From The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam ...

"The Moving Finger writes:

and, having writ, Moves on:

nor all thy Piety nor WitShall lure it back

to cancel half a Line,

Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it."

Origin of the word Afghan:
There are different theories about the origin of the word Afghan, its age, and its meaning. Some believe that "Afghan" is formed from "Apagân". The Pashtuns began using the term Afghan as a name for themselves from at least the Islamic period and onwards. According to several scholars, The word Afghan first appears in history in the Hudud-al-Alam in 982 AD.

Meaning and origin of the name "Afghanistan"
The last part of the name, -stān, is an Iranian suffix for "place", prominent in many languages of the region.The term "Afghanistan," meaning the "Land of Afghans," was mentioned by the sixteenth century Mughal Emperor Babur in his memoirs, referring to the territories south of Kabul that were inhabited by Pashtuns .Until the 19th century the name was only used for the traditional lands of the Pashtuns, while the kingdom as a whole was known as the Kingdom of Kabul, as mentioned by the British statesman and historian Mountstuart Elphinstone. Other parts of the country were at certain periods recognized as independent kingdoms, such as the Kingdom of Balkh in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

With the expansion and centralization of the country, Afghan authorities adopted and extended the name "Afghanistan" to the entire kingdom, after its English translation, "Afghanland", had already appeared in various treaties between British Raj and Qajarid Persia, referring to the lands that were subject to the Pashtun Barakzai Dynasty of Kabul. "Afghanistan" became the official name when the country was recognized by the world community in 1919, after regaining its full independence from the British, and was confirmed as such in the nation's 1923 constitution.

Some good movies to watch over the holidays...
. The Outlaw Josey Wales

. Breaker Morant

. Ben-Hur

· Lawrence of Arabia

· Dial M for Murder

· The Godfather

· The Good,The Bad and The Ugly

· Rocky

· Blade Runner

· Bravo Two Zero

· Star Wars

· It's a Wonderful Life

· Casablanca

· Cross of Iron

· Dr Zhivago

. Thunderheart

· The bridges at Toko-Ri

Things change very slowly in Afghanistan...

2000 years ago, the Persians (present day Iran) were fighting about water from the Helmand river in southern Afghanistan. In 1998, almost 100 000 Iranian troops were massed along the south west border of Afghanistan - the reason... they were arguing about water from the Helmand river!

Total area: 647,500 sq km
Population (2008 est.): 32,738,376

Capital city: Kabul, 2,206,300
Other large cities: Kandahar, 349,300; Mazar-i-Sharif, 246,900; Charikar, 202,600; Herat, 171,500

Languages: Dari Persian, Pashtu (both official), other Turkic and minor languages

Ethnicity: Pashtun 42%, Tajik 27%, Hazara 9%, Uzbek 9%, Aimak 4%, Turkmen 3%Baloch 2%, other 4%

Religion: Sunni Muslim 80%, Shi'a Muslim 19%, other 1%

Geography
Afghanistan, approximately the size of Texas, is bordered on the north by Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan, on the extreme northeast by China, on the east and south by Pakistan, and by Iran on the west. The country is split east to west by the Hindu Kush mountain range, rising in the east to heights of 24,000 ft (7,315 m). With the exception of the southwest, most of the country is covered by high snow-capped mountains and is traversed by deep valleys.

The following extract, "Good and Evil" is from The Prophet, by Kahlil Gibran


And one of the elders of the city said, "Speak to us of Good and Evil."
And he answered:
Of the good in you I can speak, but not of the evil.
For what is evil but good tortured by its own hunger and thirst?
Verily when good is hungry it seeks food even in dark caves, and when it thirsts, it drinks even of dead waters.
You are good when you are one with yourself.
Yet when you are not one with yourself you are not evil.
For a divided house is not a den of thieves; it is only a divided house.
And a ship without rudder may wander aimlessly among perilous isles yet sink not to the bottom.
You are good when you strive to give of yourself.
Yet you are not evil when you seek gain for yourself.
For when you strive for gain you are but a root that clings to the earth and sucks at her breast.
Surely the fruit cannot say to the root, "Be like me, ripe and full and ever giving of your abundance."
For to the fruit giving is a need, as receiving is a need to the root.
You are good when you are fully awake in your speech,
Yet you are not evil when you sleep while your tongue staggers without purpose.
And even stumbling speech may strengthen a weak tongue.
You are good when you walk to your goal firmly and with bold steps.
Yet you are not evil when you go thither limping.
Even those who limp go not backward.
But you who are strong and swift, see that you do not limp before the lame, deeming it kindness.
You are good in countless ways, and you are not evil when you are not good,
You are only loitering and sluggard.
Pity that the stags cannot teach swiftness to the turtles.
In your longing for your giant self lies your goodness: and that longing is in all of you.
But in some of you that longing is a torrent rushing with might to the sea, carrying the secrets of the hillsides and the songs of the forest.
And in others it is a flat stream that loses itself in angles and bends and lingers before it reaches the shore.
But let not him who longs much say to him who longs little, "Wherefore are you slow and halting?"
For the truly good ask not the naked, "Where is your garment?" nor the houseless, "What has befallen your house?"

It's better to be a tiger for a day than a sheep for a thousand years

"The Road Not Taken"
by Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

Sunset on Mount Aspiring , Mount Aspiring National Park, New Zealand

A friend who is far away is sometimes much nearer than one who is at hand. Is not the mountain far more awe-inspiring and more clearly visible to one passing through the valley than to those who inhabit the mountain?