Afghan Engagement

It’s the month of romance in America. As a simple exercise of the imagination, go to a day your parents decide upon the young man they have in mind as a good match for you, the one you should marry. Being open-minded, your dad gives his permission for you to spend a half hour or so in the company of this young man before you agree to this. He, bless him, has offered you the right to say no.

Where in today’s Afghan society, can two non-engaged young people, a boy and a girl, chat together for half an hour or so without attracting the attention of those who feel this is wrong? The young girl asks her friend for help. “Come with me and find us a place where we can talk before I agree to live as his wife the rest of my life.”

Kabul Museum

Her bright young friend suggests the Kabul Museum and that is where they meet. The friend notes that the couple is spending more time talking about what is on the walls then about themselves, they do have some time together. That is until a security guard approaches her to ask if she is with them. She admits that she is and pleads that they are engaged, just a small stretch of the truth, to bargain for their safety. “We’ll not ask you for paperwork to prove that, but know if they do not exit in the next 15 minutes, they will face those who would make big trouble for them,” the guard tells her.

In Afghanistan, couples still struggle to find a time and place to know something of one another before committing to a lifetime of marriage. Contrast this to our young couples with the freedom to spend years getting to know one another before making a similar commitment, but one that is not necessarily for a lifetime.

We’re all doing what we can

I had a strong connection to Afghanistan from when I was a young Peace Corps volunteer there and, through connections to Afghan students here, thought I understood what it means to grow up female and Afghan.  Over the last eight months of frequent, lengthy conversations with female students at School of Leadership Afghanistan, I have come closer to seeing the full picture. Some of our Skype sessions are full of humor and culture swapping, others full of anger and sadness at the intolerance and inequality. We laugh at the irony of Afghan students’ being encouraged to watch Hollywood movies to improve their English and of all the misconceptions about life in the U.S. they imbibe at the same time. We bemoan the discrimination and doors closed to them by virtue of their being female. The assumption that girls have no need for education beyond basic literacy and the fear that more would cause them to question their faith haunt their dreams for higher education.

Demonstration for Women’s Rights, Kabul

Yet, isolation and oppression feed determination for contact with a larger world among bright young Afghans women. Such determination is demanding and at times I feel overwhelmed with the need to connect through me with that world. Yet, they will carry the light leading theirs and future generations of Afghans to a better future. How privileged to have a tiny part in this revolution.

Look Under Your Wheels

Diner in Weston, West Virginia

Driving down the highway, tank full of gas, GPS on a clean windshield, some CDs in the player, and time spread out before me is still a lot of fun many years after my first time behind the wheel. The U.S. Highway System works so well for wandering. Signage of all kinds, guard rails, rumble strips, speed limits, patrol cars, and divided highways make it relatively safe. Rest areas and travel centers let us stretch our legs, walk our dog, and we find comfort and information inside. Truck stops and roadhouses that are easy to access have friendly waitresses, inexpensive meals, and often local color.

The System was in great shape when I was learning to drive in the mid-1960s, and it seems so still if you can use it before and after rush hour and in fair weather. On my recent 5,345 mile trip over 30 days and 11 different states in the eastern U.S. I was able to get from city to city without slowdowns, could exit for city centers and get back on easily, and cross rivers on beautiful bridges.

It’s a great system for leisure and exploration, but don’t go near it when it’s congested. The traffic dragon consumes millions of hours, millions of dollars in lost time, is the enemy of commerce and trade, and, no doubt, a huge contributor to one of our worst public health problem – stress.

Everyone’s talking again about the high cost of gas.  A small part of it is the 18.4 cents federal tax. (You’ll find what you’re paying in state tax per gallon posted at the pump; the average is $.30) In Europe such tax in about 20 times greater, but we’re not Europe, hey, and don’t want the federal government telling us what to do. That federal tax does cover about half of the cost of maintenance and improvements for our fabulous highway system, a system feeding our economy and our security that along with social security and a balanced budget, we want as our legacy. We could do much worse than re-vitalizing our infrastructure for the new century, increasing the incentive for more fuel-efficient transportation, and reducing highway stress.

Living with terror, not in terror

A week ago on Sunday, Taliban forces were able to hold parts of the central city of Kabul hostage from about 1 PM until some time the next morning. Eventually the Afghan Army, with some support from NATO, killed most of the fighters who’d been firing from buildings near the Parliament and other prominent offices. Civilian deaths occurred, but could have been far greater according to the western press.  The intelligence failure has been explained away by pointing out the instances in which intelligence has prevented attacks. NATO’s plan to prepare a national force capable of protecting national and international institutions appeared to be working.

From inside some of the thousands of compounds in Kabul where the sounds of attacks and counter-attacks echoed, the mood was different. Family returning home reported seeing dead bodies in the street. A young woman was frustrated to find that her bank was not open that day due to “computer problems.” Upon returning home, she learned that minutes after her leaving the bank, attackers were using it to fire from. She’d escaped harm by minutes.

The power was off. The night was filled with the sound of missles. Fear traveled from friend to friend by cell. What would the morning bring? My friend awoke five times in the night sure the Taliban would be in control again by sunrise.

We spoke two days later. She brought up books she’s reading, progress and setbacks with university applications, and my post on the Amish. Only after these did we get to Sunday’s hours of terror. “This time was different,” she said. It was more threatening because the Taliban were firing on the most important buildings and called this just the beginning.

A young person is studying and building her future while her country trembles under her feet. Being female, with an overthrow of the national government, she will lose all she has worked for. As a member of the minority Muslim faith in Afghanistan, the minority prosecuted, hunted down and murdered by the Taliban in the 1990’s, she knows she could witness this and lose her life. Yet, it does not consume her. Her work continues, her studies, her plans. Her dreams may splinter apart in nightmare, but my friend is the same bright, hopeful, hard-working individual she has always been.

Freedom

The road trip through what was the Southwest until the Louisiana Purchase is now taking me home. A lasting memory will be of personal freedom, the kind common to an early summer morning, the day stretched out ahead free of boundaries. So many days of this month-long trip felt like that. The U.S. inter-state highway system with its bridges and causeways took us everywhere we wanted to go. Scenic byways for birders, country music fans, etc. did the rest safely and, except for the New York State Thruway, without tolls. That was part of it.

Freedom to explore in whatever direction, with whatever choices I make was another part of it. It felt like the road that leads to nothing but blue sky.

I’m left no longer merely curious about the southern region of my country, but really interested in it. The lens of someone from the Northeast I use to see the world opened up a bit. The literary works of Eudora Welty and a guided visit of her home in Jackson, Mississippi, piqued my interest. A stop yesterday at the Eastern Tennessee Flea Market with a string band jamming some country tunes put that feeling to music.

A big part of the story of The American South, the one of African-Americans, I didn’t learn much about directly. Maybe I appreciate their sacrifice and survival more. Standing on the ground where much of this story evolved makes me think that our fellow human beings in the social-political trap that is now Afghanistan will gain their human rights one day too.

A Mindful List

Going cold turkey is not working.  List-making is a multi-tasker’s charm, and its results admired by those a safe distance from what it takes to pull off. Not admired so much by those closer. As one teacher/author said, “My husband wants to know where that centered, soothing voice is that I use in my books?” Was he noting her high-shrilled calls for help around the house, impatience with roadblocks at work?

How to ease out of the tyrannical clutches of my To-Do list?

A canvas bag loaned to a college student friend was returned recently during her whirlwind visit. When I later noticed there was something in the bag, I found a copy of Mindful Living with Awareness and Compassion. Gift?  Mistake? I didn’t ask, but now that I’ve read it, don’t have to. It is a gift. It describes one way out of my list-making obsession in the column A Mindful Calendar by Janice Marturano. The writer suggests we pay attention to sensations in our bodies while looking at a single calendar page from our schedule. If we’re able to notice how our bodies are reacting with tension, we start asking questions.

I’ll substitute list for calendar and concentrate on sensation in my jaw while asking

• is this what I want to do
• what are the consequences of not doing this
• will it bring joy
• does it square with my beliefs about how to live

The questions will change over time. I’ll make mindful choices. The list will shrink. One item is not a list, and  surely I can remember one thing I want to do.

List No More

I  inherited the make-a-list gene from both sides of my family. Like a lot of other afflictions, listing was  an adult-onset disease. At college I realized no one was managing my time outside of the few hours a week in class or in the dining hall. Dismal grades at the end of the first semester brought on the lists. While my grades improved significantly, I was not yet a slave to lists.

That came with managing a teaching job I was dedicated to and needing a life of family and community. 9 or 10 items to deal with each day was my average, and I checked them off methodically. With the  emphasis on re-use and recycle, my lists shifted from bright-white paper fresh off the stack to toast-size sheets with something else on the back. Yet, number and intensity remained. Lists turned my multi-tasking into something friends and foes alike marveled at.

I’ve retired from that and rebelled. My husband has never written down a thing he intended to do, to buy, to make, or to pay, and his happiness index looks good. I began by tearing up the tiny sheets if the items were not dealt with in a few days. I developed an antidote to them, a sense of empowerment to change my mind about doing some things. Now that I’m my own boss, I set the rhythm of deadlines and time off’ for each project, and I switched to ICal for items time-sensitive.

Next thing on my list, stop making mental lists and silence the nagging voice of regret heard at the end of my afternoons.

Stop Signs into Yield Signs

When I was in college in the late 60’s, I knew my generation, those under 30, were going to make a better world. How hard could that be the way the WW ll generation had sold out to materialism and was drafting student-age guys to fight in Viet Nam? I thought I’d get started with that by joining the Peace Corps. I applied and got in, made it through de-selection of trainees and got assigned to northern Afghanistan.

The job mostly consisted of motivating a small group of Afghan men to do their job in ways more like the way we’d go about mass vaccinating in rural areas. Our notions of how to do this was based on – what – how we structured our approach to writing a paper, finding a summer job, taking care of the family dog? Theirs was based on training from the Afghan Ministry of Health and the cold reality of working without resources like transport, fuel, pay, supervision, etc.

