Let the Move Begin!

Well, as you can see by the layout, the clan is on the move again. We womenfolk are just fueling up the camels and then we will be off for the Land of Sand, aka the UAE. That's me in the scandlously hiked up tunic,Abez is helping me fill the bottles (she must be closely supervised during drudge work or she will wonder off and start blogging) and Owl, the family work horse is about to hand off the bottle on her head to Bro.Zaman,(aka Large Hulking Son or LHS)who has shot-gun on the lead camel. Poor over-worked and over-stressed Hubby is in a heap at the back of the caravan probably calculating miles per gallon of camel fuel and the expected number of washroom stops with diet Pepsi and muchies for 30 people. That naked boy, I don't know his name, but he's the child of my neighbor's servant who stands in our driveway and gawks at us shamelessly whenever are loading the family camel and heading out. I'll be glad to be rid of him.

In reality, the trip isn't that far along yet. We are up to our eyeballs in packed boxes and waist deep in clutter as Owl takes the orginizational lead and cracks the whip on slackers (Abez) and over-whelmed procrastinators (yours truely). Yesterday we took a much needed day off and went to the Lok Virsa Maella. That's a massive folk-festivel in town that looks like a cross between a county fair and the main street of a tiny one road village. We shopped for hand loomed cloth while watching the weavers who were making the stuff. We saw potters working clay, handprinters making tablecloths, and rugs being woven. We ate saag (a spinach-like veggie) and cornmeal flatbread, traditional villager food. We saw dance troops and heard musicians and saw mock-ups of traditional village houses.

I bought two semi-precious stone necklaces, one tiger-eye and one garnnet, a hand crochetted tablecloth, all at great prices. It was so great I went once in the afternoon with the girls, spent all my money and returned again in the evening with LHS and shopped again. He and I even road the rickey ancient farris wheel, ate more saag and cornbread and even cotton candy!

My comment was, "I'm having a great time. Pakistan should be like this everyday!"

LHS said: "If you brought foreigners here right off the plane they would think, 'Wow, Pakistan is really just like in the movies.'"

Owls comments as we drove around town, "The dirt bumps (Margalla Hills) are looking extra fine today. I'm really going to miss this place."

And so, amid the packing of boxes we are trying to pack in some good memories, because the hardest thing about moving isn't packing: it's leaving.