Priceless Irony

I saw this kid crossing the street and couldn't get over how funny his baseball cap was given the very Muslim nature of our surroundings. Somehow I managed to take a picture, even though crossing a street here is terrifying enough without the photography aspect. What is the story behind this cap? Is he Kabul's only Christian? Does he think it is the name of a sports team? Are there missionaries in Afghanistan handing out "I Heart Jesus" paraphernalia? If so, does the Taliban know? Ah, so many questions.

The World Cup Perspective

As little as five years ago, playing soccer in Afghanistan might have cost you your life. Under Taliban rule, soccer was forbidden, along with television, chess, egg-rolling, and the national pastime of kite-flying. The sports stadium on Kabul's outskirts stood empty, except when the Taliban assembled an audience for its public beheadings.

Today, this is hard to imagine. World Cup mania has descended on Kabul like you would have never thought possible in a country where grass is as rare as guys wearing shorts. But it's a fact: The Afghans are crazy about soccer.

In the car to work every morning, I have to pretend that I watched the game the night before; anything else would make me a sorry excuse for a European. The men--and sometimes even the women--will talk about the game, the shots, and the exceptionally tall Czech goalkeeper. The morning after Sweden's pitiful draw, my commute turned into a geography lesson, as nobody had ever heard of Trinidad and Tobago--let alone of their soccer team.

My coworker Basir takes this general soccer craze to a different level. This is a guy who walks out of a rusty tin door of a mud shack every morning looking like he's about to host a show on MTV. When a few nights ago electricity went out mid-game, he packed his TV into a car (might have been a donkey cart) and went to look for a place with a generator. Now, that's committment.

I have made a habit of asking Afghans if things are really better now than under the Taliban; the riots two weeks ago made me doubt whether the people of Afghanistan think that this invasion-turned-assistance mission has done anything for them. This past week, everyone I've asked has said the same thing: "You are joking, no? Under Taliban, we cannot watch football!"

In a country where I rarely manage to make sense of things around me, it's good to see that football transcends even the most vaste cultural differences.

The Other Afghanistan

Yesterday we went with a few friends on a daytrip to Panjshir, a fertile valley surrounded on all sides by mountains. Though it is no more than 100 kilometers from Kabul, it is like a different universe. This was my first time out of the city, and it was simply amazing. Offroading in a Toyota minibus, through flooded creeks and over narrow bridges, I got to see an entirely different Afghanistan. Here are some pictures:

This is probably what most people expect the Afghan countryside to look like--dry, deserted, and war-torn.

This particular spot looked like an art installation, or as if the Soviets just gave up one day, got out of their tanks and walked home.

As you get closer to the valley, the landscape gets a bit more green. The man in traditional white garb provides such beautiful contrast.

You enter the valley through a narrow pass, no wider than the river plus the dusty road running alongside it. This is as far as both the Soviets and the Taliban ever got--the Pansjiris wouldn't let them enter the valley.

Through the gorge and over a few hills, then the valley opens up like a garden of Eden. It is majestic, awe-inspriring, and absolutely stunning in all its colorful glory.

Cows grazing in a field surrounded by water; three men walking by in a neat row.

We hiked up a dirt road into a smaller, connected valley. As the road got smaller and rockier, it looked as though we had left civilization--but then we would come upon a group of houses perched on a hillside, or an old weapons and ammunition cache with a seemingly cheerful guard.

As we sat down for a picnic, we were joined by a few locals. They were incredibly friendly and nice, admired my friend's hiking boots, and had a bite with us. I don't think they get a lot of tourists.

Except for the strangely misplaced shipping container (how did it get there?), the headscarf, and the questionable dishrag on O's head, this could definitely be Switzerland. Note the snow on the peaks farthest off in the distance!

On the way home, we stopped in my coworker's village to meet his cousins. They brought us to their garden and shook down a mulberry tree to give us plenty of the sweet berries to munch on.

It was so amazing to get out of Kabul and see the clean, beautiful, and peaceful side of the Afghanistan. I kept thinking how this country has such potential for adventure tourism. Once the whole place has been cleared of landmines, that is.

