Diary of an Introverted Extrovert

Yeah I know it’s been a month that I wrote the part one of this blog but I was really busy and was just not feeling like writing anything. Let’s continue from where I left telling you about that walk. After the monument I moved towards the London Bridge which is one of the oldest bridges over the river Thames. Just to tell you a quick fact, the existing queen of Great Britain has also the code name after this bridge and the code line in case of her death is “London Bridge has Fallen”. Well coming to the point again, I was standing on the London bridge looking at the old Tower Bridge, The Shard, some other old and new buildings and at that time it occurred to me again same as back in Lahore with the old tree. The old, peaceful river Thames started talking to me, telling me stories of the old times. It told me the transition of this place from a primitive place with no facilities to the center of an empire on which the sun never sets, and then again in to a small but power full ...

It was about 2 weeks of me being in London and I had been to nowhere. It doesn’t mean that I was keeping myself stranded in the room. The Pakistani community here was quite cool and really supportive, I attended some parties too, also went to meet some old fellows but that was not satisfying my nomad soul. I had to see London; I had to visit the places as they say in Urdu, “Awargi main had sa guzar jana chahea” We called one of our seniors who was living in this place from a long time now and literally begged her that we want to go somewhere; we need to have some sightseeing. She was so nice to set a plan for the coming Saturday to take us to Piccadilly Circus. Piccadilly Circus is a place which would be in the mind of every person who is somewhat in to the Urdu literature as many authors quote it in their writings. We gathered at Mile End Station of the London underground tube system at 5 pm. One thing I observed here in London generally everywhere and specially...

Like most of the people from middle class background in Pakistan I have never traveled via airplane to anywhere not even locally. So all the information of how the plane looks like, and how the airports look like from the inside were all confined to the movies and videos but not for long. This time I got the chance to travel by plane and it was not going to be an intercity travel, I was going to London. It was October 2 nd which was designated to be my flight date and I was supposed to be travelling via the Qatar Airways. I reached the airport and I was quite anxious about the customs and the security check, but i t was not a big deal. I was through it in less than 20 minutes and I was in the boarding lounge an hour prior to my flight. So I waited and waited. Not just waited, I tried to explore the newly built Islamabad airport too which was unexpectedly really nice. These guys seemed to be much fond of the timings so there was no sighting of my plane which was supposed to dep...

I had to go to Lahore for a day and my train dropped me there in the early morning at 4:30am (Pakistani trains follow the time schedule now). So I had like 4 hours to kill before the office where I had to go even opens. I walked to Lahore food street Anarkali still I got there in 45 minutes and the shopkeepers were just starting out :D. ultimately I got myself some breakfast and  some tea then again I walked to the point where I was intended to go. When I got there it was 7 and still I had like 90 minutes to spare. It was the queen’s road of Lahore. I found myself a bench on the road side, shoved my earphones and just sat there looking at the people. It was the morning of a working day, so it was full of the typical big city hassle. People in hurry, getting breakfast things from the shops, kids going to sc hool, youngsters to the universities, busy bus stops, busy roads just everything and everyone was in a great hurry. Only two living things were sitting calmly on the sid...

There are two types of travelers in the world. First are those who prefer vanilla trips, the planned ones which can cost exorbitant sum of money. These travelers plan everything ahead of them, from hotels they want to stay in to the restaurants they would eat in. Most people tend to do such kind of travels because it is safe. They prefer to go to a known place and photograph the things which have already been photographed. Then there is the second type of travelers, the adventure freaks, the backpackers. They tend to explore new pathways and make they own way in the wilderness. Sure they have idea of where to go and when to go but they are not limited to that. They leave their destinations to their fate and keep only one must in their life, “Enjoy”. Despite backpacking is not a very safe bet but it can be a life changing experience for any one. Once you start it, you are going to get addicted to its adventures and beauty but the reason most of people do not do this way is that they do...