I'm pretty used to being in the majority. I grew up going to church in the conservative Central Valley of California, where (despite California stereotypes) most people are church-goers. I was a middle-class white high school student in north Clovis, where the student body is - you guessed it - largely white and middle-class. I celebrated the election and inauguration of Barack Obama while living in Washington, DC, which voted for Obama at something like 92%. Even when I've been a minority in terms of power (as a woman), I've still tended to be in the majority in terms of numbers. My grad school program in International Peace & Conflict Resolution was something like 80% female - in my first semester my two IPCR classes had a combined total of three men.
All that is about to change because: I'm moving to Afghanistan! There, it's no exaggeration to say I'll be something like one in a thousand. My future home, Kandahar Air Field (KAF), is home to about 35,000 people - a military base, but a veritable city. All the numbers I've come across say that somewhere around 34,965 of those people are Air Force and Army. Yup, I'll be one of just 35 civilians living and working among a sea of airmen, privates, sergeants, lieutenants, captains, colonels, and maybe even generals. One in a thousand! An Army friend estimated that about 20% of these are likely to be women - pretty much the inverse of my grad school experience.
For those who know me, this is pretty freaking hilarious. Lisa, the Mennonite Brethren FPU graduate, Returned Peace Corps Volunteer, former intern at the Woodrow Wilson Center Conflict Prevention Project, the World Vision Peacebuilding Team and the Alliance for Peacebuilding, MA in International Peace & Conflict Resolution, for crying out loud! - bumming around with 35,000 military in a war zone?? At the same time as I shake my head at the irony, I think: It's really not that hilarious at all. Afghanistan - KAF - is exactly where I want to be. After all, if I can't be a peacebuilder in a war zone, what's the point of being a peacebuilder? Isn't that pretty much where we want the peacebuilding to be happening?
I have a lot to learn, and I'm ready to start learning it. Soon the next great adventure begins: Life as one in a thousand, and one in the land of a thousand splendid suns. I hope you enjoy the journey with me as I navigate the new waters of life in the minority - in more ways than one!
