July 7, 2006
Well I got my 11:30pm train from Jodhpur, India to Khokrapar, Pakistan and we stopped at the Indian border at 7:30AM the next day where 700 people crammed into huge queue's at the Indian immigration. A young customs official who was surprised to see a foreigner on this train came over to talk for awhile and then he said he would take my passport and get it stamped so I wouldn't have to wait in line. After getting my passport back I went through customs where they dumped out everything in my backpack and went through everything. The Indian official asked me what my shaving cream was and I told him and then the bozo presses the button and shaving cream sprays out all over my bag and he has a surprised look on his face as he sees what he just did and then looks at me with a bewildered look on his face and I say "Good one!! now you can clean that up". Him and his assistant are looking around for napkins and can only find paper so they do a half ass job cleaning up the mess on my backpack. As I am leaving the customs area and heading for the waiting room the young customs officer who helped check me out of Indian immigration tells me that my train will be coming in the late evening. I say "Evening?? It is only 8:30am right now" and he says that everyone on the train must go through customs and everyones bags must be searched and that will take 10 hours or more and when everyone is through customs then they will call ahead for the Pakistan train to come and pick everyone up. When I had asked around at the Jodhpur train station about how long the train takes to get to Pakistan 2 separate train officials had said 7 hours and the hotel manager who talked me into this train had said the same thing but a young Pakistani man dressed with a white muslim cap and white garment who was in line for the Pakistan train tickets as well had come up to me and asked why I was taking this train and that I should fly to Pakistan instead and he said we would be arriving in Pakistan on Sunday morning and that is why I had such a hard time making up my mind on what route to take and if I should take the bus north to the Attari/Wagan border crossing or the Friday train to Pakistan. The young Pakistani had an honest face and I believed him but 2 train officials told me otherwise so I decided to take the train.
So it is Saturday evening and I have been waiting at the train station at the Indian border for 10 1/2 hours. It was very hot at around 50 degrees Celsius and the water they were selling was even hotter than the weather and they didn't have any cold drinks. I met a lot of cool Pakistani's and Indians who could speak english and hung out with them periodically until the train was ready to leave. It was around 4pm and one poor Indian had passed out on the train platform and people were kicking him trying to get him out of the way for them to cart their bags through and I realized the guy had sun stroke and wasn't just in a deep sleep so as I saw all these Indians just looking at the guy I got to the front of the crowd and told a guy (pointing at his water) to give him some water since he is probably dehydrated and as the guy is pouring water down into the guys mouth I realize he isn't responding to drinking it and that he was unconscious by the vacant gaze in his eyes so I tell him to stop the water immediately because you are drowning him and begin spraying his head with water and a few people are smacking him to wake him up and he eventually comes to.
At 6pm (Saturday) the train to the Pakistan border finally leaves and it is only a 10 minute ride to Khokrapar, Pakistan border where we all get off and go through the exact same thing again. They have good food and cold drinks on the Pakistan side so I quickly munch down some rice and take off to beat everyone else to the immigration dept. We are all packed into a small fenced off area where everyone is carrying all their bags and suitcases and there isn't even elbow room. After I get my passport stamped I have to go through a narrow area where portable rooms are on the right side and a big fence on the left side and a Pakistani in typical muslim robes pulls me into one of the rooms and continues to ask me questions about why I am visiting Pakistan and where I plan to go. His english is so-so and continues to tell me I don't have the right authorization to get into Pakistan and I continue to point to my Pakistan visa 2-3 times during this conversation and after 10 minutes he finally realizes that I do have a Pakistan Visa. And at the end of the interrogation he begins asking me questions about the Indian border and wants to see my pictures from my camera and I know that this is just a spying operation and collecting as much information from travelers about India as they can. I felt like saying "Well you know... I did see a lot of military trucks building up along the border that had heavy tarps covering their V-2 rockets and nuclear warheads but of course I am know military expert but word around the Indian immigration office was that they were planning a surprise attack on Pakistan over the next few days.... but don't quote me or anything" :).
I leave that room and walk 8 steps where another Pakistan official calls me into his room and begins asking the same questions and I tell him that I just went through this with the guy next door but he doesn't seem interested in this so I repeat the exact same thing. After this I proceed to another check point where they search my bag but not as thoroughly as the Indian customs and don't take anything out of my bag. After this I go into a bigger fenced off area that have Pakistani customs officials wearing squeaky clean white customs officer uniforms and they look more like high ranking admirals in the navy. There are huge lines so I begin to get into one when a customs official in his late 40's early 50's (We will call him "Shar" because that is his real name and he appears later on in this travelogue) calls me over to his line and with a friendly smile asks me the usual questions while he quickly looks through my backpack. We have a friendly chat and I tell him I am going to the ancient city of Moenjodaro and he tells me the train won't be leaving for another 4-6 hours but another customs official named Mr so&so would be very interested in chatting with me about archeology in his office where you can wait there until the train departs and Shar goes past the train ticket reservation line to get me my ticket to Hyderabad and then I head over to the portable room where 3 other Pakistani customs officials in their early 50's and in their white customs uniforms begin a conversation with me and there is no access to water in this little compound where 700 Indians and Pakistanis are sitting on the dirt ground with their belongings and waiting for 4-6 hours to board the train but they call for a soldier to grab me water whenever I want and I am thinking to myself "Hell, I like these guys!!" and after about 20 minutes officer so&so calls me into his air conditioned office where we have an interesting conversation talking about the places I am going to visit in Pakistan and what best modes of transportation I should take etc and I also learned alot about Pakistans short 60 year history since it broke away from India in 1947.
Everyone in Pakistan knows that the military controls the country and not the elected prime minister. He tells me about an old prime ministers grave by the site of Moenjodaro and tells me that this Prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was elected by the people in 1973 and in 1977 the military General Zia ul-Haq staged a military coup and made himself president of Pakistan and had the ex president Bhutto hanged in 1979 after an unfair trial and most people say that the charges were false and made up. 10 years later in 1988 General Zia ul-Haq is killed in a mysterious explosion in his helicopter which sounds like an assassination and then Prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto daughter Benazir Bhutto took power for awhile then was exiled to Dubai.
