Lindsay Hilsum (3:05)

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Kiln Theatre. Welcome to intelligence squared. As Miha just said, I am the international editor of Channel 4 News and as you would Expect I am a thoroughly objective, careful, fair and balanced journalist. But I'm going to have to tell you on this occasion, I can't claim to be an unbiased source because this woman is my friend and I think her book is great. And she's kind of a sister, too, because Lisa and I started out in journalism in parallel. She was the BBC West Africa correspondent while I was the BBC East Africa correspondent. So that was really how we kind of knew each other across those crackling shortwave radios in those days, in the 1980s.

Lise Doucet (4:00)

But Lindsay is older than me, though.

Lindsay Hilsum (4:03)

I am not older than you. I am not older than you in any way that counts, but.

Lise Doucet (4:08)

And I just have to just bring you into my confidence and just to have a little bit of sympathy from you, because Lindsay's being forced tonight to say nice things about me. And she doesn't normally say nice things about me.

Lindsay Hilsum (4:26)

I always say nice things about things.

Lise Doucet (4:27)

So if she looks uncomfortable, you know, being the BBC, I think I should tell you the truth and nothing but the truth. So I just wanted you to know. I mean, she's a great. I mean, she is a great friend. Great friend. A bit older than me, but she's a great friend.

Lindsay Hilsum (4:39)

Can I just say that on this occasion, I'm asking the questions, you're giving the answers. Right.

Lise Doucet (4:44)

So the last time I interviewed her on the stage about her great book, she totally. I mean, I asked you to read one section of the book and you said, no, no, no, I'm not reading that. And you read another section of the book.

Lindsay Hilsum (4:57)

Well, that was because you didn't go for the right bit. Anyway, as I was saying, she. Enough of that.

Lise Doucet (5:04)

Start again. Should we start again?

Lindsay Hilsum (5:05)

Okay.

Lise Doucet (5:06)

Okay.

Lindsay Hilsum (5:06)

Lise Doucet, the chief international correspondent of the BBC, she's also a presenter, as you know, and she travels the world now, presenting and reporting, and she's been based in a number of different places. So she started out in Abidjan, and then. I'm going to get some of these wrong. Jerusalem, Amman, obviously. Kabul, where else? Lise, you've got to use that microphone. Remember that we have these things called microphones.

Lise Doucet (5:39)

I'm a bit. I didn't sleep very much. Abidjan in Cote d', Ivoire, in West Africa for five years. Then to a short diversion through London for six months, then Islamabad, Kabul, Islamabad, Iran. And then little diversion again through London and then to the Middle east, first to Jordan and then to Jerusalem.

Lindsay Hilsum (6:06)

So tell us a bit about how you got to be a journalist in. In the first place. Because everybody knows you're not British.

Lise Doucet (6:13)

Yes, exactly. Exactly. Do you know how do all great stories begin? Once upon a time, not so long ago. Actually, quite a long time ago. I mean, shorter than Lindsay, but. So do you remember those days? Remember those days when we didn't have the Internet, we didn't have the phone in our pocket? Well, when I started with the BBC in West Africa, the BBC used to get these really long letters with people writing, dear BBC, why can't you get people with a British accent? Why do you have to hire people who don't have a British accent? And the BBC used to constantly get these letters saying, where is Lise Doucet from? Where do Lise Doucet's parents come from? And every few years, I'd have to go. We used to have these call in programs. You'd have to answer the listener's questions. And every time I did this, I became more and more defiant. And so the last time I did it, they didn't invite me back. The presenter said, well, what is your accent, Lise? And I said, well, I come from the east coast of Canada, and on my father's side, the Doucet family, they're Acadians. And they said, Acadians? And I said, yes, Acadians. 1755, Britain's first ethnic cleansing. They put us out to sea, Drew, you know, and I said, do you know Louisiana? Louisiana? Cajun music. Cajun. Oh, Cajun, Cajun. And I thought, oh, my. You know, my. My great ancestry comes to Jabbalaya Rice. And. And so when the presenter of the program said, well, you know, Lise, where. Where did you come from? I said, well, my ancestry is Acadian. And the British expelled my people from the Eastern seaboard of Canada in down to the thirteen colonies and to Louisiana. And they didn't allow us to come back and take our land. So I said, we didn't get our land back, but I got a job. And so working for the BBC is my Acadian revenge. And then I got letters from Acadians around the world, including a memorable one. And someone said, vraiment, Lise Doucette chapeau vous ete la Celine Dion de Journalisme. And of course, you know, Celine Dion. I know, I know, I know. Just. Anyway, it was. It was. But it was. I would say, when young. When young journalists. And I think it's the same thing with you, Lindsay. Lindsay and I often get messages from young journalists. Are there any young journalists in the audience? There you go.

