The Days Melt Into Weeks...My Feet Touch Down

Hi there my peoples.  Ho there my friends.  Sorry I have not written sooner and thank all of you who emailed me saying WTF Lou, what is going on over there? In all honesty I have been totally absorbed and overwhelmed by all that is Afghanistan, by all that is this job, by it all.  This is precisely why I have not written in a while.  This cultural submersion is precisely why I could not write sooner.  Honestly, it has taken me this long to see this place, to feel and understand small parts of the Afghani culture.  To be swept up in the world of corporate intrigue, the bullshit that goes with it, and the working scene shenanigans that are necessary to survive.  To take my wildest observations and distill them into words that can be placed here would have been fruitless prior to this moment.  In general, I have had very little time for myself.  In particular, it is taking all my resources to understand this work flow.  I still don't grasp much of the nuance yet.  I have confidence in my ability to manage the jobsites and do the necessary paperwork.  This knowledge takes time and it tests my patience.  

The first week of work, was a whirlwind of massive information download and paper chasing which ended in my getting the flu.  My first weekend I spent feverish in bed, unable to read because I ached all over.  I had a bad fever.  Hell, even my eyeballs hurt.  My mind rewound on my decision to come here, Lou, your shit is too weak for this.  You are going down in the flames of a viral/bacteriological fury. Well, my illness passed and I recovered quickly and started wandering the streets of Kabul looking for power tools with my co-worker Allen.  Then just as suddenly I found myself flying to Herat city every week.  Herat is in the western edge of Afghanistan, right by the Iranian border, but more on that later.  This is where the jobs I am to "supervise" are.  I inherited five jobsites that I am supposed to manage.  Hmmm.  In the city I am even more isolated than in Kabul because there are no other expats out there.  None.  No expat "nightlife" at all.  I hold the weight of the heightened isolation at bay by working until 8 or 9 pm.  They serve me dinner at my desk.  

Herat is a nice town with trees and clean air, which cannot be said for Kabul.  An example of the vibe in Herat can be told by the events that unfolded on this one desperately beautiful Tuesday night.  I come down from my office after dark into the rose garden in the courtyard of the Herat office.  My rooming house is on the other side of the courtyard.  I stop on the porch and gaze up at the twinkling night sky and take in deep breaths of effervescent air.  As I descend the few steps to the garden path, I notice a group of men sitting on chairs in the grass.  They are my security guards and some other workers.  They all rise up to greet me.  It is a sign of respect to rise whenever someone approaches.  I smile at them in the moonlight and say Salaam Aleikum, the Afghani greeting of may god bless you.  They respond by inviting me, to join them for a cup of tea in their broken English.  I start to thank them for the invitation but...and I stop in my tracks.  The moonlight is shimmering off their shining eyes and grinning smiles.  Their gestures exude a welcoming feeling...I accept, and I am humbled by their openness and their kindness.  I share three cups of tea with them while they try to speak in broken English, while I laughingly try to learn a couple of Dari phrases.  Tasha Cor, thank you.  Time passes as we exchange a comedic charades dotted with stilted descriptions of our respective homelands.  The moon glistens off the watered roses.  I have arrived and Herat is extending its embrace to me.  It makes me smile.  It calms my beating heart.

Back in Kabul, I finally get my feet under me and I realize the ground here does not shake from bomb blasts.  It vibrates with life.  It pulses with activity.  There is a constant flurry of ongoing activities punctuated by the Inmans call to prayer and incredibly loud low flying helicopters and fast moving Army convoys.  Balancing these diametrically opposed scenes is the essence of living here.  So welcome my friends and family.  Welcome to life in Afghanistan.

