How Snegurochka might look at two months
I just found out that the pregnant cat across from my office gave birth this morning. My little Snegurochka was one of the four.
Now I am not really sure what to do. When is the right time to take a kitten away from its mother? Four weeks? Eight weeks? Can I make her food myself or should I buy the hella expensive cat food they import?
So many questions. I have never had a brand new cat before!
Whenever I read a story like this, I feel like I have been kicked in the chest.
I have been out of Afghanistan now for over four months. Still, I can't tear myself away from the stories--stories so fucking bewildering they make me want to cry. Why would anyone gun down schoolgirls?
I think about the time I went to a school opening in the same province where these two little girls were killed. My organization had built a primary school for boys and one for girls and a few colleagues and I were invited for the ceremony. Dozens of little girls lined the walk as we approached the school--handing us flowers, singing and shaking our hands. They were all wearing the traditional green headscarves and maroon dresses with gold trim. After we toured the new school, one of the girls read a poem she had written and the teachers provided us with sugar coated almonds, raisins and green tea even though it was Ramadan and all of the Muslims were fasting--not eating or drinking until sundown.
Two months later, a rocket hit the school at night. No one was hurt and there was minimal damage, but it was a warning.
I guess things are getting worse.
Stories like this also remind me of the Afghans who really meant a lot to me--the civil engineer I worked with who broke down crying when he heard I was leaving for Ethiopia and told me, "I have three daughters. The youngest, she is like you. I always encourage her to be like you." The Afghans who called when the riots happened to make sure I was OK, the friends who offered to take us into hiding. I also think about Sharif, a driver at my work. Sharif did not speak English, but taking me and my husband home one day my husband noticed a Zemfira tape in his car.
"Ti gavareesh pa-ruskii?" ("you speak Russian?"), my husband asked, using the informal "you" which always pisses me off. "Da", he replied--a friendship was born.
Sharif went to university in Leningrad and finished his degree in history in 1987--two years before the Soviets were run out of Afghanistan by the Mujahadeen. He had five daughters, a real misfortune for an Afghan father. Since I was the only expatriate Sharif could communicate with (the only one who spoke Russian), he often asked me what was going on within the organization--the hirings, firings and other gossip and he told me what was going on in Afghanistan--the corrupt police, the bombings, the rumors.
Before my husband and I left Afghanistan for good Sharif invited us over to his house for dinner. He lived in the "unplanned" area of the city where people squatted on public land in mud houses. He lived on the side of TV hill, on the third floor of a lopsided building with no running water and no sewer (wastewater ran down a trench in the center of the dirt road). We met all of his beautiful daughters, including the smallest, Arazu, who was five. Sitting there drinking tea with Sharif and his family, I could tell how much he loved his daughters.
They brought out dozens of dishes from their small kitchen in a genuine display of hospitality. After dinner, Sharif's daughters presented me with some jewlery they had made for me and Sharif brought out his photos.
The pictures broke my heart. Here was Sharif--twenty years ago with more hair--in Sochi, with his college friends (big Soviet women lounging in bikinis in the background, obviously scandalous for an Afghan). Here was Sharif in Red Square, in front of Lenin's tomb, in his obshezhetye (dorm) with his friends from Pakistan, China and Kenya. Here was Sharif, so full of hope, thinking that the world was ahead of him with no idea what was going to happen a few years down the road.
Now he is a driver earning $125 a month and supporting his wife and five girls.
When I hear terrible things about Afghanistan, I think about people like Sharif. I think about people who just want to raise their children and celebrate their weddings, to play with their grandchildren and sit around with friends and drink tea. I think about how the bombings have killed the family members of friends. I think about the little girls who sang songs for the foreigners when they got their new school. I think about Sharif sitting in the window of his small, two-room house, holding his little Arazu.
Why is it no matter where I go I get cat-called? I can be wearing anything, any time of the day in any part of the city and men cannot help but yell something at me! Walking back to my office from lunch with my husband a man pulled up next to me in his car and yelled, “sexy!” And last week, wearing sweats with greasy hair going to play Frisbee a man in a minibus taxi pulled in between me and my husband just to holler at me (I was walking with him and three Ethiopian men, but the driver was undeterred): “Hey baby, how are you?”
What are these guys thinking? Seriously, is there some myth about white women that I have not heard? Do they think that I am going to talk to them? What gives them the fucking right to walk past me and whisper, “sweet, sweet sister”? What gives them the right to even talk to me at all? I just want to yell “LOOK, I AM WALKING WITH MY HUSBAND, THE ONLY WHITE GUY WITHIN A TEN MILE RADIUS AND I AM WEARING BUSINESS CLOTHES. I AM NOT A PROSTITUTE AND I HAVE NO REASON TO TALK TO YOU. FUCK OFF.”
