borderwalk

I wasn’t sure what to do now so just stayed there hoping the building didn’t collapse. A few moments later and it was all over and everything was intact. The people suddenly went quiet and their running turned to walking and the people slowly started returning to their rooms. I wasn’t a hundred percent sold on going back to my room. I went downstairs into the reception and asked the guys if we had to leave the building at all. I’d seen billboards all over the state talking about poorly built housing being a major killer in earthquakes and how many were structurally unsafe, so I figured if they weren’t panicking I was fine, they seemed ok and said we were safe, so back I went to enjoy breakfast, slightly off centre about earth having a mild hissy fit.

That was my first ever earthquake experience, one which I hope to never go through again, there’s something extremely unnerving about something so solid as the ground beneath you, the earth, the steady ground beneath your feet, suddenly becoming the least bankable commodity in your current situation. What do you do when the earth under which everything you hold dear gives way, in every direction. I’ll tell you. Grab a door frame because of a vague memory of Japanese people screaming in a high-rise on a TV re-enactment told you to and hope more than you’ve ever hoped that the building you’re in wasn’t made on the cheap. Something I never knew about myself was that I took the ground for granted!

That morning I left and at the end of the day found myself on a long road lined by houses whilst it rained torrentially. I sat next to a small tuck shop and bought a drink and some biscuits whilst I sat there thinking I’m definitely not moving from here until it stops… It didn’t look as if it was going to stop any time soon. Across the road from where I sat, was a unusually large church, unusually large because the houses on street were immeasurably smaller than it, it was like a mega structure amongst normal small houses, definitely not in-keeping with the local aesthetics. Nevertheless whilst being sat there I was curious about the amount of kids that were coming out to buy drinks and packets of crisps. Where were all these kids coming from? they couldn’t be coming far, the rain was to heavy for someone to make the journey out to the middle of nowhere for a single can of coke, not even the lure of a foreigner has that pull. 

As I was sat there the old man who served me asked me where my bike was, this was a running theme in India, people would ask me where my bike was and I’d have to tell them I was walking, to which they would then say yeah where did you leave your bike? I would then have to explain that I never had a bike and that I’ve always been walking. I think they have this idea that I was in some sort of accident that had totalled my bike and was now walking. Once we past that stage we could have a normal conversation. I told him I was going to wait at his shop till the rain stopped. He said I’d be there a long time, and why not ask next door if I could stay. To my surprise I asked what was next door? He told me it was a hostel for students of the church opposite, suddenly the children buying stuff made sense. I asked him if he knew the owner, he said yes and agreed to ask for me. Moments after he went in to ask, he returned with an English teacher in tow and we began talking. He asked me where I was from and  where I was going and after a few minute of talking he said I was more than welcome to stay the night.

He said it was currently school holidays and the majority of the kids wouldn’t be back for a few more days, so we went in and it wasn’t as I expected, the whole outside of the main building was made from a sort of mud like shell. I asked if he had felt the earthquake in the morning. “oh yesss!” he exclaimed, “we had to evacuate the house to be sure”… I was suddenly on edge, was it safe??? He took a moment and then reassured me, “oh but its fine”. The few seconds wait before answering did not reassure me. But in no time after having met the others teachers and student in the hostel and being given some food, he had given me some fermented rice wine to go to bed with, my worries of the roof caving in on me didn’t seem to worry me too much longer… it was strong.

I came across a small town that had a hotel in it. A nice hotel compared to most I had been in and I got indoors with AC. My ear was happy for the change as the humidity was not helping its situation. There were two guys that worked on the reception and I, in my best Hindi/English mixture, explained my situation and they pointed me in the direction of a phone shop.

I got my self down to the shop straight away and explained that I needed a sim card. The guy there was great and could speak English which helped immensely as the technical speak about options of sims, tariffs and pricing was never going to work with my limited skills. we sat for a while and eventually he explained my sim hadn’t been activated because the Indian sponsor I used to register, wasn’t from Assam but Delhi. I in fact needed a local sponsor. He explained that the state had lots of extremists who register hundreds of sims in order to communicate with each other so that was the reason.

