“I miss the donkeys!” … A lesson on culture shock

Walking slowly down the cleanly buffed halls of the Georgetown Mall, I felt myself slowly drowning, gasping for breath, in a rising flood of merchandise, advertisements and messages. Scantily-clad posters of artificially manufactured, starved and busty Victoria’s Secret models, jewellery stores selling massive shiny rocks, bright neon lights, slogans and logos all assailed me – assaulting each of my senses.

And all I could think as my heart beat nervously in my chest and my brain struggled to process this absurd onslaught of messages was, “Help! Someone, please! Where are the donkeys? I just want the donkeys!” I was longing, inexplicably for the crowded, dusty streets of Kabul, where donkeys, money changers, crippled mine victims begging for “bakhshish” (charitable gifts of money) and man-pulled wooden carts all join in the chaos of rush-hour traffic. The chaos of an American mall was simply too much – too clean, too organized, too bright and too demanding.

I suppose my friend Chris was right when he said that culture shock is not so much the obvious differences. It is not my not needing to wear a scarf, for instance (though I did take a double take a few times on the way out of a house when I realized I was lacking my chadur). Instead, the more difficult culture shock involves one’s constant semi-conscious evaluation of and adjustments to unspoken norms, rules and behaviours.

Reverse culture shock, usually far more difficult and painful, is more like an old pair of jeans that no longer fit. Perhaps they have shrunk in the wash of time that has passed in one’s absence or perhaps one has grown too big for them. In either case, these norms and rules which once fit so perfectly are suddenly uncomfortable and unnatural, leaving one to suck in and pull tight so as not to be revealed as being totally naked and ill-equipped in one’s own “home” culture.

After five weeks away and having generally succeeded in pulling my Western jeans on, I have returned to Kabul and am again having to readjust. I am reminding myself again not to look men in the eye, not to laugh too loudly in public, to dress appropriately and to take time to ask the long series of questions about one’s health and family that make up a proper Afghan greeting. I am reacquainting myself with dust and dirt, with a few hours of municipal power daily, with cold showers and the challenges of transportation. My tongue is relearning its way around the Afghan language. And as much as some of these things leave me a little frustrated, I mostly find myself happy to be back. Not yet quite comfortable in these cultural clothes, but grateful to once again see the donkeys.

The NGO Chaos Theory

“It seems like NGO workers are constantly followed by a certain amount of chaos.”

These were the words of an almost perfect stranger, a friend of a friend who had graciously offered me his sofa in Dubai when I had, in desperation, contacted him less than twenty-four hours earlier to ask if I could stay the night. This conclusion, I recognised, had largely been formed through years of experiences with our mutual friend, a fellow Kabul-based NGO type. Yet, somehow, through our first conversation this man, who knew almost nothing about me, had managed to confirm for himself this statement. I sat there wondering whether to be insulted or convicted. Surely I am not followed by chaos … am I?

Perhaps he had reason for his statement. After all, I had just shared with him the story of how it was that I had come to sit cross-legged on his living room floor – a story that included airport strikes, cancelled and delayed flights, plane malfunctions, international calls failing to go through, totally booked hotel rooms in both London and Dubai, taxi drivers getting me lost and a rather dodgy promise of a seat on the flight to Kabul the next day. I hadn’t even mentioned my having booked a rental car at the wrong airport in Washington, DC earlier in my holiday.

“Chaos?” I thought. “I deny it!”

No, just a day in the life of a NGO worker – one who functions in a world where Murphy’s Law rules, a world where complications will always occur at the most inconvenient times and will find the most amusing solutions and a world where laughter and patience are essential tools should one not wish to find their next trip involving a straight jacket and padded walls. I’m sure this is thoroughly normal.

