Holiday in Afghanistan
By Jessica Mudditt • September 13, 2009 @00:10 • 2,237 words

In the winter of 2009 an Australian primary school teacher dared to visit Afghanistan as a tourist. In this interview, Nick Buckley, 29, provides a glimpse of the other side of Afghanistan – a country still celebrating lavish weddings, and where men get drunk and watch Chuck Norris films.

This is not to say it’s a picture of calm or frivolity Nick presents – some of his experiences were downright terrifying, as he is the first to admit. Yet in speaking about his visit as an ordinary punter, Nick allows us to gain a fuller picture of a country that is almost always discussed in military terms.

I interviewed Nick before he left and shortly after he returned.

INTERVIEW ONE: PRIOR TO DEPARTURE

Jessica: When did you first have the idea of going to Afghanistan?

Nick: It was about eight years ago, when I started reading books on the region. I had been reading a book about India and there was something in it about the Pashtuns, Afghanistan’s major ethnic group. And so I started reading books about them.

Jessica: How are you going to stay safe?

Nick: I’ll have to keep a fairly low profile and try to blend in. But you never really can blend in, can you? I’ll wear the shalwar kameez [traditional dress] I bought in Pakistan on a previous trip. I’m also growing a beard but it’s taking longer than I hoped. I’ve never had facial hair beyond a day and a half so I had no idea of the amount of time it takes to grow.

Jessica: Safely assuming there’s no backpacker scene, where will you stay?

Nick: I have a contact in Melbourne who worked for an NGO in Afghanistan – she put me in touch with a couple of New Zealanders she worked with. They now have their own security company and I’ll stay with them in an apartment in Kabul.

Jessica: How safe – or rather, unsafe – is Afghanistan at the moment?

Nick: My contact brought over her laptop to show me a ‘safety map’ she made when working there in 2007. Red means really bad, orange is getting bad, and green is relatively safe. In 2007, the bottom half was red and the top half was green with some orange patches. Now it’s basically red everywhere with orange in some places.

My contact told me that if I’m recognised as a Westerner by the wrong person, I’ll be taken to the nearest kidnapper and sold to the highest bidder.

Jessica: Is your girlfriend really worried about you?

Nick: No, she’s been supportive. I’m pretty lucky to have her. She’s fairly well travelled herself – she just came back from a four month trip through West Africa – from Morocco, all the way to Nigeria, through some fairly hairy countries. She’s not scared of going to Afghanistan – she’d be up to it. But the idea of travelling as a woman in that part of the world doesn’t appeal to her.

Jessica: Are there any particular dangers during winter?

Nick: During winter the Taliban put down their arms and sort of… have a holiday. [Muted laughter] So the risk of bombings is relatively low. But winter is still a dangerous time to visit. There’s a lot of banditry because there’s not a lot of food around. So the risk of being kidnapped is very high.

Jessica: What are the costs of this trip like?

Nick: They’re fairly high. Accommodation is very expensive, for that part of the world anyway. It’s $10 minimum per night and for anything decent, $30 upwards. But I’ll be staying with the Kiwis and I’ll pay my share of the board.

However street food and public transport is really cheap – though public transport is a quite risky. I’ve heard stories of bus drivers driving ‘desirable people’ to the closest kidnapper, who then sells them to the highest bidder.

Jessica: Are you scared?

Nick: No, I’m not actually. It’s a funny thing – I was watching one of those foreign correspondent shows last week. It was about Guatemala – which is in a similar situation to Afghanistan in terms of the banditry. I was sitting there watching it and I found myself getting nervous. But that was because I know nothing about Guatemala and so I felt totally vulnerable.

The reason I’m not nervous about going to Afghanistan is because I feel like I know that part of that world from previous trips and I have done loads of reading.

I feel as ready as I can be and I’m excited.

Jessica: Have fun Nick.



INTERVIEW 2: AFTER AFGHANISTAN

Jessica: So, what was it like?

Nick: It’s a fucking crazy country so it was a pretty action-packed trip. Usually when I’m writing travel emails I have to think hard of stuff to say. In Afghanistan I’d be on the internet for two hours because so many things happened in one day.

Jessica: Let’s start at the beginning.

Nick: The Afghan guys who picked me up from the airport told me we were going straight to a wedding. They also told me straight-off that it was really important for me not to talk in public. They said they had guns but would prefer to avoid a shoot-out if there was an attempted kidnapping. Now I know this sounds pretty grim, so I hasten to add that I met a lot of foreigners there who communicate with locals on a daily basis. These guys just didn’t want me to take any chances.

Jessica: What’s an Afghan wedding like?

Nick: The room was the size of a huge basketball court – I think there were around 1000 guests. It was a real mixture of people – some were wearing jeans, others were in traditional dress. It was segregated – a wooden screen divided the room. The young kids were peeping through at the women.

Jessica: What sort of entertainment was provided?

Nick: There was a cool Afghan band with a keyboard player and a singer. The singer was really good. After a set he said: “Here is my SMS – vote for me on Afghan Idol!” It was hilarious.

Jessica: Would it be correct to assume there wasn’t any alcohol?

Nick: None was served, but one of the Afghan guys I was with was absolutely smashed. He was talking loudly and inappropriately and people were turning their heads to stare. My friend Habib told him to pull himself together. After that he disappeared, but before he did, he walked into a curtain – thinking it was a door – and fell over. At 3am Habib got a call from the drunk guy saying he’d gone out the back and fallen asleep in the kitchen. He wanted to be picked up!

Jessica: What else did you do?

