Good Shit Part 3

What can I say about Afghanistan in the winter of 1975? A Peaceful Kingdom. That is without what the place was. Travel anywhere, and not to feel any sense of being in fear. The women often wore baby blue head to foot. The urban-men looked at us as customers who were probably nuts or why would you come at all? However, since you were here why not look at his nice AK-47 or perhaps this old Red Cross medical box that has been kept current?

Back a bit. I flew in over the snowy fields and hills that hold Kabul in its palm, as if the land is undecided as to the town’s fate. Clench or not? Clench or not? As I went into the town on a bus I was surprised at the pines. Like relatives from the West Coast of Canada. I felt optimistic right away, and that feeling never really left me for the rest of my stay.
By the time I was roomed it was dark as well as cold. A smiling man dressed in browns brought in a pail of wood and built me a fire in the airtight. His teeth gleamed in the candle light. I fell asleep to the smell of pine sap burning. I could not wait for the new day. I was 24 years old.
Chicken Street. The day was early and I was on the prowl for drugs and adventure, or so I imagined it then, and I was probably right, because when I tell this story to people whose lives have been more “at home” they always are kind enough to tell me how much they wish they had of included those times in their story. I wonder if they know how sometimes I wish I had of been “at home” a bit more.
CHICKEN STREET. This name was celebrated among all the young bandits of the West. Hippies, smokers, dealers or adventurers all knew the name of Afghanistan’s main market. Chicken Street was the archetypal soul of a small lifestyle. I was there. The day was gray and promised snow. Hungry, I looked for food. Too soon in history for Mac’s or Burger King. I spotted a sign in English that announced, “The Yoghurt Store”. Something I could relate to. I walked in and realized I was not the only Euro type in the city. A couple from Germany sat together and ignored my entrance. The other inhabitant was obviously native. He was dressed in a gray robe made of warm material. His boots were local, a form of rubber boot and leather. On his head was a black turban and he had a long beard that was not planned in any way. His eyes were gray and watching me. I smiled and he nodded back. Hunger was becoming more immediate and I sort of slid up to the counter, sort of sussing the place so I did not come across as a total doofus. I hate to look stupid in my eyes.
Despite my slick move I still could not figure how to order or even what was on offer. The guy who ran it walked over to me with the question on his face.
“All they really have Canadian, is fresh yoghurt with limited toppings and oh yes, they also have coffee that all in all is not too bad”.
I turned, looking at the man who had spoken up just in time to save a bit of cool. It was the ‘looks like Afghani but not’ who had spoken. He was smiling a tiny bit, his demeanor welcoming in some lovely way. I smiled back, feeling open to what was going to be.
“Hello”, he said with his smile opening up wide, “my name is Fred and I am a Dutchman”. His hand, held out for shaking, was long, slender and not put together for manual labor.
I smiled into his face, recognizing someone I could involve myself and my time in Afghan. I thought “this guy has to be aware of all the shit that is going down in this place and that is what I need. A guide for the Kingdom of Afghanistan”. I asked right away how he figured I was Canadian. He told me the combo of my height and carriage plus the fact Americans never came here and when they did they were never alone, plus the fact I did not look European. I just figured he smoked a lot of good hash.
How a person sees another human is going to be useful if not wonderful in their life is beyond me. I just do not have the nuts to answer those kinds of questions. I just knew. It is that simple. I knew he was not anything other than he said. He was a Dutchman who had fallen in love with a geographic space. I understood absolutely and everywhere. We were the same and a good time was in store. I wish all of you readers this blessing if you ever take the risks. It does take some of that, and does not always pay off, but when it does…
One word led to another and before you know it, he is coming to help me move into a much cheaper place where the Europeans live after they have enjoyed the country or a while. I moved in with Fred and a few other types. In the middle of the floor was a giant hubble-bubble, as they call them.
One of the major disadvantages of drugs in excess is the sameness of the days and nights. This leads to a form of forgetting. Kind of a blackout based on repetition rather than booze. Apparently the brain is too bored to record. I mention this to explain the paltry amount of info the next week or so contains. Smoking hash, inject heroin, smoke, shoot, smoke, shoot and …….