And now we have the current prime minister General Pervez Musharraf who lead a similar military coup against the then Pakistan president Nawaz Sharif in October 1999 and Nawaz Sharif got life imprisonment on hijacking and terrorism charges but later he was exiled as well. Most Pakistanis liked their democratically elected prime ministers but when the military wants to change leaderships they do it whenever they want through military coups.
Anyways it was an interesting conversation and at 10pm he tells me my train is now bordering and I thank him for his hospitality and as I am leaving the big fenced gate that is full of Indians and Pakistanis sitting on the ground floor inside the compound everywhere I glance across at Shar at the customs counter and give him a smile and wave before getting onto the train. The train doesn't leave though until 2:30am Sunday morning and I have the guy who helped me bud to the front of the line in the Jodhpur trainstation in India in the same compartment as me. At 8:30am we arrive in Hyderabad where I jump off the train and many Pakistanis come up to me immediately and begin chatting when I see a hand from behind them reach over to shake my hand and for a full 2 seconds I am trying to remember where I know this guy from and realize it is Shar from the Pakistani customs in Khokrapar but instead of being dressed in his sharp looking white customs uniform he is wearing a simple muslims garment that looks a little dirty so I am shocked to see him. I asked him if he had slept and he said he had and that all the customs officials live in Hyderabad but travel to Khokrapar on Saturday nights just for the once a week train from India. They all drive to Khokrapar in their vehicles and left at 1am that morning. So Shar gets an auto rickshaw and we head to the bus station in Jamshoro which is 15 km out of Hyderabad and find out the bus leaves at 11am so I go to pay for the rickshaw driver and Shar says "No, you don't pay, you are a guest in my country and the bus leaves in another 2 hours so you can come back to my home to meet my family and get an opportunity to clean up and refresh yourself". I am always a tad bit skeptical in situations like this which I think is healthy and keeps me on my toes just in case I am being set up for money or something but I knew he was genuine and wanted to show me Pakistani hospitality.
We arrive at his house which is very modest and I meet one of his sons. He has 2 daughters and 4 sons and they are all going to university for degrees. Shar has a degree in Economics. He asks me if I would like to take a bath and I tell him that would be great and am just dreaming of soaking in a tub for 30 minutes but I hear his son running water into a bucket and it is then do I realize I will be bathing like the Indians by reaching into a bucket to pour water over myself as I wash. After I shave and clean up he has his son bring in tea, water, crackers and some type of nan bread which is popular here with a yogurt side dish for dipping the bread into. We chat a bit and he tells me the elections in Pakistan are a joke and that General Pervez Musharraf will be president for as long as he likes. I tell him the Joseph Stalin quote "It isn't how many votes you get that matters but WHO counts the votes that matter". I asked him if he sees many foreigners come through on that train and he says no except for one American came through 4 months ago when the train line to Khokrapar had just opened after being closed for 40 years. Pakistan bombed the train tracks in 1965 in one of the many Pakistan/India wars fighting over Kashmir region. Afterwards Shar drives me out to Jamshoro and I grab my 11am bus to Larkana. It was a 4 1/2 hour bus ride up to Larkana. The bus horns in Pakistan and India sound like the combination of a horn and ambulance siren (Very annoying).
In Larkana I must have been the first white person to come through this town because as I walked down the streets people would stop what they are doing and get their friends attention and turn back to watch me go by. I mean restaurant murmur will stop as I passed a restaurant. In Hyderabad I didn't walk around much but many people were looking into the rickshaw as we drove around. People are friendly in Pakistan and all I have to do is smile at them and they return the smile with a big toothy grin. The only english that some people know is "How are you?".
As I walked down an alley I saw a guy driving a motorcycle with a woman completely covered in black and an infant in between them and the guy looked exactly like Osama Bin Laden!! I mean identical and wearing the same type of turban. I almost pissed my pants. I was going to take a picture but he went by too quickly.
I went into a store that had air conditioning and bought some ice cream because it was so hot outside and as I left the store and walked down onto the main street in Larkana and was completely focused on opening that ice cream and devouring it when after taking 10 steps out of the store and onto the road I all of a sudden feel my right foot not land on the pavement and it seems to be going lower and lower into the road and of course my attention is still on the ice cream but I am beginning to wonder what is going on when I put my free hand out to stop the falling. The next thing I know I am on the main street in downtown Larkana and up to my waist in OIL!!! I am in shock and confused and it takes me 3 seconds to realize what is going on and manage to climb out of this hole in the road that is full of oil. After I am out of the oil and assessing why there is a huge hole in the middle of the road that just happens to be filled to the top with oil I tell myself that I am in a foreign country and many things here don't make sense. As I fell into the hole I heard people on both sides of the streets say "OH!!" as if they just witnessed an accident and they are still there on the street looking at me (probably laughing) and I feel my temper rising quickly where I shriek "WHY THE FUCK IS THERE A HOLE FULL OF OIL IN THE MIDDLE OF THE GOD DAMN ROOOOOAAAAAAAD!!!!". Nobody says anything but a guys calls me over and hoses me down. As I walk down the street I am wondering what the odds were of me being completely focused on something else (The ice cream) and falling into the only hole of oil in the whole town if not of all Pakistan. Luckily I was wearing my sandals and not my hiking boots. After thinking about it for a long time as I continued down the road I arrived at the firm conclusion that it wasn't chance or coincidence but destiny and that I must have been meant to fall into that hole full of oil even before I arrived in Larkana. The odds of it happening were a million to one. But you all will be happy to know that I did save my ice cream even after I tumbled into the hole full of oil (I must save the ice cream at all costs!! :)).
There hasn't been a dull moment since I arrived in Pakistan and sometimes I will just lock myself in my hotel just to relax and even then I had my phone ring and I picked it up and heard a muffled voice speaking and couldn't even tell what language it was so I hung up and then 10 seconds later the phone rings again and it is the same muffled voice so I assume it is the front desk calling me and that they have a bad connection so I go down and the front desk clerks sees me and nods me over and begins asking me questions like "Where did you come from before Larkana?" "What is your next destination?" "What is your profession?". Well everytime I tell him my answer he turns to another guy on the same side of the desk as me who has his back turned to me and looking down while the front desk clerk is giving him my answer in Sindi. After the second time he turned to this guy I pointed at the man and asked the clerk "OK who is this guy?" and the clerks tells me he is with Pakistani intelligence and that this type of intelligence gathering on foreigners in Pakistan is routine in hotels.
