Today is Friday, the Sabbath. We begin our day in the northern part of Kabul, where the sun is up, the dust is down, and it is warming up. As we travel north, up through the Shomali Plain, we witness additional evidence of decades of war - first, the Russians invaded along this route, so both the mujahedeen and Russians laid anti-personnel and anti-tank mines that remain today; then, the Taliban burned the remaining vineyards and orchards and forcibly resettled those who had remained in the area, due to their sympathies with the Northern Alliance. We pass many large graveyards in which the green flags of those who died as martyrs are prominently flown. It is like a different world from Kabul. There are green fields of grass and rice. Almond, apricot, and cherry trees are
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