Afghanistan suffers but dreams

Sorry if I could not respond to people individually - I really would like to but the internet situation doesn't quite allow it.

In one of my previous posts, I mentioned how the remains of war were not immediately apparent. Well, I take that back entirely. Once one steps out of the shoes of a foreigner and into the shoes of the an Afghani, war, instability, and suffering become all too present. I think I skipped over the point on electricity too quickly last time. In Afghanistan, stable electricity is non-existent. One of my colleagues gets 4 hours of electricity every two days, and my other colleague gets a luxurious 10 hours each day. This may have been manageable except for the fact that the temperature is always below zero. I have my hotel heater on around the clock, and I still sometimes need more heat. Without electricity, live become far more complicated.

I still pass the garbage dumb twice a day where I can be certain a small child or a burqa clad women will be roaming of anything that can be salvaged. As I was taken around the city, one begins to see a pattern of the rows of houses that are bullet ridden and in a deeply mired state. These houses have been damage by either the Soviet war some 15 years ago or by the more recent war to oust the Taliban. The house owners, poor and hardworking Afghans, lack the fund to make any repairs, and so the houses have remind in its state of disrepair until today. Amongst those begging on the street are the "war veterans" with their prosthetic limbs from mines and other forms of warfare. Unfortunately, not only do they not get a warm war veteran's reception, but there is not a single stable organization whose function it is to support these individuals handicapped by the war. Speaking with an individual who is engaged in de-mining activities, the countries is still polluted with landmines that go as far back as 20 years (interview attached). These mines still pose a potential threat and disable thousands of people each year.

One incredible place I got to visit was Kabul University. It was so amazing because within the poorly lit rooms and freezing temperatures, one could see high aspirations contained within the premise. The university population is about 75000 students. The conditions of the building range from decent to abysmal. Schools and universities have their holiday during the winter because there is no heating in the university. Walking through the icy library, I couldn't imagine how study would be possible in such conditions. The university has a large number of faculties such as law, Islamic law, economics, english, farsi, dari, Turkish, medicine, engineering, etc. The better off faculties are those that are funded by outside countries. Thus Turkish department gets funding from Turkey and has decent resources, whereas the english department gets no such funds and is thus a sore sight indeed.

(Pictures from top: (1) houses in the snowy mountains (2) Soviet war remains (3) a colleague in the Turkish department (4) decrepit English department)