You can't fly from just anywhere in Pakistan to just anywhere in India, though they are neighboring countries. There is a flight from Lahore to Dehli which will have to suit my purposes. It goes once a week.
Tuesday, 29 October 2013
Pakistan-Visa
My imagined itinerary runs from Pakistan down through neighboring India to Sri Lanka in the south. I called Trailfinders and they don't provide assistance with visas to Pakistan, though they could inform me that having a Pakistan visa in your passport can get in the way when you apply for a visa to India.
Pakistan-Books
I set out to pick up a travel guide to Pakistan not realizing Pakistan fell into the same category of country as Afghanistan and Iraq.
NOVELS
* Moth Smoke, by Mohsin Hamid (2000) -- modern-day tale of feudal relationships between a Golden Boy (Ozi in the 1990s, referencing princely Aurangzeb of lore), his beautiful and rebellious wife (Mumtaz, same name then and now, who moonlights in the 1990s as radical journalist Zulfikar Manto), the Ragged Orphan (Darashikoh, adopted by Ozi's father out of a sense of loyalty, and who increasingly resents Ozi's sense of privilege); and servants. Set in Lahore. [4]
* The Reluctant Fundamentalist, by Mohsin Hamid (2007) -- An ex-Princeton ex-valuation-consultant ex-West-loving Pakistani tells his story in monologue form to a stranger in a tea-shop, an American we learn about only through the narrator's brief asides about the various forms his discomfort takes as he sits in this Pakistani street-side eatery. The book makes clear what Pakistani's love about America; the narrator's rather sudden disillusionment with all he had previously admired was less convincingly portrayed. [3]
* A Case of Exploding Mangoes, by Mohammed Hanif (2008) -- A somewhat magical-realist satire with a touch of Catch-22, about the last days of General Zia ul-Haq who died in a 1988 plane crash. Told through the eyes of a military trainee (Ali Shigri) whose army father was scape-goated by the regime and whose death he is seeking to avenge. [1]
* Noon, by Aadtish Taseer (2011) -- a young male expat Pakistani goes back 'home' to find his birth father. Four stories that loosely intertwine give us his outsider's perspective on common ("traditional"?) power relationships in Pakistan, within members of the family, between the family the servants and the (formal) law, between nouveau-riche and fading raj's. [2]
* The Wandering Falcon, by Jamil Ahmad (2011) -- Bleak bleak bleak. Harsh tales of tribal Pakistan (& Afghanistan & Iran) in the 1950's (maybe?), bound loosely together by the figure of Tor Baz ("black falcon") who appears (at least briefly) in each story, less a protagonist than a tribe-less shape-shifter who enables us to be flies-on-the-wall in different tribal settings and situations. [5]
* In Other Rooms, Other Wonders, by Daniyal Mueenuddin (2009) -- Intertwined stories, with feudal landed gentry K.K. Harouni at the fulcrum. Tells the stories of people who worked for him, his offspring, their lovers; chasing back and forth in time from when K.K. (always in the background) was a young man to when he is dying.
* The Bride, by Bapsi Sidhwa (1983) -- The story of Qasim, a tribal from Kohistan, who migrates to Jullundur in the plains after his wife and children succumb to smallpox. He rescues a young child, Zaitoon, a girl from the plains orphaned when her Muslim parents were slaughtered at the Pakistan border during partition. She is The Bride, married by her adoptive father to one of his clansmen once she is a teenager. First story I've read that focuses on the experiences of women (even though still told through the lives of men).
* The Diary of a Social Butterfly, by Moni Mohsin (2009)
* On Wings of Diesel: Trucks, Identity and Culture in Pakistan, by Jamal J. Elias -- Anthropological study of trucks, truckers, and truck art; beautifully photographed. Elias is the Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at UPenn.
SNIPPETS
Other Rooms
p.117 - "She had always inhabited an indefinite space, neither rich nor poor, neither servant nor begun, in a city where the very concept of a middle class still found expression only in a few households, managers of foreign banks and of the big industrial concerns, sugar and textiles and steel."
p.125 - "What can you possibly find to say to her? Sheherezad told me she came for tea the other day, and that this unfortunate little thing sat without saying a word, just listening, like a frog in the corner. It's indecent."
Falcon
p.76 - "He was never very clear about his plans. Sometimes, he would talk about going to the city for a while. Sometimes, he would be critical of city life and would plan on going north, where he had not been for some years. He was a strangely disturbed man, and behind all his talk one could sense an undertone of worry and fear; a feeling of failure. Indeed, he did mention on more than one occasion the virtues of a settled life, but he would immediately counter it by saying that he himself was not designed to live in one place permanently."
p.93 - "Who are you and where are you from" / "You have asked me a question I have not been asked for a long time now... It is true, I am neither a Mahsud nor a Wazir. But I can tell you as little about who I am as I can about who I shall be. Think of Tor Baz as your hunting falcon. That should be enough."
p.119 - "What makes a man like you seek out and visit this place and these people? After all, the only memory you have is your father's. This land should have meant nothing to you as you have not seen or lived in it before. / It is difficult to explain. It is only a question of feeling and reasons do not come into it. Let me put it this way: that without knowing my people and my father's land I have always felt that I did not truly know myself."
