Sylvia's Journal

Last night we went to a party organized by Democrats Abroad in the centre of town. We met a whole new cast or characters, not just Americans of the Obama type but also sympathetic South Africans, Spaniards, Brits, Afghan-Americans, Chinese, Koreans, etc. It was a contrast to the usual American-who-live-in-a-bubble types I meet professionally. The people we met last night actually run the hash in Kabul, faithfully, every Friday and live a near normal life.

Our hosts were a Chinese-British couple who showed up half-way through the festivities, returning from the hash. By then the barbecue was going at full speed. Hamburgers, beer, wine, salads, there was enough for us and for the thousands of flies that had descended on the food. I decided to go for foods that had been shielded, as here you don’t know where these flies have been.

We met Ben again who we had last met at Babur’s gardens. Ben is a horticulturist who is here on a long assignment that ends in December. He is from Indiana which endeared him right away to Axel, for whom Indiana was, during his graduate student years, his second home.

About 10 AM this morning I had recovered from the stressful week, ending my processing of the week with the ultimate frustration dream in which I was trying to catch a plane but no type of transport was able to get me to the airport on time.

When I woke up I had enough energy to do my 5 km walk on the elliptical but I was too late for my usual Saturday morning physical therapy session.

Today the embassy had organized a celebration which, according to our TV reports, coincided with the new commander taking command. MSH staff was invited to participate in the celebrations but my name was not included on the list of invitees. It looked like someone simply copied the list from last year when I was not yet here and MSH still employed two Steves. On paper we still looked like an organization that has no women in the senior leadership ranks. Too bad.

We spent a quiet (and very hot) day at home which stood in some contrast to our colleagues from DAI in Kunduz who suffered an attack on their compound. Some staff got killed, including expats, according to the incident report we received from ANSO. Axel wondered, should be have a packed suitcase ready in case we have to suddenly evacuate? There are days sometimes where we wonder, how long will we be able to stay here?

We had our usual Dari class in the afternoon. Axel once more found himself wondering whether he will ever be able to speak this language. His good teacher talked him back into not giving up. At home we practiced Dari with our guard and then played a game of backgammon and then searched for the channel on which to watch the Germany-Argentina game.

This what Thursday was like: After an early morning meeting with the acting minister to which I was summoned the night before by one of her staff, I returned to the office at about 9:00 AM. I was in for a surprise. All day I experienced, albeit only a fraction, of what it is to be a Finance and Operations director.

Like a lave stream pieces of paper that required signatures oozed around me, wherever I went. Everywhere there were people with pieces of paper in their hands that needed signatures (all of them now). I signed things that I didn’t even knew existed. This experience has given me a new appreciation of what it takes to run a multi-million dollar project (and I only dealt with the small stuff).

The risk of course with me, a neophyte, to sign (which means authorize payments) is that people can slip in things that were denied by our previous Finance and Operations Director. I was warned about that and tried to sign everything after some due diligence. But one can only do so much due diligence when the pile of paper starts to get close to 10 centimetres, and the incoming stream is relentless. My extra bad luck is that it is the end of the month (or rather the beginning of the new one). Imagine doing this day after day.

Luckily my Afghan finance and administration colleagues were patient with me and everyone took great pains to explain to me what I was signing. I have a long way to go to understand accounting terms.

I tried to get to a debriefing from one of our consultants who is returning home and who had a mid morning meeting at the ministry, but on my way to him not only did I meet more people with papers to be signed but also, something I should have remembered but forgot, three new staff members in my team who reported for duty, their first day (a moment of panic until they were safely placed in the hands of knowledgeable people).

Steve has clearly arrived in Pakistan and found a computer as there was another stream of emails about things he hadn’t gotten to, some rather daunting and complex contracting issues.

There was an informational interview about a job we are trying to fill (I had forgotten I had made the appointment, thinking Thursday afternoons are usually quiet) and there she was suddenly in the middle of my attempt to write a fair and even handed first draft of our investigation report in the hope of speeding up the process so that the people involved in this messy case can get on with their lives.

And then there was the email from the incoming Finance and Operations Director about his reporting to work on July 6 (yeah!!!) and that he needed a letter for his wife about his employment in Kabul so she can get a visa. That too needed to be done urgently as we are closed (now) for a three-day weekend.

Amidst all this frenzy, we had to report to one of the ministries that controls (yup) NGOs like us with the material they had requested. We had not been able to provide all the documents and send a staff member with an envelope with about 60% of the requested information to show that at least we had not entirely ignored their deadline of today.

And then it was suddenly 5 PM and I collapsed, quite literally.

Across from our office voters are being registered for the September parliamentary elections. I was driving with five of my Afghan colleagues into town. I asked them whether they were registered. They all nodded, but immediately added that they were not going to vote again. With the typical western indignation I gave the typical western response: if you don’t vote you can’t complain.

But I quickly found out that that was a very silly remark that showed I had no idea about voting here. My colleagues patiently explained that they had voted for a particular guy in the previous elections and that their votes were pursued with a friendliness and sincerity that lasted until the elections were over. Once elected their (successful) candidates surrounded themselves with bodyguards and became, what my colleagues called, ‘commanders,’ building five story houses and ignoring their constituents, or at least those who weren’t paying for access.

The democratic process, as we know it, however flawed it may be in my two home countries, bears very little resemblance to what masquerades here as parliamentary elections (or presidential for that matter). Are these simply an infant democracy’s teething problems? Or what?