Fade to Black&White: My Summer Trip~ Part 2

Here's my account of the second day of my trip to

THE NORTHERN AREAS

~See, lots of mountains with snow and glaciers there too!~

Anyway, do I need to do a recap? Well, we set out from Islamabad Saturday morning and reached Darosh late Saturday evening and spent the night at army headquarters and with the myseterious insect thing that squeaks like a baby mouse.

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(^.^)/)
DAY TWO
15th July, 2012
Sunday
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Today, I got up around seven o'clock and quickly got out of that room and went to the other room where my father and my other siblings were sleeping and then I did the only thing to pass the time. Played games on my phone. Dragon's Blade to be exact... ^u^

Anyway, let me tell you something. We might have a big tv at home, but it doesn't have cable and no body really watches it. It's just there for our game system and DVD player. So our room DID have a tv with cable to obviously, that was turned on to see what was happening with the world. At that time, the weather reports said that it was pouring in Karachi and also, at that very moment, the boxer Aamir Khan was getting ready to face his opponent.

That WAS interesting news but it didn't really interest me. I'm not a sports fan. And I already had a feeling Aamir was going to lose. Sorry.

When we headed out, we changed cars yet again! Now it was a red Prado!!

~My father's looking at the grapes that are hanging from the tree~

Bundling into the Prado, we started another journey. Although it wasn't AS long, I mean, only two hours I think, it was super bumpy. My younger sister kept complaining that her head and stomach were hurting. I guess she isn't the off-road travel type. But I repeat again, the journey was really bumpy because the roads were unmetalled. There we were climbing up the mountain, then down and then back up but the river never left our sight.

Where was our destination? It was the Kalash valley, the valley of the Kaafirs. We stopped at a PTDC (Pakistan Tourist Developement Corporation) resthouse and wandered around for a while, sighting the first of the many women dressed in the black clothes that marked their religion.

~Inside of the PTDC resteraunt. Oh, it looks nice but it's just okay. Didn't seem to have much of the mystery factor as the other hotel resteraunt had~

After that we went walking up the road where we could see everything up close. Of coarse it all looked pretty normal (for a village) and then we went climbing straight into the Kalash domain and visited their graveyard.

~A casket. They used to leave their dead to rot in the open~

Most of the graveyard had caskets like these with most of the bones missing. Also, most of the bones belonged to the children of the Kalash people. That is sort of freaky, you know, that they have a graveyard full of CHILDREN.

~Here's a closer look! A half skull of a child~

Next, we went climbing up and met a big idol on the way. It was supposed to be used for some ritual of theirs. Or was it for marking a grave? I can't remember that detail. I just remember that it was very ugly.

Climbing on, we met three very lively ducks too!

~Aren't they cute?! I think that is a mother and two growing ducklings~

Right, moving forward. We got to see some of the houses. Only from the outside though and I noticed that most of them had locks on them. My first theory was that maybe they all died of a plague but obviously I was wrong. It turns out they just left on their own little vacations. (^.^)

~Here's their "Hall of Burning People Alive". Nah, just kidding. That's just the ashes of a barbecue party~

That is the hall where they place their dead corpse and then dance around it. It's all part of their ritual. Then they cart off the corpse to rot in their open air graveyard. I think they changed that law. Now they bury their dead instead of leaving them out in the open.

~Look, two idols~

Next we saw those two idols. Those are supposed to be the idols who bring rain. The Kalash people take a goat and slaughter it for them, spill the goat blood everywhere and then feed the meat to the children. That's supposed to bring them rain.

Then we took a detour and sat on the banks of the river. The water was REALLY cold and moved REALLY fast. You couldn't keep your foot in for more than four or five minutes!!

~We crossed that bridge. The other side is where all that Kalash stuff is~

~Met two little girls on the way. One is Kalashi and one is Muslim and they are both friends! (^.^)~

After that, we walked all the way back to the PTDC place and had lunch. Since it was around 2 o'clock, at the sun's zenith, we had to stay there for about an hour till the real heat passed. Travelling in the heat on a bumpy road is not good for either your head or stomach.