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[E. Gilmer] Three years ago, I graduated from
the IU School of Social Work here at IUPUI with a bachelor's degree in social work. I was very
excited to start my first job with Health Families as a Family Support Specialist, and I
had been working part-time at Barnes and Noble bookstores. It was a great job also and I
decided to continue working there part-time. A manager at the bookstore had just finished The
Kite Runner; she was talking about it at work one day. She was highly recommending it, saying
it was great. So, I knew I had it and I decided to get around
to reading it finally. I purchased the book because it looked interesting, but I had a
mountain of other books I had to get to first. Correct, I was not very interested or
knowledgeable about that entire region of the world at that time.
Yeah, yeah, I wanted to go there. I couldn't really move on; it captivated me that much. I
wanted to go there; I didn't think it was possible. I didn't think anyone was going there
except for military. A friend of mine had gone on a trip through an
organization called Global Exchange, and she had gone to Mexico, and she had a newsletter in
her house about Global Exchange and all of their upcoming trips and I just happened to be
looking at it one day and there was a trip to Afghanistan focusing on women's issues there
and I immediately knew I was going to go. The title of the trip was "Women Makin
g Change" in Kabul, Afghanistan, 2007, and the focus was basically on what women are
doing--what Afghan women are doing in Afghanistan--to help rebuild their country, to
help each other, and so we met with different organizations that help women. We met with women
who are leaders in their community, including a women who had run for president, and a woman who
was a general in the Afghan army, and other community leaders.
I really want to go back; I think it's just a matter of when, it's not a matter of if. I
wanna go back and stay longer and work there and see more of the country and learn more of
the language.