For a while I thought I was mistaken for a spy suspect, but apparently most overlanders, whether traveling with motorcycle, car or bicycle, experience that the Pakistani police are on to them like mosquitoes on a tent vacation in Finnmark. It is called “governmental instructions”. Some Europeans even throw stones at them to make them go away. That method would violate with my upbringing, so I decided to sneak out of the Multan hotel and disappear in the morning smog. It worked for about 120km until they realized I was gone and caught up with me. From there no less than 10 vehicles and 35 officers were involved in escorting me to the door in Lahore.For a while I thought I was mistaken for a spy suspect, but apparently most overlanders, whether traveling with motorcycle, car or bicycle, experience that the Pakistani police are on to them like mosquitoes on a tent vacation in Finnmark. It is called “governmental instructions”. Some Europeans even throw stones at them to make them go away. That method would violate with my upbringing, so I decided to sneak out of the Multan hotel and disappear in the morning smog. It worked for about 120km until they realized I was gone and caught up with me. From there no less than 10 vehicles and 35 officers were involved in escorting me to the door in Lahore.
That’s right, the news just broke that there is a sale at IKEA

The smog in Lahore was so immense that I could put away my sunglasses an hour earlier before sundown. The vision was no further than 500 meters. The exhaust was just too much for the afternoon sunrays to penetrate, and for three days it was unbearable to go out. Windows and doors were shut as if Lahore was struck by a nuclear disaster. However, there were several pleasant things to do inside the hostel. Sleeping became my favorite. But when the worst had blown over to India, it was time to explore. Ah, Kentucky Fried Chicken!!! Finally something else than stew and bread. A nearby grocery store sold Nestle Choco Pops, and Internet was fast enough for entering the inbox within the hour. It seemed like the level of western welfare was beyond the rock bottom and on an upswing. Particularly notable was the many guests in the hostel that hesitated to move on. Christmas Eve was around the corner. It was a strange vista, those hardcore world travelers clinging on to a hastily constructed family of western faces, anxious of being alone on such a night.

Lasse from Denmark was happy to find McDonalds a few blocks away

The Christmas foreplay was a so-called soufi night, which is a gang of Pakistani drummers playing the same rhythm for five hours while smoking a lot of dope. It was an OK gig, but not when they returned the next day to do it all over again. In search of a more traditional Christmas feel we went over to a five star hotel, looking for a buffet. They did not have any, but they did have a Christmas tree in the reception and Japanese restaurant two floors up. In the hotel hallways I found a Pakistani Santa Claus and bribed him handsomely to ho-ho my new made sushi associates. Then we returned to the hostel where the drummers were stone and we gulped some black market whiskey on the rooftop till our eyelids became heavy and it was time to give in.

Christmas Eve at the hostel. To the right: Paal from Oslo is not the kind of guy you see on a charter plane to Mallorca

I left the next morning, and I met my last Pakistani mosquito at the border to India. He quickly took the Carnet, wrote down the details in a flash, and did his routine so fast that it was suspicious. Just one more thing, he added, and guided me to another room and closed the door. Nobody else was there, just him and me. “How much money do you carry?” An alarm rang in the back of my head. “Sixty Rupees”, I answered, which was not the complete truth. “Only sixty Rupees? No Dollars? No Euros?” I shook my head. He insisted on seeing my Rupees, and I showed him. Then he took them and put them in his pocket. “You don’t need them anymore”, he said and left the room. I was free to leave the country.