Beauty and the beast nature

by Aroosa Manzoor (Pakistan)

I didn't expect to find Pakistan

I belong to a society where girls are hardly allowed to travel alone to other cities or countries alone or they are not much supported by their families. But in my family I can make excuses to go places. I am very fond of traveling but I can't afford the expenses. I have spent a lot of my time thinking about myself lost in a country other than mine. My travel to the northern areas of Pakistan was the most exciting travel. Me and my partner(my Boss) had a thing in common which is fondness of travelling to places. He had been to many countries unlike me. Well both of us planned to go to Hunza- khunjerab pass that is also known as Pak China border in September. My country without any doubt is very naturally beautiful. We decided to have our first stay in naran. We started our journey from Islamabad the capital of Pakistan. The reason why I set the beauty and the beast title is because of a lake which flows in between the mountains, the dry mountains of naran. I didn't expect that it would be so beautiful which such a fresh color. The lake was as beautiful as a fairy stuck in dry rocks. The way to lake was so bumpy it was only to be traveled in jeep and that is why we called it bumpy ride. The driver was so experienced of bumpy rocks that he didn't even wanted to hold anything and we were holding some handles of jeep so tight but still it was very funny to see each other jumping on the seats of jeep. The lake was worth travelling in such a vehicle on rocks. When we reached there I was asked if I want to have a boating ride. I couldn't refuse to be in the middle of such a beautiful lake. Feeling and touching blue green lake. I like touching colorful waters wherever I go. The boat driver wanted to take our picture. We allowed them but the poses he made was funny that I couldn't control my laughter and he thought that I am too happy to reach here. I was happy actually. Some old people who used to live close to that lake say that at night some fairies come down to meet the lake. We rode the boat and the driver told us some more stories about the lake. We were wearing warm jackets but the people who work there were wearing only one sweater. They have so much got used to the weather that they don't feel much cold. Well I feel cold alot and have endless love for my heater. We ate some local snacks there too which caused some problems in my tummy. Very hard to explain that. We were tired and we wanted to take some rest after we came back. The most important thing was setting a limit to every activity we did. Girls mostly take more time than men to get ready even for going to markets. My boss set time for everything and he gave deadlines to me for each thing I had to do like getting ready in 10 minutes, see you in exactly 10 minutes and i followed him happily. In fact I had to follow. After coming back we decided to sleep after all it was a 9 hours drive. We went to sleep. During my sleep I felt like someone is shouting saying please get up and come out and my bed started vibrating. One more reason I called the mountains beast was due to Earthquakes earthquakes z are very common in that place. I got up grabbed my jacket and rushed towards the door wth heavy breathe. The funny thing was the way I got up and started running my boss thought that if he was in sleep and just he felt the earthquake, I was also having my eyes semi opened at that time went back to sleep. We cleared it after so many days and in this span I kept on thinking that the earthquake stopped that is why he asked me to go back and he thought that he was in deep sleep.