Sweden Day

We had been drivng up and down the streets of Wazir Akhbar Khan--the Embassy Row of Kabul--for a while when I finaly saw it: the Swedish flag. The sight of the familiar blue and yellow against the brown backdrop of the afternoon dust storm was mesmerizing. Faroukh the driver smiled a toothless smile at my visible excitement.

The overwhelming sense of joy and belonging that strikes me every time I enter a Swedish embassy abroad is somewhat paradoxical given how lost I have come to feel in Sweden proper. Having been away for a few years, I now feel like a stranger among my fashionable, well-coiffed, and somewhat superficial countrymen. Indeed, I am not hard-pressed to criticize Sweden and the Swedes. But with Swedes abroad it's different--with them, I am in my element.

There are some real benefits that go along with being from a small country. Most notably, you never have to be lonely. Wherever you show up, provided it's big enough to house at least a couple of Swedes, you belong to a community. I came to Kabul a month ago not knowing a soul; tonight, at least a dozen people came up to me and said "hey, you must be the new girl working for the research organization!" The soldiers told me to come over for waffles on Sunday and the embassy women invited me over for a movie night. And they don't even know me.

All of this went through my head as I gazed up at the flag. Moments later, I was sitting at a table from IKEA, talking to people named Johan and Fredrik, and eating cured salmon that had traveled from Sweden to Kabul via Mazar-i-Sharif. And I felt at home. On the table were meatballs, smoked trout, and two kinds of pickled herring; waiting underneath it was a yellow cat named Svensson.

So it was that just off an unpaved street in a country far from the motherland, the Swedes of Kabul celebrated National Day with a feast fit for royalty. But the soldier who suggested that we cheer the king was quickly silenced.

Thoughts in the wake of riots

It’s now been a few days since rioting mobs plowed through the streets of Kabul, leaving a broad swath of destruction in their wake. Things have gone back to normal, at least on the surface. The fruit vendors are out blocking traffic with their carts, children are playing football in the parks, and the annoying jingle of ice cream trucks can be heard at most hours of the day. The gaping holes of hundreds of shattered windows have been covered with colorful plastic and the glass has been swept up.

Even in the expatriate community, life is getting back to normal. We are back in front of our computers, in our bikinis by the pool at the french restaurant, in our white oversized “vehicles” (nobody calls them cars here). But yesterday’s party at the British Embassy had to start at three in the afternoon so that people could drink enough to sing and dance yet be home before the ten o’clock curfew.

For me, Monday marked the end of the honeymoon phase. It had been two and a half weeks since I arrived, and I had been feeling safe to move around the city, excited about making a difference, and just incredibly happy to live in such a fascinating place. On Monday, that sense of euphoria took a serious hit. When gunshots were fired and cars exploded on the street outside our office, I felt nothing but caught in enemy territory. Climbing wobbly ladders to seek safety in our Afghan neighbor’s garden, I cursed myself. Sweden must be the safest country on Earth—and I leave it to risk my life trying to better the lives of the Afghans?

This last part is the crux of the emotional dilemma I have been battling since the dust settled on Monday night. The riots targeted everything having anything to do with the West, with no distinction between military entities, private companies, and humanitarian organizations. The offices of two aid organizations were looted and burnt; so was the Afghan-owned Pizza Express in our neighborhood. Guesthouses catering to foreigners were set on fire, and the city’s only five-star hotel saw its bakery and business center disappear with the crowd. The construction workers across the street from our office pointed the mob in our direction, yelling “there are foreigners in there!” Considering all of the above, I ask myself: Is my presence here wanted? In the eyes of the Afghans, am I doing anything to help them?

It is true, my work does not bring tangible, short-term results. I produce research and publications, not wells and hospitals. My organization’s cause is noble: We document the livelihoods and needs of this country’s population in order to inform the spending of aid money. But perhaps in their eyes of ordinary Afghans the value of our work is limited to the warmth our lengthy reports can bring by fueling the fire in wintertime?

I don’t know.