Word: driver
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...halfway through lunch at roadside restaurant in central Jalalabad when we heard the first gunfire. The place was empty except for an elderly bearded man at a table nearby, and my driver and I were sharing Kabuli pulao (rice), Afghani tikka (barbeque meat) and Kandhari nan (bread) with a television repairman we'd picked up at Torkham. TV repair was a bad business to be in, Sardar Mohammed told me, because the Taliban had banned television. But he'd helped me negotiate two-way cab fare with Mohibullah, the driver. It was 12:30pm, a pleasant afternoon with soothing breeze...
...gunfire was distant, at first, and we took it to be Taliban anti-aircraft firing at high-flying U.S. jets. "Eat well, don't worry," said Sardar. "The driver will take you safely back to Torkham. Don't slow down. Nothing will happen...
...Another waiter brought the green tea. As I picked up my glass but before I could touch it to my lips, another shot was fired just downstairs. "We will have tea somewhere else," shouted the driver. "Let's hurry. Get up. They have arrived...
...taxi driver tried to avoid them by saying something in Pashto. But then he stopped, rushed towards their commander, and said something pointing towards me. I kept sitting, not knowing what was going to happen...
...abandoned Taliban checkpoints, my driver would slow down without stopping, shout something to the new guards, and speed away. At one such checkpoint, he found some of his old friends. He got out of the car and hugged each one. At another checkpoint, another friend of the driver asked jokingly whether I was Taliban. "They are from Younis Khalis Group," said Mohibullah, gunning the engine to 80 miles an hour. "They have taken over the city. Talibans are gone...