VillageChick

Tuesday, 1 March 2011

TRAVELS WITH OUR SHERPA. Pt 3

PAKISTAN. STUCK IN THE BALUCHISTAN.

Pakistan was by far our favorite country. It came top of our list for hospitality, adventure, value for money and stunning scenery. All the negative things that were told about Pakistan by the West, just didn’t happen to us or other travellers we met. That we would get robbed, shot and that the men would have little respect for me as a western woman. It wasn’t true. Every Pakistani we met, (except one) couldn’t do enough to help us and make our visit a happy one. My only disappointment was that I didn’t meet many women. Women led a very traditional life, staying at home looking after the family. In some rural areas, women only ventured outside when wearing a Burqa, a sort of complete covering of a huge round table cloth, with a material mesh window for the face. Burqas were not so common in the cities, where women, held jobs and dressed in a more relaxed manner. I adopted the traditional Shalwar Khamese, baggy long trousers, covered by a long dress, and had no problems.

Pakistan is not for the faint hearted. But for the rough and ready seasoned traveller who know to expect the unexpected. If you are open-minded, down-to-earth and dress conservatively, you’ll have a wonderful time.

Our first impression of Pakistan at the Iranian/Pakistan border was how filthy it looked. Rubbish, mostly plastic was strewn all over the streets, piled high in some places and men urinated on the rubbish piles, adding to the unsavory odours of rotting rubbish and dead dogs. On top of that the border town looked run down, dingy and had a very healthy population of flies.

As we sat in the overcrowded customs room, in the sweltering heat, I couldn’t help noticing a rather fancy arrangement of twigs and pieces of moss covering the entire and only window.

‘What on earth is that?' I asked the official stamping my passport.

‘Oh, that’s our air-conditioning unit.’ He proudly exclaimed.

‘Well you’d better get it turned up then.’ Quipped Alan as he mopped his brow. The official then ordered one of the office minions to turn it up. This was achieved by flicking water on the arrangement, allowing it to evaporate, so cooling, if only feebly, the temperature of the office.

From the border we had to cross the potentially dangerous Baluchistan Desert, the only road being a rough broken tarmac track, of roughly 300 miles. Having made sure we had a full tank and plenty of water, we set off. The Baluchistan was just miles of semi-desert scrub land. In parts, desert storms had covered the track, making driving in a non-4X4 difficult. In the event of a break down, RAC recovery didn’t stretch this far! The route was quite well frequented by Iranian truckers carrying fuel and other provisions into Pakistan. We had met up with two travellers, a Brit called Lorraine and her partner from New Zealand, Shane. They were in a Land Rover and agreed to travel with us for the crossing. Also traveling at the same time were a German couple with two cats. They had got held up at the border due to their suspicious cargo. Religious statues rapped up in bandages! They were on a religious mission for the Catholic Bishop of Madras. They told us that they had done the same trip 4 years ago, in search of the meaning of life, but didn’t find it!

Our desert crossing was going well until we decided to try and drive from the old road to the new road, which had just been built but not officially opened. In between the two was an area of soft, deep sand, which didn’t look good. We watched Shane and Lorraine make it to the new road in their 4X4 Land Rover, then we (Alan) tried. I knew what was coming, that we were going to get stuck, but my predictions were falling on deaf ears. All I could do was grip my seat and wait for us to grind to a halt. We did get stuck, being unable to move backwards or forwards. I was informed that my quip, ‘I told you so.’ Was typically female and that I couldn’t have possibly have predicted the results of momentum, speed and weights involved, in such a difficult manoeuvre! Shane tried to pull us free, but couldn’t do it, mumbling something about his clutch. A huge 6X6 Volvo construction

truck coming the other way tried, but our super duper heavy duty towing rope from a well known car accessory shop, snapped 4 times. The German couple eventually caught us up and pulled us back with their multi stranded, metal tug boat rope.

At the Sind/Punjab border we were stopped and asked to wait for an escort. Apparently a military coup was looming and there was civil unrest, and as visitors we were to be kept safe at all times. As we waited at the state border Zafar, a very friendly policeman insisted that we partake of refreshments. A tea slurping, biscuit eating, uniform swapping, photo session ensued and we were so busy enjoying ourselves, that we didn’t notice a Toyota Jeep with a sub-machine gun mounted on top, underneath which sat six more armed police.

‘Your escort has arrived.’ Proclaimed Zafar.

