Punjab: The Land of Five Rivers

Re: # 26

The following picture is another gem of this area, the Gurdwara Punja sahib in Hasan abdal. This portrait is of an incident that happened in 1920s when British prevented Sikhs from cutting the wood in the area and they protested by lying down on the railway tracks. The area has not changed much despite explosive construction, most of it still remains below the treeline.



If you look closely on the very top of the mountain there is a building which is the Mousoleum of Baba Wali Qadhari. Legend has it that there was a querrel beween Baba Wali Qandhari and Guru Nanak on the water rights in the area. The querrel reached to a point when Baba Wali threw a rock the size of a buick to crush Guru sahib from the top of that mountain. Guru sahib fielded the rock with his bare hands and stopped it from rolling down. The very point where this rock was stopped a water spring emerged which runs to this day. The imprint of Gurus hand can be seen on the rock to this day.

This picture is in fact a mirror image, meaning what is on right is in reality on the left. It doesn`t show but this is quite a steep mountain, which me and my friend used to climb quite often. It is no ordinary climb; it is a three hour back breaking climbing. Me and my friends usually used to climb the mountain during the sikh pilgrimage time with water bottles and cups and used to offer water to the huffed and puffed sikhs climibing up or down the mountain; but the actual reason was to socialize with sikhs and their families especially the sikhnis. It was my parents who always told me that the sikhnis were some of the prettiest girls ever. But I am sorry to say, and I do not want to offend anyone, most of the sikhnis I met on the mountain were malnutritioned and bloodless; which I found quite shocking - the myth created in my mind by my parents was tarnished.

#27 pindi girls today are mere brats compared to the heavenly things of the 1960`s!!

Re: # 27

Sometimes I really miss my daur-e-jahiliyat :)

#25 - Indeed. I have spent hours thinking over the reasons for why Pindi girls are the most beautiful in Pakistan. I came to this conclusion that Pindi is the melting pot of punjabis, kashmiris and pathans. And hence the phenomena of seeing heart-stoppingly beautiful girls coming out of those old and shabby houses in the interior of Pindi.

Regardless of the reason, on many of my visits to Pakistan I find myself roaming Moti bazaar where girls come with their mothers for shopping.

Urstruly#21:

Ah, those oranges! Yes, I had a bagful of them on my way from Taxila to Sirkup and Jaulian (a corruption, no doubt of Ja-walian because of a large number of walis in that area, Punja Saheb is supposed to be a place where Guru Nanak encountered one of those walis).

You are unduly harsh on those poor people trying to sustain an ancient art and craft of making statues and idols. Yes, they should be trained, but to improve the quality of their products, not to extinguish their virsa.

BTW, I was offered fantastic deals on ``genuine`` excavated idols.

Re: # 23

Excellent observation, I can attest to that. As a matter of fact, the whole Potohar region is bestowed with beauty and God`s grace. As a matter of fact as you travel southwest towards Mianwali, passing through Fateh Jang or Talagung etc. every other guy looks more handsome than Tom Sallek and Burt Reynold; I bet women would be prettier than that of Rawalpindi but that is the area where one can only see one eye of the women through chador.

I agree with everything Drlokraj said and also compliment the writer, although it mostly seems to be from a tourism site. I was born in a village near khewra and ketas and, so, have a special place in my heart for these areas.


nazarhayatkhan:

When I visited the Mohenjodaro musesum, a thought came to me that maybe, the Indus Valley Civilization did not vanish but merely morphed/evolved into another phase. The gods may have been precursor of some of the vedic gods, like Shiva and the artifiacts are quite recgnizable as the precursors of those that were used in Punjab until recent times.


zeemax:
uba and lokraj are right. As long as Kashmir is in India, all five rivers of Punjab originate there; in fact so does Sindh in Ladakh. Sutlun, Beas and Ravi, of course, flow through East Punjab as well.

#1 - I sugget the title for Rawalpindi should be be replaced to ``Rawalpindi - Along whose narrow streets live the most beautiful girls in Pakistan`` :)

yeah, i wrote the above sentence with a smile on my face...

If one knows the area and could recognize the landmarks, The Google Earth has some of the most breathtaking views of the Taxila area with incredible clarity.

I think under the headline of Taxila the writer has erroneously mentioned the name Sirsukh City, whereas the correct name is SirKupp named after a Raja who had the title ``Sirkupp`` meaning the headhunter. (headhunter=the guy who cuts off heads and not the guy who gets you a job).

A trip to Taxila espaecially in winter is great because of vast expanse of orange groves surrounding the area. Surprisingly even in winter the flora and fauna is incredible with blooming flowers, scent of fruit from orange groves, slightly mixed with a certain smell from horse droppings from the tongas that still run in the area.

However, as one gets closer to the highway, one sight especially turns my stomach, and that is the sight of sculptorers carving fake buddhist and sometimes hindu statues along the roadside. Accosrding to Pakistan`s most famous archeologist and internationaly recognized anthropogist Dr. Dani (forgot his first name) , these sculptorers are remanants of the Greek army that came along with Alexander. It might be true, since many have curley blonde hair and blue or green eyes. I wish these people are taught some better vocational skills so that they could abandon this vile practice of creating statues.

West Panjab name should be changed to Islamistan or something now that it is more or less pure, and Lahore should be renamed too. Its spropriate to align names with the reality.

by using pin-chuky attached with a network of pipeline land of balochistan can be fertile.but it needs good paper work first.

drlokraj: Instead of cursing the darkness, far better to light a candle.

Given your love and knowledge for important parts of panjabi culture, why not write an article on a specific topic. I agree that this article is too sketchy - but it is still a zillion times better than the article that never got written. So, lets see some action here....light a candle for bulleh shah. or for Puran Bhagat (I dont even know who this is).

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Re: # 3
In Persian also, ``panj`` means five and ``aab`` means water. Sanskrit and Persian belong to the Indo-Aryan group of langauges. Hence the similarity.

no comments on any ones personel capability and calibre.



I think, then the ensuing further discussion within that topic that carries a lot of weight.