NGK Fellowship: Destination Afghanistan

Aid Afghanistan is a remedial program for girls who didn’t get a chance to get an education during the Taliban period. In this all girls program, began by my host during the “forbidden years of education”, there is a wide range of ages in each grade level. One of my projects was to the get the 10^th graders ready for American University in Afghanistan. The American University “consortium” has decided to open an American University of Afghanistan, much like the ones they have in Beirut, Cairo and Dubai. First of all let me digress a bit.

It would be a scary proposition to attend the American University in Afghanistan (AUAF), not because of the quality of education, which is consistent with AU in Washington. But with the Anti-American Taliban campaign what makes a finer target than the American university? First of all to get in, the ‘unauthorized cars’ must remain outside. Each person signs in twice, once at the gate, then at the main building. You must “wear the American University badge at ALL times” or else….as one of the deans calmly told me, “you could get shot”. Nice. For the “authorized vehicles” the bottom of the car is scanned with a long rod and a large mirror like object affixed to the bottom. They are scanning for bombs. Ahh, I have been in this country for about 7 weeks, and even I know that there are many more creative ways to kill a whole bunch of people than strapping car bombs to the bottom of the car which is the most utilized form.

I have pondered about this illusive idea of security in Kabul, or Afghanistan as a whole. There is NO way of fully protecting yourself from people that are ready to die as long as they take out a few foreigners or locals to make a statement.  With that said, I guess, living here, you MUST be immune to bombs, suicide bombers, and the likes.

Side note again: (It doesn’t help that my father is Mr. Security Conscious, but since I’ve been here, I have become a “Security Consultant”. I seem to know all the security loopholes as soon as I enter a room/building.). I should think of a change of career…..

With that said, I believe in the rationale behind attending the AUAF, it is would be an opportunity of a life time to get a solid educational foundation for the girls who may not be able to leave the country: especially girls that are so smart!

Now about my girls…these girls however, are sharp! They are survivors and the sky is their limit. First I gave them a test to check their English aptitude. After which the highest scorers got an intensive English training. I was actually assistant teacher, because we bumped into Ruth an English teacher from San Francisco who agreed assist with the English training. Another digression….Afghanistan is crawling with volunteers. As many people come here to make money, (there is apparently LOTS OF MONEY to be made here) there are those like me, who are just curious and work for free.  Some international NGO workers make up to $20,000 per month. I know you probably read per year, no, PER MONTH!

Back to my girls. I call them my girls. This was one of my more rewarding projects. Helping the girls improve their English. If Afghanistan allows these girls to grow and expand their knowledge, this country will already have a handful of leaders in the making. They were bold, they were vocal. They didn’t strike me as what I perceived to be the “typical Afghan woman”. I was astounded. My first day in class, we had questions session. Among the poignant questions which I got were, are you married? Why are you in Afghanistan (there is a question) how old are you? Are you Muslim? If you are not Muslim how come your name is Zainab? Here I was thinking, I’d get a bunch of docile girls…far from it!

In my class of 13 I had three aspiring doctors, 3 aspiring Sailors (wasn’t sure where that came from, but Hey!), 3 aspiring business women, 2 pilots, one aspiring housewife, and one computer engineer.

My last assignment for them was to write on the topic “If I were a vegetable, what vegetable would I be and why?” We had fun with that one! My last day was two days ago.

I finally understood why Yemi wants to be Professor. There is a lot of gratification in seeing someone develop partly because of your effort…

Hey all,

I know it has been a while. I just recovered from a horrible episode of “more than travelers tummy”. After 2 days of feeling listless, faint, and avoiding ALL food, I saw a doctor who prescribed some serious doses of antibiotic. He thinks I had some sort of food poisoning. Well after the third day, I am back as new! Eating recklessly again! I figure it can’t happen twice in a row…

As my internship draws to a close, I want to share two of the many lingering thoughts/observations which I have had for a while.

They put the l-o-v-e in brotherly love

First let me start by saying living in the US “corrupts” ones interpretation of tactile affection. Here, it is customary to see men walking hand in hand, not because of their sexual orientation, but as a sign of affection and friendship.

To date, I am still amazed by the affection displayed in the office every morning. Let me also add that it is always between and among men, and not between men and women. Okay, with that said, here is what happens every morning among the men in the office. One walks in, says his “Salamalekum or Subahare”, then they hug with a kiss on the cheek, or one puts his head underneath the other’s chin, almost nuzzling…I am sure my description is not doing this justice. Anyhow, if they don’t hug+kiss on cheek, or nuzzle, then give a heart felt embrace. A hug does not adequately cover this action, embrace is more involved.

Yet, I don’t see the same public display of affection among women. I see the occasional handholding, but nothing “heartfelt’. Understandably in a society where all women once wore burqas, there is a sense of “decorum” and subtlety that women must undertake when in public.

Double-standard-mannequins

So in my first week, given this “decorum” you can imagine my shock. After obsessing that my sleeves weren’t long enough, and covering my head in 30 degree (Celsius that is) weather, I am surrounded by “scantily clad” mannequins. First there are mannequins in pretty much every store that sells clothing, which are most stores. Then, these mannequins:

a)don’t have their heads covered! Ubiquitous, uncovered heads peaking from glass store windows

b) the mannequins have sequenced gowns with short sleeves, or spaghetti straps!!! I mean spaghetti straps in a town where women still wear burqas and you hardly see women without a shawl + long sleeves.

My question is who wears these clothing and more importantly to WHERE do they wear them? The unsatisfactory answer I get is that women wear these clothes to weddings. Traditionally during weddings, all the men celebrate together in a different venue from the bride and all the other ladies. So, I guess these fancy short sleeves, spaghetti strapped gowns would be worn to girls’ parties. Somehow, it doesn’t justify having soo many stores with these “indecent” mannequins; even though, I know that there weddings occurring every week. I am still searching for a “more satisfying” reason…

At about 9:30 am, the building began to “rumble”. It felt like that house was on a railway and a HUGE train was passing by. That description is the only frame of reference I have for explaining what I experienced. ... [Continue reading this entry]

I WROTE THIS ABOUT A WEEK AGO….unfortunately, the predictions that the violence is coming close to Kabul came true about three days ago—with three bombings in one day--. However, for the time being all is well.

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There is ... [Continue reading this entry]

Walking in Kabul has got to be one of my scariest experiences. I can trace this fear to internal and external reasons. Internally, I would attribute much of the problem to information. My problem really stems from being “over-informed”. ... [Continue reading this entry]