At 8am the next day I hire a taxi to take me out to the 5000 year old ancient city of Moenjodaro which is as important in archeological terms as ancient Egypt and ancient Sumeria. It is a 3000 square meter city built during the bronze age when the Indus river used to wind its way around the city but over 5000 years the Indus river has shifted course. I went into the museum first and saw old chess sets from that time and other games and dice that is still popular today. Moenjodaro was discovered in 1911 and excavated in the 1920's. It is a mud brick city that had granaries and pools and bath houses and an area for the rich people and an area for the poor people. I don't usually like guides for sites that have english signs posted but some older Pakistani guy was following me around whose name was Momon Husson and claimed to be an archeologist and my guide book talks about an archeologists that is always on the site so I assumed it was him. As he showed me around I read an english sign about the Kushana period at Moenjodaro and asked him what years they lived and after dodging the question a few times he finally said he didn't know and I begin to doubt his self acclaimed credentials about being an archeologist since civilizations and dates are obviously important to archeologists but when I left he didn't ask for any money and sat down to let me leave to another site nearby so I gave him 300 rupees assuming he doesn't make much here. I looked at the guest registry and saw that only 1 foreigner per week visits this site but everyone said it was because of the heat that most people don't come to Pakistan at this time of the year. I totally understand!
Afterwards my taxi dropped me off at my hotel where I checked out and grabbed an auto rickshaw to take me to a minibus station which is the only way to Bahawalpur from Larkana. I was packed in with 20 other people on this minibus (4 seats on a row and 5 rows in the van). I met 2 english speaking Pakistanis on the minibus and they told me that English is Pakistans official language because Pakistan is divided into 4 provinces and each province speaks a completely different language so all the universities are in english and they use english to talk with their friends in other provinces. They were on their way to work as computer technicians working for Pakistans power company and their office was between Sukkur and Rohri.
There was an off-duty police officer in the minivan and he was asking them to ask me why I didn't have an armed escort to travel throughout Pakistan and I told him I didn't need one but the officer wanted to know where I was coming from and where I was going etc... and then used his walkie talkie to call in to report this to the police station and the 2 pakistanis said something about him arranging for me to have an escort for my trip to Bahawalpur. I told them I didn't want it. So we arrived in Sukkur and had to switch minivans to go to Rohri. The two Pakistanis get off at their stop and tell me their friend in the minibus will take me to the train station in Rohri.
So I get to the Rohri train station and a huge crowd of curious onlookers gather around me and of course no one speaks english. After 10 minutes of this a young english speaking Pakistani named Shakkeel comes up and asks me where I am going and he tells me that the train bound for Bahawalpur is getting ready to leave now so I rush to get a ticket and Shakkeel helps me carry a bag as we run to the platform where the train is moving and picking up speed so I throw my backpack onto the moving train and climb onboard with Shakkeel. I thank him and we exchange email addresses and I realize I purchased an economy class ticket as I enter the coach and realize why the 6 hour journey only costed $3us. As I am in one of the coaches with 5 other Pakistanis I see a big stocky Pakistani in a police officers outfit come in and he nods at me with a little wave and sits down in my coach. I am suspicious of whether this guy is here for me to escort me on the train to Bahawalpur but he doesn't speak english. This guy is about 270lbs so very big for a Pakistani and he looks like the Pakistan version of the character "Schultz" from the 1970's TV series "Hogans Heroes". I could almost see him saying "I see NOOOOOOTHING! I hear NOOOOOTHING!" like the Schultz character always said. As I am sitting down in economy class I hear a Pakistani call me over asking me why I didn't get the air-conditioned coach. When I get over to where this english speaking Pakistani is I am shocked that he too looks like Osama Bin Laden! I have to do a double take. This guy is a gentle soul which I can tell by his mannerisms and he tells me he is a famous artist in Pakistan and his work is displayed all over the world in different galleries and asks if I want to see it. I don't want to see it because I think he wants me to buy something from him but he is nice and I don't want to be rude so I say sure that I would like to see his art work. He has a portfolio with him and shows me all the media attention and newspaper clippings with his picture on the front displaying his work and then takes out paintings of his that are fantastic and art that I like but half his stuff I thought was crap (This of course is coming from a guy who can only draw stickmen :)).
A few hours into the train ride the train conductor comes around checking on tickets and gives me a warm greeting and sits down to talk with me. He is about the same age as myself and he is insisting that I come as his special guest into the air conditioned coach and not stay where I am but I gracefully decline his offer and tell him I meet the most interesting people in economy class so he assigns a guy to look after me and this guy buys me drinks when I am thirsty which I don't like but that is Pakistani hospitality for you. Later he comes and gives me some train souvenirs that I can use like cloths for wiping the sweat off of me and combs etc... His name is Abid and we exchange emails and Hanif the artist doesn't have an email address but I give him my email address anyhow since I enjoyed his company. Really nice guy and I can't believe he is stuck with a face like Osama Bin Laden! There were a few others in my coach that spoke english as well and they were very friendly and curious people. Very curious because they were constantly staring at me when they thought I wasn't looking.
The train arrived in Bahawalpur at 7:30PM and I said goodbye to everyone I met in my coach and headed off to grab an autorickshaw to head to a hotel. One autorickshaw guy snags me on the platform and tells me he can take me and once we are outside the train terminal I asked him how much and he says 50 rupees which I know is too high since I am only going 400 meters down the road and look around at the other shouting autorickshaw operaters pushing their way closer to me and ask them for a better price and the guy beside me says 30 rupees and I say "OK I am going with you, lead the way". Well the first autorickshaw driver didn't like this and thought I was his customer and began pushing the other driver and I tell him he should have given me his best price to start with or he could have had the fare. I can be such a prick over a little 50 cent difference haha.
I grab a pop and we zip down the street to the hotel when I see a dog come out of nowhere with a possessed and angry look on its face as it dodges around other moving autorickshaws and looks completely determined to bite my leg that is sticking out of the rickshaw because my backpack is taking up too much room inside the rickshaw. The dog must have smelled white meat entering his town and was determined to take a bite of it. As the dog came within biting range I cracked him between the eyes with my plastic 600ml bottle of Fanta which made him stop dead in his tracks and I scared the hell out of the driver who turned around with a concerned look on his face and said "Did that dog bite you??". I showed him my Fanta bottle and said the dog meant Mr Fanta before he had a chance to bite me.