I really need to invest in a tazer.
From the NYT--I knew that the Ethiopian Government was restrictive and authoritarian, but sanctioned rape and torture?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
June 18, 2007
In Ethiopian Desert, Fear and Cries of Army Brutality
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN
IN THE OGADEN DESERT, Ethiopia — The rebels march 300 strong across the crunchy earth, young men with dreadlocks and AK-47s slung over their shoulders.
This is the Ogaden, a spindle-legged corner of Ethiopia that the urbane officials in Addis Ababa, the capital, would rather outsiders never see. It is the epicenter of a separatist war pitting impoverished nomads against one of the biggest armies in Africa.
What goes on here seems to be starkly different from the carefully constructed up-and-coming image that Ethiopia — a country that the United States increasingly relies on to fight militant Islam in the Horn of Africa — tries to project.
In village after village, people said they had been brutalized by government troops. They described a widespread and longstanding reign of terror, with Ethiopian soldiers gang-raping women, burning down huts and killing civilians at will.
It is the same military that the American government helps train and equip — and provides with prized intelligence. The two nations have been allies for years, but recently they have grown especially close, teaming up last winter to oust an Islamic movement that controlled much of Somalia and rid the region of a potential terrorist threat.
The Bush administration, particularly the military, considers Ethiopia its best bet in the volatile Horn — which, with Sudan, Somalia and Eritrea, is fast becoming intensely violent, virulently anti-American and an incubator for terrorism.
But an emerging concern for American officials is the way that the Ethiopian military operates inside its own borders, especially in war zones like the Ogaden.
Anab, a 40-year-old camel herder who was too frightened, like many others, to give her last name, said soldiers took her to a police station, put her in a cell and twisted her nipples with pliers. She said government security forces routinely rounded up young women under the pretext that they were rebel supporters so they could bring them to jail and rape them.
“Me, I am old,” she said, “but they raped me, too.”
According to Georgette Gagnon, deputy director for the Africa division of Human Rights Watch, Ethiopia is one of the most repressive countries in Africa.
“What the Ethiopian security forces are doing,” she said, “may amount to crimes against humanity.”
Human Rights Watch issued a report in 2005 that documented a rampage by government troops against members of the Anuak, a minority tribe in western Ethiopia, in which soldiers ransacked homes, beat villagers to death with iron bars and in one case, according to a witness, tied up a prisoner and ran over him with a military truck.
After the report came out, the researcher who wrote it was banned by the Ethiopian government from returning to the country. Similarly, three New York Times journalists who visited the Ogaden to cover this story were imprisoned for five days and had all their equipment confiscated before being released without charges.
The violence has been particularly acute against women, villagers said, and many have recently fled.
Asma, 19, who now lives in neighboring Somaliland, said she was stuck in an underground cell for more than six months last year, raped and tortured. “They beat me on the feet and breasts,” she said. She was freed only after her father paid the soldiers ransom, she said, though she did not know how much.
Hit the road!
Since it is almost time for all Americans to travel for the Memorial Day weekend, I thought it was time to pass on the knowledge I have gained in my travels.
On the road:
1. Check your tire pressure and fluids before you hit the road. Take a cell phone and make sure your ipod is charged.
2. Time your trip to avoid rush-hour traffic in urban areas. While this usually means 5:00 pm, take into account lunch traffic and church-goers heading to buffet restaurants on Sundays.
3. When your tank gets to ¼ full, pull over and get more gas. You never know when there is going to be a slow-down on the interstate and you definitely don’t want to be the dumbass who ran out of gas and is stuck on the side of the road. Use your fill up as an opportunity to powder your nose and replenish your supply of Diet Coke, Camel Lights, Rold Gold pretzels and Ephedrine.
4. Only pass in the left-hand lane, even if you are the only one on the road.
5. Use your turn-signals, even when changing lanes. Truckers appreciate this.
6. Truckers also appreciate if you blink your lights to let them know they can pass.
7. Scan stations when you hit college towns. There are usually good college stations out there, or at the very least you can catch some NPR.
8. If you turn off and the next gas station is over a mile away, get back on the interstate and go to the next exit. Trust me.
In the air:
1. Before you check in, call the airlines and let them know your seating preference. Ain’t no need being in the middle if you can have the window!
