A Birdie in a Minefield
Oct. 2, 2006 — -- Kabul Golf Club -- a field of dirt and scrub -- is open for business. "We have only one golf course for Afghanistan," said Axfal Abdul, the club's very proud pro.
Abdul has played the course since he was a child but was forced to flee to Pakistan under the Taliban. "The Taliban no like the golf. The Taliban only liked the beard and turban you know," Abdul says.
Now he's playing again on what is far from your average country club course. Built on what used to be a minefield, every step means a potential sand trap. The well-groomed greens are brown, made of a smooth mixture of sand and oil, an Afghan substitute for grass. The fairway is portable: The caddie picks up a small disc of AstroTurf and carries it to and from each shot.
A second caddy stands watch, gun in hand, another kind of shot on his mind.
The man who helped to restore the course to its pre-Taliban glory is an American, Paul MacNeill, a top logistics officer at the United Nations. He re-introduced golf while he was stationed in Kabul after the fall of the Taliban, and slowly, it is catching on.
This is not, however, the first "extreme golf course" that MacNeill has turned his hand to: That came during his first assignment for the United Nations in Rwanda, after the genocide.
Nor, it seems, will it be his last. We caught up with MacNeill in Darfur, in western Sudan, scene of the worst humanitarian crisis on earth, with 2½ million refugees fleeing what the United States describes as genocide. We found MacNeill playfully mapping out a course on sandy streets, accompanied by a following of golf-shy children whom he affectionately called future Tiger Woods. These kids have never held a golf ball before, but thanks to MacNeill, they now have a vague idea of what to do.
Although golf is strictly an extracurricular activity for MacNeill -- a hobby and a passion -- it is the legacy he is most proud of. "You know what I'm thinking is when I get to heaven St. Peter's going to ask me what did you do to make the world a better place, and I have something to tell him."
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