The next day I grab a minibus from Bahawalpur for the 71km drive to Uch Shariff where 500 year old Sufi shrines are located. We get there in 1 1/2 hours and then I grab a bicycle rickshaw for the 3-5 km distance out to the Sufi Shrines. The best preserved Sufi shrine was built in 1494 but they were all damaged badly by a big flood 200 years ago. They are octagon shaped shrines with a dome on top and have blue and white tiles on the outside and they look absolutely beautiful. Another english speaking Pakistani wants to be my guide and I reluctantly agree. After showing me around I give him some money and then because it is so hot we head for the shade in the Sufi Shrine. The best preserved shrine is only half a shrine due to the flood damage and there is scaffolding inside and lots of other Pakistanis inside taking refuge from the incredible heat. Some are smoking hashish and others just relaxing so I go over to join them and they tell me that they are all either Sunni or Shi'ite muslims and claim that all the Sufis are a crazy muslim group which is normally associated with fighting and the Taliban. I have a hard time believing this but then assume there are crazy sufis just like there are other types of crazy muslims. After an hour or so I meet up with my bicycle rickshaw driver and we head back to Uch Sharif and then I grab the same minibus back to Bahawalpur.
The next day I go to the trainstation to buy a last minute ticket to Lahore for 11am to find out 1st and 2nd class is all sold out so I am forced to take economy class again. When I first entered Pakistan I used to wonder why they didn't clean the seats since all the seat are full of thick dust but I soon realized it gets that way within an hour of riding on the train from the desert sand coming through the windows and you can clean your seat and it will be full of dust within an hour again. When I got off the train in Lahore at 11pm I saw the most beautiful sight that to me was the more beautiful than even the Taj Mahal. That of course was seeing PIZZA HUT!! I haven't had fast food since leaving China and was already thinking on the train while checking out my map of Lahore that I would go to Pizza hut but didn't realize they had one inside the train station. A soldier with a double barreled shotgun was patroling the Pizza Hut doors as I bursted through.
The next day I take a cab out to the Iranian consulate in Lahore and enquire about the possibility of getting an Iranian visa through them so the guy at the gate tells me to come back Sunday and I tell him I won't be hear on Sunday and just want to know what my chances are of getting a visa through them so he takes my passport and tells me to wait as he checks with the Iranian high consulate. As I am waiting a friendly Pakistani soldier calls me over to sit down and get me some tea which I liked. 10 minutes later the Iranian official opens the gate 2 feet wide and thrusts his arm straight towards me with my passport in his hand and says and I quote *No visa for you!*. He said it just like the soup nazi off of the Seinfeld episode where the soup nazi says *No soup for you!!!!*. But this guy was the Visa Nazi. My guidebook tells me that this Iranian embassy is pretty much useless and only a few other travelers have had success getting a visa through them so I decide I will go to Islamabad since most Iranian visas are issued through the Islamabad iranian embassy which is basically my only chance.
I am heading back to my hotel when my cab driver Shakkeel who is a nice old man who had 9 kids tells me how he hates the Japanese. He tells me he is very happy that the USA dropped a couple atomic bombs on Japan and if he had the power he would nuke them too. I am thinking that this isn't really helping the muslim image with foreigners. Apparently he saved up his money to get a tourist visa and plane ticket to fly to Tokyo to seek out work and the Japanese officials detained him upon arrival and wouldn't let him leave his hotel and sent him back to Pakistan within 3 days so he lost all his savings. He tells me he knows how to build an atomic bomb and I say *OK so you understand plutonium and the whole yellow cake process etc...* at which he says again *I know how to build a nuclear bomb*.
I head to the Lahore trainstation to get a first class ticket to Islamabad *Pronounce Islam-is-bad* :) and meet a friendly Pakistani named Waqas who is a well dressed and educated Pakistani who helps me purchase my train ticket and then shows me around the old city. We stop off at one of his friends places where they have a school book manufacturing shop and 6 people making school books with wood covers and gluing the paper to the wood covers. He tells me they work 12 hour days and 6 days a week and make around $100 cdn a month. They are super friendly and invite me in to let me take pictures of them working and offer to get me a drink. Since I have been in Pakistan I see they all use metal glasses and jugs which look cool and out of the middle ages and I want to buy some so Waqas takes me to a shop that has the stainless steel glasses and jugs and I buy 6 glasses and a pitcher for $8US.
After this I am craving milk since I haven't really had any since leaving China and I am with someone who knows the city inside out and he brings me to a place that sells delicious milk in a big stainless steel container for 25 cents per glass and I am in heaven! We exchange email addresses and then I head off to Lahore fort inside the old city and there is another guy who wants to be my guide and I tell him I don't want one but he was persistant and saves me 50% of the entrance fee to enter the fort which almost pays his guide fees so I agree. He tells me he lived in London for a year back in 1999 but unlike the other guy Shakkeel he got off the plane and immediately declared *Political asylum* so the British government paid his room and board for one year and gave him 50 english pounds per week as spending money. You can't buy a whole lot with 50 pounds in London so I guess he must have mostly window shopped. He said he spent a full year there looking for a wife to marry and that seems to still be his goal.
Today *July 7* I went out to the Iranian embassy to find out they are closed today on Friday but they will be open on Saturday. I am now wondering whether I am going to be meeting more Iranian Visa Nazis here. Some people said it would take 2 business days to get an Iranian visa but I am very skeptical about that but am still hoping that is the case. If not I will be either flying back to Bangkok from Islamabad or head back into India to Amritsar and then Delhi before heading back to Bangkok. I have to admit that I am beginning to feel very tired of traveling and have been thinking of home ever since I arrived in India. India took a lot out of me for some reason. Maybe the poverty or the filth I don't know but am positive I will be back in Canada before the end of July. Pakistan is the most friendliest country I have ever visited. The hospitality towards foreigners is incredible but then again they don't see too many foreigners here and I am the only foreigner I have seen in my 6 days of traveling through Pakistan from the south *Hyderabad* all the way up to the north *Islamabad*. I will email again once I know whether I am going to Iran or back to Bangkok.
