Afghan Border Hostel.
I buy a good, cheap meal of rice, potatoes, bread and tea.
The darkened main room of the hostel is crowded with poor international backpackers. The smoke is psychedelic. There is so much coughing the French woman, Isabelle, remarks “It’s like a sanatorium”. Exactly. It’s high in the mountains, cold and probably, outside of this smoky room, quite a healthy climate. Later she whispers: “It’s like a monastery.” True. The only sound is subdued conversation and low laughter. Almost everybody in the room is stoned. The world’s most bizarre music is barely audible from a radio in the kitchen where the Afghani workers are cleaning up from the meal. Everyone is mellow except for one of the Frenchmen who has a huge Bowie knife that he loves to unsheathe with a howl and flourish like a Hollywood Musketeer, but even he is subdued.
I step out into the bright moonlight for some fresh air.
It’s good to be here. I feel great. It’s a wonderful trip!
Does this balance the depression I felt in the Teheran bus depot?
I fall asleep wrapped in my poncho lying on the clean, carpeted floor littered with other snoring travelers in sleeping bags.
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