UN Heaven

Ok, ok, that was admittedly lazy blogging to just put up 4 photos in the previous post. I've changed it now.

Tonight was a party for one of our best midwife trainers, who is leaving after a year and half of work up here in Jalalabad. She's next to me; on the left is another IMC HQ person; the lady in the white works with jailed Afghan women and women's prison guards.

Nangahar province borders Pakistan, and its very religious. ALL women are in burkhas, no matter what; beating and jailing your wife is normal and accepted; i met a doctor today who said she must have 18 children because that's what her husband insists. One a year for 18 years. (She is in her 4th year of marriage and is at 40 weeks with her 4th child.) We joked about family planning, but it hurts my heart.

Maybe i'm getting softer in my old age, but i was also almost in tears while touring Sheik Mesry returnee camp for Afghans who were previously living in Pakistan. It is one of the harshest places I have ever seen, and its where the government designated for thousands of returnees. Its about 25 minutes outside of Jalalabad on the wildest drive that I have been on in a long long time. Our Afghan driver was manhandling that Land Cruiser up and down rocky passes and through not quite dried-up river beds. It was so fun I couldn't stop shrieking and laughing. But the township itself is so sad, and it boggles the mind what people are forced to live with (and without.) It is the epitome of desolate and harsh. We run an outreach clinic there 2x/week (photo.)

I wasn't so generous with the photos at the public ceremony beforehand. With men, I just don’t like it, I feel like a zoo animal. They kept sneaking up to me with their cameras so I wrapped myself up like a ninja too, and put on my big sunglasses. I suppose I should be more gracious, or even magnanimous, but I just get creeped out.

We went back to the Kunar province office for lunch. I eat like a man now, I swear. I am so famished by lunch time! Had a whole plate of lamb, an amount of bread that could feed a family, oily but delicious greens, spicy potatoes, melon, pepsi, and a watery yogurt drink I didn’t even like. Oh, and my muscles are seriously atrophied--I feel them twitch as they die. But, I don’t seem to be gaining any weight. I like this life so far… But, I'm sure building back my running endurance in the oppressive summer heat of DC will be as painful as pigging out here is pleasing. Can't wait.

Here's a photo I call Come Mister Taleban, Tally Me Banana....(daylight come and me wanna go home.)

I'll be back in Kabul soon and then to similarly hot Pakistan next week. I don't want this trip to ever end! Its put a fierce travel bug back in me, so consider yourselves warned....

Bye!