.1954 -the first car
preseted by Chinies governmet to " Dalai – Lama" in Tibet. 22 men carry it and
passing through 3000 met. High mountan to get to Lahasa Sikkim north India |
Abdullah, my brother, is not with me in this journey, but I feel his presence
in my imagination. During all the expeditions, as an adventurer, I was eager to
feel and face the danger which would probably pup up in each of them but he was
restraining. This time I, Issa, go on alone carrying this thought in my mind.
All the last nine days I drove from one city to another. Passing thorough these
cities I had many obsessions and difficulties. The passionate fans of Omidvar
brothers, who had read about my journey in the magazine, had gathered around me
and continuously were encouraging me by showing their kindness toward me. These
events did not leave me enough time to write down my memories. In the cities on
my way I encountered with great interest of young and old people caused by
those news. They made me stay at every town out of their courtesy. Therefore my
journey through Iran toward Pakistan lasted longer as I was about to make along
the south east. The most enjoyable memory which remained in my mind was due to
the accompaniment of a group of my friends from Tehran and the reception of
another group from other cities. I continued my journey by keeping this sweet
memory in my mind. When I left Tehran I felt lonely, but it didn't last long
because some of the acquaintances went with me to the beginning of the road
which was led to Qom.
After seeing me off, I drove toward Isfahan and I spend the night in that city.
A good and profetional dentist on the street side will be the one has more tooth on his showcae.Sukkur Pakistan |
At 4 a.m. I drove toward Yazd. Before 50 kilometers to the city there was a
heavy traffic of buses and trucks. They had chosen that time of the day in
order to avoid the hot weather, and it was 40 kilometers to Yazd that a bus
speeding about 130 Km/h was coming from the opposite direction and caused that
suddenly a big piece of stone fled from the huge wheel of it and gets my car
and hit it. The acceleration of the stone was so high that for a moment I
closed my eyes unconsciously and when I opened them I noticed that the
windshield of my car was totally broken into pieces. I stopped the car and
touched my face. Nothing had happened to me.
I did my best to arrive to the city despite of dust and particles which were
driven right into my eyes because of the broken windshield. When I reached
Yazd, instantly I tried to change the windshield of the car. When I got the
store, many youngsters that had read about my journey made me surrounded. They
asked many questions. In the moment that we were talking, one of them who had
just arrived started to talk with me about Abdullah's death with sorrow; and
said:
- At the town there is a rumor that Abdullah is dead when he was traveling to
the Pacific Ocean Islands. By saying that everyone expected me to cry but I
laughed and in order to make a joke I said:
- Death cannot knock us out! When we got back from South Pole, Abdullah was so
cold and was shivering all the time because of the coldness of the Pole and
that's why he preferred to reside in one of the hottest bathrooms in the world
called Chilly.
Then I got into my car in order to drive through the desert, but the passionate
youngsters of the town blocked my way.
At night I was their guest. And at dawn I hurried toward Kerman. I drove one
whole day but still there was 15 kilometers left. On a curve of a road two
cheerful young men stopped my car. I pulled over and they got close very
gentle, and respectfully they welcomed me with a very hard hand shake that I
felt paralyzed in my arm. I simply answered to their questions because I though
they just want to welcome me, but then it revealed that they had something else
in their mind. They were expecting me on that place about one day and a half
hoping that one of them can be my company in this journey. The one who was more
interested in going with me started to talk about himself, and was trying to
describe about the odd things he had done in mountain climbing and cycling. He
spent the other half of the day with me. He was insisting that if I give him a
week, he would make himself prepared. How interested he was!!!!!!
I left Kerman. My destination was Zahedan. It was so hot on the road. It looked
as the road was covered with the lava of a volcano. Although it was not summer
time but was so hot that seemed the desert was on fire. But at sunset time it
got suddenly cool. A gentle breeze started to blow and the moonlight was
shinning all over the desert. In the moonlight the sky and land showed off in
different way. The big pebbles which were turned into black because of day
hotness were like brilliant diamonds under the moonlight.
