Afghans ask ”Where is humanity in Obama’s 83 billion+ American war??”?
April 14, 2009 by
Filed under Journey Updates
Afghan youth ask questions about Obama’s wish for US$83 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Afghans ask ”Where is humanity in Obama’s 83 billion+ American war??”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WyHjugYBoDU&feature=channel_page
The youth were filmed as they volunteered to plant trees at Bamiyan Peace Park, Bamiyan, Afghanistan.
Below is a text of their questions.
My name is Najib. People in Bamiyan call me Najib Ekhloqi.
I am a citizen of Afghanistan.
You see that we have come here to start work at this place named Bamiyan Peace Park.
This park is located at a place near the historical City of Gholghola ( ‘Dying Screams’ conquered by Genghis Khan )….
and at its north-east lie the Bamiyan Buddha statues ( destroyed by the Taliban )
We have come to build this Peace Park, peace for humanity.
Today, having come to the Peace Park, we’d like to ask, as the youth of Afghanistan,
Why peace? Peace for who?
When they are deciding in the American congress on 83 billion dollars for the war in Afghanistan
We have some questions..
Can anyone answer us?
Where is humanity in this 83 billion+ American war??
Where is compassion and kindness in this 83 billion+ American war?
Where is peace in this 83 billion+ American war?
Where are Iraqi, Afghan and American mothers in this 83 billion+ American war?
Where is human dignity in this 83 billion+ American war?
Where is progress in civilization in this 83 billion+ American war?
Where are those who struggle against violence, like Martin Luther King, in this 83 billion + ?American war??
Where are all the world’s religious leaders and intellectuals in this 83 billion+ American war?
My father was killed by war…Where is peace in this 83 billion+ American war?
?
Letter of Humanity’s Love from Afghan Youth to the UN Hague Conference 31/03/2009
March 30, 2009 by
Filed under Journey Updates
The Afghan youth’s dream of a kinder humanity
As it has been in the hesitant development of human civilization and history, the hearts of ordinary human beings may be ignored once again.
How long more?
How long more will Man accuse Man of being ‘evil’?
How long more will Man look at War and call it ‘good’?
How long more will Man pretend to uphold ideals he is un-true to?
How long more will we think ourselves to be ‘better’ humans?
How long more will humanity quench her conscience in defending eye-for-an-eye , power-hungry, and money-driven killing industries, while untenably holding on to her inhumane disguises of democracy and religion?
How long more will we justify self-importance and greed while marginalizing the ‘forgotten’ individuals just ‘off the map’?
How long more would we chase Names and Forms, knowing intuitively their impotence in addressing the disparity of justice within our own souls and walls?
How long more would we dictate every decision based on the gain of Money when we are losing the more noble and dignified responsibilities to the wider community and humanity?
How long more would we deceive ourselves by dreaming of peace while harboring hate and killing our ‘enemies’ while claiming love for them?
We, the youth of Afghanistan, having lived through some of the worst scenarios of the human condition, refuse to believe that humanity’s love, once given voice and shape, however minuscule and wherever practiced, cannot add dignity and magnanimity to Mankind.
So, we express humanity’s love today, not a love we own, but a love that causes humanity to smile, sing and dream, even in the darkest moments.
We express humanity’s love when we ask forgiveness on behalf of generations past and present, for the wrong we have done. We express humanity’s love by clearly saying that we forgive you too, whoever you may be, for the inadvertent or deliberate mistakes which you have made because of us and for your indifference to Mankind’s lives and Mankind’s deaths.
We express humanity’s love when we ask to be held accountable to treat all men and women alike and when we ask to be treated as humans, as you would treat yourselves.
We express humanity’s love when we grieve over every act of violence on any infant, child, youth or adult of any race, because we believe that God created all and that belief is powerful only when it leads us to grieve. In death, there is no distinction of civilian or military, intention or faith.
We express humanity’s love when, though you think it natural for us to hate or to be bitter, we choose kindness to the best of our hearts and take firm hold of the freedom which compassion gives us.
We express humanity’s love by thanking every individual who has worked to raise the possibility of peace. We know there are many who seek peace and believe that these make the majority and are deeply grateful to their labour of love and truth. Yak jahan tashakur!A w orld of thanks!
