I have been in Kabul for three weekends now. Friday is slower than Saturday as till 1 pm most shops are closed for Juma. On Saturday, expats visit each other, go shopping and relax. The government offices are closed on Thursday and Friday.
On my second and third weekends, I met with friends in open air cafes. On Friday, Bele and I go for lunch and the café has a somewhat forlorn look. Bele is based at the AWN and is doing a PhD on the Afghan women’s movement. We learn from each other, sharing contacts and ideas. She sits-in on some interviews for my project. At the café, only five tables are occupied, of which one has expats.
Till a few years ago, this place was bustling with laughter, voices in many languages and good cheer. There were shops with khilims, silver ware, local pottery and books. Now most of the shops in the café are closed and the menu is sparse. The glass case that held the pastries and other baked goods of the day is now filled with soft drink cans.
On Chicken Street, Najiba, Bele and I visit Wahid who owns the Herat Carpet Centre. Many of his khilims grace my home and those of my family and friends. Chicken Street has changed a great deal over the years. The lovely old shops have given way to concrete buildings with communal shops, like a mini departmental complex. Business is slow as expats have been forbidden from going to the Chicken Street as it is a potential target for attacks.
But Wahid jan and his fellow Khilim sellers have worked out a way to do business.
They take their wares to the embassies directly. Business is good, says Wahid with a smile. And as always, the visit starts with Wahid jan offering tea and disappearing into the adjoining pantry. I hear him crushing the cardamom seeds and within minutes, there is a steaming pot of green tea with saffron and the cardamom seeds and many goodies.
Back in the guest house, we have tea and the goodies that Najiba bought from the sweet shop. A cake, a white fudge like sweet with crushed almonds, walnuts and biscuits. After a brief rest, Najiba and I start a lasagne of broccoli, yellow and red peppers and spinach. We send someone out for yogurt as we are not making a traditional white sauce – this one is with cheese, eggs and yogurt. The mozzarella cheese was put in the freezer by the cook so it is a mess to grate it. I decide to use a knife and hack at it.
Jawed’s snooker friends are here and we eat at around 7.30 pm. Then, Tom and Fritz – who are with the German foundation – and I chat around the bokhari. Tom is part German and part British. He came to Kabul in 2011 under a Caritas project. He is married to an Indonesian and stayed in Afghanistan for two years. Now he is back in Germany and working with Fritz who heads the foundation. Fritz is married to a woman from Bulgaria. Thursday and Fridays are holidays for Fritz and Tom. On both these days, Fritz wears a starched white kurta pyjama with a black vest, looking very impressive and different from his suit when he steps out of the Guest House during work days.
Last Friday, I sat at my desk transcribing the recordings. Through the windows, I see the trees with their leaves almost all gone. It is now easy to see the birds. I love the way the sun creeps across the sky and I can see it from the room, all day. It was a no power day so the genset has been on and off, as has the internet.
Fritz needs to make a two-day trip to Tajikistan. I shamelessly ask him if he could try and get a tea pot for me like the ones I saw in some of the shops in Kabul. I showed him the photograph. I will try, he promises. Two days later, he is back and hands me two boxes – sets of the tea pot and three tea cups each for the pots. I am delighted and we sit around and drink tea in my prized tea cups that evening. A few days later, I do a water colour of the set.
In the evening Najiba, Elisa and I make pasta with mushroom sauce.
I found these mushrooms at the store, Spinneys. I also bought pasta imported from Italy at a reasonable price. No parmesan cheese. Najiba made a salad and I started a soup for tonight’s dinner, for Jawed Jan’s snooker friends and us - Elisa, Gonoosh and Hungama. Goonosh and Hungama are originally from Iran, but now live in Italy and the US, respectively. Elisa is of mixed parentage and grew up in France.
My birthday was a very nice day with greetings from many parts of the world. A lot of love and sweets all day and, to crown it all, I was greeted with a handmade cake by Jawed jan at the guest house. The Afghan lawyers gave me a set of earrings and a pendant.
It is getting colder every day. The sun is still strong and the sky is blue. At nights, with no street lights, the light from the stars brighten up the streets.
One thing that makes me believe that Afghanistan is changing is talking to young people.
One young woman tells me that she is engaged. I am 23, she says, but will wait for a year or two to marry, as she shows me her ring. It is not a love marriage, she says, so I want to get to know him first. Yusuf, a young man, is engaged and getting married. Love, he tells me. Thirty-five year old Humaira has a relationship with a man she has known since high school. He is a close friend and she would like to marry him and have a child. He works at a UN agency and is posted outside Afghanistan. He wants me to shift there, she says, but my life is here.
My friend Omar and I walked back from a café two nights ago. It was dark and the absence of street lighting meant we could see the stars. He began to tell me of his friend who migrated to Canada. He misses the stars, says Omar. There are too many lights in Canada, his friend says. It is a good thing we are in Afghanistan, I say. We both laugh, content with our lives and the fact that we are in places where we can see stars.