Lindsay Hilsum (9:15)

I know there's Some old ones, yes.

Lise Doucet (9:17)

So I always say to them, you know, take a risk, a calculated risk, not too dangerous. Don't go to the, you know, major front lines. Find a place that is important enough that an editor will take a story, but not so important they already have a correspondence. So when I graduated from University of Toronto in Canada with a master's degree, I wanted to become a foreign correspondent. I didn't want to start on the local, the city desk. I wanted to become a foreign correspondent. And I wrote letters I would like to become. And they said, sorry, sorry, you don't have a journalism degree. You don't have any experience. And I thought, well, but I want to be a foreign correspondent. So I got a job as a volunteer. So did what you did. I got a job as a volunteer, Canadian Crossroads International. And the luck of the draw was I got sent to Cote d' Ivoire because I had some French. And when my volunteer assignment was over, teaching English in a village, I did as village girls do. I went to the big city and there was the BBC setting up its first West Africa office. And there I was. Wrong accent. And that was when the accent really mattered. Wrong cv. I mean, no cv. I had a few articles for Real Estate News in Toronto. Wrong country. But then, really, Lindsay, the skies opened and angels descended from heaven and they said, give Lise Doucet a job. And I did. And that's how it started. And you didn't tell that part. They really did try to actually get rid of you and get rid of me when you were in East Africa and I was in West Africa. But we held on. We wouldn't take no for an answer.

Lindsay Hilsum (11:06)

Well, that's right. And what was that first experience like? Because we're talking about the early 1980s, aren't we, here? So what kind of stories were you covering in West Africa? Because you were in Cote d', Ivoire, in Ivory coast, but you traveled the region a bit, didn't you? So what kind of things were you covering?

Lise Doucet (11:21)

Well, it was a very interesting time, actually, for journalism Britain, because that was when the Independent was set up as a newspaper. As you know, in Britain, some tend to the left, some tend to the right. They usually have some kind of an affiliation. So the Independent was set up to say, we're independent, we're not going to be connected to any one political view. But they also had an idea that they wanted to put stories, which were usually on page nine, stories about Africa. They wanted to put them on the front page. And this was at the time when the BBC, as I mentioned, also set up its first West Africa office. So there was an idea that let's tell stories and tell them in a different way, including stories from Africa. And during that time in Africa, there was drought in the Sahel and there was a spate of military coups across the region. So there was a lot of news. And I sometimes wonder if I had started in the Middle east where people watch coverage, you know, with a real eagle eye. But in Africa, I learned on the job because I hadn't gone to journalism school and because there wasn't as much coverage. I'm not saying I don't remember making any major factual errors, but that was where you, as you know, you didn't go to journalism school either.

Lindsay Hilsum (12:45)

No, absolutely not.

Lise Doucet (12:47)

Yes. Yes. Can you imagine being in a place.

Lindsay Hilsum (12:49)

Yeah, we made it up as we went along, didn't we, really? But say West Africa, and then you've listed all the other places where you've been based, and of course there's other places where you've visited. And I think both of us feel that we kind of leave a little bit of ourselves, don't we, everywhere we go. But you've left a lot of yourself in Afghanistan. And we're coming to the book. So what was it about Afghanistan that captured your heart?

