We Really Need More of These Guys

Yesterday an insurgent suicide bomber was heading out to find his target when he stopped to say goodbye to his buddies and accidentally detonated his vest. He killed himself along with six other insurgents.

CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL STORY

Now I know there's no way this guy will be getting his 72 smokin-hot virgins, but I wonder if Allah is willing to prorate him. I mean, instead of 72 hot ones will he at least get half a dozen homely ones for trying? I'm trying to push the idea of having ISAF send his family a thank you note, a posthumous medal, or a cash bonus, but I don't think the idea will go very far.

Happy New Year

Saturday marked the first day of the Persian New Year, known locally as "Nowruz." Under the Taliban regime, the traditional celebrations (which included such sinful acts as singing, dancing, and *gasp* kite running) were banned as being against the Quran. It's hard to imagine a civilization that would ban a New Year's celebration, but then again I come from the land of MTV Spring Break and Girls Gone Wild.

Now that we're here the locals get to party like it's 1388. That's the current year according to their calendar anyway. It puts this society only 621 years behind the rest of the world, so it's probably about right.

Predictably, the Taliban had a blast:

CLICK HERE TO READ ABOUT TODAY'S INSURGENT BOMBINGS

OR HERE

OR HERE

All the while I've been here I've been trying to come up with any way that I can think of to make life better for the people here.

I'm still at a loss.

VBIED Attack in Khowst

In a brief this morning they showed us this video. It shows a truck loaded with explosives* as it approaches a security checkpoint outside of a government center in the Khowst province (in eastern Afghanistan) then detonates prematurely.


The government center was largely undamaged, but the same cannot be said for the crowd of elementary school students you see walking along the right side of the road in the video. Based on the last report I read, 14 of those kids were killed instantly in the blast and dozens more were seriously injured.

If you want to read a story about it. CLICK HERE. For some reason, the video isn't getting a lot of circulation. I think it's the sort of story the world needs to be more aware of.

In other news, it snowed for a bit in Kabul today (finally) and there was an earthquake in the Badahkshan province (the northeast end of Afghanistan) that registered at 5.8 on the Richter scale.
More to come. Stay tuned.

*a Vehicle-Borne Improvised Explosive Device (VBIED) in current military language.