Burqa to Burning Man Blog

afghan wedding

nancy — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 18:32:25 GMT

so after 3 attempts i finally made it to an afghan wedding. i think because i totally didn't expect to actually go and was going to work all afternoon is why it came together. murphy's law. it was a staff member who got married. the whole situation was kind of surreal. i went during the ladies time. so apparently only men go to the wedding ceremony, and close male relatives. and then then men celebrate in the morning. i went in the afternoon and it was all women, dressed in their disco finest. i swear. glitter in the hair, irridescent shiny clothes, lots and lots of hairspray. i swear it was an 80s disco. i felt so plain and drab in my grey longsleeved shirt. apparently it's okay to dress trampy when there's no men in the room! and i left all my hoochie clothes (read: tank tops and tops that don't cover my butt) at home thinking what's the point! there were these girls dancing in these disco gypsy get ups. blue ali baba pants, pink cap sleeved dresses, scarf on the head, tons of makeup, the whole bit. thought they were hired dancers, turns out they're the groom's sisters. of course! they had a live band doing this crazy middle eastern electronic type music. there was an alley between the chairs where people would dance one or 2 at a time. there were tons of people there. easily 300. when people get married they invite the whole darn town. it's a bit of a status thing. the ironic part is they spend a ton of money (that they usually don't really have) on these huge affairs, and the bride and groom were at the place the same time as me and the guests for 5 minutes from what i saw. and i was there over 2 hours. the bride left the first party and goes and spends a couple of hours at the beauty parlor. so we're eating food at her party and she's off at the salon! when they finally appeared, the bride and groom walked through the dancing alley, and the camera crew was leading the way. and behind them the ali baba girls were throwing glitter. i left when they were bringing out the cake. i was there long enough to get the idea.

afghan reflections

nancy — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 09:40:46 GMT

Hello everyone! So I know I've been a bit quiet lately. But here I am! Still in Afghanistan, with less than a week to go. I figure this is a good time to write, before the stress sets in of trying to accomplish all my tasks. Right now it's Saturday morning and still not real to me that I'm leaving so soon. So I've had a relatively quiet few weeks, focusing on my work. Haven't done a lot of site visits - lots of computer time. That's why I haven't written much! I'm definitely going to be sad to leave here. If anything has left an impression on me about Afghansitan, it's how kind and giving the people are. There are so many different types of people here - different ethnic groups, educated, uneducated. Maybe I'm blind, but it's hard for me to see the vindictive warrior side that typifies Afghans. I also spend a lot of time with the women, not with the men. And the men I work with are all doctors, and other professionals. It seems like people have just made do the best they could in difficult circumstances. They definitely don't seem worn out to me or beaten down by life. Not at all. I don't even get that impression from the village women who have lost husbands and have a million kids. There is a serenity, a kindness. If I'm left with anything, it's how big people's hearts are here. Amazing. Afghanistan is a lot of tea drinking. It's sitting on the floor to take your meals. It's putting your hand over your heart to say hello instead of shaking hands. It's camels on the side of the road with about a foot of cord tying their ankles so they don't run away. Afghanistan is round bread with every single meal, that has little dots pressed into the middle. Afghanistan is newly paved roads with barely any cars on them because no one can afford them. Afghanistan is people who speak 4 different languages without second thought (Dari, English, Pashto, Uzbeki). Afghanistan is eating the most tasty grapes you have ever had in your life. Afghanistan is eating fresh melons on a fork like a popsicle after every meal. Afghanistan is smart young women who lost five years of schooling and were forced to stay home and weave carpets under the taliban. Afghanistan is hopeful. Ok well that's all for now. Maybe you'll hear from me before I head back on Thurs, maybe not. But just know that Afghanistan is not the scary place you may think and it's nothing like Iraq. It's just people trying to get through the day, and many are doing the best they can to make this place better. Love, n.

dust and dreams

nancy — Wed, 25 Jul 2007 13:20:25 GMT

hi everyone! It's hot and dusty as usual in Afghanistan. My life made a bit of a shift today. I found out this morning that I will spend the rest of my time here (1 month) in Shiberghan rather than Maimana. The old governor who had been given the boot has returned to power and not everyone is happy about it, so I'm in a different province now. It makes sense anyway, since the most of the staff I had been working with in Maimana are away for awhile. The news came as a bit of a surprise this morning, having my morning tea and found out that I would be moving my base in two hours. But I do like it here in Shiberghan. I spent a week here last week. It is a little more developed, the girls don't all wear burqas and people are more educated. And I've made friends with some of the local staff here. In Maimana there is a tight ex-pat crowd, and they're all going away on holiday anyway. I will miss my runs on the airstrip in Maimana - had the best run the other day and realized I should take a pic to share with all of you. Alas.... So I've been busy working on the Adolescent Development lessons I'm creating. I'm finding how this is a perfect project for me. I'm not only teaching teens and parents about sex ed, but I'm teaching life skills - how to have healthy relationships, healthy communication, etc. I must say my years at Omega and in healing school are helping a lot - a number of activities that the teens of rural Afghanistan will be doing are inspired from activities I've done in personal transformation workshops at home. So I am spreading the light around here, even though it often doesn't feel like it! (I realize I am just one girl and I have a sneaking suspicion that I won't be saving the world before I'm 30. So much for that goal). But more and more it makes sense why I was brought here to do this work. My life has been full of funny juxtapositions. Ordering sparkly purple platform boots for burning man while in a country wear women wear burqas. (I'm dying to put a burqa on and walk through a bazaar those boots on. They're not being sent here though. Oh well.) Driving in a car listening to the King Missle's Song "Detachable Penis" while looking out the window and seeing a man made hill in a field with a bunkbed on it. Of course. That's where I'd put a bunk bed. Following the Lindsay Lohan scandal while others are worried about Pakistan's instability. Thank God I rely on others to update me with the security situations!

