Life in the Land of the Pure, 2024-25 season, episode 4: Things to do in Islamabad when you’re howard

 

… Or all work and no play isn’t quite how I roll 

Every now and then I’ll use the blog to let you know what I’ve been up to.  Like anything anywhere, it’s mostly what you choose to make of it.  

Starting with last weekend …. Saturdays (unless its raining) I walk the diplomatic zone (DZ) with a handful of other embassy folk.  It’s usually a core of about five with another handful rotating in and out.  It’s about five hours, taken us an hour and a half, and just before the last couple hundred meters to the embassy we stop at the Dz’s Dunkin’ Donuts.  My standing order is an Alaska coffee (cold and blended frothy with whole milk) and a donut.  That walk gets me my 10k steps.   

Last Saturday night (sept 21) was a busy one.   A few of us were invited to the South Korean political counselors house for Korean food (sushi, fried chicken, and this amazing spicy fresh pasta) and a documentary movie -Beyond Utopia—about North Korean and families that escaped from there.  Some of the escapees described the social and educational system that lied to generations of children and rewarded adults who helped perpetuate the lies.   I’ve told ben & harrison so many times that if you need to lie to make your case, you have no case.  The film was harrowing at times.  One of the interviewees said that the degree of control there was only outmatched by that of Nazi germany.  

Ironically perhaps our next stop that night was an Oktoberfest event at the Marriott hotel sponsored by the German embassy.  Brats & potatoes, and beer, and music.  “Country roads” was playing as we  entered, and much of the soundtrack that evening was drawn from the late 1990s/early 2000s, and was replayed countlessly at embassy parties in the mid-2010s—black eyed peas featured prominently.  Because I’m not a 20-something first-tour officer, or a (practically teenaged) marine security guard, I was back in my apt by 1030.  

Sunday mornings I usually join the management counselor for a smaller, shorter, and usually pokemon-oriented enclave walk, with embassy dogs in tow.  It was a slower day overall, after the walk I treated myself to some laps in the salt water pool (air temps have been in the 80s-90s throughout).  Then a walk around the embassy compound, ending the garden plots.  I agreed to be the POC for the garden club and get things organized.  Starting with drawing a map of the 21 plots, not all of which were labeled.  Fun fact, there’s a plot between 6 and7 that I had to label as 6b to sort things out.  Eventually discovered that all the plots had been cultivated by people no longer here at post so I’ve been doing drawings for people to adopt plots and get things going, so far about half have been claimed.  After doing the mapping, the CLO and her husband, who works in Assist, came out for their weekly wine picnic with their yorkie Gucci.  We chatted a bit then I called it a night.  

Usually weeknights are dinner - reading  -bed. But not this week.  Wednesday after work I drove (just a couple hundred yards, to avoid the wild boars 🐗 — more on those in a later installment) to the pizza place near the Dunkin’ Donuts for a meeting of Islamabad PAWS. The group raises money to feed, get meds for, spay/neuter, and support adoption of the dogs that roam the diplomatic zone.  I have been entrusted to empty the donation box we have at our commissary— most of the members are outside the us embassy so servicing the box has been a challenge for them.  I was able to bring 19,500 rupees—$65–to the meeting.  I worked with a colleague on new flyers and signage to encourage donations.  The heads of the organization are German, and very German at that-/nice people but not terribly flexible.  The police force once tried to evict the dogs but other dogs took their place—this way, we have healthy dogs who protect and crowd out other dogs from the enclave.  

Last Thursday was trivia night.  Not a huge turnout, three pick-up teams of five each.  We did well (with some help from me) especially  on the movies & Star Trek categories, but what put us over the top was the poetry smackdown. We tied over who could recite the most of In Xanadu (the Coleridge poem, not the Newton-John song), but I swept with the first four lines on the introduction to Canterbury Tales.  Thanks go to Hugh school English teacher Mr Cimerol for getting us the 10 points that earned us a shared  $25 club gift certificate (basically a round of drinks).  

Saturday was back to the long walk—but a nicer high-70s temp.  I then spent most of the afternoon walking around one of the large shopping plazas. Tallied up 10k steps during the walk and almost 18k by window shopping.  Came back to survey the garden plots, weeded one to make it more attractive for someone to adopt it—didn’t take long, they’re about 4 square meters—and as I was finishing, the CLO and her husband & Gucci were setting up their picnic again. One glass of wine later, I was done for the night.  

This brings us to today.  The short Sunday walk, followed by lunch, weeding & planting my own plot (#12.  I planted pumpkin and sunflower seeds). The I hustled down to the gym for my introduction to pickleball. Man that was a workout!  I thought it was like shuffleboard with a net but an hour wore me out.  A quick drive to the little grocery shop next to Dunkin to get snacks for next Friday’s happy hour, and that was all for me. 

Whew….. I’m exhausted just typing this.  My next installment will be something different I think, but for now, thank you for letting me share.  

Be back soon, 

Howard