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GORDO-BADAKHSHAN AUTONOMOUS OBLAST, Tajikistan — Finally! I waited 43 years and traveled to one of the most remote places on earth to find it, but find it I have: American tax dollars being spent productively. “USA,” the label on the bag reads in Helvetica Bold. “US-AID Flour.” Just like the ’70s, when my little kid heart swelled at the sight of “Gift of USA” food bags being delivered to starving African villagers! Thank God, America still finds time to help poor Third Worlders in between all the bombing and torturing.
As I chewed a nan bread my Pamiri hosts had baked using US-AID flour, I got the warm fuzzies. The struggle for hearts and minds never tasted so good.
It ain’t just flour the Agency of International Development is using to woo the people of eastern Tajikistan (who, by the way, happen to be Ismaeli Muslims). Empty flour bags (“USA”!) patch broken windows. Empty cans of US-AID rapeseed and fortified vegetable oil litter backyards. But it isn’t hard to see that we could be doing more.
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By far the deepest assistance footprints belong to the Aga Khan Foundation. If a building postdates the Soviet era, odds are it was financed by the Aga Khan, the Swiss-born billionaire and spiritual leader of the Ismaeli sect of Islam. Schools, medical clinics, bridges — there isn’t a village in the GBAO that hasn’t benefited from his largesse.
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Want a microloan to start your own business? The Aga Khan is there for you. (He’s also making sure that your daughter gets an education.)
Ismailimail 