Posts tagged “Greg Cabrera”

Greg’s War Story: Culture shock

Anthropologist Greg Cabrera spent 17 months in Afghanistan as an embedded academic with the military, supporting social science research and analysis as part of the Human Terrain System. In his third story here, he encounters a challenge to his own moral standards.

One of the first places I visited in Afghanistan was a security checkpoint along a major route in northern Kandahar. The security was contracted to a private group of Afghans, mainly from the south and east, to provide route security and protect military and civilian supply routes. Their job was to protect the route against insurgents who wanted to disrupt the convoy and see oil tankers burn.

A few days before insurgents did exactly this. They stopped a convoy carrying military supplied with an improvised explosive device, hitting the first truck and killing the driver. Then they attacked the last truck and shot a rocket-propelled grenade which effectively exploded and hit the side of a fuel truck. Civilians fled, the insurgents attacked the checkpoint, and it was utter chaos. These security guards returned fire and called the local police for reinforcements. All that was left at the end were a few burned trucks, dead bodies, and some burned firearms.

Upon arrival, I could see where these men were being shot at, how they fought back, and where they stored their weapons. They worked on this mountain and lived here too. There were approximately 15 to 20 men living in this bunker. All they carried were machine guns, assault rifles, ammunition, and blankets. Of course, they also had food, chai, cooking supplies and utensils. As I inspected their site and positions, they told me about the event and shared their war trophies, burned AK-47s captured from insurgents. It was unusual to observe so many men living in such a tight area together, away from their village and home. This was security, Afghan style, and it felt like a group of armed nomads living under the radar. They were living and working together in a confined space in the middle of what felt like nowhere in particular. I would later find out that these men often worked for 2-3 months at a time before going home for a short period.

When we all sat down for chai, I noticed some of the people who were working at this checkpoint did not look old enough to be here. I thought to myself “Shouldn’t these kids be riding their bikes or playing in the village?” The individual serving chai and placing candies out for our consumption did not have facial hair and had henna painted finger and toe nails. I looked over at my interpreter and asked him on the side what these kids were doing here hanging out with security guards. My interpreter, looking down, smiled, and turned to me saying, “They have fun with them at night.”

The sergeant who I worked with was sitting across from me. When he heard this, his face turned blank. I could tell this made him uneasy. I always wondered what the expression on my face looked like. As the young boy finished serving everyone chai, he moved near an older male who was resting comfortably on a pillow on his side. That’s weird I thought to myself. I had just arrived in country, at this field site, surrounded by strange men who do strange things. I grabbed my cup of chai and drank it down.

Despite the weirdness of the situation, I carried on. I asked lots of questions, took lots of notes, and attempted to be as respectful of their culture as possible even though it bothered me and made me uncomfortable. Who was I to judge? I wondered to myself, what business did we as a nation have in this country? How can its people allow human exploitation to exist like this? I learned later on that Kandahar was a different place than most of Afghanistan. It retained practices unlike the rest of the country. Although this specific instance of culture shock made me uneasy to say the least, I learned to see past it. This was an unconventional war in a strange, neglected land and I was not there to change their culture, only study it.

Greg’s War Story: Biting off more than I can chew

Anthropologist Greg Cabrera spent 17 months in Afghanistan as an embedded academic with the military, supporting social science research and analysis as part of the Human Terrain System. In his second story here, he gets more than he expected out of meal with a local respondent.

In Afghanistan, hosts treat their guests as a gift from God. One of the principles of Pashtunwali – the way of the Pashtun – is hospitality, and a host must protect and treat his guests with the highest form of respect in order to preserve his cultural identity. An interview in Afghanistan is not a one-hour/gift-card-honorarium/thank-you-for-playing experience. Rather, it is a large chunk of your day, 4-5 cups of chai and maybe a meal if you are welcomed kind of interview. This was apparent from my first interview in Afghanistan.

