Today we went on a picnic to Akram’s family orchard, high in the hills north of Kabul. After breakfast we loaded up a van and Akram’s car with toshaks, pillows, dishes and all sorts of stuff Reza needed to make a meal al fresco. Zamir drove the van with our host Ken, Reza and his son Aziz, Akram’s brother and me in the back as the sole female. With Akram were Brian, Dan and Akram’s cousin. After a couple of stops for Reza to buy salad veggies , pomegranates and naan, we headed up a surprisingly nicely paved road, through a couple of villages along a stream that was occasionally shunted into various channels for irrigation purposes. I later learned this was called Sugar Canyon.
We stopped after about an hour, unloaded the vehicles and tramped down through a forest trail to a wide creek bed; crossed that and meandered downstream a bit until we reached a glade which had been built up with some stone walls. After getting everything in place, most of the men hiked up past the orchards to a higher mountain. Reza and his son began to prepare the meal. Akram’s brother and I talked politics. He is a law student at the University of Kabul with the intent of going into politics. He told me his professors have warned him not to talk politics until after he has finished his studies, but I promised not to tell.
Reza made kabuli pilau with both lamb and beef. The meat he had brought in a pressure cooker and he put that on a portable gas burner to cook further. The rice had been brought in a basin of warm water which he drained off and rinsed again in fresh water. He arranged some stones in a circle and then built a fire in the middle with wood gathered nearby. He first used the fire to heat some water which was used to clean dishes later. Eventually, he poured the meat and onions from the pressure cooker into a big pot, added the matchstick carrots and raisins we had brought, the put the rice on top and let it all simmer. Later he covered the lid with aluminum foil and transferred some of the coals to the top, forming a sort of oven with heat from above and below.
Meanwhile, Aziz had been cleaning the veggies, and with the help of Zamir who turns out to be a chef’s son, the tomatoes, cucumbers, onions were artistically arranged on a large platter. They also opened the pomegranates and piled the seeds on a platter, surrounded by orange wedges. Zamir then astounded us by creating a long string by tying several tea bag strings together and used it to cut an apple so that it could be pulled partially apart as the centerpiece of our fruit platter. A large bowl of yogurt also appeared, the pilau was heaped on another platter and we were set. We Americans were allowed to use the toshaks and had plates and forks. The Afghanis ate in the traditional fashion by gathering the pilau into balls with the naan. Ken had the bright idea of putting the pomegranates into the yogurt, which proved to be a huge hit. Some even improved on it by squeezing orange juice over it.
All in all, it was a marvelously relaxing day. I felt a bit like I was in the middle of a scene from Emma, where the servants all work hard to bring a picnic for her and her friends to Knob Hill. Akram took a couple of pillowcases and filled them with apples from the orchard for us to take home. Then it was back down the hill, past the security checkpoint at the entrance to the city (I have never had to produce my passport or my identity card other than at the airport during my entire stay here), back to the dust and the hundreds of cars beeping their horns, beggars sitting in the middle of the street on the speed bumps, young boys wandering through traffic selling things, people everywhere.
This will be last post from Afghanistan. After making a few contacts this morning and perhaps some last minute shopping, we head to the airport to leave for Dubai. Sigh.
No comments:
Post a Comment