Re: Iran 1978

Posted by kit carr on Dec 15, 2013; 5:34am
URL: http://sundownersadventures.385.s1.nabble.com/Iran-1978-tp5706763p5706792.html

As far as I can recall we stopped doing full overlands in 1978, and started flying punters from Kabul to Istanbul (I think).
We called the "Indian Leg" KK tours: Katmandu to Kabul.

At this time Iran was a bit messy, and considered unsafe for punters generally but OK for road crew.

I was in Kabul when one of Simon's punters assisted my breathing activities as mentioned about. We were there to repair Kees van Yperens bus, and bring it back to London. We ended up leaving it in Istanbul I think and flew back from there.

The bus was being repaired at a trucking depot, owned by a dutch comnpany. Theyt had a really well equipped workshop, and dutch trained Afghani mechanics. They did a good job of repairing the Seddon. Effectively a full engine rebuild was required. The job was charged in Afghanis and the bill paid in Holland.

The workshop manager was a grteat guy named Barry. He was related to the deposed Royal Family, and spoke English, French and Italian as well as Dari and Pashto. We went to his house one day for tea. It was a nice house, in a compound some distance from the workshop, and in a nice part of Kabul. The work took some days, and the longest part was waiting for the payment to be made in Holland.

When the work was nearly finished Barry did not come into work one day. It was one or two days after we had been at his place for Tea. We went to his house to see if he was Ok, and it was completely empty. Nothing in it at all. Barry had completely disappeared. We never saw him again.

At this time the Russian influence in Kabul was strong, but the Russians had not invaded at that time. The Russians were all "Advisors" who had been asked to help by the Afghani Government. Many wore uniforms without badges, and civvies, but carried weapons. They controlled the information in and out of Kabul as I found out when I tried to send a telex. It stopped sending a paragraph in, and two Russians with short hair came and had a chat.

When Afghanistan closed after the Russian Invasion the flights were changed to Karachi-Athens flights. I remember Dick arranging a special flight using a tariff arranged for repatriating greek seamen. There were lots of jokes about the spelling at the time :-)

Jaffa was mentioned above.

The last time I went through Iran we stopped in Esfehan and saw Jaffa. HE contacted KD and made an arrangement for me to take some money out of Iran for him, which would be used by the buses as expenses. Sndowners were going to pay him back by depositing the money in London. I tooke the money and did with it as instructed, finished the tour and my time with Sundowners and returned to NZ.

About a year or two later I was contacted by a solicitor, acting for an Englsih solicitor seeking payment of the money I had taken under instrucution from Esfahan, along with interest and costs.
SOme legal expenses were incurred justifying my position, and after about a year (and some money and stress) I heard no more. I guess that Jaffa too was burned by the Sundowner management