Where's Dara?

For once, I am posting an entry on the day of the event. Unfortunately, it is a depressing subject.

Today, a suicide bomber shattered the relative calm of Kunduz. It was as audacious as it was devastating. The suicide bomber set himself off on the road in front of the provincial police station. A large number of police were there, apparently practicing for a parade on 28 April. It was in the center of town. It was close to a school. According to reports, 8 died at the scene and at least 20 were seriously wounded.

At 8:35 this morning, the world shattered for those nearby and those whose loved ones and friends died.

My chokidor went to the hospital. He had a good friend who was a policeman. His friend is dead.

"Madam Dara," he said to me, "it is a very horrible day."

Indeed it is.

I found out about it after our morning meeting. My head of office called me and said "No one leaves the office. There are reports of a suicide bomber in town." I called my colleague, who was outside the office, to make sure that he stayed where he was. No movement. I went and told the staff.

And then she called a few minutes later and told me the news. The staff already knew. They find these things out fast.

The last time there was a suicide bomb in Kunduz was last June. At that time, 3 died and 8 were wounded. It was in a market, I believe. There was one attempt in the time that I have been here, but it was thwarted.

Now, we have been warned and jolted out of our sense of relative security. We had a few IEDs (improvised explosive devises) in the provinces, but most were defused. We have the most mobility of any region-and we enjoy it. Now, though, we have been warned.

My female assistant said to me, when she heard the news, "I must start wearing a burka." She interprets this as a clear sign that the Taliban have returned.

I told her to wait and see and not to overreact.

"I was not here last time," she said, "but I heard they killed women for not wearing the burka here."

Wait and see, I said to her.

Another of my national staff said to me, "I just can't figure out what makes someone do this. They are just poor police officers. And why would someone kill himself to hurt others?"

A good question. And one that I really could not start to answer.

The strange thing is about a suicide bombing in the town you are in is that it seems like a hundred miles away if you do not see it with your eyes. If you cannot touch it, it just does not seem real. But you know that it is. And you know the implications.

You are no longer safe.

Nor are your friends or your colleagues.

It happened right down the street--to the people who are supposed to protect you from these things.

It may not seem real--but it is. Your rational side knows.

My female assistant had brought her son into the office. They were supposed to have flown to Fayzabad with her son, a day ahead of the rest of us. The flight was cancelled (as usual) and she returned directly to the office. The only place the car was allowed to go.

Her son is one and half with big, curious brown eyes. Oblivious to our discussion, which was in a language he could not understand, anyway, he blithely went around the office, playing with everything. A happy distraction. So, I thought, let's go into our other office and bring a smile to the guys. The laughs came, as we played our game of hide-and-go-seek.

Normalcy, for us, had returned.

24 February 2007

I made a promise to Dominique before I came to Fayzabad. The promise was that I would bring food—good food—and cook.

The last time I was in Fayzabad, in October, food was an issue. It looked unappetizing; it smelled unappetizing; and it tasted unappetizing. Tired looking lamb with bones in an unrecognizable brown sauce and some tired looking rice at the guesthouse, where the staff lived. At one point, desperate, I asked Dominique if the staff could find something decent to eat. They came back with… strawberry pop tarts! Unbelievable. I have never even seen them in Kabul. We had them for 2 days until the cleaning ladies at the guesthouse absconded with them.

The guesthouse compound

I decided that this trip I was going to take cooking matters into my own hands. And Dominique was more than happy to oblige.

Having recently been in Kabul, I had done a PX run, even filling Dominique’s orders for “anything pork” (it becomes a luxury item in a strict Muslim country) and lots of V8 juice (vegetables are a scarce commodity in Badakshan). I lugged enough pasta, sauce, spices, olive oil, and meat products to last us the week. Plus, I brought the 'piece de la resistance', Betty Crocker brownie mix.

Brownie mix, though, was a compromise. It was in lieu of chocolate chip cookie makings.

The Badakshani Boys had received regular shipments of homemade Afghanized chocolate chip cookies. (They were Afghanized by the fact that our Pakistani gem of an oven, along with the halal margarine (no butter around Kunduz) appeared to render the cookies slow more crispy than my normal cookies.) The boys (Philbert, Dominique, and Hakim) had received relatively regular deliveries via plane and car. It got to the point where I was convinced that, when Dominique said, come out, that he really just wanted my cookies and not my smiling face!