We express humanity’s love when we ask Man for creativity and courage to learn from history’s errors and to rise above the mundane and expected solutions to humanity’s problems today.
It may seem strange and insignificant that we, the youth of Afghanistan, have these thoughts and feelings.
But then you shouldn’t be too surprised; you have them too. Any human being does.
We wish to show you, in a flash of un-remembered history, that a humane love IS possible.
We wish for humanity to relate humanely though we cannot expect or demand it.
And even if you insist on thinking badly of us and wish to hurt us still, we will hold our smiles with confidence and hope that PEACE is the peacemaker’s eventual destiny, even if it were just a well-intentioned tale.
Stop. Please stop.
Listen. Please listen.
And journeying along with us, stand firm in a love that captures empathy, sorrow and joy with equal resolve and strength.
We are no longer willing for any one of you, any of us or any one of humanity to perish at Man’s hand, at our own hands.
We are no longer willing for ourselves or our elders to forget what Man could be and to remain self-absorbed in primitive motivations.
Because that hand which kills is shriveled and feeble and needs an artistic and thoughtful transformation into a hand of friendship.
We choose to smile at every child and person.
We choose to act with compassion.
We choose to deny the rough, proud, violent and resentful suggestions that haunt our corners and weaknesses.
For we all die and wish that when our time comes to leave our families and our world, we can witness a gentler world of civilities, of brotherhood, of friendship, of joy, of love and all those tender virtues lauded by the sages of our time, the valued men and women who would put themselves and their self-interests aside to imagine another universe.
A world not of the fables, but a world that is present, real and free.
To borrow the life of John Donne, ‘any Man’s death diminishes me because I am involved in Mankind, And therefore never send to know, for whom we smile…….we smile for Thee.’
Our Journey to Smile
http://ourjourneytosmile.com/blog/
Letter to Obama and Khamenei from Afghan youth
March 27, 2009 by
Filed under Journey Updates
A youthful Afghan dream?
Obama and Khamenei overtures
Al Jazeera 21/3/2009 and 23/3/2009
In his video appeal to Iran on the 21st Of March 2009, Obama said: “This process will not be advanced by threats. We seek instead engagement that is honest and grounded in mutual respect.”
The press adviser to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president, urged Obama to back his words with concrete action to repair what he called past mistakes.
“They chant the slogan of change but no change is seen in practice. We haven’t seen any change,” Khamenei said.
Dear Obama and Khamenei,
We address both of you respectfully as humans, fellow human beings who will, like all of us in Afghanistan, die with dignity some day.
We request forgiveness as the way forward, hoping that whatever the words we use, our trembling actions will be courageous in love; we request of the quiet and concrete peace and vision that both you, Obama and Khamenei, and the rest of humanity, have been expressing since our hearts and imaginations have allowed us to.
We must no longer live meagerly in fear of the human instincts to claim right-ness and revenge. All of civilization now recognizes the value of our shared frailties and the dream of a kinder humanity.
This dream has no borders and as we retire for another night, hopefully to a brighter day, we will pray in both Persian and English that our children and youth would not be confined to or disappointed by your and our limitations.
This is Our Journey to Smile.
With sincerity,
Our Journey to Smile
http://ourjourneytosmile.com/blog/
Aren’t Afghans Humans too?
March 26, 2009 by
Filed under Journey Updates
We are humans
We are proud to be Afghans
Freedom is a basic foundation of every human being and of all individuals
We ask for the right to live decently, freely.
We wish for peace, freedom, humanity.
Aren’t we humans?
Aren’t Afghans humans?
Aren’t we humans too?
Afghan Youth’s Request to UN on behalf of humanity
March 12, 2009 by
Filed under Journey Updates
Dear Friends of Humanity and Friends of the United Nations,
Man has gone to the Moon but mankind has lost faith in mankind.
For both these reasons and to encourage the world that humanity has retained dignity, we, the youth of Afghanistan, ask for an opportunity to deliver a message of humanity’s love and wishes to the UN Conference on Afghanistan to be held on the 31st of March 2009 in the Netherlands.
We make this bold request because this Conference is about us, the future of Afghanistan and the dream of a kinder humanity.
This is Our Journey to Smile.
