Saturday, April 07, 2018 Vol. 2, No. 86 2. Short Stories 3. Personal Essays 4-5. News 6. Community 7. Literary 8. Interview See Inside Quote of the Week "Gratitude is an act of grace, a way of blessing yourself into a future abun- dance of gifts. For when we are grate- ful we open a channel of receiving in ourselves." Daphne Rose Kingma Star Educational Society Weekly Interstellar (adjective): situated or occurring between the stars; conducted, or existing between two or more stars A message from Ali Reza Yasa, Star founder and chairman I started Star Educational Society in Ka- bul with almost nothing, barely a wall to write on. I developed my own curric- ulum and started attracting students. My students were like me, mostly re- turning refugees, mostly from deprived families, struggling to rebuild their lives in our destroyed country. If you could have seen very humble beginnings, you would never imagine that fifteen years later we would have over 60,000 gradu- ates and branches in provinces across the country. My motivation to start an English language center in Kabul was not for wealth or fame, it was motivated by my sense of civic duty and my belief that knowledge of English was a coveted and valuable skill in our war-torn and backward country. At the time, I was working as an interpreter for the Ministry of National Defense. Shortly after, I became a senior interpreter for American troops and then a senior pro- gram officer at the National Democratic Institute. For the first five years of Star’s presence in Kabul, I began my days be- fore the sun rose teaching English class- es, before putting in a full day of work at my regular jobs. At the end of the day, I returned to Star to teach evening classes and then went home to work on Star’s management and administration well into the night. My work days were usually 18 or more hours long. As Star grew, it became an extended family business. My siblings graduated with their English Language Diplomas and became teachers and then branch managers. My uncle was a guard. An- other uncle was a maintenance man. My father managed rental contracts, purchasing and other odd jobs. My cousins also graduated from Star and worked as teachers, drivers, bookkeep- ers and office staff. At the same time that my family members became em- ployees, Star’s employees were becom- ing like family members. In spite of our tremendous growth, Star still feels like a family to me and to many of the people who have crossed through our doors. At Star’s peak in 2008, we had 13,000 students. Today, with the worsening security, we have opened several more branches, but we serve only about 8000 - 10000 students. Our facilities are very modest. In some cases, they could be considered primitive. We don’t own any of our buildings. And most of the build- ings we rent are in some state of disre- pair, without modern facilities. Instead of buying fancy factory-made student desks, for the past ten years, our long- time worker, Najjar, builds all our desks by hand. His children study for free at Star. These are among the many rea- sons that we don’t measure our success by our physical assets, by high salaries, or by our financial profit. Our success is measured by the success of our stu- dents; the impact we have had on the lives of our workers, teachers and other staff members; and the contribution we have made to Afghan society. Star provides a public service. We have opened and support branches in remote areas that do not generate any profit. We offer scholarships to hun- dreds of needy students to take English classes at our branches. We provide countless services at no charge. Star teachers, staff and volunteers provide application support for students ap- plying to high schools, universities and conferences around the world – the American University of Central Asia, the American University of Afghani- stan, Asian University for Women, Ful- bright, Germany’s DAAD scholarship, England’s Chevening scholarship, the Afghan Girls’ Financial Assistance Fund (AGFAF), United World Colleges, Schar- zman scholars in China, the MEXT scholarship in Japan, Korea Develop- ment Institute, OSCE Academy in Kyr- gyzstan, and Mongolian International University, to name only a few. Unlike other institutions in Kabul that charge $1000 US for university ap- plication support, $100 for essay writ- ing support, and $50 for a single let- ter of recommendation, Star offers all of these services for free. Our support includes essay coaching, CV revisions, practice interviews, GRE preparation and more. In addition, we offer free workshops, such as workshops to end violence against women, anti-street ha- rassment workshops, and Fulbright ad- vising workshops. We have free clubs, cultural events and futsal tournaments. We host art exhibits, Model UNs, film screenings, candlelight vigils and other events for free - providing the space, heat, refreshments and security. Star publishes approximately 3,000- 4,000 copies of our free weekly newspa- per, the Interstellar Bulletin, and offers soft copies for free on our website. We publish our quarterly Dari language literary magazine, Shahrzad, which is also available on our website. Star bears all costs of printing, dis- tribution, and design work. However, the contributors and editors are all volunteers, including Kara Lozier and Jonathan Greenburg in the US, and students from the University of Califor- nia Santa Barbara, who work as interns through Lozier’s organization, ROYA – Resources of Young Afghans, provid- ing writing and editing support for the Interstellar Bulletin. My home in Kabul is like a hostel for many, many people - students who are in Afghanistan on their breaks from studying abroad, students from other provinces who need a place to stay in Kabul, many Star staff members and relatives. We hold manager’s meetings in my home and I host social gather- ings for Star teachers and students. Star has paid for the medical expenses, airfare, funeral costs and other urgent expenses for many current and former students, staff and family members. In many respects, we are more like a so- cial service organization than a profit- making business. Star's wealth and contribution to Afghanistan cannot be measured in afghanis or dollars. We serve local stu- dents in deprived communities to help them to improve their futures. Our stu- dents pay as low as 500 afghanis per se- mester to study at Star in Kabul, even lower in the provinces. Our students dream of becoming teachers at Star one day, not because we pay high salaries, but because there is a sense of pride and responsibility to follow our philos- ophy of “gain and convey” and because they have a deep affection for the work that we do and the contribution we make. Most teachers have other full- time jobs to pay their living expenses. Our highest paid and most devoted employee is our executive director who earns around $400 per month. It is difficult for me to reject differ- ent organizations’ requests for help from Star. Although Star has a policy that caps student discounts to 50%, we have offered free TOEFL classes to some AGFAF students, and a 50% discount for Bale Parwaz Library students. We offer a 50% discount to students from the ROYA Mentorship Program and we accept many free students from orga- nizations such as Help for Our Afghan Heroes, a philanthropic group helping the families of martyred ANA and ANP soldiers. Star has made and continues to make a tremendous investment in Af- ghanistan’s future, an investment in human capital. From this perspective, our profits have been significant. We have educated an entire generation. Our lessons extend far beyond English language classes. Students who study at Star learn about democratic principles, equality, volunteerism, hard work eth- ics, accountability, punctuality, harm- ful cultural practices, and many, many more things. Star has helped shape the new leaders of the country, has carved a path for thousands of students to study abroad, receive prestigious scholar- ships, and gain coveted positions in organizations inside and outside the country. Hundreds of our students have gained admission, scholarships, and training opportunities in the U.S. alone. Students who were once desti- tute and herding sheep, selling plastic bags in the street, and weaving carpets are now internationally-recognized civ- il society activists, government leaders, professors, and scholars. We share the astounding success of our students and consider our organization one of the most profitable in Afghanistan when we measure our success in those terms. Among the Enemy Reza woke up from a nightmare, wiping his eyes as if wiping off his sleep. He poured a glass of ice cold water and slowly took small sips. It was winter, and the workshop where he slept was cold without fire during the night. Dawn was slowly breaking after ... Page 2 A Bad Memory with a Good Outcome Their shining and bright day of hope and joy changed to a dark and frightening night of sorrow and misfortune when my parents found out that their youngest son has left for Iran without informing the family. ... Page 3 Meet the activist telling the stories of Afghan women that usually never get heard Outspoken Afghan human rights activist Noorjahan Akbar has re- cently published ... Page 8
Transcript
Saturday, April 07, 2018 Vol. 2, No. 86
2. Short Stories3. Personal Essays4-5. News6. Community7. Literary8. Interview
See Inside Quote of the Week"Gratitude is an act of grace, a way of blessing yourself into a future abun-dance of gifts. For when we are grate-ful we open a channel of receiving in ourselves."
