Continued from Part 3
PROLOGUE: Bangladesh 1971, and all that went with it.
"The Emergency", 1975 through 1977 in India, was a period in our multi-hued history which I sawup-close. I also saw the end of the Vietnam war, live episodes of conflicts in Mozambique, Angola, Papua NewGuinea and the evolution of East Timor. Of course, we also sailed to the economically stronger parts of theworld, Western Europe, North America, Persian Gulf, Far East, even South Africa. For some time I tried tostudy in Ireland. In Poland, during a strike in the docks, we sat with Lech Walesa. USSR was beginning to lookshaky. South America was about discovering women. Africa was about discovering wars.
These were my formative years, after a childhood spent listening to martial lore, where the enemy wasrespected for bravery. Late teens through early 20s was when we who were lucky to sail saw the good and thebad that went with it. There was no internet, so exchanging notes on evolution of the human mind wasrestricted to those you sailed with or met, and learning was largely through books. I was lucky, I crossed thePacific regularly before the term "Pacific Rim countries" was invented. And so I also met a lot ofAmerican people, in addition to those from the rest of the world. And I learnt why the size of maritimecontainers was linked to the size of the 24-can Coca-Cola crate, shipped by the box-load to Vietnam.
I met black and white and Latino and Red Americans and rednecks and soldiers and draft evaders and hippies andjunkies and whores and truck drivers and pimps and night-life and discovered that they were also human,understood what a miserable life war was, smoked gifts from India, drank cheap plonk in brown paper bags,learnt philosophy on the real meaning of life. I also saw the evolution of the hard working family ethos withthe "average" North American that went towards well known icons like huge big cars and massivebuildings with deep lawns on wide roads and immense meal servings but also lesser known qualities likesupporting sustainable education, bringing up the next generation through time spent on evolving youngstersthrough neighbourhood little league base-ball clubs and similar, community service through volunteer firefighters or draw-bridge maintenance.
And I also understood how validation of truth as well as history were even then the prerogatives of those withfatter wallets. And how these fatter wallets came through a combination of agriculture and aggressive defenceand humanities and economics and religion and property and showmanship and commerce and . . . power overcommunication. Individual or nation or religion or all points in between.
That's when I figured, hey, this is America, a continent with soil as fertile as mine, so how come I amcarrying shiploads of grain back to the starving millions while they seem to be getting there? One hell of away to evolve an open mind, I tell you.
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SENTIMENT: I am on a high, not tired.
I have spent the previous night at a miserable ramshackle railway station, Wagah, myfirst interface with and therefore first impression of Pakistan on this trip, which is probably the lowestpoint of my journey. Next, I have been introduced to Lahore through the doubtful joys of Mogulpura, andsubjected to an assault on my lungs and senses in an ancient rotten train passing through untended slums anddusty terrain. I shall never forget this and not ever let any pompous Lahori-wannabe on both sides of theborder as well as anywhere else in the world forget either. Then I have spent some quality time beingtorpedoed across Lahore in a 3-wheeler with 80 pounds tyre-pressure, straight out of Octopussy, that was fun,in retrospect.
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Downside: All we got to eat in Lahore was chips, wafers, in plastic sacks. Finally, I spent the postmidnight through dawn hours being driven in a snazzy and comfortable bus, on a superb motorway, dozing througha Sunny Deol-Preity Zinta movie. All this over land that my forefathers probably tilled. Or at least, walkedor rode across. Or fought with invaders. Or ran from them. Or capitulated. Whatever.
For some reason, I feel like I have been stranded in and around Lajpat Nagar, Delhi, circa 1975, for thenight, except when I got on the bus. Once I was on the bus I felt like I was on the Delhi-Ludhianaair-con super-deluxe. Except that...
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ASIDE: For the curious reader who wrote in, and others, what I saw beneath theLahore-Islamabad bus next to the luggage compartment was the "hidden" double bottom that many busesand trains and ships and planes all over the world have, for some amount of private commerce also known as"smuggling".
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That's OK, I am not here to check on morals. I am sure people will recall a day and age when even grade-AEuropean airlines, some now sadly defunct, alas, would come in and disembark seats for "repairs",stuffed with gold biscuits.
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0930-1400, 16th April 2004
... except that, well: Where are the women in this country? Makes me wonder at the logic the fleshtraders gave me at Attari when I asked them what the drive, if not monetary, was: Young Muslim girls wouldotherwise get sold to Hindu husbands, they said, when they tried to explain to me that they were doing it forthe good of the girls and for The Faith. I have been given the same reasoning whenever I've asked thisquestion in other Muslim countries too. Another version of the hard luck stories dished out by women of thetrade who tell customers what they want to hear so that the size of their tip increases. It goes with what weas shippies learnt very early in life - anybody who wants anything from you will always tell you what a great(big) Dick you are (have).
We saw a few women on the train. As we disembarked, they moved off; escorted. After that, agreed, it ismidnight in Lahore, but there are none on the streets. None at the bus station. None in the bus. Early in themorning, none at Skyways/Pindi. None at the hotel. None seen along the way or walking with the crowds. Andnow, in the fairly upscale 2000-rupee Javed Miandad stands, right next to the balcony leading to the Pakistaniteam dressing room, barring a few obvious Indian women in Indian colours, none. What is the male-female ratioin this country, anyway?
I am not going to get a straight answer to this question during my stay in Pakistan.
