The Pakistan Border

 While we were in Amritsar we took a day trip to the border of Pakistan... something I had decided beforehand that I would never do.  Being American, we hear about wars and see lots of video/images of war in Pakistan so I instantly had the perception of it being incredibly dangerous, which was way off.
We bought a seat in a car to go with tourists and were told that it was an awesome experience of watching the two countries' flags come down, watching the soldiers do a fancy routine, and that we would have special seats just for the tourists... which later you will find out was completely a lie! We took a packed jeep of 13 people and found ourselves at the border 40 minutes later.

When we got out of the car it was utter chaos. We had no clue where to go, what to do and there were so many people there, like 3 baseball stadiums full.  Landon and I quickly got separated because as men & women, there is always separation, he went in one line while I waited in another anxiously not trying to lose eye contact with each other.  The woman's line went quickly and I was panicked because I lost Landon and we were separated at the Pakistan border and it was just a crazy, scary thought for me... a situation that I would have never thought to be found in!  About 10 minutes later I climbed up on a wall and found him...hallelujah!!... which is shown in the last photo... see if you can find landon...

Once we clasped hands, we tried to find a seat in the immense crowds of people.  There was no special seat for us special tourists like we were promised... big surprise... but we found one right in the front which was lucky. So as we waited for the flag ceremony the crowds were chanting "INDIA, INDIA!"and had their fists pumped in the air as if we were at a sports game.  They were so proud of their country and were unitedly singing in their Hindu language.  As the Indian soldiers got ready to go through their routine they had a man cheerleader trying to rowel up the crowd even more louder than they already were.  It suddenly became a crazy uproar of the men all jumping, yelling, and pushing each other; it was honestly like one huge mosh-pit with 100+ Indian men.  We were caught in the front and were trampled on and for the first time I felt unsafe.  They continued to get louder and more rowdy and we were stuck right in the middle of it.  I started pushing people and yelling but with little ol' me that did absolutely nothing.  I felt hands on the sides of my legs either trying to feel me up or pick-pocket me, either way it didn't go well with me. I started slapping their hands and yelling at them... Anyways, it was the longest 30 minutes of our lives. We were covered in 100+ other men's sweat and felt suffocated.  Once the ceremony was over we quickly ran to the middle of the street to get a fresh breath of air and bought ourselves a bag of popcorn. Whew what an experience!

But in the end of it all, now we can say we've been to the Pakistan border!