Where's Dara?

25 December 2006

Many of ended up in Kabul for Christmas this year. Most of you are thinking, eh gads.. Christmas in Kabul, how depressing. Not so!

Not only did we have a wonderfully white Christmas, but were there many parties on Christmas Eve, and on Christmas Day the Serena Hotel (4 star hotel chain) in Kabul had a lovely brunch, complete with sushi, smoked salmon (always my weakness) and Chinese dishes) to which a bunch of us went.

See, we are all happy!

Kirstie, Nazia, Sonja, Candice, Kara and me

Javier and Amir happily contented

We then party hopped to a house party, and then off to a relaxing evening near a warm bukhari (heater).

14 December 2006

Today we went to a Buskashi match. Sitting amongst the elders, who were wrapped in turbans and tribal coats, we watched the ancient game play out on a cold, overcast day.

Gabriela, our head of office, had told me the day before that Mir Alam, a famous Buskashi player and local commander, had invited all the internationals of the office to watch the three day game. Purdel, one of our assistants, was excited by the prospect and had attended the opening lunch yesterday.

Buskashi is one of the ‘must-do’ Afghan experiences, and one that is not necessarily easy to find. It is virile and violent game played in the winter or early spring. Men on horses fighting over the carcass of a sheep… dragging it across the field, trying to get it into their team’s circle.

The audience watches the battles from above. The audience is almost exclusively men. When I mentioned to my Gender Assistant that there was a game and asked her if she wanted to go, her eyes looked excited but her mouth said no. “Come,” I said. “You will sit with Gabriela and I—you will be an ‘international woman’ for the day.” She was persuaded, and she came.

The game pitted three teams against one another: Kunduz, Samangan and Takhar. Kunduz and Takhar were from our region, while Samangan was from the neighboring one.

Unfortunately for us, the teams were equally matched. What this translated into was a lot of fighting over the carcass in big, barely moving clumps of horses and few breakaway gallops. No real action.

I should explain the rules of the game a bit more. As I said, the players fight over the carcass. In order to move the carcass, a player must be holding the carcass by their hand (i.e. dragging it along, not carrying it on the horse) while managing to ride the horse. If a player drops the carcass, he or another player must grab it while still remaining on the horse. No jumping down. Certainly is a game of skill and strength.

Given these restrictions, the battle for a dropped carcass is intense and can be fierce. While in possession of the carcass, opponents make every attempt to dislodge it from the player’s grip.

The game we watched mostly involved attempts to grab the dropped carcass. In sports fans terms: a bit, well, boring. Indeed, about an hour of sitting in the biting damp cold of Kunduz, the diehard audience, began to disperse, as did we.

Here are some pictures from our perch above the field (apologies for the quality):

Players setting up, and being told the rules.

The carcass at its starting point.

Gaby, Ghizal, and Mohiuddin at the match.

Referee talking to the crowd

And the game begins!

After the carcass is dropped, a new argument amongst the players ensues.

The battle continues...

Movement begins...

The many hatted crowd

And now a breakaway

Victory!

I sat down with 2 young women, who had removed their burkas as they walked into the compound, and, after a long day, saw a slice of hope.

The women worked for a local radio station for women, by women, about women. They use our internet (however slow it may be), and wanted to meet me and my other new staff member, our Gender Assistant. [Yes, we have the most ridiculous names for posts.]

After the requisite ‘nice to meet you’s and ‘you are doing great work’, we began talking about the issue at the front of our minds: the “16 Days of Activisms Against Gender-based Violence”. It was coming up fast—25 November –10 December and the region and our office just did not have good activists events. It was frustrating me to no end.

Over the past week, my newly arrived Gender Assistant and I had been canvassing the key actors—the Department of Women’s Affairs and the Independent Human Rights Commission to see what they were doing. And we were discouraged. No one who should know knew what we were talking about or if they did they had the days all wrong.

