Sylvia's Journal

I never left the guesthouse during the weekend. I sat mostly in front of my computer, digging through the contents of my inbox to make sure that I am as well informed and prepared as I can be for the meetings that are lined up for me tomorrow, my first official workday in Kabul.

I took breaks from time to time to study Dari using a program from Transparent Language (free on the web, Byki 4) that drilled me ad nauseam in both recognition, recall and writing. It was pretty tedious at first but I am getting the hang of it and can now type in Dari using the English keyboard. I feel very accomplished about that. Now I have to keep it up. The program has a feature called ‘stale words’- words that I haven’t ‘touched’ for a certain amount of time, to make sure I don’t lose them.

My Dari teacher has made contact by email and I hope to meet with him soon. I want to take advantage of my evenings alone to study as much as I can. I made a deal with the Director General  for health services that I will be able to have a meaningful conversation with him in Dari before the end of the year. I am putting the Pashto on hold for now.

I am still home alone and that makes the dinners pretty boring; not just the lack of company but also because I am eating the same thing at every meal. The cook had prepared massive quantities of rice and a minced meat/bean/tomato stew and a plate full of dried out slices of eggplant and zucchini that noone had touched so far. It looks pretty bad but tastes OK.

For snacks there are inexhaustible supplies of the sweetest grapes dangling from the long arbor that covers the entry way into our compound. There are many more at the office which has an arbor three time the size. If only I had the wherewithal to make wine…(sigh).

This is what my room looks like now that everything has been neatly stowed. It’s like being a student again, everything in one room.