purdah's pumpkin

A house sits to the east of my blue room window and completely blocks any sunrise view from where I stand next to my bed and brilliant oranges and reds were spilling out from each side of the house so I promptly ran up to the roof at 6.15 this morning and what a disappointment to see in such a huge sky only a small area of oranges and reds and it wasn’t enough to remember with a photo. 

And it was cold.  The blue room at night is now cold enough I put on a few more layers but what a terrible night of sleep because of mosquitos.  How is it they still live in the cold?   Why are they always going after my ears?  Do they see infrared heat spewing out, I don’t know.  So now, today, my morning class has finished, I am free until Saturday afternoon.  Gee, I could almost go to Dubai.  I hope I am productive today, why, the first thing I need to do is start a new book.  Hmmm.

6.51pm—A splendid sunset tonight, almost a hundred photos as the yellows became reds  on fire, and it would have been even more special if I didn’t have this conversation with the man who lives on the large empty plot in a tiny house with a family:

Excuse me excuse me

yes

my family cannot come out because you are on the roof with a camera.

I’m taking photos of the sunset.

my family cannot come out because you are on the roof with a camera.

ok, five minutes I finish. 

I gestured with my free hand to my chest to show him respect and whatever form of apology he could take from that and I finished taking photos for I don’t know how long and twenty minutes later back in the blue room Said Wali called and said five neighbors are complaining that I am on the roof with a camera.  Hanukkah was told to calm them down and tell them he doesn’t know our ways blah blah, oh but I do know your ways, middle-age purdah pumpkin heads.

And it is completely absurd to entertain any notion of someone telling me I can no longer take photos on the roof because I will leave.  No complaints. I have enough to live on for a while before I find something else.    

Then I saw Hanukkah in the kitchen and I pantomimed holding a camera and gestured toward the neighbor who spoke to me and he went into an explanation and I understood ‘Kandahar’ the three times it was mentioned and then I told him I understood “Purdah” and he laughed, wo, ok. 

And I know what they think of keeping their women safe from all men’s eyes, here’s a fuzzy white dude wearing his LL Bean shirt for the first time in two years since he picked it up at St. Joes taking photo crazy pics of stunning sunsets or moonrises or just bloody boring ass clouds. 

Look through all my photos and you’ll find there are no photos of any people in this neighborhood outside of this house.  Of course I believe you, Jack, and you know how to win them over.  Trust. 

Trust, shmust.  Hanukkah suggested maybe one of them would take a shot at me if I photoed his purdah, ha, bring it on Pat Benatar, of course I should take this crazy man sort of serious, I have to respect the people, if staying off the roof is the way I have to show my respect then they are showing me no respect because they don’t want to trust me.

How do they trust me?  I show them all my photos.  Not good enough.  I’ve read enough to understand Afghans have never in their history trusted people from the outside and why should I be the exception, oh right because we'll never know each other.

On to more tranquil moments of the day:  Rezak cooked a nice chicken with potatoes lunch and he gave me a Tupperware full of it for lunch tomorrow.  That was very kind of him.  And he took my beige kameez to the dry cleaners.  A double thanks he is off tomorrow. 

And I started Helen Rappaport’s “Four Sisters” --The Lost Lives of the Romanov Grand Duchesses, good choice, I think I am gonna really like this one.  Lots of history explained from another view and what I didn’t know started on the first page.  Enjoy.