There is certainly a thrill setting forth into a new country, this time from the back of a tonga, or horse drawn cart, trotting though the streets of Lahore, the second largest city to Islamabad. I stare in awe at a magnificent pink Badshahi Mosque (c.1674)
next to the old city fort, dreaming of the Mughal empire. Pakistani soldiers snappily changing the guard at the tomb of a local hero, and the bugler plays a spine chilling last post. At the end of the performance I felt like applauding. Climbing one of the minarets soaring about 50 metres above this ancient city - my attempts at a call to prayer were not heeded by the faithful. Groups of wrestlers in a dust pit entertain the curious. Cricket games everywhere. Australia is well known by the average Pakistani, Indian or Sri Lankan – if only for our cricket. “Australia? Ah! Chappell! Thompson! Lillie! Packer!” I wish I knew a little more a bout cricket to have a more meaningful dialogue with the locals. That was my first day in Pakistan.The other day was spent in a tortuous bus trip to Peshawar, there to collect some redirected mail, and a visa for Afghanistan. “You have some mail for me?” No.” “You’re sure?” “Yes.” “You must have some letters for me!” (desultory search) “No.” Refusing to succumb to bribing him, I jumped across the counter and rummaged through his stack of mail, finding no less than 8 letters. “What are these then?” (shrug). Patently I was not in a position to rely on him for any useful information I was seeking. Normally, in this part of the world, you ask for information from three different people, then take as a high chance the one differing opinion….
New Year’s Eve in Pakistan ain’t very exciting – liquor is almost impossible to get, and the Muslims are not that interested in celebrating this occasion. The government steadfastly continues with the Islamisation of the country – outlawing interest on loans, decreeing hours for praying, enforcing shariah law. Soon, some say, it will be illegal to me a non-Muslim. Now that is scary.
So a group of us whooped it up a bit with the help of some potent local weed, and ventured out of our cheap hotel into a nearby carnival, with coloured lights, food stalls and rides, and maybe a hundred thousand people. But we soon realized the hundred thousand people were all male people. Mainly young testosterone charged males. The only girl with us, although suitably attired from head to foot, became the object of much unwanted attention, and soon started to get groped and mauled, and we found ourselves being crushed by the curious mob as we formed a shield around our female colleague and frantically escaped back to hotel. A stupid thing for us to do. Now that was scary, too!
1/1/79 The best way of seeing the historic Khyber Pass is from the roof top of the crowded bus, lying prone as possible, with a borrowed Muslim cap, while eyeing the glint of the rifles of the Pathan tribesmen scattered along the rocky ridges high above. It is easy to imagine the many battles fought here – every building seems to be a mud hut with gun turrets and rifle slots – ruins of old forts still bearing the British regimental plaques – its strategic military value is obvious.
We reach the last town in Pakistan and catch a grossly overloaded mini-truck down to the actual border, where we were besieged by money changers. One taxi that passed us was a battered old yank tank Chevrolet – I counted eleven people on the roof and five in the boot. We said goodbye to a friendly old Pakistani who once was a gardener for the British – now he is a hashish gardener, an arms dealer and smuggles suspicious white powder. We decline his polite invitation to his home for a cup of tea – we were running a little late. We walk across the border into another country, and another entirely different world – Afghanistan.It’s the omnipresent soldier looking distinctly Russian, and the red flags and political banners everywhere that leaves me a little uneasy. Frequent searches on the bus journeys, and cars with blaring loudspeakers, and radio programs of cheering political rallies remind us that it was only several months ago that the Russian-backed coup took place.
But the Afghani people shine through, very different to the Pakistanis, heads held high, direct eye contact, strangely aloof and often smiling (even when being searched). After the third checkpoint from the border, everyone in the bus relaxed, and out came all the radios to be tested and all the other smuggled goods to be compared. (The kids had them hidden during the searches.) Amazing facial characteristics on these ancient people, fairer skinned, lined, weather-beaten, grey beards.
