A Trip to the Zoo

After yesterday's climb, I was a teeny bit sore, but not too bad.  We went out to eat at this restaurant that is owned by some Europeans, and that feels like anyplace but Kabul when you are inside.  Cleany, shiny surfaces, trendy lighting and decor, expensive dishes.  Apparently it is a place where a lot of the military men hang out, because it meets all of the security specifications necessary to make it always ok (set back from the street X kilometers, walls X meters high, X number of guards, etc).  It is supposedly quite the singles scene.  I am glad I went with a group. 

The food was good, although I kind of got screwed with the bill.  I had forgotten what that feels like -- you know, when you are the one person in the group who doesn't make a salary but instead is in a bunch of debt so you order the cheap dish and no appetizer and only have one drink while everyone else orders two or three drinks and apps and then at the end everyone wants to just split the bill evenly which works well for everyone except you who would feel like a jerk be to be the one person to ask to contribute less and so you end up subsidizing everyone else's consumption despite your best efforts to not spend too much on your own.  You know the deal.   But it was great company and good food, and I thoroughly enjoyed myself nevertheless.

Today I went to the zoo with Ash (one of my fellow hikers from yesterday).  I and a woman in a burqa were the only two women there.  I got lots of stares.  The zoo is not very big, and especially now that about half of the pins/cages/animal areas have been destroyed by the wars, there is not too much to see. 

I felt both good and bad about the zoo.  Really the only good part was that the people there were really interested in us, and this whole little crowd of grown Afghan men wanted to show us around and talk to us.  One of them was very tall and, like most Afghan men, had a dark, stern-looking face beneath his white turban.  It was fun and incongruous to watch him put his fingers up above his ears like horns, as he tried to explain the animals to us.  Another one was a master of the one English phrase, "Come on!" and used it repeatedly to encourage us to follow them to the next cage.

The rest of the zoo was a big ol' downer.  I mean, I have mixed feelings about zoos anyway.  I hate to cage up wild animals and restrict them from their natural environments and territories, but if they are well-cared for and if it helps protect endangered species and encourages people to love and respect animals, then that's good.  But here, the zoo fails in every respect.  The animals are not well cared for.  They are in tiny cages (giant bears in a cage the size of a small studio apartment, large birds of prey in cages the same size with no room to fly) and they are clearly hungry and the visitors do not respect them.  The areas with the monkeys and the other bears are surrounded by small canals of giardia-infested, green, stagnant water with all sorts of trash and debris floating around in it.  The gazelles looked okay.  And the "wild boars" seemed to be doing fine (although they are not wild boars at all -- just regular ol' domestic pigs!), even though visitors regularly climb down into their area and tease them.  The lions seemed okay (there are two new lions -- there were two previously, but the Taliban threw a grenade into their pit and killed one and took the eye out of the other.  the one-eyed lion died last year of kidney failure.)  but then again, they didn't move.  I noticed that there were many ways that these lions could easily jump over the walls of their little area if they were happy enough, healthy enough, well enough fed.  This could not be a very good sign that they were just laying there even though freedom was so easily attainable.  The parakeets also seemed to be doing well. 

That is about all there is to the zoo.  It is kind of surreal to walk around some of the old destroyed parts of the buildings, and see up close like that the destruction of war.  There was some graffitti, in English, on one of the old buildings (I imagine it was a reptile house, but don't ask me why) which read, "Long live Mujahudeen of Afghanistan."  I wonder who wrote that and when.

We left the zoo and went to Chicken Street, the main commercial street that caters to tourists in Kabul.  Carpets, clothing, more animal fur and pelts than you can imagine, jewelry, and some knick-knack stores like the one we went into.  It is a metal store, with antique metalworks like rifles ornately carved and decorated with ivory and wood, water pipes, locks, instruments, swords, shields, chain mail, old coins, and anything else made of metal that you can imagine.  Pretty neat store, really.  The pieces come from all over Afghanistan and all over the world.  I am not sure how to judge the quality, but nothing here is as expensive as it is anywhere else, so I am sure you can' really go wrong.

Tonight I will go out to eat at the Chinese Dumpling House and play some ping pong and some cards.  A slow Kabul weekend evening.

Wall Walking on Sher Darwaaza: View from the Top

See also the story about our trip in the Afghan SCENE Magazine, page 15:

http://www.afghanscene.com/pdfs/asmaug.pdf

This Friday was the first day of real exercise I have had since I arrived in Kabul. I went with two of the Le Monde guys (that guesthouse I mentioned) -- Ash from Australia and Jeremy from the States -- to climb the tallest peak in Kabul. It was fantastic! (Despite the fact that I had been ill the two days before!)

