Messy goodbyes

I had imagined my last week in Karachi to be seven days filled with revisiting favorite parts of the city; eating at all my old haunts; sharing memories with good friends and indulging in some last minute shopping.

Gone

The reality has been quite different. For one this has been among the filthiest weeks of my life- the house is a sea of packing material, dustballs and Coke cans. It is astonishing just how much stuff one can accumulate in almost five years, and even more shocking how many scraps of paper, random receipts and scribbled notes I have managed to squirrel away in every nook and cranny of my house, possibly fueled by all that Coke! And then there has been the sorting- what to take, what to sell. At first I shed a tear over every item I was to be parted with, but soon enough the nostalgia wore off and a certain ruthlessness set in; three weeks later I just want people to take the stuff away, preferably in cartloads. So the thought of shopping and adding to the load of cartons and knick knacks is frankly nauseating.

The list of essential things to be done is forever growing, so taking time out to stroll around Empress Market or take a last carriage ride on Bunder Road is looking highly unlikely. Fortunately, we have been able to squeeze in a few hurried coffees and dinners with friends, which has definitely helped. We had one very memorable evening with some very dear friends, sitting on broken mooras, our glasses perched on an upside down packing carton. It makes me happy to know the glasses we drank from are now at that friend's house :)

It's all got to go

It is almost the end of our Karachi adventure, and what a ride it has been. Goodbyes are never easy for me, so rather than reflecting on all that (or more precisely all those) I am leaving behind, I'm just going to focus on what comes next...see you all in Istanbul. xxx

Goodnight Karachi.