It got to the point where my Gender Assistant turned to me and said, “Are you sure we are right about the dates?” (I checked my files when we got back to the office, doubting myself as well. I was right.) After the third person told us the wrong dates, my Gender Assistant said, “Is Afghanistan in some alternate reality?” “Seems to be,” I said.

These young women, however, were not part of the alternate reality. As we chatted about ideas we were kicking around for more activists events, one of them said, “Why can’t we give the victim’s a voice? Why can’t we give them an opportunity to tell their stories and expose the awful things happening to them?” It was a great idea.

As we developed it with them, I got more excited. After a week and half of pulling teeth in the office for national staff’s ideas, here were two intelligent young Afghan women developing a program. It gave me hope for Afghanistan.

Postscipt: On 29 November, the Department of Women’s Affairs in each of the three of the region’s province facilitated a radio program called “Giving Victims Voices”, in which victims of violence against women spoke about their ordeals. The response was positive, and the hope is that help create momentum to address these awful cases.

12 November 2006

There he was sitting across from me. The police chief. Just plump enough not to burst out of his fall uniform, comfortably ever so subtly reclining in his chair, perpendicular to mine. He was talking in the foreign tongue they all speak in up here—Dari (a dialect of Persian/Farsi). I was half listening, looking at his conspicuously clean desk next to him, at the note taker, and was extremely self-conscious because of the cameraman holding the digital camera filming us. (This is not uncommon. During many one-on-one meetings there is a camera stuck in my face.)

He was telling me about the background of a potentially volatile land dispute. I needed to know the information but I was just trying to judge the veracity of it. And there he was sitting across from me –again.

The last time I saw him he had laughed my question off. It was about why he had not apprehended one of his dstrict Police Chiefs accused of murder. He laughed. Yes, laughed at me. “This is not a problem,” he said. “He will report to me because I told him to come.” This was unlikely because he had complained to the Governor 30 minutes earlier that this district Chief of Police was not obeying his orders. Clearly, he wanted me off his back.

But today he wanted me intently listening to what he had to say. He requested the meeting. He had calmed the situation a few days before, avoiding a violent protest that could have blocked the main highway from the North to Kabul. Today, though, his job was different. He was assuring me all would be calm, and blaming the ‘other’ main ethnic group. I was entering familiar territory.

After he had his say, entertained my questions—somewhat—whilst answering his cell phone every five minutes—we were ushered into the adjacent room for lunch.

Now, I have been privy to a few lunches in my time in Afghanistan, with Governors, former commanders, elders, and the like. All feasts. All too much food. And all with more vegetables than this lunch. This lunch was fit for a fighting man: meat, meat, and, more meat.

Kebab—usually three pieces on a skewer, two small lamb pieces sandwiching a small piece of fat (are we getting why Afghans have short life expectancies?). A leg of roasted lamb. Half a roasted oversize chicken. Tear off pieces of the lamb and chicken, slap it on top of the rice, and pull at it with your fingers.

Rice, a staple of the Afghan diet, was on the table. Half a heaping platter for me, the other half for the Chief. My assistants shared a platter. Drenched in oil, it is not as healthy as you think. The Chief had been nice enough to give me a spoon to eat it with. He, as most Afghans do, grabbed a bunch of rice with his hands and pushed it into a loose ball and ate it. He was more focused on the rice than the bread. In every Afghan meal there seems to be at least 2 starches.

As we ate, we continued to chat. My poor assistants eating and translating. Such is the life of field staff…”Why have you not eaten much,” the Chief asked. (I had eaten most of my kabob, a bunch of chicken, half my slab of bread, and a good chunk of the rice in an attempt to not be impolite.) A little dismayed, I quickly tried to think of a witty retort. The only thing I could come up with was: “I am smaller than you, so I eat less—not everything fits!” He accepted this weak response.

