2012's Summer Trip

Hey, just cause the title might seem lousy, doesn't mean the post is lousy. Anyhow, Happy Ramadan to you all. Hope you get the best of the blessings of this Holy Month.

I'm going to start by telling you about MY SUMMER VACATION.

TO THE NORTHERN AREAS.

~See, look! The Northern Areas have lots and lots of cold water!!!~



It all began with my dad's 'trust' or NGO type thing. He had gone to Chitral in May, earlier this year, to a school. There, he arranged for the children to get tution and then be tested. Those who made it where sponsored to go to the Cadet College in the area.

Anyhow, after that, my dad said he was going to go in July too and that all of us were coming too! Of coarse, I originally wasn't going because I wanted to go to Karachi, but then my Nani Jan died (Inna Lillahi wa Inna Ilaihi Rajiun) and so I couldn't go obviously. (I mean, Karachi without my Nani???) So then we all decided to go to the Northern Areas.

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(^.^)/)
DAY ONE
14th July, 2012
Saturday
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We all got up around 5 o'clock in the morning and had a quick breakfast of tea and bread, finished all the packing and bundled into our metal gray Corolla Altis. By then, it was 6 in the morning when we officially set out!

~No, that Alto is not mine. No, we are not going to Rawalpindi or Itwar Bazaar. We're going to the Motorway!!~

And yes, I fell asleep the whole time we were on the motorway and woke up when we entered the Swat District.  There, we stopped around 10 to have the rest of our breakfast at a little place near the Swat River (I like saying Daryay Swat. Sounds cooler). The water looked kinda muddy but there sure was lots of it.

~See? There's lots of water! And that's half of my family :P  ~



From there, we got back into the car to continue the long journey. It's really hard sitting in the car all day. But then there's always something to see. Anyhow, next stop was Dir! Here we stopped at another hotel to eat lunch and change cars. The hotel was kind of cool and had lots of old-ish fancy decorations like a peacock rug that they hung on the wall. (Which doesn't really make sense. A rug for a wall???)

~Tada! Obviously the owner of the hotel adores peacocks!! And birds~

I find hotels in Pakistan very interesting. They aren't like the hotels in usa which are all nice and proper. See, my brother got this game where you're a detective in a hotel. Ever since that game, I have looked at hotels in a new light. Perhaps even this peacock loving hotel has a history of mystery..... XD

Oh yes, so we had to change cars. This was the place where we had to part with our Corolla Altis and rent another car along with a driver. At first, the idea was very... not likeable because we were originally three adults, two teens and two kids in a Corolla and NOW it would be FOUR adults, two teens and two kids in the rented car which was kind of a station wagon type thing. But it worked out in the end because my younger siblings were sent to sit at the back with the luggage, haha. 

Next stop was Darosh but before you get there you have to make a choice. Will you go over the mountain or under it? With the approximate 9 mile long tunnel, the journey could be cut short by an hour or two, and so that's the route we took.

~Can't really tell what this is but that light is the end of the tunnel and you can sort of make out the dashboard and steering wheel. Sort of....Sorry, the car was moving alot so.... ~

Let's just say, I found the tunnel bit very interesting. It was rather cold in the tunnel and there were lots of potholes filled with water so all you could hear was the tires sloshing and then the bumps and ups and downs and the utter darkness. It was all very cool, alot like this ride I went to in America. It's called Rhino Rally. Since the ride only operated in the day, you can't really get the real feel of driving in this tunnel, which is one of a kind in it's own way. Besides that, I have to say it ALSO reminded me of Bionicle. You know, dark caves and those crabs the matoran people travelled on. Very mysterious stuff. Cool nevertheless. (^.^)

We reached Darosh at around 6 pm at an army headquarter, which was approximately 40 kilometers from Chitral, our original destination. Here we had to stay for the night.

