Every day in Kabul brings a new and fascinating experience, be it a simple observation from the car window or an afternoon’s adventure at work or in the old city. I’ll start with the latter – a certificate awarding ceremony for ladies who had completed their first year of a Literacy course. We gathered in a school classroom, the ladies squeezed behind the small desks designed for much younger pupils. While they patiently waited for us, the guests, to assemble ourselves a small, elderly lady who was sat at the back of the classroom started to sing a song. I later learned that she is in her early 90s, and she has waited all this time to learn to read and write. The other ladies ranged in age, I imagine from their twenties to their sixties. I handed them certificates and shook their hands in my new (unexpected) role as token ‘international’ in the school! After the formalities were over we did what Afghans do best – tea and cake. The tea is usually green, except when you eat cake, in which case it is black. The cake is invariably yellow – worryingly so, and often loaded with canned cream. In fact a good Afghan birthday cake, I have discovered, is generally a creamy mass dotted here and there with some sponge. I’ll never forget the mess all over the wonderful, shiny suits of my colleagues when we had such a cake to celebrate the end of the art exhibition back in November!
Day to day observations... They happen all the time and I always mean to write them down. Some are forgotten but here are a few:
A donkey running away down the street from his two young masters who are chasing after him, a fireman in full aluminium silver outfit standing on top of the fire engine as it speeds down the street, balloon sellers and ladies in burqas banging on the windows as we sit in traffic begging us to buy a balloon or give up some change, another donkey standing patiently next to the water pump waiting for his master to load him up with water containers, men wearing women’s perfumes (I assume they aren’t aware of this), sheep hooves lying in the gutter outside the butcher, men walking the streets with carts of strawberries piled up in gravity-defying mounds, a man driving his motorbike home along with a boy, two women and a baby on board.
A few nights ago we were able to experience a wonderful celebration of Afghan music and poetry, at a party to wave off the US ambassador. We sat on a roof terrace with a fantastic view of the city and surrounding mountains. The air was warm and scented with incense that wafted through the tent which we sat under. The poetry by Persian masters such as Rumi and Hafez was read in Dari and we were able to follow with an English translation in the programme. A traditional Afghan music group accompanied the poetry with various instruments including the tabla (drums) and tula (reed flute). Together with the beautifully recited verses they were some of the sweetest sounds that I have heard here in Afghanistan. It was a night for pulling the two cultures of the US and Afghanistan together in solidarity. We heard a poem from Maya Angelou and the night finished off with the jolly beats of a New Orleans Dixieland jazz band belonging to one of the US airborne divisions.
Monday, 20 April 2009
Saturday, 4 April 2009
New Beginnings
Time seems to have flown by since our last blog posting! It has been an action-packed month, starting with a great trip to Oman at the start of March, followed by Will temporarily taking on the reins at TM and me finishing one job, then starting another. Today is Friday, a day off, and a welcome opportunity to rest and catch up with ourselves.
We came back from Oman warmed by the gulf sun and feeling ready for a bit of spring weather. Fortunately we were in luck, as a warm breeze had moved in to replace the cold winter air while we were away. The weather stayed like this for several days after we got back, reminding me of the British summer. Then, in true British style, the rains came. At one point last week we were lying in bed wondering if the mud roof over our heads might not fall in with the weight of water! The Kabul River is fuller than I have ever seen it and the air is for once dust-free. It is all a good sign that the drought which has plagued Afghanistan for most of the last decade is on its way out!
With the rain the gardens of the fort where we live have suddenly burst back to life. Tulips and daffodils are blooming, and beautiful apricot and apple blossoms scent the air. Pahlawan the dog is enjoying his new bed - the bushy carpet of green lawn that has risen up out of the winter mud. The city too seems to have sprung into life. A whole row of mini gardening centres appeared overnight on the side of one of the city’s main roads. Afghans, it seems, love to tend to their gardens. I’m sure that thirty years of peace following the past thirty years of strife would give them the opportunity to bring this once bountiful garden of Asia back to its former glory.
My new job involves creating a curriculum to teach subject-related English to students of Science. I also have to train two young graduates in teaching methodology. It’s going to be a great challenge, and I’m already enjoying it. The young Afghans that I work with are inspirational, and the other ex-pats on the team are great fun.
