In Kabul schools, fear of Taliban return

[deadparrot]

KABUL, AFGHANISTAN - Glory and service to country seem to drive the students taking private English lessons in one of the many foreign language schools that have opened here since the Taliban fell. They aspire to be doctors, engineers, and journalists - to elevate themselves above the decrepitude and insecurity they see all around them.

"I want to be an astronaut!" announces 14-year-old Arsalan. So does his little brother. Their friend, Seeyar, is determined to be president.

"He's on the land," says Arsalan. "We'll go to the stars!"

But those youthful dreams - expressed boisterously by these boys and more shyly inside a classroom of a dozen male and female students in their late teens - give way to details of fear about a Taliban resurgence and heartfelt concern about the US intent regarding the Muslim world.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/ohopes