Ten minutes in the desert and already the feet felt raw. How do the kids walk all day without shoes, I wondered as I read the novel And the Mountains Echoed by the acclaimed author Khaled Hosseini (whose novels The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns have sold a combined 38 million copies worldwide). The first few chapters of his latest novel drew me to the touching tale of a brother and sister.
The brother heard about another boy whose family owned a peacock. It would be hard to think of a better gift than a peacock feather with a beautiful large eye at the tip. The ten-year-old brother wished he could bring the gift to his sister. He negotiated. In a last-ditch effort, he traded his shoes for the iridescent green peacock feather.
By the time he made his way home shoeless, his heels had split open and left bloody smudges on the ground. If you'll let me, I'd like to tell you a little bit about his soles: thorns and splinters had burrowed into every cell of his skin. You could hear the brother's groan with every step, and possibly feel the barbs of pain shooting through his feet.
Imagine going to work or school barefoot and finding no path other than the bumpy road. You just keep looking at each step. Because if you don't learn to do this, you'll learn a painful lesson. Keep going. About an hour passes, and you're still only half way through. I had such chance to find out how it goes yesterday. Let me explain.
That's a charity walk to raise money for poor children in countries like Bangladesh and Zimbabwe. That's meaningful, right? And probably the most important thing is that we have to walk without socks or shoes. I brought my daughter to walk with us. She might laugh at the somewhat funny way of walking. And then it turns out that it isn't that funny. Of course, there will always be a flickering moment of insight, like learning to feel sorry for the poor children without shoes - which is, needless to say, how I wish my daughter could learn.
That's a charity walk to raise money for poor children in countries like Bangladesh and Zimbabwe. That's meaningful, right? And probably the most important thing is that we have to walk without socks or shoes. I brought my daughter to walk with us. She might laugh at the somewhat funny way of walking. And then it turns out that it isn't that funny. Of course, there will always be a flickering moment of insight, like learning to feel sorry for the poor children without shoes - which is, needless to say, how I wish my daughter could learn.
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