The Afghan Amulet: Travels from the Hindu Kush to Razgrad

by Sheila Paine

In 1990, armed with five kilos of luggage, a camera, and a liter of vodka, Sheila Paine set off for the high valleys of the Hindu Kush in northern Pakistan, looking for an interesting amuletic pattern relevant to her work as a textile expert.
It remained elusive, always to be found "in the next valley." Undeterred, she followed traces of it on tribal costumes and in fabric amulets into increasingly dangerous and remote territories.
Over two years, her quest took her into Makran, an area split by the Pakistan/Iran border and totally closed to outsiders, then into Iran itself, once she was able to escape the watchful eye of a suspicious government official. She was smuggled into Afghanistan and continued her journey through Iraqi and Turkish Kurdistan before reaching the Black Sea and the last link in the chain, the small town of Razgrad in eastern Bulgaria.

Genres: Nonfiction, Middle East, Travel, Pakistan

278 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1994

About the author

Sheila Paine is a world expert on tribal societies and textiles. Her passion for travel began when she was very young and has taken her across the world, from Africa to Pakistan. She is a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and has worked as a professional translator/interpreter in French, German, Italian, and Spanish. Her museum-quality collection includes embroidery and amulets and has been staged in numerous exhibitions. She is the author of several acclaimed books, including Embroidery from India and Pakistan, The Linen Goddess, and The Afghan Amulet, and has won travel writing awards from the Independent and the Sunday Times

Reviews

[Daren · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well written, and thorough in its intent. The short chapters are well organised and capture the culture, the attitude of the people, and importantly for the author, the fashion of each location.
Despite the book sounding fairly specialised (looking for the location of origin of a dress and an embroidered amulet), it made interesting reading for those not specifically interested in embroidery!

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent travel writing about places most of us will never see. I just wanted more information about the amulet and why this embroidery was so important to the author! I couldn't decide if she was crazy or brave or stupid to travel through places where her life was constantly at risk to learn more about this specific embroidery pattern.

[Lesley Potts · Rating 4 out of 5]

The only thing that could have made this book more enjoyable would have been photographs of the people and places Ms. Paine describes. Given that, for most of the length of her travels, the author was shrouded in a burqa, it would have been difficult to get away with taking pictures. I've seen a few on various websites. Apparently they weren't of a high enough quality for publication.
I admire the sheer bravery of a woman of my age undertaking a solo journey into, even in the 1990s, very dangerous areas of the world. Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, Kurdistan, any -istan, pre-Isis but full of Kalashnikov toting muhajedin and all societies where women exist, for the most part, in servitude to men. Everywhere she went, she met with the same questions: "Where is your husband?" "How many sons do you have?"

While the predominant theme is her search for the origins of a particular embroidered amulet, her interactions with the people she meets and the place they live are equally interesting. I'm so glad I finally finished this book.

[Marsali Taylor · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautifully written account of the author's travels in the near east in search of an embroidered amulet. Her descriptions of place gave you a real sense of being there, and there were many humorous or moving accounts of the people she met in her travels. It was a window into a world most of us will never see, and I wasn't sure whether Paine was brave, obsessive or totally mad to go into such danger - a mixture of the three! My one complaint was that she described the embroidery she saw in various villages in such detail that I really wanted to see it, and I'm sure she must have many photographs of it, so it's a pity these weren't included (the ones that were, were taken from a distance).

Well worth reading, both for real travellers (if only to warn you what you're taking on) and for armchair voyagers.

[Liz Wager · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fascinating account by an intrepid needlewoman -- I can't imagine how anybody can get quite so obsessed about embroidery patterns (the the extent of risking life and limb in some of the most lawless parts of the world) but am delighted that Sheila Paine did, because the end product (her books) are such fun for armchair travellers like me.

[Geri Hoekz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Re-reading this after a quick scan several years ago. It's non-fiction that reads like fiction, the story of the author's hunt for an elusive amulet, the motif of which she's seen on various objects such as fabric. Parts of it read like a National Geographic article (in my book this is a + since I'm a NG fan).

[Matthew Holmes · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing woman with an amazing story to tell. Read it.

[Gypsy Fredrich · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book, very interesting. I have read it twice. It set before the Invasion of Afghanistan by the USA who read no history before the invaded.

[Helga]

I'm not sure what I thought of the book.