evainpakistan

posted by evainpakistan @ 9:28 PM 7 comments

Today I realize that my time here in Pakistan is running by… so quickly. Nearly 6 months are already left… I started taking pictures of my school children and the teachers… to take them all home!
But mostly I am happy these days, because my dad is coming to visit me!!! Yes!! It’s nearly unbelievable… I remember when we sat together in my home and I tried to explain my parents that I want to go to Pakistan.. yeah, that was kind of difficult, but now he is really coming to see what Pakistan and the people here are like! We have 3 weeks together to travel here, explore Pakistan and visit people! I told everybody –the children, the teachers, the people at work and of course my friends here and at home, that my dad is coming! Plus I decided already what I can wear at the airport to pick my dad up. Really, I am very proud and happy because of that!
Additionally it is my dads birthday today! Congratulations and a happy Birthday, Papa!

posted by evainpakistan @ 9:24 PM 0 comments

Eid-ul-Azha made us happy and gave us a couple of free days. Three! In the middle of the week! The Muslims celebrate that Abraham, who was sent to sacrifice his own son… but the son did finally change into a goat. So the goat was sacrificed. That is why the Muslims still sacrifice animals today and you saw animals in the last couple of weeks over and over… goats, camels, cows and sheep.

Eid is the celebration when these animals finally get slaughtered. That is why we visited a family of one of my colleagues to see a cow getting slaughtered. It was a bloody experience I can tell…. The men were standing down in the entrance of the house separating the parts of the cow, the women and children stood up on the roof to watch the whole ceremony…Phyllida and me rushed to join the females who than started to decorate our hands with some Mehndi (some decoration and color on the hands that they use here and in India for several occasions)!

Of course we had a lot of invitations to eat, eat, eat a lot of meat! Siri Pai we had for lunch –of course I did not know what exactly that is! But today I figured out, that this is the scull of the head and something from the feet of the cow! I am not sure but I think I better should become a vegetarian! After we finished our visiting-families-and-get-a-lot-to-eat-tour we went around in the car to go to one of our schools. CARE started to collect hides, which is the skin of the animals, to make some money and invest it in houses for the Earthquake-victims. So we visited this school and saw all these skins piled up! In fact, the whole area was kind of a market for those skins… I was asking myself where those things are happening at home –definitely you don’t see it happening in the streets!?

After all this Meaty-Eid I really feel not hungry any longer at all! In fact, I don’t need to eat for the next weeks. And I should seriously become a vegetarian?!

posted by evainpakistan @ 2:03 AM 0 comments

I spend my Christmas in Pakistan –one that will remain in my thoughts as something really special!
For Christmas my friends invited me to their homes to celebrate this with me. Even if they are Muslims themselves and don’t have the tradition of Christmas! I feel that this is just so great and loving – I can not describe in words.
At work they build up a Christmas tree, which was looking really cute! Below they put some presents for both of us –Annie from England and me! I was so happy about that, never expecting to have that! We sang all Christmas songs together, had cake to eat! It was a great time!!!
Christmas Eve We were invited to Asmas place. We had a good Christmas dinner next to our Christmas flower. The flower was nicely decorated, candles were lighted! We sang songs, gave each other presents and really had a special time! I still feel happy about all this!

The next morning we went to church, which was supposed to start at nine in the morning. So I was kind of feeling in a hurry when we finally left for church at 9.45. As soon as we arrived, we figured out that we were not too late at all! They told us, that they might start in half an hour. The priest is at home to relax. We left for visiting a family and came back an hour later. Finally the service started. Caroline and me were sent up front to sit next to the nuns, which made me feel a bit strange. But still, it was a wonderful service, although we did not understand much in Urdu! The songs are great and just made us feel good and happy. Afterwards all the women came up to us, gave us a big hug and wished us a merry Christmas. We kind of had a hard time to leave that place….

We spend our lunch in the Holiday Inn, where we took a nice Christmas buffet! Annie invited Caroline and me… J Lots of things to eat…. Belly-friendly-growing-guarantee.
Next day we went to Mansehra, which is a place near the Earthquake region. It looks so wonderful their in between the mountains.. that I felt kind of sad seeing all the tentcamps around every couple of hundred meters. We lived there with Zainab’s family with amazing hospitality, that Caroline and I just felt as if being home (Zainab is Hissams Sister, a friend studying in Germany).

In Mansehra we visited the Earthquake victims in a tent as well. This was amazing, sad- something that made me think and will remain in my thoughts. All these children there – looking dirty and sad – but still they were smiling, when they saw us…. We altogether had a wonderful time packed with sad stories. I felt kind of helpless in this situation, but still was it good to be there and talk to them for some time! One lady holding a baby told us, that her mother died after 15 days when she was born due to the Earthquake….

We visited a school as well – which was good and impressive to get some new ideas. The school belonged to a woman, who build it up all on her own… this really inspired me seeing the circumstances in this more remote and conservative area!
Of course the children are so cute in Mansehra as well!

