I'm Really Getting Tired of This Shit........

Well, it's been kind of a long day here (longer than usual) and I'm about a third of the way through a bottle of tequila*, so this will be a bit disjointed.

*Even harder to find than decent whisky, but also more difficult to impose "local" substitutes, so therefore generally safer. Still cost me $100 USD.

By now, you've probably seen the reports about the ever-so-annoying events in Kabul this morning. If not, a BBC summary is here.

Why, one may ask, must the Taliban always launch these spectacular attacks so early in the day? Especially on Juma (Friday), which is supposed to be a day of rest. And a day when most Westerners, myself included, are sleeping off absolutely bone-crushing hangovers from the night before. And on the anniversary Prophet's birthday no less. Have these people no decency?

Heedless of my desire for a few more hours of decent (albeit alcohol-fueled) sleep, the bad guys decided to try and blow up a couple of hotels and guest houses in downtown Kabul, kicking off their ill-timed attempt with a massive suicide car bomb at precisely 0645.*

*I know the exact time because, contrary to tactical good sense, the first thing I did when I rolled out of bed was check the clock on my mobile phone. And then say, "Oh for fuck's sake!"

Anyway, the intial blast cracked the glass on my windows, despite being six blocks away.* After checking the time (and cursing about the hour), I found my pants, my weapon and my boots, not necessarily in that order. The image of me with a Kalashnikov, sans pants, is probably not one to make the ladies swoon, but one has to set priorities in such situations.

*That, and the huge mushroom cloud that resulted, are what give lie to the reports that the first blast was a "suicide bomber." No way one man carries enough explosive to make a boom like that. Definately some sort of VBIED. After a year, you get a sense for these things.

After locating and arranging all necessary items (i.e. weapon, pants), and checking the immediate vicinity from my balcony, I legged it over to one of our job sites about a block away. We have 20+ guards on duty at this site and of course they were all up and armed and standing post. For all the faults in management with this outfit, our guys on the line are dedicated and determined.

One of the guards on-site told me that the scene of the attack was the Safi Landmark Hotel, about five blocks away. I confess that I was actually relived to hear that since, to my knowledge, none of our clients had personnel in the Safi. In a prime example of "be careful what you wish for" just then one of our supervisors pulled up in an SUV. I was puzzled since his AoR is ten blocks away, but he informed me that we, in fact, DID have a client staying at the Safi (news to me, which reflects poorly on myself and our management system) and that this guy was on his mobile phone freaking out.**

*Area of Responsibility
**Understandably of course, but at times like this, it doesn't really help to go all ape-shit.

I detail the supervisor and one of our PSDs to see if they can get through the police cordon and pull this guy out. Meanwhile, I call the main office and rather testily suggest that a little back-up might be in order. The only response I get is the question, "Why are you not in your residence?"

Um..........because this is what we get paid to do?

Predictably, the supervisor returns having been unable to get past the police blockade at the traffic circle (I suspect he didn't try all that hard). By this point, I'm talking to the client who is in the Safi, and I'm trying to keep him calm and rational. To his credit, despite being wounded by flying glass, he's reasonably calm, if a little shaken up. Intelligently, he has abandoned his street-facing room for the (relative) security of the the interior of the building. However, there are now bad guys in the hotel and attached shopping center and things are most decidely not looking up.

Much to the dismay of our supervisor*, I jump in the SUV and we head off to try and talk our way past the police again. Occasionally, the presence of a Westerner helps in these situations.

*Who, it should be pointed out, is only a 26-year old kid.

In this case, not so much. I did have several highly-charged shouting matches with various ANP officers, somewhat hampered by the fact that they don't speak English, my Dari is weak, and our supervisor (who speaks both fluently) was unwilling to press the issue. So after standing in the rain for twenty minutes, listening to gunfire up the street and trying to keep the client from totally freaking out (tough to do over the phone), we relocated to another of our job-sites about a block away to await the QRF (Quick Reaction Force) which would bring with it someone with the authority to deal with the ANP.

