Another Year, Another Tear!

October 8th, 2007

Another year has passed.

This is 8th October 2007, exactly 2 years ago, devastation struck my native towns of Kashmir.

I happened to visit Bagh in July 2007 again, for a short period of time. Life seems to be coming to normal a lot. People have become more financially secure, as earth quake, as it opened windows of opportunity for all of them. Many got new jobs, many got aid from govt. Many are still aidless.

But this financial prosperity can not heal the scares of heart that were left that bloody day. Each one still remembers those horrifying moments, when earth shook so hard, it had never had before.

We hope for the people of my town to get back to normal life and start a new Bagh, a Bagh full of happiness and Joy..

Amin

WIth regards,

Bobby Shahzad

Chief Technology Officer

Goldbar Enterprises.

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Land Slides in Earth Quake affected areas

March 25th, 2007

More miseries for Earth Quake victims :(

Last week, there was mud slides in Chokothi (Muzzafarabad) and some areas of Bagh. These land slides killed thousands of people. Since its a hilly area, earth quake has effected the land structure a lot and ever time there is a rain, we see land slides happening in different parts of Azad Kashmir. Previously, these land slides were not as lethal and simply blocked a road, without affecting any population. But this time, population has been hit.

The life of earth quake affected population is difficult and in contant danger of further earth quakes, land slides and other natural disasters, causing more troubles for rehabilitation efforts.

Bobby

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Earthquake Prediction Through Satellite

October 9th, 2006

 

After earthquake struck Pakistan, there have been number of so called Seismologist appearing on media telling people that Earthquake prediction is impossible.

 

We reject that claim!

 

I did some research and found that the more recent research has shown that it that earthquake prediction is getting possible by using Space Technology.

 

Just few days before the earthquake, when plates start to grow pressure, there is a huge change in Electromagnetic field in that area on the earth. A Satellite sensors can sense this change in electromagnetic field, and analyzing this data, scientists can predict if these are early signs of a major earthquake. This has been proven to work for 15 earthquakes in California in last few years, and could be a major discovery towards earthquake prediction.

 

The more information can be found in following articles.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earthquake_prediction

 

http://directory.eoportal.org/info_BetterEarthquakePredictionAstatement.html

 

 

Our government should work on these directions to provide better safety to our people from earthquakes, that can save lives of millions of others in any future earthquake.

 

 

 

  

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A tribute to Martyrs of 8th October

October 7th, 2006

Today is 8th October 2006

 

It’s the First anniversary of the tragic disaster that struck our nation last year

 

Exactly One year ago, at 8:52 AM, our nation suffered the worst disaster of it’s history.

 

More than 75000 people lost their lives, most of them children studying in their schools

 

More than 20,000 were injured or permanently disabled. Millions homeless.

 

October 8th changed most of us from inside, we decided to re think our purpose in life and help those who lost their loved ones and property as well as their jobs and means of making their living.

 

People are still suffering from devastating effects of Earth Quake. None of them have re-established their homes, as funding provided is too little to do so. There have been reports that role of our Government in rehabilitation has been more than poor. There have been reports of corruption and bribery in the distribution of financial aid to victims.

 

However, NGOs have been playing more positive role in the rehabilitation. We see American Chnob Helicopters resumed their operations in the affected area.

 

Its time for us to pay our tribute to the Martyrs of this tragic incident, which include children of 1 day to old people of over 90s. These are men and women who lost their lives, to show a new cause to so many people. These are people who changed to purpose of life of so many others.

 

We pay tribute to them, and pray for them in our own ways.

 

 May their souls rest in peace.

 

AMIN

 

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Visit To Lake Formed Due To Earth Quake

August 11th, 2006

This was my Last day at Bagh!

I decided to spend this for myself along with my family. Today, we decided to go to Sudhan Galli, a hill station close to Bagh. This is an ideal tourist and there is a tourist Rest House on this hill station. We decided to hire a truck so that entire family can travel to Sudhan Galli.

I was told by the local people about a NEW lake that has been formed due to earth quake. I was really curious to see this lake so we decided to go on the lake first. This lake was 10 Km, ahead of Sudhan Galli, so instead of stopping at Sudhan Galli, we decided to keep moving until we reached the lake in 30 minutes.

A top view of lake between 2 mountains formed due to earth quake

This was truly a wonder of nature, a newly formed lake due to earth quake. Here is its storey.

