Why, Yes...I AM A Dumbass

Or, at least I was. Thanks for asking!!

A student at Loughborough University who is stranded in Kabul has said he has “no regrets” after flying out to Afghanistan for a holiday.

Miles Routledge, 21, from Birmingham, arrived in Afghanistan four days ago, having seen videos on YouTube promoting the country as a tourist destination.

“I thought [Afghanistan] looked quite nice, the food seemed amazing and it was dirt cheap,” he said.

However, as Taliban insurgents began surrounding the capital he realised the danger he was in and claimed he had been abandoned by the British embassy, who had not responded to any of his phone calls or emails.

Once upon a time, actually up until April of this year, I had a blog that I’d maintained for 20 years. I’ve always been fascinated with human stupidity and the truly, unbelievably ignorant things people would do, so early on I wrote a fairly regular column I called “The DUMBASS Awards.” It was a forum in which I’d detail some truly, deeply, irretrievably brain-dead action someone had engaged in. Some of the actions I featured defied rational explanation or understanding. Some of them were of the “What the….?” jaw-dropping variety, which would leave one wondering if the person in question should be checking their knuckles for scabs. Or how they’d managed to survive.

I thought of “The DUMBASS Awards” when I read of Miles Routledge and his spectacularly ill-advised decision to go on holiday in Afghanistan…just as the Taliban is overrunning the country again after 20 years.

Ah, to be young and stupid, eh?

Of course, I can’t be too tough on the young lad. There was a time in my life when I got off on the idea of traveling to places where angels (or rational, safety-minded people) feared to tread. I was living in Cyprus during the Lebanese civil war, and during that time, I had many invitations to visit friends in Beirut.

Come to Beirut, my Lebanese friends would tell me; my family will guarantee your safety. But, then, just about the time I was seriously considered venturing into a seriously chaotic (and dangerous) war zone, militias started kidnapping Americans off the streets of Beirut. As much as I hated to, at that point even I had to err on the side of caution when the kidnappings began…if for no other reason than no one in my life had the money to pay a ransom for me.

I’ve lived and worked in two different war zones, and while I’ve never seen combat or come under fire, I was aware of the risks I was taking. Chalk it up to being young and stupid, I suppose. But there was also a part of me that didn’t mind taking risks. Having grown up in a part of the world where violence meant a snowball fight, being in a war zone was an adrenaline rush. And I was young enough to feel bulletproof.

I once came very close to being shot by a Turkish soldier in Cyprus. It’s easy to be proud when you can relay a story like that, having emerged unscathed. It would have been very different had I actually taken a bullet.

Beyond that, I’ve never been the sort to want to travel to the same places other American tourists go to. Sure, England, France, and Italy are all wonderful places, but in my younger days I enjoyed being in places that were rather rough around the edges. I never wanted to have the experiences others wanted to have. I wanted to go to the places none of my friends had ever heard of…and I did a pretty decent job of doing exactly that.

Some folks wanted to go to North Umbria. I wanted to go to North Korea. And I still do, though my urge to live on the wild side has diminished with age. Having a wife with enough common sense for both of us is actually a good thing, something I wouldn’t have thought much of 20 or 30 years ago.

Miles Routledge also wants to go to North Korea. While I might question his intelligence and/or his methods, I rather admire someone willing to get off the beaten path and see something that most people wouldn’t even consider. At 21, he’s too young to understand that there’s a smarter and less risky way to go about doing the things he wants to do. Then again, what 21-year-old male doesn’t think they’re bullet-proof?

I can see a little bit of my young self in young master Routledge. I want to think I would’ve been a bit smarter…but would I really have made better decisions? Or would I have gone for it and made it up as I went? I have the benefit of hindsight and four decades more experience, but I might not have been any smarter at 21.

Besides, I hear Pyongyang is beautiful this time of year.