I left you, if memory serves me, my dear readers, standing in a parking lot at Kabul International Airport, squinting into the glaring sun, waiting for my driver.  Walt the Texan, my "grab him and bag him" co-worker, grabbed his cellphone and called someone named Akbarfarzi or something and said in his best Texas drawl, "Wherz ma car?  Where is Majeed  Who is this?" His eyes twirled in their sockets, "Don't tell me you forgot about me, don't tell me that...again?  Really? All the while he is making faces that resemble a man going through a Joe Cocker moment. He slips on his cobalt blue sunglasses and turns to me. I'll tell you what there Lou, with these guys, you gotta keep on em and slickem, slackem slokem, all the time. I nod knowingly and then I tilt my head at an impossible angle and look sidelong at him.  "Excuse me, I'm gonna do what exactly?"  How does what ever the hell he said work?  More importantly, what does "slickeming, slackeming, slokeming" look like?  That was the third or fourth time I heard his pontification directed at no one in general and everyone in particular.  I made a really wise choice and stayed far behind my mirrored sunglasses.  Way back.  It was a good thing that my popping eyeballs were completely masked by my poly-carbonate lenses, lest somebody see my utter confounded look of utter amazement.  My brain lost traction for a while, as I tried to fathom what in the hell he was saying, and why was he repeating this phrase incessantly to people who obviously can not understand one word of English, much less Texican for Christ sakes.  Of course, on the outside of my blown out brainpan, I continued to stand there acting nonplussed.  Totally cool in my sweating cowboy boots.   I casually shifted my weight into an unconcerned slouch.  On the inside I was pondering the flying circus I had just joined. Hey, at least Kabul did not smell like New Dehli, India, I concluded mindlessly...hey, that is something...isn't it?  It is isn't it?

Dirty boys ambled around me with their grubby hands out, looking for, well, looking for a hand out obviously. "Gim me daller" they marble mouthed and move in ever closer. "Wutchu boys want now...get outa here." Walt proclaimed with a dismissive wave of his hand.  "Go wan, get outa here."  My two baggage cart guys who were still arguing in Dari over which one is "officially" pushing my baggage cart, twirl on the kids and  say something terse sounding.  The kids respond in a smarmy sounding fuck off and slink away immediately accosting the other white people pouring out of the foreboding Kabul International Airport Terminal building.  "Gim me daller" I hear in the fading distance.  Festooned in peeling blue plastic lettering the terminal building greets me with the "Welcome to Afghanistan" greeting.  Well, they must have a sense of humor I muse...now that's another story entirely which I will get to later.

We trudged past the first parking lot which was a few hundred yards from the international terminal building and decorated with huge concrete crash blocks.  This lot was crammed with huge black SUV's sporting monstrous antennas and cow catcher bumpers that would look perfect on a 1850's steam engine.  A might bit overstated on Ford Excursions and Expeditions, but the flat black cow catchers did add a counterpoint to the entire scene and blended well with the runway line of muscled guys in full fatigue gear sporting bullet proof vests and a vast array of black pistols strapped to every appendage.  All of them are total posers, arms crossed and brows furrowed.  They look exactly like mercenaries, which I stupidly realize they actually are.  I am not talking smack about these guys, quite the contrary, I am merely the observer reporting faithfully on the almost obscene absurdity of the moment.  Then it all dawns on me.  All at once.  This ain't a Hollywood set on TV.  This is real and unfolding in living color right before my dilated eyeballs.  Hmm, would you look at that.  Well I will be damned to hell I'm sure...

They slung black M-16's around their shoulders like so many backpackers heading for a picnic.  They lean in toward me expectantly, like that lineup of important looking limo drivers you see at airports, holding signs for Mr. Albatross and Mr. Perfidy.  Yeah, here I was staring at a selection of Halliburton guys who were looking for their new "meat".  I knew they were Halliburtonians because they had black "H"s tattooed to the furrows in their foreheads...I mean duh.  Me and Walt ambled right up to them while they slid their mirrored sunglasses off their greasy tanned noses. A couple of the larger ones started to extend their hands in greeting as we shuffled past them.  I smiled a stupid grin and waded right past them.  

"Har ee iz.  Where u bin Majeed?"  Walt broadcast.   "Dontcha love me anymore?" The Afghan smiled wide and extended his hand, then pressed his right hand to his heart in greeting.  I smiled back and kind of bowed and gave him the 'Namaste' Indian hand sign.  With that we strolled through two more parking lots for the elite commandos and Army brass, past the dirty green Connex guard gate and into to the 3rd parking lot.  I was officially out of the airport and standing in the ancient city of Kabul.  I was stumped...what is up with all the faded puke green paint?

