Dr Karen explores healthcare in afghanistan

Lockdown hampers shopping

2010-07-20T00:10:00.000-07:00

So, I'm busily preparing for the trek to Nuristan and also manoeuvring around the chaos that is Kabul. Somehow we had neglected to realise that by bringing the trip forward by a few days we were then slap bang in the middle of the Kabul conference; the massive international meeting of world powers being held here in Kabul to discuss the future of Afghanistan. The whole place is in lockdown and here, where we are in Wasir Akbar Khan, there are tanks, armoured gun vehicles and soldiers on every corner, there are NDS, ANP and ANA all in their different uniforms and nobody is going anywhere - except for to Spinneys, that pinnacle of supermarkets which is staying open despite everything. Rock on those groceries!

Last night I had to be rescued from my place by PM and Tariq who drove across town on a mission to spring me from my place and bring me back here. I was sad to leave my rose garden, the five kittens, two tortoises and multiple rabbits who were out and scampering about on the volley ball court. S and M and Leg Roll were discussing which of the rabbits would be subject to the cull that they were planning; several of the rabbits were pregnant and a veritable bunny population explosion was threatening. It was a shame to leave the tranquility of the garden, a freshly white washed wall was to be used as a screen for showing films and the guys were getting ready to enjoy the lockdown with a film or two, comfy cushions spread out on the lawn, a barbecue and some good wine. I, on the other hand, was headed for the compound and a paddling pool on the roof...

I'd foolishly underestimated what would happen here with nobody travelling and the shops being closed for two days. Being all so very last minute I've got a ball gown being made in Qualaifatullah and some ethnic tops I wanted for the trip. One day I'll learn not to leave things to the last minute.... I hear what you're saying about priorities and seriously, I probably shouldn't be worrying about a ball gown right now, but still, what's a girl to do? It's certainly been an interesting process having a dress made here, as I mentioned before, they just don't do natural fabrics so my cunning find of some raw silk in AWWSOM was a precious one. My first round at the tailors produced a reasonable skirt, it fitted well and my only criticisms were that they'd glued a random panel into the front of it (heaven knows why) this had marked the silk at the front, and from where they had been working there were dusty paw prints all over the white silk and it would need a thorough dry clean. It wasn't bad. The top however was more of a circus with a bust that would have fitted Diana Dors and some handy ruched panels at the sides that they were very proud of but which I could see would need to be instantly unpicked as soon as I got it home. I wondered why they didn't go for the concept of making the item in rough, having a fitting with me and then making the final fitted product. I felt bad that they'd made it all but would now have to unpick and re-sew a lot of it having grossly overestimated the size of my bust, it was either that or the fashion here was totally 1980's bustier - given the dresses that I'd seen displayed (brightly coloured nylon creations that would have had pride of place in a Barbie doll's fairy princess wardrobe - I imagine that this was one of those clashes of style moments that I should have anticipated.

PM told me last night that he had heard several loud bangs in the distance - apparently I was engrossed in the computer and heard neither the bangs nor him telling me about them. Repeated rocket fire on the airport... and us waiting to fly out of there. I'd had several email updates on the progress of the vehicles and thus far all was going well, they'd not had any problems and we were still on target for our rendezvous up North. We found out a couple of days ago that there is still a lot of snow on the pass and the horses won't be able to go all the way over. We had planned for the horses to carry the bulk of our kit (and there's a lot of it) so now, when their little hooves can go no further, we'll be lugging it over the pass ourselves. The image of a straggly band of people labouring through the snow at 16,000 feet comes to mind but seems so very remote and painless as I sit at my desk in Kabul - I know it's going to hurt but I just can't imagine it right now.

In deference to the Kabul Conference, the airport and roads surrounding are completely closed, so many important people arriving, amongst them Hilary Clinton, who, when I saw her on the TV, looked ever so much like a man in drag. PM had horrified me with stories that she was partial to a little reverse action, especially with young men, and I just couldn't get those images out of my head when watching her despite the fact that what she was saying was reasonable and not totally outlandish. Most of the time I listen to politicians on the TV with an autistic head on, you know the kind of head where you can instantly tell when someone is lying through their teeth or is simply delivering a foil of bullshit, liberally peppered with terms designed to disguise that there is absolutely nothing inside the hot air that they are spouting. If you squint your eyes a little and just listen to the words, the child or the dog inside you, the bit that is innocent and can still tell the difference, will raise it's ears and say, "That person is offering me what looks like food but when I go to eat it they will grab me by the paws and squeeze me til it hurts, best I don't listen to them". So I am torn but find myself switching on the TV to listen to various puffy people talking shit.

Luckily for me, instead of boring politicians, the headline story is of a love sick baby platypus: it's the BBC reporting from Sydney, Australia, where a lonely platypus has swum into a sewage plant, "This duckbilled juvenile had taken refuge in a large pipe attached to a tank and it was feared that this amorous semi aquatic, egg laying mammal might have suffered hypothermia...." but then it's back to the Kabul conference and Hamid Karzai is there swishing by in his distinctive striped chapan. From a hotel room in Kabul, Lyse Doucet is there doing her best to level out the crap and get some straight talking from the various bigwigs. Bernard Kouchner is with Lyse and as ever, she has my admiration for being there, brilliant and professional, I can only hope to follow in her footsteps.

Snippets from the week

2010-07-12T14:33:00.000-07:00

G tells me that an Afghan friend was telling him about another Afghan friend whose young son had been 'accidentally' kidnapped. The kidnappers it seems realised their mistake almost immediately and, when they did, rang the father of the kidnapped boy to tell him what had happened, "Really sorry and all that, erm it was an accident, and we'd like to return your son, but we can't just let him go as it will, erm, look a bit funny. Tell you what, we'll only charge you our basic costs for the kidnapping and we'll get him straight back to you....". Apparently, basic costs for a kidnapping out here came in at around $10,000 USD, and this was just to cover the expenses of mobilising all the people involved in the snatch. The boy's father agreed to pay - he wanted his son back - and a relatively straight forward drop was arranged in a desert area far from any town. A convoy of about 20 Landcruisers forged in to view and, just like in the film with Leonardo di Caprio as a foreign agent, the cars started circling faster and faster, raising a circular wall of dust disguising the pick up of the funds and the drop off of the accidental kidnap boy...

I'm in the Gandamak Lodge, it's one in the morning and the world cup final is being played out on the TV, someone mentions the psychic octopus (or Soc-topus as he is also known) and I'm aghast to hear that there is a British born octopus called Paul living in a German sealife centre who has predicted each of the world cup winners throughout the competition - Paul correctly predicted the triumph of Spain over Holland by eating a mollusc from a box with the Spanish flag on. Of course I am delighted and can't wait to get home and google Paul the Octopus. Apparently, such was the passion and fervour of footballing support from the various countries that when Paul predicted a defeat famous chefs retaliated by posting octopus recipes on facebook. A Spanish men's club raised a stack of money to bring him over to Spain for a celebrity visit but the Germans, being Germans refused saying that 'it would be bad for him'. Threats to Paul's safety meant that he had to have a body guard 24/7 at the aquarium to prevent him from coming to harm ....

I'm in Afghan Spinney's supermarket and I'm there being totally girly, lured in by the cosmetics counter I leave PM chatting with one of the police commanders who's in there shopping too. I wonder if I should go over and say hello and be interested and social but decide that it's better that I stay out of the 'men talk' and anyway am having too much fun looking at nail varnish colours. There's not that many to choose from but enough to occupy that portion of my brain which delights in such fripperies and I am absorbed blissfully in this activity for at least 10 minutes. Such tiny pleasures, I'm thrilled to pieces when I find that the store stocks proper nail scissors, an emery board, and a pumice stone, and I go totally wild when they offer me not just one but three choices of facepack. Later PM tells me that the police commander had offered to pay for my purchases, but then again PM didn't think that the police commander actually paid for anything when he visited the shop.

I'm in the shower at home and I'm contemplating the negative impact of taking nail polish on a medical expedition into a remote mountainous area of Afghanistan. Ridiculous I know but several tense minutes were spent thinking through the consequences of bonding with the women of the village over Crimson Lake or Buttercup Baby, only to find that nail polish is considered to be the devil's sporn or at the very least the mark of a harlet and that my actions are punishable by death. I contemplate not wearing any myself but decide that toes a la nude is a mistake and that I should just risk it with a neutral shade.

I'm in the car outside the Attorney General's Office and we're making our way through the complex concrete chicane when I spy Elbo a freelance photographer friend walking in the other direction. Waving at her through the glass, she can't quite make out who I am, she's appears to be with three other men and I don't want to embarrass her if she's on a photographic job. I roll down the window and say a discrete hi, ask her if she's working. She tells me that they're here to try and get a couple of friends out of jail, two Americans and an Afghan arrested with two bottles so whisky in their car....

It's 2am and I'm thinking back on the day - I'm thinking about Sean Langhan's comment that his Clinique facial products were the only things keeping him going during his twelve weeks in captivity after he was kidnapped in Pakistan/Afghan border whilst looking for a news story. I'm also thinking about the how butcher street - the aptly named place where you can buy a whole or half a cow if you want to is also home to the Afghan aquarium shop. A sweet if somewhat incongruous shop that's not so very different from one that you might see on the high street in Harrow or Ealing Broadway. The home to several medium sized fish tanks with wavy weeds and brightly coloured stones to keep the fishies happy this little shop also sells budgies and parakeets.

My last two stops of the night before bed are the website www.icanhascheezburger.com, and the weird but wonderful, sushi cooking show on youtube called Cookingwithdog- I need cheering up and my dear friend T has sent me the link to cookingwithdog on facebook. A small grey poodle talks me through how to prepare Temaki Sushi (Japanese hand roll sushi). Apparently, T often gets her cooking inspiration from him :). In the mean time our garden cats are doing their nightly prowling thing and, as I've left the conservatory screen door open, each of them in turn ventures in to my darkened lair where I am working at the computer. On icanhascheezburger.com cats are doing there thing and I find a kitteh who looks like I feel (see pic at top of page).

Back with cookingwithdog and we're making Takoyaki (Japanese sushi octopus), the chopping up the tentacles bit is a bit hardcore as suddenly I'm thinking of Paul in his little tank in Germany but dog seems like he knows what he's talking about and later, when he's finished cooking, I go to bed to dream of sushi.

Elizabeth Duke at Argos

2010-07-11T02:08:00.001-07:00

I've been experimenting; nothing here comes out quite the way you'd planned it in your head, so it's always kind of exciting as there's inevitably the risk that it'll turn out better than you thought. Here you can buy gemstones wholesale and, not being a gemologist, it would be quite easy for me to make mistakes but I can tell what I like and, when you're talking about a few hundred dollars rather than thousands of dollars, it's fun to just take a punt on what you're buying. I buy for myself and enjoy the process; selecting a stone, bargaining a price, taking it to a crafts man. Once there, struggling to discuss a reasonable design and then leaving it all in the hands of the gods to be made. The aesthetic is different here, although the old fashioned pieces are beautiful, ornate, flowery, the new stuff is frankly ugly and bling-tastic in my eyes. It feels like design and jewellery making have lost their way, here is the evidence of 30 years of instability, of loss of skill and knowledge; the silversmiths are starting over, many of them learning skills for the first time, their produce is rough and lacking in delicacy. I'd bought a beautiful sapphire and had taken it to the workshops close to the Indian Embassy, the place where they manufacture the jewellery for Turquoise Mountain. I'd struggled to describe the design which I thought was simple but obviously was not. Returning the first time, the guys were apologetic but told me that they'd completely forgotten about making it (strike one), I returned a few days later to find that they'd made me something that Danny la Rue would be delighted with. Declining to look like a man in drag I ask them to make it again, "This time for a woman", I say (strike two). Now I go back for the third time and I am presented with a ring fit for a 12 year old. Having saved my pocket money for weeks, I'm sure that Elizabeth Duke at Argos would have had something similar in stock for me, but this was not the early eighties and I was no longer prepubescent and undemanding (strike three). I'm not happy but they tell me they've spent a lot of time on it so, British Guilt Factor (BGF) on high, I hand over the money, smile sweetly and leave with my bauble. It's too big for me too. I wonder if it will grow on me, and at the same time I hope that conversely I won't grow in to it....

Another day on chicken street and I'll try again, it's all good fun and I enjoy it. My other life I call it - where I rush round with my driver, the poor man, doing ridiculous things. I went on a mad hunt for silk which apparently doesn't exist here in Kabul or at least not in the wholesale market in the Kabul Old City bazaar. M and H and I had gone there a few days ago and had asked at every stall only to be shown skeins of velvet and viscose, synthetic lace in every colour imaginable but no natural fibres anywhere, they just weren't the thing. Wearing something from the bazaar was a surely a fire hazard - too close to a flame and you'd be an incendiary ball of white hot nylon. It didn't stop me from buying some additional granny print shalwar kamise sets; here I've reconciled myself to being fat and frumpy, there's no way round it so I'm embracing it and stocking up for old age. An image of me, floral prints, spare tyre and saddle bags, sporting large old lady gemstones on my gnarled fingers rises up in my mind and I play with the idea that someday I and my circle of triad granny comrades will be found playing cut throat marjong in a basement somewhere in China Town....

Later, I am inspired and remember where I'd seen some silk - AWWSOM had some in stock and so Icks and I went there and he was subjected to a long round of me umming and erring over the grey, the white or the black silk that they had on offer. In the end we bought some of each, and delighted, I bundled back in to the car to go round to the dressmakers. Here there are tailors on every corner, it's extremely hard to tell who is good and who is bad, yet another round of experimentation. The culture clash on the fashion front makes things doubly difficult, they don't see what you see, so interpretation of style is risky. If you don't specify exactly then you've only yourself to blame when a vision of Madonna at the height of the 1980's rears into view in a gaudy puffball number. I wanted the silk as I'm making a dress for a special occasion. Me being me, I've left everything to the last minute and just to add extra pressure I've decided to run the gauntlet of the Afghan dressmaker. There is significant risk that I will end up with something strangely unwearable but the roulette factor spurs me on. Via Icks, I am communicating with the tailor, (if Icks didn't know about women's dressmaking before, he certainly does now), explaining the intricacies of the five panel versus the six panel A-line skirt is tricky, corsetry and boning even more so. So when Icks offers to find the necessary plastic bones that are required I'm thrilled to bits. The very next day he arrives at my guest house with a couple of rather interesting items: a second hand lace basque and a full on corset. We're going to take the plastic out of them but there's a moment where, stood in the doorway to my room, one of the cleaning ladies catches us handling the goods and with great curiosity approaches us. I am sure she is wondering what the hell my driver and I are doing playing with lace underwear, so to dispel the rumour mill, I give them to her to play with too. She looks happy and approves of my choice, but at this point I'm in a catch 22, whatever I do she's still going to think I'm running a brothel from my bedroom.

As an afterthought, if you ever want to stay happy with a man - pay for one - it's brilliant. That way they get to come shopping with you and have to look like they're enjoying it. My driver "Icks" is fantastic, and to my mind provides a great example of a trait of the men here that rarely gets the publicity it deserves. A strange by product of the women in doors mentality and other forms of hierarchy and control is that the guys here are completely used to running errands, to being asked to take you somewhere or find things for you. Unlike a typical British or European man who resents being asked to go shopping, a number of the Afghan guys I've met here consider it there duty to take care of you, to accompany and protect you as their guest. I don't know why I should feel such a sense of surprise to find gentlemanly behaviour but I guess that having grown up in England where men consider it their right to be obstinate and selfish, I am warmed by the existence of patience and the sense that to serve another is a good and rewarding activity.

This is a very different place from England though and family and the social hierarchy are strong. The upsides are the generosity, the subtleties like the terrible driving but the lack of road rage, the lack of food, space and money, but the offer to share nonetheless. The downsides are the rigidity of the system, the safety in conformity and therefore the lack of courage to break the mould by being an individual. It's difficult to explain but to step outside of normal behaviour here results in rapid condemnation either because people believe it is 'dangerous' or have to be seen to be saying that they believe it to be dangerous. Either way, the downside is that attitudes change very slowly.

US army use yoga as defence...

2010-07-10T23:37:00.000-07:00

Last night was yoga - a strange yet welcome concept in this place of dust and Kalashnikovs. I'd popped over to K-Meisters place, not far from mine, and we were taking a taxi. As we arrived it was like stepping through the back of the wardrobe into Narnia, suddenly the bustle of the road disappeared and there was coolness, dark like a cave, and a wonderful smell of lemon and incense. I was calmed immediately - my last experience here had been 'the pedicure from hell' but this time I didn't need to worry as no one was going to attack my feet with sharp objects. In the changing rooms - on the floor a wonderful soft rug with the profile of a mountain dog woven in to it. - I changed into yoga gear and shoved my stuff into a locker. In the practise room, in the semi light, I could see at least one face that I recognised from yesterday, one very large chap with a Chewbacca beard.

Chewbacca boy had been there at the poolside with a group of his friends. P-Monster and I had taken a day to relax at the 5star hotel in Kabul and a pleasant breeze by the pool side had thrown a couple of the large umbrellas in to the water, narrowly missing a stout yet determined Chinese man who was studiouly doing laps as the sun disapeared behind the perimeter wall. PM had complained that being there at the pool, he was surrounded by the worst examples of all that was wrong with the worst kinds of people here in Kabul. I just thought he was a bit hot and bothered and slightly over exaggerating - not everyone here is horrible. PM had been miffed at the foolish conversations that he'd been subjected to in the men's locker room, some large and over privileged, contract worker complaining about having to work late and not being able to get to the gym, and how unfair it all was. PM had gritted his teeth but I could tell he probably wanted to give 'Over privileged toss-pot' an opportunity to see unfair - possibly say the loss of a limb, unfair imprisonment in an evil place, massacre of his family - you know something simple like that, even the more common getting up at 4 in the morning, washing your face and arse in cold water from a jug, cycling 8 miles to work for some patronising fat, foreign wanker would be an unfairness that I'd have liked this guy to try, just to get things in to perspective. Anyway, I didn't see the guy so who knows... Back to Chewbacca boy: the wearing of the beard by the foreigner is always a curious item, for a start they look very strange and secondly, if it's an attempt to blend in then you'd have to be a blind idiot not to notice that the 6ft 4, fat, white person wasn't from a local village. I often consider getting myself a beard and moustache set made and then wearing it around town just for the hell of it, to be honest I'd probably look more like and Afghan man than some of these Scandinavian-creature men. Anyway, Chewbacca boy and his slightly smaller goatee wearing friend were there with their mats, relaxing and waiting for the class to start.

