Home Again

After a sleepless night on the floor, they let me leave the safe house this morning. Things are calm here, but our security is watching the situation carefully (i.e. we're ready to run at a moment's notice).

I still have a hard time believing how quickly this happened. I woke up in the morning, everything normal, and then all hell broke loose. After having the hell scared out of me by the attack on my car, and then listening to the automatic gunfire outside, the evacuation to the safe house was terrifying. The mobs around my house had been temporarily scared off by the cops and army, but their burning road blocks were all over the place. We charged down the streets, horn blasting, careening around and in one notable instance through the firey blockades. The other folks in my car thought it exciting, but since I'd been caught in one of those roadblocks the whole thing was petrifying. At one point we saw a mob at a cross street ahead, the men carrying axes and clubs, and made a U-turn as fast as our armored vehicles could. I was sure we wouldn't make it to the safe house without getting caught up in something, but by some miracle we did.

Then, sitting at the safe house, listening to the radio traffic, and hearing my "house is burning!" blurted over it then nothing. When the mob set the guard shack on fire it must have caught the bamboo screen atop the wall on fire as well. I'm sure it was quite a sight.

I still can't get over the risk our guards took to protect our personal property. One's hand is heavily bandaged, the other has a crack on the head. The latter vowed this morning to defend us to the death - could have something to do with the lump on his head!

In spite of the fact that this rioting was like nothing I've ever experienced before, it's incidents like that that convince me that most Afghans are decent folks. They have a tremendous sense of hospitality, and all the Afghans I've met with since yesterday have bent over backwards expressing their shame and anger at the attacks and trying to make me feel safe. It seems a lot of things fed off each other -- the criminal element looting the city and setting things on fire (there were so many fires, the air still reeks of burning), the anti-foreigner element...

Anyway, it is hopefully over. I am scheduled to fly to Pakistan on Thursday and plan on taking a couple days off in Islamabad to regroup before heading down to Lahore.

Night time, Kabul

I'm spending the night at the safe house, and I'm guessing that we'll stay here in the morning until they can figure out if riots are starting up again.

It turns out the Afghan guards at my house (mostly unarmed) were champions, fending off an angry mob and putting out the fire on the generator shed. One sustained minor injuries - in the midst of all this crap I'm deeply touched that they cared enough about our personal property to risk their own skins to protect it. Fortunately, there were more guards than usual at my place. After the angry mob attacked my car and all the shooting outside, my office sent more guards to my house to keep me from freaking out too much.

My adrenaline rush is fading, and all I want to do now is go to bed, even if the bed isn't my own.

3:30 pm, Kabul Time

They've moved me to a safe house, where I will stay until things get better or worse. Apparently after I left my house it was attacked and bits of it set on fire. I don't know how bad it was, but am glad I got out in time. There's nothing there I can't afford to lose.

I think I'll be okay. I feel better being in a group of people.

Evacuation?

I'm being moved to the evacuation point. Got my emergency kit packed. Hope it won't go farther than this.

My car, post-brick

Angry Mob

My car was just attacked by an angry mob in downtown Kabul - across from the Emergency Hospital in Shar-e-Naw. I'm okay. They blocked the street -- a guy dragging and swinging a big piece of metal that looked like a bed frame piece -- people were suddenly pounding on my car, my idiot driver didn't DRIVE, he tried radioing in, I'm screaming DRIVE DRIVE DRIVE and suddenly a brick comes flying through my window, glass everywhere. That finally got his ass in gear, and he drove. I'm okay - still shaking a bit. I'm back at home - staying put until further notice.

Apparently there was a traffic accident involving international forces and some locals. Shots were fired, rioting began.

May Offensive

It's May again, and that means the Taliban's spring offensive! Not quite as looked forward to as, say, the Nordstrom sale. It's probably not a good sign that my friends and I have become blase about the occasional bomb blast that rattles one's windows.

What's going on is terrible, of course. There's been some serious fighting in the south, along the Pakistan border (coincidence, I'm sure!), and the usual share of innocent bystanders have gotten killed in the cross-fire. In Kabul, where pitched battles aren't practical or realistic, there's been an uptick in rocket attacks and bombings... and innocent Afghans have taken the brunt of it.

It's all reminiscent of last May, when in a ten day period all hell broke loose. Hopefully this surge in bad stuff will end as quickly as it did last May. However, I don't remember the big battles in the south last year that have been going on over the last week. Something has changed, but I don't know what it means. Good that scores of Taliban fighters are getting their asses thoroughly kicked. Bad that they've been able to group like this for battle. Bad that they're running from American fighters into villagers' homes and getting those destroyed in the process, along with their inhabitants.

Birthday party

Today I got a good reminder of why we're here. A young Afghan colleague of mine had invited me to her birthday party. It was women only (naturally), and the other guests were all smart, hip, and unassuming. Some worked for NGOs, others at government ministries, and hearing their stories of Taliban days, it's as if they've come out of hibernation and are starting to bloom (some mixed metaphors there, but you get the picture!).