I felt like I had hit another brick wall. I sat for a while, as he served the ever growing number of customers that had been waiting and the odd few that were just sat there because a stranger had come to town and people had seen me walking through.

I was trying to think of a way I could get a local sponsor. It came to me,  I told him I would be right back, the reception guys! They seemed like nice guys, so I thought I could ask them. I got back to the hotel and sat around reception talking, laughing and joking with them, then hit them with the question. They went silent, both looked at each other and back at me and said they couldn’t… I was back to square one.

I walked back to the phones shop with my tail between my legs and told the phone shop guy they wouldn’t do it and to throw away the sim application papers I had half filled out. He offered me a conciliatory cup of tea so I accepted. We sat talking about what I was doing for about 20 minutes and talked about his family. By the time we had finished our tea, he turned to me and said “look, what you’re doing is incredible and I want to help, I will be your sponsor, I’ve filled out the paperwork already, lets go have dinner with my family and by the time its done, your sim will be ready”. He could see the grin on my face and as we started walking to the back of his shop to enter his house he told me I better like saag (spinach) because its all that’s been made. I told him its my favourite.

I was introduced to his family. His wife, his mother, mother in law, children, brother and even his brothers in laws. They lived together spread over two bungalows divided by a long corridor the length of each apartment. After spending a few hours there eating and talking, he left and came back in the room with a functioning sim card and told me that he had it registered at the local office as well, which meant I didn’t have to wait for 2 days, but instead it would be working by the evening. It was starting to get dark by now so I decided to head back to the hotel. And as I was getting ready to leave, they presented me with a gift, a tea towel and some food to take away with me. I was overwhelmed by their kindness having only known them for the afternoon, but I said my goodbyes, had some pictures taken and made a move back to the hotel. That night I caught up on news in bed, and fell asleep reading.

As I slowly came through from my night of sleep, I made my usual slow realisation of where I was and the calm serene morning was made better by the following realisation that I now had a functioning sim. Then it was suddenly sent into disarray as the whole room began to violently shake! Laying on my back on the bed I was taken aback and sat up to see the windows rattling in the frames and screams emanating from outside the room.

An evening amongst saints and sinners (Phone-Gate) …Continued

They had now been questioning the boy for hours, they had attracted a crowd from the usual people that came in the mornings, the sun was nearly up and since the kid had been brought back against his will in the early hours of the morning, he had gone from calmly denying it stood up, to having been tied down to the chair and threaten with the use of physical violence. But at a certain point in…

An evening amongst saints and sinners (Phone-Gate)

I made it as far as I could for the day, throbbing ear and throbbing feet, the night had come and I didn’t feel safe walking on this type of road in the dark, especially with being partially deaf. Traffic was all over the place and there were no street lights. There was a dhaba (roadside café) ahead to the left and I decided to enquire about staying there the night. I figured even if there wasn’t…

“BODOLAND 50/50”

It was everywhere and questions were beginning to form in my mind, I would be asking the first person I found that could speak English. It would be sooner than I thought, as well as having learnt the hard way that it was indeed now rainy season in the north east. Having spent days previous to this one, continuously barraged with sideways rain for hours at a time. My ankle was now making a comeback and it was making it known that I had no place walking on it. I could feel the throbbing pain or revenge again and I needed to get off of it.

Later that night I made the short journey down the road into the town and found a restaurant that had a few rooms attached. I got in after the usual bargaining I asked him what the Bodoland 50/50 was. He began to tell me about a state that was made up half of Assam, that was called Bodoland, had its own people, the Bodo people and its own language, Bodo. They had been fighting for their own independence for years. This wouldn’t be the fist time I would hear about an ethnic group demanding and protesting for their independence, the whole north east was rife with the talk of resistance and the talk was generations old. Bodoland.

As I lay in bed with my leg raised, I read up on Bodoland, as I figured I was going to be walking through it for a long time. I watched videos and read articles and before I knew it, it was the next day.

As happens on borderwalk, one thing is taken care of and another thing takes its place. My ankle was feeling better but I had this niggling feeling inside my ear during the night and now it was hurting, I thought it was just my headphones in my ear during the night having fell asleep watching videos on the history behind Bodoland and thought that it would fix itself during the days to come.

