Afghanistan summer 2007

I have recently returned from Afghanistan. The pictures on the right are also from my trip.

The pictures portray lots of development work that has been carried out. Seeing this progress made me a happy person but unfortunately the feeling didn’t last long.

While there were new roads, tall buildings and fancy cars on the roads, there was also the lack of equivalent intellectual progress. Education was still at its lowest, and the behaviour of people was still very much ignorant. Although there was no danger of bombs on the road, one still did not feel safe walking on the streets. The attitude of the average person on the streets of Kabul was far from friendly.

TV channels were promoting a culture that is not true to Afghanistan and again education had no part of the scheduled programs. After watching a week of TV, I came to the conclusion that if Indian drama serials and foreign music was taken out of the schedule the only thing left would be propaganda news and advertisements.

To me it seems that Afghans are being blocked out from the external world. Maybe this a deliberate attempt to keep everyone in the country blind to what is happening around the world so that they can not compare their position with the rest of the world. If it is not done deliberately then lies the question of why these television stations sensor the progress of the world??

I was however inspired and encouraged to see the interest in education from the Afghan youth. Although the system is working against their needs, they were still searching for ways to quench their thirst for education. How far they may reach with their quest was not known but everyone was still trying...

During my time in Afghanistan, there were university entry exams for evening classes. The amount of people that turned out to take the entrance exam one morning was immense but unfortunately it would prove to be a futile exercise. Even if they passed they would still have to pay a bribe to get on a university course. The odd of getting in to university without being able to pay a hefty bribe was like that of winning the lottery. It seems that money is the new religion and without money you are helpless.

I met with so many students that have taken these entry exams in the past 3 consecutive years and their results were “unknown”. Everyone had the same question, what is unknown? Is it a pass or a fail? But they didn’t have the money to get the question answered.

Corruption at the level of police, the army, government, banks, hospitals, schools, universities... I could go on forever and the list won’t end. However, having the culture of corruption as part of the education system is the one that is worrying me the most.

I returned with pretty images in my camera but with ugly images in my mind. Is hope everything we have now or should we try to change this? Change is possible if we want it but impossible without anyone working for it. … Maybe a miracle will happen and it will all be fixed… or is time for Afghans to unite and face this challenge as a nation?