a fairy tale

Lives are lived under such pressure here. It crushes most and leaves a few bright as diamonds. Tahir lives in Mazar-i-Sharif. He has one pair of acid washed jeans which he wears all the time never mind the boys around him in pajama pants. Tahir is on the move. He's a stringer for Reuters and the BBC.

When Tahir was 17 he started a school to teach English, called the "American English School." He had hundreds of students including the governor of the province. When he was 18 and living in Pakistan he memorized the Koran, since it might help him with his political career, and after all he was bored. Did I mention that Tahir has a photographic memory? He recently translated "Bush At War" into Dari and wonders how to get in touch with the publisher to sell it.

He's 21 years old now and wants to be prime minister of Afghanistan. I ask him why and he tells me a story i've only read in fairy tales. It's a girl, of course. Her father has forbidden Tahir to see her. He's even pulled his daughter out of school so she won't see him. She can't call either, as he's taken away her mobile phone. They talk on a friend's phone, only in secret and only once a month or so. The reason? Tahir isn't rich enough. He's going to marry her to an older man, a trader. So Tahir is working to prove to her father that he too can be rich as well as smart. That's why he works so hard, he says. "Only that. I have to prove that I am right and he is wrong. That is the reason."

It is rather humbling to have this young man as my translator.

blog from the deep

It was really nice that a few of you checked on me after I disappeared in Kandahar and didn’t blog for a few days. I got swept up in a lot this week and every time I turned to write I’d think it would be a good idea to blog horizontally on my bed with my eyes closed. A dream blog. So right now I’m on a little 18 seater beechcraft flying north to Mazar-i-Sharif. it’s a 45 minute flight and I’m going to try to sum up the last few days in Kandahar. I also want to tell another story that happened before I left, and which I’m still not sure I understand. Just for fun I figured I’ll theme this blog according to the 10 commandments, in no particular order, and I might drop that structure if it gets boring. Ok?

YOU SHALL NOT COVET: I smelled a girl’s hair for the first time in three weeks. She was just passing by me outside the little UN terminal. I was stuck standing in the mud with a soldier who was halfheartedly trying to solicit a bribe. It was more plea than strongarm. “Bakshish?” he kept saying. “Bakshish?” I pretended I didn’t understand the word and shifted the bags on my shoulder. He was maybe in his early 20s, a slight guy with a moustache, a little dumb looking but not unkind. Suddenly this waft of girl and shampoo passes us and we both turn. She was probably French, probably from an NGO. I never saw her face. I practically pinched my soldier’s nipple in brotherly love as I walked past him.

NO OTHER GODS BUT ME: Kandahar makes me miss Jerusalem. Something ancient about this ruined oasis, baking in the sun and dust, the people in sparkly caps and embroidered shirts like time travelers from a royal century. It’s a sober, spiritual place. The dust is cleaner here than Kabul. I arrived on Monday and my cough cleared right up.

THOU SHALL NOT SKIP LUNCH: Okay that’s not one of the Sinai 10 but it’s a serious commandment in Afghanistan. Anyway, my flight was delayed and I didn’t get in till one o’clock. I was restless and raring to go interview some elders but I asked my translator Nadir if he wanted lunch and by a slight downturn in his “As you wish!” answer I realized the man was starving. He hadn’t eaten all day, which he didn’t admit to me until we were sitting down and the plates of rice and meat were laid out before us.

THOU SHALT NOT STEAL Over lunch Nadir tells stories of corruption in his city. One that sticks out for me: a gynecologist in the hospital comes in drunk, hits midwives, and frightens patients. He’s been there for 20 years but he’s in a powerful tribe and can’t be fired. “People who try to do good work get crushed,” Nadir says. “People who steal get rewarded.” There’s a joke I heard in a village: A farmer came to Kabul to see President Karzai and asked him to do something about corruption. “No problem,” Karzai answered. “How much is it worth to you?”

HONOR THY FATHER AND MOTHER The next morning I wake up in my guest house, stumble around until I find the kitchen and someone to cook some breakfast. I sit down at the table with Jalal, an Afghan who moved to Toronto 20 years ago. Now he’s back, and he’s brought his two teenage daughters. “They love it here,” he says. “Yeah the first few months they were bored and said they want to go home, but now they say they want to stay here through high school.” He tells me that he was a taxi driver in Toronto, now he manages a major development project in Kandahar. “Because I have an education, because I have experience in the West? I’m like a king here,” he says. “I’m treated with such respect.” I want to ask him if his daughters are treated with respect but he anticipates my move. “In the West, people ignore you, here, everybody is family. You feel like you belong.” He looks at me, then points to the bright morning sunlight through the kitchen window behind him. “You’re here having an adventure, yes. But imagine how you’d feel if you looked out that window and saw your cousin walking by?”

OK he got me there, because I’ve been missing my cousin a fair amount recently. In fact I had just been wishing she was hanging out with me here in Afghanistan. I swallowed the rest of my omelet and walked upstairs. The sun was already strong and it would be quite hot in another half hour. I stared out at the broken city and at the mountains beyond. I took a couple pictures with the timer on my camera. This one was over-exposed but seems to capture the light as it was.




flight just landed. More soon but Mazar is iffy on the internet.

kandahar is kanda great

arrived in kandahar early this afternoon on a UN flight. Sat next to an Afghan Turk who hunched gnome-like under his patoo and mumbled fascinating theories about the tribal dynamics of southern afghanistan in a voice so quiet i gave myself a neckache trying to hear him above the propellor. The plane was full of important people and i felt a little silly in my pajama outfit.

Kandahar sort of reminds me of Jerusalem, a more conservative, more spiritual place than dusty noisy Kabul. Foreigners are rare. Today I was waiting outside the police HQ waiting for permission to interview the chief. There was a young guard staring hard at me and smiling. Maybe 17 or 18 years old, all of 90 lbs, his frame so small his pants were safety-pinned at the waist, the Kalashnikov around his chest almost too heavy for him. He wanted to touch my hand and we sort of communicated in rudimentary hand gestures. (I speak a tiny amount of Dari at this point, but I speak absolutely no Pashto.) Still, I believe I understood him as saying, "Welcome to my country. I know that some of people want to shoot you? But not me!"

hot naan in the mornin

16 hour day yesterday most of it on the road. much to say but i have to race to the airport. still, life is good. this morning i managed to score a several minute long hot shower and warm fresh bread with honey! I bought the honey the other day in a little shop with little else to choose from. It was $10 for a big jar, very expensive by afghan standards, Hafiz the night guard was blown away by the price. He kept staring at the golden jar. Then i realized he'd never tried honey before. His face when he tasted it was probably one of my top moments of this whole trip.