Moth
p.45 - "Let me tell you what I think about secrets. Secrets make life more interesting. You can be in a crowded room with someone and touch them without touching, just with a look, because they know a part of you no one else knows. And whenever you're with them, the two of you are alone, because the you they see no one else can see."
p.65 - "What about killing humans? Well, aside from a few die-hard individualists on the fringe, the general consensus among people these days seems to be that eating and wearing other people is just not on. Wearing a suit which costs as much as a farmer will make in his lifetime is acceptable, but actually putting his eyeballs on a string and letting them dangle above tastefully exposed cleavage is bad form."
NOVELS
* Moth Smoke, by Mohsin Hamid (2000) -- modern-day tale of feudal relationships between a Golden Boy (Ozi in the 1990s, referencing princely Aurangzeb of lore), his beautiful and rebellious wife (Mumtaz, same name then and now, who moonlights in the 1990s as radical journalist Zulfikar Manto), the Ragged Orphan (Darashikoh, adopted by Ozi's father out of a sense of loyalty, and who increasingly resents Ozi's sense of privilege); and servants. Set in Lahore. [4]
* The Reluctant Fundamentalist, by Mohsin Hamid (2007) -- An ex-Princeton ex-valuation-consultant ex-West-loving Pakistani tells his story in monologue form to a stranger in a tea-shop, an American we learn about only through the narrator's brief asides about the various forms his discomfort takes as he sits in this Pakistani street-side eatery. The book makes clear what Pakistani's love about America; the narrator's rather sudden disillusionment with all he had previously admired was less convincingly portrayed. [3]
* A Case of Exploding Mangoes, by Mohammed Hanif (2008) -- A somewhat magical-realist satire with a touch of Catch-22, about the last days of General Zia ul-Haq who died in a 1988 plane crash. Told through the eyes of a military trainee (Ali Shigri) whose army father was scape-goated by the regime and whose death he is seeking to avenge. [1]
* Noon, by Aadtish Taseer (2011) -- a young male expat Pakistani goes back 'home' to find his birth father. Four stories that loosely intertwine give us his outsider's perspective on common ("traditional"?) power relationships in Pakistan, within members of the family, between the family the servants and the (formal) law, between nouveau-riche and fading raj's. [2]
* The Wandering Falcon, by Jamil Ahmad (2011) -- Bleak bleak bleak. Harsh tales of tribal Pakistan (& Afghanistan & Iran) in the 1950's (maybe?), bound loosely together by the figure of Tor Baz ("black falcon") who appears (at least briefly) in each story, less a protagonist than a tribe-less shape-shifter who enables us to be flies-on-the-wall in different tribal settings and situations. [5]
* In Other Rooms, Other Wonders, by Daniyal Mueenuddin (2009) -- Intertwined stories, with feudal landed gentry K.K. Harouni at the fulcrum. Tells the stories of people who worked for him, his offspring, their lovers; chasing back and forth in time from when K.K. (always in the background) was a young man to when he is dying.
* The Bride, by Bapsi Sidhwa (1983) -- The story of Qasim, a tribal from Kohistan, who migrates to Jullundur in the plains after his wife and children succumb to smallpox. He rescues a young child, Zaitoon, a girl from the plains orphaned when her Muslim parents were slaughtered at the Pakistan border during partition. She is The Bride, married by her adoptive father to one of his clansmen once she is a teenager. First story I've read that focuses on the experiences of women (even though still told through the lives of men).
* The Diary of a Social Butterfly, by Moni Mohsin (2009)
* On Wings of Diesel: Trucks, Identity and Culture in Pakistan, by Jamal J. Elias -- Anthropological study of trucks, truckers, and truck art; beautifully photographed. Elias is the Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at UPenn.
SNIPPETS
Other Rooms
p.117 - "She had always inhabited an indefinite space, neither rich nor poor, neither servant nor begun, in a city where the very concept of a middle class still found expression only in a few households, managers of foreign banks and of the big industrial concerns, sugar and textiles and steel."
p.125 - "What can you possibly find to say to her? Sheherezad told me she came for tea the other day, and that this unfortunate little thing sat without saying a word, just listening, like a frog in the corner. It's indecent."
Falcon
p.76 - "He was never very clear about his plans. Sometimes, he would talk about going to the city for a while. Sometimes, he would be critical of city life and would plan on going north, where he had not been for some years. He was a strangely disturbed man, and behind all his talk one could sense an undertone of worry and fear; a feeling of failure. Indeed, he did mention on more than one occasion the virtues of a settled life, but he would immediately counter it by saying that he himself was not designed to live in one place permanently."
p.93 - "Who are you and where are you from" / "You have asked me a question I have not been asked for a long time now... It is true, I am neither a Mahsud nor a Wazir. But I can tell you as little about who I am as I can about who I shall be. Think of Tor Baz as your hunting falcon. That should be enough."
p.119 - "What makes a man like you seek out and visit this place and these people? After all, the only memory you have is your father's. This land should have meant nothing to you as you have not seen or lived in it before. / It is difficult to explain. It is only a question of feeling and reasons do not come into it. Let me put it this way: that without knowing my people and my father's land I have always felt that I did not truly know myself."
Moth
p.45 - "Let me tell you what I think about secrets. Secrets make life more interesting. You can be in a crowded room with someone and touch them without touching, just with a look, because they know a part of you no one else knows. And whenever you're with them, the two of you are alone, because the you they see no one else can see."
p.65 - "What about killing humans? Well, aside from a few die-hard individualists on the fringe, the general consensus among people these days seems to be that eating and wearing other people is just not on. Wearing a suit which costs as much as a farmer will make in his lifetime is acceptable, but actually putting his eyeballs on a string and letting them dangle above tastefully exposed cleavage is bad form."
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