Spring in Islamabad and Peshawar

Jan-May 07

Shortly after Chawmos - better exactly on the last day when I tried to transfer my pictures to my Laptop bad luck strikes and the device stops working. I still don’t expect the worst - it is my philosophy to think positive until the - and go to Chitral after a few days to let it be fixed. Of course at Taifoor’s where I already had ruined my old laptop. He tells me that it is not so easy, because of the bios chip is broken and this part is not available here. One must load the bios anew and this would be possible only in Peshawar, Islamabad or Lahore. He offers to me to send it there, but I decline. I will go to Islamabad myself to fix this; I know the Pakistani approach now only too well and want to be nearby. In addition, I would like to hear a 2nd opinion. I set out for the South and reach the last flight before New Year's Eve, then flights get cancelled because of bad weather for almost one week - the street is closed of course. In the early morning Chitral looks wonderful, snowy summits all around and new, freshly fallen snow like powder sugar on the slopes. During the day before the departure my Kalash mum to my room in the in the morning. I am confused a little, because she should go, actually, during this day to the Baishali, but maybe I had miscounted. With a broad grin she indicates at her belly. Tears fill her eyes and she whispers to me that the medicine which I had brought last year from Peshawar probably worked. Her period was overdue and this has never happened during the last years. I am glad with her, but still not confident.
I have often heard of late period and know the reasons why it can happen. Not always it means pregnancy, but she was right. I had never seen a Kalashwoman with late period or had heard of it. Probably because they still live in harmony with nature. She tells me to keep it as a secret until it is confirmed. She had told only to her mother and me about it. I feel honored and insure of her my discretion. With happy heart I depart. I try my luck first in Peshawar, because I like the city by far more than the almost western Islamabad. I bring the laptop - after waiting for one week in vain for a friend who offered to help me - to a repair shop. In the time I am at a friends place. Iran, the wife of Faizi who had gifted the nice Kalash piran to me at Christmas is on her way further south to visit her brother in Lahore. A stopover in Peshawar is necessary and we spend a few amusing days with shopping, chatting and playing with her baby. I try to deflect them a little and can also get revenge for the nice present. Imtiaz had pointed a shop where one can buy the warmest and snuggest materials in Peshawar. There I took them and we select some nice designs for new Shalwar Kameezes. Also she needs a few of these actually Muslim clothes, because it would be found knobs for all the staring here in the south with the Kalashdress. Now even in Peshawar it is quite cold and we enjoy the new, soft, warm clothes. It is a Fleece similar material and I have constantly the urge to rub my cheek on the fleecy shirt. On one of my phone calls at home I also receive the happy message: my Kalash mummy is really pregnant. Her voice expresses immense luck and I dance with joy. Now I may also tell it and Iran is the first one to get the sweet news. After some time - my laptop is not ready yet (" We are on it, ma’am ") I go to Islamabad where I work again a bit for Adil Shah. The horse magazine which he had started when I met him for the first time runs well. I had written a report on the Imperial Spanish Riding School in Vienna/Austria and their famous Lipizzan horses in summer when I was there for a while. This one and some other stories and photos of mine had already been published in Horse&Horseman. He asks of course, as usual, whether I do want to work for him permanently. Finally I agree. This work is great fun to me, I would have no problems with short-term visas any more and earn money. However, I ask for the freedom to be able to go to Chitral as that’s the place for which I love Pakistan.
He agrees and we start to apply for the working visa. This lasts of course a time and, actually, it must be given at the native land of applicant, but, however, Adil says, he can do it here. The office visits pile up, here a form, there a stamp, here a certificate, there a contract, here an account opening, there a permanent residence.. Then the application can be handed in. And then one must ask constantly whether they were in need of yet another paper, because left alone they would say nothing the like and just leave the application simply in the drawer - as if it would be approved there on its own … I spend the days without such "ways" with Adil’s small daughter Neha, with the hares, chickens and guinea fowls bustling around in the small garden or on Adils horse farm.
Jan-May 07 I love horses and it is great fun to me over and over again to be with these animals. In the interim I go - meanwhile it is February - again for some time to Peshawar, because Rudaba, the daughter of Sikander Ul-Mulk whom I had got to know during a journey to Chitral - came to Peshawar with her mother for shopping and invited me there. She always wanted to improve her English and we also got on very well. I a mainly male dominated country it is great to spend time with women. For me it is a welcome change and last but not least better than in the cold office in Islamabad … We spend 2 pleasant weeks with … right: Shopping, the favorite sport of every Pakistani woman. Saida - Rudabas mother - has, indeed, a better reason: she has a shopping centre for women in Chitral at her house and was the pioneer with the opening of such in Chitral. Now there are several more, but hers runs still really well. So we buy materials, brick jewellery, make-up, toys, curtains, plastic flowers and a lot more. The weather is a bit warmer than in Islamabad - Peshawar also lies lower - and we play a lot of badminton in the garden. The small boys Purdum and Sher Khan and also Ali take part either as dreadful opponents or as net holders … Rudabas grandfather likewise is there and I enjoy pleasant conversations with him.