At 2 a.m. I got to a gorge at the 20 kilometer before of Zahedan. I was passing
the turns of the road in a mortal silence and at last on the last curve I saw
the lights of the town which were sparking like stars in the sky. When I got to
the town there was reining a strange silence as if I entered an isolated
historical one that the lights were the only heredity of this town.
Nobody was in the street. I parked on one side of a street and slept in my car.
I had a dream about who had seen me off, friends, strangers that one by one
asked me for something or prescriptions. Dreaming about the pills for making
breasts larger, long indian wigs, skulls, corpses placed on top of one another
in the cellar of Africa disturbed me so much that I opened my eyes and found
myself in the middle of crowed who were making so much noise. All of them
marched in front of my eyes; the skulls, corpses, pitch black locks, etc. I was
more afraid. I stroked my eyes. They were the people of the town that were
talking about me and Omidvar's journeys. "Omidvar brothers have the greatest
museum of bones and skulls in the world; one of them has bought an igloo in the
South Pole and is breeding penguins; another one is going to watch closely the
scene of war in Vietnam; …" these were the exaggerations which they were
making. When I got up, they were less surprised. They got quiet. One of them
walked to me and got closer and kissed me on the face as the representative of
others and said:
- The people of this territory, Sistan and Baluchestan, love adventurers; they
love legendry and adventure. Legends of Shahnameh have come up from this
region. Good luck Mr. Omidvar.
The sun was shining in the middle of the sky when I moved. There was a short
distance to the frontier. At night I passed the Iranian border and entered
Pakistan. The first roads were too rough. In spite of this difficulty I drove
until 2 o'clock after midnight. I reached to the first gendarmerie station in
Pakistan. Because of having no much time and the darkness which had made the
village near the station sunk into it, I decided to spend the night beside the
station. I was so tired, therefore I slept profoundly. The sun had not risen
when the Pakistani gendarme woke me up by hitting his hand against my car. I
got ready immediately and went to a dark room which was his office. He shook my
hand very honest and friendly like other Pakistanis and said:
While he was doing his jobs related to me, he was talking for me about
everything as well. He said that he was really upset about the "Shat al Arab"
incident and said: -
- I'm so happy to see my brother and friend from Iran.
We consider Iran as our true friend, brother and coreligionist. If one day
begins a war between your country and Iraq, we, I mean the people of Pakistan,
will fight beside you.
Days after when I met more people, I deduced that the gendarme I had met before
was expressing what he really felt because most of these people felt exactly as
same as him. These persons who love the culture and Farsi language believed
that the progress of their culture and mental maturity is indebted to sweet
Persian literature and unique wisdom. While eating lunch in the cultural center
of Iran in Lahur where accidentally all the rectors of the universities of
Pakistan were gathered, they discussed about the Persian literature and the
Iranian poetess's master pieces. The rector of university of Lahur had so much
information about Persian literature that made me shocked. He had memorized one
piece from every poet.
Baluches forms the most people of the northern and western regions of Pakistan.
Honest and brave persons. One of them who was a Shiite told me: "We consider
your territory as our origin and that's an honor for us" and then mentioned
these two verses:
I became you, you became me
I became the body, you became the spirit
So nobody can say anymore
That I'm one person and you are another one
After leaving the Kuwaite town on the west side of Pakistan, I moved toward the
south. It was night but too hot. The thermometer indicated 45 ºC. I had taken
all my cloths off and put a wet towel on my legs and every 30 minutes I renew
it. I get off the car once in order to check the tires and put my naked feet on
the ground but they got approximately burnt. So I jumped immediately into the
car. This zone was called "death valley" by the natives. Because many of them
had lost their lives because of the hot weather although they were used to it.
One of them said that the temperature of the region in summer reaches to 53 ºC
so our body blisters and we have to extract the water which gathers underneath
those blisters by a needle.