2. If you have a small bladder, take the aisle seat.
3. If you are on a short flight and have only carry-on luggage, be the first one on the plane. This way, you can guarantee that your carry on is in the bin above you and not somewhere in aisle 55, thus ensuring you can jump up as soon as the plane hits the ground, grab your shit and muscle your way to the door. (By the way, all of that blather about people traveling with children boarding first is bullshit. They never check.)
4. If you are on a long-haul flight and have checked bags, be the last one on the plane. This way, if there are extra seats on the back of the plane, you can take a few and stretch out.
5. Order a special meal. Special meals come first, so you can eat, take your Xanax, drink your wine and be ass-out before the rest of the plane has gotten their meals.
6. After meals everyone goes to the bathroom. Be first to avoid the post-meal rush: when you hear the food cart a rumblin’, get up and pee. Having a special meal makes this easier.
7. If you are traveling on an African airline, be sure to confirm your ticket at all stages of the process—when booking, prior to departure, at check-in and at the gate. African airlines sometimes have trouble accounting for their passengers, so these steps are necessary (perhaps Afghan airlines should take a lesson!).
8. Wear shoes that you can slip on and off easily. Danskos are ideal. Crocs might cause an international incident.
9. Be sure to bring your eye mask and earplugs if you plan on sleeping. The airline knows how much you hate screaming babies and will place you directly behind one without fail.
10. Never get behind Russians in the security check if you can avoid it. Russians will NEVER remove any article of clothing without explicitly being told to do so and they always wear lots of spangly, bedazzled items that set off the metal detector. You will know they are Russians because the men are wearing off-white, pointed, fake crocodile shoes and have tucked in shirts. The women have bleached hair, high heels, egregious eye make-up and tight pants. It will take them and their requisite two children at least 15 minutes to be cleared by security, all the time bitching at the security people in Russian and acting like they don't understand what is going on.
11. Getting schnockered before a flight originating outside of the US is perfectly OK and flight attendants are usually more than happy to facilitate this process. However, no more than two drinks before you board in the US. (Haven’t you all seen the TV show “Airline”?)
12. Xanax. Never fly without it.
I don't know why, but that old joke always makes me laugh: "A man who walks through the airport turnstile sideways is always going to Bangkok".
And it seems like I am always going to Bangkok (rather than "bang cock"), too, and that I always find out that I am going with less than seven days to prepare. Today my boss came and told me, "you can go to the conference next week if you want, HQ agreed to pay the costs."
Thailand is my favorite country. I go there at least twice a year whether I plan on it or not. I can drink grass jelly as I get on the sky train, head out to get a Thai massage, eat spicy green coconut curry, jump on a marshrutka and go to the beach, shlep around town with a big Chang in my hand wearing nearly no clothes. I can nearly taste the lemon grass and exhaust now.
There are direct flights, the costs are covered, why not?
One of the questions I was asked repeatedly before leaving Afghanistan was, “So, are you going home before heading to your new post?” To which I would reply, “I just spent a week in Kazakhstan. That was my break.” Generally, people who don’t know me very well think it is strange that I would take a break from Afghanistan in another Central Asian ‘stan. But this is how it is: I have spent most of my adult life in Kazakhstan and I have family and friends there. Most of what I know and how my adult character has been shaped is due to my time in the former USSR. I can’t bear dirty shoes or wrinkled clothes, bring a gift whenever invited to someone’s house, take my shoes off at the door (and put on slippers) and even last night caught myself sticking a cork under the metal handle of a pot lid. It is more than these habits, though, and this is what sucks about my lifestyle and my line of work: it is the relationships you form with the people you have to leave.
I first came to Kazakhstan with the Peace Corps, just out of grad school. After only three days in-country, with quick and intense Russian lessons, I was handed over to the people with whom I would live for the next three months. Hating children, I had requested to live with a couple about my parent’s age with adult sons. Reihan and Syrail came to pick me up at the sanitorium with their daughter-in-law, Ranosha (who spoke a little English). In a rented Lada, they took me away to my new life in a small village near Talgar. What I remember most about that day was watching my future husband walk off with his Russian host family and wondering when I would see him again.
The next two months were all about acclimating. I spent eight hours a day in Russian lessons, after which, Stas (another Volunteer in my village) and I would drink fortified wine and watch 18-year-old village boys play soccer with their shirts off. Reihan and Syrail treated me like their own daughter: the taught me pidgin Russian, made sure that I was well fed, and built me a shower in the backyard (they only bathed at a neighbor’s banya once a week and they had no running water). They took me to graduation ceremonies and to visit relatives. Syrail told me about how his father died in World War II before he was born and Reihan told me about her childhood emigrating from China with her 10 brothers and sisters. I was the first American they had ever known and they were anxious to tell me all about their people, the Uighurs. For those of you who don’t know (and most of you don’t), Uighurs are an ethnic group who live in the northwest of China in the area bordering Kazakhstan. Because they are Muslim and seek an autonomous state called East Turkestan, they have been persecuted by the Chinese government, labeled terrorists, forcibly sterilized, tortured, and generally experienced all of the other terrible fates that befall minorities in China. (Some of you might recall that there were some Uighurs held in Guantanamo; the US had no further reason to hold them but knew they would be sentenced to death in China, so they sent them to Bulgaria after their release.)
