From Afghanistan

For the past few days I have been pondering the best way I can express to those who read my journals the extreme challenges faced by the children of Afghanistan. Every moment I sit down to type, I find myself at a loss for words – overcome with sadness for their situation. The faces of these children haunt me. I think of my own four children – safe at home with all the creature comforts we Americans often take for granted. The children here live under such incredibly impoverished conditions. Words cannot do justice to what I witness. How can I adequately express to you how incredibly heartbreaking their situation is? And trust me when I say that “at a loss for words” is an expression very infrequently associated with me.

The hardest part of our job here is to see the people and their poverty level and know we are going back to a world that they couldn’t even fathom. It is sort of like forcing a city resident to go camping against their will. After you get them to the wilderness, they at least know for a few days they are going to have to deal with little heat, no warm water, little food and the knowledge that they are going to get dirty. Yet they have the comfortable reassurance that they’ll be going back home in a few days where the cupboards are full, the house is warm and a shower is waiting. Now take away the security of going home and you’re here, living the average Afghan’s life.

I am a firm believer in helping the poor in America before helping others. If we can’t fight hunger and homelessness in America, how can we make a difference in the world to help people in a similar situation? But in America, the reality is that if you were to see a child half naked and emaciated in the middle of your street, you would take that child in and care for it, even if that care was to have Children’s Services come and take over the care of the child. In Afghanistan there is no such thing as Children’s Services. So when an Afghan passes a child in the street that is standing in the snow half naked and starving, they walk by. Not because they don’t care, but because they can’t help themselves let alone another person.

As a father of four wonderful children, I worry constantly about them and their health. I can honestly say I would die for each of them if I had to secure their safety. Just as every parent will tell you, the moment their child is born there is a wave of emotions, a mixture of elation and fear combined. Yet, when a child is born in Afghanistan, the parents resolve themselves to knowing that there is a one in five chance that their baby will die, either from poor health or starvation.

We were recently doing a mission and I was on security when a young boy the age of ten passed with a burlap sack as a jacket and clothes that were three sizes too small. He stopped and looked at us with awe since we were wearing numerous layers of clothing. He started to rub his hands and in a weak voice begged “destkash luftan” over and over. I looked at my interpreter for assistance with the language and he explained that the boy was begging for gloves. He was saying, “gloves please.” He wouldn’t move from standing in front of our vehicle, he wouldn’t leave until one of us acknowledged him and he wouldn’t stop saying “destkash luftan.” I couldn’t look away for if I did I knew my heart would break and tears would flow from the pain of knowing that this boy was going to continue to suffer because I couldn’t give him my gloves. I actually started to berate myself for being so stupid as to not bring my extra pair of gloves for this child.

I would be lying to you if I told you that with time it gets easier to look in the faces of these children, but it doesn’t. Every time a little girl is crying sobbing the words, “man khonak khodan,” my heart sinks because I know those words mean, “I am cold.” If you listen long enough, you start to understand that the children are just trying to survive. They don’t care about politics or war; their concerns are to survive another day.

On a mission up in the mountains we pass a small village and during one of our security halts a group of young children come up to the vehicle for candy - knowing that we hand it out when we stop near their town. The little girls have to stand behind the boys because they are substandard in their culture. To further illustrate this point if you look at their feet you will notice the boys have shoes while the girls are barefoot in the snow. One little girl whose image lingers in my mind has at least six frost-bitten toes. Some of the girls have no jackets, just summer-weather clothes. A three year old passes me wearing nothing but a t-shirt as she walks around the village in below freezing weather. So with over eighty pounds of gear on, I take a knee in the snowy mud and look every child in the eyes, face to face. I call the kids closer and personally hand the candy out instead of throwing it on the ground. Because as I place the candy in each small hand, I want to let each one of them know that I see them and they are real to me and not just a pawn in a political war or second class citizens.

Just as we are leaving, a little girl comes up running behind the vehicle crying, “komakam han, cheva komakam namikani,” which an hour later the interpreter tells me it means “Help me, why don’t you help me?” Try having that image burnt into your brain. I ask the interpreter why he didn’t tell me earlier what she was saying and he states that the villagers believe with all their hearts that Americans can fix anything and have all the money in the world. He further explains that we also had a mission to complete and wouldn’t have made our time checks if we had stopped to help. So I swore in my heart that someway I will get back to that village and do what I can for them. I explain to the interpreter that he will interpret every word from this point forward because it is not that I believe I can save the whole country, but every person I do help is one less for the next guy.

The children are seen only a step above the donkeys and dogs in the way they are treated. Once the child turns three they can beg for food. Once they turn five they are put in charge of the livestock, keeping them in the fields. Once they turn 10, if they can reach a pedal to a vehicle they drive. Since there is no Department of Motor Vehicles down here, they don’t have any standards so a child could very well be the driver of the vehicle next to you. We were recently doing a Traffic Control Point. When the driver approaches to be checked, we routinely ask them to turn off the vehicle for safety reasons. One truck driver starts shaking his head no and pointing to the engine - immediately we go into car bomb mode and everyone takes a safe distance. Finally when everyone is cleared, the interpreter explains that the truck driver can’t turn off the engine because it’s broken and to turn it off the person in the engine has to turn the switch. Yes, I know what you’re thinking because we are all thinking the same thing. So slowly we open the hood of the engine - weapons pointed inward for any possible trick only to find a small boy no older than five sitting in the engine compartment. The little boy’s job is to change gears, and turn off the engine. After the initial relief that there is not a bomb, and then a quick chuckle to see such a sight – horror finally creeps over us as we realize that this is this child’s life. He is going to inhale all these fumes and if he is too slow in changing gears probably going to die in a vehicle collision. The worst part is that while we can say something to the driver and force him to take the child out of the engine compartment, in reality a few miles down the road he would stop and put the child back in.

There are no child labor laws, so you will see children carrying large bundles of wood or bundles of rice for over eight hours a day. Ironically, back at home your child complains if you ask them to pick up after themselves. School is also a luxury out here so if the family needs their children to work then they work first before they go to school. Don’t get me wrong, every now and then you’ll see kids being kids - they will play tag, they will kick a ball between each other and you’ll even see them playing with the animals. These moments are rare and far in between, so every smile I see I memorize it for it’s in those smiles that I see a brighter future. It is in those smiles that I see hope. It is in those smiles that I see my child and feel everything a person can feel for their child, awe and fear wrapped together.

It is my hope that you too can think of the children in your life that you love – your daughters, sons, nieces, nephews, cousins, friends…That you can imagine what you wish for them and in some small way – want that for the children I see each day. I have asked my wife for her help in making a difference here somehow. Her immediate response was of course to send them home to her to care for. I’m requesting a much smaller level of commitment from you. On my behalf my wife, Randi, has started a collection of items to distribute amongst the children here - school supplies, toys, children’s shoes/boots, gloves/mittens – the things that we make sure our own children have and often take for granted. There is more information regarding this collection elsewhere on this site.

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