Blogger makes surprise visit to Afghanistan

“I’m not here to boost my traffic,” Gorbould tells reporters

Taking his cue from Stephen Harper, Canadian blogger Paul Gorbould touched down unannounced in Afghanistan Tuesday to see first-hand what blogging is like in the war-ravaged country, and to meet with Afghan mommy blogger Habiba Qarqeen.

The surprise two-day visit began Tuesday morning in the capital Kabul, where Gorbould immediately live-blogged a cute anecdote about his children back home, and wrote an item on the state of Afghanistan’s toilets.

During an unattended news conference at the Kabul Circuit City, Gorbould reaffirmed his commitment to posting meaningless polls and pontificating on the minutia of CBC policies. He called the mission, “Canada’s least important foreign policy endeavour… but still.”

He also reiterated his belief that Canadian blogging was “of universal interest, and might inspire the people of Afghanistan to… um, improve.”

Motives questioned

Gorbould dismissed suggestions that his trip was a response to waning site traffic, telling the empty room: “I’m not here because of Sitemeter. I’m here because it’s the right thing to do.”

Gorbould’s message won him accolades from all three of Afghanistan’s civilian bloggers: Qarqeen, whose 11-month old son Ahman has recently learned to walk; university student and Battlestar Galactica afficionado Farooq Fahim, and British hostage Wesley Anderton Jr.

“We appreciate this show of support from the Canadian blogging community,” Fahim said. “We’re just not sure why he’s here. I mean, he seemed nice on the internet, but we really could have done all this on MSN.”

Qarqeen was more optimistic. “By tomorrow, or the next day, there will be some pictures of Paul and Ahman and me on my Flickr,” Qarqeen said. “And I’ve friended him on Facebook.”

“Get me the hell out before I’m beheaded on YouTube,” added Anderton.

Gorbould has committed to blogging until at least the summer holidays. The visit follows a week of heavy criticism about his sporadic and uninteresting blog entries. A key theme of opposition attacks is that, in terms of his subject matter, nobody gives a shit.

Trip shrouded in secrecy

In the 11 months he has been blogging, Gorbould has never been to Afghanistan, nor has he in fact mentioned the troubled nation. He did write an item about Kazakhstan once, in response to seeing the movie Borat.

Although Gorbould has given few travel details “for security reasons”, he wife has said she expects him back “pronto, or I’m taking the kids.” She later added, “He’s such an ass.”

Gorbould spared no effort to keep his surprise two-day trip shrouded in secrecy. His wife says she found out when she found the box labelled “summer sandals” open on the basement floor, and noticed the lack of dishes in the sink. She says she’s still not sure how to explain his absence to his three-year-old daughter, who has begun asking where “the tall grown-up” is.

CBC coworkers similarly had no idea he was overseas. At 11:15 Tuesday morning, his boss wandered by his desk and looked puzzled. By 3 p.m., his new office chair had been “claimed” by another writer.

Messages to Gorbould’s Hotmail account were not immediately answered.

Posted by: Paul Gorbould | 05-22-2007 | 03:05 PM
Posted in: Blogging