Afghanistan

If you’ve ever heard someone say they speak “Persian” and wondered whether that’s the same as Dari or Farsi, you’re not alone. The relationship between these languages confuses a lot of people — even those who speak one of them. The short answer is: they all belong to the same Persian language family. The longer answer is worth understanding.

Few pieces of Afghan dress have travelled as far as the karakul. It has sat on the heads of rulers and presidents in front of international cameras, and on the heads of men in market stalls who have never thought twice about it.

Attendance tracked by biometrics. Parents notified by SMS when a child is late. Fees recorded in a financial system. Teachers no longer filling out paper reports for the Ministry of Education by hand. This is how a growing number of Afghan schools now run their administration.

Afghan winters range from cold to severe. In Kabul the temperature regularly drops below freezing. In the northeast — Badakhshan and the high mountain valleys — it can reach −30°C or lower. For most Afghan households, the answer to winter is not a central heating system.

The samawat is a wood-fired metal urn used to heat and hold water for tea. It is found in homes, chai khanas (tea houses), and workplaces across Afghanistan. Most Afghans have grown up around one.

Online marketplaces in Afghanistan are still finding their footing. Platforms exist, people use them, but the industry has not yet reached the scale or reliability that makes online shopping a default habit for most Afghans.

Moving money in Afghanistan is a mix of old and new. People use banks, traditional sarafis, and international platforms—each with its own rules, risks, and costs.

Flying in Afghanistan is practical once you know how the system works. This guide gives you the four core airports, what each one is used for, and the local booking realities that matter most before you travel.

In this post, we are talking about paid passenger transport in Afghanistan. It can be divided into three broad categories: air travel, inter-city road travel, and inner-city transport. This post focuses on the third category: the vehicles people use every day inside cities.

In most Afghan cities, urban transport has never worked through fixed timetables, route maps, or formal stations. People usually learn it by habit: where to wait, which vehicle to take, how much to pay, and when a route is likely to move.

What does schooling look like across three generations of an Afghan family? From Soviet-era fines for skipping class, to lessons held in animal stalls, to today’s growing private school sector — this is a look at how education in Afghanistan has changed across three generations.