Afghans take time off for holiday but fear for future --- KABUL — The sun was warm and the crowds were thick at the Kabul Zoo on Thursday. Families picnicked on the grassy grounds, strolled in their holiday finery and hoisted children to see the flamingos and monkeys in their wire-mesh enclosures. -- While the international community sounded urgent alarms about the stalled and disputed Afghan presidential election — and a few officials held marathon meetings to get a suspended ballot audit back on track — everyone else in Afghanistan took the week off. -- By chance, Eid al-Fitr, the Muslim festival that marks the end of Ramadan, began Monday, then segued Thursday into the weekly holiday that culminates with Friday prayers. Exhausted by the high-stakes electoral crisis that has dragged on for months, people were grateful for a respite from the tension and a chance to enjoy simple pleasures. -- Even the two presidential rivals, former finance minister Ashraf Ghani and former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, took a break from acrimony this week and left for vacations abroad. With the vote audit on hold until Saturday, it seemed as if the entire political crisis had gone on leave. --- Yet the carefree bustle in the capital barely masked the anger, anxiety and disillusionment that Afghans of all political views expressed this week. Every Afghan adult remembers the early 1990s, when the political order collapsed amid ethnic and religious violence that lasted a decade. On Thursday, many were clearly worried it could happen again. -- “Everything has come to a standstill. Nobody is breathing, and nothing can move until we have a new president,” said Rahmatullah, a 50-year-old engineer who grew rich on international construction contracts that have now stopped dead. -- “We all greet each other and say ‘Eid Mubarak’ [a blessed Eid], but then immediately we all start talking about the elections,” he said. “Will there be a winner? Will there be violence? Will we have a government at all?” --- At the jam-packed zoo Thursday, Afghans representing all walks of life and political affiliations — an army soldier, a college student, a house painter, a public administrator, a security guard — expressed deep concerns about the future, especially the fear that their country could spiral into wider violence and collapse if the election fails and a new government is not formed. --- The inauguration of the new president was supposed to take place Saturday, but experts say it could indeed be many weeks, even months, before a final winner is declared and sworn in or the joint national government proposed by U.S. officials can be formed. --- Despite their eagerness for a solution, several zoo visitors said they were far from convinced that the U.S.-brokered agreement between Ghani and Abdullah for some form of national unity government could work. Such an arrangement, they said, would leave the power balance unclear and the new government open to permanent infighting, rather than allowing things to stabilize. --- “The problem in Afghanistan is that the losers never respect the winners,” Amanullah said. “Most of us citizens don’t really care whether Ghani or Abdullah wins, as long as we get one person in charge who can make decisions and rule the country. You cannot have two lions in one cage.” - http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/afghans-take-time-off-but-fear-for-future/2014/08/01/6845ff0c-18e8-11e4-88f7-96ed767bb747_story.html