Pretty is as Pretty Does

When the Taliban left Kabul, they abandoned Afghanistan's currency reserves.
These totaled some $90,000, a pathetic amount reflective of the dire state
of the nation. Apparently there was more, but it was stolen. The $90,000 that
remained was almost entirely made up of U.S. $1 bills. Any thief recognizes
that some things are just too much trouble to steal. The reserves
theoretically supported the native currency, the Afghani. There was not
much faith in the currency.

It is curious how faith vests itself in some bits of paper more so than
other bits of paper. Some symbols are inevitably more powerful than others. A
host of European nations have just exchanged their domestic currencies in
what Kierkegaard might label "a leap of faith," the archimedean point
between anxious indecision and anxious fatalism. In exchange, francs, gilders and
such are now replaced by the euro, a pan-European currency (sort of, as
England, Switzerland and Norway, etc., are not participating), emblazoned
with vague architectural images of nowhere. The Eurocracy was afraid lest
the pictures on the new currency seemed to favor one country or culture over
another, hence, as a symbol of the new Europe, nothing that exists in
Europe. The question of faith again obtrudes.

In Mazar-i-Sharif, rents are in a steep climb. A remote northern Afghan
enclave is now a boomtown of sorts. There is faith there in the presence of
Western aid organizations . . . and the money they bring. The mind boggles
at what premium space in Kabul is now fetching.

The relief effort is visiting the Afghans with many Western type
opportunities, like price gouging. A law forbids foreigners from living
with Afghans. The local government is canny about making hay while the sun
shines. Currency reserves, one hopes, are being augmented. Faith in the
country needs to be restored and recent jumps in the value of the Afghani
point in a positive direction. But faith needs strong symbols in which to
believe and on which to act. The symbol of charity, freely given before the
eyes of the Afghans, may restore a faltering resolve in the reality of a
better nation: a nation modeling the best qualities of what man can do for
man, the archimedean point between anxious indecision and anxious fatalism.

James Clark

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(c) 2002 Millennium Relief & Development Services, vol. 2 no. 2
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