Guns and Mangoes in the Punjab

I was on my way back to the far west of Pakistan and in order to get there, I had to fly from Singapore via Dubai to Karachi.  Knowing that it’s Ramadan and that people are fasting, I carb and alcohol loaded before I got off the plane.  It’s actually illegal for non Muslims to eat or drink in public in Pakistan during Ramadan, so I ate my pitiful airline lunch and washing it down with a little plastic bottle of Shiraz, I made the most of it.

I had a number of meetings in Karachi and I was helping to select a new office there for our local sales team and then I also had to select a new service provider for security, because this is a place where my employer requires that you don’t go anywhere in Pakistan without men with guns.  Lots of men, with lots of guns.  

There are only a couple of hotels that are generally acceptable for foreigners to stay in in Karachi and sadly, a number of the hotels or major buildings close to them have been blown up at one time or another.  The Karachi Marriott has only been blown up once, in 2002 (when the US consulate was also targeted) and because of the up armouring carried out by the owners, they now claim that its the ‘safest hotel in Karachi’  Lets hope so, because that’s where I am staying this time.   

The Pakistani people are charming but formally polite until you get to know them well.  The thing is, getting to know them beyond the pleasantries that dominate the first few minutes of any meeting.  The state of your health, the health of your family, the number of children you have and the weather are all prerequisite topics.  Even if it’s abundantly clear that what they have to sell, you don’t want, you still have to go through the motions and then politely tell them that the office that they want you to pay a fortune for, is actually somewhere that you wouldn’t run your chooks in it for fear that they would catch something.  Obviously you don’t tell them that exactly, but you get the picture.

The longest internal leg of my trip is from Karachi to a town called Rajanpur, in the Punjab. It’s not technically in the region named Baluchistan, but its right on the invisible border that runs through the mountains, so it might as well be.  I booked a flight there and back hoping to avoid the hellish drive but I found out that because of very high daytime temperatures (50 deg C plus), sand storms and high winds that around half of the light passenger aircraft who service the smaller airports have been unable to land in that area over the past few days.  I didn’t fancy getting turned back and having to try and divert from whatever other airport was open and make the journey in an unknown vehicle, so I resolved to drive in a small convoy.  Well, for accuracy, I’m not driving, I am a passenger and a fairly nervous one at that.  

At ten hours, it’s a dreadful journey for anyone, but as a jumpy passenger, with all the jingly trucks wandering across the road, motorcyclists weaving in and out, pedestrians darting though the traffic and beggars and pedlars trying to flag down vehicles at every choke point, it’s enough to make you close your eyes and pray.  In fact, I think that’s what my driver is doing most of the time.    

I think I mentioned that it’s Ramadan? and so I got up early and shovelled in as much spicy chick pea dahl and roti as I could before the journey, thinking that I’d manage the drive better if I ate my fill at the hotel as an early breakfast – at 6am, which for the faithful is still 3 hours into the fast, but as an nonbeliever, I get a break on that, even if I do have to eat in my room.  Part way through the ten hour drive I am reminded why lots of chick peas are not good travelling food. I feel like I am in the scene in the Peter Sellers film where someone passes wind in the lift, but I figure that my travelling companions won’t get the reference and besides, they are heavily armed.  Giving in to the dahl probably wouldn’t have been the best idea anyway as I always have a small but powerful attack squad of Giardia or some other exotic parasite tucked somewhere about my intestines.  As a result, I am beginning to feel a sense of impending doom with my stomach fermenting and gurgling malevolently away.   

While we are on the subject of pop (or is it poop?) culture references, this morning the security guards were checking over their weapons in the car park and exchanging admiring glances at each others ‘modifications’ – it’s probably a boy thing…  Most of the guards have the 30 round magazines on their folding stock AK47’s with another reversed and taped onto it giving the ability to change mags quickly when needed.  One actually had a small welded brace made to hold two magazines together without the need for tape and that was universally admired.  A couple of them had local versions of the MP5K, which is a very useful short weapon for bringing to bear in cramped circumstances, such as from inside a car. Not that you’d want them fire it without it being absolutely necessary, I hasten to add, as you’d be as deaf as a post afterwards.  Being former military men and all really good guys, they wouldn’t do anything so crass as to add some bling to their weapons or wear a Rambo like headband and I wouldn’t get into a vehicle with them if they did, but some of them do like ‘mission impossible’ ring tones on their mobiles. The accompanying Police Commandos also have “No Fear” emblazoned on their t shirts and vehicles.