The next day I left, staying the one day to make sure I had adequately rested my ankle and as I walked I found my ear was getting worse and worse. It started becoming increasingly painful and I started just using one earphone to listen to my audiobooks. By the end of the a few days walking I had lost hearing in my right ear. I could hear the roaring bass of traffic but that was all. Every time I attempted to touch the side of my head anywhere near my ear it would hurt so much I would immediately stop, I was like an un-scratchable itch, I wanted nothing more than to just dive in and get whatever was in there.

Each day it would progressively get worse, but there was no town near. I would have to stick to taking my pain killers that were running out and I had cotton buds (that I know were not a good idea) but the pain was such that I thought something had got inside so it, if anything, was a desperate plea to get whatever I thought it was, out. Safe to say whatever was in there was not coming out without a fight. Each evening I would have a feel and all that would come out was a dark black goo like substance and each time I emptied some of it out I gained a small percentage of hearing back for about an hour, then away it went again. (I have pictures but I imagine no one want to see that, so instead I have some pictures of scenery).

The next place that looked like I would be able to be treated in, was Guwahati, and that was hundreds of kilometres away. So began the quiet but painful walk to the Assamese capital, no audiobooks or music, just loud chewing and (the inevitable end result of being without music) talking to myself. I was once told by a friend in Kyrgyzstan that once Kieran left I would end up talking to my self having full conversations. I told him that was crazy, I’m not that guy and it wouldn’t happen. But after the shopping incident in Tajikistan, it had become a frequent occurrence. I would discuss current events, global and national, how my body was feeling, future plans, whether they be for the next city or when I go home. And I’d sometimes spend time discussing what I thought people back home were doing.

Having not touched me, whilst being more than a metre away from me, this creature had managed to injure me. All from a juvenile act, a kin to that of an older sibling to a younger one, the old ‘pretend they’re going to hit you but not actually hit you’. This animals cruel trick had cost me and I could now feel my ankle stinging from the pressure thrust down upon it from me and my bag. for a while, the evenings were a bit testing.

Fast forward a few weeks after Billy’s departure and I found myself in a small town in Bihar. Waking up from an evening of wondering where I was going to sleep, as there were no hotels, motels or dhabas (road side cafes) in this town I had found myself in and being told by a man that owned a small electrical shop that I could stay in the building that was connected to his, it wasn’t for tourists he remarked but I “wasn’t really a tourist”. Anyway, as I woke, having been eaten by mosquitos during the night, I turned to get out of bed feeling the usual aches, but one stood out more than the rest as my feet hit the floor. The same ankle I had twisted weeks before felt painful and stiff.

I had a feeling today was going to be a difficult day, but nonetheless I stretched it out a bit and it was comfortable for me to start walking on. But as the day went on I was aware there was something happening. I could feel it getting warmer, increasingly more uncomfortable and painful to put pressure on, but I was in the middle of nowhere and couldn’t stop now. So I kept on going seeing a few interesting things to help take my mind off the pain and as the day progressed it got worse. The more I needed to stop and rest before carrying on, the more it hurt. To the point I was limping not able to hide the squinting of pain on my face.

I finally came to an entrance of a small town and as I took the street to make the agonising journey down into town I was confronted with the ridiculous length of road ahead of me. Taking me a good hour I made it to a large derelict looking building (it looked it on the outside). I had been told having made a few pit stops on the way down the road there was a place to stay here.

I was now face to face with my new arch nemesis. Stairs. feeling like the day just wasn’t, proverbially ‘meeting me half way’, I begrudgingly made my way up those 6 steps… I know they were 6 steps because I counted each and every one of them as I slowly and, as you can imagine, elegantly ascended. At the top of this Everest-like mountain of stairs,  I made my way to reception and began the usual bargaining for the price of a room and had learnt enough bargaining stock lines by now to get the price down. Then was told they would show me to my room. I was curious because there were no rooms around, not that I could see anyway.

I was ushered down a corridor, I slowly limped/hopped behind him as he held my bag out of pure sympathy. Then I was told to take a left and as I did so, I was greeted with a monumental challenge that I wold not be able to defeat alone. 3 flights of stairs to get to the room.

