The heart and soul of an Afghan village is its bazaar, a collection of individual stalls owned and operated by single Afghans. They go to work each day, ply their trade, and manage to earn the equivalent of only a few dollars a month, if any at all.

Most business there is done via bartering. Without it, there would be no exchange of valuable goods and services, as money is scarce in villages. If someone is fortunate enough to have a relative in Kabul or Pakistan or the US, the family members still in Afghanistan may receive money and have enough to pay for essentials.

In moseying through each bazaar, I noticed two characteristics that stood out: bright colors and clean work environments. Afghans take pride in the look and feel of their finished product, and in how their shop looks to outsiders.

The best bread on the planet can be bought in these bazaars for pennies, although I always paid $20 for each, sometimes having to explain the significance of the US twenty-dollar bill to a man who had seen only dirty coins.

The overall look of the typical Afghan bazaar is redolent of the 1840s wild West of the US: single dirt or mud street, lined with small shops and stalls built of ancient wood and riveted together with hand-wrought nails and hinges.

Wandering through these anachronisms, I wondered what great careers each artisan could have if he only had the same opportunities as his peers do in the wild, wild West. . . .