My own personal paranoia goes into overdrive when I am up in the mountains and I refuse to move without something that goes bang close to hand.  On previous trips I have managed to persuade them to place an MP5K under my seat, where it is never mentioned, but it’s accepted that if there’s an orange jump suit being handed out, I’m not putting it on.  We aren’t going high up or out of the way this time and I don’t need a weapon because of the all the others in friendly hands around me, but it’s a matter of principle and possibly, just possibly because it makes make me feel more like one of the gang. Not that I could really be one of the gang as I’m the only white boy and just about the the only one without a beard. This time, they waited until we were just about to leave and then, with straight faces, handed me a dinky little .38 calibre pistol, in a holster that seriously looked like it had been made for Bodyguard Barbie.  Hmmm, “Shukria” I said politely and with as much dignity as I could muster, I then slipped it in the seat pocket, where it sat, looking very small.

Yes, apparently ‘desert pink’ is a legitimate colour.

Part way through the journey and late at night, I arrived at the little town of Rahim Yar Khan, where I had reserved rooms in a small hotel.  The chain, which is actually owned by the same people as own the Marriott franchise in Pakistan was allegedly the best in town, but I wasn’t expecting much, just a place with a lock on the door, air con and a bed.  When we arrived, I discovered that they wouldn’t let me, a foreigner, stay due to the local security situation.  I know, because it is my business to know, that there had been significant inter tribal conflict lately and in some parts, there was more than a general resentment of the west, but I wasn’t aware of the government directive that hotels ‘without security’ had to turn away foreign guests.  I gestured through the window at the four vehicles, two with flashing blue lights and with my private army rapidly fanning out to cover the street and without a trace of irony, said “I think I have enough security for us all, don’t you?”

That didn’t work of course and we were politely turned away and instructed to call the chief commissioner of Police for permission, but by that time of night  he wasn’t taking calls.  Some serious string pulling by the guy running my security detail got us into an approved government ‘rest house’ for the night, which actually was quite comfortable, even if my security head was woken up every thirty minutes or so by members of the intelligence agencies demanding copies of my passport and trying to force us to leave and drive on and into the next regions responsibility.  That would have meant that we continue driving through the night, which you just don’t do in that neck of the woods so he refused and told the spies to wake me up and kick me out themselves.  As he’d anticipated, they didn’t want to do that and instead let me stay asleep, even though he had to go downstairs minutes later and have a two o’clock in the morning meal before the fasting started.    

The next day, looking out of the window I was mortified to see that my security detail had actually slept in the back of the trucks and I resolved that the next night, I’d find them beds or at least they would be under cover.  I expected to hear lots of grumbling and rubbing of bad backs but they were as cheerful as ever and they climbed back aboard for the next leg of the journey

After several hours in convoy, I arrived at the same 1922 British built fort that I been to for a tribal council or ‘Jirga’ some time before. I doubt that the Brits actually laid the bricks here, more like directed the work, but the same tough looking individuals that I remembered from the last time I was there were still on the site and their crinkled faces and twinkling eyes told me that they were happy to see me and by extension, what that could mean in terms of progress for their remote desert community.

The Border Military Police post 

NOT a ‘Game of Thrones’ set…

It’s a very hard life that they lead, what with having to live with contaminated ground water and struggling to make a living from subsistence goat farming.  Although the land in the Indus river valley area is incredibly fertile and almost anything grows, including mangoes, cotton, sweetcorn, rice and wheat, nothing will grow well out there in the desert, except for immediately after the rains and then the land is inundated and would wash any crops there away.  In most desert areas hunting is banned (not that a ban stops people) in order to preserve the wildlife, or so they say.  I have a feeling that the real reason is to preserve the wildlife for the wealthy Arabs who fly in with their hawks and four wheel drives and live in luxurious tents, with flushing toilets and air-conditioning.

 The last time I came to the fort, the locals had laid on a feast of roasted goats that were hacked into pieces and laid on several platters for us to eat with our fingers. The goat was a similar temperature to molten lava at that moment and I was busy trying to cool my rapidly blistering fingers when the grinning tribesman opposite pulled apart a large piece with his asbestos hands and dumped it onto my place with the admonishment to “EAT”  so, I ate.  Everyone was fasting this time of course, so there was no roast goat, but recognising that I wasn’t Muslim and following their traditions of Pashtunwali,the unwritten code of looking after travellers and defending them with their lives, if necessary, they insisted that I had a drink of water and a few slices of delicious local mangoes. I had no idea where the water was coming from, but it would have been rude to refuse, so I drank it, all the time thinking about the consequences. I felt, rather than heard the shriek from my stomach.

One of the fierce looking, but very friendly Border Military Police guards

I knew that we had a small number of Border Military Police who were out in the desert guarding the technical equipment on our behalf and I wanted to visit them to make sure that they were being looked after, so my private army took  me on a 30 minute ‘Mad Max’ type road race to the sites.  I was reminded of Legionnaires standing post in forsaken corners of North Africa when I saw the remoteness of the location and I ambled over to introduce myself to the old grizzled guards who spent a month at a time living in a brushwood shelter on site. 

This, believe it or not, is the security guards ‘barracks’ in the desert.  The shapes on the horizon are ancient undersea reefs.