Three cups of tea and five cigarettes later, still no QRF. By this point, I'm pretty well boiling over into a white-hot rage, against the ignorance of the Taliban who would launch such an attack, the incomptence of the ANSF who failed to prevent it, and the idiocy of my boss who evidently refuses to do what he's been paid to do. What's more, my car, the SUV I came here in, has mysteriously departed for greener pastures, leaving me to walk back to my place in the rain, trying by phone to reassure the client in the Safi that help is on the way. All in all, a top-notch morning.

Eventually, we got him out but not until the whole episode was concluded. That same 26-year old supervisor went back in, by himself, and found this guy and transported him to safety. Three hours after the whole thing started. And for that, The Rug Merchant deducted from him three months pay, for operating "without proper authorization." To his credit, when I asked him about it this afternoon, the kid had no regrets and said, "I did what my duty required. He can keep his money."

So, as I told my brother earlier this evening, "Same shit, different day. It's just that here we have a different definition of 'shit' than most people."

100th Post

After almost a year here, I've reached 100 posts on this blog. I was going to mark the occasion with a celebratory post, perhaps a retrospective or something else suitable. However, it's panj shanbe (Thursday), which is basically Friday night in Afghanistan (no work tomorrow), and I'm too tired and too bitter to write anything entertaining, or even relevant.

Instead, I'm just going to put on some late 70's music (Journey, Styx, Foreigner, etc.), get good and drunk and hope that the percentage of brake fluid in the bootleg whisky is lower than usual.

The Worst Job in Afghanistan

No, not mine, although it sometimes seems like it.

And not the ANP either, although I'm sure they think so every time they hit an IED or an ambush. I'm talking about these guys:

I have no idea what they're called in Dari/Farsi, but I refer to them as "ditch men." They're the guys who, for roughly $80 USD a month, get the charming job of scooping, scraping and sucking the stuff out of the drainage ditchs that line most major streets in Kabul.

In theory, the ditches are designed as a kind of stormwater drainage system to channel away rain water and keep the city from flooding. This, I suppose, they accomplish to a limited degree. Apparently, no one told the city engineers that in order for the ditches to function properly, the water has to first get into the ditch, which is unlikely when the streets are generally composed of hardpacked dirt. The fact that the concrete lip of the ditch is usually higher than the rutted track of the street doesn't help either. The swill they have to dredge out of these channels* is not only water and dirt. These things also serve as the preferred repository for any and all sorts of trash that Kabulis might wish to dispose of rapidly.

*With shovels and scoops, I might add.

In addition, and this is the really charming part, the primitive nature of Kabul's sewage treatment facilities and domestic plumbing arrangements mean that the mix is fortified by waste that should otherwise be chemically treated and buried somewhere.* Thus the traditional Kabul cocktail.

*Yeah, you know what I'm talking about here, right? No need for further details, I hope.

I've even seen dead dogs floating in these channels. And not freshly dead either. I suppose the dead cats just sink to the bottom.

The whole putrid mess mostly just sits there, alternating between slowly draining away and bubbling in the sun. Every once in a while, the ditch men come by and invest heroic efforts in trying to keep the channels clear. This they do, if it wasn't clear already, by hand. With a scoop.

And then they shovel the stuff into nylon bags (which are not leak-resistant) and load it into trucks to take somewhere I hope I never see.

No fancy equipment for these guys. They load those leaky bags of foul muck with their own two hands.

Yeah, you win. Your job is worse than mine.

Not a dove, but......

Word from the BBC that a member of the Wildlife Conservation Society has discovered a breeding ground for the rare species of warbler (it's a bird, I think) in a "remote corner of Afghanistan."* Probably Nimroz Province in the southwest part of the country, but they don't say for sure.