Indians and Pakistanis have to be called the most easterners of the oriental
countries. Because they are loyal to their old traditions. Although Pakistan is
a civilized land and has developed in many fields but the traditions of its
people has not changed in comparison to last years. If you travel by plane
surely you will not find such traditions because the cities and buildings are
equal to modern countries. But the real and noble life in Pakistan should be
seen closely in the small towns. In one of those towns as soon as I got off my
car and started to walk in the bazaar for having fun, suddenly someone grab my
ear and pulled me to one side while had put a piece of wood in his own ear.
I was so irritated, so I pushed away his hand and shout at him. But while he
was pulling me to one side said something in Urdu that I couldn't understand
even a word. In the meantime, he picked up a handkerchief and a narrow piece of
wood like a match but longer than that which was wrapped with a piece of cloth
on the one end and got close to me. As I was very angry I was standing totally
confused watching him as he moved. A young man was passing and by noticing my
confusion came to me and said in English that this man is a professional
ear-cleaner. He cleans and removes the germs of ones ear and receives a very
low wage. I paid him also some "peasseh" without getting my ears cleaned and
went on my way.
I started to walk through the bazaar. In this bazaar you can see every kind of
sellers. Jewelers, shoemakers, cloth dealers, etc. every kind of foods can be
seen out side the stores on the stoves and beside them the baker pulls out the
hot bread from the furnace. The confectioner puts various trays on fire and
takes out the sweet paste put of the bag and puts them in the boiling oil and
instantly gives the fresh sweet to his customers. If somebody has a toothache
there is no need to any dentist either any appointment. Because the
professional dentist has spread out his things in the street beside the store
in which vegetables are sold. In this place there's no need to ask others for
the best dentist in the town because you will find him. The best dentist is the
one who has extracted more teeth and usually in this area every dentist has
gathered all the teeth which he has extracted in his small shop window.
I asked one of those dentists:
- How much do you get for extracting a tooth?
- 2 Rupieh (17 Rials), he said.
I laughed. At that moment he saw my golden tooth and said:
-You… Iran… how much?
After 15 minutes of arguing we understood each other.
- 270 Rupieh (2400 Rials) He was surprised and said:
- That's expensive. If you want me to do that I can plate with gold all of your
teeth only by 25 Rupieh.
And instantly emptied his hand made yellow tin of plates in front of me and
said:
- Come on, look! These are much better and harder that the one you have in your
mouth.
In the meantime, came a patient and the dentist seated him on his surgical
chair which was made by the boxes of fruits. At first pushed away his gum with
his scalpel and before I can take my camera out to take a photo I noticed that
he had extracted his tooth, as a small piece of gum and some blood was stuck to
it. He showed it to me and said:
- You see, acheh, acheh (good, good)
I could not tolerate that anymore so I went on my way. I had walked for few
steps that a polite man took my hand and pulled me toward a fortune teller who
had his things spread out on the ground and showed me the man who was sitting
beside those strange things and said to me:
- This man knows all the secrets of your life and will tell your fortune
exactly.
- Acheh, acheh (good, good), I said.
And as he read my palm, he truly told me all the events that had happened in my
life. At this time the young man who had released me from the ear-cleaner came
to me and took me to the other places and showed me other odd things.
At noon, the hot weather made me mad. The young Pakistani also could not
tolerate this temperature although he was used to such weather. For getting rid
of this we went to a restaurant beside which was a hot furnace. As soon as we
ordered the meal it got prepared and served. I began to eat with so much
appetite that suddenly the hot pepper in the meal burned my mouth. So I only
ate some bread and yogurt and then so many oranges because the best orange in
here is sold 7 Rials per kilo.
When we were walking along a street I noticed a man who had got all his body
tattooed. He had a long and thick beard just like yogis. This man had gathered
many customers around himself and the men were the only customers of this
corpulent and disheveled hair man. He had various planks in hand on which had
nailed up many alligators and big frogs. Of course the alligators were alive
and were moving brutally. On the other side there was pan on fire which
contained boiling substances. And there were also different bottles consisted
of medicines that were used as his means. s
I got thorough the crowd and when it was our turn I asked him what he was
doing. But he did not respond because he did not know Farsi. But some people
who knew a little Farsi or English made me understood that he uses this means
in order to cure the outpatients.
