My trip to Pakistan
03­04 June 2009
It was a pleasant morning when I arrived at Allama Iqbal International airport Lahore,
Pakistan. I left Arlanda, Stockholm on 3rd of June 2009 and arrived next day 04 at
Lahore. Lahore is famous for its unique culture; food, people are friendly and hospitable.
Hotel cab picked me up from the airport and we drove to the hotel. The first thing of my
concern was wireless broadband Internet which could connect me to the outer world, I
was pretty much happy to got it for free in the hotel because most of the hotels don’t
have this facility and they don’t offer it for free. In the evening, I went outside to
exchange the currency and came across with a strange incident, a street money
exchanger wanted to give me a higher exchange rate by mistake because he was mixing
the Swedish SEK with Norwegian NOK. The next day I had meeting with one of our
teacher training student and Apple Macintosh marketing manager in hotel.
05 June 2009
It was quite extensive training for the Teacher training student about Macintosh, iLife,
iWork and other ICT tools. We started this training by 9.00 Am and it continued till
17.00 in the evening. Now I am happy to see her response in term of understanding by
using these tools. It seems that she has learnt almost everything; it’s certainly satisfying
for me.
Venue: Holiday Inn Lahore Business center(05 June 2009). Nadia Shafique (TT Student),
Alamdar Khan

The next day on 06 I had to travel to Islamabad and then to Kabul later. I had to travel to
the Pakistan International Airline local office to book my ticket because to book a flight
for Kabul is not available online; you have to be personally visit in PIA office.
06 June 2009
I took flight from Lahore to Islamabad. The weather of Lahore was quite hot
temperature was around 40‐45. I saw free Internet availability on the airport and
mostly the young children were using it. Its good to see that young generation is born
with Internet availability. It’s a good notion for ICT usage and its penetration in future.
Allama Iqbal International Airport Lahore
One other interesting thing I found on the airport was the mobile charging facility, it
doesn’t matter whatever the mobile you have, it is possible to charge your mobile
battery at the airport, it was new and of course a unique offer from a local mobile
vendor.

Allama Iqbal international airport, Lahore
The chronological order of mobile companies name shows their popularity in Pakistani
masses. The flight was not smooth because of Monsoon winds in Pakistan. The weather
in Islamabad was around 30. I made prior booking with Margalla Hotel Islamabad (word
Margalla is famous for Margalla hills and Islamabad is surrounded by lush green
Margalla Hills). With contrast to the information, which I had asked prior to booking
confirmation about the broadband Internet connectivity they told me at my arrival in
the hotel that they don’t have Internet facility. Infect it was shocking for me at that time
because it was already 20.00 pm and on next day 07 June 2009 I planned a workshop for
our teacher training students and they all suppose to come far flung areas from
Islamabad. They had already been informed about the venue and starting time of
workshop, so it was bit challenging to find another good place for workshop and stay. I
checked with Serena, Marriott but I couldn’t find the proper place for workshop. Finally,
I found a good place in Best Western with competitive prices and facilities. The first
thing I did, I communicated the information about the new workshop venue with
participants. After coping with this challenge I went to Apple Macintosh vendor office to
pick up the laptops which were suppose to be distributed among the teacher training
students next day in the workshop. Suddenly, we heard a big blast near to Apple office
and soon we came to know that there was a suicide attack 500 meters away from Apple
office on the police check post, many lost their lives and many injured, pity. After
finalising the purchase I came to know that my credit card is not working with their
machine, I called back to Stockholm office and got an efficient response from Stockholm.
I am so thankful to entire MKFC team for their timely help. I am also very much thankful
to Apple team because they allowed me to take laptop and pay later, thanks for their
trust and for a single moment they didn’t show the trust deficit. Meanwhile Apple team