A few days before, my hosts had apologized for the poor quality of the food. We had soup, some fresh vegetables, a wet bread and meat dish (laden with fat that I only picked at), and apples. Tad more interesting and healthy though not the most fabulous meal. Did the trick though. “No, “ I said, “It was perfect.”

My hosts were a group of elders—former jihadi commanders, civil servants, mullahs—representing the side of the land dispute that had wanted to protest. We had been sitting for about an hour before the meal came. They told me their winding side of the story, and when the plastic mat for the food started to be rolled out along the floor (we were sitting on cushions on the ground, as is traditional), they were marking a hand drawn map for me. “These people came here 300 years ago.” “This is pasture land.” “This is where they want to put the dam.” They explained as they drew more detail.

“We had come to speak with them about the piece of barren land in dispute. Three major tribes, fighting over a piece of what is better characterized as desert andapparently encouraged by major power brokers in Kabul. It had layer upon layer: political intrigue, systemic failure, ethnic discrimination, fraud, illegal occupation of land, and guns.

We had come to speak with the elders. All were gathered in front of a dilapidated house by the side of the main road. As we entered the lawn, some turned their heads. The Pashtuns are the most conservative ethnic group in Afghanistan. My assistant was concerned that I was not dressed conservatively enough, though I had one of my longest shirts. He made me put on the summer jacket I had with me.

The elders themselves were not dressed how I expected. Some were in the traditional shawar kameez, some in more western dress, and not all with the traditional turban. They sat in a circle on mats on the ground outside, or milling about, chatting away.

The leading mullah introduced me to each elder—approximately 20, giving me the background of each elder. It was somewhat overwhelming. Then they ushered me upstairs for a chat about land and to draw me maps.

As we left, and said goodbye, one of the elders ran up to the car and said, “Oh, by the way, if the other party does not stop building, we are protesting. And well, we know they have arms, so we must bring ours.” “But you will not be violent, will you?” I asked. “We cannot make any promises.” Bit of a whopper to be a ‘oh by the way’, don’tcha think?

Welcome to Afghanistan.

Here is the first of some older entries that I wrote before the invention of da blog.

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November 11, 2006

Today, I woke up happy to find our electricity still on. Until two days ago, we had had almost 24 hour electricity in Kunduz—something unheard of in Afghanistan. Kunduz benefits from its proximity to Tajikistan, and imports much of its electricity—or so I am told. When it rains, snows, or there is a wind storm, however, the luck has run out. There is no electricity.

Two days ago, Thursday, I woke up and there was no sun streaming through my thin brown curtains. I thought this strange, and looked at my clock. Nope, it was 6:30 am. Sun should be blaring into my room. Hmm. I crawled out of bed and pulled the curtains back and looked out. No blue sky. In fact, I could barely see the clouds. It was all fuzzy, gray. Not so good.

We had been lucky. It was just getting a bit cool at night, but a week into November, it was comfortable, even, at times, hot during the days. In Kabul, it had been cold—sweaters and jackets needed, and the first snow had fallen on the Salong Pass a couple of weeks before. No, it now seemed the winter had arrived in Kunduz. Sigh.

A bit groggy—as one can only be on an overcast day, I got ready, called for the car to pick me up, and stumbled out the door when it arrived at the gate. When I walked out there was a strange mist or fog. Sort of brown everywhere. In my state, I could not place what it was. The air was heavy with moisture, and the blanket of clouds ominous. The weather had turned.

As the morning wore on, the wind came. Lots of wind. In fact, I soon figured out what the strange mist was: dust. We were in the midst of a 15-hour dust storm. Yup. A dust storm.

Apparently I had missed the first one when I was relaxing in Bali a couple weeks prior. Now, after months without rain, in a place naturally full of dry, the winds that come before a storm kicked up a dust storm.

