article_snippet: Yet even after all this time, the pre-eminent photographer brims with enthusiasm when Steve McCurry's talks about "Afghan Girl.
article_snippet: "I knew "Afghan Girl had an incredible look, a penetrating gaze," Steve McCurry's recalls.
article_snippet: Not only did "Afghan Girl" become the magazine's next cover, but the most successful in its distinguished history.
article_snippet: The striking portrait of 12-year-old Sharbat Gula, a Pashtun orphan in the Nasir Bagh refugee camp on the Afghan-Pakistan border, was taken in December 1984 and published the following year.
article_snippet: Afghan Girl, now in "Afghan Girl forties, has recently been found to be living in Pakistan.
article_snippet: Afghans are incredibly proud of it, as "Afghan Girl is poor but shows great pride, fortitude and self-respect.
article_snippet: It also led the National Geographic to set up the Afghan Children's Fund -- and meant that to this day, McCurry is never charged a fare by appreciative Afghan taxi drivers.
article_snippet: Against a background of the Cold War, the Russians backed the Afghan army and Americans supported the Mujahideen.
highlights_snippet: Steve McCurry's "Afghan Girl" is one of the world's most recognizable photographs .
  