One memory does stand out. I must have drunk or ate the wrong thing. I was downtown in Embassy Row, just walking when my bowels turned to water and followed gravity to its logical end (I suppose there is a joke here somewhere, but sometime I have to resist just for the discipline).
As luck has it I am right in front of the Pakistani Consulate. I run in and tell them in a rushed and frantic gobble of English and French what is about to happen. With alacrity they took me to a door and with a sigh of relief I started undoing my belt, and then I froze. The shitter was an Eastern version. The one where you squat over a bowl and use a watering can to clean up.
I do remember that.
During the course of one night around the hubble bubble Fred mentioned that he knew where to get the best hashish in the world, and did I want to take a trip?
I was pretty deep into a small habit at this point and my answer would depend on the supply of heroin. However, that was not a big problem in Kabul and we set out for the north and a town called Mazar-i-Sarif, which is a few miles from the Soviet Union (which back then was a major player).
The trip on the bus going to Mazar was around 14 hours if I remember right. Fred and I were the only non-Afghani on the bus. The men were friendly but kept to themselves. Not once was any rudeness offered to me during my trip.
The women dressed in sky blue robes with mesh over the face and all of them were covered. Head to foot and let me tell you something about that. The silky outfit moved with every exertion the woman did. These are women who may have carried stuff on their head for years or maybe not, but they stood straight, and I have never seen a North American or Euro female move like that. The sky blue cloth rippled with life, showing lines of form and movement. Now and then a flash of dark eye apparent through the cloth. However, I did not need a guide book to tell me these men were not going to be tolerant of any person eyeballing their woman.
Leaving early we got outside town quick and climbed through the foothills of the Hindu Kush range. This is a chain of huge mountains and the title translates as “killer of Hindus” which should give potential conquers or occupiers some pause for thought. If that does not do it perhaps the long history of destroying all countries who tried to invade should do so, but apparently not. Sometimes a person has to wonder if the world has more idiots in charge than it really needs. But enough! My thought son politics are entertaining and clever to a very limited audience. Me in fact. No one else.
At about 8000 feet up we stopped for ‘chai’ which is a tea break. We did this at the front of the Salang Pass. This engineering marvel runs about two miles and was used as an ambush point a few years after my visit. Apparently the Muj or locals caught a Soviet convoy.
Anyhow, back in 1975 it was still a nice place. The tea shop had green tea or the horrid concoction with sugar and condensed milk. Taking my green tea I stepped out to the road and smoked some hash. I was caught up in the local town that had grown around the entrance.
It was cool. The homes were mainly like domes and the fences were circular. All of it was, of course, made out of the same rock the mountain was so it gave a strong impression of having popped up in place, like a mushroom.
As I watched it started to snow. The white flakes combined with early blossoms from the cherry and apple trees nearby, making for a frozen gorgeous paste that soon covered me and everything else. I stood drinking my tea, and letting this moment live in me.
We got back in the bus and arrived later in the early evening, late due to the snow. My first impression of Mazar was dominated by the famous Blue Mosque and all the white pigeons that hang out there. The other memory is of all the small horse drawn carts that were colored individually and had bells everywhere.
Fred and I ate at a café where all the men sat on platforms covered in rugs eating kebab and bread. We found a place to stay and went to sleep, excited for tomorrow, which would be a wonderful blessing for people you care for. You could say, “May tomorrow be something you keenly look forward to”. How nice.hat can I say about Afghanistan in the winter of 1975? A Peaceful Kingdom. That is without what the place was. Travel anywhere, and not to feel any sense of being in fear. The women often wore baby blue head to foot. The urban-men looked at us as customers who were probably nuts or why would you come at all? However, since you were here why not look at his nice AK-47 or perhaps this old Red Cross medical box that has been kept current?