It was everywhere. It snuck through window joints, swirled through frames and got into your hair, nostrils and settled on anything it could find. It snuck in—it did not force its way into these places. The dust hung in the air rendering visibility almost nil, forcing people to cover their noses and mouths with the ubiquitous scarf or turban, and brought the city to a crawl (Boy was I glad I was not needing to fly that day!). There were no tornadoes of dust, like I had seen before. It just saturated everything—so much so that when the wind kicked up from its slightly more than gentle steadiness, you did not really notice the dust moving. It was there, though.

The wind and the dust, and the impending rainstorm coming from Mazar-I-Sharif, east of us, meant that the powers-that-be decided to cut the electricity—or so I was told. By the time I went home in the evening, once the rain had started coming down, our house was pitch black.

Being a newly established house hoping to get a generator lent from the organization, we, in our venerable wisdom, had not yet procured a generator—of any size. I guess we were gambling a bit, but like I said, we had electricity but for a few minutes a day.

Our luck just had run out.

When I arrived home, I found one candle. “Saleh (our chokidor/house helper),” I called as a stumbled into the dark house, “do we have any more candles?”

Close behind me, he responded: “No.”

“Aleks!!!” I yelled as I walked up the stairs to our house manager’s room. Had to think fast. Stay in the dark and feel my way to some dinner or…

“Yes, Dara” he answered in his Bosnian accent. [Yes, I managed to find a Bosnian from Sarajevo even in the wilderness of Afghanistan!]

“Have you eaten? [It was after 7 pm so he usually would have.]”

“No.”

“Let’s go eat at the German Restaurant”, I said. The German is the only restaurant in town for us expats. And the only place with beer.

“OK,” he easily acquiesced.

Off we went, driving through the wet, dark city to the light. Or so we thought. At some point the restaurant’s generator went—for 45 minutes. But they had candles. And food, beer, and people. Right before we left, the generator was back online. Alas, no city power.

Back to the house we went, with a few more candles around, courtesy of Saleh. Nothing else to do but say good night and go off to bed.

The next morning I awoke, with hope—which was immediately dashed. No sun. No electricity. And it was our day off. Sigh. I stayed in bed and read.

At about 10:30, Aleks knocked on my door. Sitting in the living room we looked at each other, and he, as the fearless house manager said, “I think we need to buy a generator.” I immediately agreed.

“Usually,” Aleks said with the authority of someone having lived in Kunduz for 2.5 years, “this will last for 2-3 days. It rains, they cut the electricity, they have to fix something, and we wait for 2 or 3 days.” That just horrified me. “How much?” I asked.

As we lamented our plight, both of us, we soon found out, had taken showers not knowing if we would have hot water the next day. We laughed at each other and then got to business. There were only 3 of 8 housemates in the house. Everyone else was on leave—can you believe that! [Everyone is on a 6 week leave cycle—after 6 weeks you have a week leave and everyone flees.] So, we consulted with our only other present housemate and made the only decision possible: get a generator.

We would get the ‘back-up generator’-- 4-5KW, as we were still holding out hope for one from the organization. Such a small generator would not run the boilers, but it would run everything else—like our housemate’s private freezer in which hundreds of dollars of food was going bad.

Aleks made arrangements to meet our engineer (Afghan) after Friday prayers and have him call the electrician. “Don’t worry—we prepared all the wiring for a generator before. All we need is the generator. And that should only cost $300-400.” OK, I said and left it to him and went to the office.

Friday’s, you see, are a nice day to go to the office. Our Saturday but in commerce terms more like Sunday, it is catch up day. Organize your life (or pretend to), clean out your inbox, file, catch up on personal emails. Yes, that it what Fridays are for.

Not this Friday.

The driver dropped me off in the compound. It was a bitter, wet cold, and I had my heavy fall jacket on—only 48 hours earlier I had had on my summer jacket. I walked up the external stairs, opened the door to go to my desk and saw it...

A big plastic garbage can by the door, where normally there was only carpet. That was the first thing I saw. Then I turned right to head to my desk. The bookshelf, I noticed was, well, no longer against the wall. Instead, it was angled out into the hallway, almost touching my desk.