tried my card with another bank machine and it worked out. The Apple dealer promised
me to deploy 2 dedicated persons for the whole day on 07 June for technical support; it
was so kind of them. I came back to the hotel around 01:00 Am and had dinner. It was an
extensive checking went on the roads by the police after this blast, they were stopping
almost every vehicle for checking, so, they did it with us too, but they were polite.
Alamdar Khan with Apple Macintosh team
07 June 2009
The purpose of the workshop was to make the students trained about Macintosh
operating system, iLife, iWork and other ICT tools like Opit (Learning Management
System), the built in function of Opit, Skype, Blogs, Podcasts, presentation about End‐to‐
End eLearning, Community Action Plan etc. There was also a social aspect of this
workshop, most of the students were living in different location of Pakistan so they were
not familiar with each other because they did not have face to face communication, they
had only virtual communication before. This workshop provided them a platform to
meet and share with each other. The workshop was divided into three parts the first was
to give them presentation about End‐to‐End eLearning, Community Action plan, Opit,
Macintosh, second was discussion and question answer session. After lunch the third
session started, I with the help of two guys from Apple gave them hands on training.
Two students couldn’t join the workshop physically but we took them through
videoconference.

End­to­End eLearning presentation
Community Action Plan presentation

The use of Social Media in Learning Environment
Video conferencing through Skype

Question and Answer session
Hands on Training

Rabia Nawaz, Hajra Bibi, Sobia Farid, Hashim Hussain, Alamdar Khan, Yasir Thind, Farhan
Akthar, Waqas Arif. Best Western Hotel Islamabad.
MKFC Stockholm College provided Laptops to the students, so they use it for their own
learning. These laptops are going to help them to use Internet with flexibility even if
they don’t have electricity, and electricity is a big issue now a day in Pakistan. Macbook
has potential and with its additional applications students could use it for social media
and presentations.
During my visit to Pakistan I tried to search Mifi availability in Pakistan, so it could be
used with MKFC Stockholm College approach to our mobile learning. I came to know in
Sweden that Telenor has introduced Mifi in Pakistan but when I met Telenor in Pakistan
they even didn’t know about Mifi. They told me that they have introduced EDGE
technology. Telenor has introduced USB interent and is available throughout Pakistan
with competative prices.
15 June 2009
After my return from Kabul, our teacher training students from Layyah invited me and
arranged a seminar. They invited other teachers, doctors and media person as well in
the seminar. After having information and clear image of MKFC Stockholm College work
approach we started discussion. It was an open debate everybody contributed their
ideas about community action plan and their field of interest. The young doctors were
running a free trust hospital, operated by themselves and with the support of local

people; some of the teachers had done small community projects on environment like
awareness and plantation. They all decided to make a community where they work in
collaboration, share their knowledge and skills to exert a high through put.
Seminar arranged by Teacher Training students, Layyah
Our teacher training students are going to provide them a common platform for meeting
and use of ICT tools, Internet, social media and a local discussion forum.
They have decided that they are going to work in four domains
‐Health awareness at grassroots level in a local community
‐Teacher training
‐Environment
‐Micro Credit
They want to apply MKFC Stockholm College Community Action Plan approach to their
local community. They will start community action plan approach with spreading
information and educating local people about their own problems, health issues and
their remedies. To making it more sustainable they will use the contents provided by
MKFC Stockholm College. These contents consist of written material and short pictorial
stories in their own local language. This approach will help people to remember
because they are not only reading these contents but they will practice in their real
environments.

Group Photo
MKFC Stockholm College Teacher Training students are working in authentic learning
environments, where they not only implement their knowledge in classroom
environment but in their surroundings, in their local communities. They want to become
change maker, a change for better, to strive for better tomorrow than today. They want
grassroots level involvement by the people so they could bring a sustainable change, a
change that should be visible and transparent. They are going to take their first step by
spreading awareness about health, sanitation, environment and micro credit.
I hope these efforts are not going to stop; this seems to be a continuation process for
sustainable development. Throughout my way in Pakistan and Kabul I discussed MKFC
Stockholm College approach with many people and they all were quite impressed and
happy what we are doing there. It gave me a certain kind of inner satisfaction and my
heart is delighted what we have done so far and we are planning to do in near future.