Accents and The Guard

In the Army, accents tend to soften and morph into some sort of middle ground of blunt, directive bursts of military terms, acronyms and cursing that becomes an accent all its own. However, not all regional American accents can be tamed, and in the National Guard, these local accents find a home of there own. I recently saw a post from a French Infantryman's blog, which had been translated into English. In his post, he notes the mix of American accents he had to deal with saying, 'They have a very strong American accent - the language they speak seems to be not even English. How many times did I have to write down what I wanted to say rather than waste precious minutes trying various pronunciations of a seemingly common word? Whatever state they are from, no two accents are alike and they themselves admit that in some crisis situations they have difficulties understanding each other.' (The rest of the post is a good read as well, and you can read the whole thing here: http://nakedliberty.com/2010/12/a-french-infantrymans-view-of-american-soldiers/)
In my recent travels I ran into several more examples of our struggles to communicate with coalition partners, due to strong and varying US accents as well as the accents of our coalition partners. While visiting a base with a mix of Australians and Alabama national guard, this clash was brought to the forefront, during a conversation with a collection of US and Australian soldiers.
A short female sergeant with a thick Alabama accent was recounting a phone conversation she had with her Australian counterpart. After asking him to repeat himself several times, she said 'I told him, I can't understand a single fucking word you have said to me.' She was later told that the Australian soldier told a coworker that 'nobody talks to me like that but my wife.' Now whenever she calls, if he answers he just hands the phone off to an American in the office.
An Australian soldier recounted a similar tale in which he took a call from a US counterpart. "He said, 'Blah, blah, blah. I didn't quite catch it but replied, 'Blah, blah, blah.' and then he told me he couldn't understand what I was saying. I told him, well I can't understand you either, so there's no real point in us talking mate. Click." He said, as he motioned hanging up the phone. "He didn't appreciate that much, and called right back."
The conversation then turned to what the collection of guardsmen did back home when the were not deployed. A baby faced young Specialist said back home he works at a waste water treatment plant. Here in Afghanistan, he worked for a time at Kandahar Airfield, where the waste water plant is near the middle to the base and if the breeze is wrong it smothers the base it it's funk and can choke you out if you get to close. He said most people complained about the smell, 'But it didn't bother me none. Smells like money to me.' He is a generator mechanic, by trade, but when I spoke to him he was the night shift for a satellite communications office. I noted how challenging that must be and he said, "If I get a call I just tell them, 'Everyone is asleep, but I can wake them up or it can wait 'til morning.' I can't complain though, because I'm getting paid pretty good to answer the phone."
Another soldier 'moonlighting' as a satellite communications specialist, works as a trucker for a steel manufacturing and constructions company. His laid back Alabama twang, and slight beer belly under broad shoulders gave him an air that seemed like it would fit better behind the wheel of a big rig, than in an air conditioned server room in the middle of Afghanistan. But just like the French soldier noted in his blog: 'Here we discover America as it is often depicted: their values are taken to their paroxysm, often amplified by the loneliness of this outpost in the middle of that Afghan valley. Honor, motherland – everything here reminds of that: the American flag floating in the wind above the outpost, just like the one on the postage parcels... And that is a first shock to our preconceptions: the American soldier is no individualist. The team, the group, the combat team are the focus of all his attention.'
Although the Guard soldiers have the same team ethos as the regular Army, they are unique for both the variety of fields they come from outside their military specialties, and also for the adaptability they bring to the mission. They often get parcelled out across the battle space to support regular Army units as small sections or as individual augmentees to strengthen the man power within a regular Army unit. Their broad range of skills and professional backgrounds often prove very useful in the unique mission sets they fill in a counter insurgency as well. For example, I worked with a Michigan unit (yet another unique American accent) who are supporting an Agricultural Development mission, which would be a tough mission for the regular Army that specializes in war fighting. However a guard unit brings soldiers into the mission that specialize in business and agriculture, when they are not in uniform, and those skills prove invaluable to the mission.

Courting in Kandahar

I ran into 'Tariq' again, at a busy intersection of foot traffic and shops on base today. You may remember Tariq from my earlier post in which we had discussed the future of Afghanistan as the coalition withdrawal looms. Rather than politics, this time we pulled off the side of the path and chatted like old friends reunited, catching up on personal lives and work, enjoying the breeze and pleasant spring temperatures as they cooled with the setting sun.