After my initial three months with my new family, I was sent out on my own to live in Siberia. Before I left, Reihan gave me a freshwater pearl necklace which she had gotten from her mother, “I never had a daughter, but if I had, this necklace would have gone to her” she told me, “you are my only daughter.”
I wrote letters to Reihan and Syrail (now “Mama” and “Papa” with the accent on the last syllable) and called them, and of course visited when I traveled to the Southern city of Almaty. When they found out I was getting married, they bugged me about having children, even offering to raise a child for me whom I could visit on the weekends. When I finished my two-year stint in the Peace Corps, leaving Mama and Papa was heartbreaking. As we were all crying and hugging goodbye, I took a petal from one of Mama’s rosebushes in the courtyard for safekeeping, somehow hoping that a small charm would bring me back to them.
It was almost a year before I came back to work in Western Kazakhstan. Then, luckily, was offered a job in Almaty, only 40 minutes from Mama and Papa’s village. For the next two years, I saw them nearly every weekend. Once, my husband was building a fence around our Almaty yard and Papa and one of his sons came to help. A nosy Kazakh (drunken) neighbor ventured over several times asking questions about me and my husband and what we were doing there. “I was in the military in Belarus, where I met the girls’ mother,” Papa told the neighbor about me, “she is my biological daughter, but her mother moved to America right before she was born.”
Nearing the end of my two-years in Almaty, my host father had a heart attack. Mama told me the prognosis was poor; we went to see him in a truly Soviet hospital in Talgar. I remember driving up in the snow in my beige Neva, and walking down the long, dingy hallways. Papa was lounging in the room in a track suit with another patient. He was feeling alright (Mama had not told him what the doctors said) and once assured that he would be OK, I proceeded back down the stairs. On the way down, I heard him tell his roommate, “That was my American daughter”.
During my time in Kazakhstan, their first and second grandsons were born. Abdullam and Rabkhat, now six and four, have known me all of their lives.
When they found out I was leaving once again, they were upset. When they learned I was going to Afghanistan they were just as anxious as my American Mom and Dad. Luckily, there were direct flights from Kabul to Almaty, so I was able to visit three times during my two years in Afghanistan. The last visit was just a few weeks ago, right before coming to Africa. I took a marshrutka (minibus) from the central bus station in Almaty to the village, bearing gifts for everyone and when I got there, Mama was not around. “Where’s Mama?” I asked frantically. “She’s at the hospital, we will go and see her tonight.”
After finishing dinner, and spending time with Abdullam and Rabkhat crawling all over me and vying for attention, my host father broke the news: Mama’s youngest sister, whom I had met several times and visited, had died of a sudden stroke ten days before. Mama had high blood pressure and that is why she was in the hospital. Rustam (the older son) and Papa drove me back to Almaty about 7:00 pm to the hospital. It was a nice place—the Presidential hospital, where Nazerbayev has his own ward—the complete opposite of where Papa had to stay a few years before. Mama was crying and upset when we saw her, putting aside her grief, the first thing she asked me was, “did you eat?”
Mama told me again about her sister, about what a good person she was and how she had saved her whole life (her sister was a surgeon at the Veteran’s Hospital) and was just at the point in her life where she could relax (her first grandchild had just been born) when she died. I realized that it was the stress of her sister dying that put Mama in the hospital. I promised to visit a few days later.
That next Sunday, Stas (the Volunteer from my village, now an old friend who can’t seem to leave Kazakhstan) and I went to see Mama at the hospital. Anyone familiar with the Soviet system will tell you that the hospital stay is TEN DAYS. No more, no less and most people go to the hospital to relax or recover from a cold. Mama was sharing a room with a Russian war veteran and another talkative old lady. After giving me money to buy candy (Mama knows how much I love sweets) she took us around to introduce me to everyone on her hall. “She doesn’t look like you” the talkative old woman said.
Saying goodbye was hard. I knew that I was leaving Asia and I was not sure when I would be back. Even living in Bangkok or Delhi I could fly back to Kazakhstan for a week easily, but my new position in Africa makes visits to Mama and Papa almost untenable. I broke down as soon as we walked out of the hospital. “Come on, let’s go get a beer,” was Stas’ reply.
