meet. Today, it is even more challenging as my husband can no longer work. He suffers from psychological problems and keeps talking to himself. Of course, I am not very stable either. On the contrary, I feel completely shattered and abandoned. There are only very few things left from my sons. These objects are very dear to me as they remind me of them. I am including them in the Memory Box to make my sons’ memories last. I want to keep them until the day I can finally ask the perpetrators for what reason they killed my innocent sons. I suffer a great deal because of their deaths. If they were alive today, I would certainly have many grandchildren. In fact, shortly before his deaths my elder son had just got engaged and we were preparing everything for The Well Of Death War is the most egotistical and brutal manifestation of humankind. It does not produce anything except horror and destruction. It does not distinguish between old or young, men, women or children. The lashes of war hurt everyone’s body. At the same time, not everyone suffers equally from war. Some suffer more, some less. But it is those who did not actively partake in the creation of war that usually bear the brunt of all the suffering. It is them who are victimized by a fate designed by others. their marriage. The wedding never happened. Living in an environment of constant terror, Sayed Ibrahim Shah was well aware that he had the responsibility to protect his family. He therefore sent them to far-away Behsud district while he and one of his sons remained to look after his home and belongings. It was the last time his family members would ever see him. One day he was walking the streets when he was apprehended by his own countrymen and taken to the Company area of Kabul. First, his family did not know about his whereabouts but later they found out that the he had been arrested by a local commander, detaining him in his own private jail. Sayed Ibrahim Shah’s family paid a number of bribes to secure his release but all they received in return were a turban, a hat as well as a toothbrush and toothpaste. There are different stories about how he was killed. According to one The Memory Box Initiative: Seeking to Break the Cycle of Violence and Tragedy in Afghanistan The Memory Box Initiative: Seeking to Break the Cycle of Violence and Tragedy in Afghanistan 15 The story of Sayed Ibrahim Shah’s murder uncovers one such catastrophic consequences of war. He was an ordinary citizen with no links to the world of politics. His only crime was that he lived in Dasht-e- Barchi, a neighborhood of Kabul that had become synonymous with suffering. Here, every day there existed a strong likelihood that a rocket or stray bullet could kill someone. It seems that the lives of its population were not regarded as worthy of living. It appears that those who unleashed the violence were doing it for the pleasure of seeing the people of Dasht-e- Barchi suffer. Yet, Sayed Ibrahim Shah had no other place to live. Dasht-e- Barchi was his only and final refuge. 16