Fieldnotes on Humanity

A second earthquake brought more devastation to Afghanistanis in the Southern part of the country. Now the death toll has passed 1,400 , and nearly 4,000 or more are injured. On September 3rd, I wrote a blog post about how "Afghan" women -I mean Pashtun women - are buried twice, once by natural earthquake, a second time by Pashtun men. The next day, on September 4th, an article in the New York Times by Fatima Faizi detailed the same concerns I had expressed the day before.  The summary of the article is that women die under the rubble while men are saved.  The reason why women are still under the rubble or remain under the rubble is that their male  mahrams  (lawful individuals or members of close family)   are all lost and dead under the rubble, and there is no mahram left to save their women.  On the other hand, the male rescuers who come from the village and the surrounding areas are not mahrams and by Pashtun tradition are not allowed to get close to w...

Disaster always goes after the most vulnerable population in our planet. A recent earthquake in Haiti that killed 150,000 and still Haiti’s government says that the figure could double . Afghanistan has always been exposed to various natural disasters. Yesterday, after a heavy snow fall, there have been a series of avalanches on highways between Kabul and Mazar-e Sharif. According to local news at the scene, 60 bodies are discovered and yet the number of death is increasing.  According to New York Times , NATO and Afghan National Army helicopters joined in the rescue effort. Some 2,500 people were recovered from their stranded cars and 1.5 miles of roadway were cleared on Tuesday, leaving another mile still buried in snow. Now, who to blame? Who is the perpetrator? If God is the perpetrator, can we bring him to justice because of his cruel act? Why are always prone to associate "good" with God? I don't think there's a such thing exist but delusion, and let's blam...

In Farsi there is a phrase “ har ja sang ast ba payee lang ast ,” literally it means helpless is always left in the storm. For years and years people of Haiti were grappling with difficulties. This time the biggest earthquake, since 200 years, brought a human disaster for this country that awakened the world. For the last days, I was watching the news, I felt sick to my stomach. Last year, in the Clinton Global Initiative conference in New York City, I met a journalist from Haiti. He told me that he was going to run for presidential election in 2011. He was telling me that if he becomes a president of Haiti I should be proud that I have met him. Since earthquake happened, I immediately sent him an e-mail but unfortunately I have no news of my Haitian friend “George.” At the Clinton conference we talked about politics. He liked Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai who has written a book about fixing failed states and he was saying me, Afghanistan shouldn’t have problem with having such considerable...