They spit their betel and tobacco juice on the floor of the luxury (Russian donated) bus which was speeding along the (American built) highway winding through staggeringly beautiful scenery: blue skies, rolling purple hills with distant snow caps, nearby fields glowing red and gold, arid rocky hills suddenly yielding to fertile fields of citrus groves, with eucalyptus wind breaks. (There are also many eucalyptus plantations in Pakistan). Then treeless mountains, and eerie gorges, and the road switches back through a series of tunnels, climbing to the capital city of Kabul at 6000 feet. And it’s cold in Kabul!Delicious Afghani bread, flat and oval shaped, hauled from an oven pit in the floor, eaten with kebab and perfect black tea. Much better than the cardboard tasting chapattis and sickly sweet tea of Pakistan. A tall, striking Afghani with turban and beard, leather and sheepskin embroidered coat – a perfect picture (which I later found on a postcard), selling mandarins from a big basket on the back of his mule. Kabul is a relatively modern city with busy shops, pleasing architecture of government of public buildings, well maintained parks and fashionable young in their winter coats and excellent boots – yet there are primitive tribes only a short distance away with mud huts, poor nutrition, little or no health services, no education; and camels the main means of transportation to the more progressive city.
News from Iran is more than disturbing – with the Shah being imminently deposed. Some travellers say “no problems” with the borders occasionally opening. I get a visa just in case.
A wonderful excursion up north to Bamiyan at the base of the Hindu Kush where, despite the ravages of time there still exists a Buddhist enclave; the most striking evidence being the two enormous statues carved out of the cliff dated back to the 5th century. Unfortunately the faces of the Buddhas were destroyed long ago by some zealous Islam marauder. You can climb up the 50 metres by means of intricate tunnels and caves to the head of the Buddha from where you can gaze over the remarkable valley, once guarded by the “Red City” now in ruins, but once a natural fort, with caves carved into the cliffs. You can breathe history.
[Postscript: To world wide outrage, the Taliban dynamited the monuments in March 2001 claiming that all statues were false idols and contrary to their Islamic beliefs. Eight months later the town of Bamiyan was totally destroyed by the Taliban - hundreds were killed.]
The bus trip to and from Bamiyan is so difficult to describe in words – I ached for a camera. Bright blue cloudless skies against high rugged craggy ridges – it would trump even a child’s fertile imagination. Mountains stark and crumpled, and folded and soaring with no repeated form, no repeated colour. And the colours competed and harmonized – swirling and merging in the same plane with kaleidoscopic effects resembling a topographical map with extreme variation as you’d see in a better atlas. And no, I hadn’t been smoking anything funny. Some hills resembled old marble cake. Some looked like overcooked cracked
chocolate cake, with globs of white icing dripping down, as snow melted only to refreeze as ice-flows in the sunless valleys below. Other ranges seem to have been constructed with an intricate wire framework over which was draped velvet of ivory, pale olive green and grey, sheening from various angles. And not a tree to be seen! Since leaving the Oxus plain we had risen about 6000 feet and the colours of this extraordinary valley with its cliffs of rhubarb red, its indigo peaks roofed in glittering snow and its new-sprung corn of harsh electric green, shone doubly brilliant in the clear mountain air. - Robert Byron, “The Road to Oxiana”.The flat top mud buildings blend into vast ochre coloured rocky hills, or stand silent sentinel on top of what looks like a huge pile of blue metal gravel. Some buildings are simply caves hollowed out of a pink “ant hill”, others mini forts with towers and gun turrets (just like traditional sand castles) with 3 metre high earth and stone walls as protection from the nothing desert stretching in all directions. Terrifyingly beautiful – how could people live here? But they do – you see them as fellow passengers, dusty, friendly yet aloof. But I wish they wouldn’t spit on the floor of the bus! You see them with their shaggy sheep in the middle of nowhere, turbaned and clutching their transistor radio in a home made leather case, gaily decorated with beautiful things such as turquoise butterflies. I wish I could speak Pharsee.
Back in Kabul again, with live Afghani music from two weird characters in a restaurant serving kababs and nan and chocolate pudding! They had to compete with the blaring TV sprouting propaganda, necessary with the several Russian soldiers present. Later that night, the sheer incongruity of listening to a local radio special of Billie Holliday as she wailed the blues. Where was I? The cheap hotel implores me “Please do not clean your shoes with the sheets”, a sign which previous lodgers had obviously ignored. The linen smelled of camels – again I am thankful that I lugged my sleeping bag through the tropics. In the streets, men carry beautiful Persian rugs over their shoulders mercifully not badgering me to buy (perhaps it is illegal), but making it quite obvious that they have some goodies to sell off the main road. I watch carpets getting “antiqued” as they lay on muddy street. They also spread out over the footpaths for pedestrians to walk over in their muddy shoes. It seems such a waste – but it seems people don’t prefer buying NEW Persian rugs. I learn that Persian carpets are never perfect, always there exists a built in flaw – otherwise it would be a sacrilege in Islam. Nothing man-made can rival that of the Creator.