Driving through Kabul is a secretly choreographed chaos machine coupled with the dizzying dynamo hum of bustling street bazaar commerce.  There is stuff to buy everywhere and tons of people in millions of Toyota Corollas driving around to get at it.  There are three traffic lights in town which means every intersection is a traffic circle where the rules of the road are based on whoever gets in front of you first.  Sometimes you notice the other madmen drivers react to our fully armed guard with his AK 47 in the front seat...this helps us work our way through the car entropy.  We go everywhere with our Afghani guards...even when we walk down the street to the Army base (more on that froggy scene later)

The fascinating thing about the traffic is the mix of conveyances and the frenzied ballet of cars, trucks, Humvees, man push carts, horse driven carts, bicycles and whacked out pedestrians, who never consider looking for traffic before stepping off the median.  It is really odd to watch, but it seems that the walkers are startled and surprised when they see a car barreling down on them.  Their look is kind of like, "Where did that thing come from and why is it in my way?"

What is totally amazing in this apparent vehicle free-for-all is the lack of monstrous dents in all the cars.  Everyone drives within inches of each other, using their horns like a language, while barely missing every other vehicle they come close to.  I kid you not, I could reach out the window and snatch somebody's cell phone right out of their hands, we drive that close.  (Everybody in Afghanistan has a cell phone.  Tremendous poverty does not stop cell phone sales.) There is the general rules-of-the-road concept of traffic moving in the same direction, mostly  For no apparent reason someone decides to drive the opposite way and barrels right toward you.  I mean they just bear down on you and by some unfathomable method, one person veers off at the last moment.  I am confident that those opposition drivers have some perfectly rational reasons for driving straight AT oncoming traffic, but you don't really have much time to ponder that.  I basically have to resign myself into the belief that my driver and the AK 47 armed guard sitting in the front passenger seat, know when the game of chicken ends, and evasive maneuvers start.  As the days of being chauffeured around Kabul add up, I have come to realize that there are no rules of the road around here just general guidelines enforced by the fact that you will go to jail if you get into a wreck.  Period.  This keeps all drivers on hyper alert mode which is just peachy by me.  Me, I would so LOVE to drive around here...It would be an absolute riot.  Mad Max meets Gonzo Lou in Massoud Circle...bring it!

Oh, there is one significant detail that prevents the driving frenzy from turning into a crash test dummy testing grounds.  Afghan law apparently states that if you maim someone in a traffic accident, you are responsible for them and their family until they get better.  If they cannot get back to work you must pay to support them for the rest of their lives.  If you kill someone, you must support the deceased family forever.  That is if and when you get out of jail.  The powers that be in my company, Ti, will not let us drive...ever!  Cause for immediate termination.  On a more positive note, I have only seen one semi serious wreck here in 4 weeks.  Everybody was fine, the totaled car was being pushed off the road.  Forget insurance, drive responsibly or you become the responsible party.  Sounds simple enough.

My living situation is larger than a dorm room and smaller than a decent hotel room.  Some of my co-workers have bigger rooms, the bastards.  Some have attached bathrooms and some have walk in closets with doors to outside balconies.  Right now I am on the third floor balcony, taking in some afternoon sun with my friend Ruppert.  I am on the 'beach' which I have taken to calling the third floor balcony.   This is as close to a beach as we are going to get for a while I think.  I imagine importing a couple of tons of sand, a couple of umbrella tables and plastic palm trees.  I imagine huge pineapple rum drinks and a pool.  I imagine I am in Paris sometimes too.  A man can dream.  

Well, I finished my first day of work.  It went well, I think.  I really don't know because I am still in a daze about the fact that I am here.  I attended the morning "board meeting" on the 5th floor at 7 am with VP Mr. Malik.  After the meeting he invited me into his private office (very nicely appointed by the way) and we spoke for about an hour.  I asked for some org charts and documentation that would help me understand the company structure and operations.  He gave me a chart and I soon found out that half the people listed are no longer with the company or in different positions.  I am not sure whether I should be concerned about this or not.  I discovered on my first day that the company has gone through, is still going through, what is a kind way to say this, oh yes, they call it a "restructuring".  All the departments indicated in my new freshly printed color laser organizational chart, have different names now, they have different Directors and they are in different physical locations in the building.  I realize that I am obviously part of this "re-structuring".  Well, this  particular corporate working scene is very interesting, I gotta tell ya...are they all like this?