The army headquarters wasn't so bad. There were lots and lots of fruit trees and my mother loves the idea of just walking by, picking a fruit and eating it. Plus there was this nice cook Babaji who was happy to entertain guests. He showed us some the stuff the British had built there and that were still standing from colonial times.

~See, this is where the big dudes from the Army eat. I meanwhile, was busy observing the poor stuffed peacock and that deer right at the back. Are they from colonial times too??~



The Babaji even showed us a 'refrigerater' from colonial times, which my mother called a 'cellar', not a refrigerater. It was a door on the floor leading to a drop down to something like a basement but we couldn't go down because the ladder was broken.



~I guess you can call this the backyard. If you go at the edge and look down, you can see the rest of the area, Darosh~

At night, we went outside to this backyard thing when the power was out. Obviously then, it was pretty pitch dark and we had to use mobile flashlights to get around but the sky was certainly something to comment on.

Stars. Lots and lots of stars. I would have put up a picture if only the stars came up on the camera. But there were ALOT of stars. It looked like somebody sprinkled them out on the sky. SubhanAllah~!

This place was overall pretty nice. If only signals came in my room. The problem was that as soon as I stepped into my room, my phone told me it was getting zero signals. And that's hard to believe when your mother is talking on her cellphone right beside you. Then we found out the fan stopped working but that was something okay because in Darosh, the temperature is much lower than in Islamabad. It fine sleeping without a fan there.

What was kind of freaky was that I woke up in the middle of the night and there was this creepy squeaking sound. I was totally freaked, I sat up and just tryed to figure what course of action to take with this mouse. I mean, the squeaks were soo regular.  In the end, I was so creeped that I woke my mother (like a little girl) and was like, "Amee! Yeh kia he!!??"

Amee just yawned and said "Koi chota sa keera makora hoga"

I decided to blindly trust her judgement and hope the creature was indeed an insect and not some sort of wounded little mouse.

~My reaction to the invisible creature that squeaks like a mouse~

Here's my account of the second day of my trip to 

THE NORTHERN AREAS

~See, lots of mountains with snow and glaciers there too!~





Anyway, do I need to do a recap? Well, we set out from Islamabad Saturday morning and reached Darosh late Saturday evening and spent the night at army headquarters and with the myseterious insect thing that squeaks like a baby mouse.

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(^.^)/)
DAY TWO
15th July, 2012
Sunday
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Today, I got up around seven o'clock and quickly got out of that room and went to the other room where my father and my other siblings were sleeping and then I did the only thing to pass the time. Played games on my phone. Dragon's Blade to be exact... ^u^

Anyway, let me tell you something. We might have a big tv at home, but it doesn't have cable and no body really watches it. It's just there for our game system and DVD player. So our room DID have a tv with cable to obviously, that was turned on to see what was happening with the world. At that time, the weather reports said that it was pouring in Karachi and also, at that very moment, the boxer Aamir Khan was getting ready to face his opponent. 

That WAS interesting news but it didn't really interest me. I'm not a sports fan. And I already had a feeling Aamir was going to lose. Sorry.

When we headed out, we changed cars yet again! Now it was a red Prado!!

~My father's looking at the grapes that are hanging from the tree~

Bundling into the Prado, we started another journey. Although it wasn't AS long, I mean, only two hours I think, it was super bumpy. My younger sister kept complaining that her head and stomach were hurting. I guess she isn't the off-road travel type. But I repeat again, the journey was really bumpy because the roads were unmetalled. There we were climbing up the mountain, then down and then back up but the river never left our sight.

Where was our destination? It was the Kalash valley, the valley of the Kaafirs. We stopped at a PTDC (Pakistan Tourist Developement Corporation) resthouse and wandered around for a while, sighting the first of the many women dressed in the black clothes that marked their religion.

~Inside of the PTDC resteraunt. Oh, it looks nice but it's just okay. Didn't seem to have much of the mystery factor as the other hotel resteraunt had~

After that we went walking up the road where we could see everything up close. Of coarse it all looked pretty normal (for a village) and then we went climbing straight into the Kalash domain and visited their graveyard.