Cookies, I told Dominique before I left, were not in the cards. I had seen the kitchen and it was just too dire to make cookies. Brownie mix was pushing it but would be procured.

After settling in, I pulled out the supplies and asked the food-deprived boy for his preference. Pasta with tomato sauce doctored with one of the treasured port products. So we headed to the kitchen.

The outside of the kitchen

Shiver.

It smelled like an amalgamation of hospitals and a garbage dump stained with meat flavouring. Ugh.

And the implements were coated with blackened oil, basted with a coat of grease, and usually only half functional.

Oh—and there was no sponge or soap. Gotta love Afghanistan.

The guts of the kitchen

More of the glorious kitchen

Dominique dug out some cleaning supplies from his room, and we set off to make ourselves dinner. Cutting onions, garlic, pork products, and boiling water on the greasy counters.

Dominique getting ready to assist the cook

30 minutes later, viola! All was done, except the parmesan. How to grate it? There was a grater but it looked disgusting. We went for shavings.

With our steaming pots and pans in hand, we went into the living room/dining room to eat. Sitting on the table was pizza (if you can call it that) made by the cook. “That,” Dominique said, “ has been there since yesterday’s lunch.” Lovely.

One of the things about being deprived is that even the simplest meal is heavenly. It was so for our Dominique. Easily pleased, I must say.

He was most delighted when I pulled out the brie and crackers. I had to ration them.

“Dominique, there are five days until we go to Kunduz. Pace yourself, man.”

We went to bed that night satiated.

The rest of the week we strategically ploughed through the meat, cheese, and other goodies until Friday, when we had decided we would do a nice dinner with the smoked salmon and veal roll and I had brought… and the brownies, of course. People from outside the organization(shocker for me) were invited over—though only one came.

The challenge for me was to figure out how to cook the brownies. There was no pan the right size. I finally decided on the “pancake method”, as seen below. It is quite involved, you know. Dump the batter and let the batter roll out as it may.

Pancake brownies

(There is also the "dam method", as it is known in posh mission cooking circles-yeah, right. The "dam method" is when you fold up a piece of aluminium foil to make a fake 'wall' and shorten the dimensions of the pan. Honestly, that one slipped my mind.)

Only problem with the pancake method, I discovered, is that it cooks really fast.

Didn’t help that the oven, if it could be dignified with such a designation, had no handles or indicators regarding on what temperature it was.

The problematic oven with the experimental brownies

In fact, we spent four days trying to figure out how to get the oven to work. Yes, a PhD, LLM, and various other degrees between the two of us and we could not figure out how to turn on the oven. It required pliers (or very strong fingers) and turning on the timer as well as the temperature. Who knew?

When the timer ran out in mid-bake (Oh, did I forget to say that, of course, the time was not marked nor were the few markings reliable), you had to battle with the metal remains of the knob to turn it back on. In the midst of roasting potatoes, the timer went out. Our guest had arrived but I was stuck for 10 minutes battling the metal rod with the grease dish towel (don't get me started on that!) until it finally gave way.

By Sunday, when we had to drive back (yes, again!), I must admit that I was gleeful with anticipation of returning to my mildly functional kitchen in Kunduz. Still, I had a happy Dominique, so all was right in Fayzabad.

Happy Dominique

So, here I go again. After a long absence, some entries in the blog…

This one I had almost all written out in Fayzabad, our provincial office, but my computer—not the internet connection—lost it all and I just never got back to writing it, with all 15 photos uploaded.

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20 February 2007

“Dancing in the mud”

My last few entries have been about traveling back and forth to Kabul. This one is another travelogue as well, but not to Kabul but instead to our provincial office in Fayzabad, Badakshan.

Before I delve into our adventurous trip, let me orient you a bit. As you know, I cover four provinces in the northeast region of Afghanistan—Kunduz (where I live), Baghlan (which I go through on the way to Kabul), Takhar and Badakshan.

From Kunduz, we can easily cover Baghlan and Takhar, whose capitals are within an hour and a half drive. Badakshan’s capital, Fayzabad, however, while only approximately 200 kilometers (80 miles) away from Kunduz, is about an 8 hour drive. We therefore have an office out there.

Badakshan is said to be the poorest province in the country—and much of it has to do with the terrain. The province encompasses the Wakhan corridor, which is the ‘pan handle’ that juts out into China, and has borders with Tajikistan and Pakistan as well. In fact, there are some areas of Badakshan that are only easily accessed through Tajikistan. The terrain is mountainous and foreboding.

