The long Canadian winters indirectly provided the inspiration — besides skiing, there was nothing much to do but bowling, she said. When they arrived in Kabul, the first thing she noticed was how little opportunity there was to have fun. “I really found nothing in the entertainment sector, a place where everybody, children, even women could get affordable time out,” she said.

So she persuaded her parents to let her sell some family land in Kabul (her father is a doctor, her mother a university lecturer), and she put up $1 million to bring in the equipment from China, as well as three technicians from Brunswick to train her staff.

People took to it quickly, and soon Thursday and Friday nights, the big weekend nights here, were mobbed with bowlers. Even on a recent workday afternoon, a group of 40 Asia Foundation staff members, mostly Afghans, filled the lanes.

Ms. Rahmani said that what really amazed her, though, was to stumble onto an unsuspected bowling aptitude among Afghans, with several relative neophytes rolling respectable scores, even in the 200s.

One of those naturals was Karim Yusufi, a 26-year-old sales executive at the cellphone company Roshan. A friend invited him to bowl and taught him the basics, Mr. Yusufi said. “Then he said: ‘We have to bet on it. If you have the low score, you pay,’ ” he said.

The lane fees — $35 an hour — are not cheap by Afghan standards, though a lane accommodates six bowlers. Mr. Yusufi rolled 120 that first night, far higher than his gutter-hugging teacher, and the rest is Strikers history.