| Written by Asma Bashir, |
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2709  |
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 It was May 15th of 2005 a usual day in my life. I was busy with my office assignment when I got an invitation from Art of Living Foundation India to participate in their conference for women rights at Bangalore. I just gave up the idea due to the strained relationship between both countries and registration fee for the conference. My friend Masoora had a different view and she asked me to search other options for funding. We talked to the Naem Zameenda representative of Art of living Foundation in Pakistan and he gave us a green single. He talked to his colleagues in India and they agreed to waive our conference fee and offered us for advance course of Art of living foundation at free of cost.
Now Masoora and I got together to gather our resources for our trip to India. Problem was this that both of us couldn’t afford the trip to Bangalore by air. It was around about 50 thousand Pakistani rupees from Islamabad to Bangalore. I told her that train and bus are the two other options to go to India. My relatives are living in India and my family goes there almost after ever 3-4 years by train. But none of them could give us any advice regarding our travel from Islamabad to Bangalore via train. Another big problem was this we both did not want to tell our families that we are going alone to Bangalore. We told them that from Delhi another group would accompany us to Bangalore. My parents were too scared and they resisted against my decision but I already took it so they just warned me about the results. Luckily we did not face any problem in getting the visa and we got it just in one hour. Not only this but next day they again granted us an extension of 10 days. My friend and me were pretending to look very confident but within we were worried as we were going to India without any train reservations. On 28th May at 4.00 am we left Lahore for Delhi. Before leaving my family advised me to take care of the family values while talking to my relatives in India, as they all are very conservative. Furthermore, our one senior friend advised us to live together not to talk to Hindus too much don’t take anything to eat especially from a Hindu. We reached Delhi at 5.30 pm. All roads in Delhi were crowded badly. It was my first time in Delhi and I was anxious to see the glamorous and old part of Delhi about which I heard so much since childhood. We both were happy that we reached Delhi alive and without any big hassle. But we didn’t know that worst thing was going to happen. We quickly reached at Delhi station after buying our return tickets for Lahore. Rickshaw driver dropped us at the office of a private travel agent; he took our passport and 3400 rupees for getting the seats. After one hour he told that there is no seat for Karnataka express but he can try for other trains, which were expensive. He advised us to stay in Delhi for one night if we still wanted to go through the same train. I quickly called my relatives in Himachal and asked about anyone staying in Delhi they told me that everybody was in Himachal for summer vacations. Travel agent asked us not to tell anybody that we are Pakistanis as we did not have visa for Delhi and then we can be held liable for illegal stay, though our entry and exit point was Delhi. This was the time that our whole motivation to visit India and the realization that we are at a foreign land started biting us. Masoora asked me to contact conference organizers. I looked at her surprisingly as it was 9.00 pm but we did not have any other option. I called the conference organizer in Bangalore with speedy heartbeats. Surprisingly the lady was too much supportive and gave us another number of a women living in Delhi. We called that women and she asked us to wait for some time. We called her again after a few minutes and she gave us the phone number of another woman called Rashmi Paliwal living in Vasant Vihar. We were a little bit relaxed after talking to Rashmi. She informed us that her driver would soon pick us. It was 11.30 pm and there was no sign of Rashmi’s driver. Masoora and I were trying to console each other but we both knew that we were in serious trouble. The market at Ajmeri gate was closing down. Masoora started crying and praying. Travel agents were really very good and they were consoling that see if nobody will pick you we can arrange your stay but we were uncertain about their sincerity. It was 12.00 am now I called Rashmi again and she told that driver had left two hours before. Her driver did not have any cell phone so it was really hard to trace him. Imagine two single, alone girls standing outside Ajmeri gate with no hope of finding any trustworthy place. I started crying that why the hell we were so foolish to came into this country without any information and link? We were also uncertain that whether we would be able to go back to Pakistan to meet our family? Whether we would be alive till tomorrow? These hotel agents might take us to some brothels or anywhere else from where there would be no way to come back. Suddenly the boy standing outside at the PCO told us that there is one car with the same number for which we were waiting. The Driver Jyoti Singh was finding us on Railway’s travel office for foreigners. He was returning back to Rashmi when he suddenly thought to check at private travel agents offices. We were so happy that we did not say thanks to the travel agents also who took our care during that hard time. We just took our passports and money and jumped into Rahmi’s car. After 30 minutes the car stopped in front of a beautiful house in Vasant Vihar. Rashmi received us and asked for food but we were so happy and tired that we just asked for a bed. The AC in our room was not working. Rashmi was quite concerned about our rest. Though we told her that we are habitual of living without AC it does not make any