Lise Doucet (13:17)

But everyone in the audience has this, because I'm sure everyone is traveler. There's certain places. I remember a friend told me that places, particular cities are like people, and you know immediately whether you're going to have a good relationship with them. And when I went to Afghan, I can still remember I first went to Pakistan and where I met Afghan women, Afghan. And I was immediately taken by the Afghan women, their energy, their sense of self. And I've always loved going to places when people have a strong sense of self, a strong identity, they don't want to be someone else. And it's often countries have to say, which haven't been colonized. Because my experience has been when people have a strong sense of self, they also can have a strong sense of humor because then they can laugh at themselves. And I was really struck by Afghans as their sense of identity, their sense of history, their sense of humor. So the people in the place caught my imagination immediately. And of course, when I went. We're going way back now, when I first arrived. The book begins when I. Do you want me to.

Lindsay Hilsum (14:36)

Yeah. So the book begins, and it's one day before your 30th birthday.

Lise Doucet (14:40)

Yes.

Lindsay Hilsum (14:41)

Oh, that's quite a long time ago. Lise, isn't it?

Lise Doucet (14:46)

I know you work for Channel 4, but it's one day after my 30th birthday.

Lindsay Hilsum (14:50)

Yes, sorry, inaccurate hashtag.

Lise Doucet (14:52)

Just saying. I mean, it doesn't really matter. It's just a fact. Lindsay, you don't have to.

Lindsay Hilsum (14:55)

It's just a slight. Yeah, Fact.

Lise Doucet (14:57)

Just don't worry about it. Just, you know, one fact. So there it was in. When I'd finally got to. When I'd left after five years, I wanted to come to Britain to work in London to find out a bit more about the BBC. And I couldn't get to Britain. People said to me, lise, you're a Canadian, this can be no problem for you coming to Britain. And I exhausted every possibility.

Lindsay Hilsum (15:26)

Well, you couldn't get a visa.

Lise Doucet (15:27)

I couldn't get a visa. I couldn't. And so a dip, this kindness of strangers. I think any of the, you know, the aspiring journalists in the audience, the secret weapon is kindness, kindness from strangers and friends and the kindness that you bestow upon others, it is gold dust. So there I was, I had almost given up on coming to London, even just for six months, and a British diplomat in Nigeria said, what are you doing next, Lisa? And I said, well, I was going to go to Britain, but I can't get in. He goes, that's ridiculous. So I got sponsored by the West Africa desk in the Foreign Office. They said, lise Doucet can come to Britain for six months. And actually then, decades later, I was at this storied hotel, not this one, the storied hotel in Jerusalem called the American Colony Hotel. And the British ambassador, I met the British ambassador to Lebanon, a woman right at the door and she goes, lee, this was like 30 years, 25 years later, she goes, lise, I was the one who signed the letter that got you into Britain.

Lindsay Hilsum (16:34)

Isn't that amazing?

Lise Doucet (16:34)

And it's that, you know, it's that sort of sliding doors moment because she showed the kind. So I did my six months and then I, I, then I thought, I want to go out again. And again, it was the same thing. I didn't have much experience and, And I had this friend, was a friend of my sister's who he, she'd worked in different parts of the world and he'd been to Pakistan. And he goes, liz, you have to go to Pakistan. Pakistan is in your karma. And I go, wow, yeah, Pakistan is in my karma. And I went around to all the different parts of the BBC. I went to the Urdu service, to the Pashtu service, to the Persian service. Thanks Liz, but no, thanks. No, Liz, we don't need any. No. That's nice of you, Lise. No, we don't need anything. And then I said, but Pakistan's in my karma. I've got to go to Pakistan. So I went, as one does, and I went there and I. So I chose a place that nobody ever reported from. I went to Quetta in Baluchistan province. And you know. You know. Yes. And that was where a lot of the Afghans. Because we're talking about the Cold War, when you had.

Lindsay Hilsum (17:35)

What year are we talking about?

Lise Doucet (17:35)

We're talking 1988. So the Western backed mujahideen against the Soviet backed government in Kabul. I go to Quetta and I start reporting from Quetta. And BBC in London goes, oh, did you see that report from Quetta? From these two? So interesting. Oh, things are happening in Quetta. Oh. And there I met Hamid Karzai. I met many of the Afghan mujahideen, the fighters or the spokesperson for the fighters, who then went on to play a key role in The Afghanistan of 2001, when the Taliban were toppled. And then Benazir Bhutto came back, the end of martial law. And then I suddenly played a big role in the BBC's coverage in Pakistan. The Pakistan job came up and I applied, but I was still too junior. And the guy who got it, he had a girlfriend and he goes, lise Doucet has to leave. I don't want Lise Doucet here. And I thought, what am I going to do? And again, the kindness of strangers. I got a visa for Kabul when nobody else was getting a visa.

