Publisher's Notes Welcome to the April-September (issues 8&9) issue of Lemar-Aftaab. The entire staff and contributors have once again worked hard in bringing this issue to you. We have combined the spring (April-June) and the summer (July-Sept) issues to reorganize the structure and layout and to create new informative sections: Afghanistan Geographics , headed by Daud Saba, focuses on travelogues and environmental issues of Afghanistan. It encourages Afghans to submit their work in the fields of travel and various research. A grand prize will be awarded for the best article published. Sunlight is a new section that focuses on showcasing an array of emerging talent: writers, poets, artists, musicians and other outstanding individuals. Voices is created to allow the readers of Lemar-Aftaab a chance to express themselves by forwarding their comments in response to a "question of the issue," and having their comments posted in the section. We want to encourage dialogue between Afghans spread in myriad of locations around the world. Book Review is a new addition which will critique and analyze books. Afghan Book Place has been introduced to help promote books by Afghan authors and allow the Afghan Internet community to easily access these books. Along with these new additions, we reorganized pervious other sections: Feature Articles, Fiction, Poetry, Music, Visual Arts and Editors' Corner. This has been done to better assist the readers in navigating through the magazine. We also have some exciting news: in September, Aftaabzad Publications will publish Dr. Amin Azimi's collection of poems. This collection will consist of Dr. Azimi's poems from the late 1960s and the early 1970s in Kabul and a recent collection of English poems. As you can observe, there are many projects and endeavors in which we are taking part, but we need your support, encouragement and participation. We are looking for your submissions of stories, articles, essays and artwork as well as other expressive material. It needs to be understood that we must document our thoughts, feelings and ideas. It is the written word which must be kept and passed onto the future generations so they can better understand themselves and us. We hope that you enjoy this issue, and we look forward to reading your comments and suggestions. May God be with you, Farhad Azad Publisher - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Copyright © 1999 Aftaabzad Publications. All Rights Reserved. May not be duplicated or distributed in any form without permission.