*Somewhat ironic to describe any part of this country as "remote." Is there a part that isn't remote? The whole damn place is disconnected from the rest of the world in all sorts of ways. To qualify as "remote" here, you really have to be out there in the boonies. Not for nothing do people refer to Afghanistan as "the 12th century, with cellphones."

By far the best part of the article is the conclusion:

While the scientists are excited by the discovery, they are concerned about the long-term survival of these birds.
Ironically the ongoing war and the remoteness of their location have helped their survival - but according to Mr Timmins, this might change.
"We don't wish a war-like situation on anybody. But once peace comes and development starts, you really do have to think about
what will happen to the natural environment," he said.

Yeah, like "peace" and "development" are coming here anytime soon. I think your precious birds are safe for a while longer.

Besides, if the price for some decent jobs and a functioning economy is that geeks from the WCS can no longer find birds that they thought were extinct, then that's a price I'm willing to pay.

Reinforcements

First the Finns, and now the Germans.

Finland announced that it's sending an additional 50 soldiers to bolster their already-impressive contingent of 120 troops on the ground.

Not to be outdone by the last country to give the Russians a right good kicking, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany announced that they were sending an additional 500 troops to increase their total in Afghanistan to somewhere around 4800.

Guess we'll need to open some new supply lines to the north to move all that extra beer. Won't need to move any ammunition, since the Germans and the Finns aren't allowed to shoot anybody anyway.

Things That Go "Boom!"

Another car bomb today in Kabul, this time on the Jalalabad Road out near Camp Phoenix. At least half a dozen wounded, but no word yet on how many killed. Apparently, it was a minivan packed with ammonium nitrate fertilizer.*

*This is the stuff recently banned by the Afghan government, as it is way more useful for making IEDs than it is for actual farming. The same stuff used in the Oklahoma City bombings. New slogan for agribusiness companies: "Ammonium Nitrate! The preferred fertilizer of redneck assholes around the world!" Most farmers here don't use it anyway, preferring more traditional methods. Nevertheless, thousands of tons of the stuff is imported from Pakistan every year. Guess we know where most of it is going.

Two of our clients were in the area, returning to their residential compound after a meeting. Rolled up to the gate a few minutes after it went off (nice timing), and they said the Gurkhas on the ECP were spooked. Must have been a big one if even the Nepalese are spooked. Then again, it's their job to search the cars, so a boom like that would tend to remind one of the occupational hazards.

Breakfast

Generally speaking, I don't eat breakfast in Afghanistan.* I might scarf down a piece of fruit, or perhaps some yogurt (don't get me started on what passes for Afghan yogurt), but that's about it. Very occasionally (preferably when I don't have anything to do before noon), I'll have some oatmeal.

*Truth be told, I've never been much of a breakfast person. Probably has something to do with an excess of alcohol the night before, and the ability of cigarettes to curtail one's appetite.

However, once or twice a week, I ask my chai-bacha to bring some bulani in the morning.

*Chai-bacha is a Dari word that I basically made up. A combination of "chai" (tea) and "bacha" (boy). Doesn't actually exist in Dari, although it does seem to be catching on. Literally translated, it's "tea boy" meaning the guy who makes tea. But Jamshid, my chai-bacha, is actually way more useful than that. He's the cleaner, the gopher, the all-around assistant for anything that might come up. A more accurate English translation would be the Wodehousian "gentleman's gentleman."

Bulani is a simple, yet marvelous version of the potatoe pancake. Essentially, it's mashed potatoes fried in a pan with oil, and it looks something like this:

Heavy on the starch and the cholesterol, and somewhat burdensome first thing in the morning, but nevertheless a proper breakfast on a cold morning. The key, of course, is the recourse to the Tabasco Sauce and Chili Garlic sauce, which adds a bit of spice to the morning and clears the sinuses. Honey works too.

Next, the crazy, nauseating, absolutely wonderful mix that is an Afghan "burger."