At the hotel I found a small magazine called Afghan Scene. It is exactly what it sounds like; an attempt to create a feeling of a scene in Kabul. A scene for the young, beautiful and successful (although the picture on the cover shows an old man with a thick grey beard and the traditional pakul hat). It was very interesting reading indeed. Especially one article about a woman who made a documentary on the Afghan version of the TV-show Pop Idol; Afghan Star. It was amazig reading! I did not even think there was anything like that. But as the filmer said, almost everything you hear from Afghanistan is miserable Taliban related stories about war and fighting and number of dead. But this country has a population where 60% are under the age of 20, of cause they want to hear and know something else. Of cause you can then say; is this really what they need?! Is this not only superficial popular culture. It might very well be, but maybe that is exactly what you need sometimes, maybe especially when life in itself is hard and challenging. And to quote the documentary maker Havana Marking again; There is huge unemployment and gossip is a serious problem. If people can talk about this, then they might not talk about the woman who has to go to work, or other “scandals”.
I haven’t checked it, but maybe you can read the article on: www.afghanscene.com
4 comments:
At www.afghanscene.com it is possible to download only old release of the magazine (around 2005), but it was quite interesting too to have a look about what Afgan people could read.
You wrote a lot during these days, not easy to "follow" you (for my limited english vocabolary). But always nice to read about your experience abroad; it is important to keep a view outside your country and your daily world: so thanks for this blog. I'm really invious about your life.
I hope you can now relax yorself at Dubai (I suggest you outside the freezer).
And have a nice trip back.
garaz
Don't worry about your English! The fact that my blog might not always be that easy to follow is probably due both to my confused mind and to my English beeing far from perfect as well.
Often when I write the posts I am also tired and short of time so afterwards I find a lot of errors and spelling mistakes, so no wonder it can be difficult to follow.
I will try to post some pictures later.
We are leving Kabul in a couple of hours...
It's 3 years that I daily exchange mails with Swedish people, and I can say you write in english much better than my collegues.
I wait for your pictures, even if it seems to me you are very busy in Dubai....
not very busy at all, but did not have internet connection in my room at the hotel. Very relaxing as that meant I could not check my e-mails either.
Now at the airport again waiting to board the flight back... very mixed emotions...
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