The poor young man, trying to be his politest under the circumstances. My rucksack draped over one of his shoulders, gripping onto it, trying not to drop it, and me draped on his other. I was clinging on as if my life depended on it, using him and the rails to propel myself up the stairs, trying to take the weight off my ankle and stop the excruciating pain. 3 flights. Eventually we made it and luckily the room was right in front of the stairs. As I entered the room I fell directly onto the bed, sat there with my shoes and socks off and looking down at my foot, making the immediate and necessary decision not to move from there all night.

But awhile into me laying there, as so often happens, nature bends us to its will, and natures current will, at that particular moment, was that I should suddenly and overwhelmingly, need to go to the toilet.

Walking was out of the question. Hopping just jerked my foot around, and had me jumping up and don’t on painful blisters and asking the guy to come back and help me was… no…definitely out of the question, I’d subjected him to enough. So the only option I could think of was to crawl. This was not going to end well. Especially in this toilet. I had definitely seen worse toilets, but I had not crawled on the floor in those toilets, so that fact made this toilet the worst. Crawling seemed to do the trick, I put the weight on my knee and only once or twice did I knock my foot and have to stop from the shear pain. I try not to relive the halfway point where the establishments cleaning skill were bought into question but once I was there I pulled myself up and did my business and made my way back, success!

There I would stay for four days, on the third floor not being able to go anywhere with my leg raised, wondering when it would get better.

Day two into being held hostage by my own ankle and the police made their routine visit. If ever I stopped for a few days to rest, after the first night they would come and question me. They said for security, but I suspect out of boredom. They didn’t have much going on around I imagine and a foreigner was in a hotel in town. As many police before them, they asked me a load of irrelevant questions and then spend the next 20 minutes just flicking through my passport. They asked what I was doing and then I was greeted with the usual uncomfortable silence whilst it processed, the hotel worker repeated it for me.

They consulted with each other in a serious manner, I wasn’t able to understand what they were saying and then they asked for pictures. Getting my passport back and a few smiling/thumbs up pictures later, they left and I was left to my own devices again.

On the third day I was able to put a bit of pressure on it, so decided to go downstairs and sit in the lobby. Sat there, I spent some time on Facebook and read some news on my Guardian app. Then I decided to Skype some family and let them know what was going on. As I was trying to Skype, there was a man who entered the lobby. In the background of my conversation I could hear him talking loudly but couldn’t make out what he was saying. He started wondering around me as I talked. He hovered over me constantly at an uncomfortably close distance, with a camera and as I was talking he would interrupt me by trying to speak to me. I told him politely I’m just on the phone, which he could absolutely see. In response to that, he started taking pictures. He started taking them from various angles and at one point even knelt down in front of me to take a picture. I was beginning to get visibly annoyed and my family could see. I was used to it by now, people taking my picture without asking me and in some instances videoing me and even videoing our conversations, all without my permission. But I decided to not cave in and just to carry on my conversation as I hadn’t spoken to them in a while, determined to passively aggressively not give this guy what he wanted because he was being so rude. Eventually he left and I could relax.

When I got off the phone, I asked the hotel staff who he was and they said he was a photographer, who after hearing what I was doing wanted to come and take my picture. I returned to my room and settled in for the night.

On day four my ankle felt even more better. I decided to journey outside and go buy my own food. Ever so carefully, I made it all of about 20 metres before I came to a cross roads in the street with food stalls and auto rickshaws. I walked down the side of the auto rickshaws to get to the food stalls as everyone there watched on as a strange looking guy (me) walked down the street, again this wasn’t new, this happened a lot. But the new thing was that, suddenly one of the men rushed over. I thought, to ask me where I was going, so he could tell me a price, I was wrong. He brought over his newspaper and proceeded to find a particular page and presented me with my own picture in the paper and an article in hindi.

I recognised the low angle of the picture, it was the one the man took as he knelt down in front of me, a look of half anger and half absurdity at the situation whilst trying to have a conversation with my family, determined not to look up. there was nothing I could do but laugh. I got my food and returned as quickly as I could to the hotel.

