Monday 29th August 1994 - Final Day In Lahore

8.25am - The journal says that the weather on that day was just the opposite to the day previous with the sun out and no clouds at all in the sky. I sat down in Faletti's restaurant wondering how long I would be waiting to get served when someone appeared at once to ask me what I would like. There were only a few others in there, not exactly a rush job. That day was to be my last in Lahore and then I would say farewell to Pir Mahroof's 'guides' and be on a very early morning flight back to Karachi on my own again.

I wrote that I was definitely ready for home since I had seen quite enough of Pakistan to know I never wished to return. In total honesty the country and its ways had intimidated me far, far more than any other place I had been before or have been since.

At 11.25am we were sitting in the lovely Shalimar Bagh Gardens in Lahore. We were sitting under a tree next to some fruit sellers. There seemed to be hundreds of people there since it was such a glorious day. I wrote how refreshing it was at last to see so many girls and women wearing beautiful shalwar kameez. It reminded me of Eid celebrations at Pollard Park back in Bradford when the children would come in clothes of their own choice. In all of my stay to that point I had not seen as many girls and women out together as on that day.

My journal said that earlier that morning I had spoken to the tourist information people at my hotel, Faletti's about safety in Lahore. He tried to reassure me that it was safe and we talked about Pakistan in general too. He spoke excellent English and I mentioned that he spoke in a very fair, unbiased way too.

That got me to thinking that my hosts were probably moving around with unnecessary caution. Were other people reacting to THEM because of their beards and Bazme Naushia topis? I wondered whether, over the time I had spent in my host's company, I had been reacting to THEIR perception given that they all live in a fairly closed Islamic institution. That, I will never know and is mere speculation.

I do know that they were constantly praising Nawaz Sharif and mocking Benazir Bhutto. I kept on wanting to tell them how wrong I thought the traditional treatment of women was. Of course I did no such thing but kept my feelings repressed. I had bought a book back in Karachi about Quaid-e-Azam and I had looked at it the night previous. There was a quote about how much he abhorred the abuse of women and the position they had been given in society.

This is a link to an article about Quaid-e-Azam and the role of women.

I had asked to go to Lahore Railway Station since I was interested in relics of the Raj. Like all such stations in India/Pakistan, Lahore was a large neo-gothic structure designed to impress, and it did! My journal records that we spent quite a long time on the platforms soaking in the atmosphere. I then wrote that I observed a most unusual sight, a cretin in the true biological sense of the word. In the west people with this kind of disability are hidden away but in places such as Pakistan they are not. He was sitting with his mother and had the most abnormal tiny head I had ever seen. It was way out of proportion with the rest of his body and, from his behaviour, he was severely mentally handicapped as part of the condition. India had prepared me for such sights but it was still shocking to me, a westerner not used to such things!

The station was, I wrote, rather similar to Columbo in Sri Lanka but on a much grander scale although not as large as VT in Mumbai, India. Like these places Lahore Station oozed atmosphere. I even saw an original set of Avery weighing scales made in Birmingham. Oh the joy of historical discovery!

From the station we went off to the Mosque of Wazir Khan. This one was a real jem! The journal says that, in a shrine underneath the floor, we met a Shia Muslim who spoke superb English. The diary says we spoke briefly about Barelvi sufism but records no more than that.

For my very last piece of Lahore sight-seeing it was off to the Anarkali Bazaar where we had some samosas in a tiny, cramped little place behind some shops and stalls. I noted that only one 'grubby little glass' was placed on the table to share communally. I didn't avail myself since my insides were still highly delicate! On the way through the bazaar I noticed some stunning posters of Quaid-e-Azam and his sister Fatima for RS10 each. I apparently bought two of each for my clasroom display. I must have chatted a little to the manager since he was telling me all about his travels round the world in excellent English.

My next entry was at 4.50pm and it states that we had been back in the room for over an hour and the Maulana was flat out on the other bed snoring away. Qari Sahib and Mabashir were glued to the TV since they did not have a set back in Dina. They were totally transfixed to it. When the TV news came on they turned up the volume even more.

At 7.25 I was in Faletti's restaurant again and, says my journal, there were more people in there than I'd seen before. The service was slow once more. I ordered fresh lime for RS35 whereupon I actually got a quarter glass of lime juice!

My hosts were going to come and collect me at 8.30 the next day and take me to Lahore International Airport. They said we would be at the airport by 9.00am. I didn't really want to leave it that late but, I was completely in their hands and had to adhere to the social etiquette. I hate 'goodbyes' and was dreading the moment since I always feel so clumsy and rather shy. I was also extremely frustrated that I had not felt able to talk to them about issues I really wanted to know about for fear of offending. I noted that Mobashir wasn't actually as mature as I first thought he was when I first met all the boys who were very much on their best behaviour. Silly little things would come into his head and he was very much obsessed by Kung Fu, guns and firearms.