Our escort lasted three days and took us to Lahore. It travelled in front of us with the sub-machine gun being pointed in all directions and the other armed police hanging out of the back of the jeep, guns in hand, ready to stop anyone who dared to come between us. So that we were not held up in towns, road blocks had been set up and the public held back by more armed police, who saluted us as we swept through the town. We were being treated like royalty. The most impressive manoeuvres were the rolling change-overs. Every few hours a blockade had been set up with the next escort waiting to take over, all executed with military precision. It was impressive. We parted with our escort at the YWCA, Lahore and parked up in their gardens. Lahore was a very dusty, dirty, polluted, crowded, chaotic and smelly city, but the people were most friendly.

We decided to drive the Karakorum Highway, the high road to China. The road grips the valley walls through the Karakorum Mountain range, home of K2. The KKH was originally built in 1959, to link Gilgit, some 840 kms away, to the rest of Pakistan. Later it was extended from Gilgit to Sust and into China. At the peak of construction 25,000 men were employed to build the road, which included; 24 bridges, 70 smaller bridges, 1,708 high class culverts, using; 8 million tons of dynamite to move 30 million tons of earth and rock. After the addition of 80 million tons of cement the KKH was finally completed in 1978. The chief engineer is said to have stated that, ‘No road has been more difficult.’ Whilst the construction was an incredible achievement, it also had a dark side. It left 400 dead and 314 seriously injured, though many of those involved would argue that the figures were appreciably higher. Due to weather damage and seismic activity, repairing and keeping the KKH open, is an ongoing process. The road is often impassable during the winter months. We had to drive over numerous landsides and negotiate rough tracks to avoid sliding glaciers. The scenery was awesome and we were made most welcome, wherever we stopped.

Half way up the KKH, our clutch got stuck in 2^nd gear. We managed to crawl to the next village, where the local tailor took control. He summoned a small garage into action, with the remainder of the village coming to watch. With a flurry of activity a couple of young lads instantly took the gearbox out, mended the clutch and had us ready to roll again within 1½ hours, even though they had probably never seen a Sherpa before. The job cost a mere $10 and the gearbox didn’t give us a moment’s trouble, all the way home.

Pakistani trucks and buses must be some of the most highly decorated in the world. The hours invested to painstakingly decorate with painted pictures, attachments of chains, baubles and dangly bits, is mind-boggling! The vast majority of truckers would blow their fancy horns as they passed us, at the same time giving us a heart felt smile and wave, to welcome us to Pakistan.

Pakistan made our hearts smile. They were proud of their country and accepted us as we were. Whilst they might appear to be living in the past, their acts of concern and hospitality are far superior to ours in the West. Never would they ignore one of their own or a foreigner who needed help. What a pity I am unable to say the same for the English!

Police border post, Sind/Punjab border.

5 Rupee note.

377 miles of Baluchistan Desert, Iran/Pakistan border.

Getting stuck in the Baluchistan.

Local Baluchistan bus.

Our escort from Sind/Punjab border.

Sherpie up the Karakorum Highway. KKH.

Rush hour traffic up the KKH.

A Pakistani trucker and his highly decorated truck.

More of the truck.

TRAVELS WITH OUR SHERPA . Pt 2

IRAN

We approached the Iranian border with a little fear and in trepidation. I was suitably frumpy, shapeless and covered, with hijab (head cover, law for all women) and munto (baggy coat). Contrary to Mad Max’s information it wasn’t the women that were separated from the men, but the drivers from the passengers. The most bizarre part of customs was having an official ask if we had contraband in the form of a pack of playing cards!

Iran was the first country to stamp our important Carnet de Passage document for the waiver of our vehicle import duties.

The first thing we had to do in Iran was re-fuel. Filling stations were full of old petrol Land Rovers, old Hillman Hunters, very old Hillman Hunters, and new Hillman Hunters. They were every where! Rootes, the British company sold Hillman Hunters in kit form to Iran from 1969-87 during which time Iran could not import fully assembled cars. After 1987 Iran bought the rights to the Hillman Hunters and started to make them under the name of Peykan. Filling our tank, four Jerry cans, and two litre bottles of coke, we received a handful of change out of a $1 bill! (Diesel was 1p Litre!)

