The Last Full Day of Lahore

Finally got the chance to snap a picture of his "street" or alley more like, in daylight, while we walk a few steps next door to Mamoo Ajmal's in-law's house. Told you its like M'sia x (-10) + 100 sand! only their houses are made of bricks and not wood.

This is Lareb the happiest baby girl in the world! always laughing she is.

We were welcomed to milk and this sweet dish (wana wanna help me w the name?) first as they were still preparing lunch.

This is the spread after 45min of waiting, salad, yoghurt, fried fish and fish methi w aloo ala prata (that's the prata with potatoes in between. Cool~)

While waiting for food to be served, we talked with the captain of the house. He works at the airport as a technician. His English is perfect despite his retired age. Typically pple who work for the govt agencies tend to speak good English. Anyways, i asked him what does he do at the airport, and he explained how the baggage machine works and how he goes to work, by bike. etc etc. If i could eat that translation donut from Doraemon (Japanese robot cat cartoon), i would have interviewed everybody in the neighbourhood:

1. What do they work as


2. What they do at work


3. How they get to work


4. What is their ambition

Being a close relative indeed, we spent 2hrs at their house! We hung out at the roof and saw these children playing. After i snapped this picture, my eyes quickly caught on an infant baby being left alone by his siblings near the stairs! And their stairs don't have railings or anything and he was like an INCH from falling! And i asked Z to tell the kids to bring the baby down to safety. and boy did he shout. OMG, my heart like almost stopped in anxiety. Thankfully he was saved much to his siblings' anger and frustration (that we disturbed them).

The goats, chickens, sheeps, horses, donkeys have full rein of the streets! Lol

1. History of Lahore Fort


2. History of Lahore


3. Map of Lahore (in a single sheet w great details)


4. White Mughals, a novel constructed around Lahore Fort


5. Teach Yourself Urdu x 2 (PKR 550 / SGD 14)


6. a very thick Urdu to English and English to Urdu Dictionary (PKR 450 / SGD 11)


7. Urdu Children's story book x 3


8. Urdu's A B C
   

And i came out a happy girl. There was no time to shop for Zubair's luggage. instead, we went straight to The Band's House where we were invited for dinner.

Shumail and Shaji live in DHA (Defense Housing Authority. Read as "rich pple's houses"). Did i tell you that there is a restriction to build houses only up to 2 storeys in DHA? They have a VERY large compound. like twice or prolly three times the size of a regular Sporean's "garden" and their driveway run for just as long. The main door opens straight away to a living room w a fireplace facade w sofas all around and a corner with guitars.

We chit chatted for a good 45min or so over chicken soup. Once again, i had the opportunity to interview... this time, an army colonel whom gave an insight of the Kashmir border problem. I asked, "So why is it diff for Pak to just you know give in?" All the guys replied, "No can't. The pple won't let it. The govt will face strong resistance from the citizens." Technically, they are still hanging on to the idealistic view that the pple of Kashmir should be given the right to choose which country they want to join but India suppressed that right and claimed it theirs. But then again, a lot and a lot of people and resources have been sacrificed for this lost cause when what? 50% or more of the citizens are deep in poverty!? The hatred has been very much ingrained in these pple's minds that its very hard to change them.

Then, we got to talking about the band. and i asked what's the meaning of their latest song Raastey. Raastey means road if i remember correctly and basically the song is about asking oneself where is he heading to, where is this life leading him to, to what end? and for how long... this like that. WOW! it's such an inspirational song! (i'll post it soon) and not a typical lovey dovey song. i like!

Uncle explained that they, the band, composed the whole song first then they called in a professional poet to write the words. It works like this: he gives a few diff kinds of first lines, then they decided this one is good and THEN they work from there. Definitely diff for the poet for i think this method restricts the creativity flow of the pen. I always imagined that words are written first and we will turn them into music. *shrug*

the most interesting thing is that Uncle told me that HE was the one who wrote Janey Kiyoun!! Before i had the chance to ask him what it means, we were called for dinner.

Fried rice, pasta & meatballs, fruit salad, SPECIAL yoghurt that even I like!, shami kebab, chicken in something and chilli beef (not in picture)

To my greatest surprise, Shumail was ... impeccably polite! The perfect host. But you can tell he's being trained and brought up that way. I take my hat off him. Why am i surprised he is so nice? Because he's a NIGGA wanna be! and has spiky hair and swear at every other word.

And because there's no girl in the house, 3 sons in all, the burden of tasks were rather evenly distributed actually. That's another thumbs up for this family.

If you see the timestamp from this picture, it was almost midnight! We then retired back to the living room, for another chit chat, present giving and 2 songs!!!

Before heading home, Zubair and Salman wanted to stop by DHA Y Block to buy paan and tea. They were so sweet to surprise me with hot milo when they came back! We hung around at the self designated "car park" (lol) while we finish our drinks. suddenly, Z spit out his paan (sireh/betel leaf)! I said to him, "Hey.. Please keep DHA Clean" quoting the slogan on the signs all over DHA and they laughed.

But hey, my night is FARRRRRRRRR from over! We had another house to visit! This time it's the house just opp of his. This is the house they stayed in while their house was being reconstructed ie during the period when we were "dating". They had every right to be offended bcos they lived so near and were most dear to the family but yet, they were the last for us to visit.

Anyways, we fulfilled our promise to come over, at 2am in the freaking morning! The host has 4 girls and they now occupy the first floor which Z and family were staying at tt time.

Once again there's no living nor dining room. They entertained guests in the bedroom. His old room is connected thru the main bedroom. Did i tell you that its normal not to have windows in the bedroom?!?! I suppose its a respite from the extreme heat in the summer and extreme cold in winter but still... its just... simply new to me. Shortly after we came, the electricity failed on us yet again!!! That didnt stop us from enjoying ice cream and what nots. yes ice cream in winter!!! *faint* Oh well at least, my blur and confused facial expression is not on display when i try to guess what they are all talking about. That is, when none of the girls were shining their torchlight at me! LOL!

They are nice pple really... all the girls were super excited to get to know me. So much so that Hira prepared a lot of drawings to show me... and they gave me a LOT of costume jewellery.. rings, bracelet, hair clips.... so kind so kind.

We didn't get to take pictures as we didnt wait for the light to be up again cos it was SUPER late... and the girls got sch.. but i promised them we'd take pictures when they send us to the airport the next day.

So stay tuned!