Living in Kabul

Living in Kabul

Civil Society/March 2008

“Is it safe to go to Kabul?” friends and acquaintances and would-be visitors often ask? The question though natural, often strikes me as odd. How does one answer it as a denizen of the city of a war-torn country? My usual response is to say its safe unless one is unlucky to be in the wrong place at the wrong time- the same response I would give while reporting on Kashmir in earlier years.
Alternatively I remark that I am usually more scared of the men than the bombs. Facetious though the remark may sound, there is certainly a core of truth in it. On a daily basis, nothing impacts on me more than the identity of being a woman.
Being a journalist in Afghanistan today is an enormous privilege. Seeing a country being built brick by brick both literally and figuratively is a unique journalistic experience- as one sees the emergence of new trends, cultures, economic development, institutions being built or not being built as the case may be.
Living in Kabul is not quite as easy. Electric supply can be as intermittent as two hours every fourth day in freezing winter, a time when heating, hot water and even light are the most essential in temperatures that vary between minus 15 to minus 25 degrees. Of course many parts of India also lack this basic necessity. But try running an entire capital city, and one which is attempting to rebuild a country on sporadic bursts of power? Try imagining- not the occasional power cuts at home, which we all face, but going to an office with no electricity? How do you charge laptops, cell phones, work in the evening? Most people who can afford it, and this includes almost all expatriates, rely on heavy generator sets to provide them electricity. This of course comes at a price: fumes, noise and frequent breakdowns unless you can afford the high costs of high maintenance.
In winter our rooms are warmed with wood stoves and it is only after four and a half years that I can claim to have somewhat mastered the art of lighting a successful wood fire- previous winters having been spent intermittently opening windows to air the room of smoke and closing them again to try and keep out the cold!
Though living conditions may resemble the poorer quarters or third world countries, costs of living are higher than most of the first world, because goods and services are still at a premium.
Six years into the rebuilding of Afghanistan, especially its urban centres still reply completely on imported goods including even milk and butter and fruit. Even though there is an abundance of all three in the country, the difficulties of processing and packaging and distribution as well as the complete absence of an industrial base make difficult to access locally produced goods.
So why stay on in this difficult country. Most foreigners asked this question are stumped for a rationale answer, mentioning only the intensity of the country. The ‘intensity’, difficult to explain to someone who hasn’t experienced it, is something that draws you in like an inexplicable attraction- an atmosphere where everything is experienced at a heightened level of experience. The light, the colours, the warmth and cold and most of all the emotions. Initial days there left me feeling like my life, my little personal world with its small joys, travails and sorrows was very trivial. That feeling has given way now to a more measured emption- but still one that accentuates every emotion, every detail, perhaps because of the absence of normality or what we call normality.
The normal is the unusual here and it is those expatriates who do ‘normal’ things who are seen as extraordinary. An Indian diplomat, Sandeep Kumar, stands out because he frequents the Afghan gyms, paints and travels in taxis. Deborah Rodriguez, an American became a bestselling author with her account of how she set up a beauty parlour, married an Afghan and coped with life here. Saska and Gay le Clerc are woman restaurateurs. The task is not easy. Saska and Le Clerc have to import a lot of their basic food.

Imported goods are sold at very high prices to the expatriate community and the Afghan elite while the poorer citizens get pushed to the margins. Take for example the price of housing. The scarcity of good housing- substantive number of houses were completely or partially destroyed in years of bombing, mortar shelling and gunfire and the advent of a cash rich expatriate community has resulted in enormously high rents that are unaffordable for most Afghans who get pushed to more remote areas of the city and ‘kuccha houses’ without any plumbing.

It is not just the economy of Afghanistan that is the tale of two cities. Expatriate seem to live in a bubble of their own partially by choice and partially by circumstance. Most internationals working for international organisations are bound by a clutch of security regulations. Houses with barbed wire and bomb shelters and high walls. Guards at the door, sandbags outside. Travel in armoured cars or atleast large SUVs – often with armed guards. Expatriates are also prohibited from walking in the street, going to areas or locations that are not ‘cleared’ by their security apparatus in advance and usually also prohibited from consorting with Afghans who are not ‘cleared’. Afghans are usually treated as suspect unless proven otherwise under this security regimen under which private security companies also seal off roads and access to ‘ordinary’ locals, prevent local taxies from many routes and cordon off half the road in front of the houses and offices of the more rich and powerful.
The divide is further accentuated in the social sphere. Most restaurants are either predominantly frequented by either Afghans or expats and few see the presence of both purely because ‘expat’ restaurants are way too expensive(a simple sandwhich in a simple café costs usually $7 to $10). Even where they are affordable, many restaurants hang signs outside saying ‘no locals’, ‘no Afghans’ or ‘foreign passports only’. The rationale is that they are forbidden from serving liquor to Afghans under the country’s laws and get raided by the police if locals are found outside. Whatever the reason, the result is an apartheid that appears to have become accepted.
It would be wrong to blame just the expatriate community for this separation however. Afghan society does not lend itself easily to a great deal of tolerance in socialising, especially where the presence of women is concerned.
Though the Taliban alone are usually equated with denial of rights to women, the truth is that they were only the most extreme manifestation of existing customs. In most parts of the country women still need permission to leave the house(the degree of strictness of course varies with geography, ethnicity and individual family values).
Women are largely seen as possessions and women’s role outside the family home is ill-understood. The fact that more than 50% of the women in Afghanistan’s largest jail are there for ‘moral crimes’, most of them for having run away from home, illustrates best the opinion of those in authority towards women stepping outside the family structure. Though a small number of women are joining the workforce(especially in urban centres), they are often subject to harassment.
While this view of women is not limited to Afghanistan, the polarisation of views seems far more acute here. War, displacement, extreme conservatism overlaid with exposure to TV’s pop culture and its display of women combined with a move towards more progressive liberal values has created a confused value system that has a strong streak of hostility towards women in public spaces. Where the creed of treating women as property comes face to face with the commodification of women, the result is a debate that centres around the apparent contradiction of a women in burkha or a bikini. Subsumed in this superficial dispute are the real rights of women to participate in public space- both as participants and decision makers.
The hostility that this confrontation creates also it difficult even for women expatriates to function with comfort, even though they enjoy layers of safety and insulation denied to their Afghan counterparts.
As an Indian woman I usually straddle a schizophrenic identity. Indians are the most loved nationality in Afghanistan, being seen rightly or wrongly as selfless friends with no agenda. Being a woman counters most of that advantage.
To summarise life in Kabul: as a journalist it is fascinating, living is difficult and being a woman can be depressing.