Back a bit. I flew in over the snowy fields and hills that hold Kabul in its palm, as if the land is undecided as to the town’s fate. Clench or not? Clench or not? As I went into the town on a bus I was surprised at the pines. Like relatives from the West Coast of Canada. I felt optimistic right away, and that feeling never really left me for the rest of my stay.
By the time I was roomed it was dark as well as cold. A smiling man dressed in browns brought in a pail of wood and built me a fire in the airtight. His teeth gleamed in the candle light. I fell asleep to the smell of pine sap burning. I could not wait for the new day. I was 24 years old.
Chicken Street. The day was early and I was on the prowl for drugs and adventure, or so I imagined it then, and I was probably right, because when I tell this story to people whose lives have been more “at home” they always are kind enough to tell me how much they wish they had of included those times in their story. I wonder if they know how sometimes I wish I had of been “at home” a bit more.
CHICKEN STREET. This name was celebrated among all the young bandits of the West. Hippies, smokers, dealers or adventurers all knew the name of Afghanistan’s main market. Chicken Street was the archetypal soul of a small lifestyle. I was there. The day was gray and promised snow. Hungry, I looked for food. Too soon in history for Mac’s or Burger King. I spotted a sign in English that announced, “The Yoghurt Store”. Something I could relate to. I walked in and realized I was not the only Euro type in the city. A couple from Germany sat together and ignored my entrance. The other inhabitant was obviously native. He was dressed in a gray robe made of warm material. His boots were local, a form of rubber boot and leather. On his head was a black turban and he had a long beard that was not planned in any way. His eyes were gray and watching me. I smiled and he nodded back. Hunger was becoming more immediate and I sort of slid up to the counter, sort of sussing the place so I did not come across as a total doofus. I hate to look stupid in my eyes.
Despite my slick move I still could not figure how to order or even what was on offer. The guy who ran it walked over to me with the question on his face.
“All they really have Canadian, is fresh yoghurt with limited toppings and oh yes, they also have coffee that all in all is not too bad”.
I turned, looking at the man who had spoken up just in time to save a bit of cool. It was the ‘looks like Afghani but not’ who had spoken. He was smiling a tiny bit, his demeanor welcoming in some lovely way. I smiled back, feeling open to what was going to be.
“Hello”, he said with his smile opening up wide, “my name is Fred and I am a Dutchman”. His hand, held out for shaking, was long, slender and not put together for manual labor.
I smiled into his face, recognizing someone I could involve myself and my time in Afghan. I thought “this guy has to be aware of all the shit that is going down in this place and that is what I need. A guide for the Kingdom of Afghanistan”. I asked right away how he figured I was Canadian. He told me the combo of my height and carriage plus the fact Americans never came here and when they did they were never alone, plus the fact I did not look European. I just figured he smoked a lot of good hash.
How a person sees another human is going to be useful if not wonderful in their life is beyond me. I just do not have the nuts to answer those kinds of questions. I just knew. It is that simple. I knew he was not anything other than he said. He was a Dutchman who had fallen in love with a geographic space. I understood absolutely and everywhere. We were the same and a good time was in store. I wish all of you readers this blessing if you ever take the risks. It does take some of that, and does not always pay off, but when it does…
One word led to another and before you know it, he is coming to help me move into a much cheaper place where the Europeans live after they have enjoyed the country or a while. I moved in with Fred and a few other types. In the middle of the floor was a giant hubble-bubble, as they call them.
One of the major disadvantages of drugs in excess is the sameness of the days and nights. This leads to a form of forgetting. Kind of a blackout based on repetition rather than booze. Apparently the brain is too bored to record. I mention this to explain the paltry amount of info the next week or so contains. Smoking hash, inject heroin, smoke, shoot, smoke, shoot and …….
One memory does stand out. I must have drunk or ate the wrong thing. I was downtown in Embassy Row, just walking when my bowels turned to water and followed gravity to its logical end (I suppose there is a joke here somewhere, but sometime I have to resist just for the discipline).
As luck has it I am right in front of the Pakistani Consulate. I run in and tell them in a rushed and frantic gobble of English and French what is about to happen. With alacrity they took me to a door and with a sigh of relief I started undoing my belt, and then I froze. The shitter was an Eastern version. The one where you squat over a bowl and use a watering can to clean up.
I do remember that.
During the course of one night around the hubble bubble Fred mentioned that he knew where to get the best hashish in the world, and did I want to take a trip?
I was pretty deep into a small habit at this point and my answer would depend on the supply of heroin. However, that was not a big problem in Kabul and we set out for the north and a town called Mazar-i-Sarif, which is a few miles from the Soviet Union (which back then was a major player).
The trip on the bus going to Mazar was around 14 hours if I remember right. Fred and I were the only non-Afghani on the bus. The men were friendly but kept to themselves. Not once was any rudeness offered to me during my trip.
The women dressed in sky blue robes with mesh over the face and all of them were covered. Head to foot and let me tell you something about that. The silky outfit moved with every exertion the woman did. These are women who may have carried stuff on their head for years or maybe not, but they stood straight, and I have never seen a North American or Euro female move like that. The sky blue cloth rippled with life, showing lines of form and movement. Now and then a flash of dark eye apparent through the cloth. However, I did not need a guide book to tell me these men were not going to be tolerant of any person eyeballing their woman.
Leaving early we got outside town quick and climbed through the foothills of the Hindu Kush range. This is a chain of huge mountains and the title translates as “killer of Hindus” which should give potential conquers or occupiers some pause for thought. If that does not do it perhaps the long history of destroying all countries who tried to invade should do so, but apparently not. Sometimes a person has to wonder if the world has more idiots in charge than it really needs. But enough! My thought son politics are entertaining and clever to a very limited audience. Me in fact. No one else.
At about 8000 feet up we stopped for ‘chai’ which is a tea break. We did this at the front of the Salang Pass. This engineering marvel runs about two miles and was used as an ambush point a few years after my visit. Apparently the Muj or locals caught a Soviet convoy.
Anyhow, back in 1975 it was still a nice place. The tea shop had green tea or the horrid concoction with sugar and condensed milk. Taking my green tea I stepped out to the road and smoked some hash. I was caught up in the local town that had grown around the entrance.
It was cool. The homes were mainly like domes and the fences were circular. All of it was, of course, made out of the same rock the mountain was so it gave a strong impression of having popped up in place, like a mushroom.
As I watched it started to snow. The white flakes combined with early blossoms from the cherry and apple trees nearby, making for a frozen gorgeous paste that soon covered me and everything else. I stood drinking my tea, and letting this moment live in me.
We got back in the bus and arrived later in the early evening, late due to the snow. My first impression of Mazar was dominated by the famous Blue Mosque and all the white pigeons that hang out there. The other memory is of all the small horse drawn carts that were colored individually and had bells everywhere.
Fred and I ate at a café where all the men sat on platforms covered in rugs eating kebab and bread. We found a place to stay and went to sleep, excited for tomorrow, which would be a wonderful blessing for people you care for. You could say, “May tomorrow be something you keenly look forward to”. How nice.