I let my mind move off it's usual preoccupations: planning, packing, getting things done. I let myself concentrate on the class, on the stretching, the physical sensation, my legs shaking, leaf like, under the effort. For a second I was transported back to Notting Hill - the demographic was no different; middle class, white people struggling to push there bodies through a physical regime after 8-10 hours at a desk. The room was brutally sticky, no air con and I joked that we were doing Bikkram yoga today. The room was full, our yoga matts tessellated like sardines, the atmosphere convivial and inclusive, the tone set by K-meister, we were all struggling together. I was thinking of Chewbacca boy, his smaller friend, and the lanky chap that looked like a Sikh warrior, I've always had a soft spot for men who do yoga; there are a few who are naturals and for whom the poses look elegant and strong, but for most men yoga is a bigger fight than anything that they could attempt at the gym. Here in the yoga class simply sitting upright with your legs crossed is murderously difficult and the male ego must contend with not being able to do what everyone around them is doing with ease. So, I give credit to the guys that come along and try, after all it's not a competition. What they do for themselves when they try something that is hard for them is the best thing that they could ever do and I respect that enormously.

Later as we ended the class, closing the session with focussed relaxation after working really hard, I was aware of a rumbling noise vibrating the walls. I was torn between dropping out of my Notting hill bubble to take a look from the window and remaining in the quiet bliss that I'd attained. I mentally rein-acted running to the locker room for my trainers as I didn't fancy trying to run down the road in flip flops, my meditation was dispelled by my fight or flight planning, but still I remained in the corpse pose on the practise room floor; I told myself it was the generator. I didn't know whether I'd actually be able to see out of the window and didn't want to worry anyone. It's a canny illusion but nonetheless a welcome one; long oatmeal and rice-paper coloured drapes dangle down in panels across the windows but these merely disguise the sandbags that cover the windows - (paranoid) safety measures cleverly disguised by soft furnishings - I was happy to be temporarily deceived.

The rumbling was being caused by two MRAPs (mine resistant ambushed protected), these tank-like, armoured vehicles with gun turrets on the top were parked directly outside the health club. US army people sat in the vehicles looking sheepish, a young woman in uniform jumped out and came over to apologise that their presence was blocking our mobile phone transmissions. I was quiet and didn't say anything but there was a tangible air of indignation from a couple of the folks from the UN, "Bloody military people, causing unnecessary risk, endangering us all, blah blah blah. I'd heard it all and it was boring. I just felt sorry for the soldiers in their vehicles, lost, they could do nothing but sit and wait for instructions (they'd been there for the last half hour so obviously HQ map reading was a little bit rusty). They would not normally traverse these back streets and now that they were here they did not know how to get back out. I felt sorry for them in their highly conspicuous vehicles and uniforms annoying people wherever they went.

I wanted to jump into our taxi and say "Follow me, we'll lead you to somewhere that you recognise (probably one of the super expensive supermarkets that westerners frequent), and you can find your way from there", but this was a fantasy; they probably wouldn't have followed and it certainly would have been an unpopular suggestion with UN guys with whom I was sharing a taxi, "Oh, great job Karen, lets get the sitting target to follow us around the town!". I was sad for the divisions between us but in honesty probably glad when our taxi pulled out and away from the MRAPS. My Spidey-sense had been tingling for a while and my realist fought with my idealist and won: there was no reason for them to be there, if there was a reason for them to be there then we should be as far away as possible. Our $3 dollar car was filled with us and our yoga mats and the ridiculous contrast between us and the military convoy did not escape me - I wondered how much damage I could inflict with a yoga mat, and some Jedi mind tricks, it was like 'Men who stare at goats' made flesh - I could see the headline. "Amateur yogics defeat insurgents with Tantric chanting".

Fizzy pop and the prison commander

2010-06-28T11:01:00.000-07:00

Today started much as they always do: hot. I am slow to rise, my head fuzzy, dehydrated. I meet hornyculturalist in the corridor as I stumble my way to the kitchen to make a coffee, he mumbles something apologetic about using the bathroom from the bathroom door of his own home and I marvel at the ridulous politeness that afflicts us. I register a flash of his paisley dressing gown as I boil the kettle but it's all still in slow motion.

By twelve O'clock I'm just about ready to head out - I'm going to the women's prison at Badambagh. Iqbal is my driver and already I feel bad having made him wait half the morning whilst I sent emails. I wonder why I find it so difficult to live a life with so many people waiting on me; I turn my back for a second and my delightful cleaning lady who wears floral prints and a neck brace has tidied everything away. My room looks tidy for once but still I can't find anything and run around in frustration trying to find things that she may or not have whisked away to be laundered or may or may not have secreted in a draw or cupboard. It was probably a step too far when I discovered that she'd emptied my grab bag and put everything away in various places - the equivalent of someone going through your handbag, into your purse, sorting your coins and putting your stash of rainy day condoms away safely in your sock draw, finding your vibrator and kindly cleaning it for you. Here they have a different sense of privacy - ie none. Behind closed doors, everything is fair game.

We get to the prison and in my mind I just want to get inside, see if Snook has made it in herself, and get some interview material. Instead I am treated to a very long meeting with the prison commander in which he repeatedly asks me to help him to build a new health clinic. I tell him I'm a doctor not an architect or engineer and it's really not my sphere of expertise, but he's convinced that last time I came I had promised to build a clinic. I'm loathe to disappoint him but I fear that somewhere along the line he's gotten the wrong end of the stick. I get that sense of collective guilt and collective responsibility - I am a foreigner and therefore I must be able to turn water in to wine. Although I say it to the commander, I feel bad to admit that I am only one person, pretty much working on my own and that, much as I would love to be able to deliver a brand new, five roomed clinic building to the commander and the women of the prison, I feel just a tad inadequate to do so. The meeting goes on and I am wishing that I'd just kept it simple. Snook and K, her photographer, arrive and luckily for me the conversation is punctuated by their arrrival and questions. Still, I am sat in the office and I know that time is ticking on. Snook and K get to the end of their questions and prepare to take their leave. As they go we resume our conversation and I can feel Sherparai urging us to finish up. I cut to the chase and ask if I can see the expat women inside the prison, there are five or them: two Ugandans, two Nepalese and a woman from South Africa. Aaah, the commander says, but now it is lunchtime... please would you join us. Since first arriving here in Afghanistan I have barely said no to the offer of a shared meal. Often, these meals eaten simply, have been the best and most tasty food I have had, and touch wood, I have never been made ill as a consequence of eating like this. I have found that the sharing of food is significant, it is the act that binds you to another, once a stranger, in the giving and receiving of the nourishment that they offer. Iqbal and I step out in to the next room with the commander. The lunch is two large plates of rice and two bowls of lamb stew, lumps of meat swimming in a soupy broth, chunks of bread are heaped on another plate and there are two large plates of water melon. A bottle of bright orange pop graces the table and cups are filled for each of us. I am so warmed by the generosity which comes so easily here; there may be many things wrong and difficult here in Afghanistan but by this act of eating together I cannot see the commander as different from me - this is the soft underbelly of the dog - we all eat. I am sure that they've brought spoons and forks for my benefit and Iqbal and I eat together from one plate of rice, he from one side, I from the other. He's been my driver now for three days and this kind of intimacy in the UK would be the domain of someone pretty damned close to you. I make an internal note of my own observations and feel grateful that in my own upbringing the sharing of ones food was considered a natural and positive thing to do for others. I contrasted this with the typical British way of serving food, with each individual's plate arranged with meat and two veg; isolated servings and isolated eating, none of the collective advantage of the shared plate.

Later, when I am stuffed full of rice, meat and fizzy orange pop, we go to the prison block. The commander walks us over there himself and immediately, as we come through the door i am greeted by the head of the guards, a woman who herself refuses to wear a head scarf. She recognises me and we greet each other warmly. She takes us first to one of the classrooms but as usual the women are reluctant to be photographed and I'm too tired today to try to convince them only to snap a few shots of the backs of their heads, so we leave and I ask to see the new baby. One of the inmates gave birth a couple of days ago and there we go to say hello; a small dark haired creature lies in a cradle on the floor. Wrapped entirely in swaddling clothes, this tiny bundle is obviously the pride of her mothers eye. The mother lies beside the cradle on the lower bunk of a bunk bed, she looks obviously tired. There are plenty of other women in the room with her but none of them wish to be photographed and so we head on out to the room where the expats stay. Room five, we knock and go inside. I see the two Nepalese women and ask where Margaret is. Margaret is one of the woman from Uganda, inside for seven years for drug smuggling, she and the other Ugandan (Sarah) had body packed heroin. I greet these women, who remember me from last time and we chat, catching up on what has happened since I last saw them a couple of months ago. Margaret has had her second appeal - she'd hoped that her sentence would be decreased in light of the fact that she is HIV positive, but it seems that she's lucky that her sentence wasn't increased at the second court - here in Afghanistan, they are very strict when it comes to drug trafficking and might well have given her additional years rather than less. Margaret tells me that her lawyer does not speak English and she has no idea whether her lawyer has argued for her release on health grounds. Inside the prison, these expat woman have no consular representation, they have no friends and family here. Sundays is visiting day but they will see noone. There are no phones, all of their personal possessions and passports were taken away when they were arrested, there is no internet and they cannot write letters; there is noone to send them for them (plus no decent postal service in Afghanistan). They have no books, no clothes of their own and no money - effectively they are completely cut off. I think about my friend Jammer and his close call with the drugs police at Kabul airport and swallow hard at the thought that he might have ended up in some really hot soup.

Interestingly the two Nepalese woman have apparently converted to Islam as has Sarah the Ugandan, Sarah tells me that she has changed her name to Maryam, she comments on the kindess that she has been shown by many of the women here and by the wardens of the prison, she complains however that because she is fat none of the donated clothes ever fit her. I don't really know what to say to these women, I don't have anything to offer them. I say that I don't want to promise anything that I can't deliver, but I listen to the list of the things that they don't have and in my head I wonder which of them I might be able to make an impact upon -maybe I can find Sarah a skirt that fits her, some novels to read. Sarah complains about the food that they are given saying that Ugandans don't eat rice but here it's bread and water for breakfast, rice and potatoes for lunch and again for dinner. I think of my lunch of lamb and orangeade. I resolve to stay out of prison.

Pedicure from hell

2010-06-27T09:41:00.000-07:00

I think I just had the most god awful pedicure in the entire universe! Believe me, I did not grow up being pampered but since reaching my thirties (some years ago, I might add) I have indulged in the odd salon or two but this time, I swear, I just had a six year, old axe murderer sawing at my feet. I don't wish to be mean but a nail file really isn't that hard to use... but lets start at the beginning: a lovely, slim Philipinna lady welcomed me and, as I'd had the facials recommended by a friend, I was certain that I was going to do better here than I would do at home on my bathroom floor with a pumice stone and a bit of elbow grease. Upstairs, I was welcomed into the ladies changing rooms which was also the pedi room, and, perched on a banquette in the corner, I was dismayed that the confident lady from the Philippines was not also the pedicurist. I was faced by two cartoon figure washing up bowels and a sponge; my lady, a smaller fatter one, though very sweet, was I have to say, just awful. As a Brit I could only hold my tongue and grin through gritted teeth as I was sponged, half heartedly, then rubbed...a bit... in an equally tepid manner...I was peturbed. My lady was squatting and I worried that given the lack of light in the room, that she might be going blind. My paws were pulled out of water, one by one, to be brushed at at worryingly ineffective angles with the pedi egg. I was in need of some serious therapy but I certainly wasn't getting it here. I wasn't quite sure how someone could fail to use a pedi egg - one of those completely fool proof devices that they sell to old people on the shopping channel - but several misplaced strokes later and my poor cracked heels were none the wiser. I said nothing. She brandished the pusher - a pointy ended stick thing that jabbed me several times (where it wasn't supposed to), then came the nibbling... the nibbler as many women will know is a sharp-ended scissory object that should only be placed in the hands of an expert, and she, with both nibbler and pusher in hand, a fairly lethal combination, was pushing even my patient boundaries. The word cack-handed sprang to mind, but I was quick to push the thought away as I was here to relax and be pampered not be tortured and potentially maimed. But sat as I was, quasimodo styley in the corner, the relaxation part was going to be difficult (if nigh on impossible) and I'd ruled out the pampering a long time ago. She produced a pair of plastic booties that, wired to the electrical supply, resembled nothing so much as some kind of evil torture device which in fact they were, designed as they were simply to make your feet sweat (foot sauna she claimed) a curious beauty treatment in the 40degree C sweltering heat, it was all I could do to keep her from thrusting me in to them. Tired I certainly was but I was loathe to take my beady eye off the woman with the pointy instruments who was doing something dubious with bits of my dead skin. Apparently there weren't nail scissors and the best that she had were some manly nail clippers, I didn't want to end up with a serious injury so I commandeered them for myself and clippered away a bit in the hope that perhaps she'd let me finish off the pedicure I was paying for myself. Next up was the nail buffer, I think she'd been using that to try to file initially, then a random bit of filing (this time with the nail file) in various directions in a ham-fisted fashion, she was making it painfully difficult, I was almost relieved when we moved on to the painting of the nails. I was ceremoniously handed a tray of polishes - I'd been promised earlier that all of them came from Finland, that cool, icelandic country of professional nail polish, but no, they all looked like something you'd get at Hitchin market. Given the choice between hooker red and old lady pink I found my heart sinking, there were even a couple of bottles that looked liked they'd escaped from a Christmas cracker. I opted for a shade of blood red hoping that it might just disguise the digital injuries I'd sustained. I sat with clenched buttock cheeks as the ritual painting began; Parkinsonian brush strokes were followed by smudges and smudges were wiped away with copious acteone and with them most of the newly applied polish. My teeth (as well as my butt cheeks) were tightly clenched as the second coat went on and I just prayed for it all to be over so that I could run home take it all off and start again. There's nothing quite as tortuous as wishing that you'd just said stop instead of patiently waiting through something that you're hating. What can I say; I'm sure she's a very sweet person but there was nothing redeemable about her pedi performance. I thanked her and limped next door for my facial, she blissfully unaware, me seething and my paws more farmer Giles than than the pretty twinkle toes I'd hoped for.

Alien abduction and evil crepes as cat food

2010-06-23T23:07:00.000-07:00

We'd been at L'Atmosphere for dinner and I had had a rather dubious crepe; some kind of processed liquid cheese combined with what appeared to be luncheon meat and a fried egg, French haute cuisine it was not but luckily my feline friends were on hand to help out and I launched chunks of ham, cheese and egg through the air to land on the grass where a series of moggies were patiently waiting for tid bits. Rangy little afghan cats, they knew where best to catch the crumbs and were delighted by the random lumps of fine fare that were raining down upon them, seemingly from the sky; "Thank you Sky Cat", I heard them saying to each other as another lump of ham appeared out of the darkness and landed at their paws. PM and I hypothesised about what it must be like to be a cat - or any other animal for that matter - interacting with humans and their stange ways. When a cat receives 'manna from heaven' does he believe that god is sending him food? At least if I didn't enjoy eating greasy tinned muck in a pancake the cats certainly did.

One afternoon I spied the tortoise in the garden and in my general enthusiasm whipped him up from the grass and brought him inside to have his picture taken. I had all but performed an alien abduction on him I thought as I pictured how it must feel to have big, pink hands descend upon you and suddenly levitate you effortlessly, transporting you up in to the sky. A large, gangly, alien being with no shell peering at you in the face and talking in strange tongues. A strange habitat filled with garish colours and patterns and machines with lights on that beep and whirr, some bright, bright flashes of light (no pain) and then suddenly, flying through the air again and landing, as if all was a dream, back on the grass, "White light, hazy memory. Roswell..., area 51... then nothing". Alien anal probe - my arse - that tortoise will have sold his story to the National Enquirer quicker than Elvis can down a burger on the toilet whilst flying a jumbo jet to the moon!

Nibbly nibbly, flying piggy...

2010-06-23T22:30:00.000-07:00

Pigs doing flying and diving at the 2008 Royal Melbourne show in Australia.

This morning I woke up with puffy eyes; I'd been crying a lot and when that happens, just to make me feel extra glamorous, my eyes get piggy pink and swollen, not only am I dealing with whatever has pissed my off but my piss holes in the snow give me the kind of gyp that a girl could really do without when she's trying to put a brave face on it. It's an up and down existence here and things really do change in an instant; you can be quids in one second and then knee deep in shit the next. All told though I am doing ok and relentlessly busy: one minute you're elbow deep in a bowel repair operation, the next you're in the back of an ISAF military vehicle having your phone jammed and sweating your tits off, the next in a random office talking about designing uniforms for the Afghan Police Force, then caesar salad and espresso in the gardens of a five star hotel before finding back home that your loo doesn't flush and it's back to reality. Can't complain that there isn't enough to keep me busy here. It's probably the absolute randomness of this place that I love so much - from the sublime to the ridiculous is a daily occurence.

