Wednesday 31 October 2007

Kashmiri wedding

Carrying the water pitcher

The Bride awaits her groom


The arrival of the groom


We went to a wedding last night in Rawalpindi. The families were Kashmiri though, not Pakistani. It wasn't very exciting as all we seemed to do was sit around waiting for the bride to arrive. She was due at 8.30pm but eventually they decided we should eat first instead and she arrived at 10.30pm.

I had a turn at carrying the water jug which is a tradition in Kashmir for the ladies and I think is supposed to bring luck to the couple.





Monday 29 October 2007

New house



Two views of our new house in Kashmir. Furniture we have ordered should be ready to transport to there from here in Islamabad on 2nd November and we will travel there the same day.

Waiting for "Eidie"

Village children dressed in their new Eid clothes calling to collect Eidie.

A helping hand

My niece helping me down the mountain. Not easy wearing sandals and a skirt! lol

Sunday 28 October 2007

News from Kashmir

Friday 12 November 2007

We arrived Islamabad at 6am local time just 10 minutes later than expected time of arrival in spite of leaving London one hour late. We were met by sister in law and were driven to her house to freshen up and rest until shops and bank opened. After visiting bank and buying cakes we drove to Kashmir. This is a long drive of over 3 hours and we arrived at 3.30pm.

It was thought that this day would be the last day of Ramadan, the month of fasting but unfortunately everybody was disappointed. The end of Ramadan is declared at the sighting of the new moon but unfortunately nobody had sighted in anywhere in Pakistan even though it had been seen in Europe and Saudi Arabia the previous day. Hence there was to be yet another day of fasting in Kashmir and Pakistan.

The end of Ramadan is celebrated with the festival of Eid. This is the equivalent of the Christian Christmas and the biggest celebration of the Muslim year. After breakfast the men visit the mosque for Eid prayers then they go around visiting all the neighbour’s houses. The women also go visiting but not with the men. At each house you are given refreshment. The children are also given ‘eidie’, which is a gift of money. Young children go from house to house alone and one group that visited us said they didn’t want any food just eidie please!

Visiting the neighbours was quite a feat as the houses are built on the side of a mountain. People there are as agile as mountain goats and I had to be assisted by my young nieces to reach some of the houses.

The last visit of the day was to my husband’s elderly 84 year old uncle who lives practically at the top of the mountain. We were driven there by my brother in law in his jeep. There was a tarmac road part of the way but the last 10 minutes or so were along a dirt and stone track. Even being a passenger was hard work and extremely bumpy. The roads are all very narrow with sheer drops down the side of the mountain if you wander to near the edge. It is amazing that somebody so elderly lives in such a remote place and walks the mountains with ease.

The second day of Eid is for visiting relatives who live further afield. Once again this required a journey in a jeep to visit one family. Their house is on the top of another mountain and is in the process of being rebuilt following the earthquake of 2005. Only the basement was left undamaged the upper floors were completely flattened. They are building a very big 4 bedroom house on top of the original site. I can’t imagine why anybody would want to build there again after such a disaster. It looks too dangerous to me especially for the builders trying to do the work. The family living there has had a bad few years. My husband’s brother in law’s father, who is very elderly, lives there with his daughter in law and 4 children age from 14 to 3. Their father died suddenly when the youngest child was a small baby. Then earlier this year the children’s grandmother died too. They must have some money if they are rebuilding the house but generally I think things are quite difficult. They don’t even have piped water and have to carry it every day from a well 10 minutes walk away.

We visited three further families that day and had lunch with my husband’s cousin who he hadn’t seen for 40 years. They also had other visitors who were an English couple who are working with the teacher’s training scheme at the Pearl School nearby. On talking to them we discovered that one of them used to live less than half a mile away from us in Wales. What a small world we live in!

I was going to put some pictures here but have very slow connection so they will have to wait until I arrive home.

Wednesday 10 October 2007

Fun Guy?

The damp autumn weather brings with it the inevitable fungi!







Tuesday 9 October 2007

Going away




Going to Pakistan and Kashmir on Thursday. We have just had a house built in Kashmir and are going there to furnish it. The house was started in the spring of 2005. Building was halted in October of that year because of the devastating earthquake. People were too busy repairing and rebuilding their own houses. Here is a picture of our house taken in May 2006. It has been a very slow job as the pace of life is much slower there and they don't have all the modern equipment that we have here. The stones for the house were cut by hand.
The house is now complete so once we have seen it and measured up and decided what we need we will go shopping in Islamabad in Pakistan from where we will have the furniture transported. I will keep up to date here with what we are doing and more pictures. (If I can get internet access)