Walk through the bazaars in Kabul or Mazar-e Sharif and you'll see why, for more than two millennia, people have been calling Afghanistan the crossroads of Asia. One face looks Mediterranean, another Arab - or Indian, or Chinese, or eastern European. Eyes range from pea green to chestnut brown to something approaching orange. Successive invasions and influences wove a tapestry of ethnicities and left behind what the exhibition curator, Fredrik Hiebert of the National Geographic Society, calls "some of the most remarkable archaeological finds in all of Central Asia."
The recent story of Afghanistan is revealed looking at the girl's eyes. Land mines, a resurgent Taliban, suicide bombs, the searing memory of war - the obstacles bedeviling Afghans as they try to put their country back together are daunting. The biggest thing that's broken in Afghanistan isn't the buildings, or the roads, or even the electrical system. It's the broken psychology. "Twenty-five years of war is hell. Not only were tons of artifacts stolen, so was the Afghans' history, their heritage. Afghan children no longer know Afghan folk songs. How can they get their pride back?"
Mike - the MBA blogger
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