Afghanistan has always been my purpose. It has a persisting addictive charm which I find very difficult to shake off. Not many, not even a departed lover has ever had that kind of effect on me.

Thinking about Afghanistan, learning about Afghanistan can be a very lonely affair.

Click here for entries about Afghanistan

Back in 2005/2006, I also kept a diary of pictures and entries about my experience in Afghanistan. It is far from finished but you can access it here.

Taxi drivers in old russian cars with smoky engines and hot
fur seats take me down old streets where the donkeys park and munch
on flattened plastic bags of leftovers. In my travel to Pule Charkhi Prison, we crossed villages pretty much abandoned by modernity- that the kids run after vehicles as they drive by, and men peer into passenger windows, wave and giggle at the oddity of foreign behavior!, of foreign disclosure and of foreign freedom. My hair flies in the wind as we drive. An Afghan says in English ‘Oh My Gawd’ and smiles cheekily. I am not sure if he realises that he’s called out to the glory of The Lord, ‘Masha Allah’! He and I both know this is a novelty – to me the charm of Afghanistan, to him the freedom of that foreign woman.