The Yellow Bus
“The Bus will leave on Monday 7.30pm: For Kabul ($28)

Teheran ($55)”

—scrawled in pencil on a torn page of what looked like copybook last used by a student long ago, many years before and taped to a side window of the bus, it looked like it might fall off.

The bus itself was a vintage German single-decker with more personality than mechanical integrity. A yellow beast with a curve in its tinted windows that once screamed “futuristic” but now muttered “dilapidated”. The transparent roof, once a skylight to European sun, now boasted Indian hangings and straw matting—because nothing says “climate control” like a yoga studio ceiling. Painted modestly on the side: “The Bus”.

I arrived at 7.20pm. The front of the bus was jacked up high like it wanted to take off. Beneath it: one Indian, one bright red-haired Englishman, both covered in more oil than a Punjab paratha. Red—bare-chested in a green velvet waistcoat, cotton pants, and flip-flops—looked like a member of a funk band.

many off the 19 passengers were textbook hippies: colourful clothes and hash-high, some with names like “Sunbeam”. A pretty girl was already lying down inside, her place staked out, eyeing the world with the detached expression of someone who wasn’t sure if the bus was real. Near the front, a young, very handsome Italian man named Antonio was playing on a silver flute. His withered legs were braced in iron, a contradiction to his ethereal music.

Meanwhile, an impromptu lesson in begging was happening outside as a young boy dragged his sister to the bus, clearly coaching her in the fine art of guilt-based commerce. Unfortunately, a policeman with a bamboo stick had other ideas about childhood education and intervened with a disciplinary whack .

Red soon broke the news: “Starter motor’s still shot. We’ll have to push her to get her going. It’s easier than it looks!” he declared, as if that explained anything. And laughed. Red laughed at strange moments.

We rolled out of Delhi. The passengers got to work softening hash and loading chillums—those Hindu pipes that require you to smoke like you’re praying. Red, never one to be left behind, stopped the bus mid-highway for a ceremonial puff, dragging like a guru in a Goodyear ad.

A Kiwi traveller suddenly shouted, “Red said I could pay in Kabul!” The Weasel—a co-owner of the bus and possible distant cousin of Nosferatu—was going down the aisle like a tax collector in sandals. Thin, pale, with blonde hair flopped over one eye like it had given up, he collected money while somehow chewing words and looking vaguely resentful of sunlight.

As Delhi disappeared in the rear-view mirror, we clattered toward Amritsar in a bus full of hash smoke, and two large water containers which were used to stop the engine from, apparently, bursting into flames. We lifted floor panels to douse it. It was like travelling in a sauna.

Near the station, a couple approached—smiling too widely to be anything but evangelists. “Children of God,” I muttered, having survived their temptations before. Red’s shout of “We’re leaving!” rescued me. I watched the couple pivot like heat-seeking missiles toward the next victim.

Crossing into Pakistan wasn’t smooth. One customs official found a note in Mohan’s passport: Pending trial. Mohan—bearded like a European Ho Chi Minh, with one earring and the grin of someone who’s probably hiding hash in his underwear—handed over a paper which seemed to exonerate him.

The customs officer then demanded to see a bottle of whiskey noted on an Australian’s form. “It has been consumed,” the Aussie said innocently. The official’s face twisted. “You try make joke with me?” he asked, clearly unfamiliar with Australians in general.

That night, The Weasel took over driving. Which is like handing over your life savings to a squirrel. He stalled twice. We all pushed. Again. “Red has it together, but this guy…” someone muttered.

In the middle of the night, we stopped in a dusty village. “The brakes are gone, no air, no steering,” The Weasel said dramatically, as if this was not our actual lives. He waved at a loose pipe, declared it unfixable, and wandered off in search of tea. Ian from London fixed it with a spoon and some string. “They don’t even have tools,” he grumbled.

In the morning we got stuck in mud. Locals laughed. We laughed. What else can you do when your life has been taken over by a bus that runs on willpower and weed?

We limped into Peshawar. Red and Mohan vanished to an opium den like it was the office watercooler. I went to the Government Bungalow, where I’d slept before but which had since been burned down in anti-government riots. I slept on a charpoy in the garden while enormous ants took liberties with my dignity. The caretaker gave me a farewell hash pipe—because nothing says “we’re good” like a narcotic peace offering.

With visas in hand, we attacked the Khyber Pass. Red, full of chillum smoke and enthusiasm, asked if anyone had cash for petrol. We passed signs warning not to leave the road—standard advice for areas where leaving the road gets you invited to a wedding where you can’t leave for six years.

Somewhere in the Pass, we learned Elvis had died. Nobody blinked. Had it been Ravi Shankar, we might’ve held a ceremony.

Near the Afghan border, a stern official demanded $300 for “road insurance.” Mohan shouted “Rip-off!” and slapped the desk like he was auditioning for Law & Order: Kabul. Red smoothed it over and we paid half. Bureaucracy, hippy style.

By evening, we reached Kabul, late but miraculously intact. The bus sighed into the garden of “The Peace Hotel”, exhausted like the rest of us.

Next morning when I awoke, the bus was empty. I found Red, lounging in a hotel room with The Weasel, Mohan, and a lovely Australian lady doctor. They were all lying around, sucking on chillums and grinning like people who had just invented peace.

“We’re leaving for Tehran on Monday, 10am,” Red told me. “Tell the others.”

“I’ll tell them,” I said. “But will they believe me?”

Red laughed. Of course he did.

P.S The following year the Iranian border closed, more or less, and the year after the Afghani one did likewise.