Thanks sincerely,
Dr Hakim ( international medical doctor living and working in Bamiyan )
On behalf of the ordinary youth of Afghanistan
On behalf of the ordinary international aid worker
On behalf of ordinary humanity
‘Bad soldiers’ OR ‘humane humans’??
March 7, 2009 by
Filed under Journey Updates
Conscientious Objector Aidan Delgado a ‘bad soldier’?
The soldiers who can no longer fight
BBC 05/03/2009
Hundreds of US armed forces personnel have applied for conscientious objector status since the attacks on the World Trade Center in 2001 – and military rights’ campaigners say the number is growing.
How long more will America and the world be ‘un-democratic’?, ‘un-Christian’ and ‘un-Islamic’ with regards to war and peace??
March 7, 2009 by
Filed under Journey Updates
How long more will America and the world be ‘un-democratic’, ‘un-Christian’ and ‘un-Islamic’ with regards to war and peace?
How long more?
How long more will humanity quench her conscience in defending an eye-for-an-eye , power-hungry, and money-driven killing industries, while untenably holding on to her inhumane disguises of democracy and religion?
Putting Afghan arms down?
Al Jazeera 28/2/2009
Negotiations are under way between Taliban-linked mediators, Western officials and the Afghan government.
Patricia Degennaro, a professor at the Centre for Global Affairs at New York University, told Al Jazeera the talks were a central part of attempts to end the conflict.
“It’s long overdue that there is some kind of jirga, or regional council in Afghanistan, where some of these parties who have had grievances over the years are brought together.
“They need to start talking to each other and move forward so people can start putting their arms down.”
Putting American arms down?
From Al Jazeera 28/2/2009 and Obama’s address to Congress
“For too long our budget has not held true about how our tax dollars are spent,” Obama said.”Large sums held off the budget, including the true cost of Iraq and Afghanistan.
“For seven years, we have been a nation at war. No longer will we hide its price. “
“We are now carefully reviewing our policies in both wars, and I will soon announce a way forward in Iraq that leaves Iraq to its people and responsibly ends this war.
And with our friends and allies, we will forge a new and comprehensive strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan to defeat al Qaeda and combat extremism. Because I will not allow terrorists to plot against the American people from safe havens half a world away.”
“The military industrial complex has become embedded in American life,” said John Pike, a US defence expert. “It seems normal and there aren’t strong voices, countervailing constituencies arguing against it.”
Moustaffa from Afghanistan commented on this in Al Jazeera , “The problem with America and it’s like’s never learn from the lesson’s of history. What did America learn from the unjust war it waged in Vietnam? It cost them billion’s of dollar’s and in the end left humiliated. Now they thought would be diffirent because were more powerfull and sophisticated, so they waged an unjust war in Iraq and Afghanistan. So now once again , they are spending trilions and they are achieving nothing except defeat and humiliation.”
US democratic in resisting Karzai poll date call?
BBC 1/3/2009
The US has reiterated it prefers an August date for presidential elections in Afghanistan, despite President Hamid Karzai’s call for polls on 21 April 09.
Letter to Palestinian Dr Izzeldeen from Afghan youth
February 24, 2009 by
Filed under Journey Updates
Letter to Palestinian Dr Izzeldeen from Afghan youth
Dr Izzeldeen
Dr Izzeldeen lost 3 daughters and a niece in the Gaza conflict. He says that he still believes in peace. He said that his family was only armed with love and education.
Afghan youth in Bamiyan and all in Our Journey to Smile humbly wish to put the SMILE back on Dr Izzeldeen’s face.
Dear Dr Izzeldeen,
We, the youth of Bamiyan Afghanistan, grieve with you.
We know from personal firsthand experiences that grief is permanent and inconsolable.
As difficult as this grief is Mankind’s disappointment in the obstinate, undignified in-humanity of the few fellow human beings who would kill LOVE, again and again.
War and violence kills LOVE, again and again.
Raziq and Abdul
15-year-old Raziq and 12-year-old Abdul would like to specially comfort you using a poignant Afghan phrase, “Our ‘liver is bleeding’ with you (we are intensely sad with you).”
Ba-AmAn KhudA (wishing you the peace and protection of God),
Our Journey to Smile
ourjourneytosmile.com