I shook all their hands and thanked them for their duty and as we had some fruit in an cool box in the back of the car, I got that out and left it with them. As we drove off in our air-conditioned vehicle.  I noticed my guards looking quizzically at me and I hoped that I hadn’t embarrassed anyone by offering food during the fast.  Generally speaking, when a non Muslim makes a minor mistake of etiquette, but does so inadvertently, you are forgiven with a smile and it’s usually forgotten, but in this case I wasn’t too sure.

I had been swallowing Imodium like it was candy all morning and had been able to manage my rapidly rioting innards, but right there and then, I needed to stop the convoy and consumed with embarrassment, I scampered off behind a small bush.  Within seconds, I was surrounded by armed men, all concerned for my wellbeing, but luckily facing outwards in ‘all round defence’, in case someone wanted to attack me when my pants were down.

That evening, when it came around to the Iftar or ‘breaking of the fast’ meal, the guards left the commander and I alone in the guest house.  As is traditional, we started with dates and again, slices of mangoes.  I remarked how much I loved their mangoes and I was told that it was mango season at that time and we could stop on the way back to Karachi and buy some.  The commander drank the allegedly refreshing and sugar laden pink rosewater.  I tried it but being the plebeian I am, I preferred the sugar laden coca cola that I was offered.  We had a delicious chicken curry, again eaten with fingers (I’m not even going to describe my innards by this time) and mercifully, lots of naan bread and I asked if we could arrange some bedding for the guards and somewhere inside for them to sleep. “No room Sir” I was told, but I insisted and suggested that they sleep in the dining room, which had fans.  Begrudgingly the guest house managers agreed to allow that “those who wanted it” could sleep inside where it was cooler, inferring that anyone who took up the offer was not at all welcome really.

My bathroom had several resident crickets and as soon as I had got into bed, they started up.  I knew that there was no chance of sleep with them around, so I took a running shoe and after chasing them down, battered them into silence. No sooner had I done that, but the door flew open and two guards ran in to see if I was being attacked.  I assured them that I was not and that my room was now cricket free.  Through the door, I saw that all twelve (!) of the guards had decided to sleep on the floor outside of my room.  After their food, they were revved up and ready for a fight, but luckily for me, they had no where to go.

I managed to reassure them that I was not in danger of imminent kidnap by showing them the carcasses of the crickets, which were already being dismembered by ants, but they must have thought that I was complaining about the mess, so they brought the manager out of his bed by his ear and instructed him to clean the room.  When he had done so with very bad grace,  my guards (note the possessive pronoun) as good as tucked me back into bed.  When the door was closed, I had to jump out of bed again and rush to the loo.  I tried to be as quiet as I could so they didn’t knock on the door and ask me if I was ok.

Very early the next morning, the guard commander who spoke the best English woke me with hot water and a towel.  I realised that I was expected to use that to shave but that he also wanted to chat and so I invited him to sit down in my room as I packed my small bag.  It transpired that the guards had quite taken to me and genuinely wanted me to know about the history and the peaceful nature of Islam, so that if I wished, I could use the occasion of morning prayers to convert.  I saw no irony in hearing about the peaceful nature of Islam coming from a heavily armed man in a fortified guesthouse in a province where many would have quite happily staked me out in the town square and very, very politely declined the offer but agreed that as soon as I was feeling better I’d look more closely into the history.  He took that as a partially successful conversion and I was allowed to continue my ablutions.    

On the journey back to Karachi we stopped at a Chinese run highway building project to see what they were doing about security in challenging circumstances.  The Chinese, not wanting to lessen their profits are often a little slipshod about the security of their workers and as a result are the only ones currently having people kidnapped for ransom.  The government, who are embarrassed by this, insist that they live in fortified bases and provide large numbers of troops to guard the men working there.  Of course, they also require the project people to pay for it all and no doubt make a tidy profit of their own.

When we left, I noticed the almost indecent haste with which the convoy was barrelling down the highway.  I knew that the guards were trying to get home to Karachi before Iftar and the leapfrogging Police vehicles that changed at each invisible province line were hard pressed to stay ahead of our own drivers.  I didn’t complain and just made like my driver and closed my eyes.  It was dark by the time we got to the outskirts of the city and I remembered that we hadn’t stopped and bought any mangoes.  “Don’t worry Sir” I was assured and I nodded off again.  When I awoke, we were inside the Marriott compound and all of the guards had de bussed and were formed up to say goodbye.  I had intended to pay for their Iftar meal as a thank you, but we’d run out of time.  I pressed an envelope with my remaining cash onto the guard commander and asked him to pay for the food on my behalf.  They were certainly not expecting anything, but nor was I expecting the gift of a tray of mangoes that they had obviously purchased en route as I slept.

A great gift from really nice heavily armed people.

It was my best trip to Pakistan yet and I told them all so.  I have several weeks and five countries to visit before I get home again, but I will really remember this trip and the people I met.  Some old friends and now, some new ones.