Daphne Rose Kingma
Star Educational Society Weekly
Interstellar (adjective): situated or occurring between the stars; conducted, or existing between two or more stars
A message from Ali Reza Yasa, Star founder and chairman
I started Star Educational Society in Ka-bul with almost nothing, barely a wall to write on. I developed my own curric-ulum and started attracting students. My students were like me, mostly re-turning refugees, mostly from deprived families, struggling to rebuild their lives in our destroyed country. If you could have seen very humble beginnings, you would never imagine that fifteen years later we would have over 60,000 gradu-ates and branches in provinces across the country.
My motivation to start an English language center in Kabul was not for wealth or fame, it was motivated by my sense of civic duty and my belief that knowledge of English was a coveted
and valuable skill in our war-torn and backward country. At the time, I was working as an interpreter for the Ministry of National Defense. Shortly after, I became a senior interpreter for American troops and then a senior pro-gram officer at the National Democratic Institute. For the first five years of Star’s presence in Kabul, I began my days be-fore the sun rose teaching English class-es, before putting in a full day of work at my regular jobs. At the end of the day, I returned to Star to teach evening classes and then went home to work on Star’s management and administration well into the night. My work days were usually 18 or more hours long.
As Star grew, it became an extended family business. My siblings graduated with their English Language Diplomas and became teachers and then branch managers. My uncle was a guard. An-other uncle was a maintenance man. My father managed rental contracts, purchasing and other odd jobs. My cousins also graduated from Star and worked as teachers, drivers, bookkeep-ers and office staff. At the same time that my family members became em-ployees, Star’s employees were becom-ing like family members. In spite of our tremendous growth, Star still feels like a family to me and to many of the people
who have crossed through our doors. At Star’s peak in 2008, we had 13,000
students. Today, with the worsening security, we have opened several more branches, but we serve only about 8000 - 10000 students. Our facilities are very modest. In some cases, they could be considered primitive. We don’t own any of our buildings. And most of the build-ings we rent are in some state of disre-pair, without modern facilities. Instead of buying fancy factory-made student desks, for the past ten years, our long-time worker, Najjar, builds all our desks by hand. His children study for free at Star. These are among the many rea-sons that we don’t measure our success by our physical assets, by high salaries, or by our financial profit. Our success is measured by the success of our stu-dents; the impact we have had on the lives of our workers, teachers and other staff members; and the contribution we have made to Afghan society.
Star provides a public service. We have opened and support branches in remote areas that do not generate any profit. We offer scholarships to hun-dreds of needy students to take English classes at our branches. We provide countless services at no charge. Star teachers, staff and volunteers provide application support for students ap-plying to high schools, universities and conferences around the world – the American University of Central Asia, the American University of Afghani-stan, Asian University for Women, Ful-bright, Germany’s DAAD scholarship, England’s Chevening scholarship, the Afghan Girls’ Financial Assistance Fund (AGFAF), United World Colleges, Schar-zman scholars in China, the MEXT scholarship in Japan, Korea Develop-ment Institute, OSCE Academy in Kyr-gyzstan, and Mongolian International University, to name only a few.
Unlike other institutions in Kabul that charge $1000 US for university ap-plication support, $100 for essay writ-ing support, and $50 for a single let-
ter of recommendation, Star offers all of these services for free. Our support includes essay coaching, CV revisions, practice interviews, GRE preparation and more. In addition, we offer free workshops, such as workshops to end violence against women, anti-street ha-rassment workshops, and Fulbright ad-vising workshops. We have free clubs, cultural events and futsal tournaments. We host art exhibits, Model UNs, film screenings, candlelight vigils and other events for free - providing the space, heat, refreshments and security.
Star publishes approximately 3,000-4,000 copies of our free weekly newspa-per, the Interstellar Bulletin, and offers soft copies for free on our website. We publish our quarterly Dari language literary magazine, Shahrzad, which is also available on our website.
Star bears all costs of printing, dis-tribution, and design work. However, the contributors and editors are all volunteers, including Kara Lozier and Jonathan Greenburg in the US, and students from the University of Califor-nia Santa Barbara, who work as interns through Lozier’s organization, ROYA – Resources of Young Afghans, provid-ing writing and editing support for the Interstellar Bulletin.
My home in Kabul is like a hostel for many, many people - students who are in Afghanistan on their breaks from studying abroad, students from other provinces who need a place to stay in Kabul, many Star staff members and relatives. We hold manager’s meetings in my home and I host social gather-ings for Star teachers and students. Star has paid for the medical expenses, airfare, funeral costs and other urgent expenses for many current and former students, staff and family members. In many respects, we are more like a so-cial service organization than a profit-making business.
Star's wealth and contribution to Afghanistan cannot be measured in afghanis or dollars. We serve local stu-
dents in deprived communities to help them to improve their futures. Our stu-dents pay as low as 500 afghanis per se-mester to study at Star in Kabul, even lower in the provinces. Our students dream of becoming teachers at Star one day, not because we pay high salaries, but because there is a sense of pride and responsibility to follow our philos-ophy of “gain and convey” and because they have a deep affection for the work that we do and the contribution we make. Most teachers have other full-time jobs to pay their living expenses. Our highest paid and most devoted employee is our executive director who earns around $400 per month.