Alas, all this “chaos” did not meet my mother’s prediction of my meeting a tall, dark and handsome number on the connecting flight. I had to settle for several offers by airport staff – the first to sell me a pack of gum for the bargain price of one million Euros with the Granada Airport barman included, the second by a car rental agent at Gatwick to help me book a hotel room for two instead of one (wink wink), and yet another by the passport check man who lamented at what a shame it was I was travelling alone. I suppose this is better than the Afghan passport and baggage checking staff who always feel it is absolutely necessary to know my marital status. The last time I was asked by the Kabul passport checking official first, where I was travelling to and then whether my husband was there, I decided that “there” was a general enough term and said yes. I certainly hope he’s out “there” somewhere. I suppose we’ll just have to wait for the next chaotic travel experience to find out where.

Goodbye tonight …

(A poem written after what I thought was my last conversation on this earth with my Nana.)

Goodbye tonight is a delicate thread
Like a spider’s wispy fibre, seen only under the low slant of your setting life
Loosely tugging at the membrane of that world
One stitch, tenuously sewing this world
For one instant
To that one

Goodbye tonight is a single drop
Swelling with the substance of all your years
Escaping through some minute fracture between our worlds
Falling against the surface of this one
Sending ripples that play against the wall of my heart
Calling me to tilt my chin up for its source

Goodbye tonight is an old, worn leather bag
Its scarred surface covered with the worn stickers of so many journeys
Bloated with my history
Clasping shut a century of memories
The legacy of those that have come before
The heaviness and contents of what I will carry forward

Goodbye tonight is the soft flutter of a white handkerchief
Your embroidered initials clasped between my fingers
Bidding bon voyage
Wiping away every tear
Signalling truce
Introducing wholeness

Goodbye tonight is a towering red cliff face
The heaviness and certitude of my faith rising up immensely all around me
Unshakable, immoveable, certain
The conviction of your destination
The awe of its victory
The hope of our future

Goodbye tonight is the scribbled note of my heart
Rolled up for you to deliver
Placed within the wrinkled clasp of your hand
“When you look on His face, tell Him I love Him
Tell Him He’s beautiful
Tell Him He has my life
Tell Him I’ll see Him soon”

Goodbye tonight is a weightless rising ember
Glowing red with all my love
Ascending up from my open palms
Letting your life go where I cannot yet follow
Calling out for you to pray for me
Promising to carry forward the flame you leave behind

Sweet Liberty!

When I arrived in Afghanistan six months ago, I began to feel this strange relief of being away from the context of the American church. While initially I couldn’t really understand that relief, I came to realize that my years in that Church context had left me with a rather profound sense of condemnation that I simply would never be a “good Christian”. While I am convinced that this is not unique to the States (this is only the environment in which I have experienced it), the Church in the States really seems to have bought into the cookie-cutter picture of what a Christian “should” look like. With that image comes a laundry list of spoken and unspoken rules of what we are and are not supposed to do, the vast majority of which are never addressed in the Bible. And so comes the condemnation.

I feel like much of the Church in America is bordering on becoming pharisaic. The Pharisees created for themselves hundreds of laws. They essentially “micromanaged” righteousness into something they could achieve through their own strength and discipline. Thus, they effectively eliminated any need for the Messiah. In Matt 5, Christ says that He did not come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it. In fact, He says that our righteousness must surpass that of the Pharisees and scribes. From there, He goes on to say some absolutely absurd things – if you’re angry with your brother, it’s like murder; if you look lustfully, it’s like adultery, etc. In the face of these hyper-Jews who are convinced that they have got the whole holiness-thing down, Christ demonstrates that every single one of us are totally and completely condemned under the law.

With all this, the law becomes a means not for man to achieve holiness on his own account or with his own strength, but a means for proving conclusively that there is not one man (save Christ) that will ever reach the true mark of holiness and perfection. This has the potential to cause utter discouragement and hopelessness if we don’t have the second part of the story – that Christ has won that righteousness for us and has freed us from the condemnation of the law (Romans 8 – “Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death”).