That Winter into Spring thing

That Winter into Spring thing
is all about full light laid out
on sidewalks,no leaves to shade the sight.
Crossing lines, shadows of trees bare
and bright in the turnover of light

From bright to muted to rustling trees
the weather warms stone and flesh.
Spring is the thing we say,
watching open and honest Winter leave and
masqueraders move in, celebrating by dancing
around a pole named for a month of Spring

That Winter into Spring thing
where Winter runs to the north
leaving warmth and those so green
waves of new grass
then dandelions yellow as marketed butter
then tulips of all colors, and roses and blossoms and ......
an endless distracting of shades and windy carosels
courtesy of the chromatic scales

That Winter into Spring thing
trading old black and white photos of life
for technicolor extravaganzas
etched by sunlight, beach bodies and squints
as the sun at the center takes bows and applause.

Honest Winter light cut into geometric shapes
by the power and lines of birds in flight
My love and her face etched by November day
her thoughts clear and bright, no shade to hide.

None of Spring's make-up helping disguise
no rosy lipstick, no eye shadow
for the aching gaze to hide any lie
and to put away safely a life walked
and to leave my love's beautiful face lit up by God.

That Winter inito Spring thing.
Lost now the clean sniff of blue ice
and wind rushing its light feet over
forevers of snow, clacking and tinking of icy
branches mixed in among all the
harsh sounds of evergreens rubbing wood,
smeared with cold sap.

In the god light my love reads a book
and from the side this loving voyeur
takes stock and once again wonders,
wonders how and why he became the one
the man who gets to live with such beauty.
This Winter thing, this Winter thing.

Watching a reunion

Lodged on the rocky shore of a sleepy sea
my forest dips down a wooded toe
as if to see, and then to say,
that is the right temp for me.

Further on the Bay's fullness
grows out until gone
joining its watery self
to a greater power than me.

In the damp night filled with
a gurgle and splash the tree leans
and leaning out to the sea, is
amused and touched by family sounds
as the Bay joins its mother the sea
wet whispers of "mother, it's me".

The sun rise surprises the night with red
stretched through the grey night joining horizons.
The dark of before replaced
by the light of this moment
as if removed by a thief

Where does the night sky go
as the sun and moon move?
Just a temporal smugness
announced by the gloaming
and farewelled by the gloom.

On the rocky shore stands the tree
its toe still seeking some moist
from the sea, but the rest of
the plant is gone from me.