Nick: I visited the infamous Kabul Zoo. I managed to slide through for the Afghan admission price that was less than a tenth of the foreigner price! The animals are kept in tiny concrete cages but I was told they are a vast improvement on what was in place during the civil war and Taliban days.

There was a classic sign on the bear cage depicting a caged human being taunted by animals. The meaning clearly went over the head of three young men who were hurling pieces of ice at the sleeping lions. Afghanis are somehow the most caring and most ruthless people on earth… at the same time.

Jessica: Was it hard to maintain your energy with danger all around?

Nick: Yes and no. I was lucky to have a really secure place in Kabul, in a good suburb. I could relax when I was inside. It was actually the suburb where the house in ‘The Kite Runner’ was set and the house was absolutely enormous. There were cleaners, cooks, a gym and 24 hour electricity. There were military checkpoints on every street corner, and two police boom gates on the tiny 100m street.

Jessica: What’s the story of the guy you stayed with?

Nick: He’s a tough guy and he’s been in the military for 20 years. The job he has is incredibly dangerous. He owns a company which transports important people around Afghanistan, usually in an armoured vehicle with at least three people. The important person sits in the middle of the backseat, with two shooters on either side. There is usually an Afghan driver, because they know the roads best, and someone monitoring the radio.

Jessica: What were the ex-pats like?

Nick: Everybody I met was there for work and few showed any interest in the culture or language. Some spoke about the people and the situation in a derogatory way. They seemed bitter and burnt out.

Jessica: Was there any nightlife?

Nick: I went to an ex-pat bar – now that was an experience. The security was unbelievable. The unmarked bar was tucked away down a quiet street with boom-gates, and to enter you had to show ID to Kalashnikov-clad guards who unlocked an armoured door. The door led to another security checkpoint and eventually into a six metre walled bar. This place would be an absolute goldmine for any would-be kidnappers, so it’s no surprise that security is so tight.

I also spent an evening in a charming rural mud-brick house with a friend of Habib’s. We ate, drank vodka and watched a bad Chuck Norris action film – you know the type – when America saves the world from the bad guys. Watching it inevitably turned into a discussion about why the ‘war on terror’ has gone wrong. Mohamed, who owned the house, said that he feels like a slave in his own country. He complained of American soldiers barging into peoples’ homes without respecting the customs, demanding all vehicles stop and wait by the side of the road when a convoy passes, and the fact that they are generally trigger-happy. And of course there are the careless air-strikes that result in the deaths of civilians – what the west calls “collateral damage.”

Jessica: Were there any annoyances?

Nick: I’m going to go out on a limb and say that Kabul has the worst traffic in the world. It’s not so much the volume – though there is plenty of that – but rather the aggressive, reckless way that Afghans drive. When talking about the dangers of Afghanistan, people tend to think of suicide bombs, robbery and kidnappings, but I believe the number one danger is the traffic.

Jessica: Did you have any scrapes?



Nick: We had an accident while trying to dodge knee-deep potholes in heavy snow. When Habib jumped out and began shouting in the middle of a roundabout, I suddenly remembered my contact’s parting words – a common kidnapping tactic is to crash into the target car. As it turned out it was a legitimate accident, but it gave me the shivers.

Jessica: What was your scariest experience?

Nick: Landing in Kabul. I honestly thought I was going to die. The plane was a 1972, ex-Air India 727 relic that was probably better placed in a museum than the tarmac. The plane came down on one wheel, bounced, and started to spin around. The pilot eventually regained control but it took a kilometre to slow down. We had to take off again to land properly and I thought we were going to run out of runway.

Jessica: Sounds pretty horrible…

Nick: Oh and there was also two earthquakes in two days. The first had a magnitude of 5.8 and the next one was 6. The epicentre was about 300km north of Kabul, in the Hindu Kush mountains, but they still packed enough punch to shake the house violently and many Kabulis ran onto the streets. Considering the construction standards (or lack of) it’s hardly surprising. When the first one happened I thought a bomb had gone off.

Jessica: Did you manage to get out of Kabul?

Nick: I went on a stunning overnight trip to the decidedly dodgy city of Jalalabad, which is near the Pakistan border. The region is extremely dangerous but as it is the ‘real Afghanistan’ I was so desperate to see, I couldn’t pass up the offer.

The mountain road to Jalalabad passes just 5km from Tora Bora, which is Osama’s last known hideout. It is known Taliban country so I was keeping a low profile. Before we even made it half-way we’d passed three incinerated trucks. They had been rocketed by the Taliban.

Jessica: Sounds scary.

What were your impressions of the Afghan people?

Nick: They are amazing people, with amazing hospitality, and they put their life on the line for you. I was welcomed with open arms.

But Afghans take an ‘inshallah’ [‘God willing’] attitude to life. They believe it is God’s will if they die. It is as though they are immune to danger.

Jessica: Did you blend in alright?

Nick: I walked around the bazaar buying souvenirs and nobody seemed to notice.

Jessica: How did you buy things without talking and giving yourself away?

Nick: I went with one of my Afghan friends and I let him do the talking. I would catch his eye when I saw something I liked. He would then nod at me, duck into the shop, barter, and come out, mumbling the amount under his breath. If I was happy with the price, my friend would go back inside and buy it.

Jessica: Would you return to Afghanistan?

Nick: Yes. I’d really like to see the north and visit the areas bordering Tajikistan and Pakistan. But at the moment there’s not a lot of point to travelling because everything is so restricted.

Jessica: Would you consider a holiday in Iraq?

Nick: No. I met an American guy who works in Iraq and was looking to extend his company in Afghanistan. He said being in Afghanistan was like being on holiday.

Jessica: Well I’m glad that you had a nice holiday in Afghanistan