Against this background of sometimes violent opposition to music we can better understand the dilemmas facing musicians returning to Kabul from Pakistan. Many of them come from the Kucheh Kharabat or Kharabat Street, Kabul's musicians' quarter, which was established by Amir Sher Ali Khan in the 1860s when he brought musicians from India to his court. During the internecine fighting that characterised the Coalition Government of 1992-96 the Kharabat was completely destroyed. Some musicians and their families moved to Pakistan and India, others relocated in the Khairkhona area of Kabul, far from the fighting, and there set up a system of music offices, a new idea copied from Pakistan. With the coming of the Taliban most of those musicians remaining in Kabul went to Pakistan; they had no way of making a living in Kabul. Many of them set up offices in an apartment block called Khalil House in University Road, Peshawar. Something like 25 groups were located in this one building, which was a hothouse of musical activity, of teaching and practice, and informal music sessions where young musicians competed to show off their virtuosity and technical skills. I visited Khalil House a number of times in January 2000 and some of the musicians I met then are now back in Kabul. Like everyone else who has returned, they are struggling to make ends meet, to get back to something like a normal life. Most of them are poor. Many musicians do not even own the instruments they play.