We only had a five day transit visa which we had been told could not be extended. Iran was 1,628 miles across via the shortest route. Visiting Isfahan and Shiraz would add roughly an extra 703 miles. Roads were excellent driving roads, in fact better than many English ones, considering that Iranians didn’t pay any road tax! They were mainly dual carriage ways between large towns, and Iranian truckers would always flash their lights and sound their musical horns as soon as they noticed that we were a foreign vehicle.

Tehran is a huge sprawling city, with a population of about 10 million. People, and was our rendezvous with our friend Hissam. We had arranged to meet him at the toll gate just outside Tehran.

As we approached the toll kiosk the attendant asked us where we were from.

‘England.’ we told him.

‘You are very welcome in Iran, the toll for you is free.’

Hissam was a psychologist and worked for a rehabilitation centre in Tehran, which helped those with drug and alcohol addiction and those who had attempted suicide. ...........Alcohol addiction in Iran! With the importation and sale of alcohol strictly prohibited anyone caught doing so would be faced with a prison sentence and possibly death. Hissam explained that alcohol being impossible to buy, industrious Iranians simply brewed it themselves. He told us,

‘Since the revolution the strict changes of law and conduct have left many people feeling confused, angry and rebellious. They end up being very depressed and frustrated and look for an escape. Addiction is simply a way out for some people.’ Hissam in a sombre mood continued. ‘Iran was a beautiful, very wealthy and developed country during the time of the Shah. Although things were not perfect, Iranian citizens enjoyed freedoms then, that they can only dream of now. Can you imagine what it must be like for a man not to be able to sit next to his wife on a public bus or to be able to take her for a game of tennis or even to be able to take his family to the beach and swim with them? Still today these things are not possible. Men must sit separate to women on public transport and on the beach women and girls must bathe under the covered section of the beach away from the men and the boys. All of these restrictions put tremendous pressures on carrying out a normal family life.’

En-route to Empire Park we passed a large housing estate West of the city, known as Ekbatan Flats. They were built in the reign of the Shah and it is said that when viewed from above, the lay out of the flats reads in Persian, Javid Shah ‘Long live the Shah.’ Apparently when the Ayatollah came to power he wanted to change the message to Javid Khomeini, ‘Long Live Khomeini’ but the project proved too costly and complicated and was abandoned. The Ayatollah also tried to change hospitals, by making them either for females or males, but with the mass exodus of professionals after the revolution, this also proved too problematic and had to be abandoned!

Located in the North of Tehran, Empire Park (or National Park under the Shah) is home to some beautifully manicured lawns and gardens, a complete contrast to the drab, dusty streets of Tehran. At the weekends families and friends came by the car load to picnic and enjoy the peace and tranquillity of the gardens. The park though well kept today, must have been a sumptuous and ambitious project in the days of the Shah with its fountains and waterfalls, small lakes and aviary. Surrounded by trees the Shah instructed that each one be fitted with identity plates, giving origin, age and type. After the revolution the mullahs had all the plates removed, claiming that it was petty nonsense!

We were now beginning to enjoy Iran and her people and as a consequence wanted to extend our visas. At the Alien’s Bureau (should translate Foreigner’s Bureau) we had to complete three duplicate forms and hand them in accompanied by three photos. The official took our paperwork, but then handed mine back.

‘What’s wrong?’ I quizzed.

‘I cannot accept these.’ said the official.

‘But why, what’s wrong with them?’ I asked.

‘Ma’am, it is forbidden under the regulations of the Islamic Republic of Iran for me to accept a photo of an unveiled woman.’

‘But you’ve just taken a photocopy of the same photo on my passport and that is a picture of me unveiled.’ I went on but with little effect, ‘Surely that must be in contravention of the regulations of the Islamic Republic of Iran!’ I was told that it was just silly rules and that the official granting the extensions was a very religious man and that he might not like my face unveiled and as a consequence may not issue the extension!

‘It’s not a problem, you can walk a few streets away and get your photo taken and return.’ Two and half hours later we had completed the task.

I asked Hissam, why as a professional he didn’t leave Iran along with the millions of other professionals who escaped the Ayatollah’s strict and repressive regime. His answer was short and simple.

‘Iran is my country. If all the professionals leave, there will be no one left. Some one has to stay and help the changes.’ We silently drove back to Hissam’s house, resigned to the fact that we would once more have to visit the ‘Alien’s Bureau’ in a couple of days time to collect our visas.

