The Lost Buddha’s of Afghanistan | TRACKS

this is a place with few travelers dear to tread a place that's been locked in bloody conflict for more than 20 years but beyond the conflict is a land of extraordinary beauty a place that was once the Fountainhead of one of the world's oldest beliefs for me this is a special journey to a valley hidden deep in this strictly Islamic land as I seek the gigantic relics of a much more ancient faith The Lost Buddha's of Afghanistan [Music] this is a picture of Afghanistan you've probably never seen it's an ancient realm of extraordinary culture landscape and people [Music] my name is David Adams I'm a photojournalist who specializes in traveling to the ends of the earth and that's one of the reasons I'm here because hidden away in the remote Bamian Valley are one of the unknown wonders of the world some of the oldest images of the Buddha gigantic statues which few Westerners have ever seen this was the place I remembered a country torn apart by war five years ago I was here as a freelance war correspondent now the front line is that way and there is be militia a firing one over my position through the other side of the city but I knew that beyond the bombs and the bigotry was a hidden treasure a place from where an ancient religion took its Creed to the world I swore that one day I'd seek out Bamian and it's lost Buddha's Afghanistan is a landlocked country in Central Asia sandwiched between Pakistan and Iran from the capital Kabul I head for her at and then up to mazar-e-sharif and then on to Bamian my journey starts though in Pakistan at a point where most people get their first and only glimpse of Afghanistan it's on a road well trodden by armies smugglers and spies to the Khyber Pass [Music] a bus takes me on the first leg of my journey and for the first 40 miles we pass through the tribal area a region run by autonomous chieftains as a westerner I must take an armed guard because kidnapping and banditry arrive here then a familiar sign five years ago I remember passing this burnt-out tank it's still here we've just crossed the border into Afghanistan 10,000 rupees Afghani Discover Bank these kids are offering to exchange my American dollars and Pakistani rupees for the local currency Afghan ease so how much do they want for all he's asking for 100 rupees he wants 100 rupees that is a Marmite that's in sound like the right exchange rate is it yeah I don't think so but that's what he was from you if you can the problem is there are 14,000 Afghanistan these guys are only offering me 10,000 some day I think you'll be a very good businessman after beings have pleasantly fleeced by the kids a higher an old russian army jeep at the border where that comes my driver as is and the man who'd be my god Abdul and off we said towards the spectacular Hindu Kush [Music] slowly the road snakes towards Kabul and as we go it brings back a terrible sense of deja vu [Music] the last time I traveled up this road it was controlled by the warlords of the Mujahideen and there were checkpoints all the way along it each one extracting a toll if you refused to pay it it could've cost you your life [Music] but for the mind this part of Afghanistan is relatively peaceful soon I get my first glimpse of the capital [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] you don't have to go far to see evidence of war everywhere there's rubble we film discreetly photography of humans is officially banned in Afghanistan and because this is a country suffering from trade sanctions Westerners aren't that popular some of them deprived from basic human needs of course they are not happy they are blaming the Western countries because also they feel totally abandoned in Kabul the law only allows foreigners to stay in one hotel and one hotel alone the Continental it's an ugly building not improved by the ravages of war it was where I stayed last time and it's where I stay this time and what a lineup one of the great tenets of Islam is that all visitors must be honored whatever their country or religion the plight of the Continental sums up Afghanistan normally an International Hotel like this would be brimming with businessmen politicians and power brokers but aside from me it's empty a deserted monument to Afghanistan's international isolation after years of shelling many of the windows are still covered in plastic there's a shortage of glass and I'm glad that I wasn't here when these rounds hit I asked for my old room it's of course no problem I've got the pic of the hotel [Music] thank you very much thank you and it still got the best view in town now five years ago standing here this was a panorama of battle with tanks over on that far hill all the way through the city was just gunfire and then from outside Rockets had come in and just lob into the city it was just incredible to see it at peace it's something I couldn't quite imagine five years ago but I want to go back to where I was as a correspondent the frontline the killing grounds of Kabul where I witnessed so much death and suffering and it wasn't just the humans who suffered what's so amazing is that the Cabal zoo is still here even more surprising so are some of the animals and in surprisingly good condition too since they were creatures caught in the crossfire I guess you'd have to say this is about the saddest bear in the world but it's a miracle that he's here at all because during the battle for Kabul the zoo was the front line and all around here there are trenches what's incredible is the zookeepers stayed here during all that fighting and tended the animals we