Afghanistan

Kandahar, like most of Afghanistan, is only seen from a limited perspective by the eyes of the world. It has been portrayed as the birthplace of the Taliban, where Mullah Omar prayed with Osama Bin Laden.

It was home to some of the fiercest battlegrounds of the Americans’ War on Terror, where U.S. and NATO forces patrolled villages for battle-hardened men with long beards and black turbans. It is one of the most conservative cities for Afghan women, who had the most to lose with a takeover.

But there’s another, often unseen side to Afghanistan’s second-largest city and its surrounding province. Set against both deserts and mountains, the area is a political and cultural hub for the country’s south extending back over a history of 2000 years. It is one of the most culturally significant cities of ethnic Pashtuns and the birthplace of kings to the entire country. 

On hot quiet evenings, people will line the streets, sipping chai and chatting over roadside picnics. With the Taliban leaders maintaining a strong cultural and spiritual control over the region, people live their everyday lives perhaps easier here than in the rest of the country; however, those who do not subscribe to the strict interpretations of Sunni Islam and Pashtunwali survive under constant, unnerving fear. Meanwhile, for the majority of local residents, not much has changed. They pray in the city’s ornate mosques; young children study in schools, both secular and Quranic, and citizens peruse chaotic bazaars.