It is difficult for me to reject differ-ent organizations’ requests for help from Star. Although Star has a policy that caps student discounts to 50%, we have offered free TOEFL classes to some AGFAF students, and a 50% discount for Bale Parwaz Library students. We offer a 50% discount to students from the ROYA Mentorship Program and we accept many free students from orga-nizations such as Help for Our Afghan Heroes, a philanthropic group helping the families of martyred ANA and ANP soldiers.
Star has made and continues to make a tremendous investment in Af-ghanistan’s future, an investment in human capital. From this perspective, our profits have been significant. We have educated an entire generation. Our lessons extend far beyond English language classes. Students who study at Star learn about democratic principles, equality, volunteerism, hard work eth-ics, accountability, punctuality, harm-ful cultural practices, and many, many more things. Star has helped shape the new leaders of the country, has carved a path for thousands of students to study abroad, receive prestigious scholar-ships, and gain coveted positions in organizations inside and outside the country. Hundreds of our students have gained admission, scholarships, and training opportunities in the U.S. alone. Students who were once desti-tute and herding sheep, selling plastic bags in the street, and weaving carpets are now internationally-recognized civ-il society activists, government leaders, professors, and scholars. We share the astounding success of our students and consider our organization one of the most profitable in Afghanistan when we measure our success in those terms.
Among the EnemyReza woke up from a nightmare, wiping his eyes as if wiping off his sleep. He poured a glass of ice cold water and slowly took small sips. It was winter, and the workshop where he slept was cold without fire during the night. Dawn was slowly breaking after ... Page 2
A Bad Memory with a Good OutcomeTheir shining and bright day of hope and joy changed to a dark and frightening night of sorrow and misfortune when my parents found out that their youngest son has left for Iran without informing the family. ... Page 3
Meet the activist telling the stories of Afghan women that usually never get heardOutspoken Afghan human rights activist Noorjahan Akbar has re-cently published ... Page 8
april 7th, 2018
Vol.2, No. 86 Short Story
Page 2
About the author: Nafisa Ayazi is a Star alumna. She is studying fine arts at Parul University in Gujarat, India.
Reza woke up from a nightmare, wiping his eyes as if wiping off his sleep. He poured a glass of ice cold water and slowly took small sips. It was winter, and the workshop where he slept was cold without fire during the night. Dawn was slowly break-ing after a long winter night. He had a hard time falling sleep in the cold room, and once he fell asleep, nightmares wouldn’t let him sleep long. Realizing he won’t be able to fall asleep now, he took his tea pot to fill it from the well. It was a five-minute walk to the well by the side of the road. Reza was in a hurry to get back, since the cold weather felt like it was freezing his bones. He reached the well and pulled the ropes. The bucket at the other end was drip-ping water, making a pleasing sound. The bucket was halfway up when he heard a bomb hit the houses about a mile away. Unable to grasp what was happening, a couple of seconds later he found himself kneeling be-side the well with his hands over his head. Reza gathered all his strength and ran as fast as he could. He kept running. Gasping for air, he leaned against a wall in a narrow street. Sounds of gunshots and ex-
plosions, people screaming, and cry-ing were coming from everywhere. When Reza realized he may not be able to go any further without get-ting killed, he tried knocking on the nearest door. He knocked a couple of times until a man opened the door and furiously pulled him inside.
“What the hell do you want?” the man shouted at him.
“I was outside to get some water, and then heard a loud explosion. I didn’t know where to go; there was smoke and dust everywhere!” Reza said, holding back tears.
“Who are you? I haven’t seen you around this town? Maybe you are one of them.” the man said with sus-picion.
“I’m the shoemaker’s new appren-tice. I have been here for a month.” Reza said.
“He’s telling the truth. That is the new apprentice.” said a young boy the same age as Reza. “Let him in, Padar." Looking at the boy, Reza recognized him as Zahir, the boy who worked in the bakery.
"What do you mean? We can't let in anyone that knocks on our door!" shouted the man. Zahir looked at his father pleadingly and took Reza with him to a dark, cave-like place.
For a couple of minutes, he was not able to see anything, until a woman lit a lantern. She looked at Reza for a long time, with no expres-sion on her face. The two girls lean-ing on her shoulders did the same.
"This is the shoemaker's appren-tice." said Zahir's father, as if answer-ing a question his wife didn't ask.
"What's your name boy?" asked the woman.
"Reza..." he said. He wanted to
say something else, but his voice was stuck in his throat. Instead, he looked around the cave that was carved in a corner of their front yard. People called it “Samuj.” He had heard that people were digging these in their yard to hide in if there was an attack. It was typical of people living in Ka-bul, since it had been a war zone for decades.
Reza had come from Bamiyan, a province in central Afghanistan. He used to live with his family in a cave near the Buddha statue that was de-stroyed by the Taliban. He looked af-ter the sheep before his father had to sell one of them to provide for Reza's trip to Kabul. His father had asked the shoemaker to give him a job, so he can make money for his family. Reza was a hard worker and quick to learn. He had been able to learn some skills of shoemaking in a month, but his master wasn’t giving him any money until he had completely learned it. At least the shoemaker provided him food to eat twice a day and a place to sleep every night.
He stayed with the family for hours in the cave. Reza was wonder-ing when the attack will be over so he can get out of the damp, suffocating, overcrowded cave. He was afraid the family might ask him to leave at any time. They didn’t have enough water or food to offer Reza, but he wasn’t expecting it. The sound of gunshots and explosions were coming from a farther distance, and Reza assumed the attack would be over soon.
Reza woke up with an aching neck and back from falling asleep uncom-fortably against the cave wall. The harsh sound of the attack had got-ten louder. The sound was now right
next to them, shaking the ground. The bomb must have hit the man's house. It was a one story, old house, and even a small explosion would crumble it to pieces. Reza realized they were no longer safe in the cave, but even if they left, where would they go?
"I don’t think we should stay here anymore…it's not safe…that bomb could have hit us..." Reza whispered, as if the enemy was standing over their heads.
"If you have a better place to go, then what the hell are you doing here?" said the man who was angry all the time.
"He is right, we are not safe here anymore." said Zahir.
The man looked at his son with anger. Then he grabbed Reza by the back of his shirt, shoving him out-side the cave, saying "You can go wherever you want, we are not going anywhere."
