Panjshir Review

Deciding that it would be unmanageable for the reader, and confusing for me, to blog about any and everything for the past two weeks in one post, I've decided to separate Panjshir and Herat for the purposes of today's updates. Now you get to read my retrospective comments on Panjshir, which, since I really have to use the WC and am about to leave for breakfast, might be short. [Edit: almost 12 hours later, and with the internet down, I had LOTS of time to fill-out this blog after breakfast and before tourism...so short it is NOT]

Panjshiris are, for the most part, ethnically Tajik, and are very proud of their role as mujahideen fighters who were, many have argued, what saved Afghanistan more than once. Check out this good blurb about the Panjshir Valley for some light background. Panjshir has only one entrance from the south (coming north from Kabul), which was blocked off by large boulders when the mujahideen effectively sealed-off the valley from the Taliban by exploding part of the mountain and covering the only entrance. Many people from Kabul of Panjshiri descendent fled to Panjshir, and many people literally did not move from the safe haven of the Valley for three years or more until the fighting was done. People would trickle out, making arrangements to be smuggled to nearby countries…some would join the mujahideen…but many stayed, and waited, for years for their old lives to start again.

Sidenote: I’ve always found it fascinating how readily (and intelligently) people will put EVERYTHING on hold to save their lives. You hear stories of people in times of war – the Holocaust, Rwanda, Afghanistan – where people, without much complaint or drama, will simply pick up and go and not look back for as long as it takes to be safe. I am particularly fascinated by how, in times of war, places of everyday use become very different social spaces. Churches or mosques where people might go for weekly services or confession, become, during times of war, places where they might live for weeks or months. How odd, it seems, and yet how common (during war) to hear someone say something like: “…and so I went home from work, picked up my wife and children, our money and whatever jewelry we had of value, and went to the church in a nearby village, where we lived in the basement kitchen for the next 3 months…”. These stories are, of course, horrific, but I love the way they totally destroy our perception of what is necessary to live (“I *have* to go to work to survive…”) and how spaces work (special utility and boundaries of social appropriateness). You are a highschool student in Kabul and one day have to move to Panjshir for 3 years, and maybe, if you are lucky, can smuggle yourself to Iran, or Tajikistan, or Pakistan (where you might be lucky enough to go farther – Germany or Sweden – or be officially resettled by UNHCR). Your foundation is rocked, you change course, and suddenly you’re in a place where all of your obsessive planning for the future (in which so many of us find perpetual comfort and anxiety) is moot. Is it weird for me to say there is something poignant in that?

Well anyway, That's my unqualified and un-nuanced history of Panjshir. The resistance/mujahideen fighters are basically all Panjshiri or come from a spot north of Kabul (which you pass through on your way to Panjshir) which I have blogged about before, called Shemali (the Shemali Plains). They have a rather distinctive (in my opinion) dress, and you normally see them wearing traditional Afghan pajamas with a military vest over it, and with a black and white (normally) checkered scarf (that works as veil from the sun, sweat rag, multipurpose cloth, and general indicator of Panshiri coolness). About coolness, I should add (or WILL add) that Panjshiris are not just cool, but hot (sorry to objectify). I am an EXPERT at identifying Panjshiris (to the surprise of Afghan friends) and have to say that out of the already excellent gene pool contained in Afghanistan, Panjshiris are absolutely the HOTTEST. :)

Ok, back to my trip. Well we (me, Cate Moss of Kabul, et al.) had been wanting to go to Panjshir nearly all summer, as Cate and much of his family (at least on his maternal side, as well as the paternal line of some of his cousins) are from the Valley, but logistically it just wasn't working. It takes a lot of planing to go to Panjshir, mostly because you need a car that can handle the road, you need to leave early enough to make it before dark (for safety and security -- the roads are VERY narrow in some spots and unsafe to drive on at night, and they might not let you in after dark), and you need a Panjshiri. That's right: if you are not a card-carrying Panjshiri (literally: your national ID has your father's birthplace written on it and this is considered your place of origin, whether or not you have ever lived there or even set foot in it) -- or do not having a convincing enough Panjshiri accent when you speak Dari or have the look of a Panjshiri about you -- then you won't be allowed into the Valley.

