Pakistan - the good, the bad and the ugly

Fri 5th Sept

Again the weather has curtailed our plans. We were to spend some time camping in the mountains but rain stopped play, so a revised camping location was found. We travel back toward Gilgit from Karimabad. The rock falls and landslides are something to see, from shale to rocks to boulders. Once in Gilgit, Karim phones for news of the road ahead. The news is not good, all roads out of Gilgit are blocked! We book back into the hotel we stayed at a few days ago.

After lunch we visit an ancient carving of a standing Budha. Today we see the good, the bad and the ugly of Pakistan. Good was scenery around Karimababd, bad was the rock falls, the ugly was the time we spent walking around Gilgit! I sense a different atmosphere here. People still smile and speak but not quite so many. Here people have other preoccupations. Karim tells us later that in Karimababd all the people are Ishmailies, in Gilgit there is a mix of Sunnies and Sheits ; there is tension which often overspills. There is a large police and army presence in Gilgit.

The town itself is large and busy and without doubt a third world destination, rubbish, stench, flies, broken roads, open drains, beggars. To the delight of the many flies, butchers shops hang their carcasses up, outside. This is fly paradise; rotting meat, broken drains and green grocers with fruit you wouldn't touch with a barge pole. The shops are crammed full, no bigger than a market stall but carry 20 times more stock. A few try to sell items tourists may like but they are surely fighting a loosing battle. This place will not be ready for main stream tourism for at least 50 years?

I ask Karim if there is any redevelopment plan for Gilgit, to improve conditions for the people. His shocking answer is NO. The people are too busy fighting each other to agree or be part of any improvement added to which if the money for such a scheme were to come from abroad (the only place it could come from) it would not be accepted. The people would consider it dirty money!

Roy, one of our fellow travellers, asks if there is no cohesive plan for road clearing since the landslides happen so often. Again no, the two sides cannot cooperate enough to achieve this. I suggest that with such a large army presence, that the soldiers could help clear the roads. Karim just laughs, "no, no they are too busy stopping the Sunnies and the Sheits fighting with each other!"