This was Billy’s ideal environment, he flourished in it, not in an obnoxious way, but he’s definitely a ‘people person’ and definitely someone who doesn’t shy away from a conversation, even if he doesn’t speak the language. He was for me a reminder, as I watched him, that I had started becoming an introvert, passing through these places, I had become just a part of the furniture. By complete fault of my own I had detached myself from the people around me and flicked onto autopilot. Something that would have to change.

A few days later we arrived at what would later become our half way point. We came to a town called Bijnor, it was a large busy place that we stayed in for the night to rest our blisters, but made sure we took some time to limp around and enjoy the fair that was being held during the evening. With people coming up to talk to Billy and stares all around. The next day we left slightly refreshed but still limping.

One afternoon we stopped at a dhaba and had a cold drink each, Billy took his trainers off, trainers that he had bought last minute in Delhi before leaving and hadn’t really broken in, the consequences of which he was feeling. I took no notice, as this was a routine I was used to by now, but what caught my eye was the intricate way in which he was approaching the removal of the final sock. He finally removed the sock and left there hanging on to his little toe by a small strand, was his toenail. We looked at each other and began laughing. He decided that all he could do was pull it completely off, so off it came.

That night we slept at a dhaba, where an older man and a younger boy worked, they agreed to let us use the two beds that were made from platted material and wood for the evening. As we lay there Billy, in a half joking half serious tone said “I’m enjoying it, but I don’t think I can keep going much more”, he said he didn’t want to stop just yet though, but carry on for a bit longer. We sat for a while and looked at the map on our phones and we picked out a town called Bareilly where he said he would get the train back to Delhi.

A few days later we arrived in Bareilly, we were told upon entering it was famous for its furniture and eyeliner. We found a hotel and checked in for the night. In the morning we walked to the train station where we said our goodbyes and like that I was on my own again for the second time in a foreign country. You would think I’d be used to it by now but everytime I had to say goodbye, the following day would be a long one. Kilometers would take that little bit extra to do and I would get fed up of listening to my music earlier in the day than usual. It was fun whilst it lasted.

If your interested in following Billy on his adventures around Asia, I can assure you his Instagram or twitter makes for an entertaining follow: @nomadicwelshman

A speedy few weeks spent with thw family and time had flown by, my parents were returning home and a week after that my sister followed them to return home too. Little did I know next time I was to see her she would be a mother and I would be an uncle.

The hunt for a new passport proved to be a battle of wills between me and the British embassy, or more likely the passport office back in Liverpool. Just to dispel any mystery or suspense, what should have taken 6-8 weeks ended up taking 8 months. They would leave it 3 months, quoting “security checks” each time I called enquiring, before sending me curious letters to my address in Delhi, asking me questions such as why I had put my permanent address down as one in the UK. As well as why I had asked for someone else to pick up my passport for me, which isn’t even an option on the form, so I would have needed to write that down specifically. Just to let you know at no point did I have an out of body experience or suffer from any kind of delusional episode and on a separate piece of paper write this request down, you’ll just have to take my word for that.

So many months later whilst it was processing I would decide to start walking to get some kilometres under my belt for when my passport finally arrived (how wrong I would be). 

Joining me would be the budding adventurer I had met whilst applying for my passport renewal… Billy. He was a welsh guy I had met in Delhi, they are a rare breed in India and I can honestly say I’ve never met another welsh guy in India, let alone one who could also speak hindi better than me.

You may be asking why would he want to undertake such a task and I was equally curious. The truth was that many people had begun to show an interest in walking with me, with glancing mentions from different people here and there, of joining me for a few days or a week. He had shown a keen interest to walk with me and whenever I got tired of telling my story again and again to new people, deflecting their bizarre questions, he would take the reins and tell my story for me. He enjoyed it, so why not have him join me and he could make it his story as well. We set off with the idea of getting about 600kms done from Karnal to Lucknow.