Rawalpindi Continued

My guides did not appear to like Benzair Bhutto , partly because she was a woman and partly because she represented the secular PPP. Mobashir spoke of Pakistan as a 'gift from God' and implied that what God had given could never be taken away.

I was still having major problems matching up Islamic concepts of justice and fairness with what I was seeing all around me at first hand, on TV and in the press. One small example was cited in my journal. It appears that on several occasions that day I had seen drivers pulled over by the police who then insisted an a bribe. My driver for the following day said he would be stopped on the return leg from Dina and would have to pay the police RS 50. I am shocked and scared that these people whose task is to defend the people actually turn out to be little more than state-paid intimidators.

It appears from my journal that someone told me a joke about the police with the punch line being that the police knew who had committed the crime even before it had been perpetrated. The implication here was that the police set people up, plant evidence then make false arrests. I was rapidly becoming seriously afraid on being in Pakistan because the country was peppered with soldiers, check points, police and security personnel. I was quickly coming to the view that Pakistan was a lawless country in which the ordinary person can be set up and victimised almost at will.

At 6.25pm I seemed to have gone out walking the streets of Rawalpindi, Committee Chowk and found a small mazar and graveyard. Some of the graves were colourfully festooned with trimmings probably relating to the fact that the previous day had been The Prophet's Birthday. I approached the mazar and got talking to a middle aged man who told me he was a murid of a pir related to Pir Mahroof. The man said he knew both Bradford and Birmingham well. I only wished my journal told a little more about the conversation we had but it doesn't.

I got back to the Blue Sky Hotel and noted that some 'dangerous-looking guys' on the check out called me over to ask why I always carried my bag with me and didn't leave it in the room. They told me to leave it in the room - not likely! My journal tells me how intimidated I felt in that hotel all alone and that I really was beginning to fear for my bodily safety. I apparently piled up the furniture against the room door that night. There were also two power cuts one after the other. There was, it appears, a candle in the room but nothing to light it with.

Since leaving Karachi, says my journal, I've felt nothing but insecurity. Rawalpindi, at that time, was supposed to be safe but being in that hotel gave me the creeps!

Family Eating - I was widely travelled even at that time but I came across something totally new in this hotel namely, the family eating facilities! The arrangement was rather similar to that of a hospital bed but in a hotel restaurant. The idea was that a family (including women) could come out to eat and a 'privacy curtain' could then be pulled round to preserve the modesty of the women. I was beginning to give a lot of thought to the concept of purdah since I had not seen anything similar in Tunisia, Morocco, Egypt or Malaysia, all Muslim countries of course.

More on purdah here.

My journal then goes on to say that the next few nights ought to be a lot more secure since I would be a guest in Pir Mahroof's mansion in Dina. The restaurant began to fill up with men and no women. I wondered once more about the status of women in Pakistan since I saw so few of them. In sunni Egypt women are about everywhere. Many wear a headscarf, some do not but they are in evidence doing the shopping in markets, on buses and on the ferry etc. This was the first trip I had ever made where the vast majority of women were living segregated lives. I wondered what the wives of all the men in the restaurant would be doing at home. Apart from sexual activity I was asking myself about exactly how Pakistani men and women relate to each other on a normal daily basis. Through my 'western filter' I was seeing apartheid, not of racial groups but between the genders. The Prophet's Farewell Speech came to mind in which he spoke of the rights of women. I wondered exactly what status women enjoyed in Pakistan and whether wives were properly treated as human beings or merely sexual objects. Being western, it was impossible not to be wondering about these issues.

How do young Pakistani men cope with their growing, unfulfilled sexuality during the time they are not permitted any contact with females? I began to ask myself this important question knowing, that wherever sexuality is repressed, there are always consequences in terms of human behaviour. I also wondered about women's groups in Pakistan asking myself what women did whenever they got together and how they found out about the facts of life. I was wanting to know whether it was common for Pakistani women to now know about sex until their actual marriage?

This is shameful - the irony of Lahore (YouTube video about prostitution in Lahore)

In Pakistan today, says my journal, would women be happy with their lot and treatment if they were able to speak freely? I was picking up a great deal about the way the system here actively represses women and prevents them from playing their full part in society. The illusion I had about Pakistan being literally, The Land Of The Pure, had fallen apart by this time. Pakistan was, I had concluded, the ( Land of The Corrupt and Decadent).