DEC-A-6
BY SMALL TURNS DOES FATE TWIST ME
BACK INTO UNUSUAL CORNERS
OF THE WORLD, HOOKING UP COINCIDENCES FROM PAST
FAVORS—SUCH AS A SUITCASE OF MARY KAY COSMETICS—
AND AN EXHILARATING, AND ALMOST FINAL,
TRANSIT THROUGH THE KHYBER PASS—
TO A POTENTIAL NEW ERA HUMANITARIAN MISSION TO—
WOULD YOU BELIEVE?—AFGHANISTAN!
Hi Dr. Glenn,
Here is a story of a man who is going to rule Afghanistan and some one I knew well. I had forgotten his name till I read this recent print in Indian express. Maybe, we should go to Afghanistan next year if the situation improves. It is so unbelievable that Shimla has been such a great city which takes me back there again and again.
Ravi
Hello gLENN w. gEELHOED,<br> Glenn W. Geelhoed <a href="mailto:msdgwg@gwumc.edu">msdgwg@gwumc.edu</a> spent some time at our website and has sent you this story link<BR>------------------------------------------------------------ <br>Message: How the world turns!<br><a href="http://www.indian-express.com/ie20011206/top2.html">http://www.indian-express.com/ie20011206/top2.html</a> <br>============================================================<br>Visit us at <a href="http://www.expressindia.com">http://www.expressindia.com</a> <br>© 2001: Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd. All rights reserved throughout the world.
Yes, I got the attachment, and read it with interest.
Yes, I am ready to go to Afghanistan, as soon as it can be arranged, since I, too, have had a longstanding interest in the area.
I once transited the Khyber Pass, in 1995, and also had a medical student advisee, now in Massachusetts, whose older brother was the Minister of Justice of a prior regime in Afghanistan. I delivered to him messages and a large pack--of all things--of Mary Kay cosmetics, for their mother! I visited with him in exile in Peshawar in the NWFP of Pakistan in 1995 (see attached). I have extracted the part about Elam Safi's brother, and pasted it below, since it may be that he would serve an important role in the new Afgahanistan, and we may want to keep in touch with him.
I thought you might also be interested in the other parts of the story, and my acquaintance with the Indus River in the Sindh Province. I had made (0f course) an extensive photo collection of where the Swat and Indus join (Buddhist and Hindu Temples bult side by side by the Moslem Moghuls to cobble together the "Urdu" along its banks. I also watched the Indus where it joins the other rivers just inside the border line drawn (at midnight fifty years ago) which makes it Pakistani above the great Tarh desert. I had completed some parts of my acquaintance with this oldest cradle of agronomy civilization by rafting down it near Lei on the day before departure from Ladakh.
I would be interested in working this potential visti to Afghanistan out, since it would open a new chapter for HHE--say when!
GWG
I had brought a package from Elam Safi whose struggle through college and medical school had brought him to graduation this month. For his senior elective period I had arranged that he return on an international elective to Afghanistan where he had not been since age sixteen when he had last seen his mother. He had asked that I carry a package back for his family, and I had done so, stopped at several customs agents, in Kuwait and in Cairo, who wanted to search the contents. Of all things, the contents consisted of a large box of Mary Kay cosmetics! I may be one of the first people in history to bring a form of white powder into Peshawar! I was relieved to have turned over this package to Elam Safi's brother, who then wished me well and hoped for a reunion some day when we could all meet in Afghanistan if there should be a shift in the political climate.
>>> Himalayan Health Exchange <info@himalayanhealth.com> 12/05/01 09:12PM >>>
I just forwarded you an story of the future Afghan leader and my knowing him.
Let me know if get the attachment.
Ravi