My first job of the day was to pick up some clothes and a bag from T's house, I'd been staying there for a few days whilst Richard D was out here with me in Kabul. The room I was staying in belongs to K, a freelance photographer, and I had to collect my things before she arrives back in country. We were greeted by the dogs; Tootsie, Moss and Ghazni. Moss has taken quite a bit of taming but today was friendly and didn't try to bite us. The Afghan cook and house person that takes care of the property had been very kind to us one evening when we arrived at the house and Moss was being an absolute little bastard, biting PM's heel and just generally being a fierce, bad dog. The Cook had come to find us - we were watching TV with Snook (not her real name) and Paw, when Cook called us to come outside; he had some doggie chews and with these we were able to tame Moss; Food as bribery for love!

This morning when we arrived at T's PM had dog food - dried puppy nibbles - in the car and we sat in the garden with Snook and Paw and fed the dogs whilst chatting about potential stories that Snook and I could write. PM was late for work so we didn't stay long and already the heat was rising. Back home at the rose garden house I opted for coffee with a large slug of whisky and plenty of sugar and a gherkin just to get the day started in style. I'd already succumbed to a cigarette first thing in the morning but that was because I had eyes like a pig and was feeling none too pretty.

Now I am sat at my computer in the conservatory looking out on to the rose garden and gently sweating like a fat bloke. There are rabbits frolicking on the lawn and butterflies turning tricks between the petals, a couple of medium sized goldfish languish by rocks in the pond and an ancient tortoise lumbers his way around a fantastic terrarium of grass and trees. This place is an oasis.

Morning! Dubai weirdness and Dubai kindness

2010-06-20T21:02:00.001-07:00

My alarm goes off, I snooze it - still dreaming - then the wake up call from reception, and finally I am awake. I'd laid out my bikini and goggles the night before to spur me on. I sip water and eat the rest of the wasabi peanuts I have heart burn from eating them so late last night but I'm upright now so I eat some more and go to look for the pool. I feel strangely conspicuous wondering through this gigantic hotel of pillars and marble, mirrors and glass. I wonder if indeed I am supposed to walk aroun din my bathrobe, whether this is something peculiarly european. I greet a couple of staff,a bell boy, a house keeper. They're all from somewhere else; the Philippines, Pakistan, Afghanistan. Everyone speaks English, noone bats an eyelid - must be ok. I find the pool, it's frankly hot and humid like the jungle and the water temp is better for my body. The sunlight, even through clouds is making me squint; I'm propped up at the side of the deep end looking out of one eye as this seems to hurt less than using two but there's no sense in that observation.

Later, when I am dressed and ready to go, I argue with the manager at the front desk as they took a commission when they exchanged my $100 usd for the deposit - Now they will give it back to me in Dirhams and I must change it back to dollars and pay yet another commission. I think it's pretty disgusting and I tell him so, it's against the ethical principle of a deposit that they should make a profit like that. He tries to tell me that all hotels do this (probably here in Dubai they do), he tells me that they don't keep dollars at the front desk (yeah - whatever), I say I don't believe you. In the end he agrees that he will refund the commission that they took on the exchange last night - USD to Dirhams, but he can still only give me Dirhams back. I decide to settle for this and at least have the moral high ground if sadly, I still need to pay commission (again) at the airport. My tiny stash gets smaller by the second and I haven't even done anything yet. I decide not to look at the exchange rates and just get myself out of there and to the airport. The hotel are still trying to put me in a Mercedes taxi even though I've specifically said 'ordinary taxi' (I should have said cheap taxi), but one turns up just as the bell boy and I are wheeling down the ramp with my numerous bags. 6.50 Dirhams to the airport beats the 26.50 Dirhams that I paid last night to get to the hotel, but hey ho, I'm a stranger in a foreign land and everyone is just trying to make a buck. This place is the Stepford wives on acid and everyone is working on a feverish commission. Money is king.

At the Safi desk I read the sign which specifies 20kg in the hold, I've got way more than that, (like probably double that) but I say nothing as my bags go on the scales. The guy at the check-in desk doesn't say anything either and I wonder whether we are both silently complicit in something that we can't talk about. Either way I am grateful to him, more than he will ever know, coz I'm down to my last few notes and I know that my credit cards won't work. No way to get hold of any more cash, it could all be rather embarrassing as I stand red-faced at the excess luggage counter. But I am spared this humiliation by the kind guy at check-in - thank heaven for the kindness of strangers.

Terminal one in Dubai is ok if you have time and money to burn on completely bizarre fripperies. Upstairs by the departure lounge is a Costa Coffee and I park myself there with a caramel latte and a fruit salad. I've no idea why a milky caffeine based drink has to be made molten before it can be served to you, the over enthusiastic use of the milk steamer is one of my pet hates - practically volcanic white stuff does not taste better and I wonder whether there is something strangely satisfying about watching a jug of milk flail and boil, bubbling its submission, why else would baristas flog the damned stuff so much in the belief that they are serving the customer?

I find a camera on the seat next to me and, given that it's Dubai airport (ie massive), handing it in to lost property is probably not going to do the owner any good, I have plan that I'll sit here with it, keep it safe in case the owner comes back for it and then if not I'll take it with me, put it in my blog and hope that by the viral marvels of the internet that someone who is looking for something they have lost will happen upon their pictures, message me, and be able to get their camera back.It's like an episode of Bagpuss and I'm waiting for the mice from the marvellous mechanical mouse organ to heave the camera into the shop window. Maybe it's six degrees of separation; somehow from the hub of Dubai someone will know someone who's niece's sister's uncle will know the people in the pictures and claim it back.

London to Kabul under someone else's fragrant steam

2010-06-20T19:44:00.000-07:00

I look for a way to imagine what else I might be doing right now but it actually feels like I'm right here in the moment, carried by the current, slightly to the left of centre, faster flowing water and I'm with it; on the surface at the moment but only just, got to watch my footing, by breathing by brush strokes, I'm here but really, not really. That's how it feels to be flying back to Kabul with about $100 dollars in one pocket and a couple of the proverbial beans in the other. I've got a stack of bills arriving at the end of each month and only a whisper of a plan. I'm going back to Afghanistan but maybe I should stay in England, get a regular doctor's job and nine to five some sensible money. Instead I am dealing with the unusual sensation - reliant on others as never before - of even more elevated risk. I might come home with my tail between my legs but I might just come home in glory and it's that thought of achieving what I set out to do versus never knowing if I could that makes me stay, sitting in the aeroplane seat, facing forward and urging it to go faster.

All of it; I wished for it and then it happened: PM, and him being delightful, the trek, the opportunity to just to sit still with my film material for more than 10 minutes at a time. But I feel nervous that I don't have a title outside of the the one that I give myself. I have to provide my own justification and this is hard, probably one of the hardest things a person can have to do; it's just you and what you think of yourself, and what you say about yourself, and what you can be motivated and daring enough to do when you get up each morning. But I have hope, I have leads and I have the will and the energy. The trek scares the living daylights out of me right now, what if I'm not good enough? Expedition medicine yes , in theory, in some strange ways it's the game I've been playing all my life in various ways. But mother and child care; lets just say there'll be a whole lot of internet knowledge refreshment going on over the next four weeks. That said, it's not like we can perform major operations, so what's left: basic resus, analgesia, antibiotics, antifungals, de worming, nutrition. The suggestion of referral to a bigger centre, may be to Kabul, but probably only the slightest of chances that a person will make the journey from the Nuristani mountains to Kabul for medical treatment.

As I sit and observe those around me I try to still by fears of the as yet unknown and allow myself to be thrilled, as I usually am, at the unfolding adventure. It's a strange process of transition, like one is emerging from a glut of wealth and excess to a much leaner, clearer existence. Today, it feels like that; in four weeks time though I will be dirty and tired of stinking drains and wishing for Starbucks and Zara and Topshop.

In Dubai I stay at La Bustan Rotana, a hotel near to the airport, a pretty good choice as it has a pool, reasonable size, enough to do mini lengths, and opens at 6.30am. Would go there again and ++ close to the airport. It was only later that I found out about the hotel that is actually inside the airport - this one you can pay for by the hour which sounds really dodgy but is actually brilliant for those middle of the night London-Dubai-Kabul transfers.

I feel bad about not knowing what the exchange rate to Dirhams is so not sure if a 5 Dirham tip is enough or not. I apologise to the porter and then wonder why I feel so bad, why I am apologising; I'm the one who at 3 O'clock in the morning handed her last $100 dollars over as a deposit on the minibar (did they think I would drink it dry? At Dubai prices a $100 would probably get me a cup of orange juice and half a mouldy Toblerone!). In a place where wealth is everything I was only obtaining small solace in my 'freelance' and 'charity worker' status. I wished that I had a sign that said ' my religion forbids me to use credit cards', instead of the fact that all of my cc's are maxed out and just spit forlornly back out of the money machines, lonely and unaccompanied by even the smallest denomination of currency. I feel strangely detached, like a homeless person, outside the system. "Cash only? Sorry madam, you must be a bit strange, only children pay in cash". I was right back at the shop counter, counting the silvers and coppers over for something trivial, stacks of two pence pieces, some tens and then the shiny, beautiful hexagonal twenty pence pieces - five make a pound - always my favourite.

In my hotel room at 4am, I drink (free) water and eat expensive (not free) wasabi peanuts. I open the jar and then wonder why I bothered, I wasn't really what I was looking for but I eat them anyway - such is the persuasive power of the minibar. In the bathroom I play the usual hotel game of guess how not to scald yourself in the shower (a friend had a rather unfortunate accident with the hot and cold taps on a bidet and, with this in mind, I am always careful not to assume foreign plumbing will be straight forward. In fact, the bathroom sink has a curious arrangement, two identical gold plated taps either side but possibly one is temp, the other off and on but but they seem to switch over as I play with them; hot-cold, on-off, perhaps this vice versa arrangement is the height of Emirati sanitary-ware sophistication, but it's all very confusing, or perhaps, its just 4am in the morning and I should be asleep. I shower with caution and a plastic shower cap on and go to bed. Can't sleep immediately, bloody sods law! Fitful but nice, clean, white sheets; won't be having any of those for a while. Eventually I drift off.

Love really is greater than death

2010-06-07T15:54:00.000-07:00

It’s pretty difficult watching someone that you care for dealing with something incredibly difficult; Pmonster heard today that two of his friends were killed in the Pamir plane crash just oustside of Kabul in Afghanistan. I’d received an email in the morning via the hash house harriers network and had mentioned it in passing to PM – one of those things, one never knows quite what to believe as there is so much scare mongering and exaggeration. Later in the day we were sat in an internet café sorting out our visa application forms when he took a phone call, immediately it was obvious that there was something deeply wrong, everything about his tone of voice, his body language; this was not going to be good news that he was receiving. And indeed it wasn’t, the caller a good friend of PM’s based out in Kabul was calling to say that several Brits were on the plane and two were very good friends. At the time PM said “Well, that’s life”, but I could see him gritting his teeth. It was too soon to see the true reaction, he was here with me in London, he felt it but he didn’t feel it. We carried on with what we had to do, he, with a brave face, saying nothing very much, feeling for the wife, the parents of the friends who had died. How can it not affect you?

We headed for home, he to call the wife of one of the guys to offer his sympathy, to ask if there was anything that he could do. Once home, I think it started to percolate. We went for a run, to try and see something beautiful to off set the unfairness of it all. He wasn’t saying very much about it.

Back home and I worried for him, didn’t want to leave him alone whilst I went out but I knew he needed time to speak to other friends, to tell those that didn’t know, to experience his feelings and to be there for others. To do something, anything in the face of loss, to be making some kind of contribution instead of sitting there helpless to change the circumstance. CC was an old, old friend and colleague, DT a younger man but still a close friend. PM had shown me a picture of DT with the cat from one of the bars, said how much he loved them, a big, macho security guy who loved cats. And CC, I’d heard so much about him, one of the three musketeers, a pal, a colleague, a most dear friend, with so many shared experiences and the hope that there would be many more to come. It was hurting PM a lot and there was nothing that I could say or do to make it different.

PM had said. “It’s all part of the game”, wincing inside at the same time. He’d seen people killed, had lost friends before, gotten used to the idea that this was something that you signed up for somewhere along the line. Here, out of the blue, a confluence of unexpected shit, a few weeks ago CC was best man at JB’s wedding, now CC was dead. The plane crash was nothing to do with terrorist activity; the Taliban didn’t blow the plane out of the sky. The weather, the terrain and a split moment’s decision to go despite being told that the weather was bad led to a momentous shift. Nothing in life is for sure, nothing that you see today will always be here tomorrow. All of these people come to Afghanistan of their own volition, they come knowing that they may pay with their lives, the black humour is rife, a good way to keep the apprehension low, to keep calm and carry on. Perhaps no one ever expects it to be them, perhaps not their immediate friends either, it always some poor unknown person, a local national, a third country national. We count those that matter to us. We say that we are prepared for the loss whatever that may be but is it ever possible to be so? To be so prepared is that at polar opposites to the decision to be there in the first place, that somehow, it will never be me or anyone close to me. What is it that gives us that sense, and how is it that it feels so bloody raw to have to face the reality of loss. We are all there in the plane in those last few moments, terrified and alone, angry and helpless. We are there with those people, experiencing their last time on earth, sharing their fear, there with our friend or our loved one. Who wouldn’t want to take it all away and make the outcome different?

The weather was so bad that it was impossible for anyone to get out there and find the plane and passengers. Later in afternoon the American air force were able to fly close and to confirm using thermal imaging equipment that there was no one alive in the vicinity. This additional information obliterated any last vestige of hope of having escaped fate no matter how ridiculous or slim the chance; miracles do happen. But as the hours passed the absence grows steeper and it’s just a case of dealing with that drowning sensation, the disbelief countered by the knowledge; the two fighting it out – harsh reality winning in the end.

These people are hardened to war, to injury, death and loss but humanity reigns supreme and the love between brothers in arms has a strength all of its own.

The practicalities; the repatriation, who will accompany the body, the funerals, dominate the conversation. Several times I hear PM say, “No I’m not joking mate, I’m serious”, no one can quite believe. He takes it upon himself to let people know, he knows how precious information is; however much people don’t want to know this news they will need to know. He does that work though it must hurt enormously to say those words, to write them, with each iteration, scoring the reality deeper into him. I think he is brave and generous, the energy of his soul is working for his friends who are gone now.

Coming home from dinner I met PM back home, hugged him after he’d downed eight pints of guiness in various pubs , before starting in on the vodka back home, I didn’t blame him, how else do you work your way through losing two of your very good friends. Numb is probably a pretty good way to be.

I heard him talking long in to the night, talking to people in the United States as they woke up and heard the news. “DT, he’d only come for a week, just to fill in for someone else, he’d given up all the security work, wasn’t in Afghanistan full time anymore”. “CC wasn’t even supposed to be on that flight, he’d decided to go up to Kunduz just to get something finished. Later, in the quiet, I heard PM crying in the other room, mournful sobs that asked why is it this way?

I couldn’t sleep, found it difficult to just switch off and leave him out there alone. But I didn’t know these people and in truth I didn’t know what it felt like. I knew that he needed space to mourn alone, to think, contemplate and come to terms. At 2.45am he looked in on me and I got up to comfort him, to be with him. But he didn’t need that, he needed alone time. I got back into bed and recorded here my thoughts on the day. Let him grieve undistracted, without having to worry about how he looked in mine or anyone else’s eyes. Death is a strange and complete entity. In plain sight of death we contemplate our own mortality and that sensation of loss that is so fucking unfair.

2010-06-04T02:36:00.001-07:00

As usual I'm late. I've been faffing around eating pickled onion flavoured monster munch and now as the time comes to leave I am finally in a position to select an outfit... I'd planned to wear a white silk taffeta top and get it on with a fight only to find that yes, there is a large sweat stain under one armpit and far from lady like I look somewhat tramp like, I struggle to get it off over my head and, with the clock ticking, go drag out another ballish outfit - this time a slinky brown number, a full length fishtail skirt that clings to every curve, but this time around there just a few too many curves for my liking and my VPL means only one thing: larger pants or smaller ones... Not being a fan of the g-string I can only go larger but where are all my pants? - heaven only knows, and once again it looks as though my cleaning lady has hidden them - Arrrgh!!

The hem of the fishtail skirt has conveniently decided to come down and I am wrestling with staples and safety pins when PM rings me - I am delighted to hear his voice but deep in the depth of wardrobe despair - and of course ... late!! I've got gold shoes and silver jewellery and no bloody pants! My pashmina's got a stain on it and my tassles have stuck to my sticky - what I wouldn't give right now for a roll of double sided sticky tape

- how on earth am i supposed to cope? :)

I shun the brown satin number, rush through the silver ball gown and onto a tried and tested favourite; the maxi black dress that I wore to the last fund raising ball I attended - No matter that I'm going tonight with JP whom I met at the ball and who has obviously seen me in this dress - luckily (and happily, I add) JP is a taken man and so I don't really have to dress to impress anyone except for my perfectionist self. I am super stressed but feel much more comfortable in the maxi - the curves are gently hidden under a mass of material and I can breathe in it which is always a blessing. Taxi's here and I've gotta dash...Wish me luck!

Happiness comes in gas filled packages

2010-03-30T12:23:00.000-07:00

The highlight of yesterday was pulling over to the side of the road where P-monster bought me four sweetly garish giant parrot balloons, as P pulled each one in through the drivers seat window, I was giggling at the absurdity and at how deliriously happy I was. At $5 dollars a piece I think we probably made the street seller's week. With $20 dollars worth of blow up creatures in the back of the car, we headed for the supermarket for my weekly outing to the world outside the walls of the clinic. The brightly lit and immaculately organised shelving system of Finest was blowing my mind - upstairs a plethora of products thronged the aisles and I made merry with the shopping basket. Here I am stocking up on shampoos and shower gel and, even for me, I'm overwhelmed by the sheer number of different L'oreal beautifying potions one can purchase. I'm particularly unattracted to the whitening washes and creams - spending half my time chasing after a sun kissed glow - the idea of a Michael Jackson powder white mask for a face is not exactly ideal. I am reminded of Mazar's wife's photos - he's been showing them to me on his computer - her wedding photos showed her heavily made up in a selection of elaborate, glitter laden costumes, her face pancaked in white, lips and eyes starkly outlined in luminous peacock, absolutely no trace of a smile, the look: Extreme Geisha.