Lindsay Hilsum (18:37)

Because he wanted his girlfriend to have the job.

Lise Doucet (18:39)

Yeah, he wanted her to do anything.

Lindsay Hilsum (18:41)

So that's the meanness about the journalists.

Lise Doucet (18:44)

Meanness? Yes. Yes. Well, that's another doctor.

Lindsay Hilsum (18:46)

She always looks on the bright side, doesn't she? The kindness of strangers. I'm like, but he didn't.

Lise Doucet (18:51)

The UN envoy and some people in Kabul, I got a visa through again. So people from the UN people in Kabul said, okay, we'll give Lys to set a visa. And there it was in the harshest winter in more than a decade, in the depths of the Cold War, I get this visa and I fly in the day after my birthday, my birthday is Christmas Eve. And then Christmas Day, 1988, weeks before the Soviet troops are about to pull out of Afghanistan, I arrive in Kabul and I find myself in the biggest story in the world.

Lindsay Hilsum (19:30)

It's so amazing, isn't it, how it happens like that by accident. And the first place you went was to the Intercontinental Hotel.

Lise Doucet (19:38)

Yes.

Lindsay Hilsum (19:38)

So there you are. So tell us, why, in this book, why did you decide to tell the story of Afghanistan, the Afghanistan that you have known, and some of the history as well, through the Intercontinental, through a hotel?

Lise Doucet (19:56)

Lindsay and I often talk about storytelling. What is the best way to tell the stories of our time? Both of us do television reporting. I also do radio reporting. We also do online. Lindsay, of course, has written a few books. And ever since I started traveling, and I don't know, it'd be interesting the questions to hear from you, what kind of reading you like to do. But I've always found that reading novels, reading what we call narrative history, where the history comes alive on the page, where the characters come to life. Books. Dominique Lepierre and Larry Collins. Oh, Jerusalem, Freedom at Midnight. Those kind of books, those are the books that I read every time I went to a new place to get a sense of place, the sense of people. And I remember being so thrilled when I moved to. I didn't get the job the first time to finish that story, but the guy who got the job turned out to be an alcoholic. So I applied. A year later, I got the job. Hashtag, just saying. But when I was reading a book like Freedom at Midnight, they were about partition during the Indian subcontinent. I had friends in Pakistan who were in the book who were still alive. They were elderly. And I thought, wow, this is like, really living history. So when it came, when I decided that I would like to write a book, I thought it also came at a time where, in our business, there was what we call news avoidance. People, including us, it has to be said, say, the news is so depressing, so many wars, so many terrible things happen, so glum, so grim. And even I started to turning the dial away from Radio 4 and the World Service to Radio 3 to listen to classical music. But of course, you know, look. Look at all of us here. We are privileged. We're educated. We live in. For all of its imperfections, we live in a democracy. We have responsibilities as citizens. We can't say, I don't want to follow the news. We have to know what's happening elsewhere, because it's not out there. These are stories that involve all of us. And so I thought, well, how can I find a way to tell a story, in this case about Afghanistan, which tells a story in a way that can draw people in. Which, again, goes back to that idea about living history on the pages. Because the kind of news that Lindsay and I do is just a snapshot. So if you watch a television report from the inside, whether it's Ukraine or Gaza, Afghanistan, Sudan, and if it's a country torn by war or crisis, people are running away from the bombs. They're standing in the rubble of their homes, they're moaning in the hospital. Their moments of sadness and grief, some of the worst moments in people's lives. But what do they do in between? Because they also, no matter where people live, they're like you or I. They have to get up in the morning and face the day and find some measure, to find an everyday kind of courage, to get up and to find and to live with some, some degree of hope. Lashings of humor, because humor is one I have found. Humor is the universal language and it is a tool to help people survive and to get through the day. And so in this book, in Afghanistan, yes, it is a book about Afghanistan, but it could be a book about Ukrainians, about Sudanese. It's about people living in the worst of times and trying to make it at least not the best of times. But every all these lives have births and birthdays and weddings and celebrations. Life goes on. And in those places. And we've discussed this, Lindsay, when death is at the door, what is the solution? What is the antidote? It's to live. To live. Because every day as if it's going to be your last day. Because quite frankly, it might be.

