Onion restaurant. I ordered my food half in English and half in Urdu. Another waiter watched me from a distance. Eventually he came towards me and said “I love to speak English!” I said “OK, that’s great!” He then repeated this statement to me two more times. I did not know what to say so I asked him his name, age and where he was from. He then said “England is a very beautiful country!” I asked if he had been there or whether he had relatives there. He answer was negative but he pointed out he had me there. I replied “I have moved to Pakistan forever!” He asked for my passport so he could go to live there. I laughed and said “it would take you another five years to weigh as much as I do. Not one to give up he wanted my phone numbers and address so he could write to me. [/FONT][/SIZE]
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[SIZE=3][FONT=Times New Roman]I looked around and I realised I was not the only one missing Friday prayer’s. There were some very western influenced people here. The men were suited and booted and quite a lot of the women did not even bother covering their shortly cut hair. Why the international media portrayed Pakistan as a conservative backwater I never really understood. I was guessing a lot of the people sat in here today had military connections so they generally could behave as they liked more or less. The children called their parents “Mommy” and “Daddy”. Their dress sense was western too and they could probably access western media through the number of satellite and cable channels broad cast here and not to forget the internet. The British left their mark on Pakistan in a very big way. The elite groups and high societies would socialise with each other in a very non-Islamic and more of a western way. [/FONT][/SIZE]
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[SIZE=3][FONT=Times New Roman]I ate and decided to move on. I prayed by myself and then boarded a bus to Mansera. The road twisted and turned but within 45 minutes we arrived at Mansera. Mansera was a smaller city than Abbottabad and had more of a Pakistani feel. Before we entered the start of the city I awakened myself to the horrendous tragedy which hit Pakistan last October. The earthquake which may have killed over 100,000 people in these beautiful and serene Himalayan valleys were showing their scars. On the outsides of the city there were tents and porta-cabins established by voluntary groups and countries in order to help in this awful tragedy. We drove through Mansera and suddenly the sky darkened and it rained. I had to buy an umbrella in the bus station. It almost lashed us and the buildings furiously. I asked for buses to Balakot and the Kaghan Valley. I was told that I could get to Balakot but not ahead because of landslides. The earthquake had weakened the environment here and whenever it rained it caused a hue problem. Stones, boulders, soil, trees and remnants of buildings demolished by the earthquake would find their way down to the road in either slow or extremely fast speeds. I had to turn back. [/FONT][/SIZE]
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[FONT=Times New Roman][SIZE=3]It was still raining in Abbottabad and I decided to book a hotel room. I found one for 300 ruppees. Per night. It had a clean bed, decent enough bath room and running water s I accepted it. I had stayed at this hotel a number of times since 1998 and then it was just 100 ruppees a night. I mentioned this to the receptionist but he said the cost of living had risen. I as an outsider could only feel the crunch now. I wondered how the locals felt. I walked around the cantonment for the rest of the evening and when I got back I realised I had a blister. I popped it. [/SIZE][/FONT]
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[SIZE=3][FONT=Times New Roman]The next day I decided to visit Thandiani, an old British hill station at 2700m above sea level. I hired a taxi for the occasion as I knew as soon as I saw a bird of the feathered variety I would need to note it. We left the city and then rose up and up. It was a 1500 metre climb and took less than an hour usually. The forest became thicker and thicker and at some points it was very dense. The moist climate supported quite a large variety of insects and birds. There were quite a lot of butterflies of various colours flitting gaily around the flowers and shrubs. Thandiani was fairly busy and a crowd of young children escaping the heat from the Punjab flocked around the Rhesus Money packs which scavenged fro scraps on the town edge. I decided to go for a hike in the forest with my driver. We descended into the forest which was dark. It was extremely silent except for the birds in the trees which flitted above. The ground was wet but not soggy. We had not travelled that far down when the taxi driver, Sajjad said do not go further as it is very dangerous. Sajjad said not even the locals ventured into the forest. I ignored him and the trees just pulled me in. Sajjad’s pleading broke the silence “It is very dangerous here as there are animals here which will eat humans, please do not go any further.” I knew that there were Common Leopards and Black Bears here and I felt that somewhere in these trees there must be a leopard resting. I wanted to see it but did not know how too. I felt that we were being watched by someone, by something and I wanted to see it too. I regretted that Sajjad had tagged along with me but then if something was to have happened to me at least I had his company right? I did not feel that safe in this forest which was thick and dark but I surely did want to explain more of it. I decided to ignore Sajjad and carried on. He followed me and after another 15 minutes he again asked me not to go further. I decided to listen to him this time around as he was more scared than I was. Or maybe he knew of the danger’s that occurred here and did not want to be entangled in something which could be deadly. I looked up and realised we had to hike back up and it would be tiring. We went back to Abbottabad and ate there. We stopped at an Afghan restaurant and ate Kabuli rice. I was very hungry. After dinner I decided to go back to my village to plan the next journey. [/FONT][/SIZE]