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World Compassion Network Executive Director Joe Wilkey recently returned from Afghanistan.
And while he saw first-hand how devastated the country is, he also witnessed how compassionate people can be.
"My personal purpose (of going) was to help the Afghan people and bring the grace and mercy of God to them," said Wilkey Friday at his home. "I was temporarily employed by Samaritans Purse, which is the organization run by Franklin Graham. "
He was employed previously with another organization for 10 years as the international director. He decided to rest awhile because he was traveling six to eight months a year.
"When the Afghan thing broke out, I just couldn't stand it anymore. I had to get back in the action," he said.
He and his wife had already started their own organization, World Compassion Network. At the same time, because he had worked alongside Samaritans Purse and other organizations, he contacted a few of the organizations to jump start his activity and told them he'd be willing to do a short-term deployment to Afghanistan. Samaritans Purse contacted him and agreed to a contract, and he left for Afghanistan in mid-January. He returned last week.
"I was actually supposed to be there longer but I broke a rib in a crazy accident ... so they had to medically evacuate me because the medical facilities in this area of Afghanistan were pretty poor," he said.
While there, Wilkey served as the logistics officer and was responsible for making sure everything was provided that was needed for the project - a hospital in the city of Kholm.
"In addition to that while I was there, they asked me to take on a project to reconstruct schools," Wilkey said. "I really jumped at that because I knew the little girls had never been able to go to a public school in Afghanistan. And so I took my interpreter and another team member to Kholm and met with the elders of the city and told them we would agree to reconstruct at least three schools ... if they would sign a contract agreeing to let 50 percent of the population be girls.
"And after some discussion, they agreed. They signed the contract. Actually, one of the lead elders was the one that really influenced the decision. He stood up ... and he said this is nonsense and said it was about time they were fair to everybody, let's send the girls to school. I was quite happy."
The country itself, he said, has a rather typical Persian culture. The people are very, very poor.
"The only ones who seem to have any wealth at all are the warlords by virtue of their guns and power. But everybody's just scrapping out a living. They're very entrepreneurial people. There's little shops opened up. They'll have a shop opened up that's 6 feet wide by 8 feet deep that they've made out of whatever materials they can. They'll sell their skills."
Currency is pretty valueless, Wilkey said: "10,000 Afghans is worth 8 cents, to give an idea. To buy something much more than $5 or $6 is just prohibitive to the average Afghan. The average income is about $150 per year."
The country has been at war for so many years, they've never really recovered he said. The Russians were there for 10 years. When the Russians left, the warlords started their individual fights for territory.
"The whole country is absolutely destroyed. When Sept. 11 comes out and we do our thing, we just further exacerbate the situation. However, I would say that we certainly brought a new kind of war to them. One that does pinpoint targets, 100 percent better than anybody's ever done. I don't want to get too political, but it's my opinion that they grossly underestimated our capability and because of that they lost.
"I'd also like to say this to people: I've been doing this for at least 15 years and this is the best cooperation I've ever gotten from the U.S. military. They were very, very helpful in every way. ... "
He said it was sad to see so many people suffering and hungry. Wilkey's group hired many of the Afghan nationals to interpret, cook or drive.
"We would pay our interpreters more money than they ever made in their lives and it was like $100 to us. But for them, they were wealthy because they got $100 a month for being an interpreter. But we encouraged them and tried to get to know their families to make sure they were using this wealth properly, improving their homes, that sort of thing. That's really the way we reached the Afghan people, was by the staff that we would hire. We felt like we had influence with them and if we could influence them, they could influence their neighbors,: Wilkey said.
"Like I said, our goal, even though we were building a hospital and reconstructing schools, our goal was really to bring the grace and mercy of God to these people. They never saw it, all they saw was war, hatred and fighting. We just wanted them to know while there may be B-52 bombers above ... the fact is that Americans really do love them. We really care."
During his stay in Afghanistan, Wilkey visited the camps for displaced people in Mazar. The people there lived in holes with grass and mud roofs.
"It's very sickening to see them try to clean themselves in the dirty water. Of course, they are also drinking that dirty water. So that spells death."
As for the women, Wilkey said, the international media is reporting the bourkes (typical veils won by Muslim women) are coming off the women. "I can tell you, by my experience, they are not coming off. The women are still wearing the bourkes. The men are still quite strict about it. ... It's just sad to see them treated that way. They're lower than second-class citizens. It's a shame. It broke my heart."
Even more heartbreaking for Wilkey is the children "begging on the street. "Many, many orphans, absolutely."
Due to a strict curfew, Wilkey said, they could not go out at night. But in the mornings, he said, they saw kids on the street sleeping under cardboard or anything they could get.
"I did notice the American soldiers were quite generous with their personal supplies. They were constantly giving the kids something to eat," he said.
"I remember one soldier drove me out to see a school. This old man came along all bent over and broken. He had a light jacket on, very light. It was cold. So the American soldier goes over to his truck and gets a blanket out and puts it around him and gives him a big hug. It just made me feel good about our guys. But I saw a lot of that kindness."
For more information:
World Compassion Network: www.w-c-n.org
Samaritans Purse:
www.samaritanpurse.org
