New Afghanistan's TV Anchorwoman — Anne Hart

New Afghanistan's TV Anchorwoman, Maryam, promotes tourism. "Is your world shrinking?" she asked her TV talk show listeners. It takes a psychiatrist to promote the tourist industry here. Her introduction began the same way each shift:"Afghanistan needs tourists. The New Afghanistan's burgeoning tourist industry eagerly hired me, a psychiatrist and TV anchorwoman, Maryam Khazara to develop image. Spin and buzz the mountain views instead of the land mines and bandits. I do more than read the news. I create it. In the New Afghanistan, it takes psychiatrists, scientists, and finance majors to uncover stories behind sealed doors."Maryam completed her usual TV anchorwoman stint that day and hopped into her regular unmarked taxi. "Go ahead, stick out, flaunt your differences in public, and let them raise their brows." The psychiatrist scowled over her thumb to the driver during the long taxi ride. "Only don't get too cozy outdoors in your tribal language. When you take your culture out of the kitchen and rally it in public, expect scowls and a fist in your face." "So you're a direct descendant of Genghis Khan, Miss Maryam, are you? Funny, you don't look like John Wayne. What I don't understand," the Pashtun taxi driver shouted, "is what goes through a powerful heroine's mind when she dials a Hazara TV psychiatrist?"