also looked after the trees because everybody wanted to cut them down for firewood it's just one of those amazing stories that comes out of war the bear was unharmed but the lion was hurt when a grenade was logged into his cage he's blind but alive it's here that I first encountered the Islamic warriors whose leaders control his country the Taliban they couldn't look less like the fierce champions of Islam demonized in the Western media and in a place where photography is rigidly policed they're naturally enough intrigued by my camera but to place all Taliban in the same fundamentalist camp is not to understand where they're coming from most of them just want to see order restore and a better life for their children imagine being a kid growing up with this as your playground a lot of this has been the mind and a lot of the unexploded bombs been taken out both children lose their legs just having fun [Music] [Music] it's been a daunting first day back in Kabul back in a ruined city where people still live with the prospect that any day the end of their world could come [Music] I've been invited here to take photos yet this is a country where under the Taliban Islamic code there are severe restrictions on taking photographs tomorrow I get a permit but as I was to discover getting the permit is one fact making it work quite another [Music] morning in Kabul and sunrise reveals a shattered city 20 years of fighting has taken a terrible toll on the Afghan capital this was once the shah's mausoleum and this was the old royal palace today they're little more than rubble but with chars and Emperor's long gone Shepherds run their sheep in the Royal grounds [Music] my journey will take me across the country from Kabul to her at but before I live I need permission from the Ministry of Information to travel to the great Buddha's of Bamiyan and for that I'll have to wait and all the time I'm being watched the Taliban are everywhere you can tell them by their black turbans the word Taliban means religious student and at the religious school or the madrasa they learn the Koran by rote all 114 chapters of it by doing this they hope to interpret Islamic law in a pure uncontaminated way or that's the theory as a force for change the Taliban have only been around since 1996 even so their rules for living are based on an eighth century text it determines everything they do even whether or not I can take photographs but time is running short if I want to get to the Bamiyan Buddhas there's still no word from the Ministry so it's time to do a bit of public relations if an army marches on its stomach let's see if I can appeal to the Taliban's hidden in a back street is a kitchen and I love cooking pasta what I'm gonna cook for the the Afghans around here is what's called the Puttanesca it's an Italian pasta first thing we do is cut up lovely fresh tomatoes but be warned they're often fertilized with human waste so wash them very carefully there's actually a very funny story about a guy who was willing to smuggle opium out of Afghanistan and to hide the smell he actually put the put the opium down underneath the truckload of onions of course he gets to the border and he gets arrested for smuggling onions because you're not allowed to take onions ahead of Afghanistan they didn't care about the opium by now I'm acquiring quite an audience the sight of a westerner cooking for Afghans must be strange indeed and that if Puttanesca Afghan stop see I'm very hot you think now for the moment of truth hmm very clear oh it's very delicious I think Afghans are just very polite fortunately one of my guests is from the Ministry of Information maybe he can put a good word in for us he obviously likes my cooking but what about Abdul it's nice do you like it yeah but no so I think you did you [ __ ] so no but it's your capers and anchovies they're very salty can I use some kitchen salt and ketchup on it okay I don't think I'm going to change the culinary tastes of Afghanistan in one one meal but you know we can but try well it seems to have worked in the morning I'm summoned to meet mr. fires Mohammad fires Taliban head of information and a spokesman for the Minister of Foreign Affairs he's a powerful man indeed maybe he can grant me permission to see the Buddhas security or stability to the country but mr. fiers is also a religious scholar and a strict adherent of Quranic law so on the one hand his law forbids the depiction of any human image on the other he wants to rebuild tourism and promote Afghanistan to the world that's his dilemma he doesn't want to be filmed but to get his message out he has to be and what do you want the outside world most to understand about the administration here in Afghanistan we have put an end to the anarchy to the civil war in their country and with that not only the tourists but even journalists could freely visit a corner of the country and they could succeed to go wherever they wanted they could succeed visited many places and that includes us we get the go-ahead ironically to celebrate the good news Abdul takes mr. faces photograph with my Polaroid camera so we can go where we like and film who we like well not exactly what mr. feyo's neglects to tell us is that we're still not allowed to film people in towns nor does he warn us that he has no control over the most powerful government agency in Afghanistan the dreaded ministry for the promotion of virtue and the prevention of Vice the spires of these religious police are everywhere invisible but always present so all filming must be done very discreetly now we've been given a permit to