I should explain--my desk is literally in a corridor, by a door connecting with another corridor. In this series of corridors sits 5 on my side, and 6 on the other. Not so conducive to effective work, but a place to set your things. Or so I thought.

Following the back of the bookcase back to the wall, I saw a huge water stain, and two more big plastic buckets almost as big as me. Then I pulled my eyes towards me and saw that the printer and digital sender were gone. And I then walked towards my desk and saw wet papers and destroyed binders. Yup. The roof—the mud roof— had leaked. And only yesterday, men where banging over my head fixing it.

And to top it off, I was Officer-in-Charge (everyone being on leave and all). Wouldn’t it be lovely if the building collapsed on my watch. I called our Admin guru…”Um, Anvar, I just walked into the office and it appears that the roof has leaked.”

“Yes,” he responded, “we thought something like that might happen. We put plastic over everything last night.”

“Hmm.. well, don’t think it worked.”

“No worries, they will work on it later today.”

“Ok. Thanks,” I said, at a loss for a better response.

After assessing the damage, I turned on my computer (thankfully unharmed) and went to work—unable to print anything. An hour later I heard “plip”. Then “plip”. And another, and another, closer together. What is that, I thought. I tried to ignore. Nope, gotta figure it out.

I got up, walked towards the sound. Looked around. Yup. The roof was leaking again. The rain had started again—and it was a downpour. I sighed and went back to work, with the “plip”, “plip” adding ambience. What else to do?

Then the phone rang. “Um, Dara, Aleks here.” “Yeah?” “I have been to 3 places and only working generator I can find is 5 KW generator for $500.” “That’s a little much, isn’t it?” “Yeah, but the guy won’t budge. All the others are Chinese. This is Korean. It is quality.” We chatted a bit, trying to figure out what to do. Then a half hour later chatted again—at that time he had him down to $470—after walking out. 45minutes later, we got it for what it was worth--$400. Aleks is our house manager for a reason—never mess with a stubborn Bosnian.

At 4 pm I called Aleks. “Power yet?” “Well, we have the generator, the fuel, and the generator works… it just does not power anything in the house.” “Great.” I went home an hour later. The generator was still not connected. But the rain had stopped. And there was Aleks, holding a massive MagLite, Saleh and John looking on, and two electricians standing on a flat ladder playing with electrical wires in the fuse box on the side of the house.

Water was dripping into the fuse box. A calamity waiting to happen. 30 minutes later, with no electrocutions, we got the generator working.

5 minutes later the city power went on—but only on the first floor. Why? Good question.

In a normal place, if the power was on the whole house would work—all the fuses were on, etc. Yeah…not in a normal place.

Apparently, we have 3 different wires running from the city power into the house—1 per floor. Each one represents a different ‘phase’ of the power company. Whereas in normal places (and I cannot believe I am putting Pristina in this category), one ‘phase’ runs to one area of the city, in Kunduz you get the benefit of each phase all over the city and one floor having electricity while the other two do not. Hey, at least there is electricity in the house, right? Hmm.. not so fast. It went out almost as soon as it came.

Later that night, after having dinner guests suffer through the loud generator, the city electricity went back. And thus, I woke up to electricity this morning.

Having begun the morning well, I thought, let’s go to the Youth Civic Participation Conference in town. I walked into the dubious Kunduz Hotel and into the conference room where around 100 young people from all over the Northeast region were sitting, listening attentively to their peers talk about what youth civic participation meant. They were demanding a voice, dismissing ethnic differences, and decrying the lack of employment opportunities. The MC was a young woman, and each province spoke through a man and a woman.

Then some of the young teenagers did a skit, mimicking a family chat, a neighbor drop in, and commentating on the need to be environmentally conscious (throwing your trash in the street is so disgusting), and encouraging civic participation.

The goal of the conference is for the region’s youth to develop an action plan. I must say, they appear to be the most organized group I have seen--including the adults.