Quotes About Afghanistan

The shootings and explosions had lasted less than an hour, but they had frightened us badly, because none of us had ever heard gunshots in the streets. They were foreign sounds to us then. The generation of Afghan children whose ears would know nothing but the sounds of bombs and gunfire was not yet born.

I laughed. Partly at the joke, partly at how Afghan humor never changed. Wars were waged, the Internet was invented, and a robot had rolled on the surface of Mars, and in Afghanistan we were still telling Mullah Nasruddin jokes.

Never mind that to me, the face of Afghanistan is that of a boy with a thin-boned frame, a shaved head, and low-set ears, a boy with a Chinese doll face perpetually lit by a harelipped smile. Never mind any of those things. Because history isn't easy to overcome. Neither is religion. In the end, I was a Pashtun and he was a Hazara, I was Sunni and he was Shi'a, and nothing was ever going to change that. Nothing.

The kinship I felt suddenly for the old land . . . it surprised me . . . I thought I had forgotten about this land. But I hadn't. . . . Maybe Afghanistan hadn't forgotten me either.

The generation of Afghan children whose ears would know nothing but the sounds of bombs and gunfire was not yet born.

He loathed Jimmy Carter, whom he called a "big-toothed cretin." In 1980, when we were still in Kabul, the U.S. announced it would be boycotting the Olympic Games in Moscow. "Wah wah!" Baba exclaimed with disgust. "Brezhnev is massacring Afghans and all that peanut eater can say is I won't come swim in your pool.

Mereka tidak melakukan apa pun kecuali menghitung butiran tasbih dan memamerkan hafalan isi kitab yang ditulis dalam bahasa yang tidak mereka pahami. Kuharap Tuhan melindungi kita semua jika suatu saat nanti Afganistan jatuh ke tangan mereka.

I know you're still young, but I want you to understand and learn this now, he said. Marriage can wait, education cannot. You're a very, very bright girl. Truly, you are. You can be anything you want, Laila. I know this about you. And I also know that when this war is over, Afghanistan is going to need you as much as its men, maybe even more. Because a society has no chance of success if its women are uneducated, Laila. No chance.

Not that they give a damn in America, mind you. What do they care that Pashtuns and Hazaras and Tajiks and Uzbeks are killing each other? How many Americans can even tell one from the other? Don't expect help from them, I say. Now that the Soviets have collapsed, we're no use to them. We served our purpose. To them, Afghanistan is a kenarab, a shit hole. Excuse my language, but it's true.

That's the real Afghanistan, Agha sahib. That's the Afghanistan I know. You? You've always been a tourist here, you just didn't know it

will forget once again about Afghanistan. The lines are from his favorite of Hafez's ghazals: Joseph shall return to Canaan, grieve not, Hovels shall turn to rose gardens, grieve not. If a flood should arrive, to drown all that's alive, Noah is your guide in the typhoon's eye, grieve not.

El niño hindú aprendería muy pronto lo que los británicos descubrieron a principios de siglo y los rusos a finales de la década de los ochenta: que los afganos son un pueblo independiente.

Aku dan Hassan memandang. Menahan tawa. Anak India itu akan segera mengetahui satu hal yang dipelajari oleh orang Inggris di awal abad lalu, yang akhirnya dipelajari oleh orang Rusia di akhir 1980-an: bahwa penduduk Afganistan adalah orang-orang merdeka. Penduduk Afganistan menyukai tradisi namun membenci aturan. Begitu pula dengan adu layang-layang. Aturannya sederhana: Tidak ada aturan. Terbangkan saja layang-layangmu. Putuskan benang lawanmu. Mudah-mudahan kamu beruntung.

Laila knows, to those who grumble that the promised aid money to Afghanistan isn't coming, that the rebuilding is going too slowly, that there is corruption, that the Taliban are regrouping already and will come back with a vengeance, that the world will forget once again about Afghanistan.

Khaled Hosseini

Prošle sedmice Bibi jo donijela je vijest da Jalilove k?erke Saideh i Naheed trebaju krenuti u Mehrijinu djevoja?ku školu u Heratu. Otad su se misli o u?ionici i u?iteljima kovitlale u Mariaminoj glavi, slike sveski sa linijama, stupci brojeva i olovke što ostavljaju taman, debeo trag. Zamišljala je sebe u u?ionici sa drugim djevoj?icama njenih godina. Žudjela je za tim da stavi linijar na stranicu sveske, i vu?e crte koje izgledaju važno.

He pointed to an old man dressed in ragged clothes trudging down a dirt path, a large burlap pack filled with scrub grass tied to his back. "That's the real Afghanistan, Agha sahib. That's the Afghanistan I know. You? You've always been a tourist here, you just didn't know it.

marveling at how every Afghan story is marked by death and loss and unimaginable grief. And yet, she sees, people find a way to survive, to go on. Laila thinks of her own life and all that has happened to her, and she is astonished that she too has survived, that she is alive and sitting in this taxi listening to this man's story.

Vi que Farid miraba también, con su mano igualmente amputada colgando a un lado. Me acordé de los hijos de Wahid y... entonces comprendí una cosa: que no abandonaría Afganistán sin encontrar a Sohrab.

Afghanistan is going to need you as much as its men, maybe even more. Because a society has no chance of success if its women are uneducated, Laila. No chance.

Afghanistan is like a beautiful mansion littered with garbage, and someone has to take out the garbage. That's what you were doing in Mazar, going door-to-door? Taking out the garbage? - Precisely. In the west, they have an expression for that. They call it ethnic cleansing. - Do they? Ethnic cleansing. I like it. I like the sound of it.

Too many young Afghan men are dying this way.

You have death certificates? Death certificates? This is Afghanistan we're talking about. Most people there don't have birth certificates.

And the Mountains Echoed BY KHALED HOSSEINI