This is an interesting photo of an Afghan village seen from above, amidst fields of opium poppy and wheat in Farah Province, It looks like a nice town with the fun neighborhood pool in the middle of the sub-division. It reminds me of any other neighborhood in the world, where I see kids playing and riding their bikes around town. I see the farmers market and the baseball games. I see the small businesses and all the dads heading to the hardware store every weekend.
Who would ever imagine that this place is rooted in evil and repression. How would you know that people are being killed daily and women and children are being tortured and raped? How could you ever understand that this is the largest location for heroin production and drug trafficking in the world? It is a nasty and scary place in this world, and I am sad for the children that have to grow-up thinking this is what the world is comprised of and not knowing anything different.
Looking at these many neighborhoods you would never know one of them is filled with anger and hate.
You would never know that one of these towns allows legal rape and beating your wife is considered a basic building block of marriage.
You would never know that one has innocent people being killed every day.
It makes me sad and sick at the same time, and though I am not delusional enough to think that we can fix everything in Afghanistan with the additional 17,000 US forces, but I can only hope we can make things a little bit better or save one child from growing up in hell, and not knowing it.
