Group Housing: Not for Loners
Although everything seems calm for the most part, and we’ve had no indication of imminent violence in the area, a few of us have gone back to Suli just to keep our numbers in Kqin down a bit. After all, nothing quite says “target” like 8 expats sitting around a table together. The community knows us well - in fact, pretty much anything we do becomes public knowledge very fast. The other day in Khanaqin we went to take some group photos at a park down the road, which attracted attention, but we tried to be quick about it. About half an hour after we returned to the office, one of our national staff members who had been nowhere in sight while we were out on our picture-taking expedition came in to ask if we had finished with the photo session. It’s definitely an environment where chances are blending in are slim. This is more the case in conservative Khanaqin though, because ONCE in Suli someone actually mistook me for being Kurdish. However, the blank stare he received upon addressing me quickly disabused him of that notion.
Moving back to Suli has its advantages in that one can actually venture beyond the office during the day, but it lacks the semblance of family life that is created down in Khanaqin. Group housing has its challenges, to be sure, but definitely goes a long way in preventing isolation in an environment where there is little other choice. While in Kqin, the CAP team essentially spends about 16 hours a day together. We all sit next to one another in one big office, then gather around the table for lunch with our expat South staff, go back to the office until about 8 or 9, then back around the table for dinner. It’s a lot of togetherness, and with 9 different nationalities, we’ve had heated discussions about everything ranging from the average life expectancy of an Afghani, to whether the number of US casualties in WWII was higher in Europe or the Pacific, to the seasonal prospects of the European soccer teams. On more than one occasion, someone has left the room in a huff.
This “dorm life for adults” gets more challenging when the power goes out repeatedly, the water is cut off for the day, and the satellite is disconnected. This last time in Kqin I had the exciting bonus of staying in a room infested with ants. They seemed to take an intense liking to some unknown element in my belongings, because they had quite the trail going on from my bag up the wall and out of a crack in the ceiling. They seemed so industrious that I almost felt bad when I made a break in their bridge from my bag to the wall.
The other advantage to Kqin is the variety of food available, particularly to me. All the expats pool their resources to stock up on provisions that our “western” palates are accustomed to. Although lunch is usually prepared by our local cook, Wahida, and every day usually involves some combination of meat, rice, potatoes, eggplant, zucchini and tomatoes, dinner is more often prepared by two of our expats who actually like to cook. Most of the ingredients for the meals come from the Big City of Sulimaniyah, which means that pesto in a jar becomes part of a gourmet meal. Any innovation is welcomed though, and my biggest contribution to mealtime so far was my suggestion of making garlic bread to go with the homemade lasagna being served. We capped that meal off with a Devil’s Food cake out of a box which baked in a record 5 minutes due to the unreliable oven settings. It may not be quality – but at least I haven’t been completely cut off from chocolate.
Moving back to Suli has its advantages in that one can actually venture beyond the office during the day, but it lacks the semblance of family life that is created down in Khanaqin. Group housing has its challenges, to be sure, but definitely goes a long way in preventing isolation in an environment where there is little other choice. While in Kqin, the CAP team essentially spends about 16 hours a day together. We all sit next to one another in one big office, then gather around the table for lunch with our expat South staff, go back to the office until about 8 or 9, then back around the table for dinner. It’s a lot of togetherness, and with 9 different nationalities, we’ve had heated discussions about everything ranging from the average life expectancy of an Afghani, to whether the number of US casualties in WWII was higher in Europe or the Pacific, to the seasonal prospects of the European soccer teams. On more than one occasion, someone has left the room in a huff.
This “dorm life for adults” gets more challenging when the power goes out repeatedly, the water is cut off for the day, and the satellite is disconnected. This last time in Kqin I had the exciting bonus of staying in a room infested with ants. They seemed to take an intense liking to some unknown element in my belongings, because they had quite the trail going on from my bag up the wall and out of a crack in the ceiling. They seemed so industrious that I almost felt bad when I made a break in their bridge from my bag to the wall.
The other advantage to Kqin is the variety of food available, particularly to me. All the expats pool their resources to stock up on provisions that our “western” palates are accustomed to. Although lunch is usually prepared by our local cook, Wahida, and every day usually involves some combination of meat, rice, potatoes, eggplant, zucchini and tomatoes, dinner is more often prepared by two of our expats who actually like to cook. Most of the ingredients for the meals come from the Big City of Sulimaniyah, which means that pesto in a jar becomes part of a gourmet meal. Any innovation is welcomed though, and my biggest contribution to mealtime so far was my suggestion of making garlic bread to go with the homemade lasagna being served. We capped that meal off with a Devil’s Food cake out of a box which baked in a record 5 minutes due to the unreliable oven settings. It may not be quality – but at least I haven’t been completely cut off from chocolate.
posted by SBM @ 2:40 PM
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