With this realization, I have been exploring what that freedom really looks like. I don’t believe that my freedom is a license to sin (1 Peter 2:16), but nor do I believe that many of the things the Church has labeled as sin are thus. In all this, I have felt challenged to return to the true fundamentals of the foremost two commandments to love God with all my heart, soul, mind and strength and to love my neighbor as myself. This is something that still thoroughly confuses me, particularly as Christ so frequently says that obedience is the demonstration or outpouring of our love for the Father. I confess I do not know what obedience looks like, which rather scares me. I know that I love God and frequently fail to demonstrate it in action. But I also know that I am in the midst of untangling myself from the rules that have condemned me.

I want to know what true obedience and true righteousness look like. I want to be radical in the way that I love God and those around me. I want to shine out a message of hope to this world. And I want to be free of stupid rules and pictures of what some guy in a suit thinks that should look like.

I should be clear that I really don’t think that this is unique to the American Church (it’s just the context in which I have experienced it). I also trust that many of those that hold so tightly to their rules and fundamentals do actually have a genuine love for God, as did, I suspect, many of the Pharisees, however much we may demonize them. It’s not them that we should look at, but at ourselves and our ability to condemn one another in our pride and fear.

I am discovering that, while I have walked with the Lord for years, I have essentially missed the truth of the freedom that was won for me on that cross. I think God is calling us to a life of liberty and love of Him and of one another. The opportunity to relish and rejoice in that freedom only causes me to want to love God more and is, I am sure, far more attractive to those who do not know Christ than the condemnation that we Christians too often offer.

So, these are my thoughts … I’m still wrestling with it. I think I have a lot of it in concept, but am now trying to fight the Enemy’s attack that keeps trying to keep me under condemnation.

Friendship Finish Lines

I have discovered a peculiar characteristic of friendships played out in this international world – they often have a finish line, to which people run – sometimes sprint – but rarely do away with. The cause of this finish line is the frequency with which goodbyes are said – the knowledge that you or the other person will eventually (probably soon) get on a plane and fly away back “home” or to another port of call – Sudan, Kazakhstan, Liberia, Cambodia, etc.

The introductory questions here in Afghanistan are almost always the same: Where are you from? Who do you work for? How long have you been here? (and then) How long do you expect to be here for? And there it is … the finish line.

(The furthest from this normal introduction I ever received was in a restaurant called Elbow Room where a friend of a friend introduced himself with the following sentence, “Hi, my name is Nick. I’m a wannabe DJ and I’m on the shits.” I should be careful, because anyone who has spent any time in Kabul will immediately know who I’m talking about since there is only one Nick that moonlights as a DJ.)

Back to the finish line – with this last question, we all know how much time we have and begin to construct a clear picture of just how far this friendship will go. We know, in essence, where it will end – not just in terms of time (April 22nd Chris leaves), but in terms of depth – and the whole of the friendship is lived toward that end.

This is perhaps not true of every expat. Some expats that grow up with stable, one-town childhoods are probably much better at not capping friendships, though many of them learn the skill quick enough after experiencing the sting of constant transition. For those of us that grew up in this crazy transitional world – we TCKs (Third Culture Kids) – this is second nature to us, and the thought of beginning a friendship with no finish line seems absurd and, more to the point, incredibly foolhardy.

The best analogue I have come up with is that of the difference between high board diving and scuba diving. Jumping off of a high board into a pool is exhilarating – the rush of stepping off, the thrill of falling and splitting the water with one’s body. But it is short lived. There is a bottom to be hit and once you hit it, you spring up quickly to the surface, climb up the ladder and jump off again. Scuba diving, on the other hand, requires commitment and bravery of a different sort. It is begun slowly and its whole passage is one of exploration. There is always further down to go, always more to discover. It involves danger, the possibility of predators or injury. But in the process, a whole new world is discovered.