He is a son of the last Mehtar (king) of Chitral and still carries the title Prince, as well as his brothers and sisters, sons and grandchildren, but he has his feet on the ground – even at the age of 94 years - and firmly believes in the universal love of God, the positive aspect in everything and shows it with delight. To talk to him is a real experience. He emits tranquility and peace which few people do here to his extend. We find a lot to talk about and common believes, as I also believe in positive things and optimism – at times even too much – and in a plan of God Almighty, which is in its inner depth positive, even if we sometimes don’t understand the outcomes and turns.
I ask him, when he had found this especially positive side within himself and whether there was a certain turn in his life. He replies that he had always been different. He tells about his father who occasionally summoned his sons from their foster parents. They had to stand in a row, and because Papa was the king and, hence, was feared, they might not look up, but had to stand there quietly. Dad complained: "This one, how he was called? Khushwaqt. He keeps staring right into my eyes. He has no respect." However, dad was wrong, his son did have respect, but not before titles or names, but before persons and actions, God and all living beings. Little outstanding Shezada (prince) Khushwaqt grew up into a respectable man. He enjoyed an education in Dhera Dun in India, at that time the most respectable place for education – it was there where also Aufschneiter and Heinrich Harrer were interned, indeed, a little earlier - and served for long time in the army. Even today he is known as a Colonel Khushwaqt. Then he was active for embassies, often abroad has also helped with the foundation of the Brooke hospitals in Pakistan actively. Brooke is specified on veterinary medicine and also tries to bring information to the people as how animals are properly kept and groomed. Primarily it is about horses, donkeys, cows etc, which are often by ignorance or shortage of money neglected, even though they are the main source of income of a family.
Now he enjoys the deserved retirement, of course with 94, however, still travels all over through the land, reads with magnifying glass and writes in stung script without looking. Every morning he gets up around 5 for exercises and holds a healthy diet. What a rarity in this country.
Now with Saida I learn for the first time Khowar (Chitrali) actively what I have refused up to now. To learn 2 languages (Urdu and Kalash) appeared sufficient to me. But with her and the children it is easy. With Rudaba I speak English and after 4 days she talks like a waterfall. She is lucky to be in a good school, just practise is lacking. In a conversation with Saida about the dwindling raw materials, clearing and rising wooden prices in Chitral she tells to me about her heart's desire. She would like to build a biogas plant. 4 years ago she had heard a documentary on BBC TV - or better: seen. She understands a little English; however, speaking is not that easy. Nevertheless, she completely understood all the advantages and the basic procedure and the thought kept stuck in her mind.
I remember a friend who had given me the contact of such a company in Austria for some proof reading of a document and sent an email to them. The owner promptly replied to my request and soon an excessive exchange of mails, suggestions (from their side) and questions (from our side) about the possibilities of building this plant commenced. This company (Mueller-Umwelt-Technik) had developed a new technology which is roughly about the fact, that firm biological waste is used instead of the customary liquid materials. We plan to put it into action soon.
Too soon the time is over and I go back to Islamabad. My computer is not ready yet. The problem is that I have bought the thing in Nepal – on a national holiday on which a friend of a friend specially opened the (one and only in the capital) notebook selling shop as I had exactly a single day time to select one of 3 models. The next day I had to go proceed to Bhutan where I would need a laptop and certainly not find one. So I took lightest, most promising in middle price range. Unfortunately, it was not branded. The other option would have been a Sony which was great but huge, however, … Now no one can find this silly bios chip and the producer answers neither to phone calls nor to emails … But they also do not want to give up – me too… Anyway, I go back to Islamabad still hoping for a solution.
Adil is the busiest man I have seen in Pakistan. He is a think-tank himself, but in a country where one has to wait for everything, ask 10 times to get one thing done and be after everyone time is a bit short to realize all of them, as he is doing it as a one man show without reliable employees. I should become such an employee, but I assure him smiling that I will do my best but I don’t feel like dying of his preprogrammed cardiac infarction. He sleeps on an average 5 hours or less, split on 2 or 3 times and puts himself into cell phone emissions for the better part of the day.