The peak (I'll find the name later) has an ancient wall bisecting the mountain. Various estimates of how old it is place it anywhere from 800 to 1600 years old. Some people say it was built during a time when two brothers ruled the area, in order to divide the land between them. Others say that there is a love story behind it. I don't know that anyone really knows. It is mud bricks and stone, with windows here and there, and runs like stairs up the mountainside.

We drove out to Karte Se (the part of town that my office is in), and got out at the foot of the mountain. I wore my REI zip offs and a T-shirt, but brought a longer sleeve shirt and a head scarf with me to wear at the bottom and at the top. At the bottom, when you first start climbing (and I in my tevas -- bad idea!), you are climbing the route that so many people, usually children, climb every day to bring water up to their mud brick homes. There are no smooth paths, no streets, just rocks and the treads of the little plastic sandals that walk there daily. I wore my headscarf until we ascended the first 500 feet and were well out of view of the villagers.


House on the way up the mountain


Jeremy and I taking a breather.


Me and Ash


Another breather


Meditation.



Wall in the background.


Village kids.



It is a good workout, and the view is amazing. You walk right along the wall, sometimes on top of the wall, up up up, over boulders, past the rusted ordinance casings that still remain scattered over the mountain after 23 years of war, and finally reach the summit. You really get a good sense of the layout of Kabul from way up there, and also a good sense of the history of the place. In so many ways, it still looks much as it did centuries ago when different people were warring over it and trying to conquer its people and its land.

Looking out over the city from on top of the wall.


Jeremy on top of the world.


Looking out over Karte Seh




At the top, there is a long, deep trench that follows the wall. More casings. And some goat bones. I imagine this must have been where some men fought and slept and ate during one of the wars. We walk along the wall toward the other side of the mountain, where we see in the distance the silhouette of a man with a gun.

At the top.


Me taking Ash down.


Silhouette of the soldier guarding the top.


We have brought fresh apricots with us to offer to him in exchange for tea and rest at the top. I put on my long sleeves and my head scarf. Salaam alaykum! we greet each other. We make our offering, apologizing that some of them are squishy after the morning climb. I am sure that squishy does not translate.

Making the apricot offering.



He offers us chai, and we accept with thanks. He goes into his small, rock shelter, and we look around. From somewhere heretofore unseen, we hear a donkey crying in pain. Over this ledge, down in this former artillery-pit, a donkey is tied to an old gun mount. He's caught, and the rope is too tight. His leg is bleeding. We free him, as the soldier watches in amusement. Poor thing. He got more loving from me during that hour visit than he has gotten in a long time.

Donkey tied to gun mount.


Me and donkey getting to know each other.


Me and donkey good friends.


Good friends 2.



This man leads a solitary life. I am sure he gets some visitors, perhaps weekly, from people like us, but mostly it is just him and his dog and his donkey at the top of a mountain overlooking Kabul. I wonder, who does he plan to shoot with that gun way up there so far from everything else? Here and there are other barricades, with even larger remnants of bombs and missiles scattered about rusting in the dust. I wonder whose they were. Were they ours? Were they Soviet? Taleban?

The soldier's fort.


Profile of the lone soldier.


Lone soldier.


Rusted bullet casing.


Rusted bomb.


Looking out over the city.


Kabul from the top.


Kabul from the top 2.


Kabul from the top 3.



We enjoy tea together, with minimal conversation. I manage to use the few words I have learned in my Dari lessons to ask, "U sag nam dara?" -- does that dog have a name? He does. But two seconds later I don't remember what it is.

We thank him very much, "Besyar tashakur" and wish that God will take care of him as we leave, "Bomane khuda. Khuda hofez." He shows us the path down the other side of the mountain. The path down is much easier than the path up. We make it down in 30 minutes, stopping for a few more photos,

On the way back down.


Wall on the way down.


Windows in the wall


Through the windows in the wall.


Wall window 2.


Through the window 3.


Me and Ash looking through the window.


Last bits of the wall.


Mosque and intersection.



and ending up on the other side of town where the old fort is and the cemetery and Olympic stadium where they play soccer and all the motorized rickshaws (we called them tuk tuks in Thailand).

We ended our hike by driving out to the ISAF market -- Supreme -- for Baskin Robbins ice cream and a cold Coke. Kind of strange to be enjoying such treats as we walk back out past the arms unloading checkpoint and get into the car to drive past the three rows of razor wire that surround the compound. So Afghanistan.

Okay. I have to get back to work. I will post the titles of all the things I still want to write about and date them appropriately (starting from last weekend - a full week ago) -- then, as time permits this week, I'll fill in the details and post photos when possible.

Love and hugs.