Cricket in Lahore

Email sent December 15, 2005

Dear All,

Susan and I split up today; we are dividing and conquering the mountain ranges here! She is off to a festival in the Kalasha valley and I am off to Kashmir to UNICEF and gun toting rebels!

We arrived in Lahore after our thirty hours of hell, well, it would be if hell was fine dust and spit. Everyone had told us we would love Lahore, that it was just like Europe. And it was. It was like Serbia. We made it to a McDonalds where we braved the security and got a burger with no meat. Basically a maccas bun with tomato, pickle and special sauce and loads of lettuce. It was the best thing I have ever eaten!

We stayed in a brilliant little hotel that had a rooftop where we sat around a campfire and listened to Sufi drumming that was amazing. They drum so intensely that they go into a trance and start to spin. Fantastic and slightly frightening!

We also met up with foreigners for the first time! There were lots of English lads there for the cricket so we hooked up with some free tickets from the team and got to watch England loose to Pakistan. they guys we went with dressed in Shalwaar Kameez like women and caused a great stir! Only to be outdone by Susan and Myself who went as ourselves. More fun was had by the crowd watching us than the game!!

Am now up in Peshawar. We went up the Khyber Pass yesterday up to the Afghan boarder, which was brilliant. Today I am wandering the market looking for a teapot and tomorrow I go with some English guys out to look for Darra, a town where they can copy any weapon in less than ten days. You can even fire a few rounds before word gets out that a foreigner is in town and you get put on the next bus back to Peshawar!

Am a bit lazy with this email, sorry, but email is rather slow and I have heard that there is a subway restaurant in town and I need to go on the prowl for food that isn't lentils!

Love

Dion