I was so passionate to see him closely so I gazed at his means more carefully.
He gutted the alligators and put those inner parts in the pan and then extracts
the oil and then sold these oils to the weak patient.
After a while I noticed that this area was the medical center in which doctors
were trying to cure the patients. In that place I saw interesting signs that I
can not mention them at present. As I was passing I remembered that one of the
acquaintances had asked me for such medicine, so I took some peoples' advices
and entered the Dr. Abdullah's office.
Dr. Mohammad Abdullah who had 72 years old with a long beard was sitting on the
ground having his legs crossed. He had obtained his specialty 45 years ago in
India and had started his career right after graduation. When we got inside
there were many patients waiting in front of him in a line. So we stood in the
line also. There were many bottles of medicines around him. He checked the
patients' pulses and diagnosed their problem. His assistant who was sitting
beside him wrote the prescription and sometimes guided some patients to another
room. It made me curious to understand what is going on in the other room. I
got there quietly and recognized that the doctor also visits the outpatients.
There was a tall afghan with a long beard outside who was training medical
courses under doctor Abdullah's supervision. He was doing his job. He had
placed a bucket of medicine containing dredging liquid on the wall and as soon
as the doctor sent a patient to this room, this sturdy trainee put the elastic
pipe into the patient's body and after dredging him he sent the patient out the
room so that receive another one.
Very soon it was my turn. The doctor was also an afghan and spoke Farsi in a
sweet way. Before he can check my pulse I told him that I'm from Iran and I
need a medicine for enlarging the breasts. If this medicine would be effective
then I would buy many of that again.
- "I have a very good medicine for "kheowatin" breast but I have to make it
prepared. If you get back in the evening I will give it to you", he said.
He knew most of the oriental medics. "We use the ancient Greek medicine. We
have learned so many things from Abu Ali Sina", he said. "I have many students
in here who are form India and Afghanistan. I practically teach them how to
cure a patient. I prepare their food and home only by 10 Rials. We use
herbaceous medicines. We import them from India, Afghanistan, china, and many
other countries and prepare them in here by ourselves", he added.
I said goodbye to him because I was going to get back in the evening. My afghan
friend also promised me to return after 2 hours and then we would go to
"Shadmani" district.
I had enough time until evening so I went to a café. I was like "Hippies"
because I was covered with dust and my hair was disheveled as I did not have
time to clean myself from the morning.
As I was drinking my tea I saw a black man with thick lips that got close to me
and sat beside me. He started to talk with very fluent English:
- Welcome Mr. Hippy. I'm from Karachi. I will stay here for 2 or 3 days in order
to do a job. I met many Hippies n Karachi who were going to Nepal. Hippies come
to Karachi every other time to work on something and I help them. If you have
something to do also I'm at your service. If you go to Nepal and return and
needed to trade I know how to help you. I'm a good buyer. I assure you that you
won't be regret.
Meanwhile he took out a pack of cigarette and offered me one. "Thanks, I don't
smoke now", I said. But he kept on offering. At last I accepted one but with
the first puff it hurt me badly and I started to cough for a long time. I
instantly recognized that there was hashish and some other things in that
cigarette.
I put it away and said: "thank you, I'm not accustomed to these things. I'm not
a perfect hippy. I have to start and continue that. s
And he started to talk about the miraculous material which was in the cigarette
and mentioned it as the convenient mixture for the youth of 20th centaury.
Listen, Mr. Hippy! If you are going to Nepal and will return to Karachi, don't
miss your chance. How much of this substance you bring me from Nepal I will
buy.
He put his hand into his pocket and took out a black box and showed it to me.
Then he wrote his address on a piece of paper and gave it to me. At that moment
my Pakistani friend appeared and the fat moron left me instantly. We went to
the doctor and took the medicine which he had promised me to prepare. It was
getting cooler so I told my friend from Afghanistan: "it's the best time to
drive car on roads. So I want to apologize you and go on my way." "Shadmani"
district can be seen in Lahur also.