After my interview with the local police chief in northern Kandahar, I was treated to a cultural meal with my interviewee and another soldier. The soldier worked closely as an advisor and assisted me with the introduction to the interview. The police chief was a proud host and he asked his men to prepare a special meal for us. As our interview came to a close, the men began rolling out mats, bringing in dishes, and placing large pieces of flat bread on the floor for us to consume. Typically, in this rural area, meals were eaten by hand from shared plates while sitting on the floor.

A typical meal consisted of rice, animal fat and a vegetable. Meat was consumed on occasion, usually to impress a powerful individual. This meal consisted of okra cooked in animal fat with rice and naan (or flat bread). “A nice treat,” I thought to myself, and a great opportunity to understand the cadences of daily life over a cultural meal.

The solider who was working with me raved about the okra, telling me how good it was and that the local police grew it in the back of the building in a small garden. Sweet!

Ready to dig in, I grabbed a piece of naan and ripped it into a smaller, user-friendly piece. I took one bite and immediately noticed a strange and somewhat hairy texture. Attempting to be as inconspicuous as possible, I moved my head to the side and pushed it out with my tongue. I examined it and noticed what appeared to be a lock of animal hair, dark brown and grey, either from a rodent or canine. In Afghan culture, dogs are considered unclean and are not welcomed inside the home. Although, part of me wished it was from a dog and not a rat. I pushed forward and avoided embarrassing my host. I moved on to the rice. The okra did not look very appetizing, so I tried to avoid eating it. However, my host asked why I was only eating rice, and the soldier next to me said I had to try it because it was so tasty. Oh alright! I dove in. I ate until I was full, and concurred that the okra tasted great in the goat fat.

Making small talk, I thanked the police chief and his men for the food and chai. We talked about security challenges for the district and government, and some next steps in increasing the security bubble through checkpoints and army forces. This was good information that I could use for my analysis. As we said our goodbyes and thanked our guest for his warm hospitality, I walked outside of his compound and the soldier pointed at the garden where the okra was being grown.

The small plot looked somewhat haphazard, not incredibly well maintained. I thought nothing of it until the soldier walked away and I saw a young man walk toward the okra, squat, and urinate on the small plot of okra. Great, he was urinating on the okra they were using for human consumption!

Perhaps, the most valuable lesson I learned was to stick to the rice. In this context, I was able to share firsthand the lived experience of Afghan policemen, and how they generated hospitality with whatever they have despite it forcing me to sacrifice my bowel system and notions of cleanliness in my home country. If I had raised the issue or appeared disgusted, I would have risked losing the relationship and opportunities for future interviews while offending my host in the process. I wonder at what point do researchers draw the line when cultural experiences make us too uncomfortable or even sick? How do researchers cope with experiences that test the limits of cultural sensitivity?

Greg’s War Story: Taking notes, getting detained (sort of)

Anthropologist Greg Cabrera spent 17 months in Afghanistan as an embedded academic with the military, supporting social science research and analysis as part of the Human Terrain System. In this story, his best practices bring some unwanted attention.

In the summer of 2010, when I first arrived to Kandahar Air Field, Afghanistan, I was unsure about how I would fit into a military culture. Just being from California created a cognitive barrier for most my military colleagues. Simply put, there were a lot of “don’t ask, don’t tell” jokes.

In any case, the first couple of weeks involved me playing catch up and learning everything I could about the assigned area and region. I took copious notes all the time to help jog my memory and capture information that would come in handy later on. My hope was to refer back to these notes and re-create the picture people were creating themselves based on scanty information.

In a war environment, you hear stories all the time and you never know what is real or not. The jargon further complicates the situation and makes it difficult for one to navigate people, places, and things, all of which tend to be obscured in military code.

