Halfway through life on the 'rooftop' of Pakistan

It is the majestic Karakoram that recalls the arduous journey of camel caravans on the ancient Silk Road. It is the unique cultural features contained on long-distance trucks or the cloud-like life in the middle of life in the enchanting Hunza valley… I came to Pakistan, as if to discover myself.

The Karakoram Challenge on the Silk Road

Starting from Chang'an (Xi'an today), the ancient Silk Road system extended all the way to Rome from the early years of the Christian era. To carry goods from China to different parts of the world, caravans of camels had to arduously snake their way through the snow-capped mountains. In the past, merchants had to overcome two most dangerous routes to bring rare products to the prosperous trading cities of that time. One was the terrifyingly desolate Pamir Pass, the other was the remote and dangerous Karakoram Road connecting Pakistan and Kashgar City in the Xinjiang Autonomous Region, China.

If the Pamir is deep and lonely, attracting many Western bikers to experience, the Karakoram challenges the brave and fearless because of the danger from the road that sometimes takes lives without warning. This is a mountain pass over 4,730m above sea level, winding and curving through the canyons of the Karakoram range, creating majestic scenery along the Silk Road. Today, the Karakoram is the highest international paved road in the world, very dangerous and precarious, especially vulnerable to flash floods. It is the erratic weather that has caused landslides and taken the lives of thousands of workers involved in building this road.

To complete the Silk Road, I took a chance and bought a one-way local bus ticket from Rawalpindi to Hunza Valley because the bus company did not sell tickets for the return trip. Because the Karakoram weather is very fickle, I was not sure if the bus would depart back to Rawalpindi on time. The bus departs at 9pm every day and if the weather is good, it will arrive in Hunza at 6pm the next day, a distance of nearly 700km. The bus company forced me to make 10 photocopies of my passport and Pakistani visa to submit to the security checkpoints because this route is located in the autonomous region of Kashmir, which is full of uncertainties.

As the bus was about to leave, a man in plain clothes held a small camera and quickly filmed each passenger’s face. A Pakistani friend explained that because the country was still unstable, the bus company and sometimes the police would keep pictures of the passengers to ensure their identity in case of an incident. I was sweating when I saw the long gun that was always next to the driver’s steering wheel. These pictures confirmed that Pakistan was unstable!

The bus ran at a fairly fast pace until dawn the next morning, then stopped at a roadside inn for the driver to rest for about two hours. Then waited for the morning to start the dangerous Khunjerab Pass. As the sky turned pink, the driver urged the passengers to get in the bus because he heard that light rains were starting to fall ahead. In the Kashmir region, the driver was afraid that the bus would be stuck on this desolate road for a week because the mountain rains roared all day causing serious landslides.

On the way there, I was lucky to arrive in Hunza on schedule. But the return journey was full of risks, with many vehicles having to turn back to Gilgit after half a day of driving and waiting for government rescue teams to arrive. Karakoram was completely blocked by hundreds of boulders, tens of tons in size, blocking the road. The bus company said they did not know when the road would be cleared. Passengers had to wait because if one section was cleared, another section would be blocked. I stayed in Hunza for two more days, waiting for the Karakoram to be opened when the snowstorms stopped roaring.

The car trips on the snowy mountainside

One of the surprises for me when coming to Pakistan was not because of the majestic landscape, the lasting religious values, the fear of danger, but the simple cultural features that have been flowing for thousands of years in a very unique way. Those were the cars that seemed to carry the whole mysterious culture of the Pakistani people back and forth on the majestic snow-capped mountains.

Coming to Pakistan, you will be surprised to see with your own eyes on the streets, highways or winding roads hidden in the clouds, the bulky trucks are decorated with colorful colors. It is like a unique and mysterious cultural message that Pakistani people surprise and delight the world.

In Pakistan, many trucks and buses are stylized and decorated vividly by their owners. These special vehicles called Jingle are also considered a form of art typical of Pakistan. They are elaborately painted, detailed both on the outside and the inside of the vehicle. For long-distance trucks transporting goods from North to South or crossing the dangerous Karakoram route sometimes for months, drivers consider them as their home. They decorate the inside of the cabin from the steering wheel, rearview mirror, gear lever to the seat cushion, the ceiling... as splendid as a private "palace" of the drivers.