There is currently, in Afghanistan, a lot of mixed feelings about Panjshir. On the one hand, you have photos of the Lion of Panjshir, Ahmed Shah Massoud (“Massoud”) -- leader of the resistance against the Taliban -- everywhere, all over Kabul. MOST people would agree that he indeed was instrumental in defeating the Taliban. Since the collapse of the Taliban, however, there has been a lot of political conflict, where other ethnic groups (Hazaras and Pashtun, alike) want redress for crimes committed against them during the civl war that was sandwiched between the war with the Soviets and the war with the Taliban. After the Soviets pulled out, Kabul was left highly factionalized, as the Northern Alliance was anything but unified (or "Northern," if you followed the Massoud Hero link, above), and competing ethnic groups occupied sectors of the city and proceeded to basically destroy Kabul, and each other, in an attempt to fill the Soviet power vacuum --> enter the Taliban (from Qandahar). As one might expect, given the complex and violent history of Afghanistan, there are a lot of mixed feelings about some of the hero figues involved in Afghanistan's liberation. The Panjshiris feel like they deserve more recognition (read: power, and places in high government) for what they did to free Afghanistan, and others feel that Panjshiris (or, I should say: mujahideen/jihaadis...since we don't want to leave out the Shemali guys...) have already been given too much political power with no knowledge of politics or law (they were great fighters, but that doesn't make them great governors).

I have no opinion on the issue :)

In any case, since basically all of my friends are from Shemali or Panjshir, I got the chance to go to a place of immense importance and ABSOLUTELY STUNNING beauty into which many Afghans are, to this day, forbidden entry. The plan was to go with Cate and one of his Cousins of Legenday Hotness *Veiled Chunk fans himself* whose family has a home in Panjshir. Unfortunately, CoLH #1 had to work until midnight that night (as did his father: a driver for an anonymous UN organization, who was forced to babysit the expats at my favourite restaurant, L'Atmosphère, until after midnight, despite their 11PM curfew!), so his older brother, CoLH #2, came instead. Cate's other cousin, and my good friend, Mr. Bollywood, drove, and it was an uneventful drive, including a stop along the way where CoLH #2 bought be a very nice Panjshiri scarf.

We really looked the part, especially Mr. Bollywood, who is SO meticulous in his personal grooming (like he won't go to dinner at night without shaving a second time that day, and his clothes are always impeccably clean and pressed -- hence Mr. Bollywood), looked too Panjshiri to even be Panjshiri. I tried to explain to him that having the perfect pajamas, with a perfect (and clearly brand new!) military vest, and a perfectly white scarf, made him look more like an actor playing a Panjshiri than like an actual Panjshiri, himself, but he always fails to acknowledge the cute absurdity behind his glisten.

The drive to Panjshir was extremely beautiful, but I was not being tricked -- the drive to ANYWHERE in Afghanistan is amazing, and I was not taking another 20 photos of more breathtaking rivers and valleys. My camera was not coming out until we reached Massoud's tomb. As if guided by the Gods, I resisted the urge to take scenery photos along the way, and when we got to the Lion's Tomb, I took out my camera, snapped a shot of the Tomb, and *immediately* my camera battery died (I'd not charged it almost all summer!) and that was it for Panjshir photos (until Cate shares his). I was glad that I had been guided by Divine Providence, though, to use my only photo on the Tomb, and while it was not glorious in terms of pomp, the Tomb is atop a windy hill that looks over the Valley in both directions, and is quiet in a way that I imagine Tibetan hill stations being -- windy, quiet, beautiful, sparse, and intense.

We made it to CoLH #2's house, sat for a bit by the river, met some family and friends passing by through the village, and took some early sleep after a nice *vegetarian* meal. It was my first time drinking non-bottled water in Afghanistan (other than boiled in tea), as the Panjshiri water is known as being the best in Afghanistan. It really was amazing, and (as Cate's photos prove) I drank directly from the river several times (with no ill effects).

The night was really interesting, because I kept waking up to flashes of light illuminating the entire sky, visible over the mountain range bordering one side of the valley. I kept thinking that maybe it was some kind of REALLY bright airplane/jet guidance system on the other side of the mountains, and didn't think it could be shelling because, well, there isn't any shelling here (or anywhere else in Afghanistan except Kunar), but I had no idea what it could be, and it went on for hours (everyone else was asleep and did not notice). Around 3AM, though, the secret of the lights was revealed, when an intense thunderstorm began in the Valley, and what I then understood to be lightening was matched with its sibling, thunder. The rain didn't last long, though, and by the early morning everything was even MORE beautiful and green, and the rocks and valley even more fresh-smelling than the day before.