~A casket. They used to leave their dead to rot in the open~

Most of the graveyard had caskets like these with most of the bones missing. Also, most of the bones belonged to the children of the Kalash people. That is sort of freaky, you know, that they have a graveyard full of CHILDREN. 

~Here's a closer look! A half skull of a child~

Next, we went climbing up and met a big idol on the way. It was supposed to be used for some ritual of theirs. Or was it for marking a grave? I can't remember that detail. I just remember that it was very ugly.

Climbing on, we met three very lively ducks too!

~Aren't they cute?! I think that is a mother and two growing ducklings~

Right, moving forward. We got to see some of the houses. Only from the outside though and I noticed that most of them had locks on them. My first theory was that maybe they all died of a plague but obviously I was wrong. It turns out they just left on their own little vacations. (^.^)

~Here's their "Hall of Burning People Alive". Nah, just kidding. That's just the ashes of a barbecue party~

That is the hall where they place their dead corpse and then dance around it. It's all part of their ritual. Then they cart off the corpse to rot in their open air graveyard. I think they changed that law. Now they bury their dead instead of leaving them out in the open.

~Look, two idols~

Next we saw those two idols. Those are supposed to be the idols who bring rain. The Kalash people take a goat and slaughter it for them, spill the goat blood everywhere and then feed the meat to the children. That's supposed to bring them rain.

Then we took a detour and sat on the banks of the river. The water was REALLY cold and moved REALLY fast. You couldn't keep your foot in for more than four or five minutes!!

~We crossed that bridge. The other side is where all that Kalash stuff is~

~Met two little girls on the way. One is Kalashi and one is Muslim and they are both friends! (^.^)~

After that, we walked all the way back to the PTDC place and had lunch. Since it was around 2 o'clock, at the sun's zenith, we had to stay there for about an hour till the real heat passed. Travelling in the heat on a bumpy road is not good for either your head or stomach.

~Overall backdrop of the Kalash valley~

After that we went on to Chitral and stayed at the house of an acquaintance. Their house was super cool, even grander than the houses in Islamabad!

Let's continue this 'My Summer Trip' thing, where I tell you about my journey to

THE NORTHERN AREAS

~Lots of good places for white water rafting if you ask. Congo River Rapid style!!~

Do we need another recap? Alright! We left Islamabad Saturday morning and reached Darosh at 6 in the evening to spend the night. On Sunday morning, we left to go to the Kalash Valley, or the Valley of the Kaafirs. From there we headed off to a place close to Chitral to spend the night.

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(^.^)/)
DAY THREE
16th July, 2012
Monday
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Today we had to wake up a bit early to go on towards the actual Chitral, so we set off around nine in the morning and spent two hours in the red Prado to get there.

~Scenery on the way~

What was 'there'? There was the school that my father was working in. So while he went off to his official business, we went to an acquaintance's home.

If there's anything that messed up my journey, it was the state of the bathrooms. I don't know HOW these Northern people got their hands on cable and dishes and internet cafes and NOT on the proper toilets and bathrooms. It's plain wierd. Like, dude, if you want to make yourself modern and updated, update your bathroom first, then move to entertainment.

You can laugh all you want. But I have serious issues with bathrooms. On past trips, I used to just shake my head and say 'NO, I want a proper bathroom'. At a hotel? First thing I do is check the bathroom and it it's not okay, I'm going to ask if we can get another hotel, but that's hard to say when you're at someone's house and you know they can't supply it, a proper toilet or a sink. So I tried not to break down and cry about this unfairness. (My parents told me to get used to it cause more situations like this were on the way)

Anyway we stayed until around three and then we headed out (carrying lunch with us) to a place near the river where there were fish farms etc and we could eat and try a hand at fishing.

