If you're so inclined...

Afternoon!  Sorry for the delay, I'm sure you were all(!) beside yourselves with suspense!  Truth is, I've had a pretty busy week so my social life hasn't been exactly breathtaking.  On the plus side, this gave me the rare opportunity to watch some fantastic TV, which in turn sparked an idea for a blog post.  I watched Lyse Doucet's documentary on Afghanistan during the week - not only was I eager to find out more about a country that the average person knows little about - often only violence, political strife and pain - but I also was interested to see how a woman would be received in a culture which is often considered to be very male oriented.  Having reported from Afghanistan for many years, Lyse Doucet had no such issues, it seemed, I imagine because she had proved (not least by speaking the language) that she was interested in the people and their lives, not just the latest story or scandal or political maelstrom.  She is quite clearly in it for the long haul.

But it was something that was said when she visited an isolated community, called Paicotal, that really struck a chord with me.  First of all, let me give you an idea of the remoteness of Paicotal.  I'd love to be able to talk knowledgeably of the geography of Afghanistan and give you a really detailed (and smug) set of directions, along the lines of "Just head north on the A76 from Kabul, then hang a left and head westwards just after Chanikar, otherwise you'll be stuck on the A76 'til you get to turn off at Khenjan, which we all know is a nightmare westbound at rush hour."  But quite obviously I got these place names from Google maps, and I'm actually giving fake directions to Bamiyan, not Paicotal, because the latter is too small to be on Google Maps.  Moreover, Google Maps wouldn't give me directions, even to Bamiyan.

But this is more than geographical remoteness, (a clue to which might have been the fact that they went by donkey) it's how remote the community is from any of the luxuries that we've come to consider as absolute staples of "normal" life - our loved ones being able (should they so wish) to have gainful employment near to where we live, an abundance of meat if we're so inclined, wheat to make bread, electricity, news of what's going on in our own country, not to mention the rest of the world. At one point when talking to a group of women, Doucet asked what they knew of the situation in Kabul.  The answer was: very little.  To our minds this seems absurd - we of the email notification when a celebrity sneezes.

But I digress.

The point of the exchange was not to highlight the differences between our society and theirs, but some of the the similarities; having a giggle with your girlfriends and maybe a dance of a Friday evening.  It doesn't matter whether your dancefloor is a tent in the middle of the Afghan mountains or a disco-balled dance hall called the Sequined Supper Club (don't judge me.)  The point is that on the inside we're all more or less the same - we crave human interaction, a sprinkle of laughter and a lot of love.  It doesn't matter what your passport says; it doesn't even matter if you don't have one, we are all humans.

Right at the end of the piece in Paicotal though, Doucet made a comment that had me reaching for my notebook and swallowing an unexpected lump in my throat.  She observed that these similarities didn't change the fact that when she left Paicotal, she'd be going back to her life, and they back to their lives; "lives that are, for the most part, determined from the day of birth."  I've been thinking about this ever since.  In my mind it links to what I said earlier in this post, about the "staples" that we've come to expect; food, news, water...anything we want if we're so inclined.  Our lives aren't determined from the day our umbilical cord is cut, nothing tethers us, umbilical-like, to places, responsibilities, jobs, food types, people.  In some instances that's a bad thing - if we're so inclined we can leave our loved ones, shirk our responsibilities, all under the auspices of "freedom".  Sure, we're free, we get it, we can do what we want, whenever we want, alright?  But most of the time, we're just using that freedom in a negative way, or a lazy way.  A great many of us have the choice to follow dreams and nurture our talents without hurting people, we're just not inclined to, or we're scared to.  I rather think that the people of Paicotal would be pretty appalled at how we are determining our lives, or more accurately, that we have the choice to determine them and we just don't bother.