There were clashes and attempts to re-structure the teams. Still muddling along, resolving situations like getting out of the mud and into the village, as they came along with whatever was around was the way we got by. Our idealism for reaching everyone in a given area in a timely fashion got tarnished.

After Peace Corps, I began teaching, without any coursework, in a public high school. In a program for “students at risk,” I knew there would be plenty of call for my compassion, tolerance for differences, and idealism about how far they would go. These traits did not qualify me for the position, and I may have done more harm than good, but it certainly satisfied my desire to work long hours for little pay and make a difference, tiny as it was.

I’ve retired after years of teaching in various programs and I miss the kids. The nice ones. I don’t miss trying to convince large groups of kids to read, write, and think while sitting still for long periods of time, for days in a row, most months of the year. And I have found a quick way to get over obstacles, to take the brakes off forward progress, and ignore the “rules” of the majority. I’ve taken up road biking and learned from fellow bikers that a STOP sign is yellow and has the word YIELD on it. So liberating and so satisfying.

Leaving the Jell-O World Behind

We left behind the late summer’s chores in Vermont for a week of high humidity among the nation’s landmarks. It was the Peace Corps’ 50th. We don’t party five nights in  a row or stay up past midnight any more, so it was both exhilarating and exhausting.

I had dinner at D.C.’s Jewish Community Center on Tuesday with Susan Barocas, director of the Center’s Jewish Film Festival, and fellow Returned volunteers Allen Mondell and Philip Lilienthal. The first question was how did we garner an invitation to show video excerpts and be part of a discussion at the heart of Jewish culture in the capital? You could guess the answer.  Susan had plans herself to serve in the Peace Corps after college but never did. There’s a world out there of people like Susan, smitten with the dream, who remain loyal to the idea. I’ve heard this over and over at screenings of Once in Afghanistan. She wanted to hang out with us, if just briefly, and provide JCC’s venue for a discussion of our work since Peace Corps.

Allen Mondell, documentarian from Dallas and RPCV Sierra Leone, presented a glimpse of his work in progress, Waging Peace The Peace Corps Experience. I was drawn into the lives of the four Returned volunteers Allen has chosen to explore. Allen’s hell-bent on raising enough money to complete a movie that illustrates the commitment of volunteers to service. Philip Lilienthal grew up summering at his father’s camp for kids and was asked to start camps as a Peace Corps volunteer years ago. His only credential was having been a camper himself and, for a couple of summers, a counselor. After retirement, Philip was able to connect that experience, his own childhood at camp, and a commitment to Africa to found Global Camps Africa for kids in South Africa. The project is about bringing HIV awareness to the youth along with all the fun of camp.

The excerpt from Once in Afghanistan began with “culture shock,” a shock you never get over. The women speak of ways in which they floundered and then found ways to continue the adventures and misadventures of trying to serve others. One member re-joined Peace Corps after visiting Kenya on her way home and worked for another 8 years or so teaching medical technicians.

It was easy to spot Returned volunteers between the gathering places last week in Washington. For one thing there were an awful lot of couples in their 60’s and 70’s. There was also about the RPCVs an eagerness to take in whatever came next. What did we find, learn, take away?  One surprise for me was experiencing the curiousity and respect given our movie excerpt about a Muslim country.  The audience greeted our group’s training director Kristina Engstrom and smallpox vaccinator Barbara Runyan with enthusiastic applause when they were introduced. This is a momento I’ll long cherish back in the Jell-O world when the excitement fades and I catch up on my sleep.

Letters Home from Afghanistan

Kristina Engstrom and Peace Corps friends in front of the library 2011

The Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America has invited the Peace Corps women who worked on the smallpox vaccination program in Afghanistan to place their letters, journals, diaries,  photos, and other documents in the library’s archives.  The librarians and curators at the Schlesinger, part of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University in Cambridge MA, are convinced that the vaccinators’ materials are important, not just to the vaccinators themselves, their families and friends but to historians, social scientists, other scholars, and to members of the public who are studying, for example, American women of their generation, foreign women in Afghanistan, public health workers, people touched by the lives of Afghans and places in Afghanistan, family relationships,  work history, education…

The Schlesinger, established in the 1940s, is currently focusing on “women acting globally after World War II” although the library has numerous collections dating from the founding of the United States. The Peace Corps vaccinators will be joining Amelia Earhart, Julia Child, Betty Freidan, the women’s auxiliary of the First Methodist Church of Greenville Mississippi,  American nurses reporting from France during World War I, and many others.

Individual vaccinators will of course make their own decisions about whether to archive their materials and, if so, where.  If they do decide to place their materials in the Schlesinger archives, they may do so at any time, even making provisions in their wills. They may also set any restrictions they want to place on the use of the materials through a formal agreement with the library.

This is a wonderful opportunity to ensure the safety of these unique materials and ensure their accessibility to future scholars.

Written by Kristina Engstrom, Training Consultant, International Programs (Director of Training for Peace Corps Vaccinators, Afghanistan)