(Isn't that what they say?)
Hey! Guess where I was in October? PAKISTAN!
Months ago, I started talking to Mian (my Pakistani-born husband) about wanting to visit Pakistan this year. It had been three years since our last trip in 2009. We'd planned to go in December 2010 but towards the end of last year my husband felt that Karachi's security situation was bad enough for us to abandon any travel plans there. This year, I really felt like we just needed to go.
I had a lot of reasons for that. First, traveling with kids is hard and in 2013, it's about to get a lot harder for us. Traveling before the end of 2012 was an ideal situation. We could not go in 2013 so skipping a trip in 2012 would mean that we wouldn't get back to Karachi until 2014 - meaning up to five years since our last trip. Second, I've always heard the language-learning window is around age four. Our kid is six. But I still think it's helpful to cram as much language in their little heads as possible as young as possible. Even with 3-4 full-time adult Urdu speakers in our house, my son's Urdu comprehension was still kind of spotty and he often produced English answers. Not a failure by any means but not anywhere near where I'd hoped he would be. I felt like even a few weeks at this age would be very beneficial for his language development. Third, we, thank God, had the resources available to go at this point. Not something we can always count on. Lastly, the kid is in Kindergarten and that's about the last year we can expect his school teachers to look the other way while we pull him out of school for a frowned-upon school year recreational trip. (Traveling over the December holidays wasn't an option for us.)
My husband, though, was being difficult about the whole situation and it ended up me kind of pushing him into thinking about the trip. He's kind of old-man like that sometimes. He just wants to stay in his garage and leaving the house for anything can be a struggle, be it a trip to a dinner at a friend's house or a trip to his childhood home. One of his issues was that our proposed trip was incredibly short - only two weeks. He also wasn't entirely convinced the security situation was much better. We went back and forth about it for a long time but eventually I got him on board. Partly he got on board through istikhara but mostly he changed his mind when I found really crazyily extra-cheap tickets. Like, "double-take" cheap. Like, "no one I know has ever traveled to Pakistan for under a thousand dollars" cheap. Like, "buy them right now in case it's an internet glitch" cheap. When I told him I had three round-trip tickets on Turkish airlines for a trip in October that coincided with his brother's trip (the bro that lives in Saudi Arabia who we really wanted to visit with him and his family) for only $925/person, he suddenly changed his mind.
But, then another small glitch. M is a US citizen now. He can't travel to Pakistan without a visa, a NICOP or a POC, and he had none of those. We couldn't figure out the NICOP/POC things, so we thought a visa would be the best choice. By the time I found those tickets, we had less that 5 weeks before departure and the Pakistani embassy in DC said the time for a visa would take 4-6 weeks. Uh-oh. We quickly prepared and sent of a visa application, not knowing if it would be rejected because he was instead supposed to be applying for one of the other things. (On one site it said that one of them is required for expat Pakistanis - still not sure about those things...)
Another glitch - kid's passports are only good for five years and though we hadn't realized it until checking on his visa validity, our kid's passport had expired! So we had to prepare and send off a rush application for a new passport for him. Assuming that got back in time (which seemed likely), and my husband's Pakistani visit visa was approved and returned in time (which was at the very least possible) we would be going to Pakistan.
(Let's just pause here to realize that neither my son or my husband had the travel documents ready to travel to Pakistan. Not the Pakistani-born one, not the Pakistani-heritage one. But me? 100% caucasian American no-Pakistani-affiliation-except-tangential had a valid visa and passport and could go there at the drop of a hat.)
When ticket shopping, we saw that the cheap option flew through Istanbul. M suddenly got the idea that wanted to visit Istanbul. "What's the difference between visiting family for 14 days and visiting them for 11 days," he said, "especially if it means you get to see Istanbul?"
So somehow, someway, everything worked out. We got the visa with two weeks to spare, the passport as well. (Turkish visas can be obtained by US citizens upon arrival in Istanbul.) We spent 3.5 days in Istanbul and 11 days in Pakistan. Our kid's first non-Pakistan international travel, my fourth trip to Pakistan, and the kid's third.
Details to come.
Hey! Guess where I was in October? PAKISTAN!
Months ago, I started talking to Mian (my Pakistani-born husband) about wanting to visit Pakistan this year. It had been three years since our last trip in 2009. We'd planned to go in December 2010 but towards the end of last year my husband felt that Karachi's security situation was bad enough for us to abandon any travel plans there. This year, I really felt like we just needed to go.
I had a lot of reasons for that. First, traveling with kids is hard and in 2013, it's about to get a lot harder for us. Traveling before the end of 2012 was an ideal situation. We could not go in 2013 so skipping a trip in 2012 would mean that we wouldn't get back to Karachi until 2014 - meaning up to five years since our last trip. Second, I've always heard the language-learning window is around age four. Our kid is six. But I still think it's helpful to cram as much language in their little heads as possible as young as possible. Even with 3-4 full-time adult Urdu speakers in our house, my son's Urdu comprehension was still kind of spotty and he often produced English answers. Not a failure by any means but not anywhere near where I'd hoped he would be. I felt like even a few weeks at this age would be very beneficial for his language development. Third, we, thank God, had the resources available to go at this point. Not something we can always count on. Lastly, the kid is in Kindergarten and that's about the last year we can expect his school teachers to look the other way while we pull him out of school for a frowned-upon school year recreational trip. (Traveling over the December holidays wasn't an option for us.)