more from ol afghie and burning man prep

nancy — Thu, 12 Jul 2007 16:08:35 GMT

hey guys. saw more of afghanistan yesterday. actually a lot for one day. i probably barely went more than 30 miles, but i was in the car much of the day. which i don't mind b/c i have a strong stomach and find it all fascinating. so interesting to see everything going on out the window. i went to check out our programs so i could get a much better sense of the programs that i am working on. first stop was a village where the school health and nutrition class was held in a tent. It was a family's home, made out of plastic that said unicef on it. these nutrition programs are based on a child to child module, older kids teaching the younger ones. the people in this village are pashtuns who tend to be more conservative and not so crazy about the education of girls (the taliban was a pashtun movement). so the girls teaching weren't much older than the others. since whitie was there visiting, i of course attracted a bit of a crowd, with a number of women sitting around the tent outside. they had tattoos on their chins and foreheads. after each class i visited someone had turned my shoes facing out and lined them up for me. now that is hospitality. we must train our children in the states to do this. (yeah, right). second school visit was in a school in another mud village. we went up a random staircase, and what do you know? i'm in a bright pink room with blue trim on the windows. who woulda thought. these girls were a little cleaner, the teachers a little older. when were leaving i saw this baby who was so tiny he looked like a bird. turns out he was 1 year old, but looked 6 months. the mother couldn't have been more than 14. turns out she just arrived in the village (girls stay with their mothers for the first year of their 1st baby's life, then move in with hub's family) and that village didn't have the parenting and health classes that this village had. it made me really see what a difference this work does and how much it is needed. let's see, what else. i ate a whole 1/2 a watermelon for lunch yesterday. that was a first, and really quite satisfying. dug right in with a fork. i've been getting to know the afghan staff which has been a pleasure. bounced home in the back of our car yesterday with 2 women from my department. very interesting to watch them chatting happily with the men in the car, and then pulling the burqa over their faces when we came into villages or passed men walking along with their animals. they weren't crazy about the burqa (one girls lived in pakistan for most of her life and didn't need to wear it there) but it's so engrained in the culture, and in this culture you don't rock the boat. even women walking on the street would turn and put their back to the road when we came by. if they had just a scarf on they would cover everything but their eyes. so let's see how it goes, with me introducing sex ed in a culture where people are too conservative to even educate their kids about their bodies. how i'm going to talk about hiv and pregnancy while avoiding mentioning sex or boys bits is still beyond me. but at least i have lots of support from the women i am working with to tell me what will fly, what won't and what's needed. let's see, what else. been practicing yoga, and went for another run on the airstrip. i am determined not to turn into a cow, no matter how much rice and nan they feed me. heading out on sunday to spend the week at another office that i stopped by briefly last week. this office has implemented a girls program that i am using as a starting off point for the adolescent development curriculum. on another note, beginning to think about the burn. that template must be beginning to enter into my consciousness! bought my airplane tickets today. flying out to san diego and riding up with my best girl and her hubs. flying outta reno on tues. will only have 24 hours in dc between afghan and cali. crazy. can you expect anything less?

It's evening prayer call time. Do you know where your children are?