- buying things here is like being at Butlins with some kind of holiday tokens, prices are in Afs and I'm paying in dollars, I can't get my head around what it is I'm spending and hand over a hundred dollar note like monopoly money. I don't really feel the pain like I'm spending real money for real things. I obviously 'need' the stuff I'm buying by the tubful and manage to spend eighty dollars on hair products and jalapenos. We cart out two shopping bags worth of fripperies and nonsense and stick them in the back of the car with our newly purchased air-filled parrot friends.

Sad Fuck Noodles

2010-03-30T10:23:00.000-07:00

My life is becoming increasing like a nursery nightmare; I'm not allowed out and it's driving me crazy. In fairness, I am the only doc in the house, but balance is everything and I can feel myself slowing burning with frustration.

I've spent the last two days doing Afghan medicals - en masse I have been terrifying Afghan men with my femaleness and daring use of the stethoscope. It is mightily disconcerting to be perceived as intimidating or just generally odd. I'm not very big and certainly not particularly scary so it's hard when the reaction that is provoked is either of abject embarrassment or of outright fear. They don't say much but like small children giggle or hold themselves rigid. It's hard not to care about people who are so vulnerable. They say that expat women here are treated like a third race - neither male nor female in their eyes - and I am getting this strongly now. I feel so very alien; in my attitude, in my upbringing.

These patients are off to Malaysia to an Islamic teacher training course. The Afghan ladies are equally as perturbing, virtually Victorian in their attitude to undressing. For a medical which includes examination of the chest and heart I had to endure my ladies squatting miserably in the corner of the room, clutching their clothes to their chests - I all but felt like some kind of bully. It was with great sadness that I sat with a 26 year old who already has five children - we'd run a routine pregnancy test and unfortunately for her hers was positive. She was obviously distressed, crying silently: her trip, her chance to get out, was now in jeopardy but not only this, she would now lose her job teaching boys - apparently a pregnant women is not acceptable in this role. I didn't know what to say. Termination of pregnancy is illegal here. This poor woman did not want another child but she would have no choice. I felt bad for her, bad that both she and I were hoping that for her sake that the pregnancy, currently in it's early stages, wouldn't remain and she would be free.

So after an emotionally exhausting day I'm here at my desk with some spicy super noodles and a cuppa soup, it's not like I haven't eaten it was just that dinner was at 5.30 and now at 10pm I'm hungry (and possibly bored). I've added extra chilli to the brew so it's hardly surprising that I'm burning my mouth off, still it's probably better than random sex which would be easy to come by in this place. I'm thirty five years old and it's just me and packet food (just add boiling water), the saddest of meals when you feel like Bridget Jones: hot, wet chicken flavour crisps in a plastic cup. But enough of feeling sorry for myself; It's been a godsend to discover that chilli is a really good substitute for men. I get just about the same emotional response from a jar of good jalapenos as I have done from my last few dates so what the hell I'd rather eat chilli!

Context, embarrassment and practise

2010-03-23T12:19:00.000-07:00

Our new ECG machine arrived today and we decided to have a little play with it down stairs in the resus room, that was all fine til it came to actually trying the bugger out; Pommery not his real name) refused to be experimented on and Rubster and PiggyP (not their real names either) were not volunteering so in the end, for want of a gentleman, I said that I would do it. I'm very much a believer in being prepared and, knowing how easy it is for things to go drastically awry in this place, I thought we'd best try it out. I got up on to the couch and they attached the rather fetish looking leads around my ankles and wrists, the boys were all looking slightly sheepish... Next up were the chest leads, Rubster asked me if I could identify my fourth intercostal space, whilst trying to feel for something without looking - it was like I was suddenly something very strange in their midst. Next came the sticky suction cups - not exactly the most elegant (or indeed up to date) of devices, these little cups are filled with aqueous gel before being suctioned onto the skin, Rubster was still not looking where he was putting the things and looked like he was in a state of apoplectic embarrassment, he'd told me he couldn't apply the suckers properly unless I was " further exposed" and almost withered with embarrassment as I whipped off my under things and said "Well then, you best get on with it then". Even then he was fumbling somewhat as the six chest leads were applied in a very unusual fashion - I think he was afraid to touch me as the leads where nowhere near my costal margin and pretty much right across the left side of my chest - I'm not sure whether Rubster was just confused of paralysed with horror at a topless collegue. He couldn't get way quick enough to start the damned machine - the trace was twitching around all over the place as the left lateral lead kept popping itself off and needing to be reapplied.... My ECG reading, needless to say, was grossly abnormal - apparently I had atrial fibrillation! - I thought this was a summary lesson as to why it is best to apply the chest leads properly first time around and not go all coy and school boy. To set this all in context these guys are experienced paramedics, people who've worked on the roads in South Africa and Australia and in war zones in Iraq and Afghanistan - They've seen the worst of days - plenty of claret on the road and possibly up the walls - so why the confusion I wondered? Ladies - if you want to bring an empire down, forget the guns, apparently all you need to do is corner your male work mates and show them a slip of lace... They'll be quivering wrecks before you know it.

It was just then that I understood the powerful psychological weapon of having a petite woman torturer when trying to bust a detainee - I'm told that a bloke can withstand a bitter beating and remain mentally intact when faced by a man but that the absolute loss of power and hope that goes with being interrogated by a woman holding all the power is just too much and they crack.

Later, I head for Karte se - it's the usual scenario - I am with Mazar our driver and we are chatting about stuff - I've a map to guide us but still we are not sure - it's usual here to get close and then to ring your host and get their Afghan guard to describe how to go the last part of the way to the house - nothing is marked here so you could be driving round many a street looking and looking, houses are all behind walls or high metal fences so you can't really peer into windows either. This evening was a novel one as we got as far as Pol e Sarc, a couple of calls later and we were really none the wiser - I am tired so I leave it all to Mazar and am amused when the guard turns up on his bicyle to guide us in - it turns out that we are still quite some way away from the house and it's a comical scene with our bicyle lead escort, a skinny Afghan on the de rigeur bike, wobbling his way through the heavy traffic to guide us in. one and a half hours late; I finally make it to dinner :)

Dinner is with a lovely family from the US who have two kids in school here. The house is full of toys and they even have a really cool McDonald's Happy Meal star wars toy of Wicket the Ewok. there are a number of families who have chosen to bring their kids with them and there are a couple of expat schools here in Kabul for the kids to go to. Some people might consider it a little crazy to bring the kids out here but from what I can see the kids I've met have amazing parents, dedicated and committed to stay for the long term, would not consider it to be right for the family to be apart. The kids are wise and adventurous, speak several languages and, as only children can do, broker a street diplomacy, live and see the real life of the inhabitants playing football in the street hanging out with their Afghan friends.

Later on the way home, Mazar knowing how much I like dogs, slows down whenever we are passing some of the street dogs who stray along on the roads at night - there are plenty of them and it's a slow drive home.

Kites and Cuts

2010-03-21T10:48:00.000-07:00

My day started with a call from Rob, one of our paramedics; the patient that I saw last night is back and needing some attention - nothing serious, just a little reassurance. The funny thing about this place is that eventually everyone knows everyone and it's no exception in this case, the patient is also a friend - an unavoidable circumstance, so after we get things tidied up he and I decide to go to breakfast at Flower Street cafe. It's a beautiful day, a little cloudy but very bright, it's Nawrous, the Islamic New year and today is a public holiday in Afghanistan so many places are closed. Flower Street cafe is also closed for the celebrations and instead we head to the Gandermack. It really is a beautiful day and it feels incredibly peaceful here in Kabul. We sit outside in the garden, on a picnic bench in the sunshine and have an English cooked breakfast and coffee. The coffee is in a mocha, stove brewed, and I'm excited about having something other than instant nescafe. For some reason the coffee is watery, not at all like the thick treacle that usually pours from a mocha, so later, after we've finished eating, I go with the waiter back to the kitchen to make a round of coffee myself. I spoon in the ground coffee and fill the mocha with water - leaving it with the guys in the kitchen to brew up. I briefly think about staying to see what happens but I don't. A few minutes later and our kind waiter delivers the fresh brew to the table but still it is watery and I'm none the wiser as to why it's coming out like that. To be honest though, I can't complain at all as it's been a wonderful morning with good company - a fascinating french man who has been here since 1998 - and quiet like a sunday morning.

After breakfast I am dropped of at the Serena Hotel - the only five star hotel in Afghanistan. I've never been there before and so I'm excited to see inside. Once inside I am actually quite surprised at how posh it is, I'd grown used to a difference in outlook; there are plenty of places here which have cost a lot of money but are still tacky as hell. The Serena, at least at first glance, seems to be worthy of it's international five stars. I'm here for the clothing sale, I couldn't resist the lure of a bit of shopping on our day off, and I am not disappointed - a number of shops and sales people have organised to bring their wares: carpets, wood carving, jewellery, bags, paintings and calligraphy, and stalls are set up in one of the courtyards. I am very happy pottering for a couple of hours, it's hot in the sun but my shopping stamina prevails and I purchase coasters, some felt animals and a couple of scarves. I'm enjoying myself immensely and it's only 11am.

Shortly, I get chatting to a couple of guys who work at the Serena and who have been pivotal in setting up today's sale. The guys are from Sri Lanka and incredibly friendly and kind, I'm taken on a tour of the hotel and am very impressed by the gym, and swimming pool. The thing about life here is that as long as you can get the balance right then it all becomes bearable, for me, I can't stand being cooped up and not getting to see anything, I also long for a proper swimming pool, cool and serene.

After my tour we join some of the hotel staff who are playing with kites in the garden, there are various people in different uniforms; green with highly embroidered lapels and belts, shirt and tie for front of house, and Chef in his kitchen whites and tall hat. Chef has the most amazing deep aqua coloured eyes, set in his tanned skin, he is an intelligent and perceptive man. The staff all help me with my kite flying. At first there is a lot of crashing into the trees and shrubs in the garden, quite a few of our kites get stuck and we have to cut the string and leave the kites stuck high up in the branches. One of mine flies high up over the top of the hotel building and crashes upon the roof and gets stuck there. Luckily there are armed guards on the roof and after a bit of tugging on the string to dislodge the kite, a face pops up over the parapapet smiling and throws down my kite. Sadly it's mangled, the paper torn and unfixable, and the kite dangles by it's string, caught in a tree on the way down from the roof. No matter we take another one, fix it to the reel of string and off we go again. It's an amazing feeling, once the kite catches on a thermal and lifts way, way up in to the air, once free from the surrounding buildings and their vortices, the kite stays aloft with virtually no effort. I am flying one reasonably close and I can see it, sometimes silhouetted by the sun, it tugs gently against the string, leaping and pulling. I am controlling it with just finger and thumb, I feel like a bird, my feet planted on the ground but my body transported along the string to the dancing, weaving kite, riding the updraft... It's meditative, transcendental. As the kite rises higher it disappears from sight and only the intensely strong sun fills my visual fields, a thin but sturdy kite string arising from my finger tips disappears in to the sky and I feel like I am connected directly to god, that if I pull hard enough on the string that something strange and beautiful might return to me attached to the end instead of my kite.

The guys who are helping me to fly the kite, warn me to be careful with my fingers, I do what I usually do which is to nod and grin and wonder what the fuss is about until I get the kite tugging fast and hard and the string flies across my fingers, whipping like wire and I am left notched and bleeding in seconds. A fierce sort of paper cut, stings like hell and I get another one not long after right across my thumb, scoring the nail as well as my finger tip; this sport is dangerous :)

After my second injury and with blood all over the place I decide to stop and go and mingle back in the courtyard with the fair, I stop inside with some NGO guys for a juice and then get a taxi back home.

Back home the guys are watching a movie and I hang out with them for a while before feeling like I need to sleep. Later Lyle tells me that I look a little sunburned and it then makes sense; the kite flying in the hot sun (doing the very thing your mother told you never to do - looking up into the solar haze). I get into bed and fall asleep, dreaming wild and wonderful things. When i wake up is to the sound of my phone, P-monster telling me that he's finally reached a nearby bar but sadly the karaoke is not tonight it's tomorrow, so not to worry about getting myself over there. Instead I go to find my house mates, in search of food and not wanting to go yet another second-hand round with yesterday's lasagne which is still sitting in the fridge. We try Afghan Fried Chicken but it's closed and instead opt for our local Indian, Namaste. I'm still in my pyjamas but really it doesn't matter as they look like what I'd probably be wearing anyway except for that they are pink. We step out in to the night and our security team ensure that we make it safely the few hundred yards we need to go to get the restaurant.

It’s been a really good day and I am at peace, the people that I met today want things to be good for their businesses to thrive and to have and share good things. Back in the UK I’m online helping a friend with his business proposal and simultaneously chatting on skype to someone else here in Kabul. The illusion of peace is gone when B tells me of the rocket attacks down on the Jalalabad road, aimed at Camp Phoenix the American Military Base. He says it’s been a bit annoying listening to the sound of the air raid sirens going for the last two hours, but he’s getting used to it.

fat and fatter

2010-03-20T06:42:00.001-07:00

Just got back from Corner Shop - I went to see if Tiger the kitten was still there, but now that she is bigger, she is not allowed to come into the shop anymore, I was a bit sad coz she was the best thing about going there. I say to Lyle that it's a bit fucked up when a trip to the local supermarket constitutes 'a day out', and even worse that I am enjoying it so much. I have to buy new towels, the ones I bought last time have mysteriously been imbibed by the house never to be seen again. Things here have a finite lifetime, some of them leave in your laundry basket only to return a flattering shade of Kabul grey, other items leave and are never seen again. On the towel front I went for clean white, baby chick yellow and of course, girly pink. A couple of friends from the UK are due to visit shortly and I'm determined to offer them a few home comforts to make up for the fact that they'll be suffering the delights of Kabul and my electrocution shower. I manage to steal away from Lyle and Mazar into the linen aisle, I have a couple of minutes of peaceful browsing (consumer grazing it feels like to me) before my shadows catch up with me - where's the short Chinese chick? Lyle says. I was rather hoping that I'd be mistaken for a boy in my baseball cap but my kittenish excitement over the furry toy dog in a furry kennel that's sat on one of the shelves clearly gives me away. We don't find Tiger but I do get my towels and some cheerful penguin stick on hooks - such small pleasures ;)

I am also watching animal planet, non stop animal wank for those that love the furry creatures - A man was watching a red squirrel as the squirrel ran up into the branches and started licking the sap oozing from the bark of the tree. Later, the man tried the stuff that the squirrel was eating and discovered a sugary substance with which he could sweeten his food.

Lunch today was chips, baked beans and chicken cordon bleu (an interesting excuse for eating processed, freeze-dried chicken wrapped in bacon and cheese and deep fried in greasy breadcrumbs). Dinner was lasagne (double cheese), chips and baked beans. Lets just say that I was feeling both lardy and British as I joined Lyle, Rommel and Rob for chow. It's times like these that I am reminded of school dinners; I never wanted to eat like a soldier or a guest of Her Majesty and here I am up to my armpits in Brit canteen food.

I've been quite good though and with Lyle's encouragement have managed to get my arse into the gym most mornings. The last few days have been a bit rough as they've straddled a sequence of St Paddy's day celebrations, all of which involved vast amounts of booze, bad Irish music followed by bad British disco music and embarrassingly bad British dancing. Slightly the worse for wear I have waddled through the days only to end up this morning bemoaning my love handles; Lyle tells me that they'll be difficult to rid of coz they're not muscle.... Later in Corner Shop he reminds me that m&ms are what love handles are made of and I have to quickly steer the shopping trolley away from the chocolate and towards the muesli.

Fuck me! Now I'm watching a tiny little bird (on the TV) as he catches an unsuspecting lizard, flies up into the branches of a thorn tree and makes himself a lizard kebab - impaled on a sharp thorn the diminutive (rather cute) bird rips the poor little lizard to bits! Yum...

Oh yeah, a new word for the day: Locationship - A friend told me this word, something I'd never heard of before, and, as you might imagine, it's one of those fling things that happens purely coz you're both in the same place at the same time and neither of you are at home. The concept slightly fills me with dread as it smacks of the kind of relationship that are ten a penny out here - convenient, corrosive and ultimately bad for the soul. I feel rather naive most of the time, having grown up in a rather innocent family, I am sometimes shocked by the hard edges people acquire here.

Dream smoking...

2010-03-20T04:37:00.000-07:00

So I’m here again and as always my first few days here have been eventful; I came up this morning and my room (stinky as it is) was decidedly more pungent, and this time with a distinct smell of burning. I entered the bathroom which is ensuite to my room and puzzled as to where the dreadful acrid smell was coming from. In the corner the plug which powers the water heater for the shower was sparking furiously; slightly perturbed I thought “ best not touch it” and went downstairs to tell Lyle that there was a bit of a problem. Downstairs I found Saabi who trotted upstairs with me and promptly switched it off at the wall. Saabi then tried to pull the plug from the socket but was surprised when the plug came apart in his hand; the top coming cleanly off to reveal a burnt out interior, smoking and badly charred.

Later, I am here in my room drying my hair with the hairdryer when all the lights go out, strangely though the hairdryer continues to work and I blithely carry on with my beautification, with just a side thought to the fact that I probably ought to turn off the hairdryer in case we are in a ‘siege situation’ and the boys are shouting for me to hide or escape. I carry on…. The room stays black, my hair gets drier and nothing else happens…. So I write my blog. The computer is still on too and I sit at my desk in the pitch black, too lazy even to light a candle or to grab my head torch from my back pack.

