Fog and fear

Mere inches separates us from the car in front, as from behind as we crawl down the mountain in first, hazards blinking, brake lights glaring. Fog thick enough to slice. Hairpin turns tight enough to make a strong man lose his lunch. The uninviting cliff to my left fortunately covered in a thick layer of white cotton candy. The fumes from the low gears set my nostrils alight. A few brave (read: stupid) souls decide to overtake. They quickly sidestep back in formation just in time for the upward bus to cruise past.

Just out the fog down the left riverbank a station wagon came to its bitter end. Upstream not one hundred meters a man buckles under the weight of the hatch-back to one banked wagon, a coveted piece of window, no doubt. People congregate, down by the river and by the side of the road where ostensibly the occupant of the unfortunate vehicle is being loaded in the trunk of a fellow station wagon.

I take a calculated sip of my day-old sparkling mineral water from the shelves of one of the "foreign nationals only" supermarkets in Kabul, desperately trying to rid my throat of the incessant taste of diesel in the back of my throat which begins to resemble a chronic nasal drip.

My book, I'll read my book and adhere to my own advice to people not accustomed to driving in the Middle East (which is rapidly being adjusted to read: Asia) - "keep your eyes inside the vehicle at all times if you want to avoid sudden heart attack or loss of lunch."