Alive on Arrival

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034_imm05_N5
007_18 neu
008_F1160034 neu
005_000027neu
032_DSC_5405
031_DSC_5423
030_7 10 DSC_1379
029_DSC_1176
028_1120_0041_icc
027_1120_0013_icc
009_1120_0017_icc
025_F1070018
024_000024
023_1120_0015_icc
022_00007
019_1120_0029_icc
018_9532_0001
017_9588_016A
015_00022
014_00013
013_F1010016
010_1120_0019_icc
007_F1100035
004_Martin_New_Scan_07
003_F1010022_Kopie
002_000011
001_F1010020kop
026_D1120049
032_imm028a
previous arrow
next arrow

Afghanistan after the fall of the Taliban divides into at least two very different periods. It was only in 2004 that Afghanistan experienced its first suicide attacks. Before this, the war was not a war in today’s sense. Only after the slow but steady re-emergence of armed opposition groups this tool would be used with greater regularity. Living in and travelling through Afghanistan in the early period was a fundamentally different experience. Contact to the provinces was less of an obstacle. Terror, crime rates, abduction or even regional warlordism were at a low compared to today.

At the same time, Afghans seemed full of hope and were enthusiastic to engage in democracy. Elections and new institutions were not tainted with the negative connotations they bear today. People I encountered back then definitely carried a taste of the new freedom on their lips and in their eyes. For this period would soon reveal itself to be short lived and fragile.