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Chacha Green Cricket reaches into a big paper sack and passes me one half of anoily but tasty "kachori", the other half goes to Raghu. He says something in gruff Urdu to me whichis a brief welcome as well as simultaneous instruction to his camp-followers to look after us. He asks me myname, I give it to him with the family surname, it goes like this:- "Malik Veeresh, ---- of Jhung, now ofDelhi, India." He stares at me, obviously recognises the surname, and I get a huge bear hug in return. Anassortment of excited young men, meanwhile, orchestrated by Chacha's nephew (who is unfortunately dumb, butmanages sounds in a way that others seem to be able to understand) are piling Raghu with lemon tea and colaand more chips. We are now going through the complete "Welcome to Pakistan" experience that has beentop of mindspace for the last few weeks. This is more like it.
The Pakistani cricket team, out in the middle, is kind of collapsing. Chacha and company are going through thedrill, with additional slogans on Indo-Pak amity and joy and brotherhood interspersed every now and then.Since I do not follow cricket, I spend my time walking around the stand and introducing myself, talking withanybody who will. Raghu watches the game.
I strike a conversation with an intense young boy, must be 16 years old or so, very obviously a great cricketfan and club level player. He was selected for some training in South Africa, but was not permitted to go byhis parents. "Study hard". Has now therefore decided to concentrate on his studies, so did not get aposition as a ball-boy, but has bunked to see the match anyway. Has a world-view on every Pakistani cricketer.
Bored unidentified Pakistani security man in t-shirt and slacks, young; sitting with equally boredunidentified Indian security man in safari suit, also young. I think I see weapons under their belts. After afew guarded minutes both let slip that they are happy that the match is getting over early, at least they cannow rest. There is a fluid synchronisation in their movements, low on wastage of any energy but alert as apair all the time, which I marvel at. What a team they would have made against other real bad guys.
Young boys working for one of the cola or soap MNCs, I forget which, walking around making people fill couponsfor some sort of market research on best movie, best actor, best actress, best TV serial and stuff like that.One side is in Urdu and the other in English. I fill the forms on random basis with my Delhi address, and theyare thrilled. I ask them what they want to be when they grow up, and both of them say "fighterpilots". I tell them they are going to have to learn good English if they want to. They look at medoubtfully.
By now I have a fan club. A group of young men are convinced that Pakistan's forthcoming loss in cricket toIndia does not really mean much because four of the Indian players are actually "ours". They havethe standard view on the fate of Muslims in India. I spend a lot of time trying to explain the status ofMuslims in India and as Indians. It just seems to go over them. I would give anything for an affluent SouthIndian Muslim at this juncture. Don't these guys watch Kamalahassan's Tamil movies dubbed back inEnglish?
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The conversation overtakes the match and moves on to equting the fight for Kashmir as a revenge for EastPakistan. It goes on. I feel like I am at The Chowk.Much of the next few hours are spent in reaching a point in every discussion which inevitably veers towardsKashmir, then changes track to watching the match, joining in shouting all sorts of slogans, and exchanging 10rupee notes. We are the first Hindus any one of them has ever met. None of them recognise the "Om"symbol across my t-shirt.
I wish I had a ponytail and wore caste marks.
Want a smoke? Walk up to any policeman. Want to walk into the restricted enclosures? Walk up with a seniorpoliceman. Want to avoid paying for a ticket? Walk in as escort to families of very senior policeman. I learnthat they are called "thullaa" and "mamu" here too. Some bored young boys try to enact thescene from Dil Se, where Shah Rukh Khan's radio jockey hero is being dragged away in the backlanes ofOld Delhi by the bad Muslim terrorists, and poor SRK desperately tries to attract the attention of some copson a goof off by shouting the magic words "oye thullai, thullai" at them. This has the localconstabulary down on them very rapidly, but considering the mixed nature of the crowd and myrequest-cum-apology on their behalf, they are not thrown out but let off without much fanfare.
I see a few familiar faces from the Indian cricket establishment, their hanger-ons and media strutting around.They all look very important with bunches of badges hanging around their necks. As a matter of fact, I see alot of important looking faces and over-weight bodies from both countries strutting around trying to look VeryImportant.
For lunch, we Indians and selected Pakistanis are invited by a few people walking aroundthe stadium with a megaphone to assemble at a point near the next enclosure and then marched off in a largehungry mixed group towards a small hotel nearby. I smuggle the 16 year old Pindi youngster who could not gofor training to South Africa because of his folks and a few other young Pakistanis with me, since it is notfair to feed only selected Indians and "official" Pakistanis, and I feel that they are like "hungryevery two hours" kind of youngsters anywhere anyway. Besides, this is what I would do when a free mealbeckons me because of my dispensation at that moment.
The Rawalpindi Cricket Lovers Association are an obviously intense and enthusiastic lot, and they have anIndo-Pak chapter with many impressive names on it. We are all invited to listen to speeches from a variety ofcricket lovers from Pakistan, while lunch awaits appetisingly in the hall next door. Not to be out-done, aclutch of Indians get up to make their speeches. Then they sing songs together. After that, there are moreslogans and speeches. Everybody wants to say how much they love everybody else.
Luckily, there are some more young people, engineers who have completed their MBAs from one of the better IIMsin India (Bangalore), who are sitting next to us. They have been here longer and wise us up to some of theessentials, like taxi rates and food. And the fact that this can go on all evening, if we don't start headingfor the food. Since they have been living in hostels long enough, they just get up and move towards the food.This starts a trend. Now you know what an MBA is good for.
One thing I want to state here: as and when Pakistan gets back to being a democracy, it will have no problemsfinding long winded speech makers. Just go to the cricket lovers.