Earlier, we ventured out on to Tapa hill, a low rise hill compared to the mountains surrounding Kabul. The hill is the home of the crazy swimming pool that was used by the Taliban for executions. The swimming pool; empty of water, it is used by the various youth of Kabul as a hang-out joint. Of course there are no girls but loads of children and young Afghan men milling, walking, chatting. The swimming pool is a nice one, but it seems like an odd thing to find on a hill high above Kabul, like it was lifted and dropped from outer space. It has three diving platforms and would have been perfect for swimming laps. It is a spooky entity – knowing that many people died here in truly horrid circumstances. There is talk of reopening the pool but I’m not sure I’d want to swim in it, like swimming in the memory of someone else’s suffering. We take pictures and film the kids, they love seeing themselves on the digital camera. There is a big and impressive Sag Jangi (Afghan fighting dog) sat with his owners. This fierce creature sits regally surveying the lands below from his vantage point on the hillside.

...Aaah the lights return and I am thrust back into the light, my rather smart flick knife lies beside the computer, also on the table are my juicy tubes lipbalm and a butterfly candle holder, a tactical dry bag full of DV tapes next to my makeup bag full of eyeshadow and mascara. Just for a moment I am struck by my curious boy/girl existence; I've a wardrobe full of someone else's (large) military beige clothing, a massive broken TV set, a precarious and possibly lethal bathroom, and enough shaving foam to last me for months.

Domestic Bliss - Camel or Rabbit?

2010-03-10T06:48:00.000-08:00

The afternoon was fantastically sunny and it was a joy to get out of the clinic and get on the road as we did a doctor's house visit to the EU compound. I was visiting a patient who was holed up in bed needing some strong pain killers. Like all things here activities are usually tinged with a surreal edge, no less this one. As Lyle and I arrived we entered a courtyard with a large area of green upon which a number of rather atrractive young men were playing football. I found my eyes drawn toward their lycra clad figures and as often happens here a sense of exposure and of skimpiness entered my head and thrilled me in a way that it would never do back home. This was the Italian Personal Security Detail for the EU ambassador. It was just terribly exotic all of a sudden to see a man in figure hugging cycling shorts. A small black and white kitty was also there in the garden peeping out from under a tree.

Inside I found my patient prostrate on her bed and feeling rather miserable, luckily I had bought with me suitable meds and shortly after an IV injection she was feeling much more comfortable. Outside we could hear loud shouts, high spirited swearing in Italian as the boys kicked the ball around. I leaned out of the ground floor window and called to the cat, squeaking at it as it sidled up between the wooden benches outside the window. Mercy, that was the wrong noise to make with Italians around! The boys thinking that I was calling them (an obvious conclusion I guess if you're an Italian male and a girl starts squeaking in your line of sight). Seeing that I had accidentally captured their attention, I jumped back from the window, but too late, the Latinos had caught the scent and en masse accumulated just outside on the patio, only to then enter one by one, hopping up on to the sill and crowding out the poor patient's room. Imagine a whole team of rather buff Italian security guards suddenly materialising in your bedroom and you, far from your most glamorous self are there under the duvet wondering what the fuck they want. I was giggling, my patient far more used to the Italians, lay there as they made a fuss of her telling her that all she needed was a really good cappucino, that she looked pale and should have a large glass of chianti. A couple of them had jumped onto the bed, the others berating them for putting their dirty trainers on the duvet, the rest crowding around the end of the bed. So predictably and sweetly Italian, when they found out I was the doc, there were several requests to be examined....! :) I said that I'd been jabbing the patient with a sharp needle and that they probably wouldn't want a turn at that. Then, with equal aplomb, the team filed out of the window, one by one, back into the sunshine of the courtyard garden, promising to invite me to one of their (in)famous pizza parties. You'll probably think I'm being terribly judgemental but that's exactly as it happened, a script writer couldn't have made a better scene for national stereotyping than that which occurred naturally.

Since arriving in Kabul I'd changed rooms and now have Bear's old room. Lyle had kindly given me my hideous floral monstrosity of a bed and the super hard mattress that goes with it. I'd braved it for a couple of nights but by night three of sleeping on a king sized board I was a bit tired and a teeny bit grumpy. Lyle being the super star that he is took pity on me and like a fairy godmother granted me my dearest wish: a squidgy nest of a bed. Mind you we had to work through several experiments first, a doubled over large piece of Chinese nylon, a dodgy fleece blanket from Ikea (pretty sure that they don't have an Ikea in Kabul but you never know), a checkered bedspread that someone had found in the back of a cupboard, but sadly none of these layers made a difference and I was still the princess and the pea.

Next we tried a new foam mattress but the thing that Zabi brought from the shops for me was worse than the original one, hard as a table top and completely unforgiving. Placed atop the first, I needed a ladder simply to get on top of the combined mattress mountain and once there lay like a fish on a brick, largely uncomfortable and somewhat rigid.

Finally then, following our afternoon house call jaunt we took a detour via the Roya Kabul Mattress shop; a nirvana of Afghani bedroom bliss. A showroom of feathers and coverlets, comforters and quilts. Earlier in the day Mateen had brought me back something from this emporium which he said was filled with camel fur; a mattress pad of sorts. A curious item, I wasn't completely sure that it was actually stuffed with camel but it had a little picture of one on the label and it was a nice thing to imagine sleeping on - very desert chic I thought. Even better was the one filled with rabbit fur which Mateen told me was cheaper than the camel fur version. It was sweet watching Mateen ask for the Khar Ghosh version of the mattress pad, I think even he thought that that was what was really was inside it. "Delivery of rabbit fur tomorrow" they told us, "Come back then". Instead we ended up on an entirely pleasurable shopping spree buying feather pillows "Imported from the United Kingdom" but made in China, garishly patterned sheets and pillowcases, and a lovely duvet. Asking the guys which was the softest mattress necessitated me having to test the thing on the floor of the shop, and me, not wanting to spend a fortune on yet another brick of a bed, thought I'd better test it properly, so from hands and knees I stretched out and had a good lie down on the thing and a bit of a bounce. As always I was torn between cultural norms, in their eyes I was a strange women in trousers and a baseball cap cavorting all over a plastic covered mattress in the middle of an upstanding Kabuli bed merchants - in my eyes I was doing what any loyal John Lewis shopper would do and trying the damned thing on for size. The boys were more elegant and using just a knee sunk, as if in prayer, to give the mattress a prong. Asking questions apparently is not the done thing here and as often seems to be the case one is left slightly in the dark about the nature of the purchases but happy nonetheless.

We rushed home to await the delivery of my new bed....

$100 dollars for this creature

2010-03-09T08:33:00.000-08:00

During my trip to Ischashem we stopped off in a village on our way back to Faisabad. I'd climbed out of the car to photograph a cows head I spotted just sitting there propped up against a ladder and had caught a glimpse of some rather fine furry creatures hanging from the wall inside a small shop. I went inside, as always creating quite a stir simply by being there (there is no way to be inconspicuous as a foreigner). Everything about me was a curiousity to them particularly as I looked up at the hanging furs and asked if I could look more closely at one of them. The old man in the shop was very happy to oblige and his sons or young helpers look on in from the doorway giggling and self conscious at my presence.

I am face to face with a creature, white furred and longer than me as i hold him up, just his skin, his dangling legs and poor sorrowful head. I hug him and I want to take him home with me. I am sad that he is just a sad skin, all dangly. We have a little chat in the doorway, he and I, a little dance with a left over mountain lion, I hold him up for a photograph " Me and my new pal", and then out of curiousity I ask how much he costs, "$100 dollars", the shop keeper tells me. I'm horrified at the thought of promoting such a trade. I'd like to rescue him and take him away from here but I cannot and I hand him back and he is re-hung next to his furry comrades.

SHEWEE does Afghanistan with Dr Karen Woo

2010-03-09T04:37:00.000-08:00

In honour of International Women's Day: 8th March 2010, I'd like to share with you one of my most recent discoveries....:)

I was delighted when early one morning I received my bright pink Shewee Extreme through the post. As a frequent traveller I had been looking for the ultimate in feminine travel accessories and jumped at the chance to order one on Shewee’s excellent website www.shewee.com

Within a few days of ordering I was the proud owner of a device that would allow me to roam off the beaten track and enable me to avoid the usual indignity and hassle of squatting behind a bush with a bare bottom and splash marks on my shoes. Resembling a small rubberised funnel, using the Shewee required a bit of confidence at first but I soon got the hang of it and after that it was easy to use. The Shewee fitted easily into a trouser pocket and the plastic case made it simple to tuck into a rucksack or a handbag.

As a surgeon I had trained myself to stand for several hours and ignore my bladder but my upcoming trip was a little different; I was off to Afghanistan to make a documentary about access to healthcare facilities for woman and children. I knew that we would be spending hours on the road travelling between rural villages in places where the off road areas might be heavily mined. There would be absolutely no nipping off into a field to find a convenient bit of covering shrubbery. The thought of accidentally getting blown up whilst squatting for a pee was a comical yet sobering thought! Wearing heavy body armour and lots of outdoor clothing presented additional challenges when having to disrobe conveniently and maintain a touch of dignity. In a Muslim country where the modesty of women is very important there were additional reasons not to have to squat in the road behind the wheel of the four by four.

I had my first opportunity to put the Shewee to the test whilst travelling to a small village in the North of Afghanistan; we were miles from anywhere and it was just too dangerous to leave the vehicle, a brief moment with my Shewee and absorbent pouch and I was back in action, no need even for the driver to stop the car.

Having had the pleasure of numerous styles of loo around the world I was determined this time to go in style! The Shewee gave me the freedom to be discrete whilst working in the field in rural areas of Afghanistan with scant suitable facilities. Where toilets did exist, being able to avoid having to squat in rather unsavoury surroundings was a joy.

For any woman who values the freedom to get on with life whether it is under hostile conditions, adventurous terrain or just a long car journey, I would recommend a Shewee!

2010-03-09T02:18:00.000-08:00

Bushkazi is the national sport and a "passion" in Afghanistan where it is often played on Fridays and matches draw thousands of fans (male only and the odd expat female). During the Taliban regime of Afghanistan, Buzkashi was banned, as the Taliban considered the game to be immoral. Since the ousting of the Taliban regime the game is being played again. American anthropologist G. Whitney Azoy described it as being a metaphor for Afghan life: "Brutal, chaotic, a continual fight for control".

Serious Buzkashi players train intensively for years, and many of the masters (called chapandaz) are over forty years old. Playing well also requires specially trained horses that know to stop still when a rider is thrown and to gallop forcefully when their rider gets hold of the calf. These horses can sell today for as much as US$10,000-15,000.

Buzkashi is often compared to polo. Both games are played between people on horseback, both involve propelling an object toward a goal, and both get fairly rough. However, polo is played with a ball, while Buzkashi is played with a dead animal. Polo matches are played for fixed periods totaling about an hour; traditional Buzkashi may continue for days, but in its more regulated tournament version also has a limited match time.

The calf in a Buzkashi game is normally beheaded and disemboweled and has its limbs cut off at the knees. It is then soaked in cold water for 24 hours before play to toughen it. Occasionally sand is packed into the carcass to give it extra weight. Players may not strap the calf to their bodies or saddles. Though a goat is used when no calf is available, a calf is less likely to disintegrate during the game.

Don't worry... there is a happy ending :)

2010-02-19T07:31:00.001-08:00

The phoenix was written after my return from Afghanistan in April 2009. I had just come out of a very difficult relationship and I was reeling from the sheer number of emotions that were spiralling out of me in response to a year and a half of battling to keep someone afloat. Love is dangerous but where angels dare to tread I will go too, where angels fear to tread I will go there anyway.. so, I had tried...and tried... and in the end I think we were both exhausted. It's not for me to judge someone negatively. All I know is that I tried to rescue someone who didn't want to be rescued, I should have realised that only he could rescue himself anyway, and that in the process of trying to lift a dead weight out of the water you can occasionally drown. Luckily though, for those of you who were worried that the phoenix had died completely, the story has a happy ending:

Downstream the river turns and widens into the sea, from the sea a distant rocky inlet leads amongst mountains sheer into the water and here the fatally injured bird is held and absorbed into the force. Amongst the branches and twigs of the funeral pyre the phoenix is able to sacrifice life into the next life. A body consumed by flames has lost only it's earthbound physicality; from the dying embers a dusty feather shakes and ash trickles from a smouldering pile, a small movement, a twitch and then a quiver of char. From the ashes emerges a hint of gold, a little red, a stretching feathered wing and then a burst of vital energy, arising from the debris. Appearing for the first time, renewed and filled with light, the phoenix is reborn.

Love seeks Fear and Death before Life

2010-02-19T05:15:00.000-08:00

A beautiful bird found me. I was lying face down in the desert. She gave me one of her feathers and she told me many things; some of which I didn't like but my anger moved me out of the desert and back into the world. I took my beautiful bird with me. She asked me for sunshine and flowers and a beautiful garden but I didn't want to give them to her, instead I fed her wispy dreams and a scattered handful of wishful thinking; I told her it was food. I sowed these seeds as sustenance for her in the garden and then I left. When I returned my beautiful bird was sick, her wings had lost their sheen and she could not raise her head.

I could have turned her loose but I decided to take her with me out of the garden. We travelled to a terrible place, I told her that I would feed her and she came with me willingly enough.

Once there I pinned her wings up against a wooden fence and stuck pins into her breast. With each pin a drop of red blood fell upon the ground and as it hit the earth a flower sprang up; each one a dream. I picked each one as it grew and ate them in front of her. She asked me "why are you doing this?", and I told her, "I don't know, but in a while I'll write you a letter to explain."

I didn't know that with each drop of blood I could have grown and entire garden and opened it to sunshine. Instead I took a blade and I drove it into the heart of my beautiful bird. Then I took her down from the fence and I laid her in a box lined with purple velvet. I went outside the walls and placed my beautiful bird upstream on the river and let her go. I turned away without a second glance and went back inside the terrible place. The garden was dead. The place was a desert. I lay down and buried my face in the dirt.

Footnote:
The Phoenix
Tales of the phoenix appear in ancient Arabian, Greek, Roman, and Far Eastern mythology. In both Greek and Egyptian tales, the phoenix represented the sun, dying in flames at the end of the day and rising each morning. Early Christians came to view the flight of the phoenix as a symbol of rebirth and the resurrection, leaving the old world for the new world of the spirit, dying and rising again, reborn. It symbolized the victory of life over death, immortality, and Christ’s resurrection. Jewish legend describes the phoenix as the one creature that did not leave paradise with Adam, and that its legendary longevity is due to abstaining from the forbidden fruit that tempted the ‘first man’. On Roman coins, the phoenix represented an undying empire.The phoenix is said to live for 500 years. When it grows tired, it builds a nest of aromatic twigs, and then sets fire to itself to be consumed in the funeral pyre of its own making. After three days, the phoenix would arise from the ashes, reborn. According to Egyptian legend, it carries the embalmed ashes of its previous incarnation to Heliopolis, the city of the sun. The Egyptian phoenix was said to sing sweetly, and to dazzle with its plumage of gold and scarlet and purple.

According to Chinese mythology, the phoenix is the symbol of grace and virtue and is second only in importance to the Dragon. It represents the union of yin and yang, and was a gentle creature associated with the Empress, who alone could wear its symbol. The feathers of the Chinese phoenix were black, white, red, green and yellow – the five primary colors. In Japan, the phoenix is found carved into sword hilts, and the image of the bird seen as embroidery on kimonos. Along with the sun, the phoenix is one of the emblems of the Japanese Empire. In Japanese tattooing the phoenix is often twinned with the the dragon, symbolizing yin and yang, the harmonious combining of the best of the feminine and masculine virtues.

The Lily
The lily appears in the bible and represents a symbol of faith and a surrender to God’s grace. The lily can represent a symbol of Christ himself and the lily is often used as decoration during Easter. The lily also represents immortality and resurrection. The ancient Greeks and the Egyptians used the lily as a symbol of erotic love - they believed it was a phallic symbol linked to fertility and images of lily’s appear often in the art of these ancient cultures. In France the royal family adopted the lily as the Fleur-de-Lis on their coat of arms in the 12th century. They believed that lily's three petals bound at the base would ensure the prosperity of the royal line. The renaissance gave the lily its meaning of chastity, purity and innocent love. The image of the lily was present in depictions of the Angel Gabriel announcing to Mary that she would give birth to Jesus and through this reintepretation the lily came to symbolise innocence and purity over erotic love.

The Lotus
Lotus flowers are symbolic of rebirth in Eastern beliefs, but aside from the religious meaning, the lotus also symbolizes truth and enlightenment particularly to those of the Buddhist faith. In many ways it mirrors the quest for truth and enlightenment amongst the murkiness and struggles of life.

The modern interpretation of the lotus flower seems to be one of estranged love or new beginnings. Many people get lotus flower tattoos after the break-up of a relationship. This may mean that they have risen above the depths or alternatively may return back to it as the lotus returns to the pond.

"Oh, the penguins deserve better. Spread the love... Beaky twats."

2010-02-09T16:43:00.000-08:00

The title quote is from www.sleeptalkinman.blogspot.com
Karen (not me) is married to mild mannered Adam. Karen is now entertaining the world with Adam's curious and sometimes incandescent sleep talking outbursts. I have to add that tw*t is definitely not a word that frogs use... :)

and of course the little green fellow is Konn the travelling adventure frog. Konn can be found at
www.konnthefrog.com

This evening I bumped into Konn's best mate Mark and we had a lovely evening in Soho. I was thrilled to bits to discover this little froggie who has travelled around the world. Looking at his album on Mark's phone (Mark often travels with Konn) I was overjoyed to see Konn in so many fantastic locations. Everywhere he goes he spreads the love and is obviously an ambassador for peace and understanding. I think Konn the frog should be a UN Goodwill Ambassador.

