The Beginning
13th August 2004
The problems started even before we did.
“Damn it!” Fazil lifted the bag and dumped everything on the floor in frustration!
I looked at his face and shook my head, “It’s not going to happen.”
The frustration was mutual. I was actually in panic-mode as I realized, we both realized, that the two small bags we had were not going to hold all the stuff we had decided to carry with us.
Fazil had been my best friend since high school. At 5’2” he stood 6 inches shorter than me but in patience and life experience he had me beat.
We were going on a long journey. Since we were going to be travelling on a motorcycle on difficult and deserted roads we had decided to take as many things as possible covering every conceivable situation. There was dry food in case we got trapped in a landslide; there were spares for the motorcycle in case we had a puncture or broke the clutch cable. But we had only two bags for all of this, one we planned to tie on a carrier stand specially attached to the bike for this purpose; the second bag was a backpack, to be carried by the passenger.
I looked at the watch – 3:15 A.M. We started sorting through the stuff, assessing priorities and making decisions as we went. Together we dumped some things and re-classified others.
Then we started packing again –
“Puncture kit?”
“Check!”
“Foot pump?”
“Check!”
“My clothes?”
“Check!”
“Your clothes?”
“Check!”
“Rain suits?”
“Check!”
…and so it went on for medicines, dry food, spare tubes etc. etc. Finally, the clock was striking 6:00 as we closed the zips on the bags.
The problems started even before we did.
“Damn it!” Fazil lifted the bag and dumped everything on the floor in frustration!
I looked at his face and shook my head, “It’s not going to happen.”
The frustration was mutual. I was actually in panic-mode as I realized, we both realized, that the two small bags we had were not going to hold all the stuff we had decided to carry with us.
Fazil had been my best friend since high school. At 5’2” he stood 6 inches shorter than me but in patience and life experience he had me beat.
We were going on a long journey. Since we were going to be travelling on a motorcycle on difficult and deserted roads we had decided to take as many things as possible covering every conceivable situation. There was dry food in case we got trapped in a landslide; there were spares for the motorcycle in case we had a puncture or broke the clutch cable. But we had only two bags for all of this, one we planned to tie on a carrier stand specially attached to the bike for this purpose; the second bag was a backpack, to be carried by the passenger.
I looked at the watch – 3:15 A.M. We started sorting through the stuff, assessing priorities and making decisions as we went. Together we dumped some things and re-classified others.
Then we started packing again –
“Puncture kit?”
“Check!”
“Foot pump?”
“Check!”
“My clothes?”
“Check!”
“Your clothes?”
“Check!”
“Rain suits?”
“Check!”
…and so it went on for medicines, dry food, spare tubes etc. etc. Finally, the clock was striking 6:00 as we closed the zips on the bags.
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