Snow

It snowed in the city for the first time last night, though by this morning it had melted away. I don't like the cold or the rain, and apart from making the landscape beautiful I'm not that keen on snow either.... but knowing what life-giving properties it has in a country where the people rely on what they can grow to survive, I have come to respect and appreciate such weather. Though I'll never personally be happy to see the grey skies of a rainy day...

Apparently during the time the Taleban were in power it didn't rain or snow very much in Afghanistan and the people suffered greatly from the ensuing drought. But for the past five years it has begun to rain and snow again with more severity in each passing winter. This is an inversion of the Narnia allegory, of the struggle between good and evil - where the snow represented the power of evil. After the Taleban were gone, the rain and the snow coincidentally (or by some greater power, if you follow C.S.Lewis's allegory...?) returned to allow the planting of crops again. In 2005, in the fertile valley of Panjshir they were able to have two cycles of crops, which I was told was the first time in many years.