Going three hours on shitty roads while suffering from food poisoning isn’t a fun experience. It is horrible. Doing this with 5 people in a shitty car and with a bad guide is even worse.
I was just hoping I could sleep and that I didn’t need to throw up, luckily the didn’t throw up part worked because my stomach was completely empty.
We stopped few times along the road, for people to pray and to pee, once I also went to pee. I was standing up, because I was outside and the people were shocked. They go to squat also when being outside and not only inside. Because I also sit down on a sitting toilet when peeing, but I never heard it that it is happening outside. After crushing their world we continued, I wouldn’t have the energy to squat anyway anymore. Of course it wasn’t nice that I didn’t respect their culture at the end, but my mind wasn’t there.
Kunduz
We arrived in Kunduz and I was more than happy to finally lay down. The people were all nervous and wanted to bring me to hospital to give me an injection. It was nice that they wanted to help me, but that would be way too much. Especially in a country, where you probably won’t receive the most hygienic hospitals out there.
Luckily the German guy from the night before was in the same hotel and he was taking care of me, so he got the guys on other ideas and I started to receive medicine. Antibiotica is usually also nothing I wanted to take, but I didn’t have energy for anything anymore. I just wanted to sleep and get back to Tajikistan. I was happy when I was able to keep something inside my body, but sadly everything came back out during the night, so it was a very short night.
In the morning my guide wanted to force me again to eat the food with a lot of oil and he wasn’t understanding or listening to me, which made me so pissed and annoyed, which usually doesn’t happen to me. Usually I am very patient with everyone around me.
Going back to the border
Going back to the border was great, I had no energy, but the German guy with us. I was speaking German and was happy to have someone else to talk to. While driving there, we saw a pelican who was tied to a car, super weird to be fair.
At the border we met a guy from Russia, who was crazy. He was hitchhiking through Afghanistan and was on his way back home. I was back then doing a lot of crazy things, but we were for sure on one level or he was even crazier. No phone with him, just a book to write down numbers and addresses, but somehow using Couchsurfing. Everything was very interesting, quite inspiring but I was too low of energy to fully get into everything deeper.
At the time we arrived at the border, the border was closed due to lunch break or prayer time, some of that. We had to wait there, but luckily it was like the border to Pakistan, that one seemed to be extremely crowded and messy. The one to Tajikistan was almost empty.
Some chill dudes are changing money and laying down. I don’t know how they make enough money, when there is almost nobody who is crossing the border.
Controls
Like mentioned in the border crossing article the Taliban were checking very deeply. I had to put everything out of my backpack and was luckily able to hide my camera. I had pictures on and didn’t know how to save them without getting the SD card away. The SD card was hidden, but still not perfect, the hiding was working luckily.
After this control, I thought we were done, but we were not. It was a really bad surprise, because some Taliban official went to us and wanted to check the phones. I quickly deleted everything and he also saw that. Good thing was that he didn’t find the deleted pictures, they were in general not so good at checking phones.
They didn’t find anything and we finally went back. Walking over the bridge into a more peaceful environment. The people finally spoke some English and everything felt quite better from then on. We got a free ride to the entry of the border and from then on the Russian guy was doing some hitchhiking and he got both the German guy and me a cheap ride, because I wasn’t having the energy for the hitchhiking actually.
Getting to Dushanbe
We got a ride for around $10 and it was great, because it was very cheap for the distance. The locals in the car had to pay weirdly enough more than us, so that felt quite good. Also the fact that we finally went back to Dushanbe to the family I knew already, also the German guy was able to stay there as well. The car was quite packed, but somehow it was still a bit comfortable. The street was fine, let’s say it like that, so perfect!
It took some while, but when we arrived I felt quite a lot better, maybe I felt more free there or something else, maybe it was the good company. Everything was good! Laying down on the ground and enjoying a shared meal with the hosts was a good way to finish the day and the Afghanistan trip.
Before going to Afghanistan I hadn’t really seen anything from the country, but this needed to change. I was for sure excited for it.
What’s up next?
Next you will read about my experience in Tajikistan and my way back home.