I woke up early, around 5AM, and read the eternal Mahfouz novel that I will thankfully finish today after breakfast. Around 6, after the mountain had been calling to me for an hour and everyone else was still fast asleep, I changed clothes, and set off for the mountain. The mountain was in a different "village" (village, here, is used to indicate a TINY geographical area consisting of only a few houses, so you might have 4 or 5 villages in what many of us might think of as one, still small, village) across the river.

{Going to go get breakfast...OK I'm back...and chunkier...}

Edit: it's 10PM and the internet has been down ALL day...so I really have to be committed to get this thing published!

I had seen a bridge down the river the night before, and went in search of it. Thinking that 6AM on a Friday would offer VC some anonymity was a TOTAL mistake. 30 minutes after leaving, I was at the foothill of the mountain, having found the bridge (with the help of some village elders along the way), and was in negotiations with about 10 men who were all fascinated by my presence, perplexed by my desire to climb a mountain at 6AM in sandals, and baffled by my ethnic origins and mother tongue -- you see, that Dari word for "why?" that is often used is the same as the Russian "po-che-moo?" so when an elder asked me "why?" I was climbing the mountain, I responded in Russian (having originally been trying to get by in Arabic) and confused everyone.

In the end, I had attracted SUCH a crowd (with, of course, invitations for tea, breakfast, chats with young boys studying English in school...) that I could not make it up the mountain, and was intercepted by Mr. Bollywood and the house attendant of CoLH #2, in a panic that I'd disappeared at 6AM; they were directed by villagers along the way who told him the khariji (foreigner) was climbing the mountain. You know it's serious when Bollywood shows up disheveled and unshaven. He and the villagers all had a HUGE laugh (especially at my sandals), and one of them invited Bollywood and me to the river to chat. I should have known where this was going. This man (who is the brother of one of the elders who showed me the direction to the bridge) is apparently the most notorious bacchabaz ("boy player") in that part of Panjshir, and told Bollywood that I was a very beautiful baccha and that Bollywood should have brought me to a party he’dhad the night before in a tent by the river. Bollywood got a big kick out of this, and when we got back to the house, just telling Cate and CoLH #2 this guy's name, they immediately knew what he must have said. On the way back home, I got to meet the father of someone I knew in Kabul, who was really kind and charming (and also thinking I was insane for wanting to climb this thing in sandals). FOR THE RECORD: I could have totally done it. Totally.

After breakfast, Bollywood and Cate and I set-out for Bollywood's home village and the end of the mountain pass closing Panjshir to the north (I think). I really REALLY wish I could post some photos of this place, because if you have an image of Shangrahla in your head, then this is it. It's endless mountain, grass, river, mudbrick houses...just browns and greens that are endlessly gorgeous.

Along the way, an army guy recognized Bollywood (I've seen this several times in Afghanistan: someone recognizing someone else that they haven't seen in like 15 years or more and just saying hello with total casualness and proceeding to pick up where they left off), and picked us up to ride the rest of the way to the end of the valley. I felt myself kind of sitting on something hard and cold, and I assumed it was a water bottle, until Cate whispered to me to look down at our seat, and I saw that he and I were sitting on (more like sitting back onto...not squarely ON) a Kalishnikov riffle. Because of the way it was laying, we weren't in any danger of being actually shot, so it was only 20% disconcerting and 80% funny -- I hope to post the photo of the AK pointing to my chunky behind (I also hope that this is the last gun ever pointed at my ass).

The ride with the army guy was fascinating. For someone who did not appear to be particularly well-educated, he was asking some very penetrating political questions. There were the typical Panjshiri "Why are the Americans only interested in disarming the mujahideen when they should be disarming the Taliban?" questions, but there was also one that really gave me pause: "Why does the Coalition insist on reconstruction with conditions? Why should there be conditions placed on building a road or giving electricity?" It was a good question, and I didn't want to be overly-political in my response. I told him that, while I can't speak for the Coalition and have no knowledge of their strategy or plan, I think that it is not targeting exclusively Panjshiris for disarmament, and tends to support a disarmament policy for all groups, and that as far as reconstruction is concerned, the Coalition is concerned with permanent solutions to persistent problems that have been caused by chaos and war, and that the conditions that it places on reconstruction projects are those conditions which it deems necessary to ensure that reconstruction is sustainable, and will not be immediately destroyed by warring tribes or ethnic groups, or usurped and abused by warlords and powerful figures operating outside the rule of law.

