sundry updates

Very dreary rainy weather the past 3 days

There seem to be lost Syrians wandering all over the city. So far I've been asked directions on 3 different occasions by a total of 5 young men speaking Arabic and not a word of Turkish, English, or French. Only my interaction with the most recent pair was long enough to glean that they were in fact Syrian.

SKIP, TOO BORING:
I'm reduced to punching my text messages in using the number pad on the flip phone my landlady lent me. I had figured it would be no problem using the unlocked GSM smartphone I brought but apparently the Turkish government didn't like people buying cell phones cheap abroad to avoid the high value added tax on electronic here and so makes you register any foreign phones or else it shuts them down after 3 weeks of use with a Turkish SIM card. For that registration you have to visit a police station, another govt office to get a personal tax number, and the cell phone company office and pay about $80, which is approximately what my beat up but useful smartphone is worth in the first place (I got one with a cracked screen and slapped on some duct tape to hold it together, figuring that in Afghanistan the crappier it looked the better to avoid unwanted attention). I could have used my phone for another few weeks but it also had the strange problem of not receiving texts from some numbers--perhaps by design to encourage me to register my phone sooner rather than later. In retrospect I should have just stuck with my iphone using local Vodafone service at an exorbitant rate. The SIM card itself was after all expensive: about $20 compared to about $3 in Afghanistan (down from $100+ in the mid-2000s, the Afghan cell phone guy told me).

In Istanbul

Research wasn't going well in Afghanistan and I decided to cut my losses and come to Turkey. On a more basic level I decided I just didn't want to be there, always feeling under siege even if nothing big and scary was happening. I flew out of Afghanistan via Dubai and spent a few hours between flights liking the place for the first time. People of different genders and colors and languages all walking around (I got luckier this than last time in my random choice of neighborhoods to walk around--I ended up in Al Karama, an area with lots of pedestrians and Indian restaurants and not enough money to make me feel awkward) not bothering each other, clean streets, guns and body armor not ubiquitious...it was a nice change. I played Gears of War on an electronics store Xbox while a little boy watched and then tried to unsubtly suggest it was his turn by leaning against my leg and then standing between me and the TV. Then I went to a South Indian restaurant and followed my dosa with their specially fulooda to meet the credit card minimum.

I think I am done with a certain danger-seeking part of my life. Sorry Afghanistan, I tried but just don't love you don't want to live in you.

Anyway I am in Istanbul and it is wonderful and clean and friendly with well-cared-for street animals. I went to a jiu jitsu class last night and got my ass kicked. Maybe the nicest thing was that I wasn't treated as either novelty or special needs student in the class--Oh, you're from the US? cool. You understood the instructions, right? cool. And then they could get on with kicking my ass. The purple belt I first paired with submitted me at least 8 times in a row in a 5 minute perio with the ankle lock that is--if I have one--my own signature move.

Herat

Yesterday I spent the morning being a tourist and then the afternoon talking with journalists. A sociology professor here has been serving as my unpaid fixer and the previous night we had driven past the first radio station where journalists agreed to talk with me and seen lots of police about. The professor thought they must have a high-ranking guest but it turned out that somebody had tossed a stun grenade over their wall. When I visited they were talking about how the police chief had accused them of doing it themselves in order to build a case for political asylum for themselves. They said this was a way for him to play down the security threat but acknowledged that other journalists had done such things.

Everyone except the hotel manager who insisted that lots of tourists foreign and domestic are still coming to Herat (I saw only two other guests--Afghans--during my two days staying here) told me that security has gone downhill in the city in the past year. People stay home much more and order delivery; once-crowded restaurants are now empty.

Today I gave a talk about a paper I wrote (looking up that link just now I realized I gave the class the wrong URL) in Persian and it went fairly well in the end. I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to print out the script I'd written for myself because when we arrived at the department it turned out the internet wasn't working so I couldn't download the document I'd emailed myself. We waited around for about 25 minutes with no change and then I asked what time the class started and the professor said Oh, 20 minutes ago. He sent an assistant to teach what was left of the class (advanced theory) and we went to the main administrative building where internet was working.
The sociology department is only a few years old and the faculty all have masters degrees and teach 3-4 classes each semester in addition to doing all the admin work. One thing they have is job security--the professor was surprised when I told him that increasingly US universities rely on adjuncts and lecturers without job security. Once you get a teaching job at a public university here, he told me, you can pretty much keep it as long as you want. It's almost unheard of for anyone to get fired. I wonder if it's different at the private universities that have been springing up in all the big cities of Afghanistan.

