A group of ordinary Afghans from a remote area of that war-torn nation set out with a dream — to scale the country’s tallest peak in the name of peace.
Aunohita Mojumdar tracks their epic journey all the way to the top
It all started over a cup of tea, as things do in Afghanistan. Malang, a cook in the Aga Khan office had a simple question: “Why not go up Noshaq?” And there it was. A straightforward question. The question ‘why not’ probably had many logical and sensible answers: because Afghanistan was a country in conflict; because Afghans had no tradition of mountaineering in the last three decades; because there was no money to back such an impossible dream. In the end, the answer to the question lay in the question itself: “Why not?” And four ordinary Afghans from the Wakhi community in the remote Wakhan corridor set off to climb their country’s highest mountain, Noshaq. On July 19, they became the first Afghan team to reach the top, and Noshaq now proudly flies the Afghan colours, planted there by Malang the cook and Amruddin, a Wakhi farmer.
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