Kabul, Afghanistan
DEC. 6, 2004

Karzai's inauguration tomorrow has me on lock down.

It was announced that tomorrow is a national holiday so a lot of staff got to leave early--now it's just me and a bunch of expats who'll want to crash in my room--because of the inability to move around. Yikes!

Starting in 20 minutes ago, 7PM until 4PM tomorrow, Malik Asghar Crossroad which is the street Aïna is on will be closed to all vehicle and pedestrian travel.

There are tanks on either side of the road already. The ones on the left, just past Aschiana are close enough to see and feel. We're gonna have the fluttering Helicopters all day again tomorrow. Maybe some tonight-which make the glass rattle on our windows and disturb us physically and tonally.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is across the street. Ministry of Planning is next door. And the presidential palace is not too far down the road. The "palace" grounds as they've been pointed out to me look like a bad office park. But, I think they are building something "nicer" for the man...

I'm already a little stir-crazy. Dinner is being served and frankly I'm afraid of it having gotten sick after a few bites of lunch. Just seeing another piece of orange oil soaked cauliflower might put me over the edge. Cauliflower has got to be the cheapest vegetable in this land. I can safely say it has been served here for at least one of 2 meals every day during my 45 day tenure. Always overcooked, limp and soaked in something, usually red, bland and all around unappealing.

The Ministry of Interior didn't give most journalists access to the event tomorrow and being a media NGO Aïna is filled with guys and girls who will go out anyway and that's when things will get, uh, interesting. The expats may just get a talkin' to, but the Afghans could really get hurt depending on who's holding the baton, gun, or whatever. That thought really sucks because journalistically, we have to encourage them to put themselves out there and question authority that questions their rights to observe, record, think and write.

Word around town is that even way out in the city taxi drivers are talking about Dick Cheney coming here tomorrow. Usually the commoners on the street, many of whom don't have access to any news media, don't know these things 3 days in advance. It's not like the US where you're inundated with the same information throughout the day on radio, CNN, newspapers, internet, etc.

Anyhow, I miss you guys and New York so much right now. It's the end of day 45. I'm half way through my mission term. But my mission has dramatically changed since I got here. And Aïna needs me more than expected, and regardless of my efforts, and comittment, it still may or may not become all that I want and dream for it to be. I'm trying to figure it all out but have to focus on some tangible things. The photo department exhibit, Parvaz, 2 video projects, and improving editorial design for one of our papers seem like reasonable tasks. I'm in charge of the Demining and DDR stuff still, but clients move even more slowly here than there so I get more time to focus on Aïna which I prefer. Radio has one talented kid and is run by a really pretty Afghan girl. I like that we have radio programs and production capabilities I'm reserving judgment on their work until they deliver documentation of the live event I was forced to coordinate which I am lucky to have gotten through but is miraculously now the talk of the town. "The best concert since before the Taliban!" they keep saying. Seriously, I still can't believe it. More than 550 Afghan teens came to see 2 plays, one really funny one a great professional troup, and a famous pop singer, Farhad backed up by a local band also called Parvaz (popular name, eh?) It means "flight". Of course the concert began with a passage from the Koran! AJ, I can feel you smirking, right about now. Oi vey!

I guess you can tell, I'm not done here yet. Amazing how new information and being here changes things; more dramatic than I thought. Since I have complained a little, let me tell you one really good thing, I can't say enough positive things about how resilient, smart, engaging, and beautiful the Aghans I work with are. And they constantly ask me if I can stay longer--even though I feel like I'm here for so much longer. They're trying to count the days left on my contract backwards. It's like little kids who count backwards from the time their friends come over to when they have to leave, begging their parents for just a little more time instead of enjoying the time they have left. It's kinda touching. And kinda telling. They want to be independent but know that they still need help and I guess a lot of people who come are coming more for adventure and leave when they get their fill of it. I don't know anyone who knew as much about Aïna's activities before coming here than I did. Certainly no one had as deep a belief in the idea of Aïna, as I have. It makes me vulnerable. And yes, every expat I work with thinks I'm a little crazy and over the top with this "believing in the idea" theory that keeps me going--but I can't help it. You know me, I gotta have something to believe in. Otherwise, I'd already be back, eating good cauliflower at CB, drinking costa rican coffee without rationing it, out of clean "We're-Happy-To-Serve-You" paper cups instead of using the same ones over and over again. I know it's sentimental and kinda gross, but I can't help that either. The cups, my TT3 pencils, and my taxi cab keep me feeling kinda connected to you guys in some strange way. Me and my attachment to inanimate disposable objects; oh, let's try not to analyze too much!!!