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Bodybuilding: The pursuit of beauty in war-torn Kabul
KABUL, June 25, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – Hindi music pumps from the speakers as
dozens of Afghan men grunt and sweat their way through a workout beneath the
watchful eye of a young Arnold Schwarzenegger, whose muscle-bound image hangs
from the wall.
The scene inside this Kabul gym is repeated at venues all round the
capital, where bodybuilding has become ubiquitous since the fall of the
Taliban regime.
The sport has a long tradition in Afghanistan, and was even tolerated by
the Taliban when they ruled the country from 1996-2001 — so long as the men
wore long trousers as they lifted.
But as security deteriorated and the initial euphoria after the US
invasion dissipated into stress, trauma and loss, more and more young men
took to the gym.
“Everyone, everywhere in Afghanistan, wants to have a beautiful body
shape, and this sport is a favourite sport for every young man,” says Hares
Mohammadi, a law and political science student turned champion bodybuilder
who is also a trainer at one gym in Kabul.
The 25-year-old, dressed in grey, strikes different poses showing off his
carefully honed muscles, and warms up his chest and shoulders ahead of a
regional bodybuilding competition.
Despite a surge in bombings and suicide attacks, life goes on, he says,
and young Afghans want to “make their mark”. One way is through sporting
success.
So, along with Schwarzenegger, other stars from Hollywood and Bollywood
such as Sylvester Stallone and Salman Khan are held up as heroes, and the
gyms stay busy for hours, filled with music and camaraderie as men tone their
bodies to perfection.
– The old days –
It was not always so.
Afghan bodybuilding legend Aziz Arezo reminisces about his time as a
teenage lifter, when there were “very, very few people” in the capital who
knew anything about the sport.
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He himself was only inspired to take it up after seeing movies and posters
featuring foreigners such as Schwarzenegger.
“Arnold was my… role model,” he says, smiling as he remembers how
expensive postcards featuring the star were.
Speaking to AFP between lifting weights at his small gym in Kabul, Arezo –
– his physique not quite what it was in his glorious bodybuilding past —
reels off his long list of accolades, including being named Afghanistan’s
first master sport bodybuilder by the country’s Olympic Committee in the
1970s.
It is a long career, and at times a lonely one.
Though now a trainer himself, guiding hundreds of Afghan youths through
lifts and crunches, he never had the guidance of one.
Years ago he made the equipment and dumbbells in his gym from spare car
parts as there was no place to buy them.
“I have been a teacher of myself,” he says, adding that his dumbbells are
“more efficient than foreign dumbbells”.
Under Taliban rule, he worked for four months in Kabul before eventually
fleeing again, fearing their restrictions despite their views on
bodybuilding.
“Nowadays, bodybuilding clubs are everywhere in the city, and everyone has
made a gym of his own,” he says.
He has trained hundreds of bodybuilders in his career, but is suspicious
of new methods employed by many young Afghans, including taking protein
supplements to boost their abilities.
“I believe if you do sport or exercise naturally, it is better than
protein,” he says, warning of detrimental side effects.
“Before my workout… I was drinking carrot and banana juice, and post-
training, I was taking two eggs, three glasses of milk, one bowl of beans and
lentils, and it was everyday food for me,” he says.
“Today’s bodybuilding is not natural.”
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– Stress and frustration –
Regardless of the method, sport can help ease the psychological trauma of
nearly four decades of war, says Ali Fitrat, a psychology professor at Kabul
University.
Afghans are stressed socially, culturally, financially and politically, he
said, citing fighting, insecurity and poor economic conditions as some of the
most devastating factors.
As such, he says sports such as bodybuilding can play a “vital role”.
But, like Mohammadi, he also suggests that young men in particular have a
strong desire to make their mark.
“They want to show their bodies, they want to attract the attention of the
people, and they want to have different looks and to look different than the
others,” he said.
However, security continues to deteriorate in Kabul, where both the
Taliban and the Islamic State group have stepped up their attacks.
Many fearful residents now limit their movements. Arezo says his gym’s
membership has shrunk.
“Nowadays people are concerned about fleeing the country rather than
taking up sport,” he says.
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