A tearful adieu

Border crossings are not always a fun day out. As a traveller, it's one of the rare moments when you actually need to be organised, and land crossings often take an inordinate amount of time. My last exit from India was into Bangladesh, and of it I retain no fond memories of the Indian Customs Service. 'Rude bastards' was how I would describe them, all this time later.
Still, India to Pakistan was a breeze; in fact, a little dull.

Where I expected milling, shrieking, disorganised crowds, dust, dirt and general pandemonium, I was faced with efficiency that you just don't expect on the subcontinent. Funny, that. During four months I had approached every civil servant with a sense of subservient dread, but here they are happy for you to leave and scan your passport before you have the opportunity to admit to yourself how much you're going to miss the place.

Then I got emotional. Being a long-term tragic single, I have few attachments and no-one to love. Instead, I fall head over heels for peoples and panoramas, and India is a place, for all of its absurdity, that really makes me feel good about myself. Unlike the Western obsession with careers, fashion, impersonal technology and the latest in everything, India certainly skips to its own beat in its own time. No-one in India really cares for all the shite we fill and end our lives with in the West. I like it a lot and admit to having a few tears in my eyes when I walked through no-man's land and into Pakistan.

The Singaporean accompanying me was appalled at my public display. Still, I've always considered the Chinese as expressive as ice and as appealing as a movie starring Nicole Kidman. I wiped my tears and silently thanked India for another four months of uninterrupted insanity.
And just let me tell you, Pakistan made an indelible first impression.

No cow. Bovine-free, a good thing. As simple as that. Lahore, a quick bus ride from the border town of Wagah, is free of excrement. This is no insignificant change when your nostrils have been violently assaulted for the last few months and your face constantly attacked by flies mistaking it for a pile of dung. Pollution and traffic remain as chaotic as I expected, but to breathe easily and deeply has made me immediately attracted to the young Islamic Republic.

I checked into a hotel full of sullen Japanese and dope-smoking Europeans, and crashed onto the bed. I flicked through my book, 'The Idea of Pakistan', and at present, I believe it to be a very fine idea indeed.

Salaam walekum Pakistan!