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OUR MISSION:
Our aim is to provide as many children as possible with their very own books, starting initially with a goal of providing 250,000 copies of each of the five Dari-Pashto titles already translated. At this time there are very, very few story books available in Afghanistan. Those in Dari or Pashto (their main languages) are even more scarce. Since there is a literacy rate of only 28% for Afghans over 15 years old, we hope these books will encourage family literacy as we return some of their own wonderful stories to the Afghan people in book form. Our vision is to see this happen for all the school-children of Afghanistan:
A child returns home from school carrying her own colorful illustrated book of Afghan stories. She reads the story aloud to her family, and they talk about it. They praise her for doing so well at school ... then she in turn teaches the members of her family to read.
For at least 95% of these children, these will be the first books they own, and they may well be tales that their grandparents recognize from their own childhood. For the older, more conservative Afghans, we hope that repatriating these stories in book form will be a comforting bridge to literacy and the development of skills that the younger generations will need in order to survive and contribute in the modern world.
To do this, we have an arrangement to print in Afghanistan on a continuous basis and placing orders as we raise the funds to cover costs.
Dari-Pashto Editions
 
To date, five Dari-Pashto bilingual titles are press-ready, with Teacher Guides in both languages to accompany them. 250,000 copies of The Lion Who Saw Himself in theWater have already been printed and distributed, and we are currently printing 40,000 copies of The Boy Without a Name in a Dari-Pashto bilingual edition. These will be distributed to some of the organizations who have asked for help. We will print more as soon as we have the funds to do so.
Afghanistan has the highest proportion of school-age (ages 7-12) children in the world: 20% of nearly 33 million people and only six million of whom are in school.* Schools have very limited resources and books are rare.
If you are in touch with organizations in Afghanistan that might need these books and teacher guides, or know of NGOs that are able to cover the cost of the books they need themselves, please write to Sally Mallam at the email address, hoopoebooks @ aol.com, with the contact information, or put them in touch directly with her.
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*Afghanistan’s Millennium Development Goals, World Bank and USAID
OUR PROGRESS SO FAR:
We have a key translator and compositor in Kabul. Final translations are checked for accuracy by translators from the BBC Dari and Pashto World Service.
We have signed a Partnership Agreement with Ms. Fatima Gailani, President of the Afghan Red Crescent Society (ARCS). ARCS will assist us with receiving, transporting and distributing future books. ARCS has a youth program in 24 of Afghanistan's 34 provinces which is supported by the organization's network of 41,000 volunteers including school teachers and government employees.
Dr. Farid Bazger, Founder and Director of Khatiz Organization for Rehabilitation (KOR), will supervise the printing of all our books and KOR will liaise with ARCS to arrange distribution to schools and orphanages who have ordered and continue to order books from us. KOR have been printing and distributing illustrated books to schools in Afghanistan for the Afghan Reading Project for some time now.
Should you wish to see the books in question, the International Children’s Digital Library (ICDL) has made the English, Spanish, Dari and Pashto editions of Hoopoe Books available on their site. Dari and Pashto editions of the five titles we have to date are readable at this website: http://en.childrenslibrary.org/ (on the “Read Books” drop-down tab, do a “keyword search” for Hoopoe Books).
 In 2007, 250,000 copies of the Dari-Pashto bilingual paperback edition of The Lion Who Saw Himself in the Water by Idries Shah were printed and distributed.
We have donated 4,400 English paperbacks to International Orphan Care, whose US office is in Laguna Beach and who handled the shipping to their programs.
With each print run we plan to produce enough copies to keep the cost of each book, inclusive of ancillary materials, to a minimum – so even a small contribution will help us reach our goal!
IN ADDITION, WE ARE LOOKING FOR:
- Organizations (schools, orphanages, libraries, etc.) in Afghanistan that might need these books and teacher guides
- Nonprofit organizations serving the Afghan community that might wish to purchase Dari-Pashto translations of these books for use in the USA and Canada
Please email Sally Mallam, Director, at hoopoebooks @ aol.com or by fax at 650-948-9546 if you can help with the above.
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A nine-year-old student in the fourth grade at a school in Kabul reading The Boy Without a Name by Idries Shah in a bilingual Dari-Pashto edition.
