kotla qasim khan: i'm tired, lost, and somehow writing about it

i've been dragging my feet through punjab for weeks, and i'm pretty sure i've been making up places as i go. kotla qasim khan? sounds like something i'd invent after three cups of chai. but no, it's real, and i'm sitting here on a broken charpai outside a farmhouse north of the village, watching a cow chew cud like it's the most profound thing in the world. i just checked and it's 11.4 degrees celsius right now, feels like 9.93, hope you like that kind of thing. i'm freezing my toes off but the sun's out, so it's a classic pakistani winter day - deceptive as hell.

kotla qasim khan is a village in kharian tehsil of gujrat district, punjab province, pakistan. it's about 2 km from lalamusa city and the gt road. the coordinates are roughly 32°40'50" north, 73°56'0" east, at an elevation of about 250 meters. i tried to punch those into my phone GPS but it kept rounding and sending me in circles. eventually i just followed a dusty road past a railway line and ended up here. the village is across the road to dinga and across the railway line to sargodha from lalamusa, which explains the constant train whistles. i heard at least three trains since i arrived, each one shaking the ground a little.

the name "kotla" is a sanskrit word meaning "fort", and the village is named after ch qasim ali khan, who supposedly founded it. someone told me he was some kind of local hero, a legendary figure who cleared the land and built the first house. but i couldn't find any plaques or museums. the locals just say "oh yes, he was great" and then go back to their tea. so, take that with a grain of salt. maybe he was a real person, maybe it's just a story. i like stories anyway.

geographically, the area is all fertile plains and agricultural fields. you can see for miles - mostly wheat and sugarcane, maybe some rice. the climate is monsoon-influenced humid subtropical, which is a fancy way of saying it gets really humid in summer and fairly dry in winter. right now, in november, it's cool and the air is crisp. i'm wearing two sweaters and still shivering a bit. the village itself has vast streets - not like the narrow alleys of old cities - and green fields all around. there are tubewells scattered about, pumping water for irrigation. and there's a farmhouse situated north of the village, which i found because i wandered north and saw a big compound with a veranda and mango trees. it looked empty, so i sat on its boundary wall for a while.

neighboring cities and villages: lalamusa is the nearest, just 2 km away. you can literally walk there if you wanted, though the road is dusty. chakori sher ghazi is 2.5 km east, parana lalamusa 2.6 km, werowall/lalamusa 2.7 km, and chak dina 5 km northwest. if you get bored, lalamusa is just a short drive away - you can grab a chai, maybe find a dhaba with decent food. gujrat city is maybe 30-40 km from here, so if you need a bigger city fix, that's an option. but honestly, the village feels self-contained.

infrastructure: the village is described as modern with developed infrastructure. i'm not sure what that means exactly - there's electricity, i guess, because i saw power lines. and there's a water supply? i saw tubewells, so maybe not. but there are three graveyards. i visited one; it was old, with cracked tombstones and a few fresh flowers. it was quiet, peaceful in a spooky way. there's an intermediate college for boys just outside the village. when i passed by, there were students hanging out, some in uniforms. the college now offers degree-level classes, and they're planning a separate higher education block for girls. that's progress, i suppose. it's good to see education being taken seriously.

population and culture: the community is characterized as comprising hardworking and honest people. someone told me that, and i have no reason to doubt it. everyone i met was polite, offered tea, and didn't try to take advantage of the lost foreigner (though i'm not foreign, i'm just a blogger from another part of pakistan). i met an old man who spoke broken urdu and told me about the village's founding. he said his great-grandfather remembered ch qasim ali khan. take that as you will.

postal information: the postal code for kotla qasim khan is 50201. and it's in the pakistan standard time zone, which is utc+5. i tried to mail a postcard to my mom but i didn't have a stamp, so it's still in my bag.

now, i'm not a geography expert, but let's look at a map to see where exactly we are:

i also pulled some random images from unsplash that, in my tired mind, capture the vibe of this place:

woman in white dress standing on green grass field during daytime — Photo by Huzaifa Waheed / Unsplash

i don't know, maybe i'm romanticizing it. it's just a village like any other, but there's something about the vast fields and the quiet that gets to you. maybe it's the fact that i'm lost and my phone's about to die. but i'm here, writing this, and i'm actually kind of enjoying the randomness.

if you ever find yourself in gujrat district and you're tired of the city, take a detour to kotla qasim khan. bring a sweater, because it gets cold. and maybe bring a snack, because the dhabas are limited. but if you want to see a typical punjabi village with a mix of old and new, this might be it. or maybe not. i'm just a tired blogger who took a wrong turn.

now i'm going to try to find my way back to lalamusa before dark. hope you liked this messy little piece.

kotla qasim khan: i'm tired, lost, and somehow writing about it

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About the author: Ophelia Kent

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