I am a high board jumper - or was, before I met Kimberly, my best friend. I have frequently thought here that Kim ruined me for high board jumping, the very necessary skill here, when she coerced me into deeper waters. She was the first friend that refused my finish line and made me keep running – terrifying me in the process. Chris, another friend who I met here similarly disabled me. Kim grew up in Knoxville, TN and Chris in small-town West Virginia (is there another kind of town there?). Both friends didn’t understand the rush and immediacy involved in my version of friendship, my need for intensity and then my commitment to clean splits. When Kim was moving away from DC, as much as she had grown to be my closest friend, I still could not see another option but saying goodbye. I was prepared for it, but not for her anger and flat refusal to let the friendship go. With Chris, I knew I had three months before he would leave Afghanistan and became frustrated when he didn’t seem to feel the same urgency to squeeze as much as possible into that short timeframe. They each, in their own way, forced me to do away with finish lines and have become precious friends in the process.

I struggle in Afghanistan with how to continue this trend. The truth is you can love people much more deeply and genuinely when you are not anticipating an end. I want to care for people in this way and to enjoy the richness of these kinds of friendships. I want to provide spaces for depth in my friendships. I know, however, that there is an incredible risk in these kinds of friendships, particularly when played out in an environment of such constant transition. It hurts when your diving partner is suddenly pulled out of the water, leaving you alone. And the process of again learning to go deep with a new partner is exhausting.

I wonder if there is a balance to be struck, but I confess that if there is I do not yet know it in full. I neither want to live with total careless abandon nor protective rigidity and superficiality. I want to be genuine. I want to love others without thinking about the consequences and in so doing to offer the peace and depth we all truthfully long for. So today, as I prepare to say goodbye to yet another good friend at the end of this month and two more next month, I will choose to imagine these friendships as extending past their finish lines. I will choose to let them develop as they will, knowing that it will cause me pain as well as much deeper joy. I will choose to go scuba diving and will trust that the exploration will be worth it.

Coming Up for Air

Have you ever tried holding your breath under water until your lungs begin to burn and your brain starts to send panic signals to the rest of your body? When your face finally breaks the surface of the water, that first, sudden burst of air to your lungs almost hurts, though it brings enormous relief. This is a little how I feel at the end of two exhausting months.

I am afraid this blog entry will not be terribly eloquent as I’m reasonably sure I lack the energy for pretty imagery, but it should serve to catch you all up on life here in the “garden city” of Kabul.

My office spent much of March concentrating on writing a HUGE proposal. Early mornings, late evenings and long weekends were spent, without ceasing, writing, planning and strategizing. Simultaneously, I worked hard to study the language and to maintain some very special friendships. I walked out of the month already feeling pressed and stretched and desperately needing rest.

April was busy and straining in a different sort of way. One friend dubbed it, “the month of loss”. We lost the proposal we had worked so hard on. I lost the housing that I had been counting on. And then there was the most difficult loss – my four closest friends, one each week of the month, left Afghanistan. While I know this is an inevitable part of the expat existence, particularly in Afghanistan where the average stay is probably only a few months, it still hurts and I find myself wondering how to keep giving out my heart and having genuine friendships when goodbyes are always lingering around the edges.

Simultaneous to all of these ‘loses’ was the business of field travel. I love going to the field – being with people in small, remote villages; rumbling across dirt roads; practicing my Dari. But it is exhausting – to the core! 24-7, non-stop work! Your brain must always be turned on and you arrive back with more of an itinerary of things to do than you left with and about a quarter of the energy to do them.

So, at the end of almost four months in Afghanistan, I find I am drained. This is not particularly surprising since everyone hits this point, but it is, nevertheless, difficult. I am trying to work out some way of taking a holiday (a long weekend at least). Thus far, the possibilities include a weekend in the UAE, sitting on a beach and going snorkeling or seeing if I can get to Finland for a week mid-summer to enjoy the peace of my godfather’s cottage.

Saying this makes me feel rather weak – like I’m not really as hard-core as I would like to think of myself – but it is reality. I am tired and need to come up for air soon so that I can go back to being immersed with more energy and vigor.

Custard Mouse ... Mouse Custard

My friend Peter and I went out to a local Indian restaurant about a week ago to have dinner before he left for home-leave in Australia. After a wonderful meal, we called the waiter over to inquire about desert options. We were politely informed that they were serving two deserts. When we didn’t recognize either by its name, we asked the waiter to describe them. The explanation came exactly as follows:

“The first is custard mouse. The second is mouse-custard.”

