What Does Life Mean to You? 02

Is it to be a positive impact on your surroundings or environment? Is it to be a help out there for people who need you? Is it to help your family in overcoming challenges? There are many more questions to ask when we embark on a self-discovery journey. Answers may vary from one person to another given the person's circumstances.

However, for me at this very moment, it is mainly to be effective to your surroundings, particularly to your family in overcoming their challenges. It could be easier to overcome family challenges if family members have positive and happy attitudes. Positive and happy attitude encourage one to address challenges effectively. Unfortunately, families are formed without any pre-family planning in Afghanistan. The majority of them, including mine, do not have basic family infrastructures such as housing, a sustainable source of income, and access to educational opportunities.

Lack of such foundational family needs has negative impacts on family members’ attitudes. It leads them to disappointment, worrisome and expectation development. As a result, you are not able to address their challenges. If you are not mentally strong, you may fail to have a positive impact on your surroundings, environment, and your family. At least, this seems to be the case in Afghanistan.

My Brothers

I have lost two of my brothers during different wars in Afghanistan. Meer Ata Khan was my oldest brother who was a senior high school student when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. He did not attend his graduation ceremony. Instead, joined Ahmad Shah Massoud, the leader of the freedom fighters of Afghanistan fighting the Soviet occupiers. He had served for a few years with a group of freedom warriors called Group-e-Mutahrek. Its English translation would be the commandoes. He got killed in a battle at the top of one of the tallest mountains in the Valley of Panjshir in an early morning. Meer Ata Khan Abdullah Ayoobi was my other brother years older than me. He had an MA in Arabic Literature and Religious Studies. Upon his return back to Afghanistan in the early 1990s, he started a volunteer job with one of the social organizations, "The Union of Afghanistan Journalists" as the Director of Foreign Relations. When the Taliban took over Kabul in the mid-90s, he ha...

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Poem of One's Life

The people in my country are always running They cannot sit; they are rushing and suffering They cannot LIVE—because they are trying to survive In Arabic “The Life of the world is like the rain/That waters the crops of the earth” (10:24) I was not even a year old, when my family ran A migration across mountains Marked desperation mounted In raids, bombs, and blockades And once, they got caught Caved, covered by an avalanche of rock Left to die But that wasn’t what my sister wanted My sister dug us out The people in my country do not have time to think They no longer hear the voice of rivers Or the smell of flowers in spring Because Afghanistan, they say, is the most dangerous place in the world I felt this violence when a bullet tore through me, on the front line fighting The Taliban I felt it as I watched the rain fall that night I watched it stream over Daud’s scarf; Daud, he was next to me I saw it in the tears of the man who rescued me But it hurt me most ...

Eisa Khan AYOOB Ayoobi

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