Here is a thought that preoccupies me, amongst others.
What will be the identity of my progeny if they choose to live in the west? Many PF members live, study, work, make homes in the west (like the toronto crew, the london boys, the aussie 'ghans', etc).
We are sticking to our culture and hewad by speaking pashto, maintaining cultural, political and social dialogues, by ties such as weddings we attend of pashtun family and friends, but will our next generation hold fast as we do? Our parents, and grandparents lived in watan, for them there wasn't this issue, their issues were fundamental: job, health, education, marraiges, family disputes, (security, war) not like identity, integration etc

So my questions to the forum:

Are you through and through Afghan or are you for, instance Afghan-American, or British Afghan etc? Have you assimilated or integrated? Do you think it will impinge on your or your childrens identity?

How do you deal with the fact that you or your progeny will become a step away from our parents' culture?

Does it worry you? Should it worry us?


I am concerned, maybe bcz I am older or maybe I am a nationalistic, or pashtunegocentric, or the kaliwal is in my blood.

My family have largely become Urdu-speakers culturally and linguistically, but we are genetically Pashtun.

I consider myself to be of Afghan and North Indian Muslim descent, as both my father's and my mother's tribes are from Greater Paktia, essentially and the Mohajir community some of my relatives have married into and have been assimilated in, is generally mixed; of Pashtun (Rohilla) and Indian origins.

My mother's family are Rohillas (Pashtuns who migrated to the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh and eventually, lost their language and adopted the local customs), while my father's family are from the unsettled Kharoti Kuchi tribe, though my paternal grandmother was a Zazaii from Parachinar.

My grandfather settled in Karachi, Pakistan, where my father and his siblings were born. They later moved to England in the 1970s and remained there.

I have a Pakistani NIC, so I am technically a citizen of Pakistan, but my nationality is British since I was born in England and possess a red passport.

However, I grew up in various cities of Pakistan and have never lived in England for more than a year at a time.

I do not have a British accent and I do not necessarily fit in with the other "Asian" kids.

To overcome this whole identity crisis melodrama, my wife will be a Pashtana and our children will be speaking Pashto as their first language.

I'm not a Pashtun... but I think that Pashtuns living in the Western/emigration in multigenerational families are able to preserve their culture and language. It's what I noticed about other ethnic minorities.

preserving culture is pretty hard here in the west, at some point or another people start loosing their culture and values.

Im a canadian of afghan descent,
Its dishonest of me to pretend otherwise

With the kids, the slide is inevitable

we need a back to afghanistan movement. if only those sobs would get their acts together.

the piece of **** russians went home like nothing happened, but left us with lost generations.

Randolph is right the problem is we cant go back home

Torkham sooner or later, and it seems more sooner than later cultures will become irrelevant..tis the sad truth

i compare the difference between my cousins and siblings that were either born or came here at a younger age to those of us who were older when we came here and the results are pretty shocking. we are still the first generation so one can only imagine what the second or third would turn out like. i think if parents try hard enough they can succeed in passing the culture and language to their children but only to a certain extent. if they grow up showing no interest then there is nothing anyone can do about it.
i don't like the idea of having children someday but if i change my mind then i will definitely raise them in afghanistan.

Great question torkham, that's something that has bothered me over past some time. But i'd like to take your concern to the next level (and it might be harsh for some of us).
Who will benefit if I preserve my language and culture and live in the west? Will Afghanistan/Pakhtunkhwa benefit from it? Will the people who live in that region benefit from it? Or is my craze for my identity search helping the language/culture at all?

My answer to all is NO, unfortunately those who live in the west (I'll include myself for now) are not doing anything for Afghanistan/Pakhtunkhwa and are not leaving any positive impact on the culture/language either. We are rather more interested in associating ourselves with the Pakhtun/Afghan race because of its Indo-European, white complexion, green eyes, dirty brown hair. I've seen people worshiping Sharbat-gula (The National Geographic blue/green eyed Afghan girl) over Ahmad Shah Baba or Sayed Jamuluddin Afghani or Mirwais Neeka. Most of us love Bacha Khan because he's our response to Nelson Mandela and Ghandhi to the rest of the world. We love that tall and handsome fellow because he belonged to the same race as I do, not because who he was and what he has achieved.

we can not preserve our culture in one state, culture is evolutional and our Pashtun culture evolution in the west is at its highest speed. In fact most of us here do not follow the fundamental Pakhto, we rather follow some riwajoona.

as far as i'm concerned. I'd love to go back to shahr-e naw, pule mahmood khan or charasiab and open up a university probably in charasiab area so that all poor can benefit especially the Pakhtun along that belt (south kabul, logar & Paktia). Provide quality education to the max for reasonable fee. And YES I can live there, If I can survive here on a friday/sat nights I'm sure I can survive Kabul's dust and traffic in sray-shahzadah, after all those people are so social and loving.