nancy — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 15:19:04 GMT

Hey everyone! So I've been in Afghanistan almost a week. And my luggage still has yet to arrive. Tomorrow is supposed to be my lucky day. It finally arrived in Kabul on Saturday. I was in a tiny 10 seater plane that scoots ngo workers around the country, sitting on the tarmac, waiting to depart for Maimana, and I swore I could see them unloading my bag from the Dubai flight that had just arrived. A car from Kabul was supposed to bring my bag in a car with some folks to the next town over, and I'll be passing through tommorow. I can't wait to have my razor, my dental floss, my nail clippers, my mouthwash. Obviously my hippie days are further and further behind. I have been in Save the Children's Saripul office for the past 2 days. We have been conducting site visits and meeting with communities to anaylze their educational situations. It has been quite varied. Yesterday we visited 2 schools built a few years back by Save the Children. Each time we have to meet with men and women separately. It definitely doubles the effort. But it's interesting the different responses you get to the same questions. Today a man, a village elder, was in the room with the women and took over the show and they deferred most of the answering to him. So today, we were about 1/2 hour off the main drag (which is actually paved if you can believe it). Our truck went through some serious terrain - over a small river, through a mini grand canyon. Which was all the more surreal given that when you're on the main road it looks flat flat flat for a long time. Well don't be deceived. The villages are made from mud. Some have been abandoned, probably too dilapitated. The people we met today are Pashtun and also Bedoin tribe people of some type. The dress is different and the language too. They are semi-nomadic, moving in the spring to where it is more lush. Right now it is quite dry and they send the kids on a 2.5 hour journey to get water. Or maybe longer. I forget. But according to the old man who kept taking over, b/c they don't have a well, kids need to spend a lot of time fetching water and wouldn't have time for school. Not like there's anyone in the village with more than an Islamic education who could teach them anyway. Apparently they have some village people going to school in Pakistan. And apparently they would come back to teach in their home village. So, no, the village has no school, but the kids do get some Islamic education. The girls get engaged around 13 years old and get married a couple of years later. The boys get married a couple of years older than the girls. The women had these beautiful tribal sparkly dresses. One girl had serious sparkles on her eyelids. Very burning man. Where they get this stuff in the middle of nowhere is beyond me. The women had these little caps on with their headscarves on top. Unfortunately they refused to have their picture taken. There is much more modesty and whatnot than I ever encountered in India. In India the whole darn country wanted to be photographed. I've had to engrain a lot in my mind so far. But I'm here for a month and a half more, so there will be plenty of other opps. Got some pics yesterday of some women from the village that actually had a school. Been thinking a lot about how I want to fit myself in this picture professionally. I intend to have something full-time lined up for the fall by the time I leave here. Whether it is in the US, or here, or elsewhere, I'm still not sure. Afghanistan is definitely an interesting place to work. Save has so many security protocols that feel natural at this point that I don't feel like that hampers getting things done. But would I be able to stay long term in a place where I would not necessarily feel safe walking alone? Even though I am in a safe area, the mangy dogs still freak me out, guards at buildings with kalishnikov rifles will always be unnerving and being stared at incessantly never feels normal. Our office in Maimana is next door to where the Taliban had their HQ. Now it's a French NGO. Apparently it's haunted and spooky. There's a shock. Better send it some of the good ju ju that I've learned from BBSH (Barbara Brennan School of Healing). From a distance. Afghanistan is one of those places that was hard to picture before I arrived, but now I'm here, it's like, oh yeah, of course. Kabul isn't as bombed out as I expected, but we are 5 years into post-Taliban development and enterprise. Where I am doesn't feel chaotic at all. But there are still Russian tanks abandoned on the sides of the roads, in the most random places. Not all the women wear Burqas. But they all cover their hair. But it's so strange when they do wear them- it's like it wipes their personality away. And then you get to know these beautiful women under the burqa and it's strange and surreal to think it's the same person, that there's a a life under the blue or white cloth.

Burqa part 2

nancy — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 10:56:02 GMT

Just arrived at a field office in Sar-i-Pul where I will be spending a few days this week. Most of the ride was super bumpy, definitely not for those who get motion sickness. The landscape went from big sandy hills to desert to a bit of green. Had my white headscarf and big sunglasses on in the car - looked like a sickly elizabeth taylor. or something. Did the funniest thing yesterday. Went running on an airstrip. With a headscarf and longsleeves. And brown little boys sneakers that I bought in Kabul b/c I thought there would be no chance of being able to run in Afghanistan. Well I was wrong. The view was incredible. And I think the little boys herding sheep alongside got a big kick out of it. And it was totally worth it since I can't remember the last time I went a whole week without running. Was beginning to feel like a cow, esp now that I'm back on the rice diet. Going to help with an assessment this week and begin digging into the curriculum I'm adapting. I forgot to mention in my last blog, I'm here for a 2 month internship with Save the Children. I'm helping to expand their school health and nutrition curriculum to include adolescents and help develop a model curriculum that can be scaled up. Been here a week. Still waiting for my luggage. At least it's in Afghanistan now! Just not in the same place I am....yet. (This mercury retrograde is kicking my ass!) Lotsa love to all! N.

Burqa to Burning Man Part 1

nancy — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 06:36:28 GMT

This is my first attempt at blogging. Not convinced people actually read blogs b/c I can't say that I do. But people have asked for it, so here goes! So I'm in Kabul. Kabul sounds like 5 am prayer calls and ice cream trucks. Kabul smells like burning plastic and other yummy delights. I've only been here two days and honestly haven't seen much besides my offices, my guest house and an expat mexican joint with contraband liquor. I go up north tomorrow where I will be living for the next 2 months and I will have a little more freedom. Here I get driven even the one block between home and work and after dark and on Fridays I'm always in a convoy with 2 cars. My luggage is still in Dubai and I've been wearing the same outfits for 4 days and am definitely pulling a britney spears, no holds barred. my hippie days are still not very far behind.....