Mazar-e Sharif
April 3 & 4, 2006
I finally had a chance to leave Kabul. I have decided to cut my time in Afghanistan short about four days. It is just too expensive to stay here and to travel safely to some of the areas I would like to visit it would cost more than I could afford ($120 to $150 per day). Before I left I wanted to see at least a little of the country outside of Kabul. The two safe options for travel are in the north of the country, either Herat or Mazar-e Sharif. Herat is supposed to be a great city to visit, but none of my novel will be set in Herat or the areas surrounding it. My other option, Mazar had a famous shrine and a side trip to the ruins of ancient Balkh. It will not likely feature in my novel either, but the areas along the road to Mazar could be used in my novel. Furthermore the general consensus was that the road to Mazar was “safe”. (NOTE: have to use quotes around the word safe when in reference to Afghanistan. I would never try to claim that anything about Afghanistan is 100% safe).
That settled it. I decided to go to Mazar-e Sharif. I only had a few days, so I decided to fly there and take a bus back. My ticket with Ariana airline was a surprisingly cheap $30. Ariana is Afghanistan’s national airline. Their current fleet is composed of decades old American and Russian planes, and among the ex-pat community in Afghanistan the airline has been nicknamed “Scariana”. My flight was on an Antonov 24, twin turbo prop. The plane was old, but looked well maintained. It was amusing to see all the instruction plaques in Russian.
Flying out of Kabul was great. It was a clear day so I got a good view of the city from the air. It was only a 50 minute flight, but in that time the landscape changed dramatically. Kabul lies in a valley on a high plateau. The landscape quickly transformed from flat dusty plains, to foot hills, to the towering snow and ice covered peaks of the Hindu Kush mountains. On the far side of the Hindu Kush the mountains gave way to the endless rolling plains of Central Asia. From my window, the Oxus River, which forms the Northern boarder of Afghanistan, was clearly visible.
On the flight I met an Afghan who had been living in Germany for the last 18 years. Sultan-Mahmood was back in Afghanistan to visit family. He thought I was a little crazy traveling in the country by myself. Even he was nervous about traveling here after living abroad for so long. After landing Sultan offered me a ride into town and recommended that I stay at his cousin’s hotel. Sounded like a plan. The Aria was his cousin’s hotel, it was dingy and the bathrooms were shocking, but at $10 a night it was the cheapest place I had stayed in Afghanistan. The only thing to recommend was that it was in the center of town and less than a block from the Shrine of Hazrat Ali, the premier and only tourist attraction in Mazar.
Before settling into the hotel and seeing the town, Sultan thought I should register with the tourism office and get the current status on the security situation. Sounded like a good idea, however locating the tourist office was a bit of a challenge. We went from one office to another; finally we were directed to the provincial police headquarters. Sultan’s cousin was the chief of police. The police headquarters was badly in need of a remodel. The paint was peeling inside and out, many windows were cracked, and it looked like no one had been through there with a vacuum cleaner in at least a decade. We had a meeting in his office and when I told him my plans to visit Balkh and take the bus back to Kabul the police chief tried to dissuade me from both plans. After awhile he decided that Balkh would be ok, they had a station there and he could guarantee my safety, but that driving back to Kabul was still a bad idea and that I should fly instead.
I wanted to hire a car to visit Balkh. When Sultan dropped me off at the hotel said he would stop by tomorrow morning with a car and driver that his family recommended. I was very grateful and went off to see the Shrine of Harzat Ali. The shrine is impressive, but it a way it was a little sad. This is one of the only intact pieces of Afghanistan’s physical cultural heritage to survive the last two decades of war.
Next day, I waited for Sultan to show up, but he never did. Sultan flaked out on me, so I was left with a choice. Do I risk traveling to Balkh on my own? It would have been easy enough to grab a taxi or minibus to Balkh, but the visit to the police office had left me a little less confident about the security situation in the North. One piece of advice I had been given about Afghanistan was that it is always bad to be alone. Crowds are usually good and you can feel safer, but when no one is around that’s usually when you can expect trouble. I decided not to go. It was a hard decision. Balkh was the city where Alexander the Great met and married Roxanne. For years it was one of the great cities of Central Asia until it was utterly destroyed by Genghis Khan. Today there is just a small village and little remains of its former glory except some of the city walls and a few arches. Still, it was a disappointment to miss visiting a site so steeped in history.
So, I had a day to kill in Mazar. Outside of the Shrine of Ali, there is nothing for a tourist to do there. Most of the people dress like in Kabul, except the dresses and scarves of the Uzbek women are made from bright floral prints and the burquas are white instead of blue. Beyond that the only other distinguishing feature of Mazar is that it is not ruined like Kabul. There are the usual carpet shops and you can buy chapans, a long robe popular in the North. In other words nothing that could really hold my attention. I did make the decision to take the bus back to Kabul (more on that later). When I bought my ticket none of the men at the office could speak English, so they brought some one over from a neighboring store who could translate. Abdul was a nice guy and very helpful. Typical of Afghans he invited me to have lunch with him and his brother. They ran a stationary shop. The Afghans are so hospitable that I often feel a little guilty. It’s a poor country so I hate taking a free meal from them, but I feel it would be rude to turn down such a polite gesture. After lunch I thought I would buy a pen from them as a way to pay back the lunch. That plan didn’t work so well, Abdul gave me the pen for free. He said that I was a guest and would not accept any money for the pen. I left the shop feeling even guiltier.
