I've finally gotten my hands on a replacement laptop. My aging macbook pro went down last week with the same symptoms as a problem that forced me last year to pay about as much as its now worth to get it fixed in New York. I figured around here it would be much more expensive than it's worth to repair, and had little faith it would be fixed properly. So I've been trying to figure out a way either to get a warrantied US mac delivered to me here by someone flying in to Kabul.
Also last week, the noisy neighbors who were constantly playing ball (the kids with their game of toss the ball unto the corrugated metal roof, the men with late-night cricket) got kicked out and I mentioned to the old guy next door that some foreigners I knew might be interested, more to make conversation than anything, but he relayed this on to the landlord, who came knocking the next day asking when my friends were looking to move in. So I placed an online ad and the next day a very blonde Englishwoman with a very large security contractor husband responded, visited, fell in love with the house despite all garbage the former neighbors had left strewn everywhere and agreed to move in in two weeks without haggling.
Problem was he wanted a thousand bucks up front for renovations but she said she's just started a new job and wouldn't have the cash until August 1 (what foreigners in Afghanistan don't have a wad of bills under their mattress?). Landlord wouldn't budget so she went looking to friends for loans. I texted her asking if she had a macbook she'd put up for collateral. She had one but didn't want to give it up, and we settled on her bringing me the Dell laptop her new job had given her but she didn't need for a $500 loan.
The landlord is now constantly inviting me over for meals (I choked down a pile of liver he had specially prepared for me, my third least favorite organ meat), and brought me a pot of Qabuli rice the other day. He has another house freeing up in a couple weeks and wants me to keep playing broker. I should ask for a commission.
In the end the Brit got the full $1000 from a friend and told me at her job they'd ended up giving the laptop to someone else. She told me her husband would ask around about buying Apple computers for US prices with US warranties on military bases.
It was my ex-neighbor who comes by to skype with his internet girlfriends who stepped up with a laptop, one his brother had bought in India a few months ago and rarely used. As we waited for the brother to show up, my ex-neighbor told me how one of his local girlfriends has been begging him to take her virginity just to spoil things for the arranged fiance she hates, but he's too honorable and also afraid she's trying to rope him into marriage, as he'd be legally forced into if she told the police that he'd deflowered her. Then he mentioned that he owed a guy $3000 because of a contract he hadn't completed but he'd spent all his money on his new house and pitching in for one of his brother's weddings (he has 5 full sisters and 4 full brothers, along with 7 half brothers and 3 half sisters from his father's second wife--he said his unhappy childhood had taught his that marrying multiple women was a bad thing, which is why he told said girlfriend from the start that he wouldn't marry her) and investing in a new ISAF latrine construction sub-contract. So just to be polite my ex-neighbor had offered that the former business partner take his car as collateral, but the guy had actually taken him up on the deal and now he had to borrow one of his brother's cars to get around and this wouldn't do, so he was borrowing money from here and there, which he'd pay back as soon as he got paid by ISAF on August 1. He began counting the money he'd collected thus far in his lap and I took a hint said I'd be happy to lend him $500. So a different ritual of exchange but weirdly the exact deal I'd worked out with the Brit.
Search history on my new laptop (I happened upon that, didn't go typing the alphabet to see what popped up, though now I'm mildly curious to do so):
.JPG)
This blog has definitely taken a turn for the obscene. I'll start reporting more on politics and history and such.
First Mughal Emperor Babur's tomb, refurbished by the Aga Khan Foundation but still bearing bullet scars from the civil war:
.JPG)
Production notes from Reel Unreel, on display at an art exhibit at Bagh-e Babur:
Also last week, the noisy neighbors who were constantly playing ball (the kids with their game of toss the ball unto the corrugated metal roof, the men with late-night cricket) got kicked out and I mentioned to the old guy next door that some foreigners I knew might be interested, more to make conversation than anything, but he relayed this on to the landlord, who came knocking the next day asking when my friends were looking to move in. So I placed an online ad and the next day a very blonde Englishwoman with a very large security contractor husband responded, visited, fell in love with the house despite all garbage the former neighbors had left strewn everywhere and agreed to move in in two weeks without haggling.
Problem was he wanted a thousand bucks up front for renovations but she said she's just started a new job and wouldn't have the cash until August 1 (what foreigners in Afghanistan don't have a wad of bills under their mattress?). Landlord wouldn't budget so she went looking to friends for loans. I texted her asking if she had a macbook she'd put up for collateral. She had one but didn't want to give it up, and we settled on her bringing me the Dell laptop her new job had given her but she didn't need for a $500 loan.
The landlord is now constantly inviting me over for meals (I choked down a pile of liver he had specially prepared for me, my third least favorite organ meat), and brought me a pot of Qabuli rice the other day. He has another house freeing up in a couple weeks and wants me to keep playing broker. I should ask for a commission.
In the end the Brit got the full $1000 from a friend and told me at her job they'd ended up giving the laptop to someone else. She told me her husband would ask around about buying Apple computers for US prices with US warranties on military bases.
It was my ex-neighbor who comes by to skype with his internet girlfriends who stepped up with a laptop, one his brother had bought in India a few months ago and rarely used. As we waited for the brother to show up, my ex-neighbor told me how one of his local girlfriends has been begging him to take her virginity just to spoil things for the arranged fiance she hates, but he's too honorable and also afraid she's trying to rope him into marriage, as he'd be legally forced into if she told the police that he'd deflowered her. Then he mentioned that he owed a guy $3000 because of a contract he hadn't completed but he'd spent all his money on his new house and pitching in for one of his brother's weddings (he has 5 full sisters and 4 full brothers, along with 7 half brothers and 3 half sisters from his father's second wife--he said his unhappy childhood had taught his that marrying multiple women was a bad thing, which is why he told said girlfriend from the start that he wouldn't marry her) and investing in a new ISAF latrine construction sub-contract. So just to be polite my ex-neighbor had offered that the former business partner take his car as collateral, but the guy had actually taken him up on the deal and now he had to borrow one of his brother's cars to get around and this wouldn't do, so he was borrowing money from here and there, which he'd pay back as soon as he got paid by ISAF on August 1. He began counting the money he'd collected thus far in his lap and I took a hint said I'd be happy to lend him $500. So a different ritual of exchange but weirdly the exact deal I'd worked out with the Brit.
Search history on my new laptop (I happened upon that, didn't go typing the alphabet to see what popped up, though now I'm mildly curious to do so):
.JPG)
This blog has definitely taken a turn for the obscene. I'll start reporting more on politics and history and such.
First Mughal Emperor Babur's tomb, refurbished by the Aga Khan Foundation but still bearing bullet scars from the civil war:
.JPG)
Production notes from Reel Unreel, on display at an art exhibit at Bagh-e Babur:
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