So this is my Uighur family from Kazakhstan. It’s strange how you can form relationships with people who have such different backgrounds, cultures, and languages, but grow to care about them as much as the people you have known your whole lives. It really sucks when you have to leave, but I am sure I will be back.
A fitting beginnging to my last full day in Afghanistan: a window-shaking explosion at 6:45am. I had just gotten out of bed when I heard it; 20 minutes later and still no news on whether it was a rocket or an IED. (Actually, in the end, it was a gunpowder storage shop that exploded on accident.)
On a lighter note, something happened that made me laugh until my sides ached yesterday. See, there are these poor kids who hang out by the US Embassy/USAID/ISAF base in Shash Durak trying to sell things. Usually they sell newspapers or copies of the Afghan Scene, or chewing gum. These kids are RELENTLESS, springing into action at the sight of a foreigner, repeating "gum, madam? Gum? Madam, one dollar, gum?" Yesterday, I was running to have a quick beer with my friend Sas who is stuck in the USAID compound when I had to pass ISAF and the throng of kids. One jumped out in front of me with a plastic snake. "Snake, madam?"
So today is my last day. Praise to Allah.
The last three days of the month are always my least favorite. I am not sure how this happened, but in my previous office (in the building that was torched during the riots) and in my new office on the third floor of another building, I am right next to the fucking cashier. This means that on the last three working days of every month nearly all of the 700 Afghans working for my organization come in to get paid.
So for three solid days, there are at least fifty Afghan men (and sometimes two or three women) crammed into the narrow 3-foot wide hallway in front of my door. They like to stand in front of my office door (which opens outward), essentially blocking anyone from entering or exiting. Often, I try to open the door, only to hit someone, who will then refuse to move. If I have to walk down the hallway to anyone else’s office in the building, the bearded men in their turbans and patus stare at me as if I were naked. Added to this is the smell and the noise. The smell—well, it defies definition. I can best describe it as a mix of sausage pizza, wet dog and used maxi pad. The heat of the summer amplifies the odor.
These people like to talk while they are waiting on their monthly pay. They talk loudly and ceaselessly, forcing Schwig, my Cheesehead officemate, to go out at least three times a day to announce, “Bubakshah (excuse me) shutthefuckup. Tashakour (thank you)”. Telling the crowd to quiet down usually works for only a few minutes as there are soon more people cycling in, getting their cash, and leaving.
This is another aspect of my life in Afghanistan I don’t want to forget about. The bureaucracy, the virtually non-existent banking system, the lack of faith in the existing banking system, the dearth of running water or perceived importance of bathing; the way the men stare at women who are not in burqas, the way this stare makes me feel. I have mixed feelings about Afghanistan. I hate it, especially on days like today when I cannot fly out to Kazakhstan because of snow, but then there is the guilt of having to leave good people behind. Good people who only want to earn a little money, own a house and watch their children grow up. The guilt of being a person who just can’t relate to their situations and their needs because I have never and will never experience such circumstances.
More on that later—got to finish washing clothes.
Last week at a staff meeting, one of the Program Managers was talking about how one of the districts where we work is “full of Talibs”.
Well, apparently, the provinces outside of Kabul are not the only place. Consider this warning from the National Defense Service:
NDS sources report that HiG (Hizb-I Islami Gulbuddin)are becoming the dominant group within Kabul district. The source reported that the grouping had been conducting a
successful recruiting campaign in the districts surrounding Kabul. As a result
an increase in attacks is expected with HiG expected to operate in
Police Districts 12, 7 and 6 of the capital. TB are traditionally strong in the Dih Sabz
area (PD9) which accounts for the concentration of attacks on Jalalabad road. (Recall the Jalalabad Road is the road one has to travel to get liquor, as well as being the road the Coalition uses in and out of Kabul.)
For those of you who are unfamiliar with HiG:
"Hezb-e Islami Gulbuddin (HIG) has long established ties with Osama Bin Ladin. (HIG) founder Gulbuddin Hikmatyar offered to shelter Bin Ladin after the latter fled Sudan in 1996. HIG has staged small attacks in its attempt to force U.S. troops to withdraw from Afghanistan, overthrow the Afghan Transitional Administration (ATA) and establish a fundamentalist state."
Gulbuddin Hikmatyar is the one who castrated Najibullah (the President of Afghanistan under the Soviets), shot him and hanged his body in Ariana square.
So the Taliban is in Kabul and ready to fight.
Not really news, but now people are talking about negiotiating with the Taliban.
