their cell phones. “What would you do if we tried to take a picture of your women?” one soldier said to a smiling Afghan, who snapped the picture anyway.
Regardless of any of this, I wrote the story that was right in front of me—the “forgotten war,” the bored soldiers, feeling left out of the Iraq action, and Crowley, unlocked and unloaded. He left for vacation, to get married, the same day the photographer and I flew back to Bagram Airfield.
The story got a lot of reaction. I realized how carefully everyone read anything about the troops. Through an unspoken agreement, I was expected to leave out the boredom and the fact that Crowley repeatedly was not locked and loaded. I told my critics that I just wrote what I saw. I moved on.
I had no idea what would happen.
CHAPTER 5
ONE WAY OR ANOTHER
I n Kabul that spring of 2005, the lack of war was as obvious as the bikinis at the pool of L’Atmosphère, the restaurant of wicker chairs, glass-topped tables, and absurdly priced wine that had become the equivalent of the sitcom
Cheers
in the Afghan capital. How quiet was it? It was so quiet that an award-winning war correspondent would spend the summer filming a documentary about a Kabul school for female drivers. It was so quiet that the photographer and I rode around in a government bus in Kabul where workers yanked beggars off the street, effectively kidnapping them for a day, holding them in a school and feeding them some gruel before releasing them, a catch-and-release program for the poor. (By now we knew the regular beggars and their acts. The boy with flippers for arms. The girl who wore her blind brother’s suit jacket and led him around by his one good arm. Egg Boy, an entrepreneur who sobbed daily next to broken eggs at various intersections, raking in egg money from concerned foreigners.)
It was so quiet that I went to a brothel for fun, so quiet that I knew I should probably fly home to India to spend time with Chris, so quiet that I decided it was a better idea to hang out in the quiet. It was also so quiet that the U.S. ambassador, Zalmay Khalilzad, left Afghanistan for Iraq, his job done in Kabul, a job transfer that wouldonly later seem significant, when the U.S. embassy finally got ambassadors who acted like ambassadors. In a blue tie, dark blue suit, and white shirt, Zal was predictably somber at his last press conference, telling the room that the country was in the fourth kilometer of a ten-kilometer journey. He also said he was not “a potted plant” and was available to help if Afghanistan ever wanted it.
“My time has come to say farewell,” he told the standing-room-only crowd. “I will never forget Afghanistan, and I will return.”
His show was Oscar-worthy, and I feared he was about to burst into a version of “Don’t Cry for Me, Afghanistan.” A few Afghan journalists actually seemed close to tears. Their deference toward Zal bordered on worship.
And then, with a wave and a smile that could have powered a small Afghan village, the Viceroy was gone. I didn’t know it at the time, but that would be the last large press conference I would ever attend, or be invited to, at the U.S. embassy, because in the future the embassy would stop holding free-for-all events, stop opening its doors so wide. And Zal would be the last U.S. ambassador who talked to Karzai that often.
Because Kabul was so quiet, our team—Farouq, Nasir, the photographer, and me—went to the most decrepit circus on the planet, the Pak-Asia Circus, making its first grand tour from Pakistan. It featured a ripped tent, a tightrope that sagged dangerously close to the ground, and so much more. The big top here was more of a sad raggedy small top. The knife thrower accidentally hit his beautiful female assistant in the thigh, drawing blood, but here in Afghanistan, such minor bloodshed qualified as slapstick comedy. The circus was usually packed, mainly with government workers, even the army, who didn’t have to pay
Regardless of any of this, I wrote the story that was right in front of me—the “forgotten war,” the bored soldiers, feeling left out of the Iraq action, and Crowley, unlocked and unloaded. He left for vacation, to get married, the same day the photographer and I flew back to Bagram Airfield.
The story got a lot of reaction. I realized how carefully everyone read anything about the troops. Through an unspoken agreement, I was expected to leave out the boredom and the fact that Crowley repeatedly was not locked and loaded. I told my critics that I just wrote what I saw. I moved on.
I had no idea what would happen.
CHAPTER 5
ONE WAY OR ANOTHER
I n Kabul that spring of 2005, the lack of war was as obvious as the bikinis at the pool of L’Atmosphère, the restaurant of wicker chairs, glass-topped tables, and absurdly priced wine that had become the equivalent of the sitcom
Cheers
in the Afghan capital. How quiet was it? It was so quiet that an award-winning war correspondent would spend the summer filming a documentary about a Kabul school for female drivers. It was so quiet that the photographer and I rode around in a government bus in Kabul where workers yanked beggars off the street, effectively kidnapping them for a day, holding them in a school and feeding them some gruel before releasing them, a catch-and-release program for the poor. (By now we knew the regular beggars and their acts. The boy with flippers for arms. The girl who wore her blind brother’s suit jacket and led him around by his one good arm. Egg Boy, an entrepreneur who sobbed daily next to broken eggs at various intersections, raking in egg money from concerned foreigners.)
It was so quiet that I went to a brothel for fun, so quiet that I knew I should probably fly home to India to spend time with Chris, so quiet that I decided it was a better idea to hang out in the quiet. It was also so quiet that the U.S. ambassador, Zalmay Khalilzad, left Afghanistan for Iraq, his job done in Kabul, a job transfer that wouldonly later seem significant, when the U.S. embassy finally got ambassadors who acted like ambassadors. In a blue tie, dark blue suit, and white shirt, Zal was predictably somber at his last press conference, telling the room that the country was in the fourth kilometer of a ten-kilometer journey. He also said he was not “a potted plant” and was available to help if Afghanistan ever wanted it.
“My time has come to say farewell,” he told the standing-room-only crowd. “I will never forget Afghanistan, and I will return.”
His show was Oscar-worthy, and I feared he was about to burst into a version of “Don’t Cry for Me, Afghanistan.” A few Afghan journalists actually seemed close to tears. Their deference toward Zal bordered on worship.
And then, with a wave and a smile that could have powered a small Afghan village, the Viceroy was gone. I didn’t know it at the time, but that would be the last large press conference I would ever attend, or be invited to, at the U.S. embassy, because in the future the embassy would stop holding free-for-all events, stop opening its doors so wide. And Zal would be the last U.S. ambassador who talked to Karzai that often.
Because Kabul was so quiet, our team—Farouq, Nasir, the photographer, and me—went to the most decrepit circus on the planet, the Pak-Asia Circus, making its first grand tour from Pakistan. It featured a ripped tent, a tightrope that sagged dangerously close to the ground, and so much more. The big top here was more of a sad raggedy small top. The knife thrower accidentally hit his beautiful female assistant in the thigh, drawing blood, but here in Afghanistan, such minor bloodshed qualified as slapstick comedy. The circus was usually packed, mainly with government workers, even the army, who didn’t have to pay
Similar Books
