It seems as if the safest thing to do in the NWFP areas is smoke cigarettes while eating nitrated meats while staring at the sun in the presence of piranhas…with rabies.

Funny, I’ve heard New Yorkers make similar comments about Beantowners Thanks for the startling insight though! I mean, I didn’t know anything about the NWFP til you folks enlightened me; I’ve only been there, what, 7 or 8 times for several summers, and don’t have family there or anything (whom you presumably lumped in with the people you’re mocking). Surely spent quite some time there which is why you’re so knowledgeable, right?

Also really appreciate you making BS up about me! Never mind that I’m not a pre-med student, or even a student anymore, since I recently graduated with my Bachelor’s in physics/anthro and will be working for the NY firm I’ve interned with for 2.5 years as a temp until I join MSF. Just feel free to sit on your ass behind the safety of your computer in your Momma’s basement somewhere and make things up about me if it makes you feel better about your own shitty life. Haha, see, I can make up crap about you too, isn’t trolling fun?

Now, I’m not bad-mouthing Pashtun people

LOL you’re like a middle school girl who says “Um, no offense, BUT” right before a scathing comment. You can’t write a chunk of text insulting a group of people and follow it up with that, you’re not fooling me here.

I honestly regret sharing personal info on this site, I really wish I could delete it now. Hah I guess this is what you get when you combine internet anonymity + desi tendency to lecture the younger ones

Alina M: @”Concerned” – Contrary to what you may have learned listening to Limbaugh & Co, Pakistan is not a nation filled to the brim with machete-wielding terrorists waiting to kill foreigners. Actually my family is from the region you speak of with such disdain, and I’ve been there many times. I have traveled all over the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa region and most of the towns were quite peaceful, and the people often friendlier than in the US suburb I was raised in. I have been harassed far more by strangers in NYC than I ever was in Peshawar. So rest assured that my family won’t need “security” visiting our own relatives. Also, I’m not a med student, nor do I work for the Peace Corps (though I will work for another humanitarian organization in Pakistan this November) – it’s both funny and pathetic how you’re accosting me without even getting your facts straight.

Boston_Mahesh: I’m with Concerned here. NWFP/Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is a very dangerous place, even for non-Pashtun Pakistanis. My own Pakistani-American and Pakistani friends told me this. The Pashtuns there kidnap folks all the time there and hold them for ransom. They will hold a student like you, Alina, for $1,000,000, and when you tell them that you’re just a pre-med student, the kidnappers will say (as they stroke their beard): “But when we mail your family your fingertips, we’ll uncover assets that you never knew you had.” Moreover, one of my Pashtun friend’s uncle said that “Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is…umm…70% safe.” Finally, one of my friends here is a Fullbright Scholar. She lived in Peshawar/Quetta for a year back a few years ago. Her SUV had bullet holes in the back seat.

It seems as if the safest thing to do in the NWFP areas is smoke cigarettes while eating nitrated meats while staring at the sun in the presence of piranhas…with rabies.

Also, I’ve read that the homes in Afghanistan’s Pashtun heartland are typically built like fortified castles. Perhaps this is for the feudal/tribal lords and only in Afghanistan’s Pashtun region and not Pakistan’s?

Now, I’m not bad-mouthing Pashtun people. They’re extremely honorable – the guys that I know here anyways. Very big-hearted, sensitive, and kind. However, the bulk of the Pashtuns there are not so educated, and they tend to be like the Blood and Crips, but with less developed-world cheer. Some of my facebook friends from Quetta/Rawalpindi also warned against me to visiting that area.

TYPO. I meant “despite being shot in the chest”

This is one reason I knew that the photo shown around the world was fake; I read that some US Government official claimed that the photo was very gruesome, and that a bit of brain was exposed above the left temple near where he was shot; this level of detail wasn’t included in the fake photo.

What we dont want to see is for them to look at him as a strong courageous lion.

Possibly this is why they claimed (I guess no one knows) that he tried to shield himself using his youngest wife; that bit made him sound especially pathetic and cowardly.

It’s really hard to pretty up a bullet to the face. I have seen shards of Rajiv Gandhi being bombed pics. And while one feels sympathy, it does tend to put a weak victim like halo on the dead person. THat is just what the visual conveys to me.

It’s OK if some muslims feel sorrow. What we dont want to see is for them to look at him as a strong courageous lion.

Why do you think that, Praveen? Consider the picture of Jesus nailed to a cross. The Romans intended that to be a warning. But over time Jesus’s cause was considered just, and that very picture became a heroic image.

Of course, bin Laden is not equal to Jesus. But bin Laden conveyed a grievance that many others feel, and that grievance still needs to be addressed. So bin Laden’s final image could well become a symbol