By Rachel Bouer

pictureninja.com

While the city of Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan has changed regimes six times in the second half of the 20^th century, past and present Oberlin students have not stopped visiting and making their mark.

Oberlin alumnus and Kendal resident Bob McCluskey spoke in the Kendal Auditorium Feb. 18 about his Peace Corps term in Kabul between 1960 and 1963.  The following day, College senior Robin Comisar presented a video he made about his winter spent in the same city.

Comisar volunteered with Skatistan, an organization that teaches Afghani children skateboarding basics and English. Comisar found the organization about a year ago and has been working for them online since. This winter term, he taught English, instructed skateboarding lessons, and helped with curricular development.

Though Skatistan certainly uses a unique approach to impact the daily lives of Aghanis, the need for international efforts is not new.

Forty-eight years before Comisar’s trip, the first Peace Corps volunteers pioneered the international service movement upon their arrival to Kabul. McCluskey said they came in with three goals: first, meeting the needs of the population they were visiting; second, fostering greater understanding by others of Americans; and third, learning more about the other populations.

In his time in Afghanistan, McCluskey did just that through everyday activities like teaching English, playing basketball and participating in other daily activities. However, life is not always sunny in Kabul. Consistent violence, harsh law-enforcement, and unforeseen demolition broaden the tension of this atmosphere.

Comisar said that children were often arrested the day before lessons; though detrimental in and of itself, is compounded by the fact that many of the female students were beaten in jail as they were in cells with adults. Furthermore, explosions near the homes of students on lesson days prevented the program-run transportation service from safely picking them up for their skateboarding lessons.

“It’s really difficult to run a school in Kabul,” he said.

As McCluskey’s visit was during the reign of Zahir Shah, a monarch who ruled from 1933 to 1973, violence was less common; the king promoted increasing education and a style of “new democracy,” as explained by McCluskey. He said that due to the many different ethnic minorities of the city, ruling over them was like “governing complexity.”

McCluskey met the King during his visit and displayed pictures of the event during his presentation. He said he was “impressed” with his charisma, and noted the Western dress of the Queen, which displayed the consistent modernization of the city.

As McCluskey was there for three full years, he received many opportunities to leave Kabul and see the country. “I was on a camel for 25 seconds,” he joked. He also showed pictures of the majestic Bamiyan statues, which are enormous Buddahs carved into the sides of mountains. Unfortunately, with the Soviet reign through the 80s, these treasures were destroyed.

Comisar was also able to travel around the city with the father of another Oberlin student, Ahmad Wahdat. In order to get around without much knowledge of Dari, the most popular regional language in Kabul, Comisar had a translator with him “at all times.” He said that this was a bit of an adjustment at first, especially in the classroom because it was “harder to get them to trust me.” He said they often would look only at the translator at not at him even while he was speaking. Eventually, they overcame this barrier and he said he was much better able to connect with the students.

McCluskey and his contemporaries also encountered similar experiences in their English classrooms. As boys and girls were in different schools and each class had 60 or more students, teaching proved to be a bit difficult at times, particularly as Afghani social stigmas toward asking questions were often incongruent with traditional American teaching styles.

250 students are currently enrolled in Skatistan programs, though 1,000 more are on the ever-growing waitlist. Though Skatistan’s approach to help in the region may appear frivolous on the surface, Comisar emphasized that their efforts are far-reaching and extremely significant.

“Skatistan has a real impact here,” he said. “It lets kids be kids again in an environment where they otherwise grow up way too quickly.”