Dennis the architect gave me the 1 hour tour and introductions to the 5 floors of people working for the company.  His floor is "Design" down on the first, with my friend Jeff Ruppert (who turned me onto this job, is currently on vacation in the states, priceless).  Construction (my department) is on the 2nd floor while Logistics & Procurement are on the 3rd floor.  The 4th floor is Quality Control, Estimator and Finance.  Well that is what the placard says, "Estimator", not Estimating Department or some corporate sounding title.  The 5th floor is Upper Management and Chief of Staff Ali, a very "trendy, bright young Afghan man".  The basement is reserved for the mole men from IT.  Dennis takes me on the roof and we gaze upon our domain.  "It is a little hazy out today." I observe.  "No, it is really kinda clear out today.  Look we can actually see the mountains." states Dennis in all seriousness.

I am set free from "Dennis the Orienteer" (I miss him already) and I wander onto the Construction floor and introduce myself.  Hmmm, there is no boss to "show me the ropes" (he is in the states right now)  I find no emissary, no hand pumping human resources glad-hander who is ever so excited to parade someone new around.  Not even a person hanging back on the horizon.  This is the moment when I realize that I am not going to go through any more of an orientation.  That was it.  I was just "orienteered" and now I am on my own.  Literally.  You want to hear about what it is like for me to work in an office.  Stop giggling.  An office where I am not the the grand pooba?  Well too bad.  I am not going to talk about it.  Not now.  I will save that tiny tidbit of vicarious experiential-ism and share that whole exiting monologue with you later, because right now, I absolutely have no clue what "the office" means.  So I find myself standing there, totally suited up with my "brand new computer briefcase" dangling uselessly from my hand, and I have nowhere in particular to go.  There is no office door with my name on it.  No coffee mug presentation.  I take a cautious step forward.  Welcome to "work" in Afghanistan Lou.

I say hello and smile at everybody I see.  They all stand up and mumble softly, and put their right hand on their heart.  I take this greeting in and mimic the hand movement.  After shaking five or six hundred Afghanis hands, I ask the first white guy I see where I might find my desk. (and my new life by the way)  He looks at me with that certain far away gaze that speaks volumes...I thank him quietly and wade into "Lou's Life in Office-the Prequel".  More later on that.

All the expats live in the guesthouse which is right next door to Ti's 5 story office building which happens to be the tallest building nearby.  Tallest by like 3 stories taller.   The ½ acre area is surrounded by 8' walls, complete with an armored control point entrance and between 8 and 10 Afghan army guys in full helmeted battle gear spread around the compound.  There are armed guards stationed at every entrance, and on every other floor of the office.  Makes the home scene nice and cozy, civil insurrection style.  One nice thing is that my room faces west which on clear mornings (a rarity) I gaze out at the snowcapped mountains of the Hindu Cush.  The auditory ambience of city life is punctuated by the 24/7 droning of the industrial generators next door where the UN International Election Committee personnel live.  The house is beautiful but the 'force protection' decorator has got to go.  Forget about the the rooftop gun tower and the concertina wire laced through the flapping green visual screening on the chain link fencing.  That decoration goes without saying, I mean really.  But what is with the air conditioning units bolted haphazardly on the exterior wall?  They are stuck up there like band posters at the Boulder mall.  From an aesthetic design perspective, I just don't know where to start.  If this visual insult wasn't enough, there are a bunch of workers retrofitting a gorgeous Pakistani designed house across the street.  I am afraid they hired the same "force protection" decorator as next door.  It is a travesty.

So, "How is it going?" you all are asking.  I will attempt to describe the indescribable.  I will bring you here vicariously if you like.  Five weeks into this lifestyle and I am getting my head around the overwhelming demands of my work.  It is constant, relentless and work travels uninvited to the lunch table and our nights out.  I have found some solace in the relationships I am making with both the Afghans and the expats.  I have also found some tremendous weirdness and constant friction running rampant throughout this whole scene.  Go figure.  People are who they are, including myself, wherever you live.  By accepting this, what is, I am allowing myself to fully experience this incredible adventure through my Cuban Eyes. 

Thoughts of all of you friends and my dear family remind me everyday what a phantasmagorical life existence I have enjoyed prior to this...so somehow in the middle of this cacophony, I am remembering how lucky I truly am.  In fact, last night I paraded about like a drunk monkey in a set of Afghan made chain-saw leather chaps...yes, somebody had the red "record" button on, thank god.  Somewhere, I believe the production of Robin William's "Gooooooooood Evening Afghanistan!!!" is starting.  People, I guess some things never change.  Fierce hugs and huge kisses to you all.  You are in my dreams and in my mind...