I worked hard to stifle a sudden burst of laughter. I was convinced that I must have misheard the waiter and so I apologetically for the explanation again. The waiter’s face was earnest as he again politely informed me that the, “The first is custard mouse. The second is mouse custard.”

Still thoroughly confused and finding it near impossible to not roar with laughter, I asked, “What’s the difference?”

The waiter managed to look only slightly peeved and explained a third time, “The first is custard mouse. The second is mouse custard.”

Realizing that we were clearly not getting anywhere with this conversation, Peter and I thought it best to consult the menu. We noted three options listed with their traditional Indian names and asked the waiter which desert was which. Pointing to the first item, the waiter said, “This one here is the custard mouse.” Finally feeling as though we were making some progress, I asked which item the mouse custard was. Again, the waiter pointed to the first item.

I stole a brief glance at Peter, who at this stage had given up all efforts to control his laughter. We looked to the waiter and ordered one of each, figuring that this way we would at least assuage our curiosity. When the desert arrived it was indeed two different items, each of them absolutely delicious.

Ask me to describe them and what can I say? One was a custard mouse. The other was a mouse custard.

(On a fun side note, when I returned to the same restaurant two nights ago with a different friend I was asked if I would like to order a cappuccino, which I gladly accepted. The waiter returned a few minutes later and informed me that since they were very sorry, but since they had no ice cream, they could not serve me a cappuccino.)

Crying over spilt ... eggs

Driving through Kabul’s dusty roads a week ago, I watched a swarm of people buzz by. The fabric of blue burkas billowed lightly as women walked by, some balancing overflowing trays on the curve of their heads. Old, rickety wooden carts lined the streets, their oranges, carrots and onions providing much-needed splashes of color amidst the clouds of dust rolling out from under the wheels of passing cars. Three young boys, no more than ten, passed in front of our car, their backs bent under sacks twice their size, full of red plastic watering cans. The smallest turned and wagged his finger, scolding my driver for having driven so fast and come so close. I chuckled, suddenly seeing the disapproving expression of an old man somehow transplanted under the dirty skin of this young boy’s face.

My eyes wondered down the street, inspecting the goods being sold in open store fronts. Here were all the mechanics’ stores. Empty blue, red and green gas containers hung above the entry ways. A man sat bent over an old engine, his hands and arms dyed charcoal by the oil. Outside the neighboring store, another man perched the sole of one foot against a machine and strained unsuccessfully to start it by pulling on a long cord. Two stores down yet another mechanic bent over the bonnet of a car, twisting, turning and tweaking the car’s innards unconvincingly.

A little further down the road, the blue-black of mechanic’s stores turned to the red of butchers. Large cuts of meat hung in lines. Whole fat-tailed sheep, skinned and ready for consumption hung upside-down, their fatty bottoms drooping in unappetizing wrinkles.

Between the store fronts a small alley curved round, lined on either side with the mud-brick walls of homes that stacked themselves one on top of the next up the side of a mountain. Lines of clothes crisscrossed between houses, flapping out colorful brushstrokes upon this canvas of grey. The small portrait of a woman zigzagged up an invisible path, following the mountain’s craggily surface to her home.

The world outside was filled with the busyness of life in all its wonderful contradictions. I thought to myself again how much I wanted to leave this mobile metal box and walk out into the craziness and action. Too often I feel like I am watching this country on some semi-interactive live television, displayed through the screen of my car window. Security means that I do not walk, but drive, between locations and that much of my life is lived behind the compound walls of my office and home.

Much as I have repeatedly read and heard Afghanistan’s devastating statistics, I find my heart has not yet grasped the humanity behind the numbers. I am not broken by the injustice as I think I should be. I do not really understand what it means that 1/5 of all children born die before the age of five, half of those before they reach their first birthday. I do not comprehend the full significance of the fact that the maternal mortality rate is among the three highest worldwide, parts of Afghanistan giving mothers a one in seven chance of dying from a maternal death. My brain can’t seem to grasp the consequences of the average life expectancy being 45, putting me beyond my mid-life. And the numbers go on … Perhaps they are too big and what I need is just one woman or child, one story, to give these figures a face.

The closest to discovering this face behind the numbers came a few days ago while driving home from work and watching the craze of action and life rush by my car window. Struggling against a cold that had kept me under the weather for about a month, I sat dazed and hazy, cursing the traffic and generally feeling sorry for myself at the back of my driver’s car. As I stared out mistily into the bustle that surrounded me, my eyes landed and focused on the hunched figure of a small boy, crouched with the arch of his back leant against a dirty cement wall. His arms lay crossed over his tucked-in knees. His little head was buried into the crook of his elbows – crying. Between the fan of legs that passed between him and me, I spotted the source of this little boy’s tears, the tragedy that had just taken place. By the boy’s side was an empty cardboard egg carton. Strewn in front of him were the broken white shells from which crept the yellow-white contents of his daily wages.

It is strange that in a country with such staggeringly bad statistics it would be a small boy with a few broken eggs that would bring me close to tears. I pictured the boy arriving home with no money and no eggs to face his family. Would they be angry? Did he have a father to punish him or had his father been killed during the years of conflict? Would they have money to eat that night or would he go hungry? The questions filled my head and I nearly jumped from the car, wanting to do something – to buy his broken eggs, to stop the tears, to make it better. And then suddenly, the traffic parted and my car lurched forward between two cars and around the corner. I craned my head to watch the curved figure of the boy disappear and knew that I had encountered some of the humanity behind the numbers.

Lying on the Beach in Kabul

Exercise is a great challenge here as security greatly constricts the amount of free movement anyone can get. Before leaving Boston, I heard from my father about a yoga class that a few of his colleagues attend each week. Not ever really having taken yoga before, but figuring it could constitute yet another part of this grand new adventure, I made a point of investigating soon after my arrival and discovered there was a class on Monday evening.

The amusements started a third of the way through the class when the electricity suddenly began having what I can only describe as a sort of manic-depressive episode of on-off-on-off again flickers, finally leaving us in utter darkness. I was already beginning to suspect that the instructor was out to bend my body into positions it was never meant to take on. The lights going out only meant that I was left to bend in response to auditory commands with no visuals to follow at all. It was like a strange game of Twister without the help of knowing where the red dot is.

The instructor’s commands made the class all the more entertaining. She would say things like, “Now imagine yourself getting bigger. You’re taking up more room.” And so I would try to imagine myself taking up more room, only to realize that the whole point of taking these classes was so that I might lose some weight and take up less room.

When it came time for our relaxation exercises at the end of the class, I almost couldn’t contain the giggles. Despite my strategic position next to the stove, the classroom had been freezing all night. In preparation to unwind, the instructor told us to put on all the warm things we had. I fumbled around in the dark and managed to locate my socks, sweater, coat and shawl, which I duly wrapped tightly around me. I lay on my back, closed my eyes and prepared to become totally relaxed.

The instructor’s instructions came, “Relax your neck, your shoulders, your legs.” I tried to ease the tension and avoid the urge to shiver.

“Now imagine that you’re lying on a beach in the sun. You can feel the warmth of the sun on your face.” Struggling to keep my toes from becoming stiff with cold, all I could think was, “Lady, my imagination just cannot work that hard!”

“Now, breathe in deeply.” I inhaled deeply and almost chocked from a lung-full of diesel fumes coming from the stove. This yoga thing just cannot be good for you!

Finally, if the class hadn’t provided reason enough to laugh, through the silence I heard the soft rhythm of a man snoring. I thought, “Perhaps he found the beach.”

Explosions in Kabul

I should immediately apologize for this title as it really is unfair, but I just couldn’t think of a better one. These are not the kind of explosions that one might expect here, at least not if you’re new to the country.

On Sunday afternoon, as the snow began falling heavily all over Kabul, the heater in my bedroom stopped functioning. Dad and I tried hard to rectify the situation that evening, but to no avail. I threw on an extra blanket, filled my hot-water bottle and pulled on fleece socks, determined not to let a cold Afghan night get the better of me so early in my time here.

I spent the next day working out of Dad’s room, which was considerably warmer. When a guard, who my mother nicknamed Pedro after a good Spanish friend to whom he bears a striking resemblance, came in to fill the diesel tank on Dad’s heater. Trying desperately, and unsuccessfully, to remember the word “bokhari” (heater), I tried to indicate to him that my stove had gone out and would not start. I quickly resorted to silly “come” hand gestures and got him to follow me into my bedroom.

“Oh, stop!” said Pedro upon seeing my heater.

“Yes, stop!” I replied, making more funny gestures, this time of shivering. (Now we’re communicating!)

I left him to mess with the heater and returned to the heat of my father’s room. A few minutes later Pedro entered the room again. “Miss, Stop!” I gave him a puzzled look and followed him to my bedroom. A miracle had occurred! Somehow he had managed to get the thing started again.

“You got it started!” I said with real glee.

“Yes. Start!” he said with a smile.

So where’s the explosion you ask? Well, just wait …

I returned to my father’s room to finish some emails and leave my room to heat up, when I had a sudden, strange urge to check on the stove. I got up and walked across the hall to my room. Just as I opened the door, I heard a great “WHOOOSH!” sound as the flames went shooting out. The flames then retracted momentarily before another great orange WHOOSH.

Only knowing about three Dari words so far and none of them amounting to anything approaching a frantic, “HELP, THE HOUSE IS ABOUT TO BURN DOWN!!!” I resorted to calling down a very dignified, British, “Excuse me?” The son of someone who works in the house and happens to know a little English emerged from the kitchen and seemed to become quickly confused by this strange foreign woman, looking very frightened and saying, “Come! Please, something’s happening!”

As he walked into my mini-combustion center he let out a startled “Oh!” and ran over to the stove, turning some knob and making the flames come down to a restful flicker. He turned to me, still looking rather shocked, and said, “Actually, very dangerous!” All I could do was let out a nervous laugh and repeat over and over again the word, “Tashakur” (thank you).

I’m sure this isn’t quite the kind of danger we were all anticipating, but I can now say I’ve experienced one explosion here in Kabul.

Shades of Grey - Arriving in Kabul

Just as the women who walk behind the thin mesh veil of their burqas, Kabul seems shrouded beneath a gauzy grey blanket of dust. The grey sheathe masks the cities’ subtle beauties and graceful dignity so that one needs to look just a little closer, behind the curtain, to the eyes of this wonderful country. Indeed, it is in the faces of Afghans that I suspect the color really lies.

Dad and I arrived in Kabul last Thursday evening on a UN flight from Dubai. The fiercely jagged peaks of the Hindu Kush rose and jutted to either side of the plane, their snow-covered edges making their appearance all the more awe-inspiring. This is the kind of beauty we are not meant to understand nor to contain, but to respect and tremble at. It was here, in some unforgiving crevice of the mountains, that my parents’ organization lost three young women in a plane crash just one year ago. As we approached Kabul, I watched this new world approach through the small portal window next to me. The plane suddenly dipped, coming into the city’s valley, and then circled uncomfortably close to the surrounding mountains before landing on a small runway.

My father and I gathered our belongings and I brought my shawl over my head to cover my hair, tossing a loose end over my left shoulder. Backpack on, we went through passport control, which roughly consisted of two small desks ceremoniously placed behind Plexiglas walls. We collected our luggage from an equally cramped and dusty room and discovered the driver waiting for us outside.

My first views of the city were clouded by a thick fog of jet-lag made worse by a sleepless night in Dubai. Others in the car politely pointed out various landmarks as I struggled to make my mind process anything. Pot-holed streets bumped up against one another, flanked on either side by cement and mud-brick walls that guarded Kabul’s more private life. Driving here feels like a constant off-roading adventure, made more interesting by the myriad obstacles of people, bicycles and deep sewage ditches someone here has nicknamed “alligator pits”. It is the ultimate testosterone tussle – cars and drivers involved in a constant alpha-male gorilla battle to claim space and establish dominance.