During the election, election materials in some areas of the province were sent out via donkeys. Each donkey had a police escort—sitting on a donkey. The journey took 3 days.

Relatively untouched, the province also can be breathtaking, as you will see from the pictures below. The Government of Afghanistan has not been able to establish district level representation in all of the 28 districts, and in many districts, officials govern from neighboring districts.

The rough terrain has hampered the province’s development. It has one of the highest infant and maternal mortality rates in the world, has incredibly high illiteracy, and, aside from agriculture, narcotics—trafficking and growing poppy—are a key industry.

At the same time, the terrain has made it difficult to conquer. During the Taliban regime, the Taliban were unable to infiltrate the province, in large part due to its geography. One of the leading Jihadi figures of Afghan politics, Professor Rabbani, hails from Fayzabad and maintains a house and a power base there.

Despite the difficulties, humanitarian organizations have been in the province for decades, as has my organization.

Right now, my unit does not have anyone permanently out there, so I try to get out there whenever I can—but that has not been since October. The Head of Office, a former Balkanista himself, Dominique, is always nagging me to come out and to work and to hang out with him and the other international out there, a Rwandan security officer who makes us both laugh.

The plan was to fly and to go for ten days, with the first two and half days focused on work with my Gender Assistant. We made day care arrangements for her son, procured permission from the administration in Kabul to allow her son onto the plan, and had set all our meetings. I had forgotten that this was Afghanistan and the saying “plans are make to be broken” was coined here.

No flight—of course! Why would there be a flight? Snow in Kabul. All planes were grounded. Then the good news came—no flights to Kunduz or Fayzabad for the next 10 days due to maintenance. No choice left. Get in the car and go—but without my Gender Assistant and her 1 year old. The road was unpaved for 7 of the 8 hours. Not the most exciting prospect for a 1 year old.

10 days was shaved to 5 days. No planes meant that Dominique and I both had to drive to Kabul—I to get to a meeting, him to get to flight out for leave.

To finally get me there, we were going to do what is called a “Kiss operation”. (Catchy name, eh?) In a kiss operation, vehicles from two offices meet in the middle and swap passengers or cargo. In this case, the Kunduz cars and the Fayzabad cars were going to meet at Kishem, a town just inside Badakshan province.

So, a few days later off we went, on the paved road towards Takhar, which borders Badakshan. The road to Taloqan, the capital of Takhar, is smooth and the scenery was somewhat green.

View from the car on the road to Taloqan

Entrance to Taloqan

Petrol palace in Taloqan

Anywhere you go, study the gas stations. Not only do they make great money laundering covers, as they did in Kosovo, but they are a great indicator of post-conflict development. (There normally are no McDonalds to use the infamous Big Mac index!) In the Balkans, we termed the gas stations ‘petrol palaces’ because they were gaudy, ostentatious, mini-cities. Some had restaurants, shops, neon jumping dolphins (seriously), and lots of parking. Always amusing are the signs, which are inevitably in broken English but necessary to be a true petrol palace.

The ‘Takar Petrol Pomp’ has the potential to become a petrol palace, as is one of the more sophisticated gas stations I have seen in Afghanistan. Notice the lovely red building in the back with satellite dishes (indicating a TV connoisseur) and the sheltered area for the station attendants. It has potential… unlike the gas station we passed after Kishem, shown below. Plastic chairs, unpainted walls, and no overwhelming awning.

Gas station outside Kishem

One of the striking elements of the drive was the constantly shifting terrain.

As we left Taloqan, the snow capped mountains came into view,

and the terrain began to change—and the pavement of the road to dissipate.

A riverbed outside Taloqan

Fields against the snow capped mountains

The muddy road

In fact, the pavement that was there was being torn up!

Bulldozer and truck tearing up the pavement

I trust that there was some twisted logic behind this destruction of precious asphalt. A project to build a paved road between Fayzabad and Taloqan was inaugurated last fall. Apparently, one must tear up the existing pavement so as to widen and reconstruct the road—or at least this was what I am deducing.

As the car began to drive further into nature, nature began to commune with us. Rivers hugged the road.

A river along the road

And the road became almost indistinguishable from a field—of mud.

The road hugging the river

Then the mud ‘road’ turned to a literal ‘rocky road’.

A car on our rocky road

After a while in deserted mud and rock zones, we came upon a village.

Approaching a village

After the village, a young boy stood along the road, smoothing over a path for the car and putting his hand out for money for the service given. My driver rolled down his window and gave him some small change.

