Snapshots
Some snapshots, jotted down over the last two week.
1) At London Heathrow, I passed a gaggle of women walking quickly in
black burkhas. My heart skipped a beat and I quickly reminded myself,
"You'd better get used to seeing that." I'm not sure how I felt about
it in that moment. Slightly angry that they're not available to me in
any way? Slightly intimidated by that fact since it means they they
represent a strong unknown -- something I can't see, touch, feel,
understand, interact with, etc?
2) In a day in Peshawar, I saw two people in t-shirts -- Western
clothes. In a day in Kabul, I see many. Maybe five to ten percent of
the population here wears Western clothing. Young men in trendy jeans
and Diesel shirts, older men in business suits. Some women here wear
high-heels, painted toes, make-up. They clutch purses at their sides
and walk quickly, not looking at anyone, but even in silence their
choice of clothing makes a strong statement.
3) To say that Kabul is overrun with aid workers would be a mistake.
There're many here, certainly, but most stay locked up in their
compounds. You see the white Landcruisers of the UN or ISAF on the
street occaisionally, but there's little other indication of their
presence. The exception are the few bars/clubs that serve alcohol. The
Elbow Room, Copacabana. To a lesser degree, the bar here at the
Mustafa.
4) The server and window washer here at the Mustafa used to be a
professor of geography at the Kabul University. He makes US$100 per
month as a salary. My taxi driver when I first entered Kabul had spent
three years in Cairo studying Arabic and speaks five languages. The
realization of just how many educated people are reduced to menial
work here is slightly stunning, but in many ways it's not different
from back home. Talk to gas station attendants, or taxi drivers in San
Francisco. You'll meet people who were doctors, professors, successful
and rich business men, lawyers, etc, in their home countries.
5) The Kabul equivelant of San Francisco's massage parlors are the
back rooms of Chinese take-away (takeout) restaurants. US$50 for a
fuck.
7) When I was a teenager, I remember overhearing someone say that the
reason girls loved guys on motorcycles so much is because the men are
completely covered, including their heads, and thus you can imagine
exactly the sort of man that turns you on most. I wonder if a similar
thing happens here with the burkhas and head coverings? You can
imagine the woman underneath as the most beautiful in the world,
perhaps secretly eyeing you as she walks past, explosive sensual and
sexual energy eager to be unleashed, only barely kept in check by a
culture that forbids even a shared gaze. Maybe the fantasy would be
blunted by seeing a few women lift their veils to reveal old,
lop-sided, wrinkled faces, missing teeth -- the old woman taunting
Buttercup.
8) Men and women here aren't really allowed to look at each other.
Worse would be a Western man looking at a local woman. Still more
egregious would be the man taking a picture of the woman. A Western
woman wearing a short skirt or a cleavage-baring top is a scandal of
the highest order, possibly ending in gang-rape or a stoning. All of
that said, the billboards here are covered with pictures of Bollywood
stars in short sleeves or sleeveless tops, some with scoop necks.
Afghan men love to take pictures of Western women. More affluent
Afghan men sit in Internet cafes all day and surf porn. Joel told me
of going up to Band-i-Amir with three Western girls and renting a
rowboat. They rowed around a bluff to a private area and the girls
stripped down to their bras and underwear and went for a swim. Up on a
cliff overlooking the area, twenty or so Afghan men -- Kabuli tourists
visiting the lake -- had followed them and were watching the girls
swim, passing around binoculars.
9) At the Kabul airport, I was willing to pay about 100 Afs for a taxi
ride back to Shahr-e Naw. The first two taxi drivers I asked said it
would cost me 300 Afs. That's US$6 for a 15-20 minute taxi ride in a
country where, as far as I can gather, the official monthly salary for
a normal government worker is US$50. The third taxi driver didn't try
to rob me blind and offered me a fair rate of 70 Afs. When we got to
Shahr-e Naw, I paid him a flat 100 Afs instead, with the extra 30 Afs
as a way of saying, "thanks for not trying to screw me." Being
overcharged is very common here. In light of the local salaries,
slight overcharging should probably be happily endured, but charging
people six times the fair rate seems absolutely absurd. Cost to value
ratios are wildly out of whack here and I hope the locals realize that
when the journalists with expense accounts and UN workers making
US$9000/month leave, prices will have to plummet through the floor
before any normal tourists will be able to afford to visit.
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home