PAF Air War College took a trip to Australia in 1990. After our official meetings etc. throughout the day with our Australian counterparts, later in the wee hours of the night, we headed to check in our hotel in Alice Springs.
Alice Springs is located in the center of Australia. Now, at this odd hour of the night, with our whole group of officers and senior staff standing in the lobby of the hotel, we could see no action happening. The receptionist was trying to search our booking details frantically. She unfortunately showed signs of having no clue about who we were and what Pakistan was, in fact didn’t know anything about our country. On seeing this commotion, I took the initiative along with one of my course mates ,Wing/Cdr Irfaan Masum , reached the reception desk and found that the lady was unable to locate Pakistan’s name and then was questioning us , is it a country , city or county , is it in Europe or Asia? ….ignoring the ignorance on her part, we asked her “do you know anything about the sport cricket“ to which she replied , “Yes, that is our country ‘s most popular sport.”
On this response of hers we asked her further “then you must have heard of Imran Khan”, she yelled out loud..”oh yes he is our idol, we love him.”
With this little quiz, our ordeal resolved, and she wrote Imran Khan in the column of country and handed us our room keys.
This is the honor which IK enjoys in the World.
(A PAF officer has shared his memories of 1990)