film in Afghanistan first film crew to be allowed to do so by the Taliban government the problem is I'm not allowed to film anybody it can only film the country and buildings so doing this walking openly in the street and filming is very much against the law I could be arrested and our cameras could be taken away and smashed so as you can appreciate this is not going to be an easy film to make [Music] so unsure of exactly what lies in store we fire up our Jeep and hit for the airport our destination harassin once one of the greatest centers of learning in Asia it was also where one of the greatest spy games was played out [Music] the Afghan city of Herat is 400 miles west of Kabul as the crow flies and it's been a battleground for thousands of years [Music] in its day it was one of the greatest centers of culture and learning in medieval Asia the city is on Afghanistan's western border with Iran from here of head northeast towards mazar-e-sharif before I go to Bamiyan and once more I'm faced with delays Abdul heads out to try and get us filming permits reminding us that in Herat were not high on the Taliban's list of priorities they Taliban from the very beginning they were under criticism from Western media and that is why they are paranoid [Music] Abdul is trying to find the local Taliban commander the only man who can give us the nod it seems cabal's ministerial read doesn't extend to harass so while Abdul haggles I wait in a restaurant specializing in boiled sheeps brains [Music] the minutes turn to hours my day there's been a write off next day a permit arrives we can film her rats ancient university though there's not much left of it now it was largely demolished by British soldiers in the 18th century earthquakes and Worf destroy the rest but miraculously the minarets remain not even Russian shells managed to fill them [Music] but permission to enter the citadel hasn't come through yet so to fill in time i explore a local antique shop you have a fantastic scam thank you just okay thank you okay okay big shop many many thing okay maybe a killers silver corp are just looking okay in a way it's like a junk shop of history filled with discarded objects from Afghanistan's turbulent past banknotes from Imperial Russia shoes from a chars harem coins reputedly minted at the time of Alexander the Great and if you like old weapons a particularly deadly gun this looks like probably the most famous guns in Afghanistan they called the gazelle and it's what the the Afghans used to fight the British for probably the first and second wars and these to fire these off their horses this low but and they used to hold them very very high like this incredible weapon I think incredibly hard to aim but apparently they were very good very accurate but this is what I'm really after glassware that's unique to this shop just at the back is a kiln where the same family's been making it to the same formula for centuries and their method well it's a closely guarded secret handed down from generation to generation and even with sanctions they have no shortage of buyers in fact they've just got another two pieces one daughter I think I'll be buying a lot yeah at last permission has arrived from the Taliban I can film in the great citadel I must say I'm surprised this is a military base and pictures will be of strategic interest to an enemy yet they let us film but on one condition every person must be removed before we enter [Music] I'd always wanted to explore this fortress because of its role in forgotten pace of 19th century history the secret spy wars between Britain and Russia known as the great game Afghanistan was the gateway to British India and Russia wanted to control that gateway intrepid British and Russian army officers roamed the country in disguise mapping and spying all the military routes one of them was lieutenant Eldridge Pottinger after being held under siege for months in the Herat Citadel it was Pottenger who saved the day for the Afghans [Music] finally the Persians began to breach the walls and the Afghans on this side seemed everything was lost the ground brassiere sat down in the dust he was going to give up but pottinger grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and marched him towards the invading Persians with his sword waving in the air this absolutely terrified the Persians they all fell back and then the Afghans within the fort followed them out and they saved the city incredible story [Music] in a way the great game sums up Afghanistan's problem in a nutshell it's a country sandwiched between rival empires so for invading armies it's always been a battlefield on the way to somewhere else [Music] how any of these armies were able to move through Afghanistan boggles the mind the roads through the mountains our report [Music] I'm now heading north slowly drawing closer to the battlefront and the killing fields the deadly legacy of more than 20 years of war [Music] the center of Afghanistan is one of the bleakest wildernesses in Asia everything here is influenced by one chilling fact they'd been fighting not for 20 years but for 2,000 years for Afghanistan has always been a land of invasion rival warlords and violence beautiful castle that you see them all up and down these valleys they defend every strategic position the trouble is when you're traveling in Afghanistan you've got to be really careful if you want to go and explore one because they're covered in minefields for both the Russian time and also from the Civil War we're now deep in the mountains of central Afghanistan on the road to mazar-e-sharif the last