Peshawar – Meeting an Old Friend

Spogmay Hotel 200 Rupees/ double bed room

The days of free computer access had finished, so now on the blog might be short and compact.

My friend from Malaysia, whom I met in India before, called me for some times, and we were discussing about the opportunity to meet up. Actually I didnt have any plan to go to Peshawar, but because she was going to Afghanistan in a very near future, I decided to ‘sacrifice’ my plan and go to Peshawar instead.

I departed quite late from Islamabad, thanks to the driver from our office who didnt come early. The bus to Peshawar, from the Karachi Company, are usually small buses. I took the Flying Coach, which do really ‘fly’, and I hoped that I would reach Peshawar before dark. The atmosphere in the Coach was not quite Pakistan already. I encountered some Hazaran Mongoloid face Hazaran ethnic boys, who also speaked Farsi. He was an Afghan refugee.

I reached Peshawar almost dark. Surprising, with my shalwar qamees and waist, despite of my backpack, people misunderstood me as Afghan. When I logged to bus, a Pashto insisted to speak Pashto (one of Afghan national languages) with me, then turned to be Farsi. I told him I only spoke Urdu, then he realized I was not an Afghan.

My friend stayed in a hotel quite far away from the main road. She said that it was difficult to find a hotel here. The hotel was nice anyway, and we shared the double room for quite a bargain.

The night discussion with her was interesting. She was travelling in India for 5 months, while I moved to Pakistan as visa expired. She got quite nice experience in Pakistan, and it was interesting to gain information about travelling in Pakistan in woman’s side. She was initially worrying about the safety for women in Pakistan, but she was also overwhelmed by the hospitality in Pakistan. Yes, sexual harassments do exist here, but people in Pakistan are more polite than in India. In Pakistan there is special seat for women in buses; in India male passengers even didnt bother to give seats for pregnant women, babies, and elderly. And that night we also discussed much about Islam, the different concept of Islam in our countries and in Pakistan, about India, and many other things.

But that night I was completely exhausted after the (short) journey.