Many researchers have studied the unique cultural factors behind the elaborate paint job on Pakistani trucks. They even tried to explain how the abstract designs influence the lives, culture, religion and supernatural mysteries of long-distance truck drivers.

Going back in history, the tradition of painting on horse-drawn carriages has existed for a long time in Pakistan as well as some other South Asian countries such as Afghanistan, India and Bangladesh. Horse-drawn carriages often carried guests belonging to the aristocratic class of that time. By 1920, the Kohistan Bus Company invited master car decoration artists from Ustad Elahi Bakhsh to decorate their buses to attract passengers. Gradually, they also sought other craftsmen from Punjab, where many famous domestic artists gathered to decorate many palaces and temples of the Mughal dynasty. Today, with the development of science and technology, the motifs are increasingly complex and detailed, clearly showing cultural elements from thousands of years ago to contemporary event characters.

I was very curious about the motifs and patterns decorated on long-distance trucks. It is truly a rich and unique cultural story that cannot be found anywhere else in the world. From the wheels, the roof, the chassis and the entire body of the truck are covered with mysterious motifs. I felt excited when sitting on the truck running slowly on the Khunjerab Pass at an altitude of 4,693m, emitting the jingling sound from the chains under the truck with golden bells or heart-shaped bells attached to them, very romantic. The driver explained that, in addition to decoration, the bells help drivers pay more attention when the truck is moving and help them ward off evil spirits and dangers that always lurk on deserted roads like Karakoram.

Car decorations are very diverse but are often divided into 5 main groups by Pakistani drivers:

1. Romantic motifs, glorifying life such as landscape paintings of the Kashmir region, countryside scenes in the harvest season, girls with divine, bright beauty, romantic poems;

2. Elements from modern life, such as images of political figures or patriotic symbols;

3. Revered symbols such as goat horns, yak tails, and traditional costumes and flags in temples;

4. Abstract religious symbols such as eyes, motifs or mascots such as fish and peacocks;

5. Religious symbols or images such as Buraq - a heavenly horse said to have been ridden by the Prophet Muhammad when he ascended to heaven.

Decorations also vary from region to region. Karachi, Pakistan’s largest city, is considered the capital of these special trucks. There are also Rawalpindi, Swat, Peshawar, Quetta and Lahore, each with its own style of decoration. Trucks in Balochistani and Peshawari tend to use a lot of wood while those in Rawalpindi and Islamabad are usually plastic. After purchasing a truck, the owner will take it to a decoration shop to decorate his second home. The craftsman will do the decoration work depending on the owner’s budget, aesthetic taste, and spiritual factors to decorate accordingly. Owners can spend between 3000 and 5000 USD on decorating their truck.

The cars also represent the cultural, historical and regional differences in Pakistan. If in Vietnam, car owners often worship their cars on the 2nd or 16th day of the lunar month to pray for a safe journey, then in Pakistan, the colorful cars are like a surreal spiritual world that protects people from the daily uncertainties on the roads in the middle of the snowy mountains.

Peaceful life in Hunza valley

When reading the book Three Cups of Tea by American author Greg Mortenson about the journey to connect poor people in Pakistan and Afghanistan, I had a feeling of horror mixed with longing to travel to Gilgit - Baltistan. There are also remote villages that are said to be famous for banditry and state control in name only.

Gilgit is the capital of Kashmir and the largest city in northern Pakistan. About 50km away is the Hunza Valley, where traditional Islamic life is preserved and there is a majestic snowy landscape. Pakistanis themselves dream of visiting this beautiful land of mountains and rivers at least once in their lifetime.

Sharoz is the doctor who took my mother back to her hometown for about a week, and I got to know him on the long bus ride. It had been three years since they had returned from Faisalabad to visit the place where he grew up and finished high school. According to Sharoz, Hunza was the land of kings in the past, so life here was more quiet and peaceful than in the capital city of Gilgit.

Shazon invited me to his home on a foggy afternoon in the Hunza Valley. He said that people here go to bed early because of the constant power outage, and every house has at least one or two generators. The weather is bitterly cold at night. The mud houses are perched precariously on the cliffs, scattered all the way to the Hunza River that flows down below.