Once he was out of the cave, he remembered how cold it was out-side. Reza was only seventeen. He was scared, and on the verge of cry-ing as he was running in the dust and smoke-filled streets.
He remembered what his father had said: You are a man Reza, and a man does not cry.
He was walking carefully, hid-ing behind one wall after another, his heart beating like a drum in his chest. He didn’t know where to go or what to do, so he just kept walking. Confused, he stopped behind a wall to think, when a tall man appeared in front of him, a rifle on his shoulder.
"What are you doing here, sol-dier?" The tall man said in Pashto. “Where is your gun?"
Reza only speaks Farsi and didn’t understand what the man was say-ing. The tall man gave him a small pistol from his pocket and told Reza to follow him. Trembling with fear, Reza didn’t know what was happen-ing. Reza looked like a Pashtun, with brown, almond eyes, and broad shoulders, he was always mistaken for a Pashtun among Hazaras. That caused him trouble sometimes. He realized the man probably mistook him for a Pashtun as well. Reza took the gun and followed, although he wanted to shoot the man in the head right there and run away. If the man finds out he is a Hazara, he will be killed immediately. Reza pointed the gun at the man, his hands shak-ing uncontrollably. With his finger on the trigger, hesitating to shoot, he saw a man coming the opposite way. He put his gun down quickly, hoping the man he was with hadn’t noticed. He was disappointed that his last chance of survival was lost. He listened to the two men talking in Pashto, trying to understand what they were saying, but not even one word sounded familiar. He walked behind them, not knowing what else to do.
Among the Enemy
Vol.2, No. 86Personal Essays
Page 3april 7th, 2018
Their shining and bright day of hope and joy changed to a dark and frightening night of sorrow and mis-fortune when my parents found out that their youngest son has left for Iran without informing the family. His name was Basir Ahmad and he
A night to remember is the title of a short reading in American Eng-lish File 1, the book that I teach my students in Senior Two. “Why do we remember some nights in our lives?” is stated in the book. Is it because we went to beautiful places, meet inter-esting people, heard wonderful mu-sic, or saw a fantastic movie? These are the questions that the author of the book has written that they have asked people all over the world to
was in his twelfth year at school. We were enjoying a simple but happy life in our crowded family. Each moment of life was fun for all of us because we loved each other and things were going on as we wanted. One night my only younger brother, who was the youngest member of the family at the same time, asked my father to give him three thousand Afs and said he would get admission in a Kankor preparation course. But, we did not know that he wanted the money to rent cars to go to Ghazni and join his friends. My father paid the cash with-out seeking more details, unusually.
The next day unlike other days, my brother woke up, got dressed and pre-pared to leave home very early in the morning without having breakfast. When I asked him where he went, he said, “I am going to look for Kankor preparation classes together with my classmates and I will not be back till evening.” I left home for my English class and university. When I came back home from university, I found out that something was going wrong because my father asked me where my younger brother was. He said that he had received many calls from his
tell them about the night that they can never forget. I have asked my students the same question. Unpre-dictably, I have heard totally differ-ent answers compared to the foreign people’s answers in the book.
At first, no one was willing to share their memorable night. It was possi-bly because they felt pain and sor-row whenever they remember that night. After some minutes, one of the students raised his hand, and broke the silence of the class. “One night I went to the soccer match with my friends. That was really a good night. We had fun besides playing soccer. In conjunction with having fun, we also were amused by our witty friends. Unfortunately, our happiness altered to the sadness,” said the student. He added that when they left the soccer hall toward home, surprisingly two armed boys rushed on them. The rob-bers took their phones, money and all the things that they had with them-selves. “I can never forget this night,” the student said sadly.
The next student asked the first student to shorten his speech because he also wanted to share a night that he never forgets. “One early morn-ing we woke up and noticed that all the stuff in our home are dislocated. No one from our family members did that because we all were asleep. It was a robbery, but the burglars were so astute that none of us heard their sound and movements while they were searching things in our rooms
friends from Ghazni province. He continued, “They said that they had seen Basir with some people who had already planned to go to Iran.” I said they were making a mistake because Basir must have been at school that time.
Basir did not answer my call for the first two times when I tried to talk to him. Consequently, I called his teacher and asked him if my brother was in the class. I got impressed when the teacher said my brother was not at school. Finally, I succeeded in talking to him via mobile. I could hear some music and noise while talking to him. He was trying to deceive me and not to tell me the truth but because of my persistence he said that he was in Qandahar. He said, “I am on my way to Iran together with my friends and we will go illegally.” This sentence of his was like a big cloud of sorrow and hopelessness that spread its shadow on us, especially my parents. My old mom started crying and the others were abundant with sorrow.
I tried to persuade my brother to come back and promised that I would provide him a passport and visa and that he could go there legally. But he
that night,” the second student said. All the students shared their memo-rable night one by one. There was one common point among all the stories. The point is that none of the students remembered their memorable nights because of happiness or going to beautiful places, meeting interesting people, hearing wonderful music, or saw a fantastic movie, they remem-bered that night because they lost something.
The above stories are just two ex-
did not accept and said that he would not return under any circumstances. Moreover, he requested me not to call him until he arrived in Iran. This is obviously a bad memory that my family and I still suffer from.
Finally, he went to Iran and worked there for two or three months. Then he decided to leave for Europe. De-spite our disagreement, he left for Sweden and fortunately he arrived there safely in forty-five days.
He joined school there and suc-cessfully graduated a few months ago. The last time I talked to him, he said that he had got accepted in col-lege.
Comparing the circumstances of life here in Afghanistan and there in Sweden, I think that he has made a good decision. If he stayed here he would not have successfully passed Kankor because he was not good at mathematics, chemistry, physics, Pashto and religious studies, which play a very prominent role in doing well at Kankor examination. That’s why although he is not granted citi-zenship yet, I think he will have a bright future there.
amples that I have chosen to write about. Each student had a painful memory. Someone’s friend was in-jured with a knife by thieves on the street. Some of them had lost their wealth. It is a very clear example of our society. All people who live in Kabul endure living in a place where no one can guarantee their life. The severe situation is not tolerable. Our happiness is fleeting. The youths’ memorable nights are sadness, rob-bery or losing a beloved one.
About the author Mohammad Monir Kamran is an English teacher at Star C Branch and is currently a student at Kabul Medical University (KMU).