Back to London

2010-02-06T09:38:00.001-08:00

Feb 5th 2010
...and so I returned, now a week ago.. time has just flown by and of course I've been up to all sorts of nonsense since arriving back. Last night was a great evening, a 1920's charity ball in aid of the Liberty Trust, a charity set up to help children in Belize. Indeed it was rather a jolly evening which commenced in George, I had chosen to wear a full length black maxi gown and although I had fashioned a little silk ribbon attachment at the hem, I was still struggling with stairs and the like. My osteopath and two weeks on a sandy beach in Lamu had significantly improved my buggered up ankle but I was still slightly self-conscious in sling backs...

Glamourously, I leapt from my taxi, a rather shabby vauxhall cavalier, and stepped out across the street, stopping momentarily, light as gossamer, by the temporary traffic lights and some builders cones to get my whereabouts. Freezing in the cool night air, I burst in upon George to find almost no one in there... "Downstairs" they cried, seeing me looking nonplussed, and pointed me in the right direction, "Thanks", I replied as I tottered down the stairway, maxi in hand and into the basement. Once below I was greeted my our party who were clad in a variety of 1920s finery; the girls all silk and feathers, the boys; well aside from the pencil moustaches and the occasional spat were pretty much wearing what boys generally wear for black tie events. Luckily for me, A.M was also wearing a maxi and later, as we trotted down the street, she with fag in hand, we compared notes on the difficulties of wearing ladies shoes whilst running around the streets of london trying to look fab. A.Ms feet were killing her already, I was lucky however as had on my super pink sling-backs from China which, through a masterpiece of Chinese engineering, are actually comfortable. We hiked along at a pace leading the group through the streets of Mayfair, the boys in their warm trousers and mercifully flat shoes lagging along at the back, the girls, feathers and cloaks flying in the wind, cackling and leading the way. We shot past the papparazzi who were lying in wait at the front doors and congratulated each other that "Thank good the paps hadn't recognised us at all", but being mistaken for Courtney Love and a podgy Bridget Jones was not going to terribly flattering anyway...

Once inside a warm and wonderful evening began, in true style I managed to gatecrash the table next door to us and grabbing hold of their glo sticks insisted on bidding on their behalf in the charity auction. All was going really well, I was spending JPs money at a rate that one can only do when it's somebody else's, we were winning the bidding war, when in an over excited frenzy I thrust my glo stick in the air just one too many times and ended up bidding against myself! Thankfully, my twinkle infused brain was mainly immune to the vast embarrassment I was supposed to feel as the evil compere ridiculed my apparent blondeness in front of 500+ guests. Hhaha, I thought as my fuzzy brain told me that I hadn't quite understood the rules of the game but was enthusiastically playing anyway, and ahahah I thought again as we got to
£10,000 and a cheer went up from the crowd as JP and I won the bid for lot three: a week in Zanzibar, a week in Chamonix, and riding lessons with Richard Dunwoody - suckers, I thought, my double bluff, my cunning bid against myself actually worked... JP was a wonderfully good sport, any man who lets a random woman grab his glo stick and throw away £10k of his dough has got to be a pucker sort of bloke.

Later, I discovered that Richard Dunwoody is an extraordinarily nice man, who had dated our lady singer-songwriter Georgea Blakey for some years some time ago. Richard, it turns out had actually been to the Wachan in Afghanistan, so already I felt a connection. I'm not sure what he's going to make of my riding style, a la Courtlands riding stables in Stevenage, but hey ho, I suppose I can only improve.

Anyway, a marvellous evening in which the evil compere managed to garner in excess of £200,00 from a generous crowd. I met a spiritual guide and had a great time with baby Chris on the dance floor, at one point an older gentleman joined us and I looked on amused as Chris and said gent performed some kind of macho disco dance off with each other. Much as I'd like to believe that it was for my benefit (me being the lady and all that) I got the distinct impression that they were rather enjoying their little dance floor spat and were quite happy posing and posturing to each other in a way that only men seem to enjoy so much.

By now most of our party were suffering the effects of a liberal number of twinkles, a drink introduced by the lovely A.M. This tipple made of vodka, champagne and elderflower affair looked innocent enough but snuck up upon you and then promptly knocked your socks off! We were amongst the last to leave, and had a protracted session of running around in the ladies loos looking for LK before finally falling into black cabs some unknown time later. LK had acquired a trilby, I think from Tom and had made off with it into the cab. I jumped in and along with H we headed northwest wards, LK lolling on one side and H and I jabbering on about nothing as we rolled along through the small hours of the London night. Dropping H near to hers, I then had the task of getting the rather twinkled LK back to her place. Eventually, on her door step I watched as she opened her front door and fell inside, satisfied that she was safely home I jumped back in and off we sped to mine. 3am and I was suddenly feeling pretty tipsy myself, still roughly aiming for sophistication I nicked the last of my flatmate's bread and went for pate on toast and a chicken cuppa soup before falling asleep on the sofa.

And today.. a late mid morning, twinkle still flowing through my veins, I stumble from bedroom to bathroom to kitchen in search of water and coffee. Sometime during the night I had actually made it in to bed and into pyjamas so clad in wincyette duck print PJs and pink crocs I settled on the sofa to check email and contemplate the day. My only consolation was that if I was feeling a little the worse for wear LK was surely feel a damn sight worse than I was! I was due to meet David at 1pm and was trying to gather my enthusiasm to get on to my new bike and cycle over to Raouls to meet him. Once plied with coffee and ibuprofen I was then raring to hear all about David's recent exploits in the Brazilian rainforest. He had travelled with a band of 13 others to experience the delights of a tribe in Brazil and had spent two weeks taking hallucinogenic forest potions and vomiting a lot. The group had bonded over endless diarrhoea and the loo and through chanting. David had initially shied away from doing frog (a tribal ritual where small burns are made on arms and legs and are covered in frog toxin causing the heart to race and the user to vomit copiously) but had decided to make the most of this further cleansing opportunity to good effect. David had been fair bitten to death by sandflies and had a number of rather nasty looking eschars on his legs and hands. He told me he was "Going natural" and treating them with tea tree oil and lavender, he looked amazing and his eyes looked clear and bright, and I had to respect his adventure even as he rushed off mid lunch for a quick round with the restaurant loo. During the trip he'd lost about 5kg and said that he felt great and at peace and that nothing really mattered that much anymore. Sat in the heart of Portobello eating a burger and fries, surrounded by Italians and screaming children, I wished that I to could have just a little of his serenity at my disposal.

Later...
I've just returned from a local shop, too lazy to go any further than my corner shops, I went in search of cherry coke, but no, denied, neither of my locals stocked this awful beverage I craved and instead I had to make do with Tizer. I had forgotten this ancient elixir and probably having never seen it out of the can had poured it like a grown up into a glass, from whence I could see that it look just like fizzy piss. "Perfect" I thought, " A delightful cure for my hangover", as I downed it in one. Some loo roll, a can of baked beans and some posh biscuits, that'll tide me over for a night recovering from the night before.

I can never work out whether Sam in the corner shop is drunk or whether he has Parkinsons disease, I know it's harsh to say and as a doctor I should probably be able to tell, but I'm just never sure, sometimes he's normal but increasingly, he's not. Sam is incredibly slow and drops things, looks at the till like it's a marvellous but mysterious creature, his wife materialising from out of nowhere from somewhere in the vicinity of the fridge cabinet (perhaps even from inside the fridge cabinet ) and her, all concerned rushing to help me, to help him with the money and the till and the bags of shopping. So many years, I think, are they happy, I wonder, would she waver in her dedication even if she weren't? I wondered where that love comes from, and where the anger and the acceptance take you?

..and now here I sit in my little living room in London, early Saturday evening and it is peaceful here. Lyle is dinging me on facebook messenger from Kabul and I know that if I started chatting to him now we'll be at it for most of the evening. Another friend is dinging me too but I'm trying to ignore so that I can get something down in my blog.

I have a little time to ponder whether I am glad to be back... I am, of course, my own bed, clean sheets, london air, my burning thighs as I cycle through Ladbroke Grove. Such rich freedoms, of course I'm glad to be back. But with it a sadness a strange sense of being outside, of wondering why we all try so damned hard. I recognise that my life in Kabul is simpler in so many ways, the rules are apparent and it is easy enough to live within these confines, the groups, the activities and the behaviours are even more proscribed and predictable then the characters here. There are fewer choices there, clothes are all big and baggy, hair is always covered, there are only two main expat supermarkets, Finest and Spinneys and there is nowhere near the onslaught of consumerism that is thrust upon us every second of the day here in London.

Twice now in the last week I have braved the hideousness of the Westfield shopping centre. I have had to devise a survival strategy for my forays in to this place much like the mental preparation one must perform in order to survive a trip to an Ikea. I'm ashamed to say it but I have partially adopted an almost male technique to shopping in this place which is a temple to vacant consumerism. Entering via a side entrance, I move quickly and purposefully toward my destination, the apple shop. I skirt the moisturiser stand and the stand selling the incredibly useful t-shirt in a cube, past the carphone warehouse (which for some reasons gets me every time) and on past Top Shop and Mango. I am determined and I get there almost in one piece, but at the last moment the Calvin Klein underwear shop looms up to my left and before I know it I am sucked inside and I find myself buying knickers and a bra that I "Oh so desperately need". My purchases sweetened by the gift of chocolate I am released and I have to martial my self past Massimo Dutti and several shoe shops before I reach my safe haven beyond the clean white doors of the apple mac shop. Once inside I know that I must conserve a little energy for the return journey and tell myself silently inside my head that sparkly shoes are just not a necessity for this evening's event. I concentrate and a skinny youth with bad English teeth helps me enormously to spend rather a lot of money on gadgetry. I feel a small sense of triumph and a larger sense of guilt (my credit card is groaning) but I walk away after approximately 2hrs with a long, long overdue new computer and a stronger foothold on the ladder of my filming making aspirations. I have never wanted to do things the easy way and, as luck would have it, it nearly always been a challenge, from my battles with myself to my battles to do what my heart desires.

Maybe you will recognise the strange dilemma, we buy therefore we exist, we consume and others recognise us by our brands, when we don't buy we fail, or so we fear. But sometimes I feel sick when I consume, I feel overloaded with 'stuff'. I feel unnatural and natural all at the same time. A short lived glee exists when I use my sat nav, when I connect to the internet, but the feeling of completeness never last as along as when I find my way home by the stars, or when I eat what I catch. So today, I wish that I could pare it all down, strip away all the stuff that I really don't need and carry just the basics. This is the dilemma I face when I consider my life in London with the parties and the social whirl, theatres and galleries, the taxes and the paperwork, the richness and the responsibility. When I am here I am part of this world and all that goes with it. When I am elsewhere I can live out of one bag and simplify things a little but it's never very long before the lure and the luxury of the modern world exercises it's hold over me, demonstrating how technology is inextricably entwined with my life whether I like it or not.

2010-01-29T07:42:00.000-08:00

I got back this morning, flew in overnight from nairobi, had that strange sense of de ja vous you get when you haven't been home for a while, can still see the image of my street from my memenory, sometimesf rom my dreams, aand now agian in reality, rounding the corner in a cab, the northern dawn of the northern hemisphere exciting me laced as it is with fresh rain. Lucy is in my bed so i camp out on the sofa, finally able to stretch out properly i tuck under my goose down jacket, my duvet. Later, when Lucy has gone, I climb into my own bed, clean sheets and freshly showered, no insects are trying to bite me and everything is clean. I lie with my eyes closed and the sunshine after the rain presses itself against the blinds. I listen to the sounds of the street, cars going by on tarmacced roads and school kids talking and laughing. These children are free to speak, to walk and it is such a basic freedom, one that we may take forgranted but it is missing elsewhere in the world, pressure pushes out freedom to be. England; how lucky we are.

I was still thinking about it when I succumb to the lure of a box of terry's dark chocolate assortment; I tucked into a a cappucinno intigue and then a strawberry bloom, all the while feeling a sense of guilt around my rather expanded midline and wondering when did the simple chocoalte aquire such ridiculous names, I then ate a burnished nut brulee and then another Cappucino Intrigue just for good measure. Bang goes the suger free diet I thought, washing it all down with a generous double expresso - bang goes the caffeine free diet too...

I am quick to excuse my guilt as am late for a the hairdresser. Tonight a burns night celebration, so my transition from dust-cat back to girl begins...

Whilst cycling, (fooled by the sunshine -I had totally underestimated how bloody cold it is here)- my finger tips burning, I had eschewed gloves and was bitterly regretting it. I thought about the wonderful, breath biting cold, the traffic and the opulence of holland park. In my head I started to design a burkha trouser suit - the perfect practical attire for a woman wishing to ride her bike through the streets of Kabul.

Arriving late at the hairdressers, the place is hectic, heaving with holland park lovies having their highlights retouched, - I find myself deeply engrossed by an "asian wedding magazine" and find healthy tips on how to integrate into your husbands family whether it's an arranged-match or a love-match and how not to expect too much on the sex front - love, respect and understanding is the top tip, and I can't diagree with that. I find myself planning my elaborate wedding sari and am deep in this fantasy when my t-section time is up and I'm ushered to the sinks for a rinse. I am massaged to within an inch of my life and almost wish for it to stop when my man asks if I'm ok and I nod in a very British way, not wishing to offend - in response I am treated to another excruciating minute of overvigorous head massage and I'm cursing our slavish British following of politeness...

From Kabul to Nairobi – the girl gets clean…

2010-01-12T17:02:00.000-08:00

I felt a very bizarre lifting of my senses when I suddenly encountered the green of Kenya, looking from the window of the plane I was aware of a restriction around my heart that was now less tight. I was no longer face to face with desert lands and I was closer to the lushness of my home country. I was bound to compare the two countries; Kenya with Afghanistan and, having so recently survived the myriad frustrations of the one, to find the other, by comparison, a paradise. This illusion was fleeting as I got stuck in at the house: a beautiful villa set in a well kept garden, but here there was little running water, the cold tap ran city water, the hot tap ran from the tanks on the roof, none of them produced hot water. Afghanistan seemed suddenly quite sophisticated. A rather stylish water filter sat atop the fridge in the kitchen, 70’s in design it was a large space egg with a column of tiny stones and gravel in pretty layers through which the water flowed to be cleansed. It was something that I desired simply for the design features, that and the fact that water we were putting into it came out of a barrel that had sat in the bathroom for weeks. The boys blithely told me that it was fine and that boiling killed everything, my medical senses told me otherwise but not wishing to appear a wimp I grimaced and followed suit. The situation worsened when the water completely ran out and a large water tanker came to fill us up, lacking receptacles, the boys thought it would be a good idea to fill the bath for later use. By the evening the bath water was awash with a pleasant selection of flying insects and martyred moths that had been unlucky and now flavoured our kitchen water; no amount of filtering was going to get moth dust out of my mouth and off the spaghetti.

So several sluice baths later I was beginning to miss my shower in Kabul, my electrical heater that lives cheek by jowl with the ornate but largely leaky sink. Whilst in Kabul I thought often of the stories told of foreign places where an unsuspecting visitor might chance the dodgy electrics in a downtown hotel and, whilst stood in an innocent looking pool of water, find themselves brutally jolted to somewhere that they hadn’t quite expected to be, sometimes alive, sometimes not so. Now in Nairobi, I shivered on the stone floor and plunged my empty coffee mug into the barrel and attempted to wash my hair. The soft water here proved to be a bit of problem when ten minutes later I was still washing out the copious lather; still I was now vaguely clean. Kabul had been relentlessly dirty, nothing can clean the grey dust away and it covers everything. The Afghan men say that a woman past thirty already looks old, apparently, they thought that I looked 18; I thought that was flattering but naïve and probably that they weren’t looking all that hard. Feeling chapped but chipper I consoled myself that years of expensive moisturizer must have done me some favours. For the ladies of Afghanistan harsh winters, wood burning stoves, thickly polluted air and relentless early mornings washing in icy water clearly takes its toll on the old complexion. They really could do with a Clinique counter, and Harvey nicks would make a killing in Kabul, I thought to myself, even the lowly Avon lady with her catalogue of potions would be a blessing for the parched cheeks of Afghanistan.

Here in Nairobi the atmosphere is so very different from Kabul, it’s difficult to describe the freedom to be, the space. Are the people here happier? Well they certainly don’t risk being blown up quite so frequently, and women don’t get stoned in quite the way they might in Afghanistan. There are poor people here, those who lack food and clean water, those who lack education and opportunity. Religion features strongly as does male control of women. The street and shop signs here are often hand painted and for many, more than one pair of shoes is a luxury, do these small features describe a nation? Is it patronizing to comment on the difference, to note the simplicity as an adult would commend the efforts of a child?
Even here I don’t feel entirely free; I am part of an elite, educated rich and white. That sentiment remains the same from Afghanistan to Nairobi, I am still able to buy what I want, leave when I want, choose what I want and to get others to do my bidding; these things are not something I have earned, it is part of my white person package. It makes me feel bad. By default, I am less than equal because those around me are less than equal to me, we dance around each other in an uncomfortable fashion.

Back In Kabul, we driving along to the airport, Mazzar said to me, “Better that I wash a dog in Europe than sit in an armchair in Afghanistan!” At first I thought he was telling me what he’d like to do, the concept of dog washing being quite a nice one in my eyes, then I realized that he was expressing his utter disdain for his life in Kabul, at 26 he felt like he was going nowhere, would never be anything that he wanted to be. Even though this might include having the luxury to sit around in an armchair in Kabul, that was not what he wanted. Again I felt the weight of the guilt of my privilege, I tried to brush off his comment and to lighten his mood but I knew that I was leaving, my shiny UK passport was taking me out and he was returning to his daily grind, something that he could not easily escape. He told me that he hated his life in Afghanistan, like so many that I had spoken to, they loved their country but they hated the corruption, the parasitic feeding frenzy, the selfishness of their fellow citizens and most of all, they hated their lives.

