Calling Abdalians
Friday 29 March 2024
Comfortably tucked in green hills north of Islamabad, Hasan Abdal is situated right on the Grand Trunk Road. The town's claims to fame are Cadet College and temple of Panja Sahib. This small and clean historic town neat is sacred for Sikhs.Hassan Abdal is famous for its cadet college and also serves as the gateway to some most stunning sites in Pakistan. It is from here that Karakoram Highways turns towards Northern Areas. It is a convenient halting point of Grand Trunk Road (G T Road) from where one can go to places like Abbotabad and Northern Areas, Peshawar, Taxila, Wah, Rawalpindi. Coins of the Greco-Bectrians kings discovered from the adjoining tract suggest that the area was inhabited in first century B.C. Accounts of Xuan Zang, a seventh century Chinese Buddhist traveler tells us that the place was also sacred to Buddhists. However, presently the town is associated with Guru Nanak, the founder of Sikh religion and Baba Wali Qandhari, a revered Muslim saint.
Labels: Hasan Abdal, Panja Sahib, Travel
posted by S A J Shirazi @ Friday, March 29, 2024,
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Gogera Sadar
Tuesday 12 March 2024
Situated on the bank of river Ravi on Okara Faisalabad Road, Gogera (Sadar) was once an important and dignified town in the plans of Central Punjab. It is reduced to a shabby and sleepy suburb of Okara today. Town still boasts its importance when it was British power centre and district headquarters from 1852 to 1865 and the part played by the resilient people of the area during War of Independence in 1857. The stories of the war that was fought around Gogera echo in the pages of history books.
The only historic building — a British court — that reminds of the colonial period has been converted into a school. The verandas of the old building with round arches have been clogged to create additional rooms and red thin bricks are covered with coats of whitewash. It was much better if the building could have been conserved in its original shape. That does not seem possible now.
Labels: Gogera, History, Travel
posted by S A J Shirazi @ Tuesday, March 12, 2024,
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Happy families are all alike
Saturday 9 March 2024
The first sentence of Tolstoy's novel Anna Karenina is: “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way” (Tolstoy, 1875-1877/2001, p. 1).
posted by S A J Shirazi @ Saturday, March 09, 2024,
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Judge the Nations by the Way They Look at Their Women
Saturday 2 March 2024
Societies pride in different strengths: Some give importance to bravery, some to democracy, and some nations think that freedom of expression, development, and or education are the hallmarks of their long-term sustenance. “The nations should be judged on how they look at their women,” writes Abbas Khan, the author of the Urdu novel Mein Aur Umrao Jan Ada, his eleventh.
There is a famous saying that everything in fiction is true except dates. But in the novel written by Abbas Khan, even the dates are true because he has based his novel on the background of five very famous women in history: Helen of Troy, Cleopatra, Qura tul Ain Tahira (Iran), Mughal Princess Noor Jehan and Umrao Jan Ada.
Helen of Troy was the daughter of Zeus and Leda and the wife of Menelaus, considered to be the most beautiful woman in the world. Her abduction by Paris caused the Trojan War and made thousands of ships drown.
Helen of Troy was the daughter of Zeus and Leda and the wife of Menelaus, considered to be the most beautiful woman in the world. Her abduction by Paris caused the Trojan War and made thousands of ships drown.
Labels: Abbas Khan, Books
posted by S A J Shirazi @ Saturday, March 02, 2024,
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Changing Chitral
Friday 1 March 2024
{This is an old article when I was stationed in Mirkhanni, Chitral} Picturesque Chitral town sits up in Pakistan's northwest district, walled in by the Hindu Kush range. During winters, the only way in is by air (weather permitting) as the two passes, the 3118-meter Lowari from Dir and the 3810-meter Shandur from the upper Gilgit Valley are closed to road traffic. The Fokker Friendships drone for 50 minutes and burst through clouds on descent to reveal on mountains covered with whitecaps and red tin roof houses.
This is Chitral. On the small airfield, the cold wind thrusts you to shiver. The remoteness of the district has left it undeveloped in spite of its grand natural beauty, hospitable people, and ancient history. The town is a base camp for tourists, adventurers, and researchers from across the world. And, people seem to be living there in peace.
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This is Chitral. On the small airfield, the cold wind thrusts you to shiver. The remoteness of the district has left it undeveloped in spite of its grand natural beauty, hospitable people, and ancient history. The town is a base camp for tourists, adventurers, and researchers from across the world. And, people seem to be living there in peace.
posted by S A J Shirazi @ Friday, March 01, 2024,
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