My organization has been in Afghanistan for a while, so we negotiated with the Taliban to have access to provincial areas pre-2001. Last year, while implementing a shelter program in the East, we also met with Taliban leaders in one district so that supplies could be carried in. I am not sure how I feel about this. On the one hand, talking to the Taliban is a necessary evil; we are non-partisan and are working in the interests of the people. On the other hand, I feel like it lends them some legitimacy and reinforces the notion that they are the decision makers. Moreover, this could possibly undermine the fragile Afghan government in areas where their power is waning; having to ask the Talibs for permission to do our work might tip the balance.
Anyway, after one month this is NOT MY PROBLEM.
No one ever wants to hear a doctor say the word "larva" when making a diagnosis.
It seems I brought a little something back from my two-week trip to Africa.
The CDC describes hookworm (ONE of the MANY possible parasites I MIGHT have):
These barely visible larvae penetrate the skin (often through bare feet), are carried to the lungs, go through the respiratory tract to the mouth, are swallowed, and eventually reach the small intestine. This journey takes about a week. In the small intestine, the larvae develop into half-inch-long worms, attach themselves to the intestinal wall, and suck blood. The adult worms produce thousands of eggs. These eggs are passed in the feces (stool). If the eggs contaminate soil and conditions are right, they will hatch, molt, and develop into infective larvae again after 5 to 10 days.
Fantastic. But one must also consider that the doctor "never sees these things in Afghanistan" and might be wrong about the diagnosis.
If I spend only two weeks in the Horn and come back with worms what will happen when I live there for two years?
Dear Applicant,
Thank you for submitting your resume for the Gender Officer position in Afghanistan. There were several moderately qualified candidates and therefore, the selection was slightly difficult. I regret to inform you that you were not selected for the position due to one, or a combination of, the following:
1. You mentioned your “mental state” on your CV as “rural, urban, cosmopolitan”;
2. You sent me a long email after the phone interview explaining what you really meant to say during the interview, but just couldn’t;
3. Your writing sample included the phrase: “poverty has a women face” and/or “empowering the powerless through concretization”;
4. Your references told me how you “did not dress appropriately” when you worked in Kabul two years ago;
5. Your writing sample was 32 pages long, written in 2002, had eight annexes (including an ORGANOGRAM) and was over 1.5 MB;
6. Your writing sample had several misspellings and grammatical mistakes;
7. During the interview, you described your management style as “authoritative”.
Due to some, or all, of these reasons, we cannot extend an offer of employment to you at this time. Thank you for your interest.
Sincerely,
Confection
I just got a text that someone has left me a voice message on my cell. None of the mobile providers in Afghanistan provide that service, but it was nice for them to let me know that somewhere out there someone has left a message for me.
The good news: I am leaving Afghanistan (Praise be to Allah).
The bad news: I am going here.
How come war gotta be declared less than ten days after I get my new job?
So over the next few weeks, I am going to wrap up my time here in Afghanistan and wrap up this blog with all the things I meant to mention about this country, but haven't yet.
I want to start out by saying I know cold. I have lived in Siberia for two years and have seen my share of -53 degrees days. However, not even a stint in a Soviet gulag could prepare me for the cold I now have to endure in Kabul, without the warmth of a coal-burning electrical plant to fire my radiators in the depth of the Central Asian night.
A lot of people assume that Afghanistan is a warm place, that it is mostly desert and that it rarely dips below 80 degrees. For those people I have two words: Altitude, baby. Kabul sets in the Hindu Kush mountain range and the capital is about 4800 feet above sea level. Its location between hell and the devil’s anus means that summers are long, dry and hot and winters are snowy, cold, and also long.
Now, I know that everyone bitches and complains about cold weather. Even in Atlanta, I have known people to work themselves up over 50 degrees during the winter. However, these people have access to central heating and constant electricity. Here in Afghanistan, there is no electricity. Sure, during the summer there is central power almost 12 hours a day, but in the winter, you are lucky to get six hours every two days. Central heating is unheard of. That heat pump you’ve got out back or that sputtering radiator in the kitchen--Afghanistan has not seen technology like that since General Najibullah was around.
In order to keep warm, Afghans (and white folk like me) use bukhari. These are little stoves with chimneys that feed into the wall. Generally, these are diesel or wood burning and need to be refueled every few hours. They heat only one small area, so running to the bathroom at night results in a severe and immediate drop in body temperature.
Bukhari. My carbon footprint is bigger than yours!