And now I sit here, on the verandah of the villa in Kenya, gin and tonic beside me, dog snoozing on the couch, and I know that I am incredibly lucky. I have the liberty to observe without having to take part; if I take part it’s by choice and not by necessity. We talked long into the night last night about why film, what to film and how to show it, I am driven by the desire to tell those stories that have been told to me, those that I have watched unfold. I want to convey the emotion of those circumstances and give others that opportunity to see if not to feel, taste, and smell the gritty reality of another’s life. Last night I was so tired, and I guess a little despondent, making the film is happening so slowly and each tiny step feels like it takes all my sticking power just to stay positive. I want to have those rubbery lizard feet, that climb me up walls and ceilings – a minor distraction if not a solution to my challenges!

Ants crawl across my laptop and I contemplate the showering arrangement, adapting, I now boil a kettle of water and manage to splash around a bit in hot water rather than freezing my bits in aqua laced with mosquito. I’m waiting for the boys to get back from tennis, the others have arrived from a day of shopping in town, laden with gifts to take back to Denmark. The house here is a peaceful one, six of us, one small baby and a dog. Next to no internet, no hot water and a shed load of mozzies but still, we are the lucky ones.

Koalas in distress

2010-01-06T21:05:00.000-08:00

Until a person has learned how to have love for an animal, their human soul will remain unawakened.

This little fellow went into a house to hide from the heat and to get a bit of shade. Here's what happened when the house owner gave him something to drink.

At 120 degrees in Australia, it was so hot for a week that koalas were asking people for water

2010-01-01T07:55:00.000-08:00

Last night I was chatting to a couple of our Afghan staff, we were looking at pictures of the ashura celebrations, an event where large numbers of Afghan men gather in the streets to self flagellate in memory of the death of Hussain Ali (son of the prophet Mohammed). Hussain Ali was making a pilgrimage to Mecca with his family when they were killed by decapitation. Now the anniversary of these deaths is commemorated each year. Thousands of men take to the streets with whips which they use to beat themselves across the back. Lashing into the flesh, some reach a transcendental high, others sustain deep cuts, lose a lot of blood and collapse. It's difficult to imagine but some of our staff and our Afghan doctor, all friends from a village in Loghar province, travelled to the ashura to provide medical assistance. With graphic pictures they described to me how many of the men were brought to them in a makeshift emergency room on the floor of a mosque where our doctor and some helpers swabbed and stitched up the heavily lacerated backs, bright red blood soaking shredded shirts and smattering marble floors. Once repaired some of those receiving treatment then went back to the procession to continue with their flagellation.

Talking about customs in different countries, Ms wanted to show me a picture of his fiance. A very pretty girl, I asked "How old is she?", "16", he said, "She's still in school studying". How old are you I asked, "I'm 26" he told me. "Do you think that you're a bit too old for her?" I asked him. In Afghanistan that is normal, and anyway we are just engaged, I cannot marry her until I can pay her family for her, maybe $6000USD, it will take me a long time to save up the money". I think to myself how curious that the Afghan bride price is quoted in US dollars.... "So you're going to buy her?" I ask. "Yes, but it's ok because she loves me" he tells me."I don't like others where the family tell the girl she must marry him, where they sell her like an animal" he added. Ms asks me, "In the UK, do they pay the family for the woman?" No, I say, "Not really... In my head I'm thinking about the various ways in which people and families manipulate each other in marriage. It's not quite the simple transaction of a girl transferred from her family to her husband's family as a chattel, however pre-nups, vast sums on engagement rings and the sheer cost of some weddings means that we're not such a long way away from a cold hearted business transaction.

2009-12-29T23:42:00.000-08:00

Have now aquired the nick name the ninja bunny. Wasn't too long before the guys came up with a suitable name that represented both my fascination with tactical gear and my clear allegiance to small furry animals.Building up my Dari vocabularly I asked what the word for Rabbit was. Khar Gosh the guys told me, "The literal translation is donkey's ear". So now I am Ninja Khar Gosh - The Afghan Rabbit.

I had my first intimate moment with Kabul mud yesterday evening when exiting a villa in shar-e-naw. I had successfully negotiated the rather posh rain cover ramp thingy when the slick soles of my converse baseball boots caused me to slither. In the headlights of the taxi and in front of the driver and the chaukador, in silhouette I went arse over tit (in what I thought was a rather graceful manner) right into a large "mud" stacked puddle. Luckily, I was completely fine but now cunningly covered with a large stripe of swampy sogginess all up one side. My brand new, rather expensive,Canada Goose down jacket was finally christene! I giggled, jumped into the taxi and opted not to say anything to the taxi driver about the pool of mud I was bringing with me. We went the long way round back to home and when we got there I had to borrow four dollars from Rob as only had a $50 USD note. Getting home I copped a bollocking from the guys for taking a taxi in the first place. Then the Afghan staff also gave me hard time, they were worried that I might get kidnapped. I actually found it quite difficult to keep my temper as in general there's a tendency for them to treat women as if they are delicate creatures, stupid and incompetent. You can imagine how I bristled!

.....I hear Midge doing his miaowing thing and have to rush out of the ops room with a plate of cat food to go and feed our rather grubby and demanding compund pet. He was clearly at one time someones house cat but now he just does his own thing, big and loud, he makes his presence known.

Later I am in trouble with Abdul coz I've been using the fine china to feed the cat...

Work is progressing with the shipments of medical equipment from the UK to hospitals here in Afghanistan. This humanitarian aid project is part of doing something to directly address the lack of pretty much anything in the government run hospitals here. The network of people both here and in the UK and USA is building and the US military are being a great help. My key UK and US contacts are mobilising the assistance of The Knights Templar and The Knights of Malta. So fingers crossed we can get something going here.

Here in the clinic I get to hear many tales. E is an American who told me about the tragic case of two of his Afghan colleagues; The recent suicide attack on the 15th Dec outside the Heetal Hotel involved the explosion of a large black van parked just outside. Ehsamudin Salim and Rohullah Shams were driving into the hotel and their vehicle was caught in the blast. Rohullah died on impact - 'fragmented' was the term used to describe what happened to him. Ehsamudin sustained greater than 50% burns; taken initially to the Afghan Military Hospital he was then transferred to Esteqlal, the official burns hospitals here. In bad shape, over the next few days septicaemia set in. Facilities at Esteqlal are limited. Bagram Air Force Base might have offered a higher level of care but Afghan nationals are not eligible to go there, (neither are the majority of non military expats eligible to there). Ehsamudin was without many options and he died on 24th December, he was 27 years old and was married with one child. Ehsamudin had been a friend and colleague of E's for over two years and E was understandably upset by Ehsamudin's death. E felt that not enough had been done to ensure that this injured man received the best available treatment. The major objection raised by E was the double standard that is often applied; if it's an expat then spend the money, get them out, get them treated. If it's a local let them live or die with what is here locally. This is a very difficult ethical problem. The economical implications of having full insurance capability for all members of staff would be potentially prohibitively expensive for a company operating here. So they opt to have a tiered system in which other nationalities feature higher or lower on the scale of importance. At the top are the 1st world nations: the USA, UK, members of the European Union, then there are all the imported staff: the Philippines, India, Nepal. In some large companies here the eating and accommodation are segregated... not expat versus local nationals but 1st world versus the others. Different food, different standards, different expectations. There are some sick things going on here, differentiation based on nationality, the passport you hold; an indicator of your worth. Like everywhere in the world money talks and 1st world status confers all sorts of privileges upon a person. I think about Mahatma Gandhi's protest against 1st 2nd and 3rd class status based on ethnicity, sadly it exists here in tangible form.

AFC - Afghan Fried Chicken - Kabul takes on the Colonel and his special recipe

2009-12-27T08:58:00.000-08:00

We are sat in the living room, watching yet another hour of television, we are doing the weirdest thing, three of the household are sitting here on our laptops chatting away to each other on skype instant messenger. We are each arranged on our own burgundy faux leather sofa, each wrapped in a large furry Chinese blanket(100%nylon) keeping warm. No sound except for the TV, tapping keys, and the skype squawk every few seconds. We are not talking to each other, we are typing to each other like some kind of seriously fucked up menage a trois. I'm chatting with G about lesbianism and the pros and cons thereof, and with L i'm chatting about farmville; a curious internet game that he wants me to play and become his neighbour in farming cyberspace. L has already promised to give me a turtle for my farm if I join and apparently they are quite difficult to come by. So lured easily by the promise of a cyber creature I'm on the website which looks like it was designed to please a two year old. Hokey southern US music is blasting out and I have to frantically grapple with my numerous chat windows just to turn the thing down but now I can't hear the skype chirrup so decide to claim my turtle another day and close the farmville window.

Tragedy strikes as my laptop battery suddenly runs out of juice and I have to leave the comfort of the sofa and run out into the corridor to find a three point plug socket. Out in the entrance hall next to the bukhari is the warmest place in the house so now I am pretty toasty like a cat. I have a strange compulsion to carry on our odd skype driven conversation; somehow we are linked in an intimate trance.... of typing. When I got up to plug in the spell was broken and I found myself saying, "Now I'm actually going to have to speak to you guys in person", the sound of my voice outside of my head was strange and actually unwelcome, I had grown used to hearing my sentences inside my head and reading theirs back in silence, rapid fire conversations about nonsense cycling back and forth between the three of us.

Looking back on the week
It's been a long old week, seems to have taken a really long time to happen. Once again, I'm not sure what day it is just now but we're somewhere between Christmas and the new year and at least I know what year it is...

The Thai massage parlour was an interesting experience. I had booked a few days back but as the lady who had taken the booking didn't speak english I wasn't entirely sure whether it was a gooer or not. I turned up, having been made slightly anxious by the guys; due to security threats they insisted on my being taken in the car and not getting a taxi, paranoia, it seems is contagious. Like many things here you are greeted by a guard at the entrance, admitted through external gates, then into the house itself. From the outside you could not tell it was there, then suddenly, on the inside, all that makes for a typical Thai massage parlour. As I stepped through the door a man rushed past me and the lights went out. More curious than scared, I shouted hello in my best British voice and quietly waited for several minutes in the pitch black for them to come back on again (which they did). Power cuts here are common occurence and I was just glad that I wasn't half undressed or in the middle of chopping chicken.

Plastic potted plants, oriental decorations, numerous brightly coloured pictures of well made up, glamorous Thai ladies adorned the walls. With the reassuring background purr of the hair dryers in the hair salon, the place was a curious combination of ramshackle Afghan interior design and the essence of a beauty store; in one room the de rigeur large four piece suite of velveteen sofas and armchairs, far too big for the room and the ever present telly, in the other: pink towels, hair wash basins and a fantastic array of different coloured nail polishes. A small thai lady came out to greet me and took me downstairs into the basement. Not having been here before I did not know quite what to expect. One of the strange things here is the absolute lack of benchmarks by which to measure things, there are so many different people here from different places that a posh place to one would be a shabby hell hole to another. That there are far more men here also confuses the issue as it's virually impossible to get a thorough run down on what somewhere is really like. Talking about a restaurant or bar a woman will tell you details; the size of a room, the decor, the lighting, the facilities, what the food is like, the service and the range of drinks available. A woman will also tell you about the ambience, the crowd and whether she feels safe there. Blokes will tell you somewhere is good but there's no differentiation made between places so in the end it's better not to believe and go see for yourself. This seems to be true for shopping, bars, guesthouses and most other things where a detailed analysis would be quite helpful. So... thai massage: I had no idea whether I was steeping in to a brothel, or an above board beauty therapy centre.

As it turned out there was noone else in the place and it was kitted out much as the places I had been to in Thailand were arranged. Multiple rooms, some separated by cloth curtains, contained a massage table, a heater and towels. The lady who was looking after me didn't speak any english at all so I decided to just go with the flow and show her only where my ankle was injured and my spider bites which i didn't really want to have pummeled. I was surprised by the choice of "relaxing tunes" as we started out with Hotel California, moved on through a variety of popular rock to Steve Winward through The Back Street Boys and finally to Duran Duran. Strangely enough I kind of enjoyed her choice more than the usual plinky plonky rainforest, tribal nonsense that they usually play at you in spas. The small thai lady worked me over, gave me painful massage to my ankle and then, squatting on the massge table, lifted me physically off the bed in a variety ways, stretching me and cracking my back, all the while I'm wondering how this bird like creature the size of a 12 year old child has the strength to drag me about. But it was good and it was kosher.There was nothing seedy about the service there. Such a shame then that the authorities had stopped them from treating men and that indeed there were going to be moving site to somewhere else, closing down in the meantime. There was pressure from the authorities to stop providing an immoral and un-islamic service. I said to the owner "But we need you, the ladies of kabul need you to keep our small semblance of glamour in this gow forsaken dustbowl". Through the gap in the door I could see a pair of expat sandals and expat feet having a pedicure and I thought of all those ladies who would miss the soothing ritual of the hair and nail salon once this place was closed down.

A few days later and it was Christmas. A Friday, a day off for the local nationals and also for us, ,so home alone we were cooking for ourselves. Our cook Abdul had had to be soothed, the boys had hidden our purchases for Christmas lunch in the meeting room lest he see them and become offended. I had been warned by the others that Abdul did not take kindly to us cooking for oursleves, even less then did he like it if we dared to use his cooking pans and god help you if he caught you with a takeaway. Bosh and tosh i said, this is nonsense. No, they told me, he had been known, having found takeaway evidence in the form of wrappers from Afghan Fried chicken, to sulk for days, to only serve left overs and sandwiches. So the boys were taking no chances and Abdul had to be appeased.

I had added in some pup-eroni special dog trreats to the shopping and took great delight in opening them at the kitchen table and sharing them with G and L. Them being from south africa I asked them if they'd like to try, saying, "You guys know Biltong , they're just like that". I could hardly believe it when first G then L took a chewy doggie stick and munched down, g took as second bite and then offered the rest to L. I was gobsmacked as both of them had seen the large picture of the cute puupy on the front of the packet and it was with trepidation that I came clean before they went back for more. G was unpeturbed and took another bite before deciding that actually dog treats weren't that great after all. Swigging from a bottle of gin he washed away the rather tangy taste. L decided that the remedy for doggie chew mouth was a large spoonful of condensed milk. I thought that was a better choice than the gin though I was soon to find out when made to try the doggy chews and both the remedies in quick succession! So goes the holiday season, a South African braai on the roof, dog food in the kitchen, music and sunshine in the biting Kabul cold.

R and R had been going on about wanting to get a dog and so there wish came true when they unwrapped their joint present from me which was a packet of fags each and a fantastic puppy!! Very similar to the battery operated pupster I'd had as a child I'd spotted this cute pressie in Finest supermarket. The ideal christmas gift for two grown men, the little dog was suppose to yap and walk forward , sit and them perform a somersault. Poor little thing could yap if you helped him but other then that when we switched him on he just whirred, nothing else happened. I said that we could always take him back to the shop and exchange him, but the boys were already attached to our house pet and were busy putting on the doggy outfit that I'd bought for him at the same time.

Finest is currently my favourite shop primarily because of the kitten that lives in the shop, a beautiful grey tabby, I first met her when she was tiny and shy, two months later she had grown stronger and bold. Now I go to Finest purely to see her. The lads in the shop bring her out for me and she rides round the shop in my arms or on my shoulder whilst I browsed the shelves for something I probably don't need. In this place going to a supermaket it considered an outing. Having been inside for days on end the sensory input of the shelved goods, the choices and the coloured packaging is like a form of entertainment. Coupled with a kitten to keep me company I am more than happy to spend an hour in there, an alternative to the cinema or a walk in the park, neither of which is easily on offer here. I asked what they called her, the boys in the shop asked me to give her a name, we named her Tiger.

I did have a meloncholy moment the other day, I was tired of being cooped up indoors and tired of never being able to choose what and when to eat. There is also a certain amount of guilt for me with the large amounts of food that are laid on for us for lunch and dinner each day. I'm not happy that we eat first and that different meals are prepared for the local nationals and that often the guards (the lowest in the pecking order) eat our left overs. It just another example of the ways in which humans are not equal, not here, not anywhere. Feeding the cats with peices of steak left over on plates can seem like a horrendous act when there are children with nothing to eat and people search through rubbish piles for scrap metal, tin cans and food. Kabul, I am told, is for the rich, poor people are not allowed inside, they must exist on the outskirts of the city and try and make it in where it might be possible to get somewhere in life. In the Afghan Fried Chicken M, one of our Afghan staff tells me that upstairs is for VIPs, people like you he tells me and the rich Afghan middle class. I feel sick that this kind of set up is possible and accepted, for there to be this sort of segregation of importance and that internationals take that place almost automatically. I don't want that to be the case, it disturbs me. It's as mistaken as the view that all internationals are infidels and should be destroyed or thrown out. Neither view is particularly helpful. The waiters at the counter wear too large, off white shirts, one with a rather large collar, a grubby bow tie and a waistcoat. The waiters serve with good temper, they are young and if they harbour resentment it doesn't show. They are excited that I have my camera with me and I ask if I can take a shot. They are more than happy and delighted to see the pictures, asking if I can bring them a copy to the shop. I say I will. Afghan Fried Chicken is the KFC of Kabul, a fast food joint with chicken burgers, fries and a coke, hot wings and pizza to go. on the way back I have the pup- eroni in my pocket but we don't see any of the numerous stray dogs that roam the streets. The temperature is dropping here and maybe the dogs are hidden away, trying to stay warm til morning.

