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Mustafa Rasuli | Photography |
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| Nowroze, New Years Celebration | 3/21/2002 | |
| Happy New Years! Nowroze Mubarrak! Today is the first day of the new year. I was planning on actually working today and I did for a little while. Early in the morning I awoke at Sikandar Uncles house and made my way down the muddy roads to the main street. I waved a taxi down, said goodbye to my uncle who walked me down and made my way to Mustafa Hotel. I am not feeling to good today. I took a shower yesterday at Mustafa Hotel, and Ohhhh it felt soooo good. I stood under the warm water for about 20 minutes. The unfortunate part is that as soon as you step out of the shower, this wall of cold hits you. I must have caught a cold there. I’m sniffling all the time, my nose is running, my body aches and all I want to do is sleep. I haven’t used the heater in my room yet, but tonight I’m gonna turn it on. Actually I turned it on before coming to the restaurant so that my room would be nice and crispy before I went back to bed. I have a small pimple right under my nose that is killing me. Every time I blow my nose, it sends a stinging pain through my whole body. Small little pimple causing so much pain. Anyway the point is I’m feeling under the water today. I put on a suit and went back to Akbar jon kaka’s house. As I got there the person who was going to take me to go see Rasool Amin was coming out. I looked up over the doorway and in the window was Sheila. She asked where I had been. I told her that I had been at the hotel. I smiled and got back into the Taxi. It was about 7:30AM and we were on our way to the Intercontinental Hotel. The sun was coming up and the white snowpeaks were glistening. I took some pictures from the car, but I was wishing we were somewhere with a better view. We continued to the Intercontinental and made out way in. We went to Rasool Amin’s room and there were about 5 other people there, his deputy minister and other staff. I felt a bit awkward as we were in very personal setting and I was trying to conduct business. People were coming in and out and Mr. Amin had not come out yet. We waited for about 30 minutes and I finally went up close to the person who had brought me and told him that if today was not a good day to talk business that I could do it another time. So I was introduced, and of course my lineage was told. In Afghanistan it seems that people know you from your lineage. They give respect based on your forefathers. Luckily I’m blessed in that my grandparents and great grandparents were both respected and loved by most Afghans. So I was introduced and asked him if we could have some time together to talk business. He told me to come by in about two days. I said OK and we made our way out of the small double-twin bed room and went downstairs. My “escort” was busy talking to people and I told him I was going to walk around. He said OK and that was the last I saw of him until evening. I walked around the hotel grounds for about 30 minutes and took some pictures. It was a great view. There were actually trees left in the area. The air seemed a bit cleaner here. I made my way back down the long driveway and halfway down the hill I grabbed a taxi. He told me 50,000 rupees which is 3 times more than you would normally pay, but I figured I’d rather take a taxi than walk down the hill. I told him that he was really overcharging me but that it was OK. I clicked a few more shots on the way back to the house. I sat down for a while and changed into my traditional Afghan clothes. It was New Years and we were invited to somebodies house for “Josh.” Josh is a dish that is made mainly of meat and grain. They stew the meat until it’s tender and drain all the liquids. They take that liquid and mix some flour with it. Now that’s what I was told. It was pretty good, except for the fact that the guy put about a pound of salt in the dish. Every time I’d take a mouthful of Josh I’d have to gulp down a cup of Iranian Coke “Ashi Mashi” or something like that. The coke actually wasn’t that bad. We finished with the Josh and were forced to eat some fruits. I put two oranges in my pocket and waited for about 10 minutes and then told everybody I was going to the New Years celebration at Sahid Saibs mosque or something like that. The 5 of us made our way out of the house, through the muddy streets and to the main road. We walked to the base of the mountain and the streets were filled with people coming and going. I saw kids, woman, children, and men of all ages. The first part of the climb was pretty easy. The slope was not to bad and I was busy watching all these people and what they were doing. There were fruit stands, “Parcha Kaila, 1000” they kept screaming. There were dry fruit stands, people selling toys. Woman in the blue chadaries walking up and down the mountain. Young boys attempting to look real cool in western style clothes, showing off. Families sitting under the shade of a tree or large rock formation. Music was blaring, from different stereos, Hindi of course. What really tripped me out though was the fact that most of the women were wearing stylish platform shoes. Now normally this is ok, I have no personal problems with platform shoes. But when you’re climbing up a mountain? I don’t know, anyway I have a new found respect for afghan woman. After I saw them in the heels climbing up the mountain it made it 100 times easier for me with my dress shoes. The slope kept getting steeper as we ascended the mountain. We stopped for pictures every once in a