AN UNFORGETTABLE TRIP "Plane to Kabul"

I was lucky to visit Afghanisthan recently. I had the most unbelievable trip to Faizabad, Bharak and Jurm , on a project as a media consultant , for capacity building of local journalists. You are on the third page of my diary of that unforgettable trip.

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Aboard KAM 006 I made friends with my fellow passenger, a middle aged Tajik business man. He had migrated to Washington during the Taliban regime and returned only a couple of years ago to get hold of the family business of electrical works. For the sake of safety and a certain lifestyle that they were used abroad, his wife and two children stayed in Dubai while he travels every two weeks. Sometimes his family would also accompany him (more than three times a year) and they apparently all love to go to Herat where they have brothers and sisters and cousins galore all living under the same roof in a palatial house built by his father. “No place is like home" my friend fondly claimed and even extended a warm invitation to come and stay with them in Herat.” We have our own hotel too. You can be my guest. You don't have to pay" he added.

My Tajik friend has 11 brothers from three different mothers all happily settled in the same house but he confessedin his broken English and a naughty glint in his eye,(when asked if he hadplans to take one more wife), "I can handle only one."

Meanwhile smart Afghan girls, surprisingly without any head-gear, served us our drinks and meal. This is the first time after Taleban rule that girls have come out to seek employment and to be an air attendant must have needed a lot of courage and family support I imagined. “They are without a head cover. Isn’t that disallowed in your country?” Most of them belong to the rich households in Kabul I was told. The culture of Kabul like any metro was distinctly different from the rest of the country. The younger generation was as fashionable as anywhere else in the world and the ones who have travelled abroad cut out their distinct lifestyle even as avowed Moslems.

Looking out of the window I saw vast stretches of dunes in varied sizes with no habitation in site and beyond them snow capped mountain ranges .I imagined the first nomads crossing those perilous peaks, into the stark sandy desert country to find a home along some oasis or mountain streams at first. Gradually they would have make way for the traders and the travellers. How difficult it must have in those days. How difficult it still is for so many who live in the folds of those vast unforgiving stretches still trying to eke out a living.

Our two hours flight seemed too short when the Captain finally announced the end of the journey. He spoke in Dari to the local passengers and then in English . But his strong Afghan drawl made it sound all the same at first. When he fianlly extended a wish for "a happy stay Kabul" I experienced the firt stirrings of excitement of landing in a place of a farway dream. The land of Mustafa Ali's kabuliawalas, and more recently Khaleed Hoseini's kite runners.

At the international airport which looked no bigger than a govt hospital at first, few people spoke in English. The Airport security was also rather tight. They looked at my face and asked me if I were from Islamabad. When I said no I was from India, they seemed to relax a bit. One official even excalimed with a big broad smile, “India is our friend” which gave me some idea of what they thought of Pakistan.

In the recent years there has been so much misgiving between the two bordering Muslim countries that even a common man is disenchated with Pakistan. And this despite a large chunk of Afghan population having migrated to Pakistan and finding a safe home there if not much job opportunity. They still marry their children across its porous borders, just as it used be in India years before we fenced our borders.

It seemed like forever at the customs . Unsure fingers dabbled with the keys of the keyboard.Across the glass window it made me thoroughly impatient. They had to search for every alphabet before carefully logging in the details . It took hours. But I must say everything was being done with a certain efficient briskness that is lacking in the lackaidasical attitude of our officials in own domestic airports.

Once out of the airport I went looking for the parking space I had been assigned to wait for my pick up. There were three parking spaces with Parking lot C the biggest and meant for all and sundry. Here I waited expectantly for my name to show up on a board but no one came. Karzai had a visit to the airport I was told and so all traffic movement restricted for the next few hours. I was in a quandary. "What do I do? " The telephone lines were also down it seemed and since it was Friday no offices were open.

Here I met Usman a taxi driver. “For twenty dollars I will take you to AKG guest house.” He spoke in clear English. How do you speak so well in English? “Oh I was in Iran when the Taleban came and worked as an interpreter there in a tourism company.” Here he was with the Govt tourism dept, driving one of their vehicles. He earned 600 Afghani every month which was really a paltry sum to run a home.” Govt pays are low and so I run an electrical shop too with my father.” He offered me to take to a shade near a tea stall, and even got a chair for me to sit. Over a cup of chai he smiled an easy smile and said “ hopefully our days of trouble are over.Only the day I earn a little more I will know things are moving at last .”

When my vehicle pulled in (and Usman spotted the man)two hours later, I came alive to my first moments In Kabul. I handed Usman the bottle of fresh orange juice I was carrying from Dubai which he vehemently refused at first… “No no you are a guest in our country. You don’t have to pay of anything.” Touched by his words I gently said “This is for my brother in Afghanistan. Please accept this token gift from me.” And so he fianlly did.

Later that night at the Lebaneese eatery with Sujeet, the national advisor of AKF, who welcomed me to my new assignment, I let my hair down and enjoyed a lovely meal of pita bread, hummus, hot chai and a black forest cake (which was on the house). Nothing seemed so war ravaged around here, I thought to myself. Infact this was better than anything I got in Kharghar where I lived in the Mumbai outskirts .I was truly amazed at what money could do to the most impoverished and remote places.

Kabul of course was no ordinary place. It was the hub of all political activity and the destination of hundreds of donor agencies across the globe. It had an expanding market to cater to the caviar and champagne circuit of the who’s who of the World Bank, the UN, the NATO and all the other important people.

I had arrived .