Before the earth quake struck, there used to flow a stream from this path. Earth Quake cause a huge land slide that ended in blocking the path of stream and hence creating an new lake. There were two villages on that mountain and over 500 houses in that village. Both the villages were buried under land slide and no body survived in these 2 villages except 2 women. They were cutting grass in a field for their animals at that time and their field remained on the top of land slides, that’s why they were saved.

Local people told us that an estimated 4000 to 5000 people lost their lives ONLY in these villages.

My picture, in background you can see lake

We had to stop our truck on a distance and in order to reach the Lake, we had to travel down hill, about 2 to 3 Kms. This was a tough challenge for us, specially to climb up hill after watching the lake. But we decided to take the challenge, after taking lunch.

Now, our family was traveling downhill to reach the lake, as there was no direct road to lake. After traveling for almost 2 KM, I decided to stay on, while Yasir, Hassan (my brothers) and Malika (my 7 years old niece) kept moving towards lake. It was really hot there, as it was a valley surrounded by mountains. If we move to the top, it is more cooler.

We could still see the lake and enjoy this scene. We had some photographs and rest of family decided to go back to the truck and wait for Yasir and Hassan to return. As expected, this was a tough challenge to climb up hill. We had to stop on several places to take some breath. Finally, when close to our truck, we stopped at a local house, made of mud.

Local people served us with a great hospitality. They served us with tea and Fruits. They also told us storey about Lake, and the villages that where destroyed under land slide.

One strange thing that I heard from them was that they told me they saw some Flames coming out of the mountains that were affected by land slide. Obviously, they meant there was some volcanic eruption at that point. Few people believe it was the Epic Center of the earth quake, but local Geological Survey and other international authorities later confirmed that it was near BalaKot. So I am still surprised what those flames meant and what did local people actually see.

Any way, it was time to come back home and decide to move back to Rawalpindi where I have to get back to normal business. But this visit was really a lesson for me. I was never so much moved from inside, but this quake really moved so many people to change the purpose of their lives and live to help others. I wish to come back to Bagh Every year or possibly twice a year to help my people and encourage them to get back to their feet.

May Allah give me courage and resources to do so! AMIN

Bobby Shahzad

Chief Technology Officer

Goldbar Enterprises LLC USA.

http://www.goldbar.net

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My Visit To High School Bagh

August 11th, 2006

Now, I decided to move to my high school. This is the place where I completed my school education after completing primary education from spring field. On my way to school, when I was passing through a market, I incidentally met an old high school class fellow. As usual, he warmly greeted me and I was so happy to find that he and his family survived during the earthquake. He gave me a picture of earth quake moments and how people suffered without rescue and aid for several days. After spending an hour together, I said good bye to this friend and move forward.

 

After entering the school, I was truly shocked. I couldn’t remember a single place in side the school. All the building has been destroyed due to earthquake. Rest has been demolished and rebel has been removed. All I could see now is demolished building. I was struggling to find where my classes once existed. Every thing has been vanished as if it never existed. I tried to find my Science lab and Science class room. I had heard that it survived the earth quake. But I could not find the building. Later, I discovered that all the class rooms have been demolished including the science lab and science class room. All of these would be reconstructed from scratch. Until then, all the classes are being held in tents. I could see a line of tents in the school ground, where once children of this school used to play games.

 

It was time for me to return home and plan for the next day. But this truly was the most disturbing day for me as I discovered many new stories I have never heard and visited the places I have never been to after earth quake.


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Visit to Spring Filed College Bagh

August 11th, 2006

Today, my plans are to visit all the schools and colleges I have been studying in my childhood and teenage. I didn’t now it would be the worst day for me to see the current state of these schools.

I start with Spring Field College. This was my first ever school where I started my schooling. It was then called Spring Field Children Academy. This school was started by a family of very nice people in 1982, which then was the ONLY private school in the area. I was amongst the first batches produced in this school and was enrolled in  1984.

                  

Today, the children who started education from this school have started their practical lives and are serving on key posts in all fields of life. All the credit goes the to family who laid foundation of this school. This family came from Pakistan and made it a mission to educate the children of this area. They were first to start the English medium school system in the area. Later on, the founder of the school (who was a woman, I cant recall her name) died of cancer and their family couldn’t run the expenses of school too longer. So the school was sold out to Mr. Khalid Khokhar, who is the principal of the school to date, after the earth quake. The school soon became a commercial commodity rather than a noble cause. Though, the size of school soon expanded, the quality of education declined. Still, this school produced best students who have been position holders and won the seats in Engineering Universities and Medical colleges. 

