Yet his nieces and nephews, sons and daughters, and eventually even his wife peered into my bedroom window from the courtyard and stared at me. I motioned to them to enter, thinking it was a futile effort; nothing could break a barrier constructed by years of humility and privacy. Finally a girl in her early teens with big-boned, dirty hands barged in to greet me and extended her hand. Without a shared language, the conversation ended with the handshake. I felt like a terminally ill patient, quarantined to a room where people just come and stare through the glass and pity me.
It had been a mere four days since I’d arrived, and I wondered what the world had been doing since I’d left it. Afghanistan hid in a time capsule of war. Many Afghans had no idea how the rest of the world had advanced technologically. There were no foreign newspapers; there was no television news, and very little electricity, for that matter. I felt claustrophobic. Anxious. I hadn’t bathed once, and the stench of my sweat—a layer of filth—seeped through my clothes. I missed my dawn runs through Lodhi Gardens in New Delhi, passing the rotund Indians fixed in yoga poses. I missed my swims at the American Club and a frothy, cold beer at the end of the day at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club. I missed all the things I hadn’t realized I had grown to love. The things I hadn’t even been aware of before. Like my freedom.
But as I stretched out on the thin mattress, I also considered the benefits of being a female guest in Afghanistan. I would always have my own room—this one was a big, carpeted, empty space with a huge bay window—separate from the men. I did not think about my appearance, or looking sexy, or male-female attraction. In America I expended an incredible amount of energy on things that in Afghanistan seemed vain if not pointless, and it was refreshing to submerge myself in an unfamiliar perspective and ideology, to assimilate in both mind and dress.
In fact, during the last few days, as I walked through the streets and into people’s homes, I had started to welcome the cover and anonymity of the thick cloth I wore draped over my head and around my shoulders. I understood the urgency of wanting to be covered at all times. As I awoke the next morning and prepared for my day, I realized that I had even grown to appreciate the constant presence of my mahram, the unfamiliar peace I found when I surrendered control to Mohammed, to our driver, to a man.
? ? ?
KABUL WAS GRAY and lonely in June 2000. Its monolithic, graceless buildings, as well as its aura of paranoia, betrayed Afghanistan’s heavy Soviet influence. Parts of the city looked as if they’d been half-buried beneath a giant dust storm: Hills of dirt faded into rusting cars, which faded into the broken clay buildings. The mood starkly contrasted with the lively, sun-dappled countryside villages that had been relatively free from the Taliban’s watch. In Kabul everyone was cautious of where he stepped and with whom he spoke. The United Nations workers—typically Afghans, Pakistanis, or people from other Muslim countries—were welcoming inside the UN compound, but I rarely saw them outside on the streets of Kabul. Locals avoided conversation with foreigners entirely in public.
I finally had to face the Taliban at the Foreign Ministry, where foreign journalists were required to check in upon entering the country. This was the Afghanistan I had been warned about. Everything I wanted to do had to be approved with a letter handwritten in Dari, stamped by the government ministry responsible for the issue I was covering, and signed by a man named Mr. Faiz.
In the ministry compound prepubescent boys with layered turbans stacked on their heads sashayed in and out of the high-ceilinged building. I waited for two hours, drinking sugary tea and improving my chances of developing diabetes. Once nervous about the prospect of meeting a Talib, I now knew the rules. By the time Mr. Faiz called me in, my nervousness had disappeared.
He was a burly press minister no more than twenty-eight years old, wearing the customary turban and beard. He welcomed me to his country. Our words ricocheted off the twenty-foot-high ceiling. Intricate patterns danced on the tattered carpet beneath our feet. I thought of the men and women who were shot and stoned to death for adultery and murder in the soccer stadiums across Afghanistan on Fridays.
“Thank you,” I said, eyes lowered. “It is an honor to have the opportunity to come here. To see Afghanistan with my own eyes. I am doing a story on the effect of twenty years of war on Afghanistan.”
I did not mention that I had already spent almost a week in the provinces of Ghazni, Logar, and Wardak and that I had spent several nights in the homes of warm, generous Afghans who all reinforced my belief that Afghanistan was much more than a terrorist state governed by unruly, women-hating Taliban, as much of the media portrayed it.
“Your country is beautiful, Mr. Faiz. I am grateful you approved my visa.”
Through an interpreter, Mr. Faiz and I discussed what I was interested in seeing in Kabul. He showered me with questions about my background and intentions, each one eliciting a purposeful response from me. I thought I had won him over.
“I want you to move from where you are staying at the Associated Press house,” he said, “to the Intercontinental Hotel.”