House-hunting-odysseia II

We started to look for houses with the help of local real estate agents. First it looked quite interesting to see afghan houses hidden inside the walls. After seeing five houses each day we became quite exhausted. There was one principle problem: because afghan families are very big, the houses have plenty of rooms too. If I asked agent to show us some really small houses, we ended up seeing houses with “only” eight-rooms or so.

There are more problems related to renting a house in Afghanistan. First of all, you are responsible for your own security (ie you must hire guards), you must run the house yourselves (ie to manage water pump, heating, generator, etc).

Secondly, most of the afghan landowners ask for six months of rent before you can move in. We liked a lot one house in Karte Se district (near Afghan parliament Lloya Jirga), but meeting with landlord was really a disaster. He demanded that we pay him one year of rent in advance. He was not interested to hear our explanations. What can we do with a house in Kabul if we have to leave the country for security reasons? But landlord of the house was not interested to negotiate.

Khabir, who is a colleague of Andres, offered us to see a garden house that was sharing a compound with afghan family. First the idea seemed funny to us, but we later decided to see the house. When we entered lovely garden filled with pelargons and roses, it seemed like a miracle in the middle of noisy and dusty Kabul. The singing of dozens of exotic caged birds was relaxing. And little green garden house – fully equipped with not only kitchen stuff but also with local style furniture and carpets - seemed to be so cozy after those empty bleak rooms we have seen a lot previously. It was not hard to say “yes” to landlord.