Before I started my new job, I finished off my work in the primary school of the old city where Turquoise Mountain is restoring historic buildings. One of the highlights of each day that I had worked there were the school pupils who were always immaculately turned out – the boys in their blue shirts and red bow ties, the girls in their dark blue tunics and pale blue headscarves. I relished the opportunity to teach them, and correct some of their mis-pronounced English (“halla harraya” – “hello, how are you” being one example). I taught them English for three lessons, eagerly pulling every teaching trick that I could think of out the bag in a mission to demonstrate some Western techniques to the teachers who were observing. Having observed them teach myself, I knew that I had to match their impressively high standard. Honestly though, I think they probably thought that I was slightly mad when I started singing ‘Heads, shoulders, knees and toes’ in front of the pupils, followed by a game of monster drawing to practise numbers and parts of the body. Never mind! The funniest part for me was the fact that the teachers kept shouting out the answers every time I asked the pupils a question!! They were keen, I’ll give them that!
When I left, we went for lunch in a local restaurant. After our meal of Kabuli Pilau (rice & mutton) and mantu (beef-filled ravioli), they very kindly presented me with some jewellery and a certificate. I am touched by their generosity, and will remember them always with fondness, particularly when I look at the certificate, copied below:
Mir’s Lucy Burnhel,
The Principal of the school is pleased to award this certificate for all the hand works for Afghan people who suffered decades of civil war and wishes you a prosperous future career in all new Afghan educational departments.
We came back from Oman warmed by the gulf sun and feeling ready for a bit of spring weather. Fortunately we were in luck, as a warm breeze had moved in to replace the cold winter air while we were away. The weather stayed like this for several days after we got back, reminding me of the British summer. Then, in true British style, the rains came. At one point last week we were lying in bed wondering if the mud roof over our heads might not fall in with the weight of water! The Kabul River is fuller than I have ever seen it and the air is for once dust-free. It is all a good sign that the drought which has plagued Afghanistan for most of the last decade is on its way out!
With the rain the gardens of the fort where we live have suddenly burst back to life. Tulips and daffodils are blooming, and beautiful apricot and apple blossoms scent the air. Pahlawan the dog is enjoying his new bed - the bushy carpet of green lawn that has risen up out of the winter mud. The city too seems to have sprung into life. A whole row of mini gardening centres appeared overnight on the side of one of the city’s main roads. Afghans, it seems, love to tend to their gardens. I’m sure that thirty years of peace following the past thirty years of strife would give them the opportunity to bring this once bountiful garden of Asia back to its former glory.
My new job involves creating a curriculum to teach subject-related English to students of Science. I also have to train two young graduates in teaching methodology. It’s going to be a great challenge, and I’m already enjoying it. The young Afghans that I work with are inspirational, and the other ex-pats on the team are great fun.
Before I started my new job, I finished off my work in the primary school of the old city where Turquoise Mountain is restoring historic buildings. One of the highlights of each day that I had worked there were the school pupils who were always immaculately turned out – the boys in their blue shirts and red bow ties, the girls in their dark blue tunics and pale blue headscarves. I relished the opportunity to teach them, and correct some of their mis-pronounced English (“halla harraya” – “hello, how are you” being one example). I taught them English for three lessons, eagerly pulling every teaching trick that I could think of out the bag in a mission to demonstrate some Western techniques to the teachers who were observing. Having observed them teach myself, I knew that I had to match their impressively high standard. Honestly though, I think they probably thought that I was slightly mad when I started singing ‘Heads, shoulders, knees and toes’ in front of the pupils, followed by a game of monster drawing to practise numbers and parts of the body. Never mind! The funniest part for me was the fact that the teachers kept shouting out the answers every time I asked the pupils a question!! They were keen, I’ll give them that!
When I left, we went for lunch in a local restaurant. After our meal of Kabuli Pilau (rice & mutton) and mantu (beef-filled ravioli), they very kindly presented me with some jewellery and a certificate. I am touched by their generosity, and will remember them always with fondness, particularly when I look at the certificate, copied below:
Mir’s Lucy Burnhel,
The Principal of the school is pleased to award this certificate for all the hand works for Afghan people who suffered decades of civil war and wishes you a prosperous future career in all new Afghan educational departments.
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