Sylvia's Journal

Picking up language lessons again – constructions that express probability, possibility or presumption in the past tense…my head is spinning. It is also spinning because I spent the last 3 hours reviewing our last year’s workplan – a level of detail that causes me great stress, but since I have to live with the plan for the next year, I have to bite through the tediousness of it all.

Physical therapy this morning. When I entered the women’s physio room it was very quiet, somber even, where usually I find it filled with laughter, women amongst each other, no fear. The place was filled with women in pain this time – old looking women, probably younger than me, but who had suffered through a lifetime of sorrow and countless pregnancies no doubt. Swollen arms and legs, aching lower backs. A lot of moaning.

I bought Sita some more house-warming curtains, upon request, in the fancy boutique downtown. I also bought myself a beautifully embroidered see-through blouse. Axel was surprised, “you can’t wear that here.” True, but I am not going to spend the rest of my life in Afghanistan – now I am, but not forever (I think now). At some point I expect to be back in a society where I can expose arms, legs, neck, hair. Question: who else is buying all these see-through blouses? For indoor maybe?

How much difference a week makes! Fruits have arrived from the south and the east (Pakistan I suppose). Along the streets there are vendors with their carts full of ripe and juicy mangos, melons, cherries, apricots and other fruits I associate with midsummer.

I slept 12 hours and it still wasn’t enough; I still feel a little shaky. We stayed in our jammies most of the morning, foregoing our usual walk in Bagh-e-bala or elsewhere. It is nice to be home and today I didn’t mind our limited freedom.

I am finishing Malalai Joya’s book (A Woman Among Warlords). I don’t care that much about the book, its writing more than a little akward, but I am in awe of her courage. and wished I could watch the Iron-Jawed Angels movie with her, to show her that she is following in the footsteps of many aunties elsewhere in the world. They all risked life and limb, as Malalai does, fighting for justice.

I wish I knew how to support her. The only way I can think of right now is to help pull the women I meet and work with out of their lethargy and passiveness if they haven’t already done so on their own; to encourage them to change from victim to agent. There is much fear (not unsubstantiated) and becoming a (female) agent in this society is no small matter. But there are already many; if and when they connect they can really be a force for change.

We have a new female staff member, Chris, who is from Australia. She will be the first and only female Program Manager (of seven), so that will make two of us in our weekly meeting of directors and program managers. I told my male colleagues that this is just the beginning and that, before they realized it, we would outnumber them. Ha, the infiltration has begun!

Although it was supposed to be a day of rest I am so far behind in reading my mail that I had to sit at least some time behind the computer, catching up, doing expense reports, reading CVs of people I am supposed to interview and finish the performance reviews that are all behind schedule.

Axel was also working, also in his jammies, and concluded at the end of the day that working is hard work. He got what he wanted, a real job, but now he’s got to do the job.

We had dinner in front of the TV and watched, for a very brief moment, Afghan child idol, an awful show with awful children singing awful songs, before we switched to watching House on Axel’s computer. He downloaded 16 episodes. After watching two House episodes his awfulness started to get at me.

We found our two gates, one for people on foot and the other for cars, to be reinforced with a quarter inch of steel plate. All the guesthouses are fortified like this as well as our office compound entrance gates. It worries me a bit. Is this in reaction to something I should know about? Or an after the fact move (the compound in Kandahar inhabited by contractors was destroyed because a car full of explosive drove through the gate)? Or is it because our operations chief is moving back to the US next month and wants to make sure everything is in order when he leaves? This is how the attacks on our minds are more severe than the real ones. We are separated by ever more steel from Afghan society.

Another piece of steel, in the form of a water tank, was hoisted, we don’t know how, on the roof while we were away. This is to provide a back-up, I suppose, when the summer drought kicks in, as it always does, in a couple of months.

Right now everyone acts as if there is no water problem here. Dusty roads are sprayed with water to keep the dust down; the cook, after he changes from his western clothes into his Afghan outfit at the end of his workday, always washes his car with plenty of water. He rides out of our gate dressed to the nines in a spotless car.

The guards scrub the terrace every morning and afternoon like only Dutch housewives can do better, but in Holland water is never a problem. And then there is the garden: the roses and the grass get a good hosing at least twice a day now that it is getting warmer.

I am sitting on the clean-scrubbed, but dusty again, terrace overlooking our neat suburban garden. The roses past their bloom have been cut, we now have snapdragons and calendulas planted in the open spaces between the roses, the stock is showing its first buds and a few tiny lettuce plants, inherited from the previous occupants of our house, have grown until full heads of lettuce. There is a little tomato volunteer that the gardener is treating like a king(let).

Axel is off to SOLA, refreshed from a long nap. I took a nap too and am trying to catch up on email so that I can make the best use of my one day in the office before I head out again on Friday. This very quick trip to the US was, until last week, considered plan B. It seems plan B is now activated. Plan A, my Afghan colleagues going to the US, appears to have been discarded. Still, I put in one last ditch effort to get my Congressman and Senator involved in the process that was supposed to have provided the two of them with visas to the US. With only 4 workdays left we don’t think there’s much of a chance. Hence the plan B.

My antivirus software is spotting Trojan horses nearly everyday. Not only is Afghanistan risky for life and limbs, it is also risky computerwise, especially if you interact with a government that does not provide its staff with the kind of anti-virus software that needs to be paid for periodically. It is like Africa in that way, where government officials, even the highest levels, use yahoo email addresses because the government doesn’t pay its internet provider’s bills (or its electricity and water bills for that matter).

