Pakistan

Sep 7, 1978. Quetta, Lourdes Hotel.  Happy birthday, Sam. After a truly horrible trip from Kandahar, we are esconced in a lovely room with private bath, hot water, thanks to the owners, the Mehtas, friends of Lillian Hoehn-Suresh. Sure hope we don’t have to pay for the room - it’s $18 a day, about 10 times are normal expense. Tonight they’ve invited us to dinner, and I am buying myself a cake for dessert. Tomorrow I get my present, a pair of Baluchi leather sandals, suede if I can find them. An even more memorable birthday than Nicole had in Dharamsala.

A quick recap of the Kabul-Quetta trip, while it is still fresh in our minds. We began at the Istanbul Restaurant in Kabul, where we are told we will be delivered to our 1:15 bus. Our contact informs us on arrival at the restaurant that the bus really leaves at 3. We hang around, buy another dress for Nicole, and take a taxi to the bus at 2:45. All hell is brewing at the bus: too many tickets have been sold. Arguments, discussions, frequent ticket checks until around 4:30. Bus goes back into town to the bus company headquarters. Efforts to throw tourists off bus (or five of us) fails through determination of tourists to remain in their seats. Policeman finally throws the extra people out; they get back on when he leaves, and ride in the aisle. Arrival in Kandahar late at night, finding with difficulty a hotel which will accept us. (Eid is on, and everyone prefers to sit around eating and smoking.).  Horrible, grungy place. Change the next day for the New Tourist Hotel – we are the only guests, the owner too busy smoking hash with about 30 of his cronies to admit others. Kandahar is a mess – most shops closed, men’s strolling around, listening to the music blaring from powerful loudspeakers, eating ice cream, drinking tea. Hell of an Eid. Next day, taxi to bus, which sits on its ass for two hours, then slowly grinds its way towards the border, stopping every few minutes to let someone out in the middle of the desert. Afghanistan customs. The official is off eating with friends: three hour wait. Next stage to Pakistan customs is accomplished in a truck talked down from 100 to 20 Afghanis. Then a kid in a trishaw drives us to the Pakistan immigration, and onto yet one more passport check. We are now in Chaman, and there are no more buses to Quetta this late in the day. We bed down on the couches of the transit office, after chasing out the gang of gawking locals, and grab the 7 AM train to Quetta the next morning. Thoroughly unpleasant young assholes gawk at us the entire 5 1/2 hour trip to Quetta, no food available at any station, and Quetta greets us with a city full of staring, lying, begging men. We stagger into a horrible local hotel, and Nicole is so pissed off at the world that she has a good cry. Welcome to Pakistan.

But we looked up the Mehta's the same day, and life now looks much better. Our problem now is to get on a train to Lahore, for first class is reserved two weeks in advance. Will worry about that on Saturday. 

Our stay in Afghanistan – three weeks old – was beneficial in many ways. The boils on our legs healed up a bit, another one went through a shorter, but still painful cycle on my right cheek, and we both gained a few pounds stuffing ourselves with steaks, kebabs, lamb, and any other meat we could find. We bought out Kabul, notably, a wildcat fur coat for $180, a fur hat, two dresses, necklaces, earrings, shirts, etc., etc. Not much dope smoking, thanks to the new regime, and too many Pakistani tourists in our first hotel. But we found the Eagle Hotel later on with a mellow stoned staff and a bunch of catatonic fellow travelers – much the nicest atmosphere for the capital.

Bamiyan and Band-e-Amir were fine, except for the bugs (about 100 bedbug bites one night) and the bottom of our feet cracking in the day air. Pretty lakes, but nothing extraordinary. Met a great English couple, Richard and Jasmine Mellor, and spent many a happy hour smoking and swapping lies.  They drove us back to Kabul in their VW kombi - the only way to go - stopping to see Genghis Khan's Red City (Shahr-e Zuhak) just east of Bamiyan.  Hope to catch them again in Kathmandu.