Having possessed a remarkable memory, I still remember my first day at school, my first teacher, my first class and first class mates. As I came here, I discovered that few of my first class fellows have been killed in this earthquake. I was most disturbed to hear this news.  

Childern's Play Ground of the school, now just rebel

I had heard terrible news about this school on TV and through my friends. Now, it was time for me to visit my first school and observe the devastation myself. What I saw was truly disturbing and terrifying. When I reached the location where school was once situated, All I could find is the rebel of 2 storey building that once existed. It was an old building from 1980s and was NEVER repaired or reconstructed. The building fell with in few seconds of earthquake shocks. That was one reason why so many children and teachers lost their lives in this building. Almost 300 children from different classes and more than 2 dozen teachers were killed under this rebel. Amongst the killed teachers was my cousin Shahid Abbas who I have mentioned earlier. He was a school teacher here and was taking class test at the time of earthquake. He couldn’t make it out of building before it collapsed completely. This building contained largest number of human beings who lost their lives under a single roof in Bagh. Very few people have been rescued from this building, amongst them, my 8 years old cousin who was in nursery classes. She was found under rebel after 3 hours and remained in shock for several months.

Classrooms of school                                  Cap of a unlucky student on the rebel

Those who have been killed under this building included 2 sons of school Principal Mr. Khalid Khokhar. One of his son was teacher in this school and other was studying in 8th class. He also lost his 2 legs in the incident. Later, he wrote his autobiography in a book that contained biographies of many survivors of Earthquake. I am still in search of this book that is written in URDU, but couldn’t find it as it sold out immediately. I will be sharing the biography of people written in English on this blog when I get a chance to get that book.

Books of Victom students

I heard from a friend about his biography. In his biography, Khalid Khokhar mentions the last moments of his school. He says he has been on routine work when Mrs. Samina entered her room to pay the dues of her child. I personally know Samina as she has been a sister of a friend of mine in Rawalpindi, married to his husband in Bagh. She only came to school to pay the dues of her son, who has been with her. But she didn’t know this would be her last visit. As soon as she entered the Principal’s room, the earthquake started. They both rushed out towards the street that lead to an open area. I know from my own knowledge that principal’s office is just 5 to 10 yards from street, but you can imagine the intensity of earth quake from this that they couldn’t make it to the street before the building collapsed. Samina died on spot, so did her 4 years old son. Khalid further says that he lost consciousness and when he regained it, he felt he has some body near him. It was body of Samina, with no signs of life.

He gained the courage and found a stick some where from rebel he was buried under. Then he used the stick to get the attention of people searching for survivors outside. Hence he was rescued.

Now, as I was looking at the rebel, I could still see the signs of devastation. Books of children, their uniforms, and a few Eid Cards. I picked an Eid card, it was written by a student to his teacher. I was most disturbed to see the text of the card that represented the joy and happiness but ended on grief.

I couldn’t stand there for too long and decided to take few pictures and move forward with a disturbed heart.

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Role Of NGOs In Bagh For Earthquake Relief And Rehabilitation

August 11th, 2006

Next day, my plans were to visit my old school and college to see what state they are right now, but the plan changed as I met an old friend in the market. He has been my school and college friend and like me, he has been a computer graduate. He was working here for an NGO called TearFund. We exchanged greetings and decided to spend the day together. He wanted to take me to his office so we headed towards his office.

Camps for Earthquake Victoms

Soon after EarthQuake, the rescue efforts started. Rescue teams from all over the world came to help affected people. NATO forces were first amongst the first ones to reach the effected area. I have heard good things about NATO forces from local people. They really helped the affected people to first rescue and then in relief operations. Local people also provided them full support and gave them gifts on Christmas as an exchange of good will. This was really a scene of true harmony between the people from different nations and ethnicity. 

After Rescue and relief operations, now was time to help people in reconstruction and rehabilitation. For that, Pakistan government called in the donors conference in which countries from all over the world participated. All these countries pledged more than $6 billion in total. All this money was now being distributed to families of affected areas. But all of this was not enough, so NGOs and UN came in to help. In this regard, a number of NGOs started their operations, some of them had short term relief plans and went back soon. Others are still here and will work here for next few years. In this list, there are names like MerciCorp, TearFund, Save the Children, Oxfam , USAID and  UN itself.

