Resume “Selimut Debu”

Selimut Debu is s a book written by Agustinus Wibowo published in 2010.

Story:
• This book discusses about author’s travel story while exploring the country of war,
Afghanistan. In 2006 the author visited Afghanistan and he decided to stay in Kabul as a
journalist and photographer for 2 years. He also done deeper exploration in the country by visited
various cities in Afghanistan, like Kabul, Bamiyan, Kahandar and coridor Wakhan
• I read this book because I was interested with the cover that written "In here,everything is
expensive, only human soul is cheap. "
During the mujahiddin war, there were some questions in children's math books, like: if I killed
three Russians and you killed 2 Russians, how many Russian did we kill?
• From this book I know some cultures and problems that developed in Afghan society
1. Ganja or opium is very popular. In Afghanistan, ganja, marijuana or opiumcigarettes is just
like clove cigarettes “rokok kretek” in Indonesia
2. The Taliban deeply confined society with their extreme regulation. Men who have not
beardconsidered as infidels “kafir”, women must cover their bodies with burqas and can not
wandering around without their mahram, there is old word that said the place for women only
two, houses and burial, women cannot go to school, taliban even prohibit tv , table and chairs. In
here, men and women always separated, on the bus, in the restaurant, even in the marriage court
male guests and female guests are separated in different rooms.
3. Kabul, which is the capital of Afghanistanhas two sides.
Those people who roar and walk down in the road for a penny, the other side is a number of
people that got a lot of money and VVIP facilities but still unhappy. There is a severe gap
between the middle to upper class population which is dominated by foreigners who work in
Kabul as volunteers, embassies, or United Nations’s employees and on the other hand there are
victims war who must survive in the poverty. Kabul, where a few important people are paid
thousands of dollars and they choose to blind with their surrounding, they don’t care or maybe
don’t knowabout millions of hungry people in the rubble of the ruins of war.
4. Bomb explosions in Afghanistan are common news, as long as the victim is not from their
family, people expression when know about bomb explosions news is the same level as us in
Indonesia if you hear there are chicken thieves “maling ayam”
5. In Afghanistan there are several ethnic groups, such as Pashtuns, Tajiks and Hazaras. Unlike
Pashtun and Tajiks which are physically indistinguishable, Hazaras really resemble with
Mongolians or Chinese. Hazara adhere to Syiah while tajik and pastors adhere to Sunni. Due to
physical differences and the religion, there was racism between pashtun, tajik with hazara.
Pashtuns and tajik often look down on hazara people.
6. Afghanistan is one of the countries with the largest yield of opium in the world. The
international world is trying to reduce the production of Afghanistan opium, but poor farmers
must survive with opium which is more profitable than wheat.
7. Many homosex cases. Even the author almost experienced same-sex abuse.
There are still too many problems developing in Afghanistan, but behind the problems of this
war country, afghan still maintains friendly culture , the author was very fascinated by the
attitude of Afgan people, despite their living is shortcomings, they still try to glorify author as a
guest or traveler. Because for afghans, serve guests is an honor. That's where he felt living with
the Afghan people in the ruins of war.