Bamiyan Trip

Aah, where to start… I guess I can begin by saying that the Bamiyan trip was certainly incredible for a number of reasons. I never thought I’d ever see those sort of sites, that kind of terrain, and those kinds of people.

Let’s start with the people. The people seemed a lot more open than the people here in Kabul; they always smiled and waved.. It was also like being in a different world (here in a different world) because the people all looked Mongolian. You can read about them here. I got a lot of good shots of the people in that area on my pictures page.

So the drive there.. We left at like 4am and gathered up all the Afghani police that we brought with us. They had several busses and a large truck, so the going was slow. However, the scenery was something to see, and I got a lot of good pictures of it. We finally reached the Bamiyan hotel (we stayed there in the parking lot) sometime after midnight. We slept there, and when I woke up I was greeted by some spectacular scenery. After the Taliban took over, they wanted to erase any evidence/presence of any other religion than Islam in the country, so they took it upon themselves to destroy the world’s largest standing Buddhas, carved into the cliffs in the 3rd century AD. Here’s an article about it. You can look on that site to see what it used to look like, and then you can go to my pictures site (in the Bamiyan folder) to see what’s left behind. :( Very depressing. We waited at the Bamiyan hotel until the Afghani officers had properly stuffed their faces, then we took off to the Forward Operating Base and set up shop.

The FOB was set up in a canyon surrounded on all sides by sheer cliffs. There was a castle on one of the sides that had apparently been there for 1300 years. Everywhere we went in Bamiyan there were abandoned buildings, things left behind from another era.. Tanks, anti-aircraft guns, dwellings, everything. I thought it was kinda symbolic of the people who live in that area. No matter what the current state of geopolitics, what regime is in power in Afghanistan, for a loooooong time these people’s lifestyle hasn’t changed all that drastically. They’re just trying to carve out a living and existence in whatever way they can, which is why I kinda felt bad when they started cutting down their poppy fields. All the villagers could do was sit there while their fields were swarmed by men with sickles, all under the eyes of many armed men. What could they do? Just watch as their hard work was cut down. I seriously doubt they’re gonna stand by and let that happen much more.

So anyway, there was some cutting going on, then we convoyed back in like 7 hours. We were seriously hauling ass, and we beat the living shit out of the trucks (F250s) we were in. There’s probably like $5000 damage to all the trucks that were in the convoy (a piece), and there were like 12 trucks. At one point I think we had all 4 wheels off the road – it was insane. So we came back, and the rest of our crew didn’t come back (they went to Bagram) until like 3pm the next day. So we had to wait another day to take a shower…….! That kinda sucked.

In any case, I will reiterate that it was quite an amazing trip. The makeup of the group was interesting; mainly South Africans for security and stuff, 3 Angolans, 3 Bosnians for unexploded ordinance, and only like 4 or 5 Americans. We also had a lot of Nepalese dudes with us – they recruit former Ghurkas for security purposes as well. The Ghurka who rode with us was actually a Sherpa too. He didn’t have any problems up there in the high mountains. ;) I felt pretty safe with all these guys protecting us, but let’s face it. If they’re gonna get you, they’re gonna get you. So all you can really do is be as safe as possible and enjoy the ride. ;)