7/1/1979 I decided to get to Herat, the last major city before Iran to discover the truth about how dangerous Iran is. You’d think a 12 hour trip across the “desert of death” in an air conditioned Mercedes bus would be boring. Not so! I took some notes of this remarkable desert experience:
- The air horns developed laryngitis; even the camels seemed to smile at their comical sound.
- Graveyards of sharp jagged rocks pointing up, aligned to Mecca - how old are some of these graves?
- I watch a dark blob on the desert horizon – the eyes start playing tricks – it seems to be moving so fast. I ponder futilely on the laws of relativity. It turns out to be a clump of camels grazing (?) not so far away.
- A man walks out of the desert to greet another. Where has he come from?
- Again, the amazing mountains soaring out of the plain, which has now become a brown sea, our bus a ship, and the mountains huge distant volcanic islands, one might see in the South Pacific.
- When leaving Kabul at sunrise, the snow streaked mountains resemble fiery hot coals in white ash.
- We come to an oasis with cool whispering pines, and irrigated fields, and I had a desultory chat with a seated camel.
- Within the air-conditioned bus there is no indication of the desert wind – no clouds, no vegetation, no dust. But when we get out for pee-stop, we almost get blown away.
- At another stop for an unhygienic lunch, I find that the toilet at the back of the shop is unique – it gets flushed by the wind, but in the wrong direction – the paper flies back up the hole! (Toilet paper has its own currency for backpackers).
- “Kabul Trots” are not pleasant.
- At a checkpoint, some locals appear with some red carrots for sale. Through a translator, I asked where they were grown. “Over there” is the proud reply as he grins – pointing out into the desert.
- I bargained for 1kg of mandarins for about 40 cents, succulent and delicious, weighed out with a desert rock.
- The empty seat beside me suddenly becomes occupied by an Afghan, who collapses in a cloud of dust, smelling
of sweat and camels and something strange – ah! Soap! He ignores me for a while, seated cross-legged. (Sensible, my toes are freezing!) Then turns and examines me at close quarters with an enormous smile, like Edna Everage’s “Hello, we have a little stranger in our midst!” “Salaam!” I venture. A scowl. End of conversation for 500km. Perhaps I shouldn’t have given him the “thumbs up” sign. I learn later it is an obscene gesture.
- Civilised locals on this bus. They carry their own spittoons for their chewing tobacco, which resembles powdered spinach.
- The stop lights for the bus are duplicated in a vase of plastic flowers on the dashboard, which lights up each time we brake.
- There are pee stops and there are prayer stops. It’s decidedly bad form to get out to pee at a prayer stop.
- The bus segregates the men from the women at toilet stops, which is fairly useless in the desert when both sides are squatting. The women use their burquas in this situation to advantage.
- A bottle of coke, with Arabic script, costs 25 cents, in the middle of nowhere.
9/1/1979 The main purpose of traveling to Herat was to determine first hand the state of the Iran situation. The borders remain open but the information is contradictory and we depend mainly on the broadcasts from the BBC world service. There are not many travelers, particularly going into Iran. The tourist places of this lovely city are nearly deserted. Two girls, an Australian and an American folk singer tell of their harrowing flight from Mashed (the holy city, just across the border) where they were trapped during the “massacre” a few days earlier. They obtained a jeep lift with the assistance of the Afghan embassy, but got caught in the mobs running in the opposite direction. As the bullets were flying, one of the girls said that the main thought was “I must get my fringe cut!” All services are crippled. Strikes have stopped the trains. Diesel and fuel are hardly available. Mobs are attacking buses looking for foreigners – one guy recounted how he had to lie on the bus floor under blankets and luggage to get through three road blocks before reaching the border. A Japanese returns to Herat stating that it was impossible to get through to Turkey. I meet seven American teachers evacuated from Mashed who told me of the terror of seeing hospitals being attacked and of being unable to move from their rooms during the past week. Prices for all goods and services are going sky high, shops are closed, and food is scarce. Despite the news that the Shah has decided to step down and leave, the situation across the whole country is wildly unpredictable. All who have been there advise that it would be foolish to enter, and to fly over Iran if possible. Regretfully I accepted their advice and decide to backtrack to Delhi where, perhaps, I can get a cheap flight to Athens, or even London. My travel plans were being thwarted!
