Tuesday, February 9, 2010 |
07:41 - No wonder the Taliban seemed like a good alternative
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/08/world/asia/08road.html
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Boy, if there was ever a reason for Google Earth. Why isn't this road through the Kabul River gorge in Afghanistan on those lists of the worst roads in the world?
The Kabul-to-Jalalabad road was paved for the first time by the West German government in 1960. In the 1980s, it was almost entirely obliterated during the insurrection against the Soviet invasion. In the decade that followed, when the Taliban and other armed groups fought to control the country, the road was a blasted moonscape. The craters were so large that taxis would disappear for minutes at a time, only to reappear as they struggled to climb out.
It was a tough road, and it had its own dangers — stretches of roadway often collapsed or washed away — but speed was not among them. That changed in 2006, when a European Union-backed project finally smoothed the road all the way through. Now Afghans could finally drive as fast as they wanted.
And they do! The cars zoom at astonishing speeds, far faster than would ever be allowed on a similar road in the West, if there was one. Like Formula One drivers, the Afghans dart out along the sharpest of turns, slamming their cars back into their lanes at the first flash of oncoming disaster. Most of the time they make it.
At least on that one in Bolivia, people drive slowly, as the Top Gear guys recently found out. This sounds like it'd be too dangerous for the likes of the BBC to send three charismatic presenters to see in person, for a whole variety of reasons:
Over the centuries, countless invading forces passed through or near the gorge on their way to the Khyber Pass. Among them were a group of 17,000 British troops and civilians, who were massacred as they beat a retreat from Kabul at the end of the first Anglo-Afghan War in 1842. Dr. William Brydon, who rode into Jalalabad on a horse, was the only European to survive.
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