This is my new VW Beetle (ingeniously christened Herb-i-Islami by my Australian housemate), at the workshop in Kabul. I don’t know enough about cars to say for certain whether or not it really is a 1969 model (as the vendor insists) but it’s certainly got enough rust and the suspension looks like it’s endured more than a few summers of love. (Most of the beetles in Afghanistan arrived overland with the hippies en route to India and Nepal. I’m told they go better in reverse up the really steepest hills). The wheels wobble from side-to-side and the ignition is a button behind the driver seat (this I suspect was an Afghan mechanic’s improvised addition). But with a bit of inshallah, it’s about three weeks from being the coolest car in Kabul.

This is my new VW Beetle (ingeniously christened Herb-i-Islami by my Australian housemate), at the workshop in Kabul.

I don’t know enough about cars to say for certain whether or not it really is a 1969 model (as the vendor insists) but it’s certainly got enough rust and the suspension looks like it’s endured more than a few summers of love. (Most of the beetles in Afghanistan arrived overland with the hippies en route to India and Nepal. I’m told they go better in reverse up the really steepest hills).

The wheels wobble from side-to-side and the ignition is a button behind the driver seat (this I suspect was an Afghan mechanic’s improvised addition).

But with a bit of inshallah, it’s about three weeks from being the coolest car in Kabul.