Stolen with a crane
7 juin 2010
In two years a lot of things can happen, especially in Afghanistan. Before I left Kabul in 2008 to go to La Rohcelle in France, I stored my VW bus in a friend’s garage ( Louis and Jerome : www.noshaq.com), two great friends who were staying one more year in the capital. A perfect storage. Unfortunately they had to leave after 5 months. Pretty tough, I was then in France and needed to find an other place. It’s like a poisoned gift, no one will accept it.
After a little brainstorm I found something. A good friend of mine, Ariane has her father leaving in Kabul. He has a house with enough space in the garden to hold this giant flower pot. After a few phone calls he accepted. Thank you so much for this huge help. I can relax a bit now my bus is in a safe place.
One year and a half went by, and when I wanted to find some news about my bus I learned that Ariane’s father sold his garden to a German company to build a parking area and that my bus disappeared !
Great so now what do I do ? Who could have taken the bus ? Afghan people don’t like this kind of old vehicle. It doesn’t have any value to them. My detective side worked on it, called some friends, analyzed the situation and everything around and found out that a member of this German company interested in vintage VW vehicles decided to become the owner of my vanagon.
You have good taste my dear, but that doesn’t belong to you and now it’s time to bring it back. Of course he was interested in this collectible Afghan version of such a bus.
After one week of distant investigation, my bus proudly reappeared in the parking lot. Many thanks to your dad Ariane ! Later I found out that the way they stole the bus was pretty special. They used a crane with straps to lift it up and put it on a truck. The way they put the straps wasn’t the best and it damaged one lateral window and the door frame. Nothing too bad—the body worker will fix it.
As soon as I got my bus back I called an other friend who suggested that I put it in his garden. This invitation came along even with an offer to drive my bus all the way to his place with the hand brake as the only brake. Great ! A safe place for at least one year. Having a bus wrapped with a tarp in a garden is not the best decoration ever, thank you so much Shakeb for that.
Eight months went by and after having elaborated 1000 plans 100 scenarios and planned 10 solutions and bought a one way ticket to Kabul, I am here in front of my bus ready for the adventure. Let’s go.