The people here live mainly from agriculture. Each family raises hundreds of cattle of all kinds and grows crops for self-sufficiency or to sell to the local market, with middlemen transporting them to Gilgit or neighboring areas of Kashmir. Some other families work in the tourism sector, but mainly in the spring when the cherry blossoms bloom along the snow-capped mountainsides, all the way to the blue Hunza River.

I was invited by the Sharoz family to have dinner with fragrant lamb stew next to the crackling fireplace with a few crackles of red charcoal. In that dreamy moment, I clearly felt the strangely peaceful life on the mountainside in Hunza.

More information

Eleven things to note when traveling to Pakistan

1. Visa: You can apply for a tourist visa for up to 14 days at the Pakistan Embassy in Hanoi with some required documents such as: passport, 2 photos, work certificate and invitation letter from Pakistan.

2. Airfare: There are no direct flights from Vietnam to any city in Pakistan. Therefore, you need to book transit tickets through other Southeast Asian countries such as Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, etc. Lahore and Karachi are two cities with many flights from Southeast Asian countries.

3. Public transport: Taxis, rickshaws and buses are popular means of public transport in Pakistan. Taxis and rickshaws do not have meters, so customers often have to negotiate the fare with the driver depending on the distance. Transportation costs in the city are quite cheap, only about 2/3 compared to Vietnam, and you also need to negotiate a little with the driver to get a reasonable price.

4. Long-distance transportation: You can use airplanes, trains, high-quality buses and local buses. If you have plenty of time and to ensure health and safety, you should use buses from Daewoo company, a very famous high-quality bus company in Pakistan.

5. Cuisine: Pakistani cuisine is very rich and diverse, of course like some South Asian and Middle Eastern countries, it uses a lot of spices. They love to eat chicken, beef, lamb and goat. As for chicken, they do not use the skin, legs, wings and head. Pakistan is also a paradise of fruits, especially tangerines, bananas, apples, persimmons and pomegranates. If you integrate into the local culture, you can find delicious milk tea everywhere, about 5,000 VND/cup.

6. Accommodation: Hotel prices in Pakistan are quite expensive and the service is not very good. Pakistan does not have many hostels for backpackers, but mostly guesthouses with private rooms or 2-5 star hotels.

7. Taking photos: Local people are very fond of taking photos and they can take selfies with tourists anytime, anywhere. Even Muslim women are willing to ask to take photos with you but must use their cameras. Therefore, this is an Islamic country where you can easily take satisfactory photos. But of course, you must ask permission before taking photos so that you will easily receive sympathy from local people. Note that you are not allowed to take photos in prohibited areas, especially police checkpoints.

8. Electricity and Infrastructure: Electricity is a big problem in Pakistan. Almost every house has a generator because there are frequent power outages even in the big cities. You can use flat pins to charge your electronic devices when needed. Roads in Pakistan are quite good, but some routes are badly damaged by heavy truck traffic, especially the Karakoram Highway, which was provided by China.

9. People: Friendly, cheerful and extremely hospitable.

10. Security: There are police checkpoints almost everywhere in Pakistan. On the road, you will also see police cars moving around with full guns. In front of every hotel, restaurant, bank, there are 1-2 staff with guns ready when needed. I once passed by the gold shop area in Karachi and saw that almost every shop was covered and protected with guns.

11. Inspiration: Read Greg Mortenson's Three Cups of Tea to get motivated before you hit the road!

Nguyen Hoang Bao: Lecturer, travel blogger

Having set foot in 72 countries and territories around the world, in 2017, this blogger with the nickname Nhung Buoc Chan continued to wander on the dangerous and unpredictable Karakoram route in Pakistan. Behind the default of laws, war, terrorism, and dangers of the terrain is a warm Muslim soul, the magnificence of nature, and a brilliant cultural heritage. With this article, he continued his solo journey on the legendary silk road through the land of Pakistan, which is still quite unfamiliar to many Vietnamese people. He still remembers the Pakistani saying: "No matter how turbulent the Hunza River is, it still hides under the proud Karakoram range." Perhaps, despite many uncertainties, Pakistan is as peaceful as the soul of its people!

Article and photos: Footsteps

The Thanh