But there is another, more sinister effect of the cold: frozen pipes. Here there is no central water system, no sewage system: wells are the name of the game. White folk (like me) generally have a well in the yard and an electric pump that forces water into a tank on top of the house. Most Afghans in the capital have this system too, but outside of Kabul most people carry water in buckets to their houses—all year. When you have a tank, the miracle of gravity brings this water to your sink, shower and toilet. Frozen pipes prevent this water from reaching your sink, shower and toilet, resulting in dirty (frozen) dishes, unwashed bodies and solid streams of urine to greet you in the morning.
This past weekend, my husband and I had the trifecta of cold-related problems: no electricity, frozen generator and frozen pipes. On Friday, we were surprised when our generator was frozen solid, so we spent the evening baking brownies by candlelight and drinking copious amounts of contraband alcohol. Saturday was even more surprising because when the generator finally started, we discovered our pipes were frozen. Forced to shower at my husband’s office on Sunday before work because we had NO water (Muslim workweek is Sunday-Thursday), I had no idea I was in for the greatest surprise of all: frozen pipes at work. Now, it is one thing to have to face your own frozen pee in the morning, but it is a whole ‘nother issue to have to stare down the excreta of your fellow employees. Plus, I had my period.
Why am I telling you this? Because I don’t want to forget how shitty (no pun intended) living in this country can be. I don’t want to think for a minute that things were OK here and not really that bad and that I could do it again. You might read articles about Afghanistan that are romantic and poetic about the country, but when it gets cold, all bets are off. The beauty is gone and all you are left with is exhaust from a diesel heater and yellow snow. I have no idea how people live here in mud brick buildings with one room and no toilet or running water. I have no idea how they sleep at night with one thin blanket and go to work wearing a patu and no coat. No idea. White folk (like me) just can’t.
I love these guys. I love their angry, cynical, left-wing diatribes.
Happy New Year and Eid Mubarak everyone--I am off to make fudge, royal icing and a cheese ball.
Caliente!
The husband and I were reluctantly stuck in Dubai for Christmas Eve and Christmas on our way back to Afghanistan because the Kabul airport was closed due to snow. My husband was recuperating from a nasty bout of food poisoning brought on by some questionable pork fried rice consumed in Thailand, but we decided to venture out to the Diera City Center mall anyway. (Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, I fucking HATE Dubai. There is nothing to do but troll the malls while trying to suppress the DTs brought on by the lack of alcohol, save for the $8 cans of Heineken at the overpriced hotels).
Bored, with nothing but a spirit-free hotel room or more mall, we decided to go see a movie. I chose Babel, not because the hottest man in the world is in it, but because I supposed it would be a thought-provoking drama about bridging cultural differences between the “developed” North and “underdeveloped” South. Boy, was I wrong.
Now, I saw the toned-down “Arab version” which left out a lot of nudity, but kept in the scene where the 12-year-old Moroccan boy beats off to his 10-year-old sister and where the estranged couple reunites over a bed pan, and what was the relevance of the deaf Japanese girl trying to have her dentist molest her? It just seemed way too long, too sexualized and too—vapid. The movie just reinforced streotypes. There was no real look at issues, no examination of why the North African police beat suspects or why Americans automatically assume that any act of violence in a Muslim country is assumed to be terrorism, it was just three hours of filler with no point.
(However, I do have a point.)
As we left the theater, I asked my husband, “what did we learn from this?” He replied, “never to let you pick a movie again?” No. The lesson is: brown people get fucked, while white people with the right passports will get their stupid asses saved in any situation.
And being in the Dubai airport brought this all home. While my husband and I could hop in a cab and head to the Sheraton for the night, the Afghans waiting on the same flight had to sleep on the concrete floor of the airport. They had no visas, no money, no food, no family in UAE to help them. The airline (Kam Air, you fucking bitches!) only gave these 150-plus Afghans food coupons on the THIRD DAY after the flight was cancelled. Most of them were being deported for being in the Emirates illegally.
When will the media really look at how the rest of the world lives? When will films examine all the things that we white, privileged folk take for granted? Probably not soon, and Hollywood has just shown us that. While critics rave about the “serious drama” about “real issues” in movies like Babel, I just roll my eyes.
Over the past four days, it has snowed in Kabul. This is strange because usually there isn’t snow until after the first of the year and usually it doesn’t snow for more than a few hours at a time. As a result, the airport has closed. The Kabul airport has no radar equipment, and therefore the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF, i.e. Coalition Forces) who runs the airport would not allow planes to land without three miles visibility. My boss (Suka) has been stuck in Dubai for the past three days and there are consultants and various others stuck either here, in Dubai, in Pakistan and in other parts of Afghanistan. Welcome to the 21st century.