About the author: Emran Poya is a Star alumnus and a teacher at Star’s C Branch. He graduated from Kabul University with a bachelor’s degree in computer science. In addition, he is an Evaluator of Computer and English at Marefat High School and Director of GYPF Alumni Afghanistan.
A Bad Memory with a Good Outcome
A night to remember
Page 4
Vol.2, No. 86 News
This guy is Mahdi. I mean he was but sadly he is no more. Mahdi was the
fourth year student of the faculty of politi-cal science at the American University of Kabul. I learned of his killing through the media and as I was on the phone with his former teacher Ali, I accidentally delivered the news of his tragic death to him. In his short life, Mahdi had worked so hard and had achieved so much. Apart from being a star student at his university, Mahdi spoke Persian, English, French and Spanish lan-guages. He was a member of the Special Forces too.
Mahdi came from a very poor family liv-ing in the shanty slum areas of Western Ka-bul. He was so poor that he worked every-day and could only attend evening classes. Western Kabul is the modern day ghetto for the type of people like Mahdi and his family who are subjected to continued discrimi-
School’s bell was rung in many schools of the country yesterday. Based on statistics that the ministry of education has released, one million new students have entered schools. There were 9 million students in Afghanistan last year and almost half of them were girls. Despite the fact that one million new students in an educational year is a high number, three million girls are still deprived of education. As a result, it is a big problem in Afghanistan that most of the students are deprived of educa-tion.
The government of Afghanistan is responsible for children’s free access to edu-cation. In the past years, hundreds of millions of dollar have been spent on battle against il-literacy and improvement of educational fa-cilities for children.
More than half of the country’s population is formed by young generation. Afghanistan has the youngest generation and because of this, expanding educational op-
portunities for battle against illiteracy is im-portant in three ways.
1) Most of the population of Afghani-stan is young generation. Because of this we can decrease the illiteracy by improving edu-cational facilities for kids and young genera-tion.
2) Afghanistan has the youngest man-power, but this manpower is jobless, because of not having enough education and qualifi-cations. Improving the qualifications can de-crease the unemployment and improve mar-keting of Afghanistan in the world. Currently, most of the employees of big banks and com-panies in the country are from India, Pakistan and other countries. However, most of our young generation are jobless or busy with dif-ficult work with low income.
3) Changing of generation in a society of literate and educated people. Chaos and war have been in Afghanistan for half a cen-tury and because of this situation, cultural re-
lationship has been changed and there is a lot of violence in the society. Lack of education is a good chance for the enemy of Afghanistan. They really utilize the lack of education and economy.
Afghanistan is still one of the countries with a lot of illiterate citizens. The sec-ond deputy of presidency said in last fall, “The rate of illiteracy in the country is a big problem.” Still most of the men and women are il-literate and the national il-literacy program goes very slowly. Worst of all the new generation were born af-ter the Taliban regime and they have been deprived of education in recent years.
Three and a half mil-lion boys and girls are
deprived of education, although they had to go to school this year. One thousand schools were closed down last year. Still there is only one teacher teaching 47 students. And also the teachers do not have higher education to teach the students well.
The president called the New Year as an educational year. There is a hope that the number of deprived students will decrease next year.
As long as illiteracy exists in Afghanistan, Afghanistan will face a lot of problems. Such as permanent instability, increasing of pov-erty, unemployment and migration.
Mahdi, his eleven year old brother and twenty eight others and injured fifty more. After the incident Mahdi’s father looked like he was fossilised with shock, his moth-er was wailing with grief and one of his rela-tives who could utter some words said “with Mahdi now gone, it’s as if all of us have died because Mahdi was everything for us”.
After the incident, security forces sealed off the area, council workers removed the debris together with the scattered remains of the victims. Ministers and security of-ficials spoke eloquently and convincingly to the media. The media duly reported the incident with all the journalistic sensations. The president, the chief executive and all other political, tribal and religious leaders strongly condemned the terrorist attack. All promised, as in previous countless oc-casions, to punish the perpetrators and to bring those responsible to justice. Yet the cycle of death and destruction continues and the justice, security, intelligence and all other needed organs of the government have so far proved to be failing so miserably.
In the slums of Western Kabul, life re-turns to whatever one can make of it. For the humans of that city life itself is on live support. Indeed life is very cheap in Kabul and throughout that country.
The inspiring photo of Jahan Taab with her two-month-
old was shared widely on social media.
People were impressed by the 22-year-old's determination to continue the entrance exam despite her crying baby.
Not wanting to abandon ei-ther, she decided to use the floor as a desk and cared for her baby at the same time.
Jahan lives in the rural vil-lage of Oshto, within Afghani-stan's Daykundi province. It is an area with no public transport and is around seven hours away
from where she took the exam.The young mum's dedica-
tion paid off and she passed the exam to Nasirkhosraw Higher Education Institute in Nili city.
She is hoping to get the money together to study sociol-ogy but the cost of the three-year course is between 10,000 and 12,000 Afghanis a term, which works out at around £100-120 ($140-$180).
After spotting Jahan's pic-ture on social media, the UK-based Afghan Youth Association (AYA) is now fundraising to help her with the fees for the private
college.'Beyond expectations'
President of the the AYA, Parwiz Karimi told the BBC: "We want Jahan to be an inspiration to other women in Afghani-stan."
Parwiz says women in Af-ghanistan are not always seen as equal to men and parents often prefer their sons to attend uni-versity.
He added: "Sitting an en-trance exam whilst caring for a child is beyond expectations. She is fighting her way through those challenges".
An Afghan mother who had to sit on the ground and nurse her baby while taking an entrance exam not only made it into college, but has won support to find funding as well.
nation because of their ethnic background. They are forced to live at the outskirts of the capital city without amenities and services associated with urban living like proper roads, electricity, water and etc.
In Kabul, the price of life is very cheap. It just takes a bullet or a hand-grenade or a suicide vest and a man with medieval mind and hairy and dirty appearance to kill and injure one or ten or hundred or more people. Sometimes, when the medieval ter-rorists have bigger urge and craving to kill hundreds, then they simply drive a car or a truck with hundreds of kilograms of explo-sives. Of course at all times the police and security forces fail to stop them and the in-telligence bodies discover them afterwards.