difference. But she did not listen and sent us in the basement’s lounge to sleep, which was quite cool. We slept and got up early in the morning with some familiar chants of Bhajans. Rashmi was playing with Sitar and we listened to her. She told us that there would be a short gathering of Art of living people to have Long Karya (exercise). We participated in that exercise, at the end Rashmi requested all people to see if they can arrange any ticket for us through their links to Bangalore. People were surprised that how come two girls from Pakistan came to Delhi alone? They were more surprised to see that none of us was wearing Burka and we both were already working in our own fields actively. At night we met Rashmi’s mother and her elder sister. Rashmi’s mother was born and raised up in Rawalpindi my home state. She was badly missing Pakistan and wanted to go their again. She was asking about old areas of Rawalpindi and quickly recognized the area of Masoora’s residence. She asked us to stay with her again upon our return. It was 7.00 pm and we were supposed to leave. Rashmi’s cook was used to make small chappatttis. We told him that your 7 breads are equal to 2 Pakistani breads. For our food he put more than 25 chappatis in our lunch box. We both slept quietly at night. Early in the morning I saw Masoora was sitting with some other family playing antakshari. I also took part in it and suddenly my team was almost winning. The other team was surprised as I was singing Pakistani songs and they never heard that songs. They blame our team for singing unknown songs. Then we explained about ourselves and their response was quite surprising. Again they were surprised to hear that we both work in the offices and we don’t wear Burka or scarf. Finally we reached at Bangalore on 1st June 2005. We exchanged phone emails with all the people and left the station in a happy mood. We got an auto rickshaw. I stopped at a post office to post some paper of my one friend to Delhi and to call my relatives in Pune. one of my cousin lived in Bangalore; his mother was surprised to hear that I reached so quickly in Bangalore and alone. The auto Rickshaw asked from Masoora “Are you Muslim? Masoora was scared and she said “NO”. Later on we came to know that he was also a Muslim and he saw Masoora praying silently in rickshaw. We met a girl at ashram who showed us our room, which was quite good and airy. The girl was too much excited about Pakistanis and wanted to see this land. Everybody was so helpful and friendly at the ashram. We were famous in the whole ashram by the name of “brave girls” who came alone to Bangalore. We were worried about our tickets to go back to Delhi and I asked my cousin but he was too much busy and he apologized to help in this matter. We both decided to go again to the city. Again we did not have much money so we took the bus towards the city got our seats and decided to roam around the city. Everybody in the shop asked us from where we are? Because we were speaking Urdu/Hindi and we thought that they can recognize us. We were too scared to roam in the markets. We did buy some small things and came back to Ashram. On 11th June at 3.00 pm we left the ashram to go back to Delhi. I met my one net friend at Bangalore station who was a journalist. We waited for him for 2 hrs. He promised to be there at 3.00 but reached at 5.00pm. Masoora was quite angry due to these things. We both decided that as we have to stay for one day in Delhi so we would not tell anybody during the journey about our whereabouts. There were two young guys sitting in front of us who passed a smile to us but we ignored them. There were two other old Bihari men sitting near us. There language was totally unknown to us. We were scared from these Bihari men. I suddenly remembered old Indian movies where a young girl is traveling alone in the train and somebody kidnaps her and leaves her at brothel. We both did not sleep till 4 .00 am. Finally they left after 4 in the morning and then we slept. When I got up the other two young guys said hello to us again and this time I forcibly replied and started reading newspaper. One of them asked whether I am a student. I told him that I am a student who came to Bangalore to attend that conference. I was not interested in talking to them. One of them offered us biscuits and Masoora who was too hungry quickly accepted it. I was shocked because last night we both vowed that we are not going to talk anybody in the train. But then we finally started talking to each other. Both guys Sudhir and Manish were too friendly and they were working in Bangalore. We enjoyed our travel with them in till half of the way. We talked to several other travelers also who were very happy to hear that we are Pakistanis. My uncle and cousin from Himachal came to pick us. We went to stay with them in Najaf Garh. Next day I called Rashmi and told her that we have got our stay in Delhi her mother was very sad to hear that we will not meet her again. On 15th June we left Delhi early in the morning at 4.00 am for Lahore. We were missing our home badly. When we reached Wagah border we both started jumping happily that we did it we did it. It was really the most memorable and challenging journey of my life. I would say that until and unless we will meet each other face-to-face we would believe media and politicians emitting venom against each other. There is lot of myths on both sides of border against each other. In India people think that Pakistani girls are oppressed badly they are illiterate, do not study and are just imprisoned at home. The situation is quite different women living in metro cities are totally different from the ones that are living in rural areas. They also thought that Pakistani girls get marry at a very young age, which is quite wrong. Our Indian friends were quite surprise to hear that we both wanted to first settle in our career and then about marriage.
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