I finally had a chance to leave Kabul. I have decided to cut my time in Afghanistan short about four days. It is just too expensive to stay here and to travel safely to some of the areas I would like to visit it would cost more than I could afford ($120 to $150 per day). Before I left I wanted to see at least a little of the country outside of Kabul. The two safe options for travel are in the north of the country, either Herat or Mazar-e Sharif. Herat is supposed to be a great city to visit, but none of my novel will be set in Herat or the areas surrounding it. My other option, Mazar had a famous shrine and a side trip to the ruins of ancient Balkh. It will not likely feature in my novel either, but the areas along the road to Mazar could be used in my novel. Furthermore the general consensus was that the road to Mazar was “safe”. (NOTE: have to use quotes around the word safe when in reference to Afghanistan. I would never try to claim that anything about Afghanistan is 100% safe).
That settled it. I decided to go to Mazar-e Sharif. I only had a few days, so I decided to fly there and take a bus back. My ticket with Ariana airline was a surprisingly cheap $30. Ariana is Afghanistan’s national airline. Their current fleet is composed of decades old American and Russian planes, and among the ex-pat community in Afghanistan the airline has been nicknamed “Scariana”. My flight was on an Antonov 24, twin turbo prop. The plane was old, but looked well maintained. It was amusing to see all the instruction plaques in Russian.Flying out of Kabul was great. It was a clear day so I got a good view of the city from the air. It was only a 50 minute flight, but in that time the landscape changed dramatically. Kabul lies in a valley on a high plateau. The landscape quickly transformed from flat dusty plains, to foot hills, to the towering snow and ice covered peaks of the Hindu Kush mountains. On the far side of the Hindu Kush the mountains gave way to the endless rolling plains of Central Asia. From my window, the Oxus River, which forms the Northern boarder of Afghanistan, was clearly visible.
On the flight I met an Afghan who had been living in Germany for the last 18 years. Sultan-Mahmood was back in Afghanistan to visit family. He thought I was a little crazy traveling in the country by myself. Even he was nervous about traveling here after living abroad for so long. After landing Sultan offered me a ride into town and recommended that I stay at his cousin’s hotel. Sounded like a plan. The Aria was his cousin’s hotel, it was dingy and the bathrooms were shocking, but at $10 a night it was the cheapest place I had stayed in Afghanistan. The only thing to recommend was that it was in the center of town and less than a block from the Shrine of Hazrat Ali, the premier and only tourist attraction in Mazar.
Before settling into the hotel and seeing the town, Sultan thought I should register with the tourism office and get the current status on the security situation. Sounded like a good idea, however locating the tourist office was a bit of a challenge. We went from one office to another; finally we were directed to the provincial police headquarters. Sultan’s cousin was the chief of police. The police headquarters was badly in need of a remodel. The paint was peeling inside and out, many windows were cracked, and it looked like no one had been through there with a vacuum cleaner in at least a decade. We had a meeting in his office and when I told him my plans to visit Balkh and take the bus back to Kabul the police chief tried to dissuade me from both plans. After awhile he decided that Balkh would be ok, they had a station there and he could guarantee my safety, but that driving back to Kabul was still a bad idea and that I should fly instead.
I wanted to hire a car to visit Balkh. When Sultan dropped me off at the hotel said he would stop by tomorrow morning with a car and driver that his family recommended. I was very grateful and went off to see the Shrine of Harzat Ali. The shrine is impressive, but it a way it was a little sad. This is one of the only intact pieces of Afghanistan’s physical cultural heritage to survive the last two decades of war.
Next day, I waited for Sultan to show up, but he never did. Sultan flaked out on me, so I was left with a choice. Do I risk traveling to Balkh on my own? It would have been easy enough to grab a taxi or minibus to Balkh, but the visit to the police office had left me a little less confident about the security situation in the North. One piece of advice I had been given about Afghanistan was that it is always bad to be alone. Crowds are usually good and you can feel safer, but when no one is around that’s usually when you can expect trouble. I decided not to go. It was a hard decision. Balkh was the city where Alexander the Great met and married Roxanne. For years it was one of the great cities of Central Asia until it was utterly destroyed by Genghis Khan. Today there is just a small village and little remains of its former glory except some of the city walls and a few arches. Still, it was a disappointment to miss visiting a site so steeped in history.
So, I had a day to kill in Mazar. Outside of the Shrine of Ali, there is nothing for a tourist to do there. Most of the people dress like in Kabul, except the dresses and scarves of the Uzbek women are made from bright floral prints and the burquas are white instead of blue. Beyond that the only other distinguishing feature of Mazar is that it is not ruined like Kabul. There are the usual carpet shops and you can buy chapans, a long robe popular in the North. In other words nothing that could really hold my attention. I did make the decision to take the bus back to Kabul (more on that later). When I bought my ticket none of the men at the office could speak English, so they brought some one over from a neighboring store who could translate. Abdul was a nice guy and very helpful. Typical of Afghans he invited me to have lunch with him and his brother. They ran a stationary shop. The Afghans are so hospitable that I often feel a little guilty. It’s a poor country so I hate taking a free meal from them, but I feel it would be rude to turn down such a polite gesture. After lunch I thought I would buy a pen from them as a way to pay back the lunch. That plan didn’t work so well, Abdul gave me the pen for free. He said that I was a guest and would not accept any money for the pen. I left the shop feeling even guiltier.
posted by TravelWriterWannaBe at 6:18 AM
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