On the day of Nawroz, the new year and the first day of the spring, one paradise-seeking fanatic exploded his suicide vest among the celebrating crowd. He killed
Afghan student caring for baby inspires funding support
By: Salman Jan
Translated by: Zakia Gullabzada
Three and a half million children are deprived of education
By BBC Republished from: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-43485751
Humans of Kabul
The Year of Education
april 7th, 2018
Page 5
Vol.2, No. 86News
One and a half years ago, the bloody picture of a girl and a man appeared on social media, both of whom were stabbed 16 and 26 times in the alley.
Zainab was 13 years old when her family nominated her with a boy from her family. Zainab's marriage was con-ditioned on the wedding ceremony to be held seven years later, but Zainab married at the age of 14, one year after the nomination.
Still, Zainab’s hand had not been painted by henna, that one day she, her father and sister were severely stabbed by her husband and father in law. Zain-ab stabbed 16 times, her father 26 times and her sister, who was pregnant, once.
The story returns to one year ago when it was just 40 days after Zainab's marriage. During her forty days stay-ing at her husband's house, Zainab was tormented by his tortures and her life was turned into hell: "My husband was addicted. He used hashish inside the room and beat me. When I was cry-ing he blew up hashish’s smoke on my face. When my voice rose up he held my mouth tight so that it could not get
out "Zainab, who couldn’t bear anymore
and could not live with him, called her father and defined the situation to him. Her father came and took her home for two days. After two days, her husband and her father in law, who were armed with knife came to their house and asked Zainab to return home immedi-ately. Zainab asked them to wait till her father arrives, who had gone to the bar-bershop, but when Zainab's father ar-rived home, he was stabbed before sit-ting or any preface. He was stabbed 26 times in his body without any pauses.
Zainab got out of the gate and run to the alley affrightedly. Her husband followed her, and stabbed her by knife in the courtyard of the alley in front of hundred pairs of eyes in the light of the day. Zainab was stabbed 16 times in her back of the ear, neck, chest, arms, waist and bosom.
Zainab's pregnant sister could not stay safe too and got stabbed once. Zainab says that if her mother did not escape, she would have been cer-tainly stabbed too: "They had come to slaughter us."
Zainab and her father were hospi-talized for about one month, to heal their wounds. But the physical and psychological wound that has been in-flicted on Zainab has not been healed till now and may be with her till the end of her life.
Zainab says her brother is the groom of her husband's family. They pushed Zainab and her family to threaten to ruin her brother's life and even threaten the lives of her brother and her only nephew, and forced them to consent that they should be released
of the prison.The widespread adoption of such
marriages in Afghanistan, called "ex-change", is common and in many cas-es is an example of compulsory mar-riages: the daughter of a family marries her brother-in-law in exchange of the bride of her family.
Zainab succeeded in divorce almost four months ago, after a year and a half, not with satisfaction, but with reluc-tance, provided that she forgives all her rights, including her alimony and dow-ry. Because Zainab's husband, even after her aggressors, insisted he was happy with Zainab and did not want to be separated from her.
Zainab's mother says she has to change her home every three months since her husband is still pursuing Zainab and may once again hurt Zain-ab and her family. He traverses now freely and considered as a black and dark shadow for Zainab's family, which bitterly exasperates their life moments: "Still our relatives ask us whether Ze-inab is married or not. Requests home address. Life is hard for us. We are afraid. "
Zainab says she uses sleeping tab-lets at night, but she cannot sleep again; if she sleeps, she will see a nightmare and she will wake up immediately "I'm scared at night." I sleep with my mom. When I can’t sleep I use sleeping tablet. But it still does not work. I always look back at my assault scene. "
Now Zainab's elderly mother and father are her only refuge. In general, Zainab's family is immune. The only person who works and provides them daily bread is her brother who has sal-ary of 6,000 afghanis a month.
Zainab, sitting silent and looking at the ground, says: "I want to go back to the past, to my childhood. I want to go to school and university. "
Zainab’s husband and her father in law, should be appointed to three years' imprisonment for the crime they committed under the Criminal Code, but they were only imprisoned for about three months because the claim-ants were dissolved.
According to the Penal Code, if a person is injured and affected by knife blows and for a long time the psycho-logical effects remain in the minds of the victim, in addition to payment of a divorce or a right, he is appointed between three to 10 years of imprison-ment. But this is a different in cases of violence against women.
Zahra Sepehr, a lawyer who helped Zainab with her divorce, says that ac-cording to the Law on the Elimination of Violence against Women, apart from the crimes of rape, abduction and self-immolation, the consent of the claim-ant will stop all judicial procedures.
According to Ms. Sepehr, the con-tributors to this article say that keeping the family foundation is a reason to in-clude it in the Violence against Women Act. According to Ms. Sepehr, this ar-ticle is reasonable if there are partial fights and fears of the collapse of the family system: "In cases like Zainab's case, family does not have any value to want to preserve it."
The Law on the Elimination of Violence against Women has not yet been ratified, and it is only a legisla-tive decree. Ms. Sepehr recommends that some revisions and modifications should be applied to this law.
The narrative of suffering; a fourteen-year-old bride who was stabbed 16 times http://etilaatroz.com/58249 Translated by: Laila Mohammadi
Before the Friday she was in commo-tion of a crucial examination and
then unaware of everything among the snowy mountains in her own world. Yesterday the helping antenna of her simple cellphone which is mounted on the top of their earthen roof, received a signal. Her cellphone rings. the sound of person who is talking to Jahan Taab is acquaintance to her. with a special ruction waving in his rhythm greets to her. Her young brother who is soldier of National Army has seen his sister's pho-tos in social medias and because of his sister praises in theses social medias he had been surprised: " Congratulation, you became famous. Many thanks that you participated in Kankor examina-tion. You delighted me, my dear sister." Jahan Taab is shocked and didn't know how to reply his brother. She doesn't know whether she has to be happy or worried. worried of her husband and her father-in-law's reaction. How will the react. A taboo is broken. Taboo of spreading a rural traditional woman
who is believing in tradition.On the contrary when her husband
Musa and her father-in-law Anwar be-came aware of the matter, they wel-come the happened matter.
Jahan Taab a 25 years old woman, on Friday walks about six hours the distance between her village "Aushto" to "Nelli" capital of Dikondi province inorder to participate in the Kankor examination of Naser Khesraw Private University. While she and her two-month old baby is sitting on ground she is both nursing her two-month old daughter and writing the answers to the questions. In this time she is sud-denly hunted by her meticulous ex-aminante's camera. Yahya Erfan a lec-turer of university spreads Jahan Taab' s photo on his facebook. after awhile Jahan Taab and her small daughter's photo became the subject of users of social medias and shared broadly. But she herself became aware of the subject after two days.