The class was about half male and half female, the women all in enveloping patterned chadors and the men mostly in a mix of suits and buttoned-down shirts. Men sat on the (stage) left and women on the right. Again I was the only one in a shalwar kameez, which always amuses.
Walking to the department I was one male student in a teeshirt that read,
F CK
all i need is u

The bike and motorcycle parking lot of the university:

The castle Arg (that scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail must have an extra inside joke for Afghans):

in Herat

Last night's Iranian-like chelo kabab. They give you more rice than 2 humans could possibly eat even in one sitting.

I've agreed to give a little lecture in Persian to a sociology class at the university tomorrow, which I'm absolutely dreading. I'm torn between preparing for that and sightseeing.

A fascinating article

On cross dressing in Afghanistan in global historical perspective: Underground Girls of Kabul

Vefa Kilisesi revisited

Here's what I hope is close to the final form of the video about the 1st of the month church in Istnbul from last year (see July 2013 posts):

Bibi Mahru Hill

                                

I walked up Bibi Mahru Hill today to see up close the giant Afghan flag, a gift from India, that they raised yesterday. The wind was misbehaving so no shots of it waving gloriously but you get an idea of the scale and of the dust cloud that hangs over the city from the photo on the right.

 A large mustachioed soldier yelled at me for walking on the grass. I heard shouting behind me and then realized everyone was staring at me. I turned around, ""Oh, should I not take photos?" (everyone else was) He ignored the question. "Do you rent your house or do you own it?" He asked. I stared at him blankly. "It's a question," he said "Do you rent your house or do you own it?" "I rent it." Ha, he guffawed to the other soldiers. "This boy is a renter. It's obvious you're a renter because otherwise you would know that when you own something you shouldn't mess it up." He gestured to the grass patch I had walked through and I finally got it, then realized I had walked back onto the grass as I approached trying to figure out what he was going on about. I stepped back and apologized profusely. Few people seem to care about such things here but those who care really care. A friend of a friend was driving me home the other night and refused to run red lights. He was the only one and everyone else honked. "I'm the only one in this country who cares about the rules. Even the police tell me 'Go, go.' I'm not going. I'm going to teach them all."

The caption reads:
The National Army
The National Power
I don't know what ad agency or ministry came up with that design, but it looks to me a bit like the little girl is begging for her life. Nice butterflies though.

I didn't take a picture of the empty Soviet-built olympic-sized swimming pool with its series of ever-higher diving boards that were apparently popular for executions during the civil war. This one I found on the internet (credit Elliot Woods):



It may qualify as a Thomasson unless its function is in preserving national memory.

Happy Massoud Day

It is the 13th anniversary of anti-Soviet anti-Taliban Tajik commander Ahmad Shah Massoud's assassination by Al Qaeda (not coincidentally 2 days before 9/11/01) and the streets are full of police checkpoints and men driving around in packed cars with huge Massoud portraits covering their windows and the black-white-green tricolor of the pre-Taliban Afghanistan state and Northern Alliance flying. Apparently they are firing off guns in celebration in some places, but I never know what is distant gunfire and what are construction sounds. Apparently this happens every year and isn't to do with the still stalemated presidential election (although according to the twitterverse some Massoud supporters have been chanting pro-Abdullah anti-Ghani slogans).

Destroyed Soviet armored personnel carrier

UPDATE: According to the Ministry of Interior, one person has been killed and 5 wounded so far by celebratory gunfire. I'm surprised there aren't more casualties from falling bullets.

man spa

I went to a fancy pool/sauna with one of the karaoke guys and two of his friends last night. All three are rich young businessmen in shiny suits and it occurred to me as we changed that I look like a fucking peasant next to them in my cheap shalwar kameez and kafiyeh.
For about $10 per person we got a huge pool, two water slides, jacuzzi, steam room, sauna (which they call dry room--they refer to the whole place as sauna), kiddy pool (which one of our number, who couldn't swim and didn't trust the strap then kept coming loose on the orange life vest he borrowed, prefer but was kicked out of), and a clever rubberized bracelet with a metal iButton that opened a personal locker.
They seemed to know half the people there (FYI the average weight of Afghans as in most of the world--with the US as an exception--is positively correlated to their wealth) but at the echoing poolside my Persian comprehension fell to about 3% and I returned to the sauna several times because that was the only place I could understand the conversation (the pace of conversation also seemed to slow in there). I've found that once you start trying to socialize in foreign countries the some of the first slang you learn is the expression to be bored (here "degh avardan"--I have no idea was "degh" means by itself -- google translate says "percussion") because everybody is worried that you aren't having fun. Upstairs after swimming we ate mediocre overpriced shwarmas (my impression is that there is absolutely no correlation between the price and either tastiness or healthiness of food in this country) in a room with less echo where I could participate more and join in joke telling. A new one I heard:
An Afghan goes to the US for the first time and when he comes back his friends ask him was he thought of the place. It's such a developed country, he replies, Even little children can speak English.
My story went over well about how when I first went to Tehran I quickly learned the shared taxi system: you shouted your destination as the taxi passed and if going your way it stopped for you. But I was puzzled that whenever a prospective taxi rider called out "mostaqim" he/she was picked up. So I took out my city map and looked all over for Mostaqim Square, wondering why all the taxis went there. Mostaqim means straight ahead.
As most who become friendly do they made fun of me for my Iranian accept. You sound like the BBC, one said, "Good evening, this is London," he mimicked sing-song girly Farsi. ouch.
We got back to the locker room and one of the new friends showed me that he had 15 missed calls from family on his phone and a text from his sister saying that they were all very worried. He called back and was dressed down for not telling them of his plans beforehand--here when you don't pick up your phone people assume the worst, he told me.


