Brave New World

Today we'll switch from song titles to book titles. And this life that I am currently leading is indeed a brave new world, full of incredible new experiences, little dramas, and grand adventures. It's all full of dirt and dust, burning garbage, and men. I think I talked about my new way of fitting in...I wear a head scarf instead of a traditional military hat...but I don't think you've seen me like that yet, so now you have. I've also learned quickly that it's important to wear makeup to my meetings every day, and I also need to start wearing earrings. Anything I can do to help demonstrate to the Afghan males I mentor that women can be both beautiful and intelligent is a very good thing indeed. Those are not values that are inherent in Afghan culture. I mean when you get right down to it, I wonder how inherent in American culture those values really are, and Afghanistan is at least 200 years behind us with absolutely zero desire to catch up.

Make no mistake about it, I think this country is beautiful and fascinating in its own unique way. My interpreter and I have basically the same conversation every day...she wants to invite me to her house for dinner, and I want to go, but this country is way to dangerous for such a thing to ever happen. So instead, we spend our days together helping other Afghan women learn English and trying to make a small difference in our own little way. Frankly, my measure of success in Afghanistan is whether my interpreter, Julia, wants to send me an email when I leave here and I sincerely want to write her back. If I gain one Afghan friend while I'm here, I will call this deployment a success.

But along the way I will, of course, look for other ways to leave my mark. Yesterday I discovered that Julia and I make excellent English teachers. We will spend one hour each Wednesday and Sunday teaching Afghan women how to converse in basic English. The women are so brave and beautiful, and even more so for working on an Afghan military base and studying so hard. They have been studying English for at least one or two years, and can ask me a huge series of questions about my husband, my family, my country, the weather and my favorite color. Considering the color of my new scarf (and the rug in my room, and my towel, and the list is endless...) I'm sure they were not at all surprised when I admitted that my favorite color is pink. Most of them claimed black as their favorite color, which I'm sure has some deep meaning, but I'm frankly too tired for that now.

Here's my favorite conversation in Dari (which I have at least once a day...maybe more)...

Me: "Hello, how are you?"
Any Afghan: "I am well, and how are you?"
Me: "I am also well. How is your family?"
Any Afghan: "My family is great. How is your family?"
Me: "They are fine, thank you."
Any Afghan: "Do you have children?"
Me: "No, not yet."
Any Afghan: "Why not?"

In my (still limited) experience, the average Afghan family has at least six children. Generations of families live together in the same house, and (arranged) marriage occurs sometime between the ages of 14 and 16. So as you can imagine, the average Afghan woman of my age has already given birth to many more children than the average Western woman.

I know that you're eager to see pictures of what life is like here, and I will deliver said pictures some time next week. But for now, the best explanation of what it feels like to live here is a cross between Thailand (extremely poor and distinctly Asian) and Morocco (also extremely poor and Muslim). The only pictures I have of the "outside" so far are images shot through a dirty truck window...but this one sums it up nicely. Things here are as to be expected for a developing country. There is so much we as Americans take for granted...running water, flushing toilets, clean clothes and living space, available health care...that is just not available in many parts of the world. Thinking about that really helps me keep perspective as I sit in my tin coffin of a room. It's air conditioned and I have a bed (and as a bonus I have nearly reliable electricity). And that, for the next six months, is an excellent start.