Into Afghanistan

By Vincent J. Curtis

Date: 2 Dec 10

Dateline: Forward Operating Base Sharana, Afghanistan

The eight hour delay in Frankfort meant that the connecting flight to Kabul aboard Safi Airways was missed.  A media colleague, a producer for ABC News, and I both believed that rebooking a missed connecting flight should be easy.  Not to be.  The Middle East is quite adept a bureaucratic inefficiency.  That inefficiency was applied relentlessly to these two westerners.

After some humming and hawing at the check-in desk, it was determined that we had to purchase new tickets to board the next flight, but the ticket would only cost $132 US dollars.  My colleague took the news with a sense of depressed resignation, and pull out his credit card.  Oh, the ticket desk was over there, not here.

Between the check-in counter and the ticket desk, the cost of a ticket somehow rose to $180.  Taxes, currency conversion, and other fees you know.  And if you don’t like it, too bad.  His sense of gloom deepening, my colleague pulled out his Walt Disney Visa card and paid for a ticket.  Me likewise.

Back to the check-in counter, and the girl there studied my colleague’s ticket carefully.  Although the ticket counter was in full view of her location, she looked concerned at something or other at the freshly purchased ticket, and spoke to one of the other girls.  Finally, she concluded that the ticket was legit, and issued him a boarding pass.  She took mine and issued me a boarding pass, stapling one copy of the ticket to the pass and keeping the other.  We then headed to the departure lounge.  With all the coming and going we passed through the security check point at least three times, and became quite efficient at stripping and dressing.

If Frankfort had a lot of non-descript looking characters, the departure lounge for the flight to Kabul was full of them.  For the most part these were men in their 30’s, 40’s, 50’s, and even early 60’s.  There were absolutely no old people or young families.  Some woman were headed to Kabul, and a few men in their twenties.

The flight to Kabul took a little over two hours, and from the air one could get a good view of the Afghan countryside.  Afghanistan from the air resembles Colorado and Arizona: brown, barren, and mountainous.  The mountains here are higher and there is more water in the valleys.  It would be hard to hide from the air a large moving body of men or maintain a supply route.  The Taliban somehow do it, but the bleakness of the terrain limits the volume they can send through.  Mostly, they move down the valleys from Pakistan into Afghanistan where there are numerous small habitations.  Men and supplies are hidden in the routine comings and goings of the villagers.

Kabul Terminal is not for the average tourist.  It is spartan and forbidding.  However, the immigration officials act with reasonable proficiency, and move us along.  Our group is comprised of the kind of folks that provide them with jobs and security.

Because it has so little business, the exit area of Kabul terminal has only a few shops.  Fortunately, one of them sells cell phones.  I needed one because no one was there to greet me and take me to the embed assignment.  I had a contact number and bought a cell phone to call for instructions.  The store clerk was helpful and put the phone together for me.  The $40 for the phone and air time was well worth it.  However, the charger for the phone is designed for a 220 V connector of a type not used by NATO or ISAF forces.

My instructions were to get a taxi and ask to be taken to the main military gate.  Look outside, no taxis.  A couple of New Zealanders were inside, and I asked them for help.  “You’re headed the wrong way mate!”, one said.  They were leaving, but gave me help needed to get a cab.

The cab ride gave me my first glimpse of Kabul from the ground.  The traffic was utterly chaotic, and after the cabbie with great dash and daring made he way around the traffic circle onto the clear road to the military gate, he sped up, turned a little an said something to the effect of “How you like that?”

At the main gate, having passing through another security check point, having my retina scanned, and agreeing on behalf of myself, my heirs, and my newspaper that my life was my own and that I held harmless the military, and would pay for any expenses my death or wounding would cause, I was received into the safe embrace of the US military.

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