while, I’d stop to take a picture of the view. One more thing, I cut my damn hair, which I had put so much effort into so that people would stop staring. I had afghan clothes on, but people were still fascinated with me for some reason. Maybe it was my camera or the fact that I actually smiled. I’m not sure. We made it up to the top of the mountain. What a view? I think I was made for the mountains. Sitting up there I didn’t want to move. I would squat down on the ledge or an outcropping and just look down at the city and people. I took some pictures and I took another 360 degree photo. I can’t wait to develop my film. There was this guy in army uniform, definitely afghan squatted down and just staring down the hill. I looked at him for a while and actually snapped a shot of him sitting there. I could tell that he was somewhere else, some other time. While I was about to set up my camera for some pictures I looked to my left and he was still sitting there but looking at me. I asked him to come and join us for a picture. After taking some pictures we sat down for a while and were talking about the destruction. The guy in a soldier uniform started speaking about the battles on the mountainside. He was a tajik looking man, with a beard and longish hair. He had been with Massood during the civil war which meant he would have been atop the mountain while on the other side were Dostam and the Hazaras. Somebody asked him how close the other guys would get to his positions which was atop the mountain. He threw and orange peel no more than 10 yards away. He looked at me, his eyes seemed to speak of the horrors he had witnessed. He didn’t speak, he just looked at me and while everybody else was carrying on the conversation I looked at him. He said that they used to throw grenades at the position we were sitting at, and how they would quickly grab the grenades and throw them back before they blew. Every time he would finish telling a part of a story he would stop and look at me. I was the only one really listening to what he was saying. When he described the scenes I would actually see it happening. We made our way down the mountain, but on the opposite side. That was where all the action was. All the people were their at a shrine for a sufi. It was one big picnic like celebration. All sorts of stands selling everything from bracelets for woman to toys for little kids. Not the type of toys in Toys R Us, but cheap plastic toys. There were people everywhere. Oh I forgot to mention, the picnic like celebration was held among graves. We were actually walking around graves of people that had died. I tried to comprehend this, and I looked as people didn’t even notice. They would set up their picnic blanket right on, below, atop a grave. The whole celebration was basically held at a cemetery. After thinking about this for a while, I actually liked the idea. It made me sad though that Afghans had been through so much that a grave no longer had any value. After walking around for while and seeing everything we made our way to the main street to catch a taxi. I was dying of thirst. The 2 pounds of salt the guy had put in the Josh was taking it’s toll on me. I felt like my insides were being eaten away. We jumped into a taxi and I swear the Afghan taxi driver looked totally American. Blondish hair, with a blondish beard, and blue eyes. He was no more than 28 years old. We were driving towards the Stadium now, where they had already held a Buzkashee match. We pulled up to a car in front of us and a girl sitting all the way in the back of the car facing the side had her chadary off. She looked at our car for a while, and then the driver started getting real close. He was teasing her, he would pull up the car, pull up the car to the side, until finally she was laughed, covered her face again with her chadary. I had heard of Kabul boys being bad, and now I had a taste of it. There wasn’t much going on at the stadium. It was still pretty full, but the masses of people had already left. The buzkashee match was over. We walked around and I finally pleaded with the other 4 guys to find some water. We found a boy with a container of water, most probably from a well. He would pour a cup in a tin glass and one of us would drink, he would refill the cup and another would drink. I let everybody else drink and then came my turn. The first sensation you feel is the cold tin and the taste of metal, which by the way doesn’t taste to great. Next you feel the well water going down your throat. Now I have been raised on tap water and recently bottled water. Let me tell you well water feels heavy. As your drinking you think that your drinking some sort of broth. It’s heavy with minerals. I drank the whole cup with some real effort. I knew that I would have a stomach ache later, but my body was shriveling on the inside from the effects of the salt. After taking a two hour nap, I looked for my uncle Sikandar, but I was told he was off to the mosque. We had decided to have lunch together and it was now 6pm. I waited two hours for my uncle to show up, but he was nowhere to be found. It had been two days since I had been to Mustafa Hotel, so I decided to go there and spend the night. I got to the hotel at about 9:30PM and hung out in the restaurant for a while. I grabbed my laptop and started typing up my diaries. Around 12PM I went upstairs to the roof and hung out with Suliman, Weis, and a bunch of foreigners. I listened to them talk for a while and finally went back downstairs to bed. I was still feeling pretty sick, so I went right to bed. |
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