The white kite flip-flops above the houses, its movements muddled
by the dirty, broken clouds behind it and the early winter snow of the mountains
that surround Kabul. My neighbour’s small boy, who never lived through the ban
on kite flying during the Taliban era, is learning how to manoeuvre his one
with skill, perhaps also becoming aware of the history of various battles over
the skies of the capital. Traditionally pairs of boys, a pilot and runner, work
as a team to chop down other kites by using the kite string. This is covered
with finely crushed glass to strengthen it and enable the pilot to wrap his
line around other lines and sever them. Once loosed, his runner predicts where
the falling kite will land and sprints to claim it ahead of other boys who have
seen the prize tumble. You don’t see men flying kites. Needless to say,
unfortunately, neither do you see any women or girls. Afghan men seem to
progress to other pastimes – keeping pigeons is one. From the rooftop opposite
a middle-aged man calls to his birds with sucking lips as he waves a long dark
flag, calling them home. Similar to kite-flying the goal is to attract other
birds and acquire them into your flock while avoiding this happening to yours.
The pleasure of kites and pigeons share a joy in the act, but even more, what
you can gain.
Afghanistan is a country that has known much war. This is an
understatement of course. The past forty years have seen multiple violent
takeovers of the country including two foreign military occupations. To be
ruled by the gun is what everyone knows here as well as the fear and
uncertainty of violence. Amniyat (security) is what everyone longs for
but has never really known in their lifetime. When there is not a foreign
‘infidel’ taking over Afghanistan and using it as a pawn in their geo-political
games, there is a domestic ethnic dimension which is as fierce and bloody as
any mujahedeen resistance. When the Russians left in 1989 after their ten-year
proxy war with America, the warlords who had fought to evict them, rich and
well-armed from CIA support funnelled through the Pakistani secret service ISI,
used their power to vie for control over the country. The worst of the fighting
happened in the capital with the various warlords taking up positions on the
commanding hills that dominate Kabul’s skyline, bombing and blasting all hell
out of each other. Thousands of civilians were killed, maimed or scarred in the
process. In those days, so the history books tell us, the night sky was full of
flares to illuminate targets and daytime littered with rockets winging their
way through the air to devastate government ministries and innocent peoples’
homes with impunity and lethal intent. Such was the fatalism of some locals
that they started to walk brazenly down the middle of the street rather than
scurry along close to buildings and walls – a dangerous form of liberation from
fear but all they could do in reaction to the horror engulfing their lives.
Most staff members I talk to have personal stories which tell of how they
experienced this – a limp, a fatherless man, a family in exile or lost to them.
Sunshine streams into my room while a green mesh gives privacy but
also creates a barrier between me and the kite-flying boy. A pigeon belonging
to my neighbour lands on the rusty, spiked perimeter fence designed to keep out
would-be intruders and peers at me through the cracked, bird shit-stained
window pane. I am warm, secure and trapped. I long to fly up and away from the
control, threat and suspicion of this place. Flight has long been associated
with freedom. For many Afghans to fly away from here is all they long for – to
abandon this place which offers little hope and many dark memories. I became an
aid worker for adventure, a challenge and mostly to bring relief to those who
were suffering and help them build a better life. These are flights of fancy.
C’est la vie humanitaire.
Postscript
The sun is setting and the pigeons are returning to the roof top
coop on the third floor of the building next door. Children are playing in the
last light as the call to prayer echoes in the Taimani district where I am
staying. There are many constants that have endured down the centuries in
Afghan life but belief in God, however twisted or culturally contorted, enables
Afghans to accept their fate and find joy where it can be found. Everyday
hobbies are important and give a sense of normalcy and continuity, especially
in places where life is hard and violence an everyday reality. Perhaps in
keeping birds or flying kites there is distraction and escape. Pigeons circle
in groups now all across this part of the city. Round and round they fly
readying themselves for home and the feeding and preening which precedes
roosting for the night. Afghans think of the common pigeon, particularly white
ones, in the same way that westerners think of doves – bringers of peace and
messengers of hope. As long as they fly over Kabul I will deep down keep on
quietly believing that better days are possible for all who reside here.
No comments:
Post a Comment