As Afghanistan once again moves towards an historic election, we here at Reach And Teach are reminded of the incredible people we met while we were there in 2002 when we were part of an interfaith peace delegation organized by Global Exchange.

Much of who we are today was influenced by that trip and the year we spent speaking to people about the realities of war in the aftermath.

The web site that used to host much of the content we'd posted about that trip has long since changed, so we've decided to bring some of that content to our Reach And Teach site. Today, we share poetry Derrick Kikuchi wrote during the trip along with photographs from 2002. 

The Play

The poor want to be rich,
The rich don't want to be poor.
Do we really want the system to change?
Or only arguing over who should play which part.

Chicken Street

What an interesting name…
Street urchins surround us
Some girls but mostly boys
Angelic faces and voices pleading for "Just one dollar"
This has become a way of life for them
No school, no way out.
This is big business
And they are their families' bread-winners.
Me, I'm a big spender
Forty dollars fills both my pockets
Bulging with Afghani money.
20,000 Afghanis can buy
A bottle of water.
Big spender indeed!

Always With Us

"There will always be people in need," the Torah says,
"So care for the poor"
But Jesus said, "The poor will always be with us but I will not."
Is it our mission to care for the needy
Or rather to care about an individual in need?
If I see a limbless old man as needy,
I might never recognize him if we were to meet again
In heaven.

Finger Pointing

Maybe it was a mine made in the United States,
Or maybe in Iran,
Or the United Kingdom,
Or Italy,
Or Russia…
It's easy to point fingers
That is, if you still have fingers to point with. 

Making a Difference

What is a drop of water in a sea of despair?
One drop of food coloring in a bucket of water can change much…
A drop of blue can bring the coolness of reason
A drop of red can bring the fire of passion
A drop of green can bring serenity and peace
But too many drops of too many colors can change the water
To murky black.

Faith

The boy has more faith in America than God.
His religious leaders after all
Went to Mecca and failed.
I don't want to be his god,
One God is more than enough.
His religious leaders were right
But perhaps they may need to try again.

Simple Logic

You broke it, shouldn't you fix it?
The logic works
For a window broken by a stray baseball
Or a boy's body broken by a stray bomb.

There is a difference with the boy…
Shouldn't we want to help
Whether or not it was our fault?

Narisula

The boy's name was Nasrulah (we called him Narisula) and he had been badly maimed by a cluster bomblet that his cousin had found on the ground. Thinking it was a food packet (same color as those we had dropped), his cousin picked it up and it started to smoke. He tried to throw it down and it landed by Narisula who suffered horrible injuries.

When we met him in the rubble of his home one of the things he told us was that when he grew up he wanted to be President of Afghanistan. He said he would pave the streets with gold and make sure everyone had enough food and medicine. As Afghanistan heads into this election, we know the rubble remains, the Taliban is back, and Narisula's dream of food and medicine for all are still a long way off. We pray for peaceful elections and for the Afghan people to begin, finally, to rebuild with our help, the help we promised back in 2002, and haven't yet delivered.