The Year in Retrospect

Living in Kashmir 1979-80: A Year of People, Places and Memories 

Some events throughout that year that influenced our lives

Pre-Posting Events

Long before we set foot on Pakistani soil, the world had already begun to rearrange itself in ways that would strip away our carefully laid plans. We had been rather pleased with ourselves; truth be told. The scheme was elegant, fly to Germany, collect our newly ordered vehicle, and make the overland drive southward, through Iran, across to Pakistan, where we would spend our posting year before shipping the vehicle home to Sydney.

After twelve months back on Australian soil, it could be sold at a tidy profit, having neatly sidestepped the punishing import duties then levied on luxury cars. We were not alone in this thinking; it was a well-worn path among those posted abroad. 

Then history intervened, as it so often does, with indifference to our plans.

• 16 January 1979 – The Shah fled Iran

• 11 February 1979 – Revolutionary forces in Iran took control

• 14 February 1979 – In Kabul, Muslim extremists kidnapped the American ambassador to Afghanistan, Adolph Dubs, who was killed during a gunfight between his kidnappers and police

The road through Iran became first imprudent, then impossible, and finally unthinkable. The deposit was forfeited. The vehicle was cancelled. The grand drive south existed only as a might-have-been.

AI generated image in NotebookLM

After Arrival

We arrived in Pakistan instead by altogether more conventional means, stepping into a country that was itself poised on a knife's edge.

• 4 April 1979 – Pakistani Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto was executed by hanging

A period of confinement in Flashmans Hotel in Rawalpindi as riots took place in the streets.

• 11 July 1979 – NASA's first orbiting space station, Skylab, began falling back Earth as its orbit decayed after more than six years.

In Srinagar, word spread that Skylab was tumbling from the heavens, and the city shuttered itself for two anxious days, uncertain what, precisely, to expect from a falling space station.

• 4 November 1979 - militants seized the U.S. embassy in Tehran, beginning a hostage crisis.

• 21 November 1979 – After false radio reports from the Ayatollah Khomeini that the Americans had occupied the Grand Mosque in Mecca, the United States Embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan was attacked by a mob and set fire, killing four.

UNMOGIP personnel could no longer visit the US Embassy cinema or bar for entertainment as security there was tightened.

• 28 November 1979– An Air New Zealand DC-10 crashed into Mount Erebus in Antarctica on a sightseeing trip, killing all 257 people on board.

Two months later we were aboard a flight from Delhi to Srinagar when the pilot had aborted a landing on late finals, the aircraft pulling away sharply as the ground rose too close beneath us. The Erebus disaster gave that event a sharper edge than was possibly necessary.

• 24 December 1979 - The Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan.

The border closed. Kabul which we had imagined visiting, simply ceased to be accessible, sealed away behind the machinery of a new war.

In March of 1980, we departed with considerable relief, making our way home via Hong Kong. On our first night back in Sydney, we sat at Watsons Bay as the evening light softened over the harbour, a feast of seafood spread before us. The sky was clean and blue and startlingly clear. The streets were quiet and free of the particular odours that had become so familiar.

We enjoyed our food, looked out at the water, and we felt the relief of having come through it all. 

Finally, we were home.

AI generated by NotebookLM

This post first appeared on earlieryears.blogspot.com by CRGalvin

The eXtras

Living in Kashmir: A Year of People, Places and Memories

eXtra memories 

These are the memories that slipped between the pages: the small absurdities, the daily disciplines, the moments that made expatriate life what it truly was for me, not merely an adventure, but a lived-in,  complicated existence. A few samples of previously undocumented memories.

1. The only advertisement on Pakistani television at the time and it was repeated over and over “Polka ice cream stick: a tasty pick” I can still hear that voice. That jingle has proved entirely impossible to dislodge from memory.

2. The Indian alternative to Coca-Cola had us amused the first time we saw the bottle -ThumsUp, It was not a spelling mistake but a well-respected brand.

3. The need to remember to keep one’s mouth closed in the shower and not to use any unboiled water for cleaning one’s teeth. Daily habits that had to be rigorously remembered.

4. The scoreboard we kept in the kitchen of the number of rats captured in winter. I once threw a plastic bowl over one running across the floor – it died of fright!