This climate doesn't make sense. It's so dry and dusty yet fruits and mosquitos thrive like few places I've been. I've been slapping 10-20 mosquitos daily and sprayed my room and the bathroom with some very toxic stuff that didn't seem to put a dent in their population. I do however  recommend the 3M ultrathon repellent lotion I've discovered on this trip.

new friend (cont)

Wahid, the little housekeeper from my former guesthouse, stopped by yesterday not for a social visit but to inform me that he'd quit his job at the other house and hand me a copy of his CV. Apparently he worked as a welder for a Turkish construction company from the ages of 14-16. Also he worked for Blackwater (since renamed Academi) for a couple years; he biked over to their base to drop off a CV before visiting me. I posted an ad on the "Kabul Survival Guide" online bulletin board advertising his services as a chowkidar (literally: one who has a chair) and handyman but doubt anything will come of it. Postings per day on the site are far lower than 2 years ago.
Wahid said he'd bring me the momlayi he'd promised to get delivered from Badakhshan in the next week (which I thought was the purpose of his visit). He swears by it as the best remedy for back pain. I wonder if it would be a mistake to try to bring some back to the US through customs.

election

The electoral commission here announced that they would complete the audit of ballots tonight, so we may have an announcement of results and even a new president here tomorrow morning, after an election that has dragged on since April. There are a lot of jokes out there along the lines of Ghani being inaugurated in 2050 at this rate.
Yesterday on a visit to a think tank I pored over some copies of ballots that the Abdullah team had presented claiming them to be written by the same hands. I don't know what they were getting at--the handwriting looked distinctive on each of them--different ways of writings s's and n's, different angle of writing,etc--and those were the one's the team had cherry picked as examples. I was surprised actually--I'd taken it for granted that both sides in the election have been right about the other side cheating.

Kabul Karaoke

Can you believe this is Kabul? My new friend asked. You must think you've gone to America.
Some of the songs sung by my and the only other group present sounded completely Bollywood but with Persian or Pashtu lyrics. The other group got up and left during my Desperado, though I'd like to think that was coincidental and they nodded and smiled sympathetically to me on their way out.

Today

I think I'm going to stay indoors today. Today is the deadline that Dr Abdullah's faction set in their ultimatum that their demands for the audit of the presidential election be met; otherwise they have promised to pull out of the electoral process. And the rumor is that Karzai intends to vacate the presidential palace today because it is the day he set for the inauguration of the new president. I had dinner with a journalist last night who had just visited Karzai and asked him about the rumors. He replied that everyone was advising Karzai not to leave the palace because it would create a power vacuum and invite a coup. But he didn't say Karzai agreed with everyone.
If Karzai does leave the palace it will be perfect timing for the Taliban to launch as many attacks as possible on both Ghani and Abdullah's factions and generally to paralyze the capital in order to foment political chaos. Chaos in the central government can only help the Taliban comeback.
So I'm going to stay home and read and check Twitter often and hope that I'm being alarmist and that nothing happens.

UPDATE: I was being alarmist. I'm going to Karaoke.

New neighborhood

I've moved out of Taimani/Qala-e Fatullah, where a mix of middle class Afghans and mostly small NGOs and news offices are hidden behind high walls, to Wazir Akbar Khan, where embassies and larger NGOs and news offices are hidden behind even higher walls.

Here are some sheep eating garbage. General/VP Hopeful Rashid Dostum's heavily-guarded mansion with its pink-tinted windows is just behind me around the corner. This sums it up pretty well.
It's a bizarre mix of extreme poverty--trash pickers and mud brick hovels--and McMansions owned by the nouveau riche (read: warlords) or rented by foreign organizations. The AP was paying $18,000/month for theirs last I heard but they recoup some of it by charging other TV stations to use their balcony for broadcasts because it has a good view of the area including the US embassy that is most often hit with large-scale attacks.
Despite the wealth the roads are still some of the worst unpaved and jagged rocky in the central city. Maybe this is by design for security because it forces everyone to drive very slowly.

Here's one from one of the fancy new malls that's opened up in the past 2 years since I was here for fair and balanced reporting: