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.