Last year I became an ambassador for a non-political organisation whose chief
aim is simply to promote one day a year of peace. Since the actor and
film-maker Jeremy Gilley founded Peace One Day in 1999, the United Nations
has unanimously agreed to designate every September 21 as Peace Day.
The idea of this day of global ceasefires and non-violence is gaining
supporters all the time: in 2007, according to the UN, more than 100m people
observed Peace Day in 192 countries.
Because of my own career in film, I’ve helped Jeremy make a documentary to
raise awareness of Peace Day and all it represents. The heroes of this film,
The Day After Peace, are the Afghans: by observing the ceasefire in their
southern provinces last year, they enabled 1.4m children to be inoculated
against polio that day. I have just visited Afghanistan for the second time
— primarily to say thank you and give people a chance to see our film.
August 31, 2008, Delhi
I’m surprised that the queue for the Afghan air flight to Kabul is so normal.
Two little Afghan boys are running around — I wonder how they feel about
going home.
I can’t help wondering whether I should be a little more nervous. The plane’s
clearly seen better days: I doubt anyone would want to blow it up but it
could well fall out of the sky. As we approach it by bus, a man who’s with
his two sons and wife, or mother — hard to tell as she’s wearing a full
burqa — makes it plain he doesn’t like us taking photographs. No words are
exchanged; there are just lots of meaningful looks from ice-blue eyes. An
immediate reminder that we’re in new territory — and need to be cautious and
respectful.
On the plane, it’s very hard to sleep. I’m thinking of the intensity of the
work schedule ahead. And I know that however many gardens and safe houses we
visit, we’ll be in a place of unpredictable, extreme violence.
Kabul, early afternoon
Driving through the streets with Jeremy Gilley and our two-man film crew — Dan
and Rob — I register just how much larger the military presence is than last
time I visited, a year ago. Machineguns everywhere. All the roadsides
fortified with high concrete walls, topped with razor wire. And yet there’s
the hustle and bustle of normal life: carts laden with produce, men on
bicycles, young men selling cards on the street corners.
Since I was last here, things have got much worse. There’s been a rise in
attacks, an increase in the number of insurgents — and more fatalities.
There’s a palpable sense of tension.
Our first appointment is with Dr Mohamad Hanif Atmar, minister of education.
When we met last year, he was very positive about using the Peace One Day
education pack — with 17 lesson plans about peace — in all Afghan schools.
This is yet to happen because it’s been a particularly terrible year for the
schools — 600 closed after insurgent fires, many children and teachers
killed, thousands of textbooks burnt. But there’s still hope, he says. We’re
keen that he shows our documentary — The Day After Peace — to as many
schools as possible. He agrees. He’s a very charismatic man, with an Alan
Rickman air about him. Gives me an Afghan prayer painting and cloak, to
“Afghanise” me, as he puts it.
On to Tolo TV, which has 40% of network viewing. With the rise in suicide
bombings, everyone now stays in to watch television. Tolo is run by an
Afghan-Australian family of three brothers and their sister from a series of
town houses. Their main “studio” is an old front room lined with egg cartons
for soundproofing. The need for positive news is great, so we give them our
film, which they’ll dub into Dari and Pashto.
My own feeling is that the Afghans are incredibly resilient people — and we
owe them so much, having helped to put them in their current situation.
Before going to Afghanistan the first time, all I’d read about was the
frontline, the numbers of western soldiers lost and the elements of society
that were destructive or extremist. Yet I saw so much more — a lot of
reconstruction and many reasons for hope, despite three generations of
conflict.
Have dinner at Fatima Gailani’s house, the international spokeswoman for the
Red Crescent, who played a huge part in last year’s Peace Day. We eat
wonderfully, with traditional dancers and musicians entertaining us.
Fatima says she was minutes away from two of the most recent suicide bombs,
and yet didn’t feel scared. It dawns on me that I haven’t felt any fear
either since coming back. You can’t be scared, because then the opposition
is winning. How dare anyone stop people seeing all of our planet, hearing
all its sounds, tasting all its foods, learning from eye contact and
conversation that we’re all alike?
Sitting on Fatima’s lawn, eating figs, listening to music under the stars, I
get a sense of what life must have been like 30 years ago: the intelligent
conversation, the beauty and pride of the scarved women, the dignity and
reserve of the gentlemen.
We drive back to our compound through empty streets before the 11pm curfew.
Stockades everywhere. Only the odd guard, heavily armed and lonely by the
roadside. They must have pulled the shortest of short straws to be on patrol
in Kabul tonight, the evening before Ramadan.
