When I told you in early December that I was in Pakistan, I was wrong. I was not meant to lie to you I simply didn’t know any better. I am in Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan, that is right but Pakistan as such is still very different from this place. You may remember that old friend of mine, Benny, who has been travelling Pakistan many years ago. I can finally share his perception of Pakistan from the depth of my heart.
The reason for this change of mind is due to a trip I did to the north. I spent a week in Mardan to see and support our field office there. That was the very first time I could leave Islamabad since my arrival. I observed the change in landscape as we drove. At first the concrete-coloured buildings of my neighbourhood got vanished and I could see a dry brownish colouring from the fields we passed. I noticed a thin layer of green on top of the fields – an announcement that spring is near. The early morning light painted the sandstone hills in a wonderful yellow that competed very hard with the clear blue of the cloudless sky. The car pushed on through villages hopelessly stuck in traffic jams. Waiting for us to get through I witnessed how the movement of cars, bikes, bicycles, carriages and pedestrians was achieved. Traffic rules as I know them from my country were turned into mere suggestions, loose guide lines one could stick to or (better) leave it up to the common sense and the empiric experience how to get along.
The climb up to the Malakand pass is doted with orange sellers who are in high season between November and May. If you stop by the road to get a taste you will get an orange cut into quarters – they don’t peel them like we use to do it back home. That way you can devour three oranges faster than you could peel one. The paring of hundreds of oranges are steadily working their way down the slop of the pass. They would surely have merged into a little orange road if the trash wasn’t biodegradable.
The setting in Swat is of high mountains that however are only foothills of the real big mountains further up north. Swat valley is part of the Karakorum mountain range, which is part of the Himalaya. In the Karakorum you find the second highest peak in the world. The Lambha Pahar better known as K2.
The wonderful landscape was one of the first to get hit by the floods. Terrasse fields, streets, houses and bridges got washed away by the impact of the flash floods. The water came down the hills, merged in the river and made it swell up in no time.
Today the river is back in its bed and it is again a source of live for the peasants and their livestock. However the reconstruction will still take a while. Thanks to the altitude Swat is a summer resort with a favourable climate in the hot Pakistani summer. Swat was not always a part of Pakistan. Up to 1969 this land was still independent. It was a kingdom in which education and nutrition of the people enjoyed a high standard, so my colleagues said. Between 2006 and 2008 a very different reign was established by the Taliban. According to the author Ahmed Rashid the extremists came to Swat in order to escape from the drone attacks in the Afghan-Pakistan border region.
The people in this northern region are mostly Pashtunes. Their hospitality is unbelievable. They say that it is considered an offence if someone comes for the first time to Swat and tries to pay for anything himself. Hence follows that it was kind of hard for me to actually spend money.
I found very decent and cordial people here in the north, who offer all they have to their visitors. I will try to develop a similar kind of hospitality myself. Because to my understanding, a lot in live is about making other people happy.