~I guess you can slightly make out me (yellow and white ghost lady on the lake)~

We ate lunch and then trie fishing. Fishing is much harder than it looks. First of all, fishing in a fish farm means that there will be tons of fish there, no matter what. Then, when you put the bait down, they will eat it in a flash and then leave you with an empty hook for all your kindness of giving them a free meal.

~Look, the fish of the fish farm!! Does it look tasty?!~

~My father is helping my little brother fish!~

The fish were kind of small so no fun in catching and cooking. Very small. Theycould just fit in your fist. So I guess you could only make a fish nugget out of them.

~See those two fish? My sister and I murdered them~

Okay, when I mean murder, I don't mean that we just accidentally threw them out of the water and they flopped and drowned in air. What happened was that maybe we pulled too hard and the hook got stuck somewhere in their mouths, so when we tried to take it out, it umm, ripped their internal organs? And so they couldn't really live? And so we left them to drown in air.

The day ended with my obsessing over bathrooms. I was planning on bringing a bulldozer and a construction company and fixing this problem myself. Of coarse, I'll leave some of the traditional toilets alone if these northern people like it so much. I'm very considerate.




Day four of my trip to

THE NORTHERN AREAS

~Plenty of people living there... (^.^) ~

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(^.^)/)

DAY FOUR
17th July, 2012
Tuesday
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Today we started our jorney back towards Islambad. So we travelled back to Dir and got our Corolla Altis back and then kept going until we reached the Swat district.

My mother really wanted to see Swat which is a pretty famous place in the Northern Areas. More specifically, we were going to Bahrain (not the country, the city town type thing) which is on the route to Kalam. But to get to Bahrain, we passed by Mingora first.

On the way to Mingora, it was already past noon so we stopped to have lunch at a roadside resteraunt/cafe type of thing.

~Habib Cabana Hotel. It was NOT a hotel, I'm telling you. I don't know WHAT definition of 'hotel' would include this place... ~

Moving on, Mingora is where a friend of mine lives. She goes there at almost every vacation and just like this summer, she was in Mingora too. She told me that Mingora is a really nice place, but from the road we apparently went on, it seemed to be a never ending bazaar. With the car moving at around fifteen miles an hour, it was certainly rather boring.

After that, we kept on going on that road looking for Bahrain. With our single road ometimes branching into forks, we DID take the wrong road once or twice, but after asking the locals we got right back on track.

Except it didn't really feel right. The road just kept on going endlessly, the mountains getting closer and the river still beside us but we barely seemed to be getting anywhere. Did Bahrain even exist? If so, why weren't we getting there? Apparently, some folks said, just a little further! The sign says, 'Welcome to Madyan'. Some random dude says 'Bahrain??'. And we say 'Are we there  yet?'.

But we reached there finally and checked into the hotel. Again, the first thing I did was run in and check the bathroom and again I was seveely disappointed. So much so I went and said 'I'm naraz' because it was sooo unfair. I mean, if you have fancy shmancy hotel, please!! Bathroom!! But I had to get used to it.... (=____=)

So we ordered some tea and after that we went to check out the river.

~This picture makes it look much better. Otherwise....~

Second thing that sort of messed up the trip. There are guys EVERYWHERE. So much so, I was starting to think that maybe females were another specie of humans that got extinct here. And that me, my sister and mom were the only specimens around.

When I say guys everywhere, I mean literally everywhere. The place was jam packed. Whether it was tourists or locals, they were all guys! And that gets really awkward and we couldn't do anything and just went back to our hotel and spent the rest of our time there.

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(^.^)/)

DAY FIVE
18th July, 2012
Wednesday
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Today we set out back home to Islamabad. 

We go on the Motorway.

And bought ice cream to eat.

And then got home.

The moment we stepped out, the thig to note was that there was super big temperature difference where we just came from and where we are headed. Islamabad is really hot compared to the North!!

We were all really tired. So then we came home and just relaxed.

The end

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And that is the last of my writing regarding my summer trip.

~Thank you for reading!!~