Rabiallah was our driver and Abibullah our guard. The driver spoke English quite well, having worked for the UN mission in Afghanistan, the one that is now under siege; he even worked with the election committee for the previous elections. A good thing he no longer does as this is rather a dangerous form of employment these days.
The guard spoke no English. Thus, armed with two dictionaries we boarded our vehicle and set out for Bagh-i-Bala, a lovely small palace, white washed with a turquoise cupola, perched just below the Intercontinental hotel with views of the city. Steve had told us that in the 70s this was a popular restaurant destination. He did not join us, preferring to keep the lovely memories from then and instead anxious to get to Chicken Street after a forced absence of several days. The shop owners no doubt called him to say that they were open again.
Despite some attempts by the UN and USAID to fix up the grounds of Bagh-e-Bala it looks a bit neglected. You cannot take the car in and so we went on foot with Abibullah by our side, he practicing his English and we our Dari. It is a nice walk and clearly still a destination for some Kabulis, especially young boys and teenagers. A group of small boys followed us, giggling and wanting to practice their English on us, and we happily obliged. Older young men were sitting on carpeted platforms smoking the shisha, drinking tea and eating some form of dal, inviting us to join us.
It was all very peaceful and lovely with plastic chairs tucked away between the now tired looking roses in small seating areas for eating and drinking tea. Small stall sprinkled across the grounds sold cigarettes, rented out shishas and provided tea and snacks. Unfortunately the small palace itself was out of bounds, its gates padlocked. We were told for the holiday only. Such a shame, it would be the only time that many people could visit it.
After our walk we went to the Herat restaurant in Shar-e-Naw, famous for its shish kebab, cooked on long narrow braziers on the street right outside the entrance to the restaurant. We had kebabs, local yoghurt and limp fries followed by green tea sweetened by the toffees that were served along with the tea.
In the middle of our meal several SUVs stopped outside the restaurant and unloaded their passengers: about 35 warriors, some with Kalashnikovs, following their commander for an Eid meal in the same restaurant. I asked the driver whether we should be concerned about the enemies of these people but he told us not to worry and so we continued our meal while watching the exotic collection of men, quietly eating their holiday meal. The men were also stealthily watching us; we were each curiosities to each other.
On our way home we stocked up on fake beer and Italian coffee at one of the international supermarkets, to arrive at a house filled with diesel fumes. I remained nauseous for some time while we opened all the windows to let the cold air in and the fumes out. I am beginning to wonder whether we should switch to wood burning stoves.
Sylvia's Journal 
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