In Esfahan, we were parked a little distance from the main square, so we flagged down a Hillman Hunter taxi. We gave our destination to the driver and before we barely had time to get in and shut the door, there was a screech of tyres and we were thrown back into our seats by the accelerating car. What followed resembled a clip out of a 007 movie as the taxi sped through the streets of Esfahan at breakneck speeds, swerving and weaving in and out of the main traffic. Suddenly he swerved into a covered alleyway and accelerated through a maize of ancient narrow market ways, sending pedestrians, cycles , and donkey carts, jumping for their life! At the mercy of centrifugal forces, we were thrown from one side of the back seat to the other, eventually screeching to a halt in the main square.

We sat in silence as the driver watched our faces in the rear view mirror.

‘You are welcome in Iran.’ He told us.

The main square in Isfahan, Meidun-e Eman Khomeini, built in 1612 and covering an area of about 20 acres is the second largest square in the world. The largest being Tiananmen Square, China. Shops and mosques line the square with blue tiled onion domes and minarets standing out in front of a back drop of clear blue skies. Lush green lawns dotted with healthy green trees brought the square to life. If you focused on the buildings it was easy to believe that you still in the year 1612, since which little seemed to have changed.

I liked Iran and her people, and we were shown acts of friendship throughout our travels in Iran, which were heart-felt and genuine. One day we were driving between towns and a gentleman passed us in a Hillman Hunter waiving a teapot out of his window! He simply wanted us to stop and drink tea with him. But I was shocked to find that Iran, a ‘cleansed Islamic regime’ had so many problems, just like the rest of us. I somehow expected Iranians to live perfect lives under the strict religious code of conduct, that professed to know what was best for everyone in the name of Islam. I understood that Islam and Moslems are not always the same and that Iranians were struggling with the oppressive regime of the Ayatollah.

On the road in Iran

Iman Square, Esfahan, Iran. Sherpa under 6th arch from left.

The Blue Mosque, Esfahan.

Blue Mosque, Esfahan.

Friday prayers.

Bas relief Persepolis, Iran.

Salt lakes near Shiraz, Iran.

TRAVELS WITH OUR SHERPA. Pt 1

NO PROBLEM.

Sick of the rat race in England, my husband and I decided to sell up and buy a camper van, and drive to Kathmandu, Nepal! We bought a 10 year old ex-British Rail ‘Sherpa’ canteen van, which cost £850 and with a few minor adjustments made it into a basic but comfortable camper. Some friends envied us, wanting to do the same but were too afraid. Others laughed at us. ‘You’re both mad. You’ll never make it to Dover in that!’ I seem to recall one of them saying smugly. But we did make it to Dover and Kathmandu, in fact 22,366 miles, 18 countries and 12 months later we arrived back on Dover docks all in one piece. Our route; England, France, Belgium, Germany, Czech Republic, Slovak Republic, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, India, Nepal, returning via Greece, Italy, Austria and Holland. But were we really mad? Had we bitten off more than we could chew? The thought did cross our minds as we left the dismal August weather of England behind, along with the familiarity of our homeland and boarded the ferry to France. We were doing the whole trip on a wing and a prayer. We only had a handful of spare parts and a few good maps of Turkey, Iran, Pakistan and India. We had no satellite navigation, no RAC breakdown recovery, no mobile cell phones, no medical insurance, no life insurance, no jobs, no home to return to, no back-up plans, and not much money. And unlike Michael Palin, we had no BBC backing for when things went wrong. On the face of it, things didn’t look good. But we had faith in ourselves and our abilities, despite all the advice from well-meaning friends and family to the contrary. Our fears soon evaporated, as we watched the White Cliffs of Dover disappear behinds us, and faced up to the arduous journey ahead. I religiously kept a diary every day of our travels, which documented the hilarious, dangerous and sometimes sad occasions of our epic journey. My personal quest was to find the meaning of life and to find out if there really was more to life than a seemingly never ending cycle of work, eat, sleep, a mortgage, and a pension. I found far more than I bargained for.

Our route through Eastern Europe was to put it mildly, rather rapid. It took us both about a month to relax and enjoy the journey, instead of rushing around with the idea that we had to be there yesterday. The pressures of modern living, were initially proving a little hard to shake off. Buy the time we had settled into a relaxed travelling mode, we found ourselves at the Bulgarian, Turkish border. It was our first real border crossing and one which we will never forget.

Turkish Delight.