He dropped us off at the foot of a towering cliff (aka: the end of our journey in the valley) and on one side there were hundreds (thousands? VC sucks at estimating things...especially his budget) of crates being guarded by a makeshift checkpoint. I asked what they were, and was told that they were weapons. Now, I am still not clear as to whether or not these are weapons that are secret stocks used by mujahideen/local militia, or if they are weapons that are sold to Coalition forces (or both). I asked if I could tour the weapons store -- which the army guy and the weapons guard thought was cute -- but was told that no one, especially not a foreigner, had access; I was told that even the PRT (“Provincial Reconstruction Team” – read: Coalition army; read: Americans) was not allowed. We got some cool photos and walked to a different part of the valley off by a connecting river that runs right in front of Massoud's family compound.

If you check out this link, then you can see a photo of Massoud's Tomb, as well as the area I'm about tro descirbe in the next paragraph. Both photos don't look much like when I was there, as Massoud's tomb is surrounded by much more lush landscape than this photo shows, and the ground is torn up for expansion/construction. In the photo of the Valley, Massoud's compound is up the hill to the left, and it is on the right by the water undermeath the trees that my next paragraph occurs -- in the photo, the water is almost evaporated, but when we were there it was deep enough to go swimming (despite still being low, according to my friends).

Bollywood wanted to go swimming, and used his and Cate's scarves to fashion a bathingsuit -- these things really ARE the do-it-all cloth, and would make, I was thinking in a conversation in my head yesterday with Cadaver Queen, pretty hot skirts (in that Gweneth Paltrow thinks SoHo is the East Village kind of way). There were some guys showing-off in the water (racing each other, making jokes with me and Cate sitting on the riverside, etc.) and one of them said to his friend that he should have taken me to the party last night because he would have been really popular for it (wonder if it was the same party that we heard about that morning?). We were all invited to have hashish with them (OF COURSE I SAID NO!).

When we arrived home, CoLH #2's best friend from Kabul had arrived, and shortly after, CoLH #1 (with ADORABLE and VERY well-behaved kindergarten-age son) and their father also surprised us with a visit. We were already running late to head home for Kabul so I could play squash with Pakistani Apostate, but ended up having an absolutely delightful lunch with Father CoLH and the rest of the clan. CoLH #2 and I traded books (I sounded out commentary on hadith in Dari, and he navigated Mahfouz's mythic alley in much better English), and we went home, regretfully declining invitations by CoLH #1 to spend the night and climb the mountain for real (I don't mean that in a dirty way! CoLH #1 is a hiker and told me if I stayed he'd take me climbing!).

In the end, I had an excellent time. It was just another instance of how remarkably full my experience in Afghanistan has been, and if Desi had never introduced me to Cate then none of this would have been possible. I really feel sorry for the other expats, who live under such security restrictions, many of which I do not think are necessary, and who never get to SEE Afghanistan (bouncing between your guesthouse, your office, and the 3 restaurants in Kabul you are approved to go to, with no walking allowed and travel only permitted in a secured vechichle *with* an armed car following you, is not, by my standards, "living" in Afghanistan). The mountains preceding Gardez, the mountain passes on the Jalalabad road and Serbie, plains and rivers of Shemali, and especially the defiantly beautiful Panjshir...these are some of the most beautiful places that I think exist in the world. Add to that weddings, parties, berry-eating trips to the river and lake...I don't think these were "risks;" I think they were experiences that made the $5000+ that I spent this summer and my disaster of an internship worth it.

NOW I have to write you about Herat? Sheesh. Ok. Well the internet is down from 8AM-3:30PM, so all this will be cut and pasted and hyperlinked later, anyway...
Edit: Shortly after 10PM and ready to publish...if this gets lost again then I am going to freak out and forget writing about this trip.

More soon,

VC