One evening, I was hanging around the base waiting to link up with my liaison, Mike. He was facilitating an introduction to a detachment commander who I would work for over the next 12 months. Depending on how the meeting went, the commander would decide to bring me on board as a social scientist to work with him and his unit. I had tried to meet the commander earlier, but it was unclear where he was. His men told me he was busy in the port-a-john, but I think those guys were testing my wits. Long story short (and bathroom humor aside), we coordinated a meeting that night.

While I was hanging around the base waiting to link up with the commander, I noticed a large gathering of soldiers and civilians in an open area. In my curiosity, I wondered if there was something I needed to be in the know about. There was approximately 50 or so people gathering around a projector to watch a PowerPoint presentation projected on the side of a wall. I assumed the crowd was too large to accommodate on this small base where work areas were tight. Doing this outside made no sense because fighter jets flew and were so loud it could cause permanent hearing damage. I thought to myself, “Well, since they are doing this presentation out in the open, the information can’t be that sensitive. Surely taking a few notes or jottings couldn’t hurt?”

This presentation took place right before I would be heading out into the field. As it started and I began writing things down, I started to feel more than a bit uneasy about what I was hearing. The gentleman started off by explaining this fighting season was the bloodiest since 2007 A chart detailed the number of significant events (SIGACTS) and quantitative information about those killed in action, enemies killed in action, those wounded in action, improvised explosive devices found, indirect fire attacks, etcetera. Cough, ahem. I stopped myself at this point for a couple reasons:

First, I did not want to walk around with this in my notebook in case I lost it and the enemy had eyes on this information. Second, I was sure this could come back a bite me somehow. I immediately became nervous because of what I already had written down. I started thinking to myself as well: I don’t really need to be here.

As I started moving back, my actions caught the attention of a very attentive Sergeant Major. Sergeant Majors feed off opportunities to explode and make examples of others to reinforce the nature of their authority and rank. A strange civilian was the perfect feeding opportunity. Indeed, when I caught a glance at others in this crowd, no one else was taking notes or writing down information. “I’m dead,” I thought to myself.

Before I knew it, this dude’s eyes were piercing through me and he pointed at me to stop moving as he came over to me. He yanked me out of the crowd, and starting barking questions at me, hands on his hips and head leaning forward: “What are you doing?! What were you writing?! Who do you work for?!” Frozen, I muttered something to the effect of “Uh, I, I’m just an analyst.”

He took away my notebook and identification card and told me to follow him. The fact I did not have a security badge did not help my case and only contributed to the uneasy feeling sitting in the pit of my stomach.

He sat me down in the operations center near the legal officer. He pointed at me and explained to others that he had caught me taking notes. He assigned a soldier to guard me while he figured out how to handle the situation. As I sat on the couch with another soldier staring coldly at me, I gazed around the operations center. There was a white board with a funny quote about strippers, an empty office with a blow-up doll in it (oddly enough!), and some metallic signs on the walls demonstrating football fan territory.

These guys were pretty laid back, but I had broken the social contract and had no idea what the repercussions would be. At this point, I wished I had just stayed in my sleeping quarters. A phone call to my liaison Mike was my get-out-of-jail-free card. The Sergeant Major explained the situation to him and the JAG (legal) officer.

The JAG officer called me into his office and explained to me the nature of note-taking in a sensitive environment. Even though the presentation was out in the open, my act of taking notes classified my entire notebook. He handed the notebook back to me and I was on my way. I never saw the guy who detained me again. I wanted to simply get out, lick my wounds, and meet the commander who was waiting for me. The commander, who was not terribly impressed with my antics, laughed about my story. He decided to bring me on board on the spot despite my initial casting as a troublemaker. I like to think this gave me an edge or maybe he saw value in having me around to take notes (ironically) and provide insight into the strange cultural environment he was about to encounter.

I shook off the embarrassment, but it was a story that got a few laughs in my organization: “Human terrain guy detained for taking notes.” For me, it set the tone for the abrasiveness of military culture and reinforced my status as an outsider. I learned to be cautious about what I would capture in field notes and the sensitivity of collecting information in a war environment.

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