After the grumpy Eastern Europeans, Turkey was a breath of fresh air. As our little Sherpa chugged up the leafy hills into no-man’s-land, it felt as though a huge depression had been lifted from our midst. At the large immigration/customs building, we had to go and obtain an impressive array of stamps, stickers, signatures, and pieces of paper, from an equally impressive array of helpfully unlabeled doors, windows and apertures, which even the Indians were unable to match. It was by far the longest border crossing of our trip, taking almost two hours to complete. I am sure one of the stamps was to welcome us to the Turkish Millionaires Club, as we had changed £20 to 9,700,000 Turkish Lira.

Our first stop in Turkey was at a campsite on the Silivri Coast just before Istanbul, which resembled a refugee camp. Large canvas tents pitched closely together, covered with extra sheets of tarpaulin to protect the canvas from the effects of the sun. The men sat around talking to each other, and the children played around the camp and on the beach, whilst women sat outside their voluminous tents, preparing the evening meals. We were welcomed by Pedro, who found us a place to park behind all the tents. No sooner than we had parked, than women and children came with offerings of food, drink and friendship. Although no one could speak any English, we were made very welcome by everyone, and no one would accept any payment for our stay. We later realized that it was a Turkish campsite, where Turkish families from Istanbul would come every year for a week for two, bringing most of their household furniture with them on trailers towed by tractors, to put in the tents literally bringing everything but the kitchen sink.

Istanbul was a huge sprawling city, in which we had to obtain our Iranian visas. We camped at Atakoy Campsite on the coast and rode our cycles into Istanbul. This was a tad risky with the melee of traffic jostling for position, but it seemed the Turkish motorists were used to cyclists and gave us a wide berth. We obtained our Iranian visas each costing $50 each in just a matter of days, with minimum fuss. In fact we wondered why everyone warned us it would be difficult. It couldn’t have been easier.

Back at the campsite, a worrying situation was apparent. A young blonde German cyclist was pitching his bivouac just feet from our camper, his frame lean to the extreme, that his trousers were prevented from falling down by a piece of string. Being a very inquisitive person, I went and introduced myself, only to find to my horror that this young man had cycled from Germany and was on his way to INDIA!

‘I must be moving early tomorrow. I have to get through Turkey before it gets too cold and into Iran before it gets too hot.’

‘Why don’t you catch a bus?’ I asked. He wasn’t impressed with my idea, and rushed off to the toilet block for a well earned shower. We woke the following morning to find only a patch of flattened grass, where his bivouac had been. I worried about him and hoped that we would pass him somewhere on the road. Another character on the campsite, was Mad Max, a German who wasted little time informing us why our Sherpa wouldn’t make it to India.

‘You have no bumper, only a plastic one.’ He said kicking our standard Sherpa bumper with his big German feet. ‘There are so many cows in India, that you must have a strong bumper.’ He told us waiving his arms about for effect. ‘Pah! You only have single leaf suspension springs. They won’t last a day. Of course you must understand that the roads in India are very rough and springs break easily.’ He then stood back with arms folded and laughed. Mad Max, and his wife it seemed, had driven to India in their 30 year old Mercedes camper van 12 times. Their first drive was back in 1976, but this year they had only been as far as Iran. Mad Max didn’t like the Iranian’s restrictive rules and regulations, and warned us that we would be in for a tough time.

‘Of course, when we started driving to India, there were no tourists, just travellers, who blended in and didn’t demand changes. Now the route is full of tourists, who have spoilt everything. Tourists are not travellers.’ Mad Max then gave us some maps and pointed to some good stopovers and which were the good roads in Pakistan and India. I took this as a compliment that we were indeed fellow travellers following the old hippie trail.

We visited all the major sights in Turkey, spending a full 6 weeks working our way around the stunning coast. One of our favourite sites was Ephesus, of which only a very small part has been excavated. Ephesus was an old Roman port city which was once Asia’s capital, and boasts an impressive library, theatre, market place, houses, fountains to name but a few. Walking through its cobbled streets, fires your imagination to times past.

It was in Turkey that I decided to write the names of the countries we had driven through on the side of the van. On seeing this list, the doorman at the gates of The Virgin Mary’s House, said to be the final home of The Virgin Mary during her later years, asked.

‘I write “Viggin Mary House” he told us. I handed him a marker and watched him carefully write “Viggin Mary House.”

As he stood back and admired his work, he said ‘Ah, entrance now for you free.’ Then waived us in.

I was beginning to understand that travelling was not about sight seeing, but meeting and learning from others, sharing their company and accepting their differences.