V for Very Safe in Pakistan
“Don´t worry, sir. You´re safe here. We will protect you!“ the guesthouse owner reassured me.
I had been in the Pakistani mountain regions long enough now to understand that the amount of weapons at display and the number of armed people at that guesthouse was unusual even by Pakistani standards.
I was not afraid, because first of all I intended to become his valued customer, so unlikely to get shot by him and by then I had learned that the mountain people thought it below them to kill an unarmed foreigner, unable to defend himself, they usually just had some quarrels amongst each other.
And once you were their honoured guest, their code dictated, that they would guard you with their life.
As crazy as it sounds, I have always had some kind of romantic infatuation with this kind of hospitality, where your host is willing to die for you.
What a difference to, for example, those shallow American invitations which are never meant to be taken up in the first place.
There were two armed guards on the roof, guards in the surrounding vicinity and when I stepped inside the house, there was a bunch of probably ten guys sitting there having tea, their Kalashnikovs leaning against the walls.
Altogether a commando post of probably twenty heavily armed guys.
I was far away from the Afghan border but still had managed to manoeuvre myself into a war zone.
The owner himself was wearing his Kalashnikov, a pistol and even two hand grenades on his belt.
I had learned before that the locals did not really like grenades, they were gun aficionados, so I thought those grenades were only for show and doubted that they would even work, because obviously nobody in his right mind would walk around with something as fickle as a grenade close to his genitals.
Later I learned that those grenades were meant as a last resort against being taken alive.
No retreat-no surrender at its finest.
Weapons usually have the opposite effect on me, they make me feel unsafe, so I asked the owner.
“What´s going on here? What´s this all about?“
His answer was out of this world, at least the world I came from.
“We have a problem with another family. At the moment we are one ahead, so they will come at us soon trying to even the score.“
I looked at him as if he was crazy, and in my book he was.
“What do you mean, one ahead?“
Now he looked at me if I was crazy.
“We have killed one more of them than they have of us and now they want to avenge their family member.“
After some tea I was shown to my room where later that day I fell into my most heavily guarded sleep ever.
Since this has now become a serious series of even more serious travelling, check out the last part too.
There you will also find a link to the previous parts.
For more inspiring stories and a group of inspiring and supportive people check out
.