Turtle Jihad

All my best pictures from today i couldn't take because there were either women or poppy plants in the way. And photographing either of those would have caused trouble. Up in the mountains of Fayzabad, took a hike today with a mixed group of afghans, pakistanis and americans I met on the plane. We left early and followed a tiny dirt path through minefields and poppy fields, and one of the american boys commented about what a good email he was going to be able to write that afternoon. He was right of course, but i felt caught in the outdoors magazine-y tone of that email. Afghanistan's clichés can make you claustrophobic. The afghans among us seemed less impressed by those tropes; they prefered the turtles. Really. Anytime we spotted a turtle, one of them would grab it and put it in the path and take pictures as it ran back to cover. This happened four or five different times. They were really getting into those photo shoots filming mr. turtle from all angles. I made a dumb joke about turtle soup which got far more laughter than it deserved. Something was up with those turtles I'll never know what. The word for turtle in Dari is the same as the word for tank and along the mountain ridge we passed many destroyed russian tanks. If I had a better camera I could have taken a sort of turtle/tank composite shot, though what that photo would mean to anyone I have no idea. It would be a photo that would require a lot of explanation. I would have to talk about afghan versus american tourism, about life on a mountain and life in a shell, I'd probably have to repeat a dumb joke about turtle soup, and I'd just end up feeling lonelier than I do already.