I'm feeling really paranoid at the moment because today I just realized that the Pakistani intelligence
agency is watching me. I kind of knew it from the first second I stepped into Pakistan. It all started happening when I
crossed the border.
So I crossed the border on foot from Amritsar in India, and that was the first problem. I get to the Pakistani side of
customs and immigration. And so they asked me where I was going. So I told them Lahore, Islamabad and
Peshawar. And as soon as I said Peshawar, the guy's face lights up.
And, you know, it was like a warning sign had gone off in his head.
And he immediately wanted to know why I was going to Peshawar
and who I knew there.
So I gave him my friend's details and everything and that was that, but I knew there was something wrong. And
that was probably my second mistake, after crossing the border on foot, is going to Peshawar. Peshawar is known as an extremely
volatile area. An area where there are problems with the Taliban and terrorism. It's also on the
Afghan border.
That's another problem because the Americans have their bases along the Afghan side of the border. It's that base on the border
which they used to...
assassinate Osama bin Laden in Pakistan (Abbottabad).
I don't know what they were thinking I was doing if I was
gathering intelligence or something and that's what I'm guessing they were thinking: that I was a spy or something.
You know, why would anyone go to this part of Pakistan? Especially where the Americans are just on the other side of the border and
it's a, it's a known terrorist hotspot.
So,
you know, that was ringing alarm bells in their heads.
The reason I was going there was because I have a friend there.
I was going to Lahore and Islamabad which are the more liberal cities. Well, they are known as the more liberal cities in
Pakistan. And so I wanted to go to Peshawar where it's known as the far less liberal and more orthodox.
I wanted to see those two sides of
Pakistan. So as soon as I passed through immigration on the Pakistan side of the border and went to my hotel in Lahore,
my friend told me that someone had called his phone
and was asking questions about me and what I was doing in Pakistan. So they were asking questions like, "Why is he going to Peshawar?"
"Who are you?"
"How do you know him?"
They were really interested in me going in Peshawar. That didn't freak me out.
I was like, yeah
they're just checking to make sure I'm going to be safe in Peshawar when I go there because
there have been terrorist attacks there and foreigners have gone missing near there, so you know that was fine.
And I didn't think anything else of it. At that point, I didn't really think I was under surveillance. Although,
I think my friend kind of knew straight away that anything, any phone calls he was making, anything he was doing
was gonna be under surveillance. And I enjoyed Lahore. I loved Lahore and
then I went to my friend's house in Peshawar.
We made it to Peshawar. And we didn't even go out and see the city, actually.
Maybe he was a bit paranoid about taking me around after he'd had a call from, you know, the Secret Service.
So, um, we didn't do anything there.
We decided to have a nice meal at this house and stayed the night.
And then we went, we left straight to Islamabad and to a beautiful hill station called Murree. After Murree when we went back to
Islamabad is where it got weird and where I started to get paranoid because
we were just standing on the street waiting for a friend and he got another call
from an unknown number and the government agency who wouldn't say who they were. When they're not telling you an agency
it is, there's only one agency they're from - and that's the Intelligence Agency. And they wanted to know more about me.
They wanted to know, you know. "What did you guys do in Peshawar?" "Are you still with him now?"
"Where did he stay in Peshawar?" "Did he leave, did he go anywhere else?"
"Did you show him around Peshawar?" These kind of questions. That interest, and that callback, and that follow-up
was really strange. And the fact that they wanted to meet him for an interview when he got back to
Peshawar about me. That started making me paranoid, like, why are they so interested in what I'm doing there?
One other thing they told him not to do with me when I'm in Peshawar, is they told him don't take him to the
gun market, don't take him up Khyber Pass. So in Khyber pass is
this amazing gun market where you can find all these
rocket launchers, AK-47s, machine guns, everything. You know, you can't travel there, you can't go there. And I'm pretty sure that stuff was there for my safety, but
still just makes you a bit paranoid.
You know, I wasn't going to go there anyway because I already knew that you shouldn't go up, up Khyber pass,
around the Afghan border. It's just not safe for foreigners.
There's that possibility that because these big guys are looking into you and following you, that something could happen to you.
You know, it's just not nice being surveilled. It's not nice being followed around. It's just not nice being watched, you know.
It's, it's a really creepy weird feeling and it doesn't make you feel safe.
It makes me feel the opposite of safe in this country, and it makes me want to get out. So at the moment
I'm just gonna find, the kind of fastest way out of here because
you know, I don't want to be in a place, which is, which has me under surveillance,
you know. Even if it is for my own protection too because you know they could call me,
they could tell my friend where they're from, they could, they could make it clear what they want.
Rather than not saying where they're from and just giving these
strange phone calls asking questions about me.
Just makes me feel like, they're not, maybe they're not actually
concerned about my safety and they're more concerned that I'm a spy or something crazy like that. But you know what? They'll never catch me.
They're out there,
watching.
You know I don't believe that
they're just following me for my safety. They're checking and making sure that I'm not who I say I'm not and
That's just, it's a weird feeling. The security is really tight around here, which is, you know, it makes you feel safe.
But when you're the object of that security it kind of
freaks you out a bit.
So here I am again at Wagah border where my trip started.
And it's a shame my trip in Pakistan's ending this way.
You know, it would have been nice to stay here a few more days, explore
Islamabad more and maybe even go up into the mountains a bit more but when your
privacy is threatened and when you don't feel safe somewhere, it just makes you want to leave. So you
know, I'm going somewhere where I will feel safe, and it's India. I guess it should be clear
it's not the people that make me worried here. It's the government. It's the Secret Service. It's
you know, these kind of organizations that are looking into me
which make me worried about being in a country like this. The people in Pakistan are amazing.
Their hospitality is great, and you know, it's just like India when it comes to hospitality.
It's not the people, it's
you know, the Government. You can check out my blog. I've just posted an article about 'Is it safe to travel
in Pakistan?' And where's it safe to travel in Pakistan. If you're worried, check that out.