Two other noticeable news items on the BBC: some guerrilla activity against the Afghan government troops; Turkey is having some trouble resulting in martial law – there were a couple of serious train accidents, believed to be sabotage. It seems to be the wrong part of the world to be in just now. And it’s freezing in eastern Turkey as the winter winds come whipping down from Siberia. Another attraction for returning to Kabul for a few days was to re-establish contact with a fascinating prince from Pakistan, who was on a mission to check on his people.
On the last night in Herat I listen, enchanted, to some beautiful Persian singing, a tenor sliding and warbling, echoed by exquisite violin playing. I was wistfully lost in a beautiful but wild place.
[Postscript: Even before the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan at the end of 1979, there was a substantial presence of Soviet advisors in Herat with their families. From 10 to 20 March 1979 the army in Herat under the control of Ismail Khan mutinied and 350 Soviet citizens were killed. The Soviets bombed the city, causing massive destruction and thousands of deaths and it was recaptured with tanks and paratroopers.]
Some minor problems: I nearly miss the early morning bus because my watch battery went flat; the boot repairer tries to cheat me; the hotel staff can only be suspected of stealing my prized bamboo flute I’ve had since Java. Life can be awful difficult sometimes….
Returning to Kabul via Kandahar and the “desert of death” and the weather gradually worsens as we progress. I’ve never been in a snowstorm before, let alone in the middle of an Afghani desert. The bus ticket seller tells me that he was recently a teacher until the new regime instructs him he has to teach propaganda and anti US doctrine. And so now he’s trying to save up enough money to
flee to Pakistan (illegally) where he might be able to buy a passport. Another potential refugee was the hotel manager who was studying in London and had returned for a short holiday only to find that he is no longer entitled to a passport. I predict that there will be more trouble in Afghanistan (and Iran and Turkey), before the year finishes.I feel somewhat foolish to learn that the Pakistani Prince I referred to earlier had disappeared from Kabul and that the incredible stories he related were most probably fabricated from a vivid imagination. How gullible was I ! At least I wasn’t robbed. Nevertheless, I was later able to establish (for a short time) letter contact with him.
16/1/1979 Back tracking seems to take longer. The Khyber Pass with its forts in the rain somehow seemed less menacing, particular when noticing an occasional TV antennae sticking out of the mud roof. I espy a PHYSCHIATRIST sign on a shop at the entrance of the Pass – some proof perhaps, that my suspicions they are all crazy around here are true.
Four of us find ourselves guest of the Press Club in Peshawar – unique for a Press Club in that there was no alcohol available. We just wandered in after finding the next door museum closed, and volunteered to the journalists all the inside information we had experienced in Afghanistan. Censorship and martial law still exists in Pakistan much to the (private) frustration of its Press. A man sells medicine made from lizards (a couple of stuffed, and freshly killed specimens on the footpath). Cures are all embracing, from piles to toothache. Didn’t buy any, though, although I suffered from both!
19/1/1979 Across the Indian border to Amritsar, and then a tortuous train journey back to Delhi. A group of us wondered why our compartment wasn’t so crowded. It was in the last half of the train, which divided in two in the middle of the night. So we were left stranded in a marshalling yard for about10 hours.
Things weren’t turning out well at all. All mail had been continued to be redirected to Pakistan, I missed the San Michel travel agent who had flown especially from Australia to assist those of us trying to make alternatives to Iran – its seems I would have had to go back to Kabul! From there a special $190 flight to Istanbul (as opposed to $441 now facing me) had been arranged. Ah woe! I decide instead to try and catch a boat from Bombay to catch up with my sister and family who had just started a missionary position in Nairobi, Kenya.
The boat from Bombay to Mombasa has ceased service 2 years ago. So I secured the cheapest flight (The Democratic Republic of Yemen Airlines) to Nairobi – but after many stops in strange and dangerous places, the plane only got as far as Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and stopped. It was the equivalent of May Day, and the socialist processions had just ended, and red flags festooned the streets. Ethiopians are the most beautiful people. I shared a hotel room with a devotee of Ravi Shankar who performed for me on his sitar most of the night – I wished I had a and was able to play it! The next day I arrived in Nairobi, and stayed for one night in a rat infested YMCA room, before knocking unannounced on the door of my sister. I stayed in Nairobi for six years.
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