My Travel Adventures

After eating breakfast close to our hotel, we walked down to the Namba Yasaka Shinto Shrine, a place of worship dedicated to the spirit of the sea and storms, Susanoo. The shrine is famous for a building shaped as a giant lion’s head which holds, in its open jaws, a stage where locals perform rituals memorialising Susanoo’s story. We spent only a few moments at the shrine before walking onwards to Shitenno-ji. We passed by a number of other temples on the way but only entered one that we saw from afar and thought very picturesque for having a blossoming sakura right in front of its entrance gate. There was nothing very notable about the interior (and the bathroom both Ciaran and I wanted to use was closed) except for a stone statue of the cartoon character Doraemon. He had apparently been elevated to the ranks of a venerated spirit. 

My plane arrived in Tokyo on Monday evening some forty minutes earlier than scheduled, which came as a big relief to me because I was afraid the airport shops would all start closing at eleven. I managed to exchange some money and buy a public transport pass. I also bought a SIM card, during which process I realised that I had lost my UK SIM card somewhere in Pakistan and spent much of the train ride from the airport trying to figure out how to block it. While unpacking my bags at the hotel, I also realised that I had lost my adapter. I must have left it in a plug at the airport in Kuala Lumpur.

Originally, my travels this spring were to last only two weeks. After my adventure in Pakistan, I was planning to return either home or to university and focus on my studies. However, I put my studies on hold when I found out my friends Brent and Joel would be travelling to Japan on their yearlong journey around the world, and another friend, Kevin, would overlap with them for his honeymoon. This constellation of events had already convinced our mutual friend Ciaran to plan his own trip to Japan during his few months of ‘funemployment,’ and my fear of missing out grew too great to bury in books.

I counted my cash yesterday evening, so I knew that I was going to begin my last day in Pakistan with 5400 rupees – roughly twenty dollars. I thus judged it would be prudent to pay my final settlement for my laundry and hotel dinners by card, since I still wanted to make two stops before going to the airport. I also made the last-minute decision not to leave my bags at the hotel but to take everything with me. This was not because I thought I wouldn’t be able to afford the trip back (which I wasn’t), but because I greatly overestimated the time I would spend at each attraction.     

I dedicated my penultimate day in Pakistan to exploring Karachi. By sheer coincidence, it was the anniversary of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto – the fourth President and ninth Prime Minister of Pakistan, as well as the founder of the Bhutto dynasty – and Google Maps suggested that the opening times of various places might differ from usual hours. I could not find any concrete information on the internet except that the Province of Sindh (Bhutto’s home province) had declared the day a national holiday and would close “all government offices, autonomous bodies, semi-autonomous bodies, corporations, and local councils.” Hardly knowing what to imagine under the terms “autonomous and semi-autonomous bodies,” I decided to simply go about my day as I had intended.

I was glad I had decided to wait until today to visit Thatta, as it was beautifully sunny all day and the roads were mostly passable again after yesterday’s downpour. Still, we had some trouble finding our way to the Chaukhandi Tombs on the outskirts of Karachi. All the paths leading to them from the N5 were dirt, and we had to drive back against the traffic searching for a passage without too many puddles. Once again, I had asked my hotel to help me find a driver with a car for the day. I was glad of his punctuality – a delay of ten minutes does not even feel worth mentioning anymore – and for what it’s worth, I think he enjoyed the trip as well. He had never been to several of the places on my list and was avidly taking pictures everywhere we went.

On this trip I have mostly been waking up before my alarm, but today only a faint light trickled in through the curtains. I had arranged to continue with my driver who drove me from Sukkur yesterday, as he had shown himself to be very dependable, and in any case my hotel in Hyderabad was not able to arrange another one. Being in the tourist industry, he also knew that he was entitled to accommodation at my hotel, so I did not need to worry about where he would sleep. My choice was vindicated very quickly. Knowing the security protocol, my driver proactively contacted the police, and although they were slow to arrive, I am sure the whole affair would have taken much longer had I tried to do this upon checkout.