Happy about a wonderful christmas, full of new inspiration, thoughts and people, that were more nice to me than I could have ever imagined. Thanks to all of you spending this amazing time with me!

To all of you a happy new year and all the best for 2006!

posted by evainpakistan @ 9:24 PM 0 comments

Money, money, money – is difficult to get. I walked into four! different banks today – each of them had an ATM Machine. In the first bank I was told –wait, we just need 15 minutes. Than the ATM will work. In the next bank I was told: Wait for just 5 minutes – there is just some problem. The lady in the third bank assured, that the ATM will definitely be fixed during the day. It stopped working in the morning! Last, but not least: The next ATM did work, it just did not accept my card! I tried the first bank again –of course nothing was fixed yet –but the time will come when everything will work again, so that I can pick up some money!Inschallah!

posted by evainpakistan @ 2:24 AM 0 comments

Going on the bus finally is one of those activities that I start to like in this country! Every time you meet nice women, that want to talk to you and give you the biggest smile! Yesterday I spoke to a woman trying out all my new small Urdu-knowledge! Somehow I must have mixed some words or anything… she definitely understood that I am married… than we were talking about her child. She was telling me that she waited long for getting pregnant. Suddenly she started with strange questions like what is my doctor saying about my health?!? I was wondering –what should he say? Everything is ok, I guess?! She asked, why I don’t get pregnant, when I am already 24, married…. And why am I here in this country all on my own? I tried to explain everything again –this time with the help of a medium talented translator riding with us on the bus. Well I hope that in the end she did understand, that I am not married, that I do not have children, that I am happy even without that here in this country all on my own! This lady was so concerned of my age and the fact that I am not married yet J !

posted by evainpakistan @ 12:25 AM 0 comments

This last week I went to Karachi for an AIESEC-Conference. We, the Lahoris, did go there by train J! So it was my first journey on a train in Pakistan. A great experience. It took us about 18 hours…but since we could lay down and sleep it was alright. I really enjoyed the train stations, where we had little breaks. People in the station were screaming and shouting, trying to sell their food! Somehow funny and enjoyable.
Having an AIESEC-Conference was a good motivation and a good break from real work. The conference itself was very good and amazing as well! We did work hard to have a vision for AIESEC in Pakistan now J! We soon will all be famous after having different television channels there to report about AIESEC…. Discussed a lot, had fun, played drinking games without drinking, did reduce our sleeping hours to a minimum and had a lots to eat! Well, we really had a good time! One day the conference was held at the beach –a great view! On Sunday we enjoyed ourselves at a Sunday Market, where you can basically get everything from shoes, clothes, DVD’s and CD’s, food…. Nice to see! After a lunch on Monday at one of the AIESECers, we already had to go home again…back to Lahore!

So, today I was really happy going back to work, see all the teachers and students again. They had exams, so I could not really do something with them, but afterwards we had time to learn some more URDU! Well, I love going to the schools and being with the teachers!

posted by evainpakistan @ 12:52 AM 0 comments

A lot of things going on here in Lahore. Actually I had quite busy life – socially and at work. I’ve been to the Worlds Performing Arts Festival, that was held here in Lahore. It’s the biggest festival of this art in the South-East. Different artists from all over the world came over to perform. Of course there was a german girl as well… She did some really strange movements around the stage alsong with a story that did not make sense to me at all. The friends (one from England and one Pakistani) sitting next to me were looking at me with a face of big question marks. I was so sorry to say that I myself did not have a clue of what was going on.

Another show I attended next day. Strange was that this day they checked basically everything on you –we were not allowed to bring mobiles. Too bad that nobody was informed about that before. Later I came to know that this was because of the visit of the President of Pakistan, Mister Musharraf. Finally after some checks we were allowed to go inside the big amphitheatre, where it was held. After a bit of delay Musharraf did arrive and the show could start. I could just see him from far away, did not meet him in person to shake hands or so. Anyhow the show was quite nice, a mixture of different styles, Pakistani as well as performers from abroad.

I attended another Mehndi, a wedding ceremony before the real wedding, which was really lovely. I enjoy the drummers so much, that I decided that I should have those when I once will marry! A teacher invited me to this function, some of my students were there as well. It was so good to see how they celebrate… What I do not understand is that they have these kind of functions in the middle of the week. Of course you come home late and the next day is just hard because of lack of sleep L!

I still love going to the schools. Already now I know that I will miss all the hugs from the teachers that I get in the morning as soon as I arrive, along with big smiles and the offers to join the classes!

This day we just had a wonderful discussion at work about Education and everything along that – because of the nice weather outside we enjoyed sitting in the sun. How good that I miss the cold, rainy winter at home!

To answer some questions about Christmas here – no it does not look like that at all. You only see lights because people are going to marry. Of course people don’t celebrate that here.. In my hostel, where the wardens are Christians, we decided to sing Christmas songs after our dinners, which would give us the right feeling J As well I find myself singing Christmas-songs on my own… so I’m quite in the right feeling for this celebration coming up soon.

posted by evainpakistan @ 11:35 PM 0 comments