Steve and I were placed on standby to write the pieces for the minister to bring along to the US. Since I never got a good answer to the audience question I made one up: congressional staffers. I wrote in ‘I’ voice as if I was an Afghan, expressing sorrow for the young American men and women who have died in Afghanistan, their family’s sacrifice and the debt that Afghanistan owes them.

I also wrote about what has happened with all those American tax dollars, the miracles that have been produced with those. I did not say anything directly about corruption and mismanagement – everyone knows it is there – but it is not good to highlight it when you come to ask for more money.

We are given assignments like ‘a two hundred words piece,’ a two-pager and a 5-to-6 pager. The 200-word piece was completed last night and this morning I turned the 2-pager into a 4-pager, leaving others to do the cutting. I left Steve to deal with the 5-to-6 pager that is so far ill-described.

In the afternoon I listened to rehearsal presentations from three of our provincial health advisors, one from Faryab province in the north, one from Khost province which borders the Waziristans where all the bad people hang out and Kabul province, a late bloomer in our team but catching up fast.

The men are presenting their accomplishments in building management and leadership capacity at USAID on Thursday. I am afraid I will not be able to attend but I know they will do a great job.

Instead of the frantic last day at work it was actually a very good day, after I had sent in my writing pieces and I was able to do my handover note to the person who will be acting in my stead.

And now I am sitting with Ankie van Holland (the TB Ankie we call her as that is the work she is doing here) on the terrace drinking our pretend beer and waiting for Axel to come home. The suitcases are waiting to be packed and my vacation has started. And so, when both Steve and I were called to the minister’s office, when I was already home and in vacation mode, I respectfully declined. Axel thought it was very unpolitic to decline a minister’s request to come to her office. But Steve has to do the writing now and so I was rational, with the risk of being disrespectful.

President Karzai is going to Washington. He will be accompanied by some of his ministers, among them the Acting Minister of Public Health. In the afternoon I attended a meeting with her Excellency, some of her best and brightest staff and people representing the US government. It was an interesting meeting with the Afghans getting a dose of reality from the Americans about what the speeches should say: the American tax dollars are (well) used to bring about a more stable Afghanistan.

At first, when the Afghans were told that the people they will meet in DC don’t care about whether life is better now for an Afghan woman or small girl, I could see their startled look. I was a little embarrassed because it presented America’s generous giving in Afghanistan in a rather stark and ugly light: pure self interest.

The prepared pieces that have to serve as input to various speeches, by the President and the Minister, prepared during long evenings by her Excellency’s staff were shredded to pieces. I felt sorry until I was volunteered to re-write them, after hours and in my spare time but also during my last day here before leaving for Holland. There went all my good plans to empty my mail box, write handover notes and get my desk in order for a week’s absence. Steve was also volunteered and taken off the flight to Bamiyan tomorrow; he will be very disappointed as opportunities to go places outside Kabul are rare.

If the afternoon was characterized by politics and speeches that will pry loose more money for Afghanistan’s development, my morning was characterized by hope and warm and fuzzy feelings. I attended the opening of the 6th Annual Congress of the Afghan Midwifery Association. For once the men were outnumbered by the women.

Several hundred young midwives from nearly all of the provinces (none from Helmand) had come to Kabul to upgrade their skills, encourage each other, feel the strength of numbers and show the men why they are a critical part of Afghanistan’s attempt to reach the Millennium Development Goals number 4 and 5 (child and maternal health).

During the opening ceremony a group of students dressed in traditional Afghan outfits from various parts of the country sung the Afghan midwives’ song, alternating Dari and Pashto couplets. The midwives in the audience held hands high above their heads and swayed back and forth while singing along. Knowing neither the words nor being able raise my arm (the angle was exactly wrong for me), I swayed along with my arms by my side while watching the hopeful faces with pain in my heart, so much goodwill in an environment of so much badwill.

I quickly spotted the Dutch women (most tall and blond) in the audience (the Dutch organization CORDAID is one of the sponsors of the Association). I recognized Mariette who I first met here in Kabul in 2002 when the previous MSH project presented its data from a massive health survey that is still being used as baseline for the post-Taliban government, revealing what was at the time the world’s most dismal health situation.

Mariette is also the daughter of friends of my parents (now all deceased), whose little brother Joost was my very first date ever at my parent’s wedding anniversary ball. I think we were both in our early teens. It was a very innocent date. I think we may have danced, me in my first long skirt, sewn by my aunt the seamstress: glow-in-the-dark-green with hot pink flowers, Joost in a jacket with tie, possibly his first.

I was very inspired by the young midwives and their energy. If there is hope for Afghanistan it lies with them. But I am also worried about their role models, the older midwives, my age, who are true pioneers, fighting an uphill battle for recognition, rights and support for what they are doing. I think these women are burning out and our only hope is this next phalange of women who are ready in the wings.

Later, back at the ministry, I spoke to one of the few men who had been at the opening. He congratulated the midwives on their excellent organization and inspiring opening program. I told him that this was just one taste of what could happen in Afghanistan if the men would let the women run the place for a while: organization, discipline, energy and inspiration. He nodded; he is one of those men who agrees on this; there just not enough of them in high places.