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July 7, 2005
‘I just want to go home’
By Z.N.
Abdullah Shah was herding his three much prized buffaloes into the forest to graze as I scrambled up the steep mountain path towards the road that morning. He had his huge catapult in one hand, a round stone in the other and a mischievous grin on his face as usual.“Baji,” he called out. “Where are you going?”
“Off to work in Nathia Gali,” I answered.
“It would be better if you went back home,” he advised. “There are faujis all over the place and the road is closed because the President is coming to the hotel up there,” he said, nodding in the direction of the mountain summit.
I thought about heading back home for a brief minute or two then decided against it. Work is work after all and the President should at least understand that life cannot grind to a halt just because he wants to enjoy a spot of fresh air!
Climbing into the waiting taxi I asked the driver if the road was open or not. It was, so off we drove past crowds of loitering police and army personnels, who kept popping up from the dense undergrowth, all the way from Bhurban to Jika Gali like something in a comedy movie.
The long drive to Nathia Gali over and done with, my work for the day completed, I headed for home in the late afternoon looking forward to putting my weary feet up on the sofa and recovering from my endeavours.
A quick stop in Jika Gali to pick up a few bits and bobs, planning to get meat and rice in Kashmiri Bazaar, then search for a mazdoor in Bhurban to carry my purchases safely back home as per usual but ......The morning’s loitering army guys and police men had not only doubled and tripled in number but multiplied at an alarming rate and one wondered if war had actually broken out.
Things looked even more ominous in Kashmiri Bazaar where every single shop was closed except for a couple of tea places doing a roaring trade with you can guess who. We couldn’t have stopped even if we had wanted to as we were threateningly waved on at gunpoint. The butchers and parchoon-walas were closed anyway but maybe the next small bazaar at Kaya would have some supplies. Needless to say that was all locked up, and deserted too, as was every single one of the countless construction sites on route.
Then the realization that, other than army and police vehicles, we were the only thing moving on the road which was not a very comfortable feeling either, but no one was stopping us, so on we went.
Reaching the turn off from the main road to Bhurban was a different prospect however, as the barricades were up, armed and definitely dangerous.
“No vehicles allowed on this road now,” announced the heavily mustachioed, radio wielding, gun at the ready police official who leaned in through the open car window to inspect its occupants in a menacing manner.
“Madame lives in Bhurban,” the taxi driver explained. “She is just going home”.
No dice.
“Baijan,” I said in as polite a voice as I could muster, “I just want to go home”.
“No vehicles allowed,” he reiterated.
“Okay,” I told him. “Then I’ll walk”.
Apparently walking wasn’t going to be allowed either and, to be honest, my shopping was rather on the heavy side despite the lack of meat and rice.
At this juncture an army guy came to see what the problem was, made a couple of radio calls and decided that we could, after all, proceed.
Heaving a sigh of relief we drove on, gun barrels sprouting out of every tree and bush, but the closer we got to the hotel, the more guns and dozen upon dozen vehicles of all descriptions were totally blocking the road.
The hotel gate was as far as we managed to get and were promptly surrounded by all manner of gun-toting males demanding to know what we thought we were doing and who had let us get this far. “I just wanna go home and water my tomatoes,” I told them but they didn’t seem to be amused!
Obviously the car wasn’t able to take me any further down the narrow mountain road towards home so I climbed out, umbrella in one hand, basket of shopping in the other and ‘Indiana Jones’ hat stuck firmly on my head, and simply glared at them until they let me through.
I did consider hanging around until the President put in an appearance so that I could give him a piece of my mind about just how many lives he had disrupted this day, and how I was now going to have to make another time and money consuming trip to the bazaar to purchase the necessities of life, but figured that someone would probably shoot me so gave that idea a miss.
Struggling back home, my shopping getting heavier by the minute, I couldn’t believe just how many more army and police guys were hanging out in the forest and on the mountain side, all with guns at the ready, and by the time I wearily climbed the steps to my house I was dripping with sweat and fuming too!
It took my husband a few minutes to realize what I was ranting about, all the “Who the hell does he think he is? Weren’t going to let me come home the idiots. Men pointing guns all over the mountain. Must go out and water the tomatoes before they dry out.”
“He is the President, jani. What else can you expect?”
“But this amount of disruption and thousands of people to guard one man is ridiculous. A complete waste of manpower. Why the hell doesn’t he just put on a pair of jeans, a sweat shirt, dark glasses, a hat and drive himself up here in an old Volkswagen Beetle or something? It would be much easier on everyone, including him.”
“Then he’d get pulled up by the cops like everyone else and be asked for a bribe before he could continue,” laughed my husband. “You can’t expect him to do that!”
Still muttering I went out to water my precious tomatoes and just as I was beginning to relax, a huge, noisy helicopter descended from a sky full of thunder and landed at the top of the mountain. One presumes that the President decided to fly, not drive, so what was all the hassle about anyway?
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