My friend has been working in TearFund as a programmer. This office was constructed from scratch using steel walls. I met managers there, most of them were foreigners. They formed a great team along with local people to help people get back on their feet with rehabilitation and reconstruction efforts. They are provided them with food, shelter, water supply schemes, living goods and most importantly, helped them re-establish public infrastructure like hospitals, schools and roads. This earth quake brought the largest scale of disaster man kind has ever seen in the recent history. This was basically because the areas of  devastation was much bigger than other disasters like Asian Tsunami and Katrina storm. Also, due to mountain area, the rescue and relief operations were most difficult of ever seen before. That mad this the biggest disaster of known history.

These NGOs are doing very good now to not only help people in reconstruction efforts but they have also created a great economic activity in an otherwise very low income area. A lot of people found good jobs and much better wages. At other times, educated people were moving out to cities to get jobs, but now they can get better paid jobs in their own town. Many of my friends I met during these days were employed and were getting paid very well, despite little or no experience. Like this friend of min has been getting 35K rupees per month as a programmer , that is twice the wages of an experienced programmer in this country. Same is the true for others working for NGOs here.

There were other jobs for local people. Like Interpreters who would translate for the foreigners to work with local people, Social Organizers, working with local people to help them, drivers, Guards etc. Every one was happy with the new economic activity in the area.

I spent the day with my friend and learnt a lot of things about this NGO and how they are helping the affected people. I would be spending next few days in surveying the areas I haven’t visited yet.

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Visiting The Families Of My Relatives

August 11th, 2006

After sleeping for almost 8 hours, I woke up with a fresh mind. My first action before breakfast was to rush to the stream and take a fresh bath in the cold water. There are hundreds of such streams in Kashmir that emerge from melting ice of huge Hamallian mountains and flow downstream in the valley. This is perhaps always the best experience of my life to take a fresh bath in the cold water of stream.

After returning home, I took a great breakfast. Now, I had to plan my day with my family. Our first goal was to visit the graveyard and offer prayers at the graves of our ancestors and those who died during Earthquake. So we started our journey towards the graveyard. As we moved to graveyard, this was the first opportunity for me to observe the devastation of earth quack in the day light. This is nothing short of shocking to see that the entire situation of town completely changed due to the quack. The tallest buildings I know once existed didn’t exist any more. Houses turned in to rebel. Schools and offices completely vanished from the face of earth. This was truly like a devastation scene from a world war movie.

          

On reaching graveyard, I couldn’t believe my eyes to see so many new graves. In fact, there were many mass graves, due to lack of space to burry the dead. We first went to our Grand Father’s grave, then visited our uncle’s, who committed suicide just a month before earthquake. Then to the other people who lost their lives in the earth quake. Now, we had to go to our uncle’s home who committed suicide a month before the earthquake. Our aunt welcomed us with the formal greetings. I also met Arsalan there who has been preparing for his exams. He is working for us in the internet marketing department. Their house has been partially damaged by the earthquake, but looked very dangerous to live in. One could see big cracks on the concrete walls every where. They may have to think to demolish and re-construct the home soon. But like many other families, they lack resources to re-build their home, and the grants offered by the government are hardly enough to meet that demand.  Government has granted 200 to 300 thousand rupees to each family for reconstruction. This aid looks ridiculous, as average construction cost of normal concrete house with minimum facilities is 700 to 1000 thousand rupees.

I took a survey of the other houses in their streets, also belonging to other uncles of mine. They were completely damaged, and really dangerous to live in. There is no option except to demolish and reconstruct these houses.

Now, as per our plan, we had to go to Farid Abad to offer condolences to family of a cousin who was killed in the earthquake. His name was Shahid Abbas and he was Nephew of Tofeeq, who is working with me in Goldbar Enterprises. Farid Abad is a small town that is up hill. It was the center of all District Offices including District Hospital, District Courts, District Administration and police station. EVERY THING has been destroyed by the earthquake. All these buildings have been constructed after years of efforts and reflected the development of district, but now, nothing was left. Hundreds of people from district administration were killed, leaving law orphan for several days after earthquake.

Grave of my dead uncle

We reached the family of my cousin. His mother was still upset about his  tragic death and kept crying for hours. All I could do is to give her courage to bring her back to life. That is a tradition here, to visit the families of people who die and offer your condolences. Now, after taking lunch there, I decided to visit the grave of this cousin that was situated up hill. This was perhaps most difficult mission for me to climb uphill. Over the years, I have gained good weight and wasn’t used to climbing the way I used to be in my childhood. Any way, with a great difficulty, I climbed the hill with my younger brother and reached the graveyard. Graveyard was itself on a beautiful spot, fully surrounded by trees. We offered the prayer on this grave and decided to come down hill after taking rest for 10 minutes.

