By telling us your country of residence we are able to provide you with the most relevant travel insurance information.
Please note that not all content is translated or available to residents of all countries. Contact us for full details.
Shares
This is after I left Italy. Seven days after spending spring driving, riding and sleeping my way through through a land both familiar and foreign. It was also seven days after I waved a shy good bye to my father at the airport in Lahore, trying to look like I was in some new mature phase. He wasn't moved in the early hour, before sunrise. I however had completely fooled myself, I needed some faith in myself to be traveling on my own for the first time. Of course now I wasn't in Lahore, far away from the narrow streets and fading gardens of the walled city. I also wasn't in Italy anymore. I wasn't looking out at the still and chill night from the window. I wasn't trying to not get lost in the crowds that invaded all the historical monuments. This wasn't the mouth of the volcano, and took a rock from. I wasn't gliding my findings through the destroyed walls of Pompeii anymore. Not going to see all of Rome in day, maybe three days. I was rushed through Florence and stuffed my face with olive oil bathed food before slowly letting it out. I thought that this trip that I fought for at seventeen would help me grow. That it would remove the shell, and harden these soft, anxious and wanting hands. Where am I now? I'm looking outside the hotel room in Qatar. The sun and light heat feels like home, and all that I have for this land is a few hours. I decided to stay at the hotel and pack for going back to Pakistan. It's a full circle moment, because in the room around sunset I have been able to neatly pack my luggage. It sounds silly and ordinary, but it feels special. When I was packing my bags in my room, it was a mess and looked like an demented animal had secured the bags. I could've asked for help, but I didn't want my innocence to be visible. I begged for this trip, despite being young and naive and I wasn't going to let any mess I made become a reason to not let me go. This was going to be a journey. And then there I was without any stress, fear and shame, unafraid of what I my father say. Unbothered yet engrossed in my new surroundings, consuming all the spring and summer images. I placed every painting, sock, gift, spare shoe, museum ticket, coin, torn scarf, bar of chocolate and carnival mask tightly and securely and stood up. This would be the last time I would look outside a hotel window and down onto the streets. At least until the next guilt trip. The sun had a few hours still it would fall behind the tall buildings of the desert and I had a few hours before I would be home and in my own room. And it was packing the remains of my journey, that I found something that I didn't expect to find. In leaving my home, walking through a foreign land and now waiting in an ancient land , I found the end result to having trusted myself. I found closure...despite the failure and shame. I found the image of beauty. I realized that spring was over and I was in blossom.