New Year’s day walk to Chiltan Hill, Quetta – Ceri’s story… Diary entry 3 January… The people at the PTDC (Pakistan Tourism Development Corporation have all been very nice and helpful to us. We go there every day, have tea and talk and generally disrupt the smooth flow of business, although i don’t think they’re rushed off their feet at any time. Quetta isn’t really a massive tourist trap.

In some ways that’s nice, in others not so good. We’re continually gawped at on the street, in cafes, anywhere we go virtually.

We ate some shami kebabs for lunch one day in a small stall in the bazaar and had plenty of people either pass by 2 or 3 times to look in again, or else stop altogether and outrightly stare. It can be quite disconcerting. Part of the trouble, I think, is that we break some societal rules.

Many cafes for instance, have separate areas for men and women / families. In the Dawn Cafe, opposite the hotel, where we often go for tea, we go in together into the male domain, which causes heads to turn. Even buses and trains are segregated.