Kevin
Well I got my 11:30pm train from Jodhpur, India to Khokrapar, Pakistan and we stopped at the Indian border at 7:30AM the next day where 700 people crammed into huge queue's at the Indian immigration. A young customs official who was surprised to see a foreigner on this train came over to talk for awhile and then he said he would take my passport and get it stamped so I wouldn't have to wait in line. After getting my passport back I went through customs where they dumped out everything in my backpack and went through everything. The Indian official asked me what my shaving cream was and I told him and then the bozo presses the button and shaving cream sprays out all over my bag and he has a surprised look on his face as he sees what he just did and then looks at me with a bewildered look on his face and I say "Good one!! now you can clean that up". Him and his assistant are looking around for napkins and can only find paper so they do a half ass job cleaning up the mess on my backpack. As I am leaving the customs area and heading for the waiting room the young customs officer who helped check me out of Indian immigration tells me that my train will be coming in the late evening. I say "Evening?? It is only 8:30am right now" and he says that everyone on the train must go through customs and everyones bags must be searched and that will take 10 hours or more and when everyone is through customs then they will call ahead for the Pakistan train to come and pick everyone up. When I had asked around at the Jodhpur train station about how long the train takes to get to Pakistan 2 separate train officials had said 7 hours and the hotel manager who talked me into this train had said the same thing but a young Pakistani man dressed with a white muslim cap and white garment who was in line for the Pakistan train tickets as well had come up to me and asked why I was taking this train and that I should fly to Pakistan instead and he said we would be arriving in Pakistan on Sunday morning and that is why I had such a hard time making up my mind on what route to take and if I should take the bus north to the Attari/Wagan border crossing or the Friday train to Pakistan. The young Pakistani had an honest face and I believed him but 2 train officials told me otherwise so I decided to take the train.
So it is Saturday evening and I have been waiting at the train station at the Indian border for 10 1/2 hours. It was very hot at around 50 degrees Celsius and the water they were selling was even hotter than the weather and they didn't have any cold drinks. I met a lot of cool Pakistani's and Indians who could speak english and hung out with them periodically until the train was ready to leave. It was around 4pm and one poor Indian had passed out on the train platform and people were kicking him trying to get him out of the way for them to cart their bags through and I realized the guy had sun stroke and wasn't just in a deep sleep so as I saw all these Indians just looking at the guy I got to the front of the crowd and told a guy (pointing at his water) to give him some water since he is probably dehydrated and as the guy is pouring water down into the guys mouth I realize he isn't responding to drinking it and that he was unconscious by the vacant gaze in his eyes so I tell him to stop the water immediately because you are drowning him and begin spraying his head with water and a few people are smacking him to wake him up and he eventually comes to.
At 6pm (Saturday) the train to the Pakistan border finally leaves and it is only a 10 minute ride to Khokrapar, Pakistan border where we all get off and go through the exact same thing again. They have good food and cold drinks on the Pakistan side so I quickly munch down some rice and take off to beat everyone else to the immigration dept. We are all packed into a small fenced off area where everyone is carrying all their bags and suitcases and there isn't even elbow room. After I get my passport stamped I have to go through a narrow area where portable rooms are on the right side and a big fence on the left side and a Pakistani in typical muslim robes pulls me into one of the rooms and continues to ask me questions about why I am visiting Pakistan and where I plan to go. His english is so-so and continues to tell me I don't have the right authorization to get into Pakistan and I continue to point to my Pakistan visa 2-3 times during this conversation and after 10 minutes he finally realizes that I do have a Pakistan Visa. And at the end of the interrogation he begins asking me questions about the Indian border and wants to see my pictures from my camera and I know that this is just a spying operation and collecting as much information from travelers about India as they can. I felt like saying "Well you know... I did see a lot of military trucks building up along the border that had heavy tarps covering their V-2 rockets and nuclear warheads but of course I am know military expert but word around the Indian immigration office was that they were planning a surprise attack on Pakistan over the next few days.... but don't quote me or anything" :).
I leave that room and walk 8 steps where another Pakistan official calls me into his room and begins asking the same questions and I tell him that I just went through this with the guy next door but he doesn't seem interested in this so I repeat the exact same thing. After this I proceed to another check point where they search my bag but not as thoroughly as the Indian customs and don't take anything out of my bag. After this I go into a bigger fenced off area that have Pakistani customs officials wearing squeaky clean white customs officer uniforms and they look more like high ranking admirals in the navy. There are huge lines so I begin to get into one when a customs official in his late 40's early 50's (We will call him "Shar" because that is his real name and he appears later on in this travelogue) calls me over to his line and with a friendly smile asks me the usual questions while he quickly looks through my backpack. We have a friendly chat and I tell him I am going to the ancient city of Moenjodaro and he tells me the train won't be leaving for another 4-6 hours but another customs official named Mr so&so would be very interested in chatting with me about archeology in his office where you can wait there until the train departs and Shar goes past the train ticket reservation line to get me my ticket to Hyderabad and then I head over to the portable room where 3 other Pakistani customs officials in their early 50's and in their white customs uniforms begin a conversation with me and there is no access to water in this little compound where 700 Indians and Pakistanis are sitting on the dirt ground with their belongings and waiting for 4-6 hours to board the train but they call for a soldier to grab me water whenever I want and I am thinking to myself "Hell, I like these guys!!" and after about 20 minutes officer so&so calls me into his air conditioned office where we have an interesting conversation talking about the places I am going to visit in Pakistan and what best modes of transportation I should take etc and I also learned alot about Pakistans short 60 year history since it broke away from India in 1947.
Everyone in Pakistan knows that the military controls the country and not the elected prime minister. He tells me about an old prime ministers grave by the site of Moenjodaro and tells me that this Prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was elected by the people in 1973 and in 1977 the military General Zia ul-Haq staged a military coup and made himself president of Pakistan and had the ex president Bhutto hanged in 1979 after an unfair trial and most people say that the charges were false and made up. 10 years later in 1988 General Zia ul-Haq is killed in a mysterious explosion in his helicopter which sounds like an assassination and then Prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto daughter Benazir Bhutto took power for awhile then was exiled to Dubai.