September 1
Film-screening, press conference and Q&A. The Afghan media, in particular, are
very positive. But I always fear being misquoted, offering a line that can
be edited and misread. Especially as ambassador for such an important
organisation. More interviews in former middle-class dwellings in the heart
of Kabul — now makeshift studios. These are the kind of houses described at
the beginning of Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner, but now surrounded by
armed guards. Then two radio interviews, both for the BBC. Both try to pop
in a couple of negative questions, which makes me seethe.
Have lunch at a foreign press lodge, Gandamack Lodge, run by a fascinating
couple. Peter is a former cameraman who’s lived here since 1980, when he was
filming the mujaheddin. A Flashman fan, he’s got an English pub built
beneath his house — complete with a carpet that smells of beer and an
original bar from Henley. He was vetted for five years before he could marry
his girlfriend — a warlord’s daughter.
Filming later in a military compound. Our Unicef security adviser Bob Gibson —
a real Scottish terrier — advises us to ask permission at all times before
filming , and to look out for “no camera” signs, or we’ll “end up with a
faceful of bullets” — a phrase I take seriously. But against his advice, our
cameraman continues filming Jeremy and me in the back seats as we drive down
a heavily fortified stretch of road. I suddenly become very aware of the
Afghan troops on guard, getting progressively more and more upset. By the
end of the street, two or three are making eye contact with me, shouting and
raising their guns.
A sudden bolt of fear runs through me, flashes of my children’s faces — and
the phrase “a faceful of bullets” comes back to me. I shout at the driver to
stop. Too late: we’re forced to stop by the soldiers. Eventually, they let
us move on. Afterwards, I’m told that this particular road is full of the
most trigger-happy Afghan guards in Kabul. Fear shakes me for the rest of
the night, sucks all the energy out of me.
September 2
Today, Prince Nadir, grandson of the last king of Afghanistan, comes over to
see us. He met Jeremy in London after seeing his film and wants to help us
with contacts in Kabul. First, he introduces us to four children from a
programme that provides education for the many street children. When asked
what peace means to him, one of the little boys says simply that he’d be
able to sell his waste plastic without fear and walk safely on the streets.
At the British embassy, we screen the film again. As often happens, I’m asked
how we manage to avoid politics in our efforts to encourage a ceasefire on
the Peace Day. Well, we’re not political; we don’t negotiate; we just aim to
keep encouraging people to recognise the day : September 21 every year. Last
year, 100m people observed the day. By 2012, we believe the figure will be
closer to 3 billion. If huge numbers continue to mark the day round the
world, how can their demand for peace be ignored?
Another meeting, with a senior minister in the government. By the time we get
back to the compound, we’re shattered.
Dinner and drinks tonight are round the corner at a UN encampment or safe
house. Catherine Mbengue, Unicef’s representative here, is host to a group
of guests who remind me of characters in a Hunter S Thompson book:
motorbike-riding photographers, chain-smoking journalists and quirky foreign
diplomats.
Then we’re sped away in a UN car stacked with machineguns to meet President
Karzai. I count five, six, seven different checkpoints before arriving at
the palace. Strangely, I’m not nervous when I talk to the president, with
Jeremy at my side. I expect a slower, dustier man but President Karzai is a
livewire — he makes us laugh a lot, and twice dismisses politics as a bad
career move. This from a man who must surely be in talks with more foreign
representatives than any other leader today.
He’s particularly struck by the results of Peace Day in Afghanistan last year
— when a ceasefire made it possible for so many children to be
inoculated against polio. And he promises to make a TV appearance asking for
the peace day to be recognised.
September 3
The entire city is hidden beneath blocks of cement, sheets of metal and rolls
of wire. It’s as if its face, heart and soul are covered by a brutal crust.
Every year, this city swallows up more cement, more stone, more metal. One
day, it will need to be rebuilt.
At Kabul airport, I go to a garden for travellers — a place of peace and shade
from the 40-degree heat. It looks out over the Hindu Kush mountain range,
whose sharp silhouette surrounds the city. I came here at the start of my
trip, too — it’s a great place to think before jumping into the energy of
this complicated, punctured, exhilarating and terrifying place. And yet,
this garden sits alongside a runway filled with Chinook and Black Hawk
helicopters, a reminder of the country’s troubles. I sit for a while. For
the first time since my arrival, I feel calm and at peace.
Jude Law is presenting a screening of The Day After Peace at the Peace One Day
Celebration at the Albert Hall, London, next Sunday. Annie Lennox, Bryan
Adams, John Legend and Peter Gabriel will perform live. For tickets, call
020 7589 8212. To buy a DVD of the film, go to www.peaceoneday.org
.
All proceeds go towards raising awareness of Peace Day and promoting
life-saving activities