major stop before the front line the killing fields though extend all the way to the outskirts of the city this is landmine country and if that isn't enough there's another scourge a terrible drought has forced these people out of the nearby mountains into this place an abandoned barracks in the middle of a battlefield [Music] unexploded shells and landmines are everywhere the human toll extracted by starvation and explosion is terror [Music] this man has lost three of his five children in the last two weeks from Hungary from there out just doesn't have enough to eat now [Music] for once we can film safely without our Taliban minders because we're here under the protection of the Halo trust these guys are the miracle workers who destroy the unexploded shells and landmines how long has it taken to collect just these is this over some months or weeks ourselves as citizens it's hostly says in three days we collected all of three day three days yeah that's incredible so every three days you find this many [Music] this work is hideously slow and there's no way to go any faster [Music] if you hurry this process you make mistakes and mistakes lead to a single result death [Music] it's estimated there are still 10 million landmines to be cleared in Afghanistan every day someone somewhere treads on one has just found a landmine and that's one of thousands yet to be dug up on this hillside and behind me this valley in three years they've cleared upwards of 1,800 mines more than 3,000 unexploded bombs and rockets and nearly 70 anti-tank mines probably take 10 years to clear all the high-priority areas in Afghanistan that's where people live but it's only if the support and the money to pay for it continues [Music] at last after two days torturous drive we make it into mazar-e-sharif [Music] [Music] despite all the fighting one building has managed to survive all the shells and bombs the great blue mosque this time there's no problem with filming [Music] of course the same rules apply here no photography of human faces so the Taliban clear everybody out of the mosque I feel a bit guilty it's almost known time for prayers but rules are rules no one may stray in front of our cameras this is one of the holiest shrines in Islam it's the burial place of Muhammad's son-in-law Hazrat Ali not only is it a spiritual place but it's one of the most beautiful mosques in the entire Muslim world we've just heard some rather disturbing news from the BBC and confirmed by the UN that the u.s. might be moving towards another missile strike in Afghanistan aimed one of the camps perhaps associated with the alleged terrorist Osama bin Laden and we can't confirm that but I've got to say standing here in this beautiful serene place it's a it's incredible to believe that maybe only 40 kilometers away cruise missiles will be landing in the next few hours on hearing this the UN pull out other foreign aid agencies follow suit and paranoia reigns [Music] all we can do is wait two days later and nothing has happened this time the missiles don't come but false alarms like this are part of daily life here never knowing when a bomb might fall is just another pressure on a country already living on the edge [Music] with the crisis seemingly past the paranoia subsides and I want to visit the ruins of one of the oldest cities on earth just her permission [Music] once more Afghanistan's violent history rises to confront us this time the timeline is three thousand years this is bulk once called the mother of all cities though it also could be called the mother of all cemeteries we're wandering around places like this is boring to a lot of people it's just a bunch of stones and bones or in fact as you could see that's literally what it is there are bones all over the place most of us just think about the last 20 years of war here in Afghanistan but really it's about much more places like bulk and sites like this all over the country these bones these ruins go back to the earliest of times this is what Afghanistan is really all about in fact bulk is built on bones [Music] all around its crumbling walls are the bleached remains of human habitation [Music] every time the city was sacked what was left of the population simply rebuilt it [Music] if anything sums up Afghanistan's violent history its bulk over 3,000 years it's been sacked and almost unbelievable 700 times is it any wonder that the Afghans are crying out for peace peace is a very important thing is not an ordinary thing you see everything comes from peace now if you got peace you will have school if you got peace you can help you can work if you got peace I mean you don't have to travel from one place to another to be a replica refugee [Music] tomorrow I head for a sacred Valley a place where a religion was once practiced that prided itself on peacefulness but it isn't a valley of Islam I'm finally heading for Bamian the Lost Valley of the Buddhas [Music] [Music] it's autumn in Afghanistan and when I first set eyes on the Bamian Valley I'm astounded by its beauty [Music] this is the Afghanistan few people ever say and I'm one of the first Westerners for a long time who's been allowed to show it to the world the last sector of my journey has taken me from mazar-e-sharif into the heart of the hindu kush not far from where natural mineral waters bubble from the ground i find a great photographic vantage point from here i catch my first glimpse of the lost buddhas of afghanistan and what colossal statues they are [Music] that one there in the distance is a hundred and eighty feet high that's 57 meters carved out of living rock the