Kabul at Work

Kabul is mainly regarded as city devastated by years of war, occupied by extremists, and with its citizens constantly threatened by random violence [David Gill]

Decades of foreign occupation and internal strife left the countrys economic infrastructure in ruins at the outset of the 21st century [David Gill]

Continuing internal strife severely hampered domestic and international efforts to rebuild the nation [David Gill]

But behind-the-scenes life for the many ordinary Kabulis continues as normal [David Gill]

Kabul is a city with a 4.5 million estimated population and more people are moving to the Afghan capital to work there [David Gill]

Zafar Ali, who works as the master sweetmaker in a small factory in Kabul, says that business was better under the Taliban because fewer people were making sweets [David Gill]

He says that under the Karzai regime more people have come into the business, prices for sugar are higher and profits ar not as good as they were before [David Gill]

In his opinion sweetmaker is not a good job for the next generation because chocolate is becoming more popular than the traditional sweets [David Gill]

General Khatooi Mohammadzai, the only female General in Afghanistan(***)s army, was widowed after one year of marriage with her baby son, and without any support she had to look after herself [David Gill]

Women were banned from going to schools and colleges during the Taliban regime, but returned to schools and universities after 2001 [David Gill]

The cost of living has increased dramatically which is a problem for many Afghans [David Gill]

The Afghan government and business officials say the economic downturn has spread across a broad swath of the economy [David Gill]

The Darul Aman Palace was built by King Amanullah in the 1920s as he tried to modernise Afghanistan, but was destroyed during the civil war in the early 1990s [David Gill]