You, Your Mind, Your Life

United States of America, the land of hyphenated citizens, is like a safe house for many people around the world. It is certainly true for me. I wasn't born here but I have had many of my best experiences and opportunities here. I earned college degrees, chose my career (even changed it with no social limitation), worked as I wanted, made my own life choices (some didn't work well), broke old traditions without retribution etc. I can  go out of my house without fear of being raped and killed, can leave my house without a man accompanying me and dress as I preferr. I am safe from many life threatening phenomena that women face around the world. I have lived the best moments of my life here, in this land. But I can never venture too far from my afghan roots. I spent the crucial learning years of my life in Afghanistan. Most of my values and personal preferences are based on my upbringing in Afghan culture. Those values and standards were refined by the education I earned and the

Being Muslim is getting harder even in a liberal country like US. I blame it to the generalized ignorance that is gripping the land of the free. It was 5-6 years ago that I noticed ignorance was becoming the new trend. People were not smart, just smart mouthed. We started to over simplify theories, to summarize philosophies and lower standards and excuse continuous failure while accepting mediocre performances. At time, I didn't think much of the trend. I assumed it will die away with time. Obviously I was wrong. Ignorance became widespread between many layers of society and now it is the accepted norm. Just listen to some talk show hosts and news reporters and you will see what I mean. The content of their questions, the direction of their proposals and the background of their arguments are shockingly primitive and presumptive. You want to answer the question or argue the idea presented, but for immature debater like me, it gets confusing. Confusing because the question posed or t