Last night's (Monday's) town hall meeting, sponsored by the American embassy, was disappointingly bland. No explosions or gas masks, no hysterics, none of the raw emotion I was so hoping to be able to observe.

I was sitting at home afterwards, pinching myself to stay awake until a reasonable hour rolled around at which I could finally go to bed, when my boab knocked at my door with a package notice in his hand. The long-awaited afghan-containing package from my mother. Ensuing discussion established that the place where I needed to go to pick up this package was very far away, near the main train station downtown, and that it must be a very large package and consequently would probably be expensive. (Duties are charged on all things shipped into the country.) My boab was terribly sorry, he wouldn't be able to go with me in the morning, but his sister's husband would come by at about 9:00 (which by the end of the conversation had moved to 10:00) before he was going to pick up something from the same place. If I liked, I could go with him and he would help me.

I woke up this morning and immediately wanted nothing more than to roll over and spend the rest of the day in bed, but the thought of my package forced me up and into clothing. By 10:30 I had decided to seize fortune and go by myself-- mostly so that I could get back to bed as quickly as possible. My boab gave me detailed instructions on what to tell the taxi driver and where to go in the building itself, and before I could leave he made me repeat all of it back to him three or four times. Surprisingly, the trip downtown was extremely uneventful, and I was soon standing in front of a dingy old multi-stored building that I might have at first glance have assumed was abandoned, if it weren't for the multitudes of people milling back and forth and in and out of the lobby of the place. Still following the directions of my boab, I went up two flights of stairs to the "first floor" and entered a vast warehouse of a room, crisscrossed by clanking conveyor belts and chutes that dropped down into huge cages filled with clerks and packages. A woman looked at my package notice and escorted me to the far back corner of the cavern, where after exchanging the usual pleasantries with the smiling woman behind the table I managed to get down to the business of obtaining my package... a business that lasted an hour and a half... thus far. I still don't have my package. Negotiations required multiple trips to another floor and several other offices, frequent and perplexed consultations of a few post and customs manuals, and many expressive hand gestures. Apparently no one around spoke English, and the situation at hand was admittedly a bit of a stretch for my Arabic. Which is, of course, the fun of going alone.

Eventually we were able to agree on a few things: yes, I would accept (and pay for) the package in question, despite the rather pricey tariffs placed on the socks, but no, I could not obtain said package today because they were still not sure if the medicine was legal. Medicine? I didn't remember my mother saying anything about sending me any medication. And she didn't declare it on the customs form attached to the package, a form I had now had ample opportunity to peruse. Maybe, suggests one man, it's vitamins. This, I think, sounds at least somewhat plausible. She's worried about my calcium intake again. So I agree, yes, maybe they're vitamins, and this prompts a discussion of how worried my mother is about me, since I live so far away from her. She doesn't think I eat right at all. Maybe they're vitamins. Finally we decide that I can come back on Sunday and maybe then my package will be cleared for pick-up. Back downstairs to the warehouse, where the two women who were originally helping me there welcome me back like a long-lost cousin and decide that I can see the contents of my package, even though I can't take it home with me. They like me; they know I'm curious. So we open the box and pull out socks, a sweater, an afghan, and... two tubes of cork grease, which I have been desperately needing for the thirsty joint corks of my clarinet. Ah, I think. The medicine. The mystery of the medication may now be apparent to me, but unfortunately explaining the solution to my new friends is a little more taxing. Very few people here have heard of a clarinet (and even those who have require visual aids for identification and recognition), but I manage to get some of the idea across-- I play a musical instrument similar to the flute (true, but ouch-- that hurt) and these inexplicable white plastic tubes are for that. Ah. Despite my poor explanation, I can see a spark of understanding. By this point everyone is utterly charmed by me, so the two women say that they will resubmit the paperwork on my package and will explain that these are my clothes, for me only, and that I am a poor student here. insha-allah this will reduce the amount of money required to free my package. Back upstairs, where we (I with the help of one of my friends from the warehouse cage) explain to the director that this is not medicine, it's for my musical instrument.... Ah. Well, in that case, the director will speak to her director tomorrow, and then I can come back the day after that and retrieve my things-- insha-allah, of course. Closing pleasantries, and at last I am outside and hailing a taxi to go home. To bed.

Note of interest: impatient and persistent ringing of my doorbell while I was in bed this afternoon finally prompted me to struggle out of bed and to the door, where I found that the impatient door-ringer had exited, leaving a package leaning up against my door. A package mailed from the States. Delivered to my door, still sealed, with apparently no tariffs assigned to it. Containing a book and a CD (and CDs are not very common here) from my friends J.r and Heidi. The difference? I haven't a clue. Logic of any Western type at all hasn't applied to my life in months. Maybe the post office liked Heidi's handwriting more than my mother's. Who knows.