Afghan Chain Letters

Probably inevitable, but this kinda breaks my heart:

KABUL (PAN): Mobile phone users in the Afghan capital have started receiving text messages warning them that if they do not send on the names of Allah to several other people, they will endure a lifetime of misfortune.

While most people in Kabul do not want to insult their religion, they say they cannot afford to send messages out to so many people.

Massoud, a resident of Qala-i-Wakil, said he had received four such text messages during the past month. Two days ago, he received an SMS which said: "TheBeneficent, the Merciful, the Eternal, the Majestic, the Powerful, and the all Inclusive. Allah is everywhere! Send this to nine people; you will hear good news tomorrow. If you don’t send it, you will be unfortunate for nine years."

Massoud said he usually sent on the messages as asked, but one night he was asked to send the SMS to another 24 people, but ran out of credit after he sent 19 messages. Because I was afraid of being sinful, I used my other mobile to send it to another five people.

I wrote a somewhat more positive story about love and mobile messaging in Afghanistan for a recent issue of Canadian Busisness:

In a society where marriages are mostly arranged, young lovers gift one another with free airtime. As the study quotes Ahmed, a 24–year–old day labourer, "The mobile phone makes love marriages possible."