2009-12-21T02:53:00.000-08:00

Just a quickie to say that I met the originator of the children's story Owen and Mzee the other evening in Sufi Restaurant, here in Kabul. Peter is a delightful man, so humble and kind, he told me about the small hippo who lived with his family in the sea just off the coast of Kenya. During a Tsunami the young hippo became separated from all of his family. All alone the small hippo was found by the villagers and taken to the nearby nature reserve that was being run by Peter's girlfriend. At the time they named the hippo Owen and, as they had no other space to put him in, put him in with a 130 year old giant tortoise called Mzee. By morning the keepers came to find the animals and saw that Owen and Mzee were side by side, close together - they had become friends. These two animals were to have an amazing friendship and could speak to each other in low snuffling noises. To his detriment Owen would follow Mzee and eat leaves like the tortoise did though these were not really that good for him.

Peter was able to observe these two very different creatures together as they interacted and had the privilege of being able to film and photograph them at close quarters. Peter's photographs were bought and published and many he posted himself on the internet for others to share in the story. Peter was contacted by many people following publication, many asking questions about the curious pair and some asking for the rights to the children's book. It wasn't until a 6yr old girl called Isabella wrote asking about the animals that a collaborative writing partership came into being and the book Owen and Mzee: The True Story of a Remarkable Friendship was created.

“Soon, they were inseparable. Their bond remains very strong to this day. They swim together, eat together, drink together, and sleep next to each other. They rub noses. Owen leads the way to different parts of the enclosure, then Mzee leads the way. Owen playfully nuzzles Mzee’s neck, and Mzee stretches his neck forward asking for more, just as he does when Stephen tickles him under the chin.”

Owen and Mzee has been used by many teachers to illustrate concepts such as the possibility for very differennt beings to get along, to communicate and to live side by side in harmony, to show how the old and the young can also find ways to connect and to help and guide each other.

Biting creature turns girl into boy.....

2009-12-20T21:37:00.000-08:00

I'm here in the office, I've lost track of what day it is and I'm waiting for my first patient to arrive. I'm pretty sure it is monday.

I'm now slowly morphing out of my London life, no sexy dresses and high heels here; I find myself blending in with the blokes. I've got my 5.11 tactical trousers on (they had to have them tailored for me, so I'm now wearing a pair of mens trousers but with short legs) lets just say they're a bit long in the crotch and therefore look a bit like clown pants - v glam. Anyway, it doesn't really matter here and pseudomilitary clothing is considered normal. So the butch side of me is getting way out of control :).

I did have a body armour vest made for a woman (slightly more space at the front) but as I don't have much to put in it anyway I've now got one of the guys' hand me downs which is much lighter and much more comfortable. Many years ago Bonnie Langford was playing Peter Pan in Pantomime, she had to have her ample chest strapped down and I remember thinking what a good idea that seemed. Luckily my Chinese grandmother seems to have counteracted the larger chested celtic side of the family and I've no need to strap.

It's strange, in a way, as I feel quite at home, though I know that life here for most of my friends back home would seem like one hellish choice to have made. I'm happy comparing kit with the boys and I don't have to discuss pop stars or celebrity gossip or other 'girly' topics that have never really excited me.

As I lay in bed last night, the generator had stopped and the power was off - I'd just been wandering the house with my head torch on, and now I was wondering about fate and why it seems that one is made for particular things. Happiness or satisfaction in life seems partly to do with whether you can match what you were made for with where you end up. All the advice, well meaning or not, from family, friends, teachers and work colleagues doesn't make a bit of difference if they don't know you. They can tell you what they might want for you, what they project upon you, or what might be beneficial for them, but it takes a very wise person to see what it is that you need, to be able to say that what might really suit you may be quite different from what everyone else expects. Oh, and don't worry, I'm not about to come out of the closet, if that's what you're thinking ;)

All my life that I've planned for a less than easy environment. For a good couple of years as a child I refused to go to bed without underwear on just in case I got kidnapped during the night. I was of course immune to my mother's protests that it was unhygienic to sleep in your underwear. I just couldn't bear the idea of being taken out through the bedroom window, night dress billowing and no clean pants.

You might say that this is a sign of neurosis rather than just being prepared but still, thinking back on the things I liked best, really it was the torches and the pen knives, the CB radio and the camping kit that I preferred, and I'd hate it when relatives would buy me something pink and girly and my brother something that was actually useful. Saying that though, I was also probably the only tom boy who also loved makeup and was very happy climbing trees outside the house in my electric blue miniskirt from Tammy Girl, leg warmers and full 1980's kohl black eyes and electric blue mascara. So although I'm now kitted out like a boy, I hope that I can retain some of my femininity.

Although 80's fashion is back in London, the interpretation here is less than desirable; local fashion for young Afghans is skin tight stone washed jeans with lots of zips everywhere, a leather jacket and slip-on pointed cowboy shoes - everyone here looks like a dodgy Essex geezer.

For women it's much more difficult to say as they are much less visible; the younger ones are obviously really into fashion though clothing cuts tend to be long and not figure hugging so there's not a lot of variation on that front, and then there is the ubiquitous headscarf and the blue burkha. According to one of our drivers there is a place in town a street where the shops sell only burkhas, different designs for the embroidery and now some variation on the pale blue that was the only colour allowed previously under the taliban. I asked the driver if this seemed like a slightly scary concept - the street of burkha sellers... he is young and he seemed to think it was a bit scary. In my heart I was able to joke because I do not have to wear one and cannot imagine what being made to wear one would be like. In my liberal upbringing I don't think I've ever been made to wear anything more stressful than a school uniform and even then there was freedom of expression in the way that you wore your tie, your shoes, your hair.

At the Afghan Military Hospital I spotted one of the American's arriving in a burkha, all that was visible were her tan desert combat boots poking out of the bottom. I look forward to a time where Afghan fashion is truly resurgent, there are some amazing fabrics, beautiful designs but very rarely do we get to see them displayed and worn in all their glory. Pride and bearing are strong parts of being Afghan, it's one of the things that you notice about the men, they are masculine even when cycling a bike, a heavy blanket casually draped in a wrap around them. They do not wear track suits for leisure and they are not fat and lazy. The women too have presence but for many it's a confused presence; they are not themselves sure what their profile should be outside the home (or at least where I encounter them) and it hurts me that they are often so subservient and silent, as if they are safer if noone notices them.

I haven't seen or heard the cat for a few days now, but the food is always gone when I go to feed him so something must be eating it.... Maybe I should lie in wait and find out...

I got some really bad bites in bed the first night I got here, I thought either bed bugs or fleas. I've no idea what it was that bit me but must have been a little bit venomous as have a spray of wheals like a triffid strike across my left flank that just won't go away and they hurt. I'm just hoping that the skin there doesn't decide to fall off as that would be a rather boring present for christmas.

We are planning a roof top Braai (barbecue) and will hopefully go shopping for meat and stuff - cooking outside in the snow will be an interesting experience but better than being stuck in doors all day. Christmas falls on a friday this year so it's everyone's day off here. There are not that many expats left in country as most people are out for Christmas and the New Year. I'm trying to round up any orphan ex pats who have not much to do. We have a Wii here so what more could a person want than a barbecue, maybe a beer or two and an excited gathering of South Africans, Brits and Philipinnos round a Nintendo Wii? I think they thought I was being particularly British when I suggested playing sardines. I'm now going to have to put up with endless jibes about singing God save the Queen and listening to the Queen's speech on Crimbo day!

So for now, I'll continue to cause a stir by putting on my makeup in my combats whilst sitting at the ops room table; waterproof mascara is a must for any hostile environment.

Afghan pics from a colleague

2009-12-18T11:05:00.000-08:00

These beautiful pictures of Afghanistan were taken by a colleague.

Why don’t the insurgents just fuck off and stop being so selfish!

2009-12-15T04:58:00.000-08:00

So my Afghan honeymoon officially ended this morning; I was sat in the clinic when the bomb by the Heetal hotel went off. At first I thought something large and heavy had fallen over upstairs and not wanting to jump to conclusions I carried on typing up my notes. When I noticed that there was dust everywhere in the air and one of the nurses came round the corner saying we've got to go doc, I shifted gear and came face to face with the nastiest side of Afghanistan. A suicide bomber had driven a car loaded with explosives into the gates of a nearby compound and everyone was out on the rooftops of the villas, looking out, watching the smoke rising. About 5 minutes later and we were dealing with a casualty, a guy who had been seated in a car when the blast hit, it had blown out the windows of the car and created small missiles of glass that had lacerated his cheek and eye, multiple cuts that were bleeding profusely. Stumbling through our gate covered in blood, it looked much worse than it actually was (thank god) he was one of the lucky ones; the walking wounded who could physically get himself to us. We sorted him out and stretchered him off to an international military hospital. At roughly the same time another bomb had exploded in an attack on an NGO compound at a location about 30 mins flight time from Kabul. Not knowing what the casualty list would look like we were on standby to medevac expats that needed to be brought out.

We had a patient in the clinic with us and certainly for him it was a slightly unnerving experience, a wound dressing with your pants off is hardly the best time for a bomb to go off!

All in all the majority of the dead and wounded were Afghans, from both bomb site locations. Civilian Afghans just going about their daily business, without the luxury of armored cars or close protection, these, the most vulnerable people are taken out by so called taliban insurgents. If I were an ordinary Afghan I think I’d say “Fuck off insurgents! Stop blowing yourselves and us up”. These events show the demarcation lines. Here in the clinic, all staff were on hand, expats from various countries and Afghan staff all working for the patient, a Philippino national. We were all equally appalled by the events though many here are old hands at shrugging it off though noone ever really gets happy with it.

Our clients are the expat community and as the reports came in we could stand down as we heard that the fatalities were all Afghan and any injured expats would be flown out by the Dubai team. Not that it made it any better; I thought of the many families who would be lamenting and keening the injustice. I thought about the cost of being here, of my friends in the military who are sent here for six months to a year at a time, housed in their bases, they make a massive personal commitment. On the bases there are no bars or easy places to go and just hang out. Many of the bases here are dry, so there’s not even the chance to relax with a beer. Meetings are still happening at 10.30om, not often bed before 1am and up again at 6am. A completely thankless task; all in the name of bringing peace and stability to Afghanistan. I wondered if many people back home knew how hard and how long some of the international soldiers here work.

Later in the afternoon we had a small collection of visitors with a variety of glass shard related injuries. Based in a house not far from us and the blast, their place had taken a hammering; glass windows turned into shredding apparatus. One poor chap was butt naked having just emerged from the shower, somehow he escaped with only minor cuts whilst the wall behind him was absolutely peppered with shards and shrapnel.

And me, I’m now just tired. The ops manager managed to make me laugh when he told me about the bagram shop – we’d sent one of the drivers there to get me some extra small technical trousers for me (sounds glam, I know!). Given that they have no changing room there (it’s just a room with lots of shelves stuffed with blokes military kit), I was forbidden from asking them to create a changing room just for me. Instead I was confined to quarters and the driver sent to fetch them for me to try on at home, like some kind of Victorian nightmare!! The driver arrived only to find that the poor souls were deep in glass themselves, their shop windows blown in this morning. “No time for trousers, fixing windows!! Go away”. “What about later?” our driver said, not wanting to go away empty handed, NO! Fixing windows and then going home! …A fairly reasonable excuse for a foiled shopping trip, I thought. At least I am in one piece and will live to shop another day.

2009-12-12T06:56:00.003-08:00

my first day on the job and I've learnt two new phrases: poo-pond and bug-out bag.

A poo-pond is apparently some kind of large man made lake for unsavoury man made items, usually found on military bases and popular here I'm told. An ingenious idea, the poo-pond has it's own colony of bacteria that thrive in this environment afloat on a sea of excrement like butt pirates on a holiday cruise.

According to wikipedia a bug-out bag is a portable kit popular in the survivalist subculture that contains the items one would require to survive for seventy two hours when you "bug out", something that happens when zombies start chasing you and/or the world comes to an end. These bags are also particularly popular over here in Afghanistan, so much so that I decided to get two: one in black (sensible for all occasions) and one in tan just in case I do desert zombies at some point;

I was fascinated by the numerous sites dedicated to bugging out; there were all sorts of suggestions on the web for creating your own camouflaged bug out trailer or BOT. I thought I was being paranoid when I thought twice about buying a soft top convertible as it wouldn't provide much protection from a zombie attack...I did not realise however that there were people out there who are seriously preparing for this stuff.

After the excitment of the purchase of new kit and the discovery of new and more horrible ways for us to experiment with making hideous toilet facilities I fed the cats. As you will imagine, it wasn't long after my arrival that I'd hunted out the ubiquitous moggies, here we have a very large black and white thing with enormous paws and a rasping meow like a siren. He is accompanied by a timid wild furry tabby. From the clinic I can hear the black and white one's demands to be tended to by his humans. I giggled to myself as I ran outside into the freezing courtyard with a fine china bowl of chopped up south african sausage meat left over from dinner. The moggies house is on top of the generator and I slipped in between the sandbags to deliver the meat. A small dead chaffinch like bird had appeared when I fed them yesterday and now all that was left were a few straggly feathers, no feet or beak to be seen, the puss cats had snaffled the lot.

As yet, I have not been outside of the compound and it seems quite strange that I am in an entirely foreign country yet you'd hardly know it from here but for the supremely crap internet connection and the numerous choppers passing over head. So far I've eaten burger and chips, burger and chips and sausage and chips so not doing so badly on the butlins kiss me quick food front, think I might ask chef to do some afghan food for me as actually prefer it.

London - Dubai - Kabul

2009-12-11T04:58:00.000-08:00

My first Blog!! So a bit exciting but still experimenting with what to write. I arrived yesterday in Kabul after a few days in Dubai. Lets just say that the contrast between the two places is extreme and in fact London is a damn sight more like Kabul than Dubai is, perhaps that's why it feels more like home here?

Leaving England it was cold and wet, typical early december weather, neither here nor there but not exactly comfortable in any way, drizzly, you know how it is. Arrived in Dubai to a sand storm, wind whipping up a desert frenzy and the skies heavy with what I thought was fog but was actually fine sand particles dangling in the air between the numerous skyscrapers. Usual shit to deal with on arrival at the hotel, I was staying at Media one hotel in Media city and after flying through the night I was pretty keen to get in the shower and then in to bed. The staff were lovely but totally ineffectual, half asleep I managed to have breakfast and visit the gym. Sue was the get up and go gym mistress in tracksuit who greeted me. Not quite sure how many times I could get Ma'am into a single sentence but Sue was doing a pretty good job. Dressed as she was in her matching shiny tracksuit and commanding as she was I was a little scared that she would drop me to the floor and demand sit ups.... I was in no fit state.

I wandered about the hotel in a daze for a few hours before they found me somewhere to go, a pretty room but with no electricity; I couldn't switch down the aircon or dry my hair, but after a massive hot bath at least I was clean and could get into bed for a couple of hours. I fell into one of those deep and confusing dream states, I was having a nightmare, in this one an evil man was killing lots of people, torturing them, dragging them around the town. I was woken by Crispian ringing me, usually I am instantly alert but it took ages to pull myself from the syrup of my awful dream and I could barely speak. It's a strange thing that one can be surrounded by so called luxury - fine linen, soft pillows, a totally controlled environment and yet none of it feels real. There's no earth in dubai, no true oxygen, and the trees are not free, by the roadside I saw that they'd painted the brown trunks green in order that they match the colour of the hedges behind them, I felt sick. I drove around in a taxi, divorced from the concrete environment, knowing all the while that the taxi driver probably resented me as yet another white colonial face, money in my pocket and an attitude to match. Though I don't have an attitude and I am wracked with guilt as I go about my 'luxury' life there.

JJ the security manager from Atlantis was my angel host. I had met JJ last time I was in Dubai; I'd spotted him on his Segway moving around the aquaventure water park and, it seems that he had spotted me too; a rather unglamorous affair with me in a newly purchased pink and yellow child size bikini, wrestling with a large rubber ring whilsts navigating water rapids. I'd sprained my ankle in Kabul a few days before and was guarding it whilst foolishly racing around in a water park. My white bits aglow, I'd watched JJ alight from his segway and light up a fag.
Later when I was leaving the park having parted with all of £50 quid for two photos, there was JJ again in the front entrance. We got chatting and as it turned out we had several people in common and we exchanged details.

This time around JJ was there to host me and celebrate my new job with me - We drank champagne and ate cheese and bread in the hotel. Some people are just good people and I'm sure JJ is one of them. I really wanted to see the dolphins at aquaventure and JJ said that he'd find out when they were running sessions tomorrow. I'd seen the dolphins the last time I was in and was really keen to get in to the water with them and touch them. At just over £100 it seemed like a small price to pay to be able to get so close.

The next morning I had stuff to sort out at the office but by 1300hrs I was whizzing my way to aquaventure in a taxi, slightly late as usual but high in the thought of swimming with hdolphins. JJ was there to meet me at the entrance and we dashed inside, golf carted it to the dolphin area at the end of the beach and thankfully I was there in perfect time! In a short wetsuit and vest, we met Lexi, a ten year old female indo pacific dolphin. Lexi was amazing, and I was really quite speechless to be kissed by a dolphin, to be able to hug and hold her and to dance with her. She pulled me along by her pectoral fins, lying on her back. I make no judgement about whether dolphins in captivity like this are right or wrong. Of all the evils in the world this is not the worst.

So I reviewed my time in Dubai with mixed feelings, there's no getting away from the mix, no matter where you go there will be beautiful elements and terrible suffering. Dubai has the patina of busy commercial enterprise, the streets look clean and expats bustle about between offices. But this a place of segregation, of a class system based on your ethnicity and it is not good. It does not sit well with me from England where we have tried so hard to move forward from that. In this place people are not equal, those who have money can buy those who have not.