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If there is a symbol of Kabul – beyond the burqa and the fast-disappearing but much-photographed ruined houses in the west of the city – it is the kite. Banned by the Taliban, popularised by Khaled Hosseini's book the Kite Runner, Kabul's kites are little more than salvaged plastic bags taped to thin bits of wood. But they dip and soar in even the worst sandstorms above the city, over refugee camps, over the poorest outlying villages. Under the Taliban, they were one of the things that local people used to tell the rare reporters in their city that they missed the most. Now Kabulis fear the kites may disappear again. For the Taliban are at the gates of Kabul once more.
Najib Samib and Said Ahmed, two psychology students, stand in the grounds on the renovated Kabul university campus. A decade ago, the complex was a wasteland of semi-derelict buildings. There were few books and fewer teachers. I had lunch there once with the Taliban cleric in charge. We sat on the floor in his office eating boiled spinach, rice and mutton. He had been educated in a conservative madrassa and saw western-style education as a threat – though he reluctantly admitted the country needed doctors and engineers. Outside a handful of students lingered in the overgrown gardens. Today the scene is transformed.
But the two students are worried and Ahmed says that for the first time since coming back to Kabul from Iran in 2002 he is wondering if he will have to leave again. "If it gets worse then we will have to leave, go to neighbouring countries," he says. "I don't know. It's pretty depressing."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008...an?INTCMP=SRCH
Najib Samib and Said Ahmed, two psychology students, stand in the grounds on the renovated Kabul university campus. A decade ago, the complex was a wasteland of semi-derelict buildings. There were few books and fewer teachers. I had lunch there once with the Taliban cleric in charge. We sat on the floor in his office eating boiled spinach, rice and mutton. He had been educated in a conservative madrassa and saw western-style education as a threat – though he reluctantly admitted the country needed doctors and engineers. Outside a handful of students lingered in the overgrown gardens. Today the scene is transformed.
But the two students are worried and Ahmed says that for the first time since coming back to Kabul from Iran in 2002 he is wondering if he will have to leave again. "If it gets worse then we will have to leave, go to neighbouring countries," he says. "I don't know. It's pretty depressing."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008...an?INTCMP=SRCH
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