This blog is written by Thomas Schwarz, director of media for CARE Germany, who recently visited Pakistan

Today I visited a place close to Mardan, where tens of thousands took refuge from the ongoing fighting in Dir, Buner and the village of Swat.

Their overall situation is horrible. Alongside the national road N45 more than 100 families are living without shelter on an area of less than five kilometres.

While there is a canal with dirty water running on one side of the road, there is a railway line and the N45 on the other. It is noisy and very hot.

The refugees tell me that they cannot go to one of the camps since they do not want to leave their animals behind. They took their cows, goats, sheep and chicken with them. But since more than 10,000 people are living together in these camps in small tents, there is no room for animals.

Animals are drinking out of the dirty and hazy water of the canal. I observed a little girl sitting on top of a big black cow, washing it. Children are running around and playing close to the cow. They are washing themselves with the water of the canal - and they are also drinking this water.

"We only want to go home again"

Somewhere on this road of poverty we meet Khan Zada and his three children. He is lovingly taking care of them. All three of them are very different. Menaz, an extremely beautiful girl, seems to be very confident of herself, in contrast to her brother Shahzad, who is a bit unsure, anxious and serious. After a short period of getting to know each other he loosens up and starts joking around. Menaz holds the smallest child, another daughter of Khan in her arms.

"We just want to go back home", Khan says. He prays for "everlasting peace" so that he and his family can all go back to where they came from. They want to go on living as usual. "But only Allah knows when this will be."

While he is telling me his story, we are standing in his "new home". It is a poorly equipped hut without a roof. The bottom is a carpet of grass, one wall is totally missing. They provisionally protect themselves with blankets and fabrics. The noise of the street does not even come to a halt at night.

For the women in particular this dwelling constitutes a very unworthy situation. In their tradition they rarely show themselves in public. Here on N45 there is hardly any sealing-off from the street. When I came to visit the Khan's family, his wife left to visit some girl friends in another "home".

A kind of farm without animals is the place where they get water to drink. Since there are not enough buckets, they have to go back and forth a lot. However, it is now most important that they have enough tents in order to be shielded from the extreme heat as well as from the street. First and foremost the women have to be able to keep their intimacy and privacy.

When I ask the children what they are doing the whole day, they react quite ashamed to this seemingly harmless question. It is not only the fact that a white man is talking to them that makes them blush. They also do not really know how and what to respond.

"Well", some of them say. "We are playing together". Being curious I want to know about the games they play. "Well, playing", they simply answer and smile. They giggle and leave. Most of the things they possessed before their flight they had to leave behind. This includes their working material for school, books and writing material. "I would prefer to go to school than stay here", a boy of nine or ten years says.

The refugees stay in between the canal with the dirty water on their left hand side, the railway line and the national road on the right. This place has also been the new home of Khan Zada, Menaz and Shahzad for the last couple of weeks. They are still waiting for tents to stay in. In a few days we will supply them with at least some so that they will have a protective shelter.

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