NGK Fellowship: Destination Afghanistan

Hey all,
 It has been a while, I am trying to pace myself and write only twice a week. I think you were getting over loaded with the Kabul stories. So much has happened in the last few days. I have been here for a little over a week and it seems I have been here much longer. In that time I have experienced A LOT
Close call
I will be sending a blog in the coming days about my experience walking on the streets of Kabul. I took a walk some days ago and marveled at the number of uniformed and un-uniformed men with guns. These guns are really big too, almost like a message…probably a message.
Anyhow, yesterday we were almost taken out by one of these huge guns. My host and I went to see one of the old palace ruins. The road to the ruin was a windy uphill road, on one of those Kabul hills/mountains I love so much. As usual I brought out my camera taking all kinds of shots. Close to the mountain was a camp, and on it a military station, with a man (and his gun) waving at me. I figured he was saying “no taking pictures”. My host didn’t see this man, and we drove to the palace ruins. Apparently, in the last month it had been taken over by the military and the sign read, “Military zone. No taking pictures of surveillance, installations, or military personnel. Offenders will be detained”. I read the sign to my host who had not seen it and we had a discussion of what “installations” were. Meanwhile, I was contemplating jail time in Kabul prison, since offenders would be detained. While this was going on, I guess we had stayed on that parking spot for too long, because that waving military guy and another man came running at us with their guns! Oh my goodness, my heart was skipping, jumping, dancing, but I stayed calm. Fortunately, my host saw him and told the driver to keep moving. The driver moved slowly, I think to indicate that we meant no harm. As we proceeded down the windy road, two trucks, TWO TRUCKS, or military men were driving  up hill…I think they were coming to get us. We proceeded even slower as we passed them and made it safely AWAY from the situation. Wow, I thought my host and I need to be more careful.
There are lots of signs in Kabul that have a camera with a red sign across [no taking pictures]. Prior to this experience, my plan was to take a picture of a sign that says “no camera”…but after yesterday, I have aborted that mission.
My adventures continue….I will keep you posted.
 

Tags: Travel

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 24th, 2006 at 5:47 am and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.