Afghan scenes

Waiting for my snow-shoeing photos to be printed last Monday, I stepped into Timothy's World Coffee Shop on Sussex Drive and discovered photography of a far superior quality by a professional photo-journalist, Stephen Thorne. Other framed photographs by him are presently on display at the National War Museum; the ones on the walls at Timothy's are an overflow from this exhibition.

All taken in Afghanistan, they reminded me of scenes from The Kite Runner, the film recently blogged about by George, by me, and by Maryam. Only this time, the images were captured from real life. My table at the coffee shop stood beneath a sharply defined picture taken right in the middle of a ferocious game of Buzkashi, the mêlée of Afghan horsemen fighting for possession of the dead calf that's the object of the contest. One of them had succeeded in grabbing its leg. How the photographer managed to get this shot is beyond my comprehension; it's in close-up. He can't have been one of the riders, surely? I found the flecks of blood on the horses' teeth most disturbing. "This is not a gentleman's game," it said, in the caption.

However, the images that stand out the most vividly are the portraits: the despairing faces of widowed mothers in a children's hospital in Kabul, the faces of the old men now obliged to work in the iron foundries as so few younger men are available. The average life expectancy in this smitten country is 48. The photographer also took pictures within the ranks of the Canadian military stationed in and around Kabul. Those people were clearly under strain as well.

I added an appreciative comment in the visitor's book as I left. Interestingly many of the other comments had paid tribute to the "beauty" of these pictures, for despite the grim environment there is still beauty in Afghanistan, and the photographer has captured it. The mountains capped with snow. The flowing drapery of burkhas (the women's faces in this picture significantly turned towards a display of low-cut, silken, western-style evening dresses on display in a shop window). A little boy running with a kite, the kite made from a Canadian flag, its maple leaf fluttering in an alien sky.