As a respected man in the community, my father was often called on to mediate feuds. He did not believe in badal – revenge – and would try to make people see that neither side had anything to gain from continuing the violence, and it would be better for them to get on with their lives. There were two families in our village he could not convince. They had been locked in a feud for so long no one even seemed to remember how it had started – probably some small slight as we are a hot-headed people. First a brother on one side would attack an uncle on the other. Then vice versa. It consumed their lives.

身为社区里备受尊重的人，父亲常被找去调停争端。他不相信复仇有什么作用，并总是试着让大家了解：如果暴力持续下去，对双方都不会有任何好处；最好的选择就是尽释前嫌，继续各自的生活。但是村里有两个家族，父亲无论如何都劝说不了。这两个家族对立的情况已经久到没有人记得到底是怎样开始的，八成只是点小事，但我们毕竟是很会小题大做的民族。一开始，其中一方的兄长会攻击另一方的叔伯，接着另一方会采取同样的举动，不断有人为此丧命。

Our people say it is a good system, and our crime rate is much lower than in non-Pashtun areas. But I think that if someone kills your brother, you shouldn’t kill them or their brother, you should teach them instead. I am inspired by Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, the man who some call the Frontier Gandhi, who introduced a non-violent philosophy to our culture.

我们的族人认为这体制很好。他们认为，正因此，我们的犯罪率才比非普什图地区要低。但我认为，如果有人杀了你的兄弟，你不该去杀他们或是他们的兄弟，而是应该要教导他们。我受到阿卜杜勒.加法尔.汗的行为启发，有些人称他为“边境区甘地”，是他把非暴力哲学介绍到我们的文化中。

It’s the same with stealing. Some people, like me, get caught and vow they will never do it again. Others say, ‘Oh it’s no big deal – it was just a little thing.’ But the second time they will steal something bigger and the third something bigger still. In my country too many politicians think nothing of stealing. They are rich and we are a poor country yet they loot and loot. Most of them don’t pay tax, but that’s the least of it. They take out loans from state banks but they don’t pay them back. They get kickbacks on government contracts from friends or the companies they award them to. Many of them own expensive flats in London.

对于偷东西也一样。有些人，像我，被逮到并发誓不会再犯。其他人则会说：“噢，又不是什么大事，只是个小东西嘛。”于是，第二次，他们就会偷点更大的东西，第三次又会更大。在我们国家，太多政治人物认为偷窃不算什么。他们很富有，尽管我们国家还很穷困，但他们仍掠夺再掠夺。他们大多数人都不付税，这还是他们最低微的过错；他们向国家的银行贷款，却不还钱；他们在政府合约中，从朋友或是那些合作厂商手上拿回扣；他们之中有许多人都在伦敦拥有昂贵的公寓。

I don’t know how they can live with their consciences when they see our people going hungry or sitting in the darkness of endless power cuts, or children unable to go to school as their parents need them to work. My father says that Pakistan has been cursed with more than its fair share of politicians who only think about money. They don’t care if the army is actually flying the plane, they are happy to stay out of the cockpit and sit in business class, close the curtains and enjoy the fine food and service while the rest of us are squashed in economy.

我不知道当他们看见自己的人民在挨饿，或是因为时常断电而只能坐在黑暗之中，或是孩子没办法上学，只因为家长需要他们一起工作赚钱时，良心怎么安稳？父亲说巴基斯坦受到了诅咒，有这么多只爱金钱的政治客。他们不在乎军队是否真的有战斗力，他们更愿意远离战场，坐在商务舱里，关上帘子享受美食和各种服务；而与此同时，人民则在温饱线上苦苦挣扎。