Jahan Taab' s husband's family had
been determined to send her to uni-versity since three years ago, but their critical financial situation didn't allow them. Anwar, Jahan Taab' s father-in-law says that she has been an intelligent and perseverant girl since her adoles-cence and she has always been the first position holder of her class in school. " So, due to her interest to education, she always had book and pen with herself. I thought that if she be deprived from education God may become upset."
Jahan Taab married to Musa a farmer from her village when she was 18- years old. Now she is the mother of three children. Her elder son Hayatul-lah is becoming 5 years old. Khezran Laila's sister, is Jahan Taab' s two-month old baby who participated in Kankor examination with her mother.
Musa is framing, he himself doesn't have land and works for others and at the end of the year they give his part. his income is inadequate to his daily expense. Therefore Jahan Taab missed Kankor examination. Now Musa ac-
cepting all the difficulties is deter-mined to let his wife to go university. He believes that if he can't send Jahan Taab to university, not only he buries her talent but also her children will re-main illiterate.
Jahan Taab who now has the support of her family is determined to study Law or Literature faculty. Up to now 8 members out of 13 members of Jahan Taab' s husband family are studying in universitie.
Jahan Taab has graduated from 12th grade of "Aushto" high school of Meramor district in 1392. After she has been teacher in her village's primary school. Now she is living with her hus-band's 13 family members in Meramor district of Daikondi province. She says that there are a lot of interristed women to education in Daikondi province who cannot continue their education be-cause of economic problems.
Jahan Taab is ready to accept all the difficulties of life inorder to complete her education in Daikondi or Kabul.
Enlightenment from the depths of the mountains;how did Jahan Taab participate Kankor Examination?
Qamar Mohammad Ayoub has al-ready been on an extraordinary
journey in her young life as an Afghan woman. With her help, many more will fol-low.
Ayoub was born in Bamyan, Afghani-stan, and was raised in that mountainous regional capital and in the national capital, Kabul.
The third-youngest child of nine sib-lings, she showed great academic aptitude
in school. Her mother had received little education, and she promoted her daugh-ter’s desire to learn. The family moved to Kabul so that she could receive more op-portunities, such as attending an English academy.
Yet there were limits to what her family could give her. Her school, Sayed Shuhada High School, was overcrowded, with a 50:1 student-to-teacher ratio. It had neither computers for the students nor a library for the girls. (Girls and boys are educated separately in Afghan public schools.)
Ayoub wanted to study abroad. She found out about the Afghan Girls Financial Assistance Fund, an American non-profit that helps young Afghan women pursue an education in the U.S. It supports those who want to return to their home country, work for gender equality, and improve life in Afghanistan.
AGFAF made it possible for Ayoub to attend high school in Virginia. An aspir-ing physician, she became interested in Wagner College. “Wagner stood out to me because of its strong programs in the sci-ences,” she says. “I wanted to go to a small college where my professors would know me. And I love New York, of course!”
Wagner awarded Ayoub a scholarship. AGFAF supplies other essential expenses, such as books, health insurance, and the cost of traveling home during summer break.
“I’m not seeking to live my whole life here, but to have a safe place for my edu-cation and then to return to my country to make change there. Afghanistan needs me,” Ayoub says.
This past summer, Ayoub started her mission of making positive change in Af-ghanistan: She opened a library for the girls of Sayed Shuhada High School.
While AGFAF provided funds, Ayoub worked with school and government of-ficials, obtained permits, and contracted with carpenters and electricians. AGFAF board member Joe Highland mentored her through this process.
“Girls’ schooling in Afghanistan tra-ditionally is, ‘Sit down, listen, and write
down what I say,’” says Highland. “We are trying to create a culture where girls read, ask questions, and discuss what they read.”
The library was created by enclos-ing a balcony within the school. The 500-square-foot space is filled with 1,000 books. Ayoub named the library Ande-shagah, a Farsi word that means “a place to think or contemplate.”
Two local Afghan college students staff the library. In addition to lending books, it offers a book club, a public speaking class, and a photography class.
“The library operates as a center for op-portunities beyond what these girls usual-ly get,” Highland says. “It’s life-changing.”
A Wagner student returns to her home in Afghanistan to create a library for girls Republished from: http://wagner.edu/wagnermagazine/a-place-to-think
Editor’s note: Qamar Mohammad Ayoub is a Star alumna and former Star teacher. She is a sophomore at Wagner College in New York where she studies pre-health. She plans to be a health administrator and policy maker in the future.
A Young Afghan Inventor
Noor Habib Alimi is a 13-year-old ge-nius residing in Kunduz, a war-torn city of Afghanistan. He is in 8th grade study-ing in a school called ‘Lycee Sherkhan’. He is originally from Panjshir province of Afghanistan, but was born and raised in Kunduz. He lives with his father, his mother, his sister and his three brothers. His father’s name is Hamayun Shafaq; he was a heart surgeon, now he is jobless.
Since Noor Habib was only five years old, he had an interest in fixing the things, such as fixing the phone charger, boiler, bulbs, and some other home appliances. When he would do that, his family would get mad at him asking him not to do that because they thought he won’t be able to fix it but make it worse. Once when he was very young, he made a little boat from the wood and would put it in river and would play with it.
With the passage of time, his inter-est in electronics and fixing things grew. He used to break things such as his toys and then repair them again. In addition to repairing them, he would add some additional features to it, such as adding batteries and making them electrical and
work differently.
When Noor Habib was ten years old, he wanted to have his own room in or-der to focus on his inventions, but wasn’t able to have it because of the financial difficulties the family had. In Kunduz, the electricity wasn’t stable, so he wanted to invent something that would give him a light and would help him during win-ters to work on his inventions and also to make a fan during hot summers in Kun-duz. His first invention was a small fan; he made it from a useless and broken lamp.
He then wanted to create an MP3 player for his entertainment and a power cord to charge the phones. Also, in order to be aware of the situation of Afghani-stan, he wanted to create a radio. So, he then thought to invent five things (light bulb, fan, MP3 player, power cord and a radio) in one device. He used to think about this all the time, finding ways to invent this device from the equipment he already had at home; he wasn’t able to find new devices and equipment since they could not afford it.
When Noor Habib was eleven years old, he gathered all the useless material and appliances from home and decided to create the device he has always dreamt of. He used things such as beard and mustache trimmer, wood, toys, and other useless home materials in order to invent the device.