Snow is not the only thing accumulating in Kabul. Consider the following, clear indications that it is time to get the hell out of Dodge:
1. My boss (Dutch) has requested that all international staff submit to him, in sealed envelopes, three proof of life questions in case we get kidnapped. (This reminds me of when my coworker was kidnapped last year and the security guy when to her house to “get some DNA” in case she didn’t come back alive.);
2. This article and
3. The Taliban Code which inclues this passage:
Those NGOs that come to the country under the rule of the infidels must be treated as the government is treated. They have come under the guise of helping people but in fact are part of the regime. Thus we tolerate none of their activities, whether it be building of streets, bridges, clinics, schools, madrases (schools for Koran study) or other works. If a school fails to heed a warning to close, it must be burned. But all religious books must be secured beforehand.
(I work for an NGO.)
Next week I am interviewing for jobs in Africa and Southeast Asia. I can't wait until I can file all the "things I worry about" under "not my problem".
I know you all thought that an UXO (unexploded ordinance) had gotten to me, but in reality I was in America ("Amrika") for the past month.
Some disturbing American trends:
-Crocs (you saw that coming): mostly sighted on overweight women who do not comb their hair and, cruelly, small children under the age of six;
-Drivers from Virginia and Ohio taking to the roads;
-Cell phone usage: On at least three occasions women were talking on their phones IN THE TOILET STALL NEXT TO ME. This seemed to happen often at Atlanta Hartsfield Airport. (Why is it so impossible to conjure up disgusting noises when they are most appropriate?);
-Cell phone usage with the cyber head gear: A guy in CVS paced up and down the aisles breaking up with his girlfriend LOUDLY while I was trying to select glitter for my workshop poster session--he was wearing one of this god-awful things;
-Leggings: Need I explain?
-Capri Pants (AKA "Clam Diggers"): Again, do I really need to tell all of the 5'1" women out there that these make you look dowdy and even shorter? Nothing says "granny" like capri knit pants and a matching shirt and cardigan!
Well, at least the disturbing things in America are not this disturbing.
Hey Afghanistan--things are not all bad. In a few months all of those unbought Crocs will turn up over here as American aid.
I just heard something strange from an Afghan guy I work with and a co-worker who speaks Dari corroborated that she had heard the same thing.
Apparently, the American forces are supplying the Taliban. The guy I talked to said with food, but my co-worker said munitions. Also, there are stories about Afghans fighting the Taliban who capture Taliban fighters, turn them over to ISAF (the International Security Assistance Force) and then capture the same guys fighting for the Taliban weeks later at which point the Taliban tell their captors, "you guys are stupid--the Americans are supporting us too!"
This could all be bullshit. But why would the Americans be supporting the Taliban? Is it a tactic of spreading these rumors among Afghans so that they will not support Americans and NATO/ISAF troops? I wonder.
Dear Crocs Fans,
I want to send a message out to all of those people who wear these hideous things: stop. Stop now. Crocs are ugly in a nefarious, soul-sucking way. No one looks good in them and no one gives a fuck how comfortable they are. I don't care if you are a nurse, waitress or lunch lady--invest in some Danskos and retain your dignity.
And to add insult to injury, they now have charms for them. I swear, when I get to Tennessee in four days and see these things schlepping around my local mall, I am not sure how I am going to restrain myself. People: I live in Afghanistan. I see starving children, dead kittens, amputees and sheep being beheaded on my way to work everyday. There is so much ugly in the world. Please take the time to make wise shoe choices so that when I come back to America I won't have to BEAT YOUR ASS.
Warmest,
Confection
I just heard that there were two bombings this morning. Rather than being concerned, here I am still working on a project design. I was thinking the other day how I have totally become desensitized to what is happening around me. I rationalize that the bombings are only targeting the military or the government, not me. It is a strange strategy of acceptance and I wonder if it will change once I leave. I really hope so.
(I totally work with those two guys in the last panel!)
Yes, the restrictions on liquids are relaxed, but how does this affect my Duty Free purchases?!?!?
Ugh, I hate flying to America. I hope they shake me the fuck down like they did in Frankfurt a year ago. Trying to prove that you work in Afghanistan and are not a terrorist is not as easy as it sounds. I was forced to bust out my employer-issued ID with the photo of me looking angelic (and Iranian) in my chador. The old American ladies working the counter finally let me through, but the Azeri American who worked for the State Department (!!!) was not so lucky. Ah, profiling. It really doesn't matter what passport you hold or where you work, they can keep you from your flight if you are not the right color.
So this will be my 22nd time crossing the Atlantic. Crying babies, farting Indians, Xanax and red wine are par for course. I hope this will all be reflected on my frequent flyer miles.