My husband, though, was being difficult about the whole situation and it ended up me kind of pushing him into thinking about the trip. He's kind of old-man like that sometimes. He just wants to stay in his garage and leaving the house for anything can be a struggle, be it a trip to a dinner at a friend's house or a trip to his childhood home. One of his issues was that our proposed trip was incredibly short - only two weeks. He also wasn't entirely convinced the security situation was much better. We went back and forth about it for a long time but eventually I got him on board. Partly he got on board through istikhara but mostly he changed his mind when I found really crazyily extra-cheap tickets. Like, "double-take" cheap. Like, "no one I know has ever traveled to Pakistan for under a thousand dollars" cheap. Like, "buy them right now in case it's an internet glitch" cheap. When I told him I had three round-trip tickets on Turkish airlines for a trip in October that coincided with his brother's trip (the bro that lives in Saudi Arabia who we really wanted to visit with him and his family) for only $925/person, he suddenly changed his mind.
But, then another small glitch. M is a US citizen now. He can't travel to Pakistan without a visa, a NICOP or a POC, and he had none of those. We couldn't figure out the NICOP/POC things, so we thought a visa would be the best choice. By the time I found those tickets, we had less that 5 weeks before departure and the Pakistani embassy in DC said the time for a visa would take 4-6 weeks. Uh-oh. We quickly prepared and sent of a visa application, not knowing if it would be rejected because he was instead supposed to be applying for one of the other things. (On one site it said that one of them is required for expat Pakistanis - still not sure about those things...)
Another glitch - kid's passports are only good for five years and though we hadn't realized it until checking on his visa validity, our kid's passport had expired! So we had to prepare and send off a rush application for a new passport for him. Assuming that got back in time (which seemed likely), and my husband's Pakistani visit visa was approved and returned in time (which was at the very least possible) we would be going to Pakistan.
(Let's just pause here to realize that neither my son or my husband had the travel documents ready to travel to Pakistan. Not the Pakistani-born one, not the Pakistani-heritage one. But me? 100% caucasian American no-Pakistani-affiliation-except-tangential had a valid visa and passport and could go there at the drop of a hat.)
When ticket shopping, we saw that the cheap option flew through Istanbul. M suddenly got the idea that wanted to visit Istanbul. "What's the difference between visiting family for 14 days and visiting them for 11 days," he said, "especially if it means you get to see Istanbul?"
So somehow, someway, everything worked out. We got the visa with two weeks to spare, the passport as well. (Turkish visas can be obtained by US citizens upon arrival in Istanbul.) We spent 3.5 days in Istanbul and 11 days in Pakistan. Our kid's first non-Pakistan international travel, my fourth trip to Pakistan, and the kid's third.
Details to come.
 |
| The kid spots and points to a Pakistani flag right smack dab in the middle of all the Turkish flags on display in Istanbul's grand bazaar. |
13 comments:
Glad your back! I missed you Gori wife! Did you get to use your newly acquired urdu skills in the motherland?
Can you please email me at michey1166@yahoo.com ??? I am getting married to a Pakistani man from Karachi. I am 18 and white female American. Please, please email me. I've.emailed you, but you never replied. It would be so amazing to just hear from you and ways to help me learn Urdu or some other things you've had to deal with that you can help me.with. Please.
...congratulations ;)
Its my elementary things to transmit on this forum,merely wannat recompense for some friends here.if its not allowed to advise on this panel,will delete this thread.Nice to find you!
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:) glad to be reading you again hun :D I forgot US citizens cant have dual nationality.. that sucks!! insha'Allah hubby will be applying for a UK passport and this lil thing growing inside me is gonna have 3 passports ;) Canadian, UK and Pakistani and yes... its worth keeping all three!! ;) Hubby also wants to visit Turkey.. wonder what it is about the place
oh and why is it about to get harder in 2013 for you to travel?? huh huh?? ;)
I would think it would be easier to travel now that your M is a citizen. Would he not have 2 passports? In our family, the baby has the easiest time traveling because he has 2. He left the US on the US passport, and entered UAE on it(US citizens get 30 days visa on arrival), then left UAE with the US passport and entered PK with a PK passport. I got into the UAE easily, but had to get a visa to get in to PK at the PK embassy there.
I have been in PK so long now, that I am almost eligible to get a passport ;-) I am seriously trying to get the DH to consider it as the trips to Saddar to renew my visa are a pain in the butt.
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Love your blog, so much fun to read and relatable :)
Great to see you back in Blogland! You have some junk comments as well as real ones!
I really enjoy reading your blog. Im a gori and have been married to my desi husband for three years. We have a newborn half desi son...maybe more to come inshallah. I had no idea that there were other people out there like me...glad I stumbled upon this blog.
Aoa
Amc87
Assalamu Aleikom
I just decided to come here after not being here for quite some time and I can't believe you were there in October--I was too!!! That would have been awesome if I could have contacted you(I really could have used some pointers lol and a fellow American )
I need to reply to your email--I'm still in KL by the way but home for a couple of weeks. I leave to go back on the 20th.
Anyway, I am happy to be back here and to read your blogs again. I really need to find the time to check out all the blogs I used to read. It helps and reminds me of the things I've learned. His family is coming to visit us in April over there and this is only the second time but I will be on home territory and I am hoping it turns out better.
Hope you and your family are doing well. InshaAllah
Shelly
I am going to Pak soon, can you tell me where you found the inexpensive tickets? I am so happy I found your blog!
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