We finally arrived at the house unscathed and were greeted by Dad’s guards, who wore some of the largest smiles I have ever seen as they shook his hand, embraced him and welcomed him home. Expecting them to politely greet me with “Salaam”, I was surprised when they shook my hand as well and then, looking to my father, said “dokhtar” (daughter). I shall never forget those smiles.

Yes, I think I will enjoy it here. The security and subsequent constraints on movement around the city will be a challenge and frustration, I’m sure. But I sense this city and this country hold something far more beautiful than the image captured in our Western media spots. In fact, I begin to wonder if it isn’t those images that have created the real veil behind which Afghanistan remains hidden to much of the world.

“You are welcome here. I hope that your time in Kabul will be good.” This is the regular greeting I have received from Afghans. Today, an Afghan doctor followed this statement with, “Many people have fear to come here. I hope you will like it.”

Yes, many people do have fear to come here, and perhaps some of you are fearful having me here. Things do happen – bombs go off, people are killed and kidnapped – these are a reality. But they are only one part of the reality and do not reflect the Kabul – the Afghanistan – I am slowly meeting and I hope to show you all in the coming months.

Preparations

How does one begin preparing for two years in Afghanistan?

Preparing for the actual travel is one thing. I find myself seated cross-legged on my bathroom floor, surrounded by a world in miniature – Little bottles of shampoo; little bars of soap; funny little foot scrubbers. I begin to wonder whether someone will also have shrunk my destination (Little Kabul?).

Kabul doesn’t feel little at the moment. Nor does this move. The floor and bed of my sister’s bedroom, covered with what will become the contents of my father and my suitcases, attests to the bigness of this move. Apparently two years in Afghanistan roughly translates to six toothbrushes, twelve boxes of tampons, two blow-dryers, five chap-stick tubes and tons of hair things. I find all this utterly absurd and rather overwhelming.

Six and a half years ago, I found myself in a similar state, this time cross-legged on my parents’ living room floor. Piled high around me were empty boxes and suitcases, and stacks of clothes and sheets and stuff that were meant to have been neatly packed into them. I looked, half-crying, at my mother. “I’m not ready,” I said. To this day, neither she nor I are sure whether I was referring to lack of progress I had made in filling boxes or whether, instead, I was saying something deeper and more significant. “I’m not ready … for college, for leaving, for life.”

Of course, I was ready and off we drove, car packed full of all my freshman belongings. By the time we arrived, something had changed and I settled in quickly. My words to my mother were my only real hint at this vague fear I held that I was not at all prepared for the next stage of my life.

Today, I am tempted again to say, “I’m not ready.” The truth is that I’m not sure what exactly to be ready for. Afghanistan feels like an amorphous fog with promises of adventure, growth and challenge just beyond the next wisp of white cloud. Through the veil, I think I begin to see the snow-covered, dusty roads packed full of cars and trucks maneuvering themselves around one another. I think I get a glimpse of men and women wrapped tightly with dark grey-brown shawls. For an instant, I even wonder if I smell or hear something of this new and foreign place. But then, just as soon as these visions begin to crystallize – poof, a wind blows in and everything vanishes again behind a new blanket of cloud.

On Monday, I will load up a car with suitcases and bags. I will look around this house in which I have lived since I was twelve, but which my parents plan to sell for an impending move to Spain. I will step on a plane, kick off my shoes under the seat in front of me and buckle my seatbelt. I will vaguely hear the stewardess recite the safety procedures I have heard hundreds of times. And then we will begin to taxi off and I will watch this country begin to move, slowly at first with a low grumble and then quicker, whirring higher. And I will say goodbye to this country as my home for the last time. When the buildings beneath me have almost vanished, I will look away from the window, close my eyes, thank God for wonderful years here and this time, I will say, “I am ready.”