Diary from Kabul

01-12-2011


Canary Ali: In coalmines in the UK for many years, you could always find a canary or two, a thousand feet underground. There job was… well their job was to cark it if suitable amounts of toxic gas was released by injudicious mining of the seams. They would be overcome by methane long before the miners were, and when they swivelled 180 degrees, momentarily hanging upside down before dropping off their perch in a terminal dive, everyone knew that it was time to ‘leg it up mineshaft dead quick like if you know what’s good for you ebygum… right anyone for a kipper tie!’ (I think have managed to get three stereotype dialects into one sentence there – really quite proud – never offend in the singular if mass possibility exists)

The reason they chose Canaries is because they are by their nature little choristers, they sing all day long as though limbering up for some Avian X Factor, so if the singing finally stopped, the panic would formally begin.

My very kind host is rather fond of his flora and fauna, and we have, in this house perhaps 30 birds of species various, including a charm of canaries. There is one that sits right outside my room in a cage, and I have to tell you I have had my eye on him for a while. There is something strange about the way he quizzically tips his head as I walk by. I don’t like the cut of his jib. He seems, and forgive me if this sounds paranoid, he seems to wear eyeliner and sport a turban, and sometimes I see him playing polo with the heads of his enemies. He appears to be charting my patterns of behaviour with a meticulous eye. So what I am going to tell you now will come as no surprise.

Today has been silence, not a chirp or tweet has disturbed the air, but he’s been there, old ‘beady eyes’, have no doubts! I was sitting on my bed earlier today, my door half ajar and, as ever, ritually violating my laptop in another enforced Internet rage (Lord give me strength), when I became aware of a slight kerfuffle just outside, I would say roughly adjacent to ‘beady eyes’! Roughly adjacent to ‘beady eyes’ is a Diesel Heater that warms the corridor outside of my bedroom. It was on fire, and a certain fear pervaded the atmosphere. I saw up to and not including five Afghans running around looking for ways to put out, what was by now quite a conflagration. There was increasing panic, and I realised that I was seconds from being trapped in my second storey room.

All the time ‘beady eyes’ just silently observed, not a flicker of fear, but a tangible sense of orchestrated control if you know what I mean. By now everything was black with acrid smoke and I could barely make out the bodies throwing Afghan rugs over the heater in what appeared a vain attempt to hold back a raging inferno. And then I faced a very real dilemma, of the ‘do I shoot black and white or colour’ variety. There were children on the third floor, potentially trapped, but in my room were my laptop and hard discs with every photo I have ever taken, and all of my camera equipment. Which do I save I mused for literally no time at all because my pictures are irreplaceable, but you can’t move for tripping over children around here.

So I grabbed what I could, ran downstairs and deposited items by the front door. I ran back upstairs to see the flames licking at the curtains. If the curtains go up it will be curtains I profoundly considered. All the time ‘beady eyes’ just smiled, and I am damn sure winked at me. I grabbed a second sack of booty and slalomed my way down the stairs, by which time there was a steady stream of people passing blankets and rugs upwards – a human chain of laundry.

There was now no way to get to my room, though I had all essentials out, but finally it seemed that the stalwart efforts of the Kabul Fire Brigade, aka Naseer and chums, seemed to be winning the holy war. After what really was quite a dicey period when the whole house could have gone up, eventually the fire was doused and order returned. I have never seen a canary sit 2 foot from a fiery death for ten minutes and not so much as twitch, leave alone swivel 180 degrees and cark it. It would be easy to suspect, neé churlish not to suspect our little feathered friend, but as he lit another match and chugged on his pipe, he threw me a look that said ‘ so we didn’t get you this time infidel, lock your room at night, we will be back’

There is a saying in Afghanistan ‘Beware the silent Canary, he be Talib’

No Word of a Lie: OK, you are not going to believe this, but I promise it’s true. After my confusion over the midget with firm breasts (MWFB) (still baffled) I was in a cab the following day when a midget on a child’s quad bike sped past me at a breathtaking 70mph. No word of a lie, even in his elevated position he can’t have been more than 3 feet off the ground. I have never seen something so incongruous and yet so apt. It was like a ‘pocket rocket’, a speeding vertically challenged mirage – it simply couldn’t be! In seconds it was gone but I swear I saw it, as I swear the untraceable MWFB is real. I need to dig deeper, but I suspect an underground movement of dwarves is plotting to overthrow Kabul using nothing but stealth and pogo sticks!

Room Up Top: Seventy years ago Kabul was home to 5,000 people. In 1979 just before the Russians invaded there were, they say, 350,000 living here. When I first came in 2003 just after the Taliban were overthrown the streets seemed empty, but the population was about 500,000. It is, though you probably know this, 2011, and the population of Kabul is 6,000,000. It is choking to death and gridlocked, dying under its own weight in humanity cubed. Kabul sits on top a plateau at 6,000 feet, rimmed by mountains, and for much of the year these peaks are sprinkled and then progressively covered with snow. As I stared out of the window of a Toyota Corolla the other day, I looked across at the mountains and they seemed to be melting. The peaks were white and enticingly crisp, but as my eyes plummeted with the elevation the mountains turned to a nicotine stained sludge. It was rather like toking on a new cigarette and watching the pristine filter bleed to a deadly brown. And when I looked again I realised this was what I was actually seeing. The toxic smog from a million cars and two million wood fires had created a pall of leaden pollution that hung over Kabul and met my vista half way up the mountains, a transitioning horizon that fused the combined breath of six million resource burning souls, with the icy purity of a billion snow flakes. It’s a horrible sight and at once a terrible metaphor, a bleeding filter choked by humanity.

And I wondered if 70 years ago Afghans could ever have imagined how much would change in seventy years!

Age Concern: There are 7 adopted children who live in this house. I have just about come to terms with their names, all of which are unpronounceable and mostly require that I cough up large amounts of phlegm to make the requisite consonant sounds. If Allah had wanted me to spit at people every time I mentioned their name in passing he would have given me bronchial pneumonia! I am getting there though, slowly but perceptibly.

However, if you ask any of them how old they are, they don’t know, they have simply no idea. We can all make stab at it, within a year or two, I suppose, but no one knows for sure. At what age do you get a drivers license here, or legally have sex, or vote in an election – when you are old enough to grow a beard I presume. And that’s good enough isn’t it, when you think about it. I mean you are a ‘man my son’ when you have a beard. Of course women don’t have beards, but they don’t count here, so they would be unaffected by this system.

And to prove my point I will leave you with this story, which is at best pure and utter evil! If you are raped in Afghanistan, you are deemed to have committed adultery, and you will be sent to prison. Please try to digest that notion for a second. There is a prominent case here of a young woman who has been raped and she has spent some time locked up here in Kabul, with her child. Members of the international community have setup a petition, which in itself has put those individuals in danger. By yesterday the number who had signed was in excess of 5,000, and this mounting outrage sparked President Karzai into action in the only way the great ‘appeaser’ knows. This evening it was announced that this poor young lady had been released, but on orders that she marries her rapist. How old do you have to be to have rights in this place, well as a woman, the answer is ‘NEVER’!

Picture of the week: The book is taking shape!