After another week I get the bitter news: my laptop is irreparable. I must get it back and buy a new one. A daughter of Col. Khushwaqt was about to celebrate her birthday and he has invited me with one of many emails which we exchange since the visit (he writes, Ali types and sends it, prints out my answer and complains now and then that I should take my time for replying). I start again for a weekend in Peshawar where I also meet another daughter of Khushwaqt. She lives in Karachi and has likewise arrived to the birthday of her sister. I come to know a bit more about the fatherly side of the Colonel. She had not seen him often in her childhood. Traditionally the children were given by socially high-ranking families to foster parents to knit a stronger net of relations within the society. Nevertheless, she finds almost only good words about him. He was the first one to send his children to a convent in Bannu (somewhat near Peshawar) where they were educated in English. They were allowed to decide about their bride or groom instead of arranged marriages and dad dealt big fun to cheer his kids with a glass of apple juice in their hand, pretending it is Whiskey when people came for a visit. Once he had been asked to permit the construction of a Hydro Power plant on his area in Mastuj and he granted it reserving that there should be no duck hunting and shooting in Mastuj anymore. An agreement was reached, now electricity and ducks coincide peacefully. Duck hunting is a popular time pass there, but it became a kind of fun sport which he deeply dislikes and thus put down his foot.
All his daughters and sons are liberal, perfectly educated and lead successful businesses in their respective areas.
She herself works on an environmental project in the awareness building of waste management and recycling, her husband is a pilot. The sister who has birthday had founded her own school in Chitral and had taught there, her husband is a doctor. Sikander, Rudaba’s and Ali’s father is Tehsil Nazim (Tehsil is an administration unit somewhere between district and municipality, Nazim means governor), owner of various companies and polo-team-captain, his wife Saida has a shopping centre and is boosting of ideas and commitment. Another son owns the (in my point of view) most beautiful and best located hotel in Chitral (Hindukush Heights) and a travel agency, honorary ambassador etc. Only one sister stayed at home instead of higher education as her mother once wanted a child to rise in her own house instead of being with foster parents and at a convent later.

My laptop story also finds an end here - or better: a new beginning, because I must buy a new one. I decide on a used, small Toshiba which is in perfect condition and on latest technology. By some ways it has come here from Dubai and costs me now to only 300 EUR. I want to hear no details about how it came, test it to find it well. With the new baby I travel back to Islamabad, in Daewoo – the only trustworthy, punctual, service-oriented bus company with working reservation system. I am meanwhile a regular customer. Next time I will suggest to the customer care centre to introduce a membership system to benefit loyal, regular clients …

Finally I come to know that I have to go to Austria anyway to get my Visa. I head for Chitral to say goodbye at least – too long I had been far away, always assuming that “tomorrow” laptop and visa would be done. But “tomorrow never comes” here.
However, every few weeks my Kalash father came to Peshawar where I met him, discussed the ongoing projects and gave him salaries for the teachers, midwives and other projects. I was glad that he supported me, it made everything easier. He brought news from the valleys to me - was born, has died, got sick or married The midwives worked quite diligently and after 2 months 5 babies had been born with their skillful help. Now I saw them for the first time and also the quite big belly of my overjoyed Kalash mum.
I enjoy some hospitable days at Saidas’ in Chitral, finalize the points to be discussed with the biogas people as it will be better to talk personally if I have to go anyway and then I am off.

more Pics of spring time