In April, 2015, when the first battle in Kunduz took place and Kunduz City fell to Taliban insurgents, Noor Habib and his
family spent eight days in the basement. After eight days, they escaped and came to the neighbouring province, Pul-e-Kh-umri, and from there, they came to the capital city of Afghanistan, Kabul. Noor Habib’s relative, Parwez Shafaq, seeing this little boy’s talent, was overwhelmed and wanted to make everyone know about him. He took Noor Habib to Am-rullah Saleh, former head of the National Directorate of Security, who then made Noor Habib famous in Afghanistan.
The head of Afghanistan’s Football Federation, Keramuddin Karim, invited him and gave him a medal to encour-age him. The Governor of Kunduz and Afghan parliament also invited him. TV channels such as Voice of America, Na-
tional TV (milli TV) and 1 Channel invit-ed him for interviews. Pazhwak News was another newspaper that interviewed him and wrote an article about him.
In 2016, when the school year started, Noor Habib’s family went back to Kunduz and almost everyone forgot about Noor Habib.
So far, he has created several things, such as a device that does five things at the same time, ‘Livon Hamzan’, which is a device that is used to prepare cof-fee, and an antenna, which has a built-in Bluetooth as well. Noor Habib wants to create tanks and helicopters in the future. ‘’It’s my dream to build a time machine in the future’’, says Noor Habib, the young Afghan inventor.
About the author: Sveto Muhammad Ishoq has volunteered as an editor and translator for the ROYA Online Writing Center and the Interstellar Bulletin. She is a senior at the American University of Afghanistan major-ing in Business Administration. In the fall, she will be a Schwarzman scholar study-ing her master's in Global Affairs at the prestigious Tsinghua University in Beijing, China.
april 7th, 2018
Page 7
Vol.2, No. 86Literary
Excerpt from:
The Prophet
Ay, you are like an ocean,And though heavy-grounded ships await the tide upon your shores, yet, even like an ocean, you cannot has-ten your tides.And like the seasons you are also,And though in your winter you deny your spring,Yet spring, reposing within you, smiles in her drowsiness and is not of-fended.Think not I say these things in order that you may say the one to the other,“He praised us well.“He saw but the good in us.”I only speak to you in words of that which you yourselves know in thought.And what is word knowledge but a shadow of wordless knowledge?Your thoughts and my words are waves from a sealed memory that keeps records of our yester-days,And of the ancient days when the earth knew not us nor herself,And of nights when earth was upwrought with confusion.
Wise men have come to you to give you of their wisdom.I came to take of your wisdom:
And behold I have found that which is great-
er than wisdom.It is a flame spirit in you ever
gathering more of itself,While you, heedless of its expansion, bewail the withering of your days.It is life in quest of life in bodies that fear the grave.
There are no graves here.These mountains and plains are a cradle and a stepping-stone.Whenever you pass by the field where you have laid your ancestors look well thereupon, and you shall see yourselves and your children dancing hand in hand.Verily you often make merry without knowing.
Khalil Gibran (1883-1931) was a Lebanese-American writer, poet, and visual artist. He was born in a village in Mount Lebanon Mustasarri-fate, then controlled by the Ottoman Empire, at-tended art school in Paris, and died while living in New York City. He was part of the New York Pen League, also known as the “immigrant poets” and is the third best-selling poet of all time.
april 7th, 2018
clicks so far. Organizations have also bought this book for their staff and attorneys. It should be available hopefully on March 8th in Afghanistan but the Eng-lish book has been for sale and we’ve been using the money for that for the Persian book. Our first book was distributed in 2013 through six provinces. We have writers around the country and they traveled to Kabul and took it back to their provinces. The same thing will happen with this guide. Last time, we published 1,600 copies and we ran out in a month. I hope it doesn’t pose risk but you never know; it’s Af-ghanistan. One of the reasons we’ve been kind of quiet about the book and not really spoken about it through Afghan media is because some of the material is very sensitive. We are being as careful as we can be. But none of the material is against Islam. It’s all written with the aim of giving women more protection.
Saturday, April 07, 2018 Vol. 2, No. 86
What can American women learn from Afghan women, 87% of whom have faced sexual and physical violence according to your book?
There’s a global brotherhood of misogynists. In the U.S. when feminists talk about harassment, they’re told, “Be quiet. At least your life is not as bad as those poor women in Afghanistan.” When women in Afghanistan talk about violence they face, they are told, “At least we are not objecti-fying you the way Western media objectifies women.” These are arguments used against Ameri-can and Afghan women all the time. Our similarities outweigh our differences. A lot of the is-sues we face are the same even if there are different degrees of intensity. A lesson for U.S. and Afghan women is that we have a common problem to fight and that problem is patriarchy. I also think there’s such a long history of women fighting against op-pression in Afghanistan. Some-times American feminists don’t know about our rich history of women fighters and they portray Afghan women as victims only. People also assume we face the most horrendous violence like stoning and maiming but a lot of women face those extremely scary cases of violence but we also deal with the more everyday normalized kind of sexual harass-ment. I think that’s something we need to change and that’s something Free Women Writers has been addressing ever since we started publishing in English. We’re portraying Afghan women as advocates and change-makers and not only victims of violence.Are Afghan women talking about the “Me Too” movement on so-
cial media?The “Me Too” movement on
social media hasn’t been dis-cussed to the degree that I have wanted. I haven’t seen many personal stories because of how prevalent it is to blame women. I was continually harassed by a driver at a radio station I used to work for at age 13; I started working when I was really young. I come from an economically humble family and each family member contributed. I left my job because I was so scared and I was a child. I didn’t know what happened to me wasn’t right and it wasn’t my fault and that I could go to someone and complain. It was something that gave me a sense of pride because I was bringing money home. I’m not alone, most women have faced harassment and it’s a double-edged sword to talk about the harassment you face. Afghan women can’t win. When activists share their stories they’re seen as playing the victim card. This is where men can come in because they won’t face consequences or violent consequences for coming forward. Whether in Afghanistan or the U.S., women sharing their experiences are incredibly brave.Did you ever get any kind of jus-tice for what happened to you as a teen? Where do you get your strength today?
I didn’t get justice. I get a lot of my strength from other wom-en, I have an incredible group of female friends who have literally and figuratively saved my life. When in their company, I feel like I am growing. Feminists ev-erywhere all over the world have inspired me and I feel energized when I hang out with intelligