Life's Moments

Today was a fun day. First, Esman was in a good mood because his wife and son returned from visiting relatives, and he was no longer lonesome for them.

And then, a couple of days ago, he made a comment on Facebook that was kind of funny. He said that he was watching a cricket match, eating almonds and raisins, and celebrating the moments of his life. Here is the story behind that comment: I cannot drink coffee; however, I found that I like lattes and General Foods International Coffees. When Max and I go anywhere, I always bring along my little can of Suisse Mocha or French Vanilla Café, and he teases me that I, as the General Foods International Coffees commercial says, “celebrate the moments of my life.” When I got my package from Max, the one that contained my lifesaving Swiffers and statins (probably more literal than the Swiffers), I found not one, not two, but six containers of French Vanilla Café! And I told Esman about how I was going to celebrate the moments of my life. He thought that was hilarious! And so every day now, as I sip on my wonderful hot taste of home, Esman says something about celebrating the moments. And of course he was teasing me via Facebook, for heaven’s sake!

After he made the comment, I called him on it in my own post, and then goaded him to bring some almonds and raisins to the office so we could all celebrate some moments. So today, he brought in a bag of almonds and a bag of raisins. I have never had almonds such as these, nor raisins. I know that sounds ridiculous, but it is true.

When I saw the almonds, I asked Esman if he had also brought a nutcracker, because the nuts were in their shells. He told me he had not, and I wondered how I was going to get at the nuts – after all, almonds have a very hard shell. But not these! They are called “paper almonds” because their shells are paper-thin and the nuts can be peeled almost like a banana. The raisins were not like the Sun-Maid raisins we get in a box that are sticky and stuck together in a mass. These raisins, golden raisins, were truly like dried fruit. Each was a separate piece of dried, sweet, chewy fruit. They were delicious! I have no idea how many I ate, but I ate enough.

Then I took a trip downtown to meet with an Appellate judge. He is a young man, earnest, serious, and I think dedicated to doing the right thing. I appreciated his taking the time to meet with us to hear about the training we are doing in the next few months. The thing is that in this country, while the legislature/parliament has passed and enacted codified legislation, it seems that there is not a way to make sure that the laws are applied justly to everyone in the country who, one way or another, avails himself or herself of the judicial system. That is what the Rule of Law programs try to do – bring a sense of legal fairness and justice to a post-conflict country. Obviously, all officers of the court do not see a particular law in the same light in the same circumstance, but if people believe the law is on their side, they will come to trust it and rely on it, and act as if they do. They can trust the law to do the right thing, and they can trust the law to find them if they do not do the right thing. That is what our training is all about: making sure that the police, lawyers, and judges understand each other’s roles in the system and work together to make the system stronger.

Once again, I looked at the landscape as it passed us – the brown dirt that is everywhere, the trash in the brown dirt fields, the areas of mercantilism decorated with endless stacks of old tires, the children out of school and looking every bit like American kids as soon as the bell rings - running down the sidewalks, teasing each other, yelling, riding bicycles in crazy eight patterns in the middle of the street. Once more I reveled in the decorations on the little motorcycle trucks – zaranjes – as they rolled down the street like big, colorful cartoon trucks. I saw buildings I had not seen before, beautiful in their designs, covered with brown dust. Esman pointed out the girls’ dormitory that houses female students at the University of Herat, where 7,000 – 10,000 students are educated; the dorm is not even close to the campus, so a bus takes the students to their classes.

I felt exhilarated to be out, to see this city, to talk to a man whose words I could not understand but whose resolve I thought I could read, and to be in a place so unlike my own home – although my experience here is limited to what is safe to see and do. I wonder what it would be like to walk through the streets and go into stores? I don’t think I will find out – at least not this trip. I think I will have to be satisfied with looking at life here through the windshield of our armored vehicle with a shooter on my left and one on my right and a driver who makes sure we don’t loiter behind vehicles for too long.

So though my vision of here is somewhat compromised, I thank Huge and Ferocious for keeping me safe, for the driver for doing a good job of getting us there and back, for Abdul, who is the Afghan seated to my left, and for Esman, who makes sure that I understand what is said and makes sure that what I say is said in the best way so as not to offend.

Almonds, raisins, meeting a judge: Celebrating the moments of my life. It was a good day.