One had just graduated from highschool when the Taliban took over and, banned from work, ended up starting a clandestine school in her house to teach other girls. Once the Taliban fell, she got a series of jobs, eventually ending up in a low-level position at the World Bank. The other young women had similar stories, and they seemed upbeat and hopeful about their futures.

This country has a long way to go. It won't transform from a medieval to modern country in this decade, and probably not the next either. But when I meet Afghans like these women, it doesn't seem completely hopeless.

Security

Kabul's famous French restaurant, L'Atmosphere, has taken on a decidedly uncongenial tone, frisking the male patrons as they walk in and searching the purses of women. More annoying was being stuck out on the street while customers clotted up the doorway, waiting for their turn to be searched. L'Atmosphere is a fairly high-profile place, and there was an attempted kidnapping nearby last year, so I suppose they feel the higher security necessary, but I don't think I'll be going back there.

In fairness, this sort of thing is standard in Turkey and Pakistan, and I wonder how long it will be before we're impatiently queing up for metal detectors to get into shopping malls in America.

The Dubai Creek and shoreline - taken from a water taxi.

Water taxis - the cheapest transport in Dubai.

Descent to Kabul

My psychic descent into Kabul began in Dubai's Terminal 2. The folks who run a lot of airports thoughtfully segregate those coming from or going to third world countries from folks coming from or going to 1st world countries into different terminals. With just as much thoughtfullness in mind, the "3rd world" terminals are never quite as nice as the "1st world" terminals. They're older, dirtier, and don't have half the facilities. The Vienna airport is the most egregious example of this that I've encountered, or at least it was the last time I flew through it a few years back. I'll never fly through Vienna again, and for the hell I went through at that airport I retain an irrational loathing for Austria.

At any rate, Dubai's Terminal 2 is a far cry from the high-tech, clean, and fashionable cheerfullness of Terminal 1. It was like a slow descent into hell. First I was prepped at the hotel, which sprang all sorts of fine print charges on us (note to self: never stay at a Le Meridien again). Then dreary Terminal 2, staffed with sullen guest workers (in my entire stay in the Emirates, I'm not sure I ever saw a native of that country) and clotted with cigarette smoke. On to the utilitarian but roomy UN plane, and then... Kabul.

I shouldn't complain, because we actually got quite lucky on the Kabul flight. When we emerged from the plane onto the tarmac, the sky was sunny and blue. But when I got through customs and out of the airport, a dust storm was in full force. Better to drive than fly through it.

Another magical night in Dubai. Sigh.

Emirates

I took off for a long weekend in Dubai en route to Kabul. Being back in the first world, if only for a weekend, is glorious. I'm eating too much (at every American chain restaurant I can find), drinking too much (alcohol isn't illegal here!), and shopping... well, I have restrained myself in that department, relative to my friends. Mainly I'm just happy to be in a sanitary environment again. Funny how one takes decent plumbing and basic hygene in public places for granted.

My colleague and I did manage to pry ourselves away from the wonders of Dubai, renting a car and setting off across the desert, passing hordes of camels along the way and sand dunes along the way. It was hot and dusty, but bearable enough for us to get out and explore a bit.

Away towards the Omani border at Hatta are rugged hills of multi-colored stone riven by wadis (dried river beds). We were hunting for some swimming holes, but never found them. Instead we trekked along and through the wadis, encountering an occasional oasis of palm trees but no water source large enough or clean enough to splash around in.

It was okay though. Our hotel pool more than makes up for it.

Camel Crossing - United Arab Emirates.

*&^! It's hot!

I'm in Lahore, and it's hot. Too hot to be trailing after loan officers in a bazaar trying to analyze their sales techniques. After seeing a temperature reading on the way to work this morning I did a celcius to farenheit conversion on the Internet. 97 degrees at 8:30 am. Bugger. It was over 114 this weekend, and seems to be averaging around 105-110. And it's humid, and it's polluted.

I've now taken to wearing the traditional baggy pantaloons beneath my long tunic. The Pakistanis probably think I'm one of those odd foreigners who tries to "go native." I'm just trying not to have a heat stroke.

Defence

I arrived in Lahore yesterday evening, spirits sinking as I observed the omnipresent film of pollution fed by burning garbage, old vehicles and farm machinery, and dust, all co-mingling with Lahore's famous ground fogs. It seemed to foreshadow what I'd find when I got to my new apartment -- lots of dust and dirt and what appears to be lizard droppings. The lizard itself is large enough for me not to hazard evicting it, and is a delicate pale yellow color. Once the place is cleaned, it will be nice. It's a duplex of sorts. I live on the top half and a wealthy Pakistani family (the landlords) live on the bottom. The neighborhood is one of the best in Lahore -- Defence, where wealthy soldiers go to retire.