In related news: Afghan women are learning how to get all dolled up, in private venues always, and especially for weddings. A US beauty parlor operator whose life was in the doldrums after a couple of failed marriages decided to join a humanitarian group and go to Afghanistan but found nothing she could do that the groups were doing. She just hung around, got to know some Afghan women, who were wild about makeup + jewelry + clothes. She started teaching some of them the techniques (more complicated than I would have imagined), and ended up getting huge donations from cosmetics firms and set up a school.
She was quite an operator, and once got a Dutch tank batallion to send three tanks rumbling down her street to threaten a neighboring Taliban type who had been harassing her and her students: no more problems after that. Interesting book.