And now we have the current prime minister General Pervez Musharraf who lead a similar military coup against the then Pakistan president Nawaz Sharif in October 1999 and Nawaz Sharif got life imprisonment on hijacking and terrorism charges but later he was exiled as well. Most Pakistanis liked their democratically elected prime ministers but when the military wants to change leaderships they do it whenever they want through military coups.
Anyways it was an interesting conversation and at 10pm he tells me my train is now bordering and I thank him for his hospitality and as I am leaving the big fenced gate that is full of Indians and Pakistanis sitting on the ground floor inside the compound everywhere I glance across at Shar at the customs counter and give him a smile and wave before getting onto the train. The train doesn't leave though until 2:30am Sunday morning and I have the guy who helped me bud to the front of the line in the Jodhpur trainstation in India in the same compartment as me. At 8:30am we arrive in Hyderabad where I jump off the train and many Pakistanis come up to me immediately and begin chatting when I see a hand from behind them reach over to shake my hand and for a full 2 seconds I am trying to remember where I know this guy from and realize it is Shar from the Pakistani customs in Khokrapar but instead of being dressed in his sharp looking white customs uniform he is wearing a simple muslims garment that looks a little dirty so I am shocked to see him. I asked him if he had slept and he said he had and that all the customs officials live in Hyderabad but travel to Khokrapar on Saturday nights just for the once a week train from India. They all drive to Khokrapar in their vehicles and left at 1am that morning. So Shar gets an auto rickshaw and we head to the bus station in Jamshoro which is 15 km out of Hyderabad and find out the bus leaves at 11am so I go to pay for the rickshaw driver and Shar says "No, you don't pay, you are a guest in my country and the bus leaves in another 2 hours so you can come back to my home to meet my family and get an opportunity to clean up and refresh yourself". I am always a tad bit skeptical in situations like this which I think is healthy and keeps me on my toes just in case I am being set up for money or something but I knew he was genuine and wanted to show me Pakistani hospitality.
We arrive at his house which is very modest and I meet one of his sons. He has 2 daughters and 4 sons and they are all going to university for degrees. Shar has a degree in Economics. He asks me if I would like to take a bath and I tell him that would be great and am just dreaming of soaking in a tub for 30 minutes but I hear his son running water into a bucket and it is then do I realize I will be bathing like the Indians by reaching into a bucket to pour water over myself as I wash. After I shave and clean up he has his son bring in tea, water, crackers and some type of nan bread which is popular here with a yogurt side dish for dipping the bread into. We chat a bit and he tells me the elections in Pakistan are a joke and that General Pervez Musharraf will be president for as long as he likes. I tell him the Joseph Stalin quote "It isn't how many votes you get that matters but WHO counts the votes that matter". I asked him if he sees many foreigners come through on that train and he says no except for one American came through 4 months ago when the train line to Khokrapar had just opened after being closed for 40 years. Pakistan bombed the train tracks in 1965 in one of the many Pakistan/India wars fighting over Kashmir region. Afterwards Shar drives me out to Jamshoro and I grab my 11am bus to Larkana. It was a 4 1/2 hour bus ride up to Larkana. The bus horns in Pakistan and India sound like the combination of a horn and ambulance siren (Very annoying).
In Larkana I must have been the first white person to come through this town because as I walked down the streets people would stop what they are doing and get their friends attention and turn back to watch me go by. I mean restaurant murmur will stop as I passed a restaurant. In Hyderabad I didn't walk around much but many people were looking into the rickshaw as we drove around. People are friendly in Pakistan and all I have to do is smile at them and they return the smile with a big toothy grin. The only english that some people know is "How are you?".
As I walked down an alley I saw a guy driving a motorcycle with a woman completely covered in black and an infant in between them and the guy looked exactly like Osama Bin Laden!! I mean identical and wearing the same type of turban. I almost pissed my pants. I was going to take a picture but he went by too quickly.
I went into a store that had air conditioning and bought some ice cream because it was so hot outside and as I left the store and walked down onto the main street in Larkana and was completely focused on opening that ice cream and devouring it when after taking 10 steps out of the store and onto the road I all of a sudden feel my right foot not land on the pavement and it seems to be going lower and lower into the road and of course my attention is still on the ice cream but I am beginning to wonder what is going on when I put my free hand out to stop the falling. The next thing I know I am on the main street in downtown Larkana and up to my waist in OIL!!! I am in shock and confused and it takes me 3 seconds to realize what is going on and manage to climb out of this hole in the road that is full of oil. After I am out of the oil and assessing why there is a huge hole in the middle of the road that just happens to be filled to the top with oil I tell myself that I am in a foreign country and many things here don't make sense. As I fell into the hole I heard people on both sides of the streets say "OH!!" as if they just witnessed an accident and they are still there on the street looking at me (probably laughing) and I feel my temper rising quickly where I shriek "WHY THE FUCK IS THERE A HOLE FULL OF OIL IN THE MIDDLE OF THE GOD DAMN ROOOOOAAAAAAAD!!!!". Nobody says anything but a guys calls me over and hoses me down. As I walk down the street I am wondering what the odds were of me being completely focused on something else (The ice cream) and falling into the only hole of oil in the whole town if not of all Pakistan. Luckily I was wearing my sandals and not my hiking boots. After thinking about it for a long time as I continued down the road I arrived at the firm conclusion that it wasn't chance or coincidence but destiny and that I must have been meant to fall into that hole full of oil even before I arrived in Larkana. The odds of it happening were a million to one. But you all will be happy to know that I did save my ice cream even after I tumbled into the hole full of oil (I must save the ice cream at all costs!! :)).
There hasn't been a dull moment since I arrived in Pakistan and sometimes I will just lock myself in my hotel just to relax and even then I had my phone ring and I picked it up and heard a muffled voice speaking and couldn't even tell what language it was so I hung up and then 10 seconds later the phone rings again and it is the same muffled voice so I assume it is the front desk calling me and that they have a bad connection so I go down and the front desk clerks sees me and nods me over and begins asking me questions like "Where did you come from before Larkana?" "What is your next destination?" "What is your profession?". Well everytime I tell him my answer he turns to another guy on the same side of the desk as me who has his back turned to me and looking down while the front desk clerk is giving him my answer in Sindi. After the second time he turned to this guy I pointed at the man and asked the clerk "OK who is this guy?" and the clerks tells me he is with Pakistani intelligence and that this type of intelligence gathering on foreigners in Pakistan is routine in hotels.
