Once children graduate from the seminaries, they are mentally primed to join militant groups, who give them rigorous training.

“They keep them in isolation, secluded from other people like foot soldiers. Only three to four people are allowed to meet them,” said Abdul Basit, an expert on suicide bombings at the Pak Institute for Peace Studies in Islamabad.

“They are told they are God’s chosen people who have been selected to this holy and sacred job of waging a holy war for the glory of the religion.”

Most Pakistanis reject the Taliban’s version of Islam which allows for public beheadings and lashings for those deemed immoral. The Taliban often blow up girls’ schools.

But Pakistanis understand that openly challenging their ideology can be risky. Parents who oppose recruitment of their children for jihad sometimes pay a heavy price.

“If someone does not send their child for training, jihad, then they would be reprimanded. They are forced to leave the region or their houses are bombed or one of their relatives is killed,” said Basit.

“They can also bomb their homes.”

After years of indoctrination, carrying out the actual suicide attack seems like the easy part. The Mardan bomber was likely pretending to be student on his way to class at a school located in the military compound.

To get a uniform, all he had to do was walk through the bustle of the main market past fish vendors, restaurants and electronics joints and purchase the outfit at a shop.

Until the government offers impoverished Pakistanis a brighter future, the cycle that leads some young people to blow themselves up won’t let up.

“A lot of girls and boys tend to want to leave (madrassas) and when their families refuse to take them back or can’t afford to take them back then they react in different ways,” said Taj.

“We are presented with odd behavior such as strange talking or they become mute. Or they start to have histrionic fits which appear like epilepsy but are not.”