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Lise Doucet (25:52)

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Lindsay Hilsum (26:57)

One of the things I find very touching in the book is that so Lise tells the stories of many of the staff at the Intercontinental Hotel, some of whom you've known since that first time you went there. And I find it very moving. The pride they take in their jobs, you know, the pride they take in folding the towels correctly, even if the towels are worn out and the K, the embroidery on the K is a bit tattered. And the food they serve, they have this incredible sense that this job is important. It's quite central in their lives, isn't it?

Lise Doucet (27:33)

Yeah, I love that you picked up on it. But back to where in deciding to write, to use the conventions of fiction to tell a nonfiction story, to tell a true story. And I remember how sometimes you have these visceral memories, like visual memories of when something makes a huge impact on you. I remember when I was at graduate school, University of Toronto, and it was like a drizzly gray day down on Queen street where there's lots of great cafes and who's been to Toronto here? Yeah, quite a few. You know Queen street. Right. So I was down not in really one of the charming capital and I was reading Truman Capote's book In Cold Blood and I still remember to this day that I finished the the book. Do you know what happens when you read a book that has an impact on you. And you just sit there and you just savor the moment. And I remember thinking, wow, that's amazing. And remember, I'm now maybe 19, 20, wanting to become a journalist, wanting to find a way to write. And I'm thinking, wow, that's amazing to use the conventions of a novel to tell a true story. And now, okay, never, never mind. Later, people made things up. Well, maybe made it like, sort of like Lindsay making things up maybe, but that kind of thing, you know, I love those kind of. So. But I needed what they call in literature a conceit, a prism. And I thought, well, in a country where for all that Afghans have lost, they have this deeply ingrained sense of hospitality, why not use the home of hospitality, the National Guest House, the first luxury hotel in Afghanistan, which also happened to be my first home in Afghanistan. And through that tell the arc of 50 years of history. Because the hotel initially, when it was beautiful evening, as you know, the sun was setting and the music was rising and Le thou of Kabul was on this hill on the edge of the city and this glittering hotel, this modern palace of glass and steel. And it had this facade of balconies and the windows like eyes, 200 eyes watching over the city. And this was when Afghanistan, Kabul was described as the Paris of Asia. It was the place where, for a very small section of the society, it was the place where, of course, there were the hippies then who went there. The. They wouldn't stay in the.

Lindsay Hilsum (30:17)

What year are we talking about?

Lise Doucet (30:18)

This is 88 now we're back at the. No, this is 70. Sorry, this is before you get 69. When the hotel.

Lindsay Hilsum (30:23)

This is the time of the king.

Lise Doucet (30:24)

This is the time of the king. So by the time I. So this is. So the hotel was built in the time of the king, when Afghanistan was before the war. But then of course, once the Soviets went in in 1979, the luxury chain pulled out, but the Intercontinental was a very Afghan hotel. So they refused to give in, give up. They kept the hotel name. So to this day it's on booking.com if you. You too can stay there too. Has kept as the Intercontinental Hotel. So it started as a luxury hotel in the luxury hotel chain. And then once the Soviet, once the Soviets moved in and the luxury chain, the intercontinental chain pulled out, then it was a government owned hotel. So in every chapter of Afghan history, and sadly it was a chapter of war, no matter who ruled in Afghanistan, set the rules in the intercon. And I write in the book that politics, like hotel Guests checked in and out. And I've always been struck that Afghanistan, and perhaps if there's better historians in the audience, they can correct me that Afghans have lived through every political system known to man. They've lived through a kingdom, a peaceable kingdom, not a perfect kingdom, but the time before war. They've lived through Soviet backed communism, they've lived through warlordism which tore Kabul apart, including parts of the hotel. They've lived through Islamism of the Taliban, they lived through Western backed democracy, a wannabe democracy, backed and bankrolled by the west. And now again they're run by the Taliban. So the hotel then became, and I checked with Afghan friends, you think it's a prism. So much history went through this hotel and in every phase, every political phase of Afghanistan, the waiters had to keep waiting, the cooks had to keep pots on the boil. They kept their sense of pride and dignity. Especially Hazrat, who's the oldest character in the book. He was trained by the real Intercontinental and he still carries himself with this, with this pride. And the pride and dignity is because again, you often in the kind of news stories, you don't see that, you see people at their worst.

