IT is almost an age-defying act, but Mustansar Hussain Tarrar seems so helpless in the face of his legendary wanderlust that he just keeps doing it. He moved around the world on shoestring budgets in his younger days. He then moved to the famed Northern Areas and went right up to the K2 base camp. His travel accounts over the last few years also made sense as they were comfortable affairs to such cosy destinations as Russia, China, the United States, Australia, and Holland. Even his two-volume narrative of the Saudi cities of Makkah and Madina reflected he was moving with age. But Sindh?

At an age when, in his own words, he has become “Baba Bagloos” — with an ever-thinning mop of silken white hair on his head — and, again in his own words, when he is just a breath away from eternity, the sandscape of Sindh is hardly an obvious choice. It is wanderlust pure and simple; of the very Tarrarian variety.

It is good for the readers, though. They keep getting what they still keep waiting for. Starting off with Niklay Teri Talaash Mein (Out In Your Search), Tarrar has captivated generations of readers over the last about half a century. In that first title, he never defined what or who was meant by “your” — and he has never done that ever since — but what we know for sure is that the “search” is still on, and that he is still “out”. Good for him. Great for his fans.

The extent to which Tarrar has explored Sindh is a bit more than even the average Sindhi would have done. How many, for instance, would explore a desolate Hindu temple in Kasbo village away from the relative civilised existence of Nangarparkar at the other end of the wilderness and vastness of Thar?

Mustansar Hussain Tarrar spends a few days travelling across the sandscape and tells the tale with wit and perspective as only he can

Not many would even know that. Not many would even care to know that. But Tarar can’t resist the call of the wild and comes back with colourful tales of even more colourful peacocks painting the town (read, desert) red in their own merry ways. Now that Tarrar has done that, it sounds like an obvious thing to do, for at least a native Sindhi.

Readers will find it particularly heart-warming that the travelogue, despite having been penned by a hardcore Punjabi, does not have even a remote touch of a condescending tone. There is nothing ‘Big Brother’ about it. If anything, Tarrar is in awe, and he has expressed that more than once.

Even when he meets Deeda Dil, a local man who remains with him for almost the entirety of his sojourn, Tarrar is so impressed by the beauty of the name that he recalls how he wanted to name his daughter Bhag Bharee, but could not do that owing to pressure from all concerned, “because we in Punjab remain so embarrassed by our own language that we name our children after Arabic names unmindful of what they mean, but avoid our own coinage”.

There is a slight jitter in this regard early on when he talks of traditional Sindhi headwear and finds it a bit dull and pedestrian compared to its counterparts in the Pakhtun and Punjabi areas, but Tarrar becomes philosophical before it gets too late and clears the air thus: “Perhaps they (the Sindhis) chose such headwear because unlike us (the Punjabis) they preferred to be down-to-earth than elitist. If they are happy with their look of the poor and the humble in this headwear, it can be nothing but their instinct and desire.”

But even this is a rarity in the narrative. He talks fondly of his old fascination with Sindhu, the historical name for the river Indus, and his description of the moment when his eyes first catch sight of the river flowing in Sindh is pretty moving. He talks in raving tones about the mosque at Kandiaro, the Faiz Mahal at Khairpur, and the sanctuary at Mehranon.

When it comes to the famed historical haveli of Mir Ghulam Hussain Talpur in Kot Diji, he finds no shame in confessing that he is lost for words. “Just don’t ask me for I have no words to express what it actually is,” he says and moves on to compare it with what he has seen elsewhere in his life. Every single time he finds it “a thousand times more impressive” than the objects on display in places like Florence and New York. It’s pretty much the same at the Kot Diji fort which, he says, puts in shade the ones in Lahore, Rohtas, Derawar, and Hunza.

But it is Mohenjo Daro that takes his breath away. It is a city about which he has written a wonderful short story, ‘Dhund ke peechay shehr tha [A city behind the fog]’ and in which the lead character happens to be the Dancing Girl whom he named Sindhia, which, come to think of it, is a much more apt and poetic name than the statue’s historical name, Sambara.

But that story, by its very nature, was a work of imagination. Coming face-to-face with reality, Tarrar stands bewitched in Mohenjo Daro. “I have been to many an archaeological site around the world. I have felt impressed and inspired by many, but roaming around alone in the streets of the Mound of the Dead, why is it that I feel that I belong ... I have been at some point in time a resident of this very city ... This is my city ... I am a man from Mohenjo Daro,” murmurs Tarrar in what appears to be nothing but soliloquy.

Other than places and people, a Tarrar travelogue is always dotted with observations that provide wonderful insight to the readers. From political banners hanging here, there, and everywhere to visible signs of corruption, negligence, and mismanagement, right down to the unique sense of religious coexistence in rural Sindh, the narrative covers just about everything. The Sindhi Sufi streak actually provides a running thread across the book and with it continue comparisons with similar trends in Punjab.

“Faqir Mushtaq’s place is an indicator of Sindhi moderation and large-heartedness when it comes to one’s belief system … Right in the middle of everything, he talks openly in the language of Mansoor al-Hallaj and Sarmad and yet no one objects … no one even imagines getting tough with him. Had he been in any village anywhere in Punjab, he would have been ‘dispatched to hell’ long ago, for forbearance is not a Punjabi virtue,” writes Tarrar, and he is apparently talking of trends in today’s Punjab rather than a historical reality.

His feelings remain pretty much the same as he moves from Sachal Sarmast in Daraza Sharif to Lal Shahbaz Qalandar in Sehwan, and finally to Shah Latif Bhittai in Bhit Shah. Talking of Sufi saints and savants, Tarrar himself becomes a Sufi every now and then. His descriptions of the connection he feels with Sarmast and Bhittai and why he cannot connect with Qalandar fall pretty much in that category and are worth having a look at. In fact, it is something worth pondering over as it reflects on society at large.

The reviewer is a Dawn staff member.

Safar Sindh Ke: Aur Sindh Behta Raha
(Travelogue)
By Mustansar Hussain Tarrar
Sang-e-Meel, Lahore
ISBN: 978-9693529579
184pp.

Published in Dawn, Books & Authors, January 15th, 2017