It's just past 9 a.m., and people are already filing into Kabul's Park Cinema. The venue's usual fare-shoot-'em-up Bollywood matinees-is popular, but today the films are being pre-empted by a different kind of firepower: the homegrown muscle that makes up the annual Mr. Afghanistan pageant. Backstage, bodybuilders from all over the country crank out push-ups and curl dumbbells for a last-second pump as trainers slap them down with oil and bark encouragement. Armed guards scan the main room for troublemakers as VIPs take their seats in the front row. Behind them, a standing-room-only crowd of some 1,500 people pulses to the reeeaeton hit "Gasolina."
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