At 8am the next day I hire a taxi to take me out to the 5000 year old ancient city of Moenjodaro which is as important in archeological terms as ancient Egypt and ancient Sumeria. It is a 3000 square meter city built during the bronze age when the Indus river used to wind its way around the city but over 5000 years the Indus river has shifted course. I went into the museum first and saw old chess sets from that time and other games and dice that is still popular today. Moenjodaro was discovered in 1911 and excavated in the 1920's. It is a mud brick city that had granaries and pools and bath houses and an area for the rich people and an area for the poor people. I don't usually like guides for sites that have english signs posted but some older Pakistani guy was following me around whose name was Momon Husson and claimed to be an archeologist and my guide book talks about an archeologists that is always on the site so I assumed it was him. As he showed me around I read an english sign about the Kushana period at Moenjodaro and asked him what years they lived and after dodging the question a few times he finally said he didn't know and I begin to doubt his self acclaimed credentials about being an archeologist since civilizations and dates are obviously important to archeologists but when I left he didn't ask for any money and sat down to let me leave to another site nearby so I gave him 300 rupees assuming he doesn't make much here. I looked at the guest registry and saw that only 1 foreigner per week visits this site but everyone said it was because of the heat that most people don't come to Pakistan at this time of the year. I totally understand!
Afterwards my taxi dropped me off at my hotel where I checked out and grabbed an auto rickshaw to take me to a minibus station which is the only way to Bahawalpur from Larkana. I was packed in with 20 other people on this minibus (4 seats on a row and 5 rows in the van). I met 2 english speaking Pakistanis on the minibus and they told me that English is Pakistans official language because Pakistan is divided into 4 provinces and each province speaks a completely different language so all the universities are in english and they use english to talk with their friends in other provinces. They were on their way to work as computer technicians working for Pakistans power company and their office was between Sukkur and Rohri.
There was an off-duty police officer in the minivan and he was asking them to ask me why I didn't have an armed escort to travel throughout Pakistan and I told him I didn't need one but the officer wanted to know where I was coming from and where I was going etc... and then used his walkie talkie to call in to report this to the police station and the 2 pakistanis said something about him arranging for me to have an escort for my trip to Bahawalpur. I told them I didn't want it. So we arrived in Sukkur and had to switch minivans to go to Rohri. The two Pakistanis get off at their stop and tell me their friend in the minibus will take me to the train station in Rohri.
So I get to the Rohri train station and a huge crowd of curious onlookers gather around me and of course no one speaks english. After 10 minutes of this a young english speaking Pakistani named Shakkeel comes up and asks me where I am going and he tells me that the train bound for Bahawalpur is getting ready to leave now so I rush to get a ticket and Shakkeel helps me carry a bag as we run to the platform where the train is moving and picking up speed so I throw my backpack onto the moving train and climb onboard with Shakkeel. I thank him and we exchange email addresses and I realize I purchased an economy class ticket as I enter the coach and realize why the 6 hour journey only costed $3us. As I am in one of the coaches with 5 other Pakistanis I see a big stocky Pakistani in a police officers outfit come in and he nods at me with a little wave and sits down in my coach. I am suspicious of whether this guy is here for me to escort me on the train to Bahawalpur but he doesn't speak english. This guy is about 270lbs so very big for a Pakistani and he looks like the Pakistan version of the character "Schultz" from the 1970's TV series "Hogans Heroes". I could almost see him saying "I see NOOOOOOTHING! I hear NOOOOOTHING!" like the Schultz character always said. As I am sitting down in economy class I hear a Pakistani call me over asking me why I didn't get the air-conditioned coach. When I get over to where this english speaking Pakistani is I am shocked that he too looks like Osama Bin Laden! I have to do a double take. This guy is a gentle soul which I can tell by his mannerisms and he tells me he is a famous artist in Pakistan and his work is displayed all over the world in different galleries and asks if I want to see it. I don't want to see it because I think he wants me to buy something from him but he is nice and I don't want to be rude so I say sure that I would like to see his art work. He has a portfolio with him and shows me all the media attention and newspaper clippings with his picture on the front displaying his work and then takes out paintings of his that are fantastic and art that I like but half his stuff I thought was crap (This of course is coming from a guy who can only draw stickmen :)).
A few hours into the train ride the train conductor comes around checking on tickets and gives me a warm greeting and sits down to talk with me. He is about the same age as myself and he is insisting that I come as his special guest into the air conditioned coach and not stay where I am but I gracefully decline his offer and tell him I meet the most interesting people in economy class so he assigns a guy to look after me and this guy buys me drinks when I am thirsty which I don't like but that is Pakistani hospitality for you. Later he comes and gives me some train souvenirs that I can use like cloths for wiping the sweat off of me and combs etc... His name is Abid and we exchange emails and Hanif the artist doesn't have an email address but I give him my email address anyhow since I enjoyed his company. Really nice guy and I can't believe he is stuck with a face like Osama Bin Laden! There were a few others in my coach that spoke english as well and they were very friendly and curious people. Very curious because they were constantly staring at me when they thought I wasn't looking.
The train arrived in Bahawalpur at 7:30PM and I said goodbye to everyone I met in my coach and headed off to grab an autorickshaw to head to a hotel. One autorickshaw guy snags me on the platform and tells me he can take me and once we are outside the train terminal I asked him how much and he says 50 rupees which I know is too high since I am only going 400 meters down the road and look around at the other shouting autorickshaw operaters pushing their way closer to me and ask them for a better price and the guy beside me says 30 rupees and I say "OK I am going with you, lead the way". Well the first autorickshaw driver didn't like this and thought I was his customer and began pushing the other driver and I tell him he should have given me his best price to start with or he could have had the fare. I can be such a prick over a little 50 cent difference haha.
I grab a pop and we zip down the street to the hotel when I see a dog come out of nowhere with a possessed and angry look on its face as it dodges around other moving autorickshaws and looks completely determined to bite my leg that is sticking out of the rickshaw because my backpack is taking up too much room inside the rickshaw. The dog must have smelled white meat entering his town and was determined to take a bite of it. As the dog came within biting range I cracked him between the eyes with my plastic 600ml bottle of Fanta which made him stop dead in his tracks and I scared the hell out of the driver who turned around with a concerned look on his face and said "Did that dog bite you??". I showed him my Fanta bottle and said the dog meant Mr Fanta before he had a chance to bite me.