So that I thanked and said goodbye to him and drove in the narrow streets and
turns of the city. The signs which were written in Urdu diverted my attention.
"Danger Bridge" (dangerous bridge), "behavior limit, 40" (top speed, 40), "pass
for soft-behavior vehicles" (pass for slow-moving vehicles), "sharp limit for
carts" (top speed for cars), the people who speak Urdu call the word car as
cart.
There were other interesting signs. But one of them attracted me the most. It
reads "khewatin's work hand" (women handcrafts center).
In the world of today, India is known as the greatest democracy of the world. In
fact, it is true. But the distinction of India is not only because of this.
There are many wonders in that territory that you will see them in every step
that you get. Maybe it's the only country that during tens of centuries has not
changed much from the spiritual, moral ad religious point of view. In this
extended land which can be considered as a huge continent and is faced with the
daily reproduction problem, exist so many different cultures, religions and
traditions. So you can not even describe part of these in just one book. Each
state of India has its own language, culture, and civilization that can not be
found in other states. In the south of India many different languages are used.
Some of them are: Telengi, ketri, tamel, melialem and sanhali. These languages
are too old and belong to the native Indians and are called "deravidi" and were
used before the entrance of Arians in this country. More than 25 up to 40
million people speak in these languages. But none of them can understand the
other languages. In each state reigns a specific wedding ceremony and way of
life. In one state the father ask a daughter to marry to his son. In another
one the daughter asks a boy to marry her. In another place the girl before
marriage no eats and drinks for 40 days. In another region the girl tests his
future husband in EVERY FIELDS. If you make a list from the jobs that exist in
India you will find so many unknown jobs that you haven't heard of them in
whole of your life either in any place. Being a yogi is considered as a job.
Betting, burry oneself for hours and days and then stay alive and won the bet,
is another job. And so many other stupid and unknown jobs.
In India in addition to tens of new and old religions which are accepted, there
are three thousand other religions. One of the oldest of them which is very
popular is Hinduism. Regarding to that you will see hundreds of disagreements
and rancor. Some these rancors sometimes led to huge killings. Although
nowadays the Indian government controls intensively these quarrels but these
killings happens sometimes.
One faction defiles the other one. One group rejects another group. The Brahman
of center India does not let their daughters get marry the sons of Bengal
Brahman. They do not eat their food and receive their letters by a special kind
of tongs.
The land of wonders!
After the wedding if the husband passed away, his corpse was burnt on fire and
his wife would throw herself into the fire so their ashes got mixed. But when
Pandit Nehro was alive he prevented that such things happens.
After passing from Darjeeling, Butan and Sikim which were situated in the
mountain slope of Himalaya we reached to the forbidden area, "Tibet". In this
region women could choose many husbands legaly. In a part located in the
northeast of India this traditions was obeyed in old days.
In spite of these varieties, these people are inseparable. Up to now 200
sociologists from India and other countries have tried to understand the social
nature of these people. But they could not get succeeded.
Meanwhile the Indian government is really in trouble. The authorities of this
country say:
"The governor of India will never be born!" according to the statistics, the
prime minister of India has to listen to the news of 20 up to 25 religious
conflicts in a day, visits 110 common people (who speak in 25 different
languages and believe in 10 religions) and make 6 speeches in 4 different
languages in a week for who believe in 14 different religions.
According to Churchill: "I prefer to be the prime minister but I can't tolerate
to become an editor of a magazine." But Nehru, the former prime minister of
India had said: "I want to be the editor of a magazine but not the prime
minister of India.
" Young Indians have a new expression. This expression in my opinion can not be
translated. But it can be said in this way: "before do suicides try to be the
prime minister of India! In other words, the only person who is tired of his
life may accept to become the prime minister of India. So when these people
want to say that somebody has committed suicide they will say: "he became the
prime minister".
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