Now, we took a cab to come back to Bagh . At this time, I was really feeling tired, but as per my plan, I had to see my old friends today. So I decided to stick with my plan and first decided to visit my old childhood friend Mr. Khurram Parvez. Khurram is a journalist and also running his shop in the city. He has been with this profession from 13 years and  is a well known journalist all over Kashmir. We know each other from 15 years, since our school age. He has a very pleasant and entertaining personality. He greeted me with a warm welcome like always. We were meeting after 2 years, so he could clearly see my body changes in last 2 years. Khurram had got married in the mean time and also had a 6 months old son. He was too busy that time, so we decided to meet at 7 PM and spend good time together.

In the mean time, I wanted to find where about of my dear teacher Mr. Iqbal, so I moved towards the shop of his brother. I was relieved to find that he and his family were all right during earthquake, though their house was completely damaged. I called my teacher who was very excited to talk to me after such a long time. We decided to meet next day at a place and then I came back to Khurram’s Office. Now, he was free from his business and we could finally sit and recall the past memories for hours.

Next day, my plans are to visit my old schools, and the college to see what devastation earthquake has brought there.

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My Journey to Bagh Azad Kashmir, One of most affected places of Pakistan Earth Quake ( Asian Earth Quake )

August 11th, 2006

Today, we are preparing to leave for Bagh from Rawalpindi. I have been busy from early morning packing up my stuff; I wanted to make sure I have packed every thing. I didn’t forget to collect my PC as I cant live without it :D .

 

My two brothers Yasir and Hassan and my younger sister Mona are accompanying this journey along with my mother of course. I was first thinking to drive my own old car but it sounds too dangerous and being old model, car isn’t capable enough for such a long journey. We have to travel around 250 km with most route being through mountains. So we decide to take the public transport, which btw is really awful to travel from. Its most uncomfortable, uneasy transport you can ever imagine of. But there is no choice as we do not have an alternative. Any way, we start our journey through this coach and gradually proceed towards destination. This is 6 hours long journey, but our driver is driving too fast, so we expect to be at home in 5 hours. On the way, bus stops whenever there is prayer time and passengers offer their prayers. During these breaks, I get a chance to step out of this awful coach and take some deep breath in fresh air. After about three hour’s journey, we are still not ready to say good bye to Punjab and enter into Kashmir territory, fully surrounded by mountains and hills. When we stopped to take dinner at a station, I came out with my brother. I can smell the familiar fresh (un polluted) and pleasant air of Kashmir, the one I am well familiar with since my childhood. A passenger tells me that there is a stream of fresh water nearby, so I take my brother along to the stream. It’s a stream with fresh cold water of melting snow, coming from Hammalian mountains. I wash my face and drink as much stream water as I can. This freshens me up further.

 

 

Now, we proceed to our destination that is two hours from here. On the last stop, I met an old neighbor of mine. He told me that one of his younger brothers (whom I know very well) was seriously injured in earth quake and had been hospitalized for several months, but still was not recovered. This was already the first storey that grieved me. I promised him that I will visit them in coming days. He also told me some miserable stories about the people I know, affected by the earth quake. It was really painful for me to listen about the people I spent most time of my life to suffer from such devastation. I would be following up each story in coming days as I plan to visit each and every one of them in the coming week.

 

Just 8 kilometers from Bagh, we had to stop as a Truck had slipped down the hill and an army crane was helping the local people to get that out. We had to stop there for half an hour and then we proceeded to our destination.

 

At last, we reached Bagh after a long drive on that awful Coach. It was already 10:00 PM and darkness every where. As I stepped out of the coach, I could already see the signs of devastation every where around me. Huge rebel of homes, broken windows, cracked houses and people living in tents.

 

My eldest brother Amjad Hussain received us on bus stop. He is our host now. He has a Torch to show us the way as we climb up hill. As this is hilly area, there is’nt any road but zigzags. So we have to climb the hill in order to reach my brothers home. As we pass through the streets, we can see destroyed houses all around us. Finally, we reach the destination. After formal family greetings often seen at family reunion, our sister in law has dinner ready for us. I feel too hungry after such a long journey and start my dinner immediately. Soon, I am on my bed but can’t sleep for a long time. In coming days, I am supposed to visit dozens of places and people I know. I will be following up each storey and will be posting on this blog.

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