They Risk Our Lives

It was the first day of Eid, a fantastic fun filled 3 days marking the end of Ramadan, and like many here in Kabul, my friends and I were planning a field trip to another region. Our hope was to get out of dusty Kabul and out to the countryside where we could breathe some fresh air and learn something more about this a country with such a rich history. Our destination: Bamyan, home of the famed giant Buddha statues destroyed by the Taliban in 2001.

Our initial concern, as applies to most long trips in Afghanistan these days, was safety. The road to Bamyan, 240 kilometers Northwest of Kabul, takes much longer than one would expect due to poor road conditions. And although the people of Bamyan are known to be friendly and relaxed, there is a known span of about 15 kilometers along the road which is a high risk area for attacks (according to our many friends working in the security world). We take this under advisement but we are still pretty keen to see this legendary city, important center of the country's Hazara population. To offset the risk, we discuss transportation options, drivers, and itinerary at length, making sure we ride with experienced people who come from that region as well. I confess despite all our careful planning, I was still nervous about making the trip, not unlike how I was nervous to come work in Afghanistan in the first place.



A few days prior to our trip, everything changed again. News spread that a pastor no one over here has ever heard of, in the state of Florida, had announced he would be burning a Koran on September 11th. Throughout Afghanistan this story spread; more and more announcements were made of protests and demonstrations in front of the US embassy and other key places in most major cities. Suddenly word came down from work and from our security friends, that most foreign workers were now on "lock down" and that going anywhere in the days leading up to 9/11 was not advised due to the potential for foreigners (American or not, doesn't matter) to be the target of angry mobs.

It seemed to me a most amazing and irritating truth, that what happens in some city in Florida, can have such a massive and dangerous impact on life in Afghanistan. A few choice words about some public relations stunt and I am now at a new level of risk to be attacked or killed for just walking down the street or riding in a car. A so-called exercise in free speech and suddenly the work of thousands upon thousands of foreign aid workers, who already do such dangerous but much needed work, grinds to a halt.

With all the warning signs and new risks we decide to cancel our much anticipated journey to Bamyan. We also don't venture out near places where demonstrators are gathering for the next few days. The very day we were supposed to arrive in Bamyan reports came in that angry demonstrators had shut down the city center. Just because people were demonstrating doesn't necessarily mean we would have been in any danger, but reading that report, I couldn't help but feel like we had narrowly missed a dangerous situation.

My residence in Kabul happens to have FoxNews among other channels, so of course I switch to it around the time the news came in that the Koran burning plan would not go forward. Some talking heads were going on and on about what a loss this was for free speech and the United States in general. I kept thinking about the new risk so many of us face ever since this issue came up, and at the same time, the risk these talking heads don't face when they go home tonight.. whether they burn a Koran or not.