The walk began and he was carrying with him in his rucksack two bottles of water, a roll mat, fly netting and a change of clothes. The first few days were ok, we managed to get a decent amount of kms done, and we would sleep in a mixture of places from camping, motels and roadside cafes. His hindi made him a success with the people of India. He was an anomaly in a country obsessed with light skinned Europeans. It was hard not to be a bit jealous to begin with. It was safe to say that even though our backgrounds were similar, both of our experiences in India could not have been further apart from each other. If I spoke Hindi people would laugh because my grammar was off, if he spoke Hindi they would give him free stuff, praise him, in that environment I challenge anyone to not feel the injustice of the situation. With that said it seemed people were willing to put up with more with him about, as long as they were allowed to talk to him we were allowed to sleep at these “dhabas” (road side cafes/restaurants/bars), wash and leave the next day. With them having exchanged numbers with billy in the hope they could stay in contact with him. (This, I would get a dose of, but not till the north east part of India, where a lot of messages sent to me would weirdly be comprised of questionable picture messages from sexually frustrated soldiers living in military camps).

DCIM101GOPRO

We met loads of people, saw strange things and I think he was glad he came, that was until his body began to entertain other ideas. Such as, does his foot really have a need for toe nails. He had got blisters during his walk and there isn’t normally anything you can do for them except let them run their course. So he was greeted with the, normal for Kieran and I, each time you began walking, the first 50 metres of pain until it became bearable and you could walk like a normal human being again. Walking behind him I couldn’t help but smile at the familiar sharp inhaled and exhale whilst swearing into the air “fuck, shit, fuck” coupled with his infamous encouraging catchphrase, which I don’t know if he knew I could hear or not, “come on, stop being such a mincer”. I think back now and smile at the time we spent together walking. He helped take my mind off the irritation that was the passport situation and watching him in what could only be described as his ideal environment, talking to people, entertaining them, shouting “Tinder?” at girls walking by and holding hands with elderly people whilst walking down the street. It’s safe to say that Billy’s India was a magnificent place to witness.

A few kms away from a town one late afternoon we were stopped by a man on a motorbike who asked where we were from, he then asked what religion we were. I told him sikh and billy told him none of the above. He replied, that because I looked like a hindu or muslim not to go through the next town because there were tensions between the two and bad things would happen. We tried to reassure him and he seemed unsatisfied by our casual attempts, offering us a lift through the town on the back of his bike, for obvious reasons we declined. But I did offer Billy the option to take the lift and to meet me on the other side of the town, he declined and we settled on trying to find a camping spot before the sun went down, instead of walking through the town at night. We found a spot just off the road into a field that had been partially harvested, leaving us a nice right angle of crops to camp behind hiding us from the road and other people who were maybe walking, but behind that about 40 metres away was a small stream that looked like it doubled as a quite well worn path. Safe to say Billy didn’t get much sleep that night, where as I slept quite well. I think I was used to sleeping in those conditions, knowing I’d need rest for the next day but the man stopping on the motorbike seemed to through billy off his stride, along with the heat, the uneven ground, the stream path and his white mosquito net, being completely visible in the moonlight.

So India was a hard slog. Every day is a crazy blend of traffic, curious locals and excruciating heat. Out of Kieran and me, I was the one good with heat, but the heat in India is some other beast. I found myself at times having to stop every couple of kilometres just to get out of the sun, consuming ungodly amounts of liquids to no relief. India is a harsh country.

On the road to Delhi, I was able to go through Amritsar, one of the few holy places for Sikhs in India (another being in Pakistan). The Golden Temple (The Harmandir Sahid),  I entered and stayed for a few hours, having some food and walking around enjoying the sights and taking a few pictures. The Golden Temple is exactly that, a golden temple placed in the centre of a large manmade lake of holy water, many people come to visit from around the world to bathe in the waters and pray in the temple there. I stayed in Amritsar the night and was back on the road in the morning

DCIM101GOPRO

DCIM101GOPRO

  The only thing I had to keep my mind busy was the thought that 400kms down this very road, friends and family would be in Delhi to greet me. The sandals I bought in Lahore had started to eat their way into my feet by now and stops were becoming a frequent burden. Not wanting them, but at the same time my body screaming for them as the sun took no prisoners and cared not for my painful feet or arms and face burning throughout the day.