5. The “Bad-Taste” Party where we dressed in ridiculous outfits and fed our international friends Vegemite on chapatis.
 
6. The night we had a variety of local guests, I had catered for Muslim and Hindu tastes and preferences and labelled the food appropriately. Catering across cultures, however, demanded a rather more earnest attention to detail. I was unaware one person was vegan and when asked by her husband what she could eat, all I could suggest was the boiled cauliflower and plain white rice.

7. The visit to the Buddhist Temple of the Tooth in Kandy, Sri Lanka when on a break. The beach in Galle, the train ride along the coast, the friendly people, the good food. A fond memory of a short break there with Australian friends.

Caught on film

Gone fishing, or was he just getting his feet wet?

Fishing in a fabled trout stream near Pahalgam

Finnish Friends were always ready to share food and drinks

Some summer cheer with I.H and P.H

Then at last, in March 1980 there was a farewell at the PX in Rawalpindi. The excitement that we were going home.

This post first appeared on earlieryears.blogspot.com by CRGalvin

Wintering Over

Living in Kashmir: A Year of People, Places and Memories

Winter in Srinagar

Winter in Srinagar that year was remembered for its sharp cold and deep snow, when the city and surrounding valley slowed under freezing nights through the long, hard stretch of those months. Power came and went without ceremony, and frozen pipes were a persistent, cheerless companion to the season.

We lived in Inglenook the UN HQ house in Srinagar through the winter months while the headquarters of UNMOGIP migrated south to Rawalpindi for the winter, as it did each year. The absence of colleagues left a quiet gap, yet there was consolation: my husband was no longer pulled away to distant field stations, and was simply home.

 
The weather was cold and bleak most of the time but there were days when the skies were clear, the mountain air sharp. Tourists had largely deserted the valley. But one steadfast figure remained: an elderly English gentleman who had been living in Srinagar since the days of the Raj. Stanley was a living thread back to another era, and we were glad of his company over shared meals. We listened as he remembered his younger days in a city that had changed beyond all recognition and yet, in certain lights, had not changed at all.

Winter view - Looking outward over the wall of the UN compound

Guards keeping watch when disturbance threatened

The Kashmiri people had their own answer to the cold. Beneath their pherans, the long, loose woollen cloaks that fell to the knee, they carried a kangri (1): an earthenware pot cradled in a wicker basket, glowing within with embers and charcoal. It was a personal hearth, carried close to the body through the long cold hours. These three chaps on the side of the road are crouched over their kangris.

Keeping warm by the roadside

Winter wanderings in the bazaar

Bazaars were treasure houses in their own right. Merchants displayed trays of precious and semi-precious stones that caught what light there was and gave it back in colours far too vivid for such a grey season. We filled many of our quieter hours wandering those stalls, turning stones over in our fingers, learning their names and their characters.

Roshangar was the respected silver merchant. Many had bought traditional silver tea and coffee pot sets from him, we were drawn instead to jewellery. Silver was the natural setting for stones, and one could browse unhurriedly, then choose or commission exactly the piece one wished made.

I came home with three matching sets of bracelet, ring and earrings: garnets, amethysts, and moonstones, each mounted in silver. I also acquired a silver bangle which is a favourite I continue to wear. We also collected gemstones in various shapes, colours and sizes: a small, glittering archive of those bazaar afternoons, of colour and quiet pleasure.

A Game for fair Weather

On milder days I made my way to the golf club, where Gulam was a most agreeable coach and caddy. His charges were modest, his patience considerable, and over those hours I developed a modest competence with a club. One afternoon the sleet began to fall in earnest so I gathered my things and headed back to the warmth of Inglenook. It was definitely not a day to stay out on the course.

In the middle of those winter months came a welcome interlude: our trip to Delhi for the Republic Day Parade, which offered a breath of warmer air and the particular thrill of ceremony and colour after weeks of grey cold.

Spring came slowly to the valley, tentative at first, then more confident, the skies brightening by degrees. With it came the knowledge that our return to Australia was drawing near. We would not miss the cold, but take with us the memories made, and Stanley’s stories of a Srinagar long past.

It was time to plan our homeward journey.

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1. Kangri the dilemma of the Kashmiri portable heater: https://garlandmag.com/article/kangri-the-dilemma-of-the-kashmiri-portable-heater/

This post first appeared on earlieryears.blogspot.com by CRGalvin