The Shah was still in charge when I was there, there was no restrictions that I observed. I travelled by public transport. Iran - Afghanistan border was interesting as there was was something like 10km of bad lands between the border posts so this ancient bus rattled at top speed across it for fear of bandits, though we had no trouble.
I could also see why the Kyber Pass was such an obstacle to the British Army, it is long, deep, narrow but steep sided, easy to defend hard to attack.
The Pakistan - India border was the hardest to get through because they were at war over Kashmir, it was only open one day a week (from memory) so there were big queues, the Indian customs came on board the bus looking for drugs, didn’t care about anything else, yet there was a cannabis plant growing beside their customs post.
In Nepal four of us rented a house outside Kathmandu in the middle of paddy fields, we would walk home drunk on rice wine and fall in the mud. I say rented, it was a two storey thatched house the family moved down stairs with their animals we had the top floor. We were woken each morning by the smoke from their fire.
To extend our visa we applied to go on the Helumbul (sp?) Trail, god it was steep, the locals would pass us going up carrying enormous loads on their backs and return down long before we reached where they had been. Saw Everest in the distance about the size of my thumb. gave up after a couple of days and returned to Kathmandu. Loved Nepal
@Bruce, here are two photos to help you understand colorguard Mom…My daughter was in this school activity from age 7 to about 14. They go to practice, march, twirl heavy flags, wooden rifles, attend parades on all holidays to support the school. It’s between a sport, military precision and a cheerleader.
In the seventies you could meander down to the surgery and be seen by a doctor within an hour with names like…Waters, Brown, Anderson, Smith, Oakford (you know what I mean…No traffic jams, hardly any traffic. Cars where it was a luxury to have a radio and heater. No headless chickens walking around with a mobile phone stuck to their stupid ear. No internet or social media, so people would go down the pub or participate in sport…or both…People had hobbies. 90% of blokes where I lived worked down the pit and lived in a thriving little village with family owned shops that sold local produce grown by the few families of farmers that lived and worked on their own farms. They grew proper crops like…Corn, barley, spuds, peas, beans, sugar beet, turnips etc. None of your silly crops like oil seed rape, maize or sold their fields to a housebuilder.
The three day week…a welcome unexpected holiday from work. Fags were 4 bob for a packet of 20, beer and petrol were just as cheap…Buses were every twenty minutes into Doncaster, and you could walk round the town centre without being threatened, robbed or stabbed. And the music…ELO, Fleetwood Mac, Rolling Stones, Eagles, Led Zeppelin, Elton John…Marvin Gaye…the list is endless…
I remember very crowded waiting rooms as it was on a first come first served basis. You would sit for hours and they had a big table of magazines that were of no interest to a child. Things like Punch or Country Living. My mum would gossip away with the receptionist who was also the doctor’s wife.
I do so remember people queuing all the way down the street to get a loaf of bread from an independent bakers when all the main breadmakers were on strike. I was one of those people. I was in the queue for over an hour & then they only let me have one small loaf.
The small independent bakers were working day & night to keep up the demand. They must have made a fortune.
In the 70’s everybody went on strike, If they wanted a longer tea break they went on strike!!
After @RightNow telling us about being a colour guard mum I had to look it up and came across this
Has anybody else seen/heard this type of thing, perhaps it is a very American thing?
Having said that I thought Marching Bands were an American thing but this Japanese band popped up in my Youtube feed a while back. Apparently brass and woodwind instruments are considered a very suitable pastime for Japanese young ladies.
Both look a very Athletic pastimes but I have no idea what is good or bad in these hobbies.
BTW My daughter took up snooker as her school sport when she was 17 because it took place at the local club in the days when no-one at the bar checked that you were over 18 once you were inside the club. I was not pleased.
Everything I know about Colour Guards is in that clip, there may well be blokes doing it, I don’t know, I had never even heard of it until @RightNow mentioned it. There are one or two blokes the Jap high school marching band in some of their performances too.
I wasn’t knocking them RightNow, in fact I think they were very brave to do something that they enjoyed. I only noticed them because I’m a bit of a leg admirer…
We also have Drum Majors leading the school bands, and they happen to be almost always young men, noting that, also. 