Mohammad Ali Jinnah

Mizar-e-Quaid- the final resting place of a great man Mohammad Ali Jinnah



Muhammad Ali Jinnah was a 20th century lawyer, politician, statesman and the founder of Pakistan. He is popularly and officially known in Pakistan as Quaid-e-Azam (Urdu: قائد اعظم — "Great Leader") and Baba-e-Qaum (بابائے قوم) ("Father of the Nation").

Mohammad Ali Jinnah



As the first Governor-General of Pakistan, Jinnah led efforts to lay the foundations of the new state of Pakistan, frame national policies and rehabilitate millions of Muslim refugees who had migrated from India.

Jinnah died aged 71 in September 1948, just over a year after Pakistan gained independence from the British Empire.

He was from Karachi, and his final resting place is also in Karachi. So being a Pakistani it is wrong if i go to karachi and dont pay a visit on his tomb, i know its not important from religious point of view but being a pakistani i should pay him respect by atleast going there and saying fateha for him. Plus there are so many more places associated with him which one should visit in order to connect to ones roots

so below pictures are related to Jinnah.



Me at Jinnah's Tomb known as "Mizar-e-Quaid"- Thanks khala for taking this picture



Mr. Jinnah's Birth Place known as "Wazeer Mansion"- now a Quaid-e-Azam Museum



A gaurd at Mr. Jinnah's Tomb



Same picture but in Colour



Mr. Jinnah's Grave is under this point , the door behind the gaurd you see leads to his actual grave not accessible to general public



Makli Hill Necropolis

My trip to Pakistan wouldnt be complete with out visiting an archaelogical site. So here it is Makli Hill Necropolis. Its a huge grave yard full of tombs of ancient kings and Saints. Its said that around 125,000 sufi saints are buried here. Some of the structures(the one in below pics) are around 700 year old, the amount and quality of the work is really impressive .All in all an amazing place to be if you love history and Archaelogy like me.

Some info from Wikipedia....One of the largest necropolises in the world, with a diameter of approximately 8 kilometers, Makli Hill is supposed to be the burial place of some 125,000 Sufi saints. It is located on the outskirts of Thatta, the capital of lower Sind until the seventeenth century, in what is the southeastern province of present-day Pakistan. It was inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1981under the name, Historical Monuments of Thatta.

People of Pakistan

Sorry guys for not posting for a long time, but now things have changed , i have a laptop and  thousands of pictures to edit and upload so i am back.

As the name says People of Pakistan, so please find below some pics of randome Pakistani, saying a lot about a majority of  Pakistanis.

A man selling Guavas with spices at kanjeer lake thatha.

Madari as we call this guy, he can make monkey to do funny stuff and get paid, out side Lok Virsa museum Islamabad.

A gaurd at the tomb of Jinnah the founder of Pakistan

Camel Ride at Hawks Bay beach Karachi

Care taker of the Holy crocs at the shrine of Mangho Peer.

a random man adjusting his pants back of a moving truck on a highway, talk about privacy 

Guide at Makli Hill 800 years old nacropolises

Folk Punjabi singers at Lok virsa Museum Islamabad

Snake charmer called "Spaira" in urdu at Makli Hill thatha

Random People on National Highway

Random People on National Highway

Random People on National Highway

Buddha

Below find pictures from my trip taxila remains of a 3rd century BC budhist civilization. It was a nice trip and museum was also nice. Beware of the sales men selling fake artifacts claiming them to be real. And please get a guide it will be much nicer with a guide.

Taxila Museum had some amazing artifacts but as per the museum the most amazing were in british national museum .

it was winter so nothing green all brown dried up grass

an old well and wall next to it.

Fort Rohtas

This is my third post regarding Rohtas, you can check the other two on the links below,http://picworldd60.blogspot.com/2010/01/rohtas-fort.htmlhttp://picworldd60.blogspot.com/2010/02/blog-post.html

It was an amazing trip. and an amazing fort , i wonder why it was not added on the worldheritage list earlier.(included in 2006). The best thing about Rohtas Fort is the city which lives within the walls of the fort since 15th century.I think i will be doing 2 more posts on this Fort.Below is a picture of a collapsed Wall with the old King Mosque in the back ground.Restoration work is in Progress but still a minor portion of the Fort has collapsed, mostly because of erosion and Heavy Rainfal

Below is the only remain of a once 200 room mansion known as "Haveli Man Singh" named after the very special Minister "Man Singh " of great Moghul King Akbar. Man singh used this Haveli in the 15th century.This used to be a tower now half burried in ground. I noticed excavation being done in the area to salvage the buried remains of the Haveli.

