Four friends,.......

Well, four friends have finally begun the meandering trail to Mt Kailash. Leaving the little Dharma community we had created together with Venerable Shenyen in Dharamkot was tinged with some sadness, but there was a strong sense of completion and the sweetness of having done good work and practice together with harmony. Time for pilgrimage now,.....

The heat of the plains and Lahore was, how to say(?), a very rude shock after many months of cool mountain air at McLeod Ganj. You know that scene from the Wizard of Oz where Dorothy flings a bucket of water at the wicked witch of the west who then cries "I'm melting, I'm melting". Yeah, something like this is appropriate imagery,.....buckets of sweat,....

We weighed our backpacks and joint kit at the railway platform in Pathankot and it came to about ~125 kilos. The printout weight tickets had one line fortunes written on the back, like little cardboard fortune cookies that you can't eat (though i'm sure the Indian street cows would consider them a treat!). Mine said "Drama is coming for you", or some such nonsense, which i took with an appropriate huff at the concept of superstitiousness in general. Two days later in Lahore i was sent skittling across the tarmac by a motorbike i did not see at all, whilst 'mindfully' crossing a busy metro road, causing me to do slight a double take of the ticket message. No injuries save for bruising, fortunately. Enough 'drama' to last the next wee while thanks,.....

Our joint weight gives us some serious incentive to do determined eating of our trekking food and any other consumables ASAP! Marks Mother very, very kindly sent a whole bunch of freeze dried veges over from Australia (Thanks!), which will contribute greatly to keeping our weight manageable during trekking and staying healthy in when we eventually enter 'tsampa only' land. Pakistan is a serious meat eating nation hey. Getting vege food here is a bit of a stretch - Anna and i have resorted to Pizza Hut twice (!) - both in Lahore and Rawalpindi just to raid their salad bar (plus escape the heat!). We tried a local street resturant last night and after much miming and gesticulation and "Nay beef, nay chicken, nay mutton,..." etc and then physically pointing out the rice, dhal and chapatis, we still ended up with two big chuncks of dead chook on the plate of rice. A no meat meal is a little bit too far outside the box here i think - it doesn't compute real well.

The first day we called in at Amritsar to check out the Golden Temple, sacred hearth of Sihkism. A highly atmospheric and evocative place. Evening prayers echoed through the temple, mingled with fading light and 1000's of devotees, some dipping in the waters of the large tank and many more lined up patiently to visit the inner sanctum. Very mellow atmosphere, relaxed and comtemplative. Impressive.

The rickshaw to the Indian/Pakistani border was easy, if somewhat bulging with our luggage. A parting conversation at the border reflects my current sentiment towards India well: (Scene - getting out of rickshaw at Indian border post, checkpoint no. 1 of 6; Midday, 35+ degrees C. Mobbed by half dozen Indians, whilst putting on our packs in preparation to go through immigration and customs).
Indian: "You want DVD, cold beer, very cheap, good DVD sir?"
Scott: "No thanks"
Indian: "Cold beer, last beer, no beer in Pakistan, cold beer you like?"
Scott: "No thanks"
Indian: "You want DVD, very good DVD sir?" (waving said DVD in face)
Scott: "No thanks"
Indian: "You like DVD, very good quality sir?"
Scott: "What do you reckon??"
Indian: "You want cold beer sir, we have cold beer?"
Scott: "Kush nay chay aye" x 2 (Hindi for 'I need nothing')
Indian: "DVD sir, good quality, you take?" etc, etc,...
They don't get the hint so easily. We wander off towards the border shaking our heads in some humour, both to say no and also in partial disbelief. Got to give them 10 points for persistence, but to be honest i'm glad to be out of India for now. Am well over that kind of in-your-face hassle. The Pakistanis we have met so far understand a simple 'no thanks' very well.

Have found myself engaging in some pointless comparisons between India and Pakistan in the last few days. Partly as a way of trying to decipher my experience of India and also as a way of trying to find a reference point for Pakistan. Best to let go of such notions i realise. They are just different. Hardly any street animals here (ie cows, dogs, monkeys etc) and the omnipresent aroma of shit-piss that plauges India is also far less evident. People here are generally very friendly and curious. They often ask why we have come here and seem to think that we westerners think they are all terrorists. Our media back home is sooooo unbelievably biased and full of utter-bull about this place and its people. Most of us know this i realise; but to actually see the stark contrast between the images cultivated in the media back home and the reality on the ground is potent. They are different planets entirely - one exists, the other is fiction. Who is writing the story???


The lack of hassle here is great, however as westerners we have a high novelty value which makes us very conspicuous, especially Anna. She is well covered up with scarf and long sleeves/pants, but she is a western woman and the mostly Pyjama clad local men here think this is kind of interesting. We spent a couple of days in Peshawar, a place dripping with 1000's of years of history, near the Afgan border and Pashtun tribal areas. Very conservative there, many women in full Burka. Mark and Joe did a day trip to the Kyber pass, with a jolly armed guard escort and a friendly guide who offered to take them to several interesting places related to the manufacture of guns and hashish. The old city of Peshawar was fascinating to wander about in, labrynthine alleys and narrow stores packed with all things imaginable, but the 'stand out like a sore thumb' factor is a little exhausting after a while.

We attended some Sufi singing and a drumming night while in Lahore. Very interesting stuff. The drumming was amazing, cranking rythyms rising and falling, fast and fluid. One of the two drummers (2 brothers) was deaf, and the Pakistani crowd was well intent on getting stoned to the eyeballs. Hash-laced ciggarettes were flying in all directions (i saw one fella sucking on five at one time!) and several very interesting looking sufi mystics were adding to the ambience by shaking their heads to the sky in semi-trance with beads of sweat dripping and eyes bulging. Outside the venue loads of street vendors with horse drawn carts were selling all manner of sweet and sticky midnight munchies to an increasingly doped up crowd. Intriuging.

We are planning on flying to Gilgit tommorrow, by a military C130 apparently, as the national carrier is not flying the Fokkers any more after one crashed a couple of months ago. Good to know they take air safety seriously! Looking forward to escaping the cities and heading for the hills! Our trekking intentions include a few 2-6 day walks in the upper valleys of the Hunza region, including Rakaposhi base camp, Ultar meadow and maybe the Batura Glacier. Will see how we go when we get there. A couple of photos from 'google earth' of some of the areas we intend to wander in are below.

This could be the last blog update for a wee while, as net access will be seriously limited till we get to Kashgar in western China. Much peace and love from us all for now. The trail beckons,.....