Geography and language

Last week I was on the bazaar. (For some reason within my organization the German interpretation of English has trumped the American and Brits' native English because instead of saying we were in or going to the bazaar, we say we were on or going on the bazaar.) So I was on the bazaar with three colleagues. We were buying things for birthing kits, and made a side trip to a stationary shop to buy chess sets. We've begun spending half an hour on critical thinking problems with our staff in the morning, called by everyone in English, "tinKEEN." Chess is the next frontier, though many Afghans play and love it already.

It was there I spotted two things: a dusty and faded globe the size of a Texas grapefruit, and a plastic pyramid with three (real) scorpions set into it that said "I Love Afghanistan" on a bright green background. I inquired on the price of both, and the globe was $1 while the pyramid was $6. Some people just don't know the value of things.

So I bought the globe much to the protestations of my colleagues that it was not a good globe, and see how they've taped it up in Greenland, we'll get another one in a different stationary shop. But you could say I've done a fair bit of shopping on these bazaars and never seen any globes. So it's now at the office on my desk.

I was showing it to the ladies yesterday and one of them said, "There's so much water!" and the other one said, "God must be huge."

There is a strong sense of inside/outside here, but the "outside" doesn't get much more specific than that. When leaving the country, it is sufficient answer for most people to say you're going to the khorage, outside. When I walk down the street, I am often called khoragie, outsider, which could be the equivalent of gringo, sometimes unkind, but sometimes just a statement of fact or affection. If I'm in the mood I will call back doekhillie, which means insider. The third word is watani, one of those words that can't be directly translated, but it approximately "your place." In general Dari has fewer words, and therefore fewer ideas, than English, i.e. no word for excited, just happy or very happy, but I would say our language is impoverished to find an equivalent for watani.

And for my closing ruminations: the word for "egg" (chicken's) is very close to the word for "button" which is even closer to the word for "sperm." I embarrassed myself a few weeks ago and have completely quit taking any opportunity to say "button," and limited my use of the word "egg" to only the most necessary functions. But yesterday my expat colleague popped three buttons off her coat and was going to great effort to communicate the circumstances to everyone in the courtyard of our office. Except she wasn't talking about buttons.