Lindsay Hilsum (32:45)

And maybe that's partly our fault that we don't show that. I think it's time for a reading. Can you. I mean, we're sort of jumping ahead here. But you do do this near the beginning, which is so Everybody will remember 2021, when the, when the Americans are pulling out and the Taliban are coming back and what's happening at the Intercontinental. And you start with this because it's an extraordinary scene. Do you want to read us some of that again?

Lise Doucet (33:10)

Trying to see it through what happens in people's, in very ordinary everyday lives when cataclysmic events happen. In this case it was the return of the Taliban in Afghanistan, but of course in the Intercontinental on the Hill, they had to keep folding the napkins, cooking the rice, snapping the sheets across the bed, carrying on as people working in a hotel do. But of course life there gets, is shattered as well. So August 15, 2021 was also a day of a big wedding. There's lots of weddings that go on in luxury hotels, but I'll read a bit and if you get bored, just tell me. Down the corridor the wedding was beginning. The hall had filled with the bouncy beat of the wedding march, a Hesta Borough. Walk slowly, my light of night go slowly. The bride and groom made their entrance. She was glowing in her Gandhi dress, elaborately embroidered in seven brilliant colors. He walked beside her in his traditional waistcoat, tunic, and billowing trousers. Family members held the Holy Quran above their heads while guests ushered the couple forward with showers of kisses, rose petals, and clapping. Saduzai watched with a knowing smile. It was always a relief when a wedding got going. He checked his run of show again. 150 guests confirmed. One hundred and eighty could show up. He looked at his watch. It was late morning, not too long until lunch, but hardly anyone was in the hall. Perhaps about 60 people so far at most. The wedding show had to go on. Nabila spun her discs, playing katagangi, music of longing and love. The familiar tunes tugged couples onto the dance floor, some rushing up to the DJ to request their favorites. Now, I'm just going to skip a few paragraphs. The bride and groom stared into each other's eyes, but their love couldn't stop their gaze from occasionally darting across their wedding party at all the empty tables. And most guests weren't looking back at them. They were looking at their phones, at each other, frantically trying to reach loved ones at work, children at school. Satosai, he's the head waiter, took a deep breath and straightened his shoulders. He moved in to eavesdrop on the tables, which were ablaze with worry. The Taliban are in Wardak. In company? No, no. They're in Kabul. In the district right next to the hotel. The rest of my family aren't coming to the wedding. They're too afraid to leave the house. What should we do? Satu's eye swallowed. He summoned the full force of his authority, the weight of three decades of wedding service. Nothing will happen, he insisted in his warm, grandfatherly voice. This is a wedding. You're all safe. Even if the Taliban come, they won't hurt you. We're all Muslims. From the corner of his eye, through the open doors, he spotted a clutch of men in the corridor in the top Paranu Tamban, traditional clothing with checkered scarves partially hiding their faces. He froze. Were the Taliban here? Relief washed over him. It was only the hotel's own security guards, but they had changed out of their uniforms. That was worrying in its own way.

Lindsay Hilsum (37:08)

It's lovely.

Mia Sorrenti (37:11)

Thanks for listening to Intelligence Squared. This episode was produced by me, Mia Sorrenti, and it was edited by Mark Roberts. Don't forget Intelligent Squared Premium subscribers can listen to the event in full and ad free. Just head to intelligencesquared.com membership to find out more. Or hit the icon extra button on Apple for a free trial. If you'd like to join us in person. You can find our full live events program on the Intelligence Squared website. You've been listening to Intelligence Squared. Thanks for joining us.

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