The next day I grab a minibus from Bahawalpur for the 71km drive to Uch Shariff where 500 year old Sufi shrines are located. We get there in 1 1/2 hours and then I grab a bicycle rickshaw for the 3-5 km distance out to the Sufi Shrines. The best preserved Sufi shrine was built in 1494 but they were all damaged badly by a big flood 200 years ago. They are octagon shaped shrines with a dome on top and have blue and white tiles on the outside and they look absolutely beautiful. Another english speaking Pakistani wants to be my guide and I reluctantly agree. After showing me around I give him some money and then because it is so hot we head for the shade in the Sufi Shrine. The best preserved shrine is only half a shrine due to the flood damage and there is scaffolding inside and lots of other Pakistanis inside taking refuge from the incredible heat. Some are smoking hashish and others just relaxing so I go over to join them and they tell me that they are all either Sunni or Shi'ite muslims and claim that all the Sufis are a crazy muslim group which is normally associated with fighting and the Taliban. I have a hard time believing this but then assume there are crazy sufis just like there are other types of crazy muslims. After an hour or so I meet up with my bicycle rickshaw driver and we head back to Uch Sharif and then I grab the same minibus back to Bahawalpur.
The next day I go to the trainstation to buy a last minute ticket to Lahore for 11am to find out 1st and 2nd class is all sold out so I am forced to take economy class again. When I first entered Pakistan I used to wonder why they didn't clean the seats since all the seat are full of thick dust but I soon realized it gets that way within an hour of riding on the train from the desert sand coming through the windows and you can clean your seat and it will be full of dust within an hour again. When I got off the train in Lahore at 11pm I saw the most beautiful sight that to me was the more beautiful than even the Taj Mahal. That of course was seeing PIZZA HUT!! I haven't had fast food since leaving China and was already thinking on the train while checking out my map of Lahore that I would go to Pizza hut but didn't realize they had one inside the train station. A soldier with a double barreled shotgun was patroling the Pizza Hut doors as I bursted through.
The next day I take a cab out to the Iranian consulate in Lahore and enquire about the possibility of getting an Iranian visa through them so the guy at the gate tells me to come back Sunday and I tell him I won't be hear on Sunday and just want to know what my chances are of getting a visa through them so he takes my passport and tells me to wait as he checks with the Iranian high consulate. As I am waiting a friendly Pakistani soldier calls me over to sit down and get me some tea which I liked. 10 minutes later the Iranian official opens the gate 2 feet wide and thrusts his arm straight towards me with my passport in his hand and says and I quote *No visa for you!*. He said it just like the soup nazi off of the Seinfeld episode where the soup nazi says *No soup for you!!!!*. But this guy was the Visa Nazi. My guidebook tells me that this Iranian embassy is pretty much useless and only a few other travelers have had success getting a visa through them so I decide I will go to Islamabad since most Iranian visas are issued through the Islamabad iranian embassy which is basically my only chance.
I am heading back to my hotel when my cab driver Shakkeel who is a nice old man who had 9 kids tells me how he hates the Japanese. He tells me he is very happy that the USA dropped a couple atomic bombs on Japan and if he had the power he would nuke them too. I am thinking that this isn't really helping the muslim image with foreigners. Apparently he saved up his money to get a tourist visa and plane ticket to fly to Tokyo to seek out work and the Japanese officials detained him upon arrival and wouldn't let him leave his hotel and sent him back to Pakistan within 3 days so he lost all his savings. He tells me he knows how to build an atomic bomb and I say *OK so you understand plutonium and the whole yellow cake process etc...* at which he says again *I know how to build a nuclear bomb*.
I head to the Lahore trainstation to get a first class ticket to Islamabad *Pronounce Islam-is-bad* :) and meet a friendly Pakistani named Waqas who is a well dressed and educated Pakistani who helps me purchase my train ticket and then shows me around the old city. We stop off at one of his friends places where they have a school book manufacturing shop and 6 people making school books with wood covers and gluing the paper to the wood covers. He tells me they work 12 hour days and 6 days a week and make around $100 cdn a month. They are super friendly and invite me in to let me take pictures of them working and offer to get me a drink. Since I have been in Pakistan I see they all use metal glasses and jugs which look cool and out of the middle ages and I want to buy some so Waqas takes me to a shop that has the stainless steel glasses and jugs and I buy 6 glasses and a pitcher for $8US.
After this I am craving milk since I haven't really had any since leaving China and I am with someone who knows the city inside out and he brings me to a place that sells delicious milk in a big stainless steel container for 25 cents per glass and I am in heaven! We exchange email addresses and then I head off to Lahore fort inside the old city and there is another guy who wants to be my guide and I tell him I don't want one but he was persistant and saves me 50% of the entrance fee to enter the fort which almost pays his guide fees so I agree. He tells me he lived in London for a year back in 1999 but unlike the other guy Shakkeel he got off the plane and immediately declared *Political asylum* so the British government paid his room and board for one year and gave him 50 english pounds per week as spending money. You can't buy a whole lot with 50 pounds in London so I guess he must have mostly window shopped. He said he spent a full year there looking for a wife to marry and that seems to still be his goal.
Today *July 7* I went out to the Iranian embassy to find out they are closed today on Friday but they will be open on Saturday. I am now wondering whether I am going to be meeting more Iranian Visa Nazis here. Some people said it would take 2 business days to get an Iranian visa but I am very skeptical about that but am still hoping that is the case. If not I will be either flying back to Bangkok from Islamabad or head back into India to Amritsar and then Delhi before heading back to Bangkok. I have to admit that I am beginning to feel very tired of traveling and have been thinking of home ever since I arrived in India. India took a lot out of me for some reason. Maybe the poverty or the filth I don't know but am positive I will be back in Canada before the end of July. Pakistan is the most friendliest country I have ever visited. The hospitality towards foreigners is incredible but then again they don't see too many foreigners here and I am the only foreigner I have seen in my 6 days of traveling through Pakistan from the south *Hyderabad* all the way up to the north *Islamabad*. I will email again once I know whether I am going to Iran or back to Bangkok.
Kevin
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