Excerpted with permission from Kabul Blogs: My Days in the Life of Afghanistan, Anita Anand, Women Unlimited.
We welcome your comments at
letters@scroll.in.
On my second and third weekends, I met with friends in open air cafes. On Friday, Bele and I go for lunch and the café has a somewhat forlorn look. Bele is based at the AWN and is doing a PhD on the Afghan women’s movement. We learn from each other, sharing contacts and ideas. She sits-in on some interviews for my project. At the café, only five tables are occupied, of which one has expats.
Till a few years ago, this place was bustling with laughter, voices in many languages and good cheer. There were shops with khilims, silver ware, local pottery and books. Now most of the shops in the café are closed and the menu is sparse. The glass case that held the pastries and other baked goods of the day is now filled with soft drink cans.
On Chicken Street, Najiba, Bele and I visit Wahid who owns the Herat Carpet Centre. Many of his khilims grace my home and those of my family and friends. Chicken Street has changed a great deal over the years. The lovely old shops have given way to concrete buildings with communal shops, like a mini departmental complex. Business is slow as expats have been forbidden from going to the Chicken Street as it is a potential target for attacks.
But Wahid jan and his fellow Khilim sellers have worked out a way to do business.
They take their wares to the embassies directly. Business is good, says Wahid with a smile. And as always, the visit starts with Wahid jan offering tea and disappearing into the adjoining pantry. I hear him crushing the cardamom seeds and within minutes, there is a steaming pot of green tea with saffron and the cardamom seeds and many goodies.
Back in the guest house, we have tea and the goodies that Najiba bought from the sweet shop. A cake, a white fudge like sweet with crushed almonds, walnuts and biscuits. After a brief rest, Najiba and I start a lasagne of broccoli, yellow and red peppers and spinach. We send someone out for yogurt as we are not making a traditional white sauce – this one is with cheese, eggs and yogurt. The mozzarella cheese was put in the freezer by the cook so it is a mess to grate it. I decide to use a knife and hack at it.
Jawed’s snooker friends are here and we eat at around 7.30 pm. Then, Tom and Fritz – who are with the German foundation – and I chat around the bokhari. Tom is part German and part British. He came to Kabul in 2011 under a Caritas project. He is married to an Indonesian and stayed in Afghanistan for two years. Now he is back in Germany and working with Fritz who heads the foundation. Fritz is married to a woman from Bulgaria. Thursday and Fridays are holidays for Fritz and Tom. On both these days, Fritz wears a starched white kurta pyjama with a black vest, looking very impressive and different from his suit when he steps out of the Guest House during work days.
Last Friday, I sat at my desk transcribing the recordings. Through the windows, I see the trees with their leaves almost all gone. It is now easy to see the birds. I love the way the sun creeps across the sky and I can see it from the room, all day. It was a no power day so the genset has been on and off, as has the internet.
Fritz needs to make a two-day trip to Tajikistan. I shamelessly ask him if he could try and get a tea pot for me like the ones I saw in some of the shops in Kabul. I showed him the photograph. I will try, he promises. Two days later, he is back and hands me two boxes – sets of the tea pot and three tea cups each for the pots. I am delighted and we sit around and drink tea in my prized tea cups that evening. A few days later, I do a water colour of the set.
In the evening Najiba, Elisa and I make pasta with mushroom sauce.
I found these mushrooms at the store, Spinneys. I also bought pasta imported from Italy at a reasonable price. No parmesan cheese. Najiba made a salad and I started a soup for tonight’s dinner, for Jawed Jan’s snooker friends and us - Elisa, Gonoosh and Hungama. Goonosh and Hungama are originally from Iran, but now live in Italy and the US, respectively. Elisa is of mixed parentage and grew up in France.
My birthday was a very nice day with greetings from many parts of the world. A lot of love and sweets all day and, to crown it all, I was greeted with a handmade cake by Jawed jan at the guest house. The Afghan lawyers gave me a set of earrings and a pendant.
It is getting colder every day. The sun is still strong and the sky is blue. At nights, with no street lights, the light from the stars brighten up the streets.
One thing that makes me believe that Afghanistan is changing is talking to young people.
One young woman tells me that she is engaged. I am 23, she says, but will wait for a year or two to marry, as she shows me her ring. It is not a love marriage, she says, so I want to get to know him first. Yusuf, a young man, is engaged and getting married. Love, he tells me. Thirty-five year old Humaira has a relationship with a man she has known since high school. He is a close friend and she would like to marry him and have a child. He works at a UN agency and is posted outside Afghanistan. He wants me to shift there, she says, but my life is here.
My friend Omar and I walked back from a café two nights ago. It was dark and the absence of street lighting meant we could see the stars. He began to tell me of his friend who migrated to Canada. He misses the stars, says Omar. There are too many lights in Canada, his friend says. It is a good thing we are in Afghanistan, I say. We both laugh, content with our lives and the fact that we are in places where we can see stars.
Excerpted with permission from Kabul Blogs: My Days in the Life of Afghanistan, Anita Anand, Women Unlimited.
