Capital Capers in Kabul
Some Afghans find humor amid corruption and hardships
Despite these concerns, city markets are vibrant. Peddlers push wooden carts filled with fresh mangoes, bananas, and dried chickpeas, a popular snack. Teens working at juice bars carry drinks to parked cars, where passengers sit listening to tapes of the popular Bollywood heartthrobs whose posters adorn buses and shops. Many women cover themselves in the sky-blue burkas but fewer, residents say, with each passing month. Many burkas have been refashioned, with the mesh face veil pushed up and over the head, like a hooded cape.
Others have abandoned burkas altogether, trading them in for fashionable cheetah-print scarves. "Life is much better than under the Taliban," says Sahera, who, like many Afghans, goes by one name. "But not as good as it should be, considering all of the aid that has poured into the country." She is shopping with her son, a university graduate unable to find a job. "To get one, you either have to know someone in government or pay a bribe," she says. For most Afghans, neither is an option. "If we had money, we'd bribe someone," Sahera says. "But we don't."
Down the road, Afghanistan's traffic cops stand on striped pedestals in busy intersections, waving paddles that seem to have little impact on the chaotic flow of cars. Many Afghans joke that the cops' main function is simply extracting bribes from drivers involved in accidents—which, if that's the case, they have little incentive to prevent.
Culture of survival. Such corruption is a daily fact of life in Kabul, where police earn $70 a month, less than most of the pushcart vendors who sell mangoes. "How can there not be corruption when this is the pay of most police?" asks the Ministry of Interior's recruiting chief, Colonel Wakil. The head of Afghanistan's security force training, U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Robert Durbin, says he hopes that a police pay raise to $100 a month will come through soon. "Corruption in many cases comes from a culture of survival," he says. "To help your family, you'll do whatever it takes."
In the meantime, residents rely on humor to get by. One comic on a popular new stand-up comedy program—a competition to become "Lord of the Laugh"—tells a joke about a homeless refugee in Kabul. Like many new arrivals, he is unable to find a house. He is sitting by the river contemplating his options when a watermelon floats by. Encouraged, he fishes out the watermelon and slices it open. A genie promptly pops out and asks if there is anything he can do for the man. "A house would be nice," the man says. "Are you kidding?" the genie replies. "I'm living in a watermelon, and you're asking me for a house?"
It is one of many such jokes in Kabul today. "If you can't make me laugh, tell me another story," says the host of the stand-up comedy show. "You can probably just as easily make me cry."
advertisement
