June 16, 2006
Afghan pilgrims-1

The story of an unforgettable journey from Prague to Kabul

I made one of the most fascinating journeys last month. I left the Czech capital Prague on 12th May, planning to visit Pakistan and Afghanistan. The journey was to take place via Frankfurt in Germany.
I was hoping to fly on Pakistan International Airlines from Frankfurt to Lahore, and a Pakistani agent in Frankfurt had promised me he would be waiting for me with my ticket at the airport.
Although I hadn’t paid him yet, the travel agent was true to his word. I found him waiting in front of the PIA check-in counter. He was an open and typically Pakistani gentleman. As other passengers lined up in front of the check-in desks, we chatted about the difficulties of European life. Looking around, it was easy to see that this 8-hour journey was not going to be a run-of-the-mill one, since most of the passengers were Pakistanis.
After checking in, I headed towards the waiting room, but I was stopped unexpectedly at the door by airport officials. They explained that they wanted to weigh my hand baggage once more. I complied, and they weighed it and found my hand baggage over the limit, or at least so they said. It was possible, and so I said okay.
But I changed my mind when I later overheard a conversation between them. This is how it happened.
The two men, both Turkish speakers, were discussing how they could get me to bribe them to let me go in. But they were unaware I also spoke Turkish and that I was listening to their conversation. After a while, one of them came and asked me for 150 euros as a "tax" for excess baggage. I knew this money would go straight into their pockets. "Excuse me?" I said loudly.
They probably hadn't expected a reaction like this, as people in my position mostly choose the path of least resistance -- in other words, bribe the officers to turn a blind eye to any excess baggage weight.
My reaction probably made them understand I was not going to be like their usual victims, so they let me go without making any further demands.
This was not my first journey with PIA, but all the others had been short flights. This was an 8-hour journey, and I have to admit it was not a very pleasant flight. The seats were uncomfortable for such a long journey, flight attendance was very weak and there were only limited options for entertainment. It reminded me of a journey I took on Iran Air in 2005 from Istanbul to Tehran.
We landed at 9:00 am the next day in Lahore, where I stopped for 4 hours to congratulate a friend who had recently got married. On the same day I left for Islamabad, where relatives were waiting for me.
I admire eastern culture for many reasons, not least the tradition of hospitality. As soon as I arrived to Islamabad my phone started to ring. After 'hello,' the second comment of each caller was to ask when I could join them for dinner. I spent many wonderful days socializing with relatives and friends in Pakistan.
As planned, after a few days there, I set off with a friend of mine, Muhammad Nadir, for Afghanistan. We planned to go by road. I knew there were two border crossings from Pakistan into Afghanistan. The main one takes the Khyber Pass at Torkham, linking the Frontier City of Peshawar to Jalalabad. The second one -- less used and carrying a severe security warning -- is at Chaman in Pakistan's Baluchistan province, between Quetta and Kandahar.
Afghanistan's Ariana Airlines also had weekly services linking Kabul with Islamabad and Quetta. Pakistan International Airways were flying from Islamabad to Kabul three times a week, with one flight stopping in Peshawar.
But we chose the Torkham border crossing. From Peshawar it took only 70 minutes to reach because our taxi driver, Malik Afridi, drove at such a furious pace through the dangerous mountains of the Khyber Pass.
Afridi was a tribal man and proud of his background and culture. I was particularly intrigued by one of his tribal traditions called ‘Lukha.’
According to Afridi, ‘Lukha’ is a kind of verbal agreement between tribal leaders. This agreement compels the entire tribe to obey its conditions, and to protect and support the members of the other tribe when they are in need of help -- even to fight and die for each other.
At the end of our short journey it was very hard to make him accept any payment for the taxi ride. He considered us guests and it was against his tradition to take any money.
The Khyber Pass was beautiful, I had seen it from afar once before, from the Pakistani side of the border at Torkum. Now, years later, I was crossing it.
Traveling in the Khyber Pass, straddling the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province, must rank among the most evocative border crossings in the world.
The border -- the Durand Line -- was fixed by the British in 1893 and divided ethnic Pashtuns in two. The resulting “Pashtunistan” issue has influenced relations between the two countries ever since. Today, the tribal Areas of Pakistan remain largely outside federal control, resulting in a completely porous border, and a haven for smugglers, drugs laboratories -- and, now, neo-Taliban fighters and most probably Osama Bin Laden himself.
But it had nothing to do with us. We were accompanied by Afghans and werer wearing typically Afghan clothes, so I more or less passed for a local, even if my typically Turkmen face told a different story.
We were on the border by afternoon of the same day. But this was more like an open bazaar than a border crossing, with customs checks all but non-existent. It was even up to foreign travellers whether they wanted to register or not. After this, we had to deal with money changers and taxi drivers.
There were few transport options. There were different kinds of taxis or local buses, as well as shared taxis to Jalalabad, a journey that takes two hours on one of the best roads in Afghanistan. A further four hours takes you to Kabul on a road that is considerably worse but very beautiful. I understand that nowadays it's possible to travel from Peshawar to Kabul in one day, if you start early enough. We found security on this road to be generally fine, but we were warned that there are occasionally reports of insurgent attacks in the region, especially in the Sarobi area.
After an interesting journey and crossing one of the highest mountains of the world, we finally reached Kabul before sunset. From afar, all we could see was the buslte of traffic and a pall of pollution, but when we entered the city images of the war also began to appear from every corner. There were also signs of the difficult road to reconstruction. The center has some new buildings, but much of the outlying city - home to the majority of Kabulis - is in a ruined or decrepit state. Kabul buzzed as a hippy hang-out on the old overland trail, developed a siege mentality during the Soviet War, was half-destroyed by the mujahideen, and suffered silently under the Taliban. But now I was witness to the fact that life has returned, and Kabul is struggling to return to its old character.
Dear readers, in the next part of my journey I will lead you to a beautiful heaven in the heart of one of the most destructive war zones ever.