height of a 20-story building [Music] but I would get much closer for that I need permission so I climbed the Bamian Citadel and asked for Taliban [Music] this medieval fortress is both a ruin and a strategic outpost the Taliban tell me this place is called the city of noise it's deathly quiet now but it got its name because of the cries of people slaughtered here by Genghis Khan more than 800 years ago the killing went on for days and you can die just as horribly up here today because this whole mountain is full of Mines any step just off the trails here and you're dead news from the Taliban commander is not good the Buddha's are of military significance access will almost definitely be denied [Music] while Abdul keeps up the pressure we stay in the local village these are the Hazara people and I'm told the Taliban would rather Lee didn't have much contact with them the Hazara are the descendants of Genghis Khan's warriors they want independence for their Valley which is probably why the Taliban don't entirely trust him at the moment there's an uneasy truce between the Taliban and the Azara [Music] but the Azura not only seem to want contact with us they want me to play in one of their volleyball teams [Music] we film discreetly officially the Taliban has banned all sports in Afghanistan well obviously no one told the Hazara [Music] the following morning there's an urgent summons and I hope it doesn't mean trouble [Music] it doesn't if we leave this second I can see the Buddhas but when I get there it's not quite what I expected it's ancient all right it's definitely beautiful but it's small not one of those big ones I saw across the valley the day before it's also not in very good shape but the irony is the very nature of this sculpture was the cause of its destruction because Muslims abhor the worship of idols and so from about the seventh century Muslim pilgrims coming through this valley simply obeyed their religion and this is the result but there's an even greater irony Buddhism was also a religion that abhorred idols over 2,000 years ago the Buddha was represented by a symbol usually a footprint or a wheel but then a great change in Buddhism took place and it took place right here the keys who ruled Bamian launched a new humanized form of Buddhism by turning the Buddha into a recognizable man so the Bamiyan Buddhas are not only some of the biggest they are some of the oldest in the world but for me there so tantalizingly near and yet so frustratingly far away early next morning we have one last-ditch attempt to get permission and miraculously it works the Taliban commander will let us see the giant borders in return for a favor he wants me to take his photograph so once again in a country which bans photography of the human form this is not the time to point out inconsistencies in anyone's logic make it warm you go first [Music] so at last I get my chance to explore the Buddhist [Music] I've been allowed to fall into ruin for a thousand years or more but nevertheless this is one of the most amazing places I've been to anywhere this is an incredible rabbit warren this whole mountain is just full of tunnels they all leave the little chambers which amongst would have lived in or prayed in and they all congregate around the Buddha here as you can see top of his face has been carved off and may have been Genghis Khan it may have been pilgrims or may have been relatively recently and they've burned any black in the face as well but you can still say it's an incredible sculpture one of the greatest I think you'd have to say in the world and then I'm told the reason why they were so reluctant to let us film here underneath is a Taliban ammunition down [Music] I'm only allowed a few minutes but it's all I need suddenly the frustrations and delays a long forgotten just think this is the place where the Buddha in human form was taken to the world before we leave Abdul has an unpleasant task to perform it seems our drivers assistant has been spying for the religious police maybe it's why we had so many problems getting permission we'll never know but Abdullah outraged not only because he's been spying but because he's broken a cardinal rule of Islam by being inhospitable to strangers we pay him out and head for the border [Music] as we head back up the Khyber Pass I begin to realize what we've achieved we're one of the few documentary crews who have not been thrown out by the Taliban largely because we tried to stick to the spirit of their rules and while we found some of those rules frustrating they respected us for trying to stick to them they may have restricted and limited what we could film but they never tried to censor what we wanted to say [Music] so as I passed the burnt-out tank yet again I wonder if it'll still be here the next time I passed this way I also wonder what other secrets lie hidden in this troubled but beautiful land a land longing to shed its embattled image as it tries to emerge from isolation at the ends of the earth [Music] you

Channel: TRACKS

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Rating: 4.844214 out of 5

Keywords: TRACKS, tracks travel channel, tracks travel, afghanistan (country), david adams documentary, buddhas of bamiyan, buddhism (religion), history documentary, Mystery documentary

Id: b1ic_VUdKZ8

Length: 50min 23sec (3023 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 24 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/ShreemBreeze]

Skip to 43:00 to see the statues.

[u/Donteatmynachos]

Thanks for posting this! For some reason I find Afghanistan history so interesting.