He turned to me, dismayed. “No school,” he said.

In his limited English, he began to lament the lack of jobs and education for people in these areas, as well as the lack of medical care. No money and no education for the young boy on the road, trying to get money anyway he could. Along the way, men young and old repeated the same ritual.

Soon after this encounter, we were thrust into a vast and watery muddy path.

The watery muddy path

The four-wheel drive was, well, useless. As the car swerved back and forth through the mud, almost gliding like an adult just learning how to ice skate for the first time, my driver turned to me and said “The car is dancing to your music. The car likes your music.”

We both laughed.

“Yes,” I replied, “it must really like the music!”

We had been listening to ‘Western’ music on my ipod (yes, they go everywhere!).

Smiling broadly, he drove confidently, swerving through the mud, with, for all I could tell, little if any control of the car, enjoying the Western music.

Eventually, the mud solidified into a soft dirt road, and the evidence of the recent snow fall became more evident…

Snow and mud mix along the way

A road mission in Afghanistan would not be complete without the sighting of a decaying Soviet-era tank… and the one below was the first of many. The tanks remain scattered throughout the country, including in ‘nouveau riche’ neighborhoods of Kabul, because, I was told, there is no equipment to move them, or it, as is likely the case along the road on which I was traveling, the equipment could not easily reach the area to remove them.

During the 2005 elections, we used to pass the hollowed out, rusting tanks in central Kabul on our way to work. That just seemed surreal. Seeing them nestled up in the forbidding mountainous terrain, though, impressed me. The Soviets got them up there, where we barely could maneuver a four wheeled light vehicle and are armoured cars strained to make it along the roads. Of course, while I was never quite convinced about why the Kabul tanks were not removed, I completely understand why no one appears to have attempted to retrieve them here.

The requisite decaying tank

To me, these desolate and decaying tanks serve as a quiet but strong reminder of the defeat of the superpower by not simply the Afghans, but of the raw power of nature. They lie as a symbol of the previous world order, and, echo a melancholy reminder of the battles fought. Plus, there is the simple absurdity of a massive, disintegrating military instrument laying the midst of urban centers or barely accessible wilderness.

As we traveled further, we got caught in a bit of ‘traffic’.

The trucks squeeze by.

Down the muddy road.

Finally, we arrived in Kishem, with our mud-encrusted cars, ready for lunch—the Fayzabad gang was almost done with theirs.

The muddy product.

Suffice it to say, getting out of the car was not a clean affair!

Washing up in front of the restaurant.

As is typical in Afghanistan—and around the world, you must wash before you eat (though the cleanliness of the water is questionable—see below.)

Stream or sewer? You decide.9

As with the trip to Kabul, the typical lunch is either kabob or pilau.

My lunch.

Happily eating pilau!

After lunch, the Kunduz gang bid farewell to the Fayzabad gang, and off I went into the Fayzabad cars down the road.

Driving the road out of Kishem.

We passed villages…

...and boys playing games to pass the time.

Traversed over bridges, while challenging stubborn cows.

The cow was shocked—a vehicle?

And passed men having a chat…

Let’s discuss…

And crossed strong streams, or were they rivers…

A river runs through it.

Slowly, the terrain transformed again.

Rocky mountains, rather than mud covered ones.

Sweeping rivers cutting through the mountains.

Green re-emerges.

As the terrain evolved, so did the way villages nestled into the wilderness.

Roadside village, sprawling.

After a while, we had to check in with our radio room to let them know we had not gotten stuck in the mud, a river, or waylaid in a village. Being in the remote mountains of Badakshan, mobile phones were of little use, as was our VHF or longer range HF radio. Left in our spectrum of communication equipment was a satellite phone. To do so, though, you have to stop, take the phone outside the car, extend the antenna and give the phone a couple of minutes to catch the satellite and then attempt the call (which rarely is successful on the first try!).

During the communications/security briefing I once had, a colleague asked “So, what happens if we are under attack and the satellite phone is the only communication equipment that works?”

“You have to get out of the car and find a safe area to call,” the briefer responded.

“Right,” my colleague said, a bit perplexed.

Checking in with base

Eventually, the green, the rocks, and the mud led us into Fayzabad.

“I’m here!” I reported to Dominique, over my mobile (which only works inside the city limits).

“About time! Come to the office, and then let’s get some dinner,” the fearless head of office responded.

Now eating in Fayzabad is a whole other story… for another entry.