For the last half hour or so it took us to get into Kabul, we sat in silence. The engine roar of the police truck, along with the circumstances that had put us into the back of the truck, made talking seem superfluous. I was sitting at the tailgate, Afghan Police in the cabin and the only other foreigners who had been on the bus, two guys from Mauritius, sat alongside us.
A large piece of the mostly shredded truck canvas canopy was flapping crazily behind me until one of the Mauritians managed to gallantly put his back against it. I had a good view behind in the moonlit night. There was nothing to see but the mesmerising sight of two tyre tracks marking our ever-receding trail in the snow.
I knew nothing of the accident until I was awoken by the blaring of the bus horn. From my third row seat, the driver was clearly visible slumped motionless over the horn. My knee hurt as the impact had thrown me forward. That habit of sleeping with knees up on the back of the seat in front perhaps saved my face. People who were seated in the aisles were now either nursing split lips or on the floor amongst the litter of pomegranate skins spat out along the journey by most of the passengers.
Everyone except the unconscious driver piled out into the snow to survey the scene. A truck was stopped right across the road. No lights. Our driver had only just managed to avert a full head on collision on the icy night road. His side of the bus front took the full impact though, totally jamming him in and he lay heavily across the still blaring horn. The back of the bus had swung around into a snow filled ditch.
Before anyone could do anything, another bus appeared out of the darkness and slammed directly into the truck. It had perhaps seen the meagre lights from our bus and so had managed to slow down a lot more. Only the radiator was smashed. Amazingly, we had all somehow chosen not to stand on the road.
With luggage on top, we had just one sleeping bag in the cabin between us, so a return to the bus was the best option in the freezing night. This was not a modern bus. Our choice of bus was based on a decision to save 50 cents in travel costs (enough to pay for a pretty good meal). Think ancient school bus with hard seats that have low hard backs, it was of course unheated, and the windows were dodgy. This was normal travel mode right across Asia, and we had set out unblinkingly at the crack of dawn on our journey from Herat in this contraption, the only females on the bus.
We had arrived in Herat via the standard travel arrangements of the times. A bus out of Mashhad took us east to the Iranian border. Leaving Iran was a mere formality. Display cabinets were set up to entertain us during this process. They exhibited the variety of smuggling options that previous unfortunate travellers had used to try to get their stash, mostly hash, out of Afghanistan and into Iran.
It was about half a kilometre walk from the Iranian border post to the point where minibuses waited to be filled before proceeding to the Afghan border post. The top of our bus was laden almost beyond belief with what seemed to be straw – it wafted down for the entire journey. The “conductor” made the journey standing on the ladder at the back so would have spent the entire journey swallowing and inhaling straw.
Our fellow travellers, all locals except for us and the two guys from Mauritius, were in a hurry, so after much haggling, we all agreed to pay extra to get under way before the bus was full. A fee to the border and a separate fee into Herat. Cars crossing the border from Iran had to park over a pit for a thorough search underneath and then everything inside the car was pulled out and searched. It was much less painful for us in the minibus, apart from the weird failure of not having had our vaccination certificates stamped by the Health Officer resulting in a mad run back to get this rectified.
And so it happened that we left Herat on a particular day on a particular bus to keep heading further east to Kabul with the bus company advising an estimated arrival time of 9 pm. There were just three break stops, each at very interesting places. However, the food looked incredibly unhygienic, so fruit and stale Iranian bread provided our sustenance over the long journey. Even though the bus travelled at a good clip, it finally dawned on we four foreigners that our arrival was going to be closer to midnight, which is why we had all settled down to sleep.
Our accident appeared to us to be in the middle of nowhere, but police arrived on the scene in a relatively short space of time, under an hour. The driver was taken away. After much discussion, we were all ordered out of the bus and an attempt was made to move the truck. This was a fruitless exercise so back into the bus we piled. Much more chatter and after about 2 hours in all, an instruction in the first English that had been spoken all night, “Ok, come on”.
We four foreigners were to get into the back of a truck escorted by three rifle bearing Afghan policeman who were well rugged up against the cold. Naturally, every Afghan on the bus seeing this unfold started to cram into the truck as well. No dice. The sardine pack that had quickly developed in the back of the smallish truck had to slide back out just as quickly and so we four privileged foreigners headed off leaving the locals to cool their heels in the freezing night.
The saga continued as our truck kept stopping along the way for our police to converse with the police in the convoy car driving in with us to Kabul. Perhaps it was just a warmup stop. The green powder went under the tongue and was then spat out again after some minutes.
We four were chilled to the bone and so dog tired we just sat and observed, grateful we were not still in the crowd left behind back at the bus.
Eventually we arrived at the closest police station on the outskirts of Kabul. It was about 2 am. From there a taxi was to drive us to our hotel. Unable to find our chosen cheapie hotel, the driver took us to a “posh” place. It was just a newly constructed (plywood springs to mind), very basic travellers stop so guess it had not yet hit the travel grapevine in a big way.
Like all destinations anywhere in the world, but especially on the overland trail, arrival in a new place not only marked the chance for new discoveries, but it was the ritual of story sharing and the exchange of current news of the road ahead that enriched the whole experience. That was how we found out from Germans travelling the night after us that there were now three abandoned buses at the accident site.
When you have been on the road for a long time, it is amazing how delicious a fillet steak and vegies followed by apple or lemon meringue pie can taste. Our favourite restaurant featured local musicians and here we enjoyed our first real taste of that part of Afghan culture. Kabul was quite something on the trail in those days.
A friendly local drove us to a lookout over the city, we got caught out by the lads running the shoeshine scam, had a taxi drive us for miles in a fruitless search for the camel market, resisted what we thought was an exorbitant price for lapis lazuli (regret that one) and wandered all over the city fascinated by a way of life unseen in our years of travels.
The view from the back of the police truck over that final drive into Kabul remains one of those very vivid travel memories. Despite the engine noise, grinding gears and the wildly flapping canvas, the image of the endless tyre tracks in the glistening snow created a sense of deep stillness in my doubtless slightly chilled brain. It still has the power to pull me right back to that night and to reflect on what could have been for Afghanistan.
Lorna On The Loose 