Tariq, like any ambitious young man is hoping for a promotion soon, and if he is unable to move up, he is considering moving back home, to open up some commercial properties he has invested in. I asked if he might try to get another job with the coalition closer to home, but he thought the distance was safer for him and his family and helped him focus on the job at hand. He also said that some of his Kandahar friends that work closer to home have actually moved their families to Kabul in order to keep them safe and prevent threats being made that could prevent them from doing their job. I was surprised, because I had assumed he would want to be closer to home, and it seemed strange to have a 'local' who was essentially deployed within his own country, but that is the reality for many of the 'local' workers and security forces.

After catching up with our professional lives we then moved onto personal relationships. I told him I was still single and not looking, which is nearly unheard of for a man my age in Afghanistan. He informed me that there was now a girl on his horizon. However, he has little to do with the developing relationship, because it is actually his mother who has been busy trying to find him a wife. Since we last spoke, his mother has reportedly found him a beautiful, educated and conservative nurse that works in Kandahar.

Our discussion reminded me of a Seinfeld episode, in which Jerry and Elaine are trying to hook George up with a friend of Elaine's. Jerry spends the episode discussing the girl with George and getting all the details about what George wants in a woman, and Elaine is busy doing the same with her friend, trying to paint George in the best light possible.
'He's bald?!'
'No! Not bald. Balding.'
'But he's going to be bald.'
'.... Yeah'

However, in Pashtu culture things work a little differently. Discussions of looks are not a priority and the couple being matched are never actually directly involved in these discussions, rather family members act as intermediaries. He said in Kabul the groom might actually visit the potential brides family, but that is considered quite cosmopolitan, and too western for even the big city of Kanadahar. In Kandahar, families will 'shop around' for brides or grooms for their children; and if a potential match is found, the family will then propose the match to members of the other family.

I asked if he would get to see the girl or picture of her; and he said he probably won't, and asking for a picture would be a bit too bold as well. But in a modern twist of globalization and social media, he said she will likely be able to find many pictures of him thanks to Facebook. Meanwhile, he said her family was concerned about his work and how it may keep him away from the family. He said they were a traditional and close knit family, and she would be unlikely to move away from Kandahar and her family. It was quite interesting to see what lengths the families went to in order to find out more about the other's child, in their tap dance of traditions and tribal norms, which prevented them from broaching any question too directly.

Although the two may never meet in the courting process, and may not even meet the other family, they can still be very involved in the process and fairly resourceful in gathering information about their possible match. Tariq told me that he has asked his mother to visit the girl's mother and tell him how she keeps her kitchen, and disciplines her children. However, even peaking in the kitchen seemed a bit too personal and his mother did not want to overstep her social bounds.

He also said, he wanted his mother to ask around with friends and possibly even the girls neighbors to find out more about the family. For one, he said noisy neighbors who fight or argue are considered lower class, and he would not want to marry into that kind of family. He said that parents and husbands in Pashtun culture are too quick to raise a hand in violence in disciplining kids or wives. He said this abuse, and concealing women, are both distortions of Islam in Afghan culture, and reminded him of a quote from Muhammad Abduh, a religious scholar, who said, 'I went to the West and saw Islam, but no Muslims; I got back to the East and saw Muslims, but not Islam.'

Throughout our conversation, he kept noting that each of these obscure methods of match making and gathering information were things people did in the city, so I asked if it would be different in the villages, and he was very definitive with his yes. In Pashtun villages, where resources and family wealth is limited, children often become one of the few commodities available to the family. They are bartered as brides or grooms to friends, or to resolve a dispute of honor, or even seal business deal. Sometimes these pacts are made before a child is even born, and often a groom is promised, in hopes that the pact may bring the son they desire. In the village both the bride and groom are told who they will marry, while in the city they at least play a role in the search for their match.

The extensive research and family involvement also underlie the importance the decision has in the culture where divorce is not an option. It reminds me of a quote from War and Peace, which I happen to be reading at the moment. Prince Andrei is a newly wed and about the head off to war. Instead of dreading the separation from his wife, he is actually looking forward to regaining his independance and pursuing the masculine adventures of combat. Recognizing his son's outlook his father says, 'They're all like that; one can't unmarry.' Such sentiment is lost in the western world of divorce and 28 day celebrity marriages, but in Afghanistan, marriage is still viewed as a 'til death do us part' commitment, and getting it right is a family affair.

In my travels I've learned that social norms that seem so logical, concrete and timeless from within, can be very illogical, unfounded and foreign to the rest of the world. Though I try to remain open to the cultures of the places I visit, I am glad I enjoy the cultural norms of the west. At the same time, Tariq also seems happy with his lot; and he is rich with life and social insight. He happily shares his wealth with me, in our conversations, and I, a traveling trader of tales and culture, am always quick to collect and treasure these conversations as I build my global empire of experiences.