Mughel King Humayon After Defeating Sher Shah Suri(who constructed the Rohtas Fort) and gaining contol over India, destoyed the Below Pictured Gate as a symbol of his power , As this Fort was a symbol of Suri Family's Power. But the great Pakistani Authorites they didnot repaired the damaged walls(they are repairing bases up to some extent), Instead they repaired this entrance which should have been left the way Humayon destroyed. Because this destroyed gate was a symbol of Mughel Power and marked the begining of the Mughel Rule in india which lasted next 200 years. Plus it doesnt look good also , as you can see the differenece in old and new construction.

Finally the gallery of Rohtas cannot be complete without a picture of a MAndir( a hindu temple below). As previously i posted the Picture of a mosque and Sikh gurdawara. In old Punjab Sikh,Hinduism and Islam were the three major religions. Islam Was the religion of Administration thats why the Mosque was inside the Royal area of the Fort, And hindu being the majority population so thats why the Mandir was located inside the town area. and Sikhism being the new religion and having less followers, so thats the reason gurdawara was out side the Fort. I will post the interior pics of the Mandir as it still had the designs and Marble from the olden times, though not in good shape.
All the three worship grounds were abadoned even the mosque(mosque and gurdawa were under repair).

Dhol

Pakistan is most of the times in news for bombs and terrorism, but we do have more then that associated with us. Below find some pictures of People enjoying Dhol, Men are dancing on the sound of dhol and women are watching (its not like they are not allowed to Dance, they just choose not too).

The sound of dhol is so mesmerizing even a small kid is lost in it. you can see the feeder bottle in the picture above.

Covered in colorful veils another women joins in to enjoy the sound of DHOl.

For those who dont know what a dhol is---The dhol is a double-sided barrel drum (straight barrels also exist) played mostly as an accompanying instrument to the traditional Punjabi dance of Bhangra, and the religious music of Sufism, Qawwali

Below picture is from Wikipedia:

3rd century buddha statue

I will post a complete album in few days as i am still working on the pictures.
but for the time being, just check out the 3rd century buddha face . This face was a big one must be from a statue of 10 feet or may be bigger.

sparklecat.com

For all the Cat owners, there is this one blog http://www.sparklecat.com/ where some one writes blog with CAT's point of view. Its very interesting, Cat refering to its owner as my human. It feels like your reading the mind of a cat, what goes in there every day.
So check it out.


Below are some Pics of Cats owned by my cousins, you guys already know I-Mate the black and white below. i never got a good shot of the brown one as she was very annoyed by me as you can see in the picture......
Actually i annoyed I-Mate too with my Camera...:P check out his first appearance on the PhotoWorld(http://picworldd60.blogspot.com/2010/01/cats.html)
JamesBond look

Faisal Masjid, Islamabad Pakistan

The Faisal Mosque in Islamabad is the largest mosque in Pakistan and South Asia and the sixth largest mosque in the world. It was the largest mosque in the world from 1986 to 1993.
Faisal Mosque is conceived as the National Mosque of Pakistan.
Faisal Mosque has the third largest capacity of accommodating worshippers in its adjoining grounds after the Masjid al-Haram (Grand Mosque) of Mecca, the Al-Masjid al-Nabawi (Prophet's Mosque) in Medina.
The Faisal Mosque is named after the late King Faisal bin Abdul Aziz of Saudi Arabia, who supported and financed the project.

And if you google this mosque you will find so many pictures and some of them are really awesome. Below find few pictures from my recent trip to the Mosque. I wasnt able to get the shot i wanted becasue of the sign saying no pictures allowed inside the mosque. but i still managed to get few good ones.

Taxila(early buddhist city ) coming soon

Sikh temple

A sikh temple abadoned from the time of partition ......... at Fort Rohtas which is a 15th century fort and this temple is from that time also.......one of my aunt was from this area and she told me when they were young this use to be there favourite place to play........ and at that time it was all made of marble......now nothing remains as with time people damaged the temple but now i saw it was close for repair and i saw few people going in so i think its been renovated for sikh pilgrimage from india.....

veiw from with in the fort from one of the window.....

Freedom

People in Pakistan really have freedom.....for example check out the picture below......it seems to setup a barber shop in Pakistan all you have to do is to look for the most busiest road a table, chair and a broken mirror and there you go.........
Along with a good shave you may also get all kinds of interesting diseases too like HIV,HCP e.t.c. but the thing is he is still in business after all these awarenes programs...........and his setting was really eye catching with the color scheme of PInk and Blue.....
Another fact about this pic is that it seems they were posing for the picture but in reality they were not even aware as i took this pic while in a moving car...passing through the city.....