Visiting the sites!

You see people like this all over. Five family members on one motorcycle. Mom is turned sideways and holding a baby!

Hard to believe I left home a week ago today. I've had a busy week!!  Met with my students yesterday and they are a sweet, smart and funny group. They are like students everywhere-stressing over grades and work assignments.  This summer's courses overlap, so while they are taking my class (TH-S), they are also taking a studio and psychology class (M-W). They are a little overwhelmed by it all, but everyone is making adjustments to make this first semester work. About half of them are from out of town so they are staying in the school hostel.

Me and two of my students.  Every time we pull a camera out, everyone comes running and yells I want in too!

We had class at the BNU City Campus in the computer lab and had some  technical troubles (call me surprised-our IT director at MCA, Gordon, says I am cursed and I believe him!)  We didn't get everything sorted out but we will next time we meet.

Saku, my assistant.  She is from Sri Lanka and a whiz at everything.

 

 

Lunch on campus!

After lunch, Yusef (the temporary driver) brought me back to the guest house, waited while I did some work and then took me to Salima's house.  From there we went out to dinner at a really nice Chinese Restaurant in a hotel.  I didn't get back until about 11pm and thought I would sleep, but of course that didn't happen.  Two movies later, I finally conked out and slept in Sunday morning.

Chinese Dinner with the Hashmi's at Avari Hotel

Sunday (the 10th), I went over to Maryam Aslam's house and had lunch with her family-Daughter Kulsoom, son-in-law Jhaved and their 3 children (all high school or college age). I had asked Saffir (their driver to stop and help me get some flowers and he bought two beautiful bouquets-one for Maryam and one for her daughter, Kulsoom). They both cost a whopping 600 rupees which is about $6US. You can get an idea from the photo how big they were-huge and wrapped in netting.
 

Bouquet for Maryam

Pakistani hospitality is legendary and the lunch was wonderful. Chicken Biryani, Lamb Chops, cauliflower cooked in a way I had never had, and some wonderful lentil patties in a sort of cream/curd sauce. We decided it was too hot to go to the Shalimar Gardens, so instead we took a tour of their lovely yard and then left for the Lahore Museum.

Pomegranate and Grapefruit Tress Growing in the front yard. They had several fruit and flowering trees.

Lahore Museum was built during the 1890's by the British and in the street in front sits the ZamZama Cannon (Also known as Kim's Cannon from Rudyard Kipling's book Kim. The story starts with Kim sitting on the cannon making fun of soldiers). The cannon was made of bronze in the 1750s and is about 14 ft. long.

ZamZama!

The museum is big (not air conditioned) and had a really nice collection of Mughal and Indian art (It is famous for the Fasting Buddha).  Maryam had done a lot of research on this piece and said it really is the centerpiece of the museum.  I was wearing traditional clothes, wrapped a scarf over my head and really thought I was fitting in. The guard at the entrance took one look at me and said foreigners had to pay more!  So much for thinking I was blending in. I took a ton of pictures, but here are just a few...

The Lahore Museum.  Rudyard Kipling's father was the director here.

Interior ceiling with mosaic and fretwork.

The Mughals were famous for this type of pottery

Early flip-flops (wooden-Ouch!)

Fasting Buddha-This isn't my image.  The one I took had my reflection in it and looked like my hands were superimposed. 

Tibetan Jewelry

These were small limestone figures and some of my favorites.  Each face was so different and had really unique details.

After we left the museum we went to Gymkhana which is a spiffy country club for tea.  I had been there several times last year and it is very nice.  Since then, I have been working on the blog and glad it saves automatically when the power goes out (which is about every hour and 1/2).  The generator always kicks in about 5-10 minutes later, but I'm glad I don't lose stuff!  More soon...