Every Day Is Special: August 19 - 100th Independence Day in Afghanistan

August 19 - 100th Independence Day in Afghanistan

Posted on August 19, 2019

A declaration of independence doesn't always mean independence. Just ask all the "nations" that aren't recognized as separate nations. Not yet, at least.

Independence from one's colonizer doesn't always mean freedom and liberty and justice for all. The United States has been an independent nation for more than 200 years, and yet it famously has more prisoners per capita than any other nation on Earth (way too many of them imprisoned for things that most of us think shouldn't even be a crime), and the U.S. really struggles with the whole "justice for all" thing.

And a constitution that outlines a democratic republic doesn't guarantee democracy. An "end" to war doesn't always mean peace. The world is super complex and often messy.

Things have been REALLY messy for Afghanistan. Like people everywhere else, Afghans would like to live pleasant lives full of love and health and friends and family. But the location of it - along the so-called Silk Road, connecting the cultures of the Middle East and Europe to the rest of Asia - meant that Afghanistan wasn't just home to many different peoples and a sort of crossroads for many different languages and cultures, it was also a target for many military campaigns over the centuries and millennia.

Afghanistan has been called "unconquerable" and "the graveyard of empires" - and yet it HAS been conquered, taken over, and occupied by many different forces. Also, Afghan armies have invaded and conquered regions that we don't consider part of Afghanistan today.

Independence Day harkens back to the 19th of August in 1919, when Afghanistan won its independence from Britain. So today is actually the nation's Centennial!

But being independent hasn't been at all easy. What with the struggle between governmental rulers and religious leaders, between the people who wanted to modernize and those who wanted to hold onto strict religious laws - plus all the competing foreign interests! - all of that mess caused a lot more mess. Civil wars, proxy wars, coups, take-overs by Soviet forces and, later, by the Taliban. After terrorists who'd been sheltered by the Taliban attacked the U.S. on 9/11/2001, a NATO-led coalition forced the Taliban out, and a democratic government structure was formed - but all these years later, the Taliban has come back and controls a lot of the nation.

Did you know...?

An Afghani statue of Buddha.
The two tallest standing statues
of Buddha were both located in
Afghanistan. After existing for
about 1,700 years, they were
destroyed by the Taliban.

Long before Arab Muslims brought the religion of Islam to Afghanistan, Zoroastrianism likely originated there; at some later point, Hinduism became a force in some regions; later still there was a flourishing Buddhist culture throughout the area. However, from the 7th Century to the 11th Century, Islam swept through Afghanistan. Now about 99.7% of the Afghan people are Muslim.

Some consider Afghanistan's national sport, goat grabbing, to be the wildest game in the world. Riders on horseback compete to catch a goat body and ride ahead of all the others to drop it into a marked circle.

I always thought that the demonym - the name for the people of this country - was Afghanis, but that's the name for the currency (money) of the nation. The people are called Afghans.

When I was growing up, I heard many, many woolen blankets and shawls called "afghans." So-and-so's grandma made this afghan. Isn't this crocheted afghan so cute? My mom makes afghans like they're going out of style!

(Guess what? They ARE going out of style!)

Afghanistan used to border on British India. But when India was carved into a (basically) Hindu section and two (basically) Muslim sections - and the latter became Bangladesh and Pakistan - Afghanistan's border with India became a border with Pakistan. There is just a little smidge of an Afghan-Chinese border.