Lahore Country Club

... virtually empty. Pakistani Rangers dress in long black uniforms and have their own blustering, stomping and threatening movements as this coreographed event unfolded. It was all executed brilliantly. The Indian Army uses high kicks at intervals during their movements. When I say high kicks, I mean it. Their boots nearly hit their foreheads!. In fact there was an article in the Hindustan Times the next day that reported that the soldiers on the border were ...

... the stinkiest flight I've ever been on. 

Upon arrival at the immigration booth in Lahore I was greeted by two Pakistani women wearing a sort of half chador/abaya, half black immigration uniform. They both spoke English fairly well and seemed quite surprised to see an American with a Pakistani visa coming to their country.

'Why you come to Pakistan?' one asked. 

'I'm a tourist.'

They looked at each other and spoke in Urdu for a moment then the other ...

... I'm told that there are just a small number of people that are religious teachers brainwashing people from a young age to believe that if they blast they will go straight to Junnt (heaven). These few evil cheaters do a lot of damage to the Islamic image and affect so many lives with their actions. Those people in the army are usually there because they desperately need the pay for their families - when one person is killed it's ...

... of traditional music. Even the masjid, the local mosque, is quite raffinée. The roads right outside the campus are well-maintained, with not-too-awful public sculptures. Even the occasional bathroom gecko (I named ours 'Frankie') is quiet and well-behaved. This illusion, this cocoon of quiet and privilege, ends when one drives a few miles from ...

... Until the car moves on. Adnan tells me that most are organized into gangs, with some sort of Mafia / Pimp organizer, who drops them in the city, collects them in the evening, and takes a hefty cut of their earnings. It's hard for me to get my mind around the idea of Beggar Gangs. Moving on ... In New York we have pigeons and sparrows. Here, we have Mynah birds ...

... myself as the foreign expert on the trains! There were some other backpackers onboard and they were confused about where to get on, where to get off, who the strange men in dresses were and what they could eat - it was only my 3rd journey but I was able to help them with everything they needed to know and it felt good to be the more experienced one for a change - I no longer feel like a 'newbie' traveler. As for my journey, although I'd left Delhi in ...

... and the famously beautiful mountains that clothe the Northern heights of Pakistan. We accepted the 40-hour roof-top ride - on a typically beautifully ornamented Pakistani truck - in a flash. We are sad to be leaving Pakistan without visiting much of its best bits, nor really having the finest of lasting memories from the place. Nonetheless, with India on the horizon - and a good deal of medicine working hard to recall our stomachs from vacation - spirits are slowly rejuvinating.

... at this point Mullah Omar's going to be busting up the place at any moment. An hour and a half into this debauchery-cum-worship-service we're informed that in the lower and much larger courtyard after Midnight is "when the real show begins". Maybe it's because I've seen way too many episodes of "Locked-Up Abroad" on the National Geographic channel, which by the way I've subtitled, "When Stupid White People Go on Vacation" --or perhaps it's because I'm a wee bit baked ...

... for lunch and that I'd be dining alone in my room on chicken jalfreeze and watching BBC in some icy air-conditioning. "We still have 20 minutes left of our 'tour' so why don't you pick me up later and we can go to the tailor -- I need to have a dress made --6:00 and please be on time." After he'd skulked away I bellied up to the reception desk explaining how disappointed in So-Called I was and how I wanted a real guide. The receptionist understood my frustration ...