The Atmosphere

This weekend was the first fully independent, days and nights out on the town for me in Kabul. Thursday night we hit up a local ex-pat hot spot called L'atmosphere (or just L'atmo.) Since the place got raided a couple of months ago, it's now operating under a very similar but apparently different-enough name. Apparently some star "playboy drummer" named Matt is leaving Kabul and L'atmo was kind enough to host his send-off party. They had a few bands on the set list, including Ceiling of Nork, Khyberzoo and White City.

A couple of new friends/Roshan colleagues, Joel and I planned to arrive at the restaurant around eight o'clock so we could grab a quick dinner before the bands started playing. I was warned that the food at L'atmo is OK and the is service was terrible. Both end up being true. A personal-sized thin crust margherita pizza and a glass of wine cost me $25 USD and arrive about 2 hours after we were seated. The general rule of thumb is that food is more expensive at places that serve alcohol... and this place is definitely serving alcohol. After dinner, we headed outside to find a massive diverse ex-patriot crowd. Everyone was hanging out in the open air garden; outdoor chairs and tables were laid out the length of the garden in a long rectanglar shape. At the end of it, there was a medium sized bar-hut, similar to one you would find on the beach in the DR.

The first band was already on by the time we finished dinner; Ceiling of Nork played new and old school covers ranging from The Killers to No Doubt and everything in between. The bar-hut was a total disaster at this point; there were people four lines deep fighting to get a warm beer. I finagled my way to the front of the bar with one of my classic midget-finagle moves, and in a stroke of genius decide to order 10 beers, which went directly into my bag... the ol' beer-in-a bag trick.

Guys around me were wearing t-shirts, button down shirts, blazers and leather jackets. Everyone had either an Australian, British, Eastern European or African accent. One in every three guys had a scarf around his neck. There was also a relatively diverse range of girls at the bar (ethnically, racially etc...) Majority were wearing jeans, three quarter length tops and heels, some had sleeveless tops on, but every girl in the room had a colorful scarf around her neck - remember, we all have to cover our heads when we get back into the car.

The party was a blast - I felt like I was at a friends house and some buddies decided to set up equipment in the back yard so they could entertain us. The bands were also surprisingly good - that playboy Matt really rocked the house. The highlight of my night by far was watching a little ano Indian girl get too drunk and start stumble-dancing in the front row. Like any other bar in any other city in the world, some guy eventually started dancing up against her and later I saw them heading to the bar, most likely to "talk".  Unfortunately, Roshan enforces one of the tightest curfews out of any organization in the city, so by 11:30 pm we were back in the car and headed home for our midnight curfew. Fortunately, we were told the next day that L'atmo ran out of booze shortly after we left.