"When I was treated as a spy “

( my narration)

I am Julia Fernandina. America is my identity. I am a journalist, masters in French and Urdu language and also doing PH.D in leadership from Harvard. From my study, people will have a perception that politics and diplomacy are my area of interest. However, I have another interest as well and that is tourism.

After a long dedicated time to my job and my studies, I finally planned to take a break and visit a place for a month that is famous and where I could find an entirely different culture from where I have been living since ages.

I started to search for places with different culture than what I am aware of. My areas of interests were South Asian countries and amongst South Asian countries I chose Pakistan to spend a month as a tourist. After having some info about Pakistan; I started with the procedures to visit and when I was done with all my procedures and preparation, I finally landed to Pakistan in fourteen hours via PIA.

When I landed in Islamabad, I was surprised to see a well maintained city, a city which had a quiet environment though it was the centre of attention of the country. The people of Pakistan were amazing. I enjoyed seeing all the political institutions together such as the parliament, the prime minister’s house, Supreme Court etc. Everything was peaceful unlike what media represent Pakistan. I got a chance to see lawyers’ agitation outside the Supreme Court. Although the lawyers were not as sophisticated as the lawyers of the west are, but I dint find them intensely wild what Pakistan media represents.

Then I went to Lahore, I was amazed to see that in an under developed country; historical things are still preserved. This was something beyond my expectation. I enjoyed seeing the red fort, Minar e Pakistan, the tomb of Iqbal and several other places. The best thing I liked about the two cities was their transport. The three wheel vehicle; known as ‘rickshaw’ and the vibrant ‘colorful buses’. They looked like any video game feature. Sitting in the so called video game feature made me amused. I liked the noise of rickshaw; I think it was better than sharing seats with all sorts of people travelling in the underground trains. But yes, the biggest advantage of it is that less time is consumed in travelling and less traffic is seen on the roads.

Since I was alone, I had a guide map in my hand but I did not have much use of it because the people were helpful but had an inquired faces. I went to ‘Anar kali’ market; the shopkeepers did not leave any opportunity to attract me with their stiff and no doubt their mission was accomplished. I went crazy after the colorful funky buttons, hand embroidery, the mirror work on caps, the thread work on shoes etc. I had a good budget for shopping but I couldn’t buy as much as I wanted because I had a long way to go but yes I bought few things. While leaving Lahore and going to northern areas of Pakistan, I had a thought in my mind that I perceived Pakistan as a country made up of small villages. I never expected developed cities. I don’t know why I had a perception that this developing country has a non mechanical life.

While travelling towards north, I planned to take a sleep but the beauty of the Pakistani land didn’t let me to take a nap. Listening to Pakistani music, seeing farms and hills, domestic animals, working of villagers compelled me to think that why am I stuck in politics. Why don’t I come here and live a simple life but any how it was just an idealistic thought.
During the eight hours of the journey, the bus stopped at several terminals. Few People used to rush to perform their prayers and rest to grab some food. However, I used to spend those fifteen minutes in selecting food for myself.

When I reached the northern parts such as Waziristan, abbot bad etc. the beauty of those places made me intrigued. Another thing I remember, I used to be in veil because I found people narrow minded. They passed weird gestures towards me, when I used to walk in western attire as if I was an alien for them. Therefore, in order to get acceptable in their culture; I wore veil but still I wonder many of the residencies caught me that I don’t belong to their land. Perhaps this was because of my walk.

The days when I was in the north of Pakistan, I guess I was considered as a spy. Many times I felt that people believed that I am a raw agent of west. Perhaps they must be assuming because I visited Pakistan in January 2002, soon after the event of 9/11 and also because since I am a journalist I have a habit of inquiring people mostly political inquires because this is my interest. I was strictly checked at different check posts in northern areas. It sounded as if nobody wanted to believe that I was only a tourist, rather any spy and I did not had any intentions to take revenge of 9/11.

I remember once I was sitting in a motel were I shared room with three Pakistani women who were also tourist belonged to different ethnicity. They were discussing the global political affairs. I could not understand most of the conversation despite of being masters in Urdu language maybe because they were code switching. But the crux of their conversation was that they were happy what happened with my country. They were also skeptical like every one else was, that who were the culprits behind 9/11. After their long discussion they came to a conclusion; that the culprits are the Americans themselves, who attacked twin towers and planned everything so that they could get a chance to claim Muslims as reprehensible and could attack Afghanistan.

They were also against of the decision that Pakistani government supported America in their research to find the culprits. They did not like that Pakistani government provided her port to America to attack Afghanistan where she could spread her army and nuclear power. There thought was, that Pakistani government should not have provided a platform to America to target Afghanistan and take the revenge of 9/11 because it was perceived that Taliban had done the attacked on twin tower and they exist in Afghanistan. There thought was that a Muslim country should have refused to give a platform to non Muslims to target a Muslim state. They called Americans as terrorism lovers though they scream for anti terrorism. They discussed all this with an obvious thought that since I am from west I have not understood any of their discussion.

Well at that time I was agreeing with them, but did not participated in the discussion at all. I thought that they might be right because Muslims do not have so much of power to take such an intense action in America.

The next morning, on my journey, I observed that the women of northern parts were suppressed as compared to the women urban areas of Pakistan. The population of women seen on the roads was quite less. I wonder they only come with their men when it is most essential.
The thing that gave me shock when I noticed, that men of those areas avoid taking the names of their women. After inquiring I came to know, that the reason behind hiding their names is that, no other man listens and could say her name in front of others or else people perceive that particular woman is having an illegitimate relationship with that man. I could not believe that how come any one could think this way. Apart from being narrow minded, men of the northern areas were very respectable towards women. They did not misbehave seeing a foreign woman alone and that is something to be appreciated and different from the western culture.

I wanted to explore the south west part of Pakistan but I did not go because it is closer to Afghanistan. The discussion against Americans and peoples belief that I am a spy curtailed me from going there. I did not want to be treated brutally. I did want to spend the rest of my life in prison. Therefore, I came to Islamabad and went back to United States so that I could have good memories of my tour that made me to enjoy a lot.