Because I am unemployed I am free to make my own sensible security decisions here in Kabul. Yesterday I walked up 'TV Hill', chatting with the children and guards and enjoying the panorama. More photos here.
I am back in Kabul - happily unemployed. While I'm tinkering with my CV my immediate goal is to catch up on my studies, reconnect with friends, and enjoy some freedom. It is wonderful to be able to make my own security decisions and, where and when I judge safe, walk amongst the real people.
This Wall Street Journal story illustrates the complexity of the World Health Organization's task in the south of Afghanistan.
It discusses the diplomatic and political issue of negotiating with the Taliban for access.
Left to right: Me, Sharky, and our security officer Staale Johansen
We don't actually have to wear our body armor all the time but apart from that this shows a bit of the way we live right now. (We were moved to the UNOCA compound after the attack on a UN guesthouse last month.) The buildings on the left is our World Health Organization home. Staale is a wonderful combination of protective and understanding. We'll miss him but we know he's done more than his share.
It has been AGES since I blogged anything except "Sharky and I are OK" after the various explosions and attacks here in Kabul. I have been so busy with work and moving that tonight seems like my first chance to really relax.
Sharky and I have now moved into our sixth home together - while we still have ten days until two years from the date we first set eyes on each other. The most recent move was for two reasons related to the attack on a Kabul guest house on October 28.
Actually we didn't know about it until the day and then only because I was nosily reading somebody's papers through between the seats in front of us on our flight home from India. The severity only began to set in when we found we had to wait a few hours at the airport before the UN gave permission for a car to collect us. Then we learned that there had been a terrible complex attack and that a colleague of one of our housemates had been killed (leaving three children). The entire UN population of Kabul went on alert with rumors of suspicious surveillance. A few days later Sharky saw a Corolla full of five men staring at our gate and then we had a visitor ask if we had any vacancies for an NGO that he couldn't name. We reported these incidents and the UN Department of Safety and Security advised everybody in our house to move. While we were still making preparations we learned that most guest houses in Kabul - including ours - were suddenly about to lose their UNDSS security approval so we had no choice. We spent two more days there (alone) and then moved to the large and heavily protected UNOCA compound where I work. This suddenly meant that I can enjoy a safe 500m walk to work instead of an uncomfortably and theoretically two hours a day in an armored Land Cruiser. Sharky, however, now faces the long ride whenever she wants to go into town.
I'm going to try to blog more often.
Sharky and I are fine. We just flew into Kabul from India and did not know about yesterday's attacks on UN staff, but now we know a friend's friend was killed. More soon.
This is getting to be too much of a habit. There was another big bomb in Kabul this morning with rumors of ten dead. Sharky and I are safe and sound.
Here is the team I work with at the World Health Organization in Afghanistan. (L-R) Dr Asadullah Taqdeer, Mr Patrick Ulrich, Dr Humaira, Ms Shabnam Waleh, and me.
There was another horrible bomb attack today. I didn't hear this one but I was right there earlier in the day.
Sharky and I are fine.
I'm re-posting this picture of me and my beloved mother in law because somehow a Japanese porn site keeps posting comments to the earlier version.
There was another explosion near my office just now. Sharky and I are fine.
Afghanistan held National Immunization Days in January and March targeted 7.5 million children under 5 years of age for protection against various diseases including Polio. Although normal winter conditions blocked access to many districts with 702,000 children most of these were or will be protected later. Monitoring confirms that in the vast majority of covered districts the target of 95% coverage was achieved. Although Afghanistan is one of only four countries with significant polio problems, surveillance and treatment is generally well established. HOWEVER, the Taliban blocked access to districts with 226,000 eligible children. Nearly a quarter of a million Afghan children are denied access to routine polio protection by these fundamentalists.
I've joined the World Health Organization. I am the 'Information Officer' for the Health Cluster, which brings health NGOs working in Afghanistan and the Afghan Ministry of Public Health together. (I think.)
It's STILL not the type of management position I'm trying to return to but it looks interesting.
As the Presidential and Provincial Council elections approach we're bracing for threatened 'complex attacks' on our compound. This means that a first vehicle born suicide bomb might smash the compound entrance and then other attackers will run in shooting before detonating their suicide vests. Our building is within a big (and now targeted) compound but we're adding a thick steel front door and windows will be bricked over. Yesterday we were told that when we hear the initial bomb (and apparently we "WILL hear it" - the Taliban won't come with less than 500Kg of explosives) we should lock our door and hide under our desks. Apparently there will be no time to rush to the bunker.
Also related to the election, we are advocating for the Independent Election Commission of Afghanistan to reverse its decision to use health facilities (and schools) for polling. We are concerned that politicizing health facilities jeopardizes their neutrality and the perception and reality that they are safe places. Furthermore, if there is violence on election day the health facilities must be available, not involved.
I spent part of my valuable free time between jobs visiting Puli Khumri in Baghlan province.
I'd had a bad time at my previous job and I hoped that visiting one of our actual projects would make me feel better about the fifteen months I'd devoted.
This is the Women's Garden wall Puli Khumri. The wall is great and the garden (which we did not develop) is lovely. The all-important donor plaque is deteriorating which is deliciously ironic. We claimed that this project generated over 100,000 (half the town's population) of our 129,000 female beneficiaries in our second year.
(In this picture I'm wearing a genuine Schuh's Saloon T-shirt.)
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