Days later, after constantly being moved on night after night from peoples land, I would out of sheer exhaustion and lack of sleep, find myself having to bargain with hoteliers for rooms on the side of the grand truck road, some regal, some squalid. Anything to just be indoors away from the constant barrage of noise, smog and most of all just to get a few hours asleep.

This would become a trend throughout India. The land everywhere if not owned and being guarded was built upon and impossible to camp on. I would engage in conversations with people, even sit down and have tea with them in the hope that they would allow me to use their land to camp on, but they would look at me like I was crazy, only replying with a “not possible”, usually followed by casual directions to a hotel nearby. I would explain I didn’t have enough money for that and then came the question I would hear a lot whilst in India, “then why are you here?”.

People had told me, and I had looked forward to, the experience of India being one of, ‘coming home’. I’ve never had much connection to India, whilst I am of Indian decent, both my parents were born in Africa and I hadn’t grown up making trip to India like other family members. But they assured me that once Id got to India I would be ok, people would be nicer and things would become easier. It couldn’t have been more further from the truth. I was completely treated as an outsider, my lack of language, whether Punjabi or Hindi, strangely enough worked in my favour sometimes. Indians from other parts of the country thinking I was merely a dark-skinned Englishman and congratulating me on the small amount of Hindi I knew. But in other places people scorning me for not knowing a language I was never introduced to or needed to use, calling me “one of those”.

It was a long hard slog to Delhi but eventually after what felt like a difficult few weeks I had arrived and a few days after my family would be arriving. The first time I had seen them since Kyrgyzstan. It felt like a lifetime ago, so many things had happened since then. The harsh winter in the mountains of Kyrgyzstan, more mountains in Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan. Was I glad to be seeing them yes, but on the other hand, how would I feel being around them, I didn’t know. I didn’t feel any different but would I have known if I was?

I walked into the elevator of their hotel, on the way up I stared at myself in the mirrors lining the four walls and took in the sight of a long haired bearded man who definitely didn’t look the same as when he had last seen them. I approached the door and knocked, at once my mum opened the door and screamed, taking a few steps back as if I had snuck up behind her and grabbed her. She immediately started laughing and my dad also made his way to the door, hugs and smiles all around whilst mum told me that I was going to need a shave

@asbhogal at the Pakistan / Wagah border #borderwalk #theborderwalk #solo #wateraid #mcsuk #sony

During this car wash, which I was personally expecting to go wrong, as everything else had so far, there was only one moment where I thought the gig was up and they had worked out that that I was not indeed Pakistani. One of the workers cleaning the car came up to me as I sat and asked me for something, obviously not being able to understand, I looked at him in silence and then shot a glance to…

Afghanistan / Pakistan border

Whilst in Kabul I went for a walk around the markets, my parents had been adamant that I stay away from the crowded markets places, but I accidentally found myself amongst one when I was walking around the centre one afternoon. And thought whilst I was there I would try and buy something, as Its not everyday you’re in Afghanistan. On my return I found out that there had been a report of a leader…

Exploring Kabul #borderwalk #tanks #Afghanistan #Kabul #solo #wateraid #mcsuk htp://wp.me/p1mVLo-SA

By the second day in Kabul I had an opportunity to view Afghanistan and it’s two polar opposites. On the first day I was shown the nurturing, forward moving Afghanistan with the Mahboba’s Promise Organisation, and their maternity healthcare project opening. Having a chance to meet  orphaned children there who were being helped and educated by great people, who want to help improve their country.…

Kabul http://wp.me/s1mVLo-kabul

The drive took about 5 hours, weaving in and out through the mountains and through small road side towns. We stopped for snacks and lunch once and finally made it to the outskirts of Kabul. Once there I called a friend of a friend who’s number I was given in Dushanbe. She told me that the small complex that she and a few other friends lived in had an empty room that would be way cheaper than any…

The next morning I woke and called the commanders son who could speak English, he agreed to meet me and help me arrange transport back to before Baghlan. I met with him outside the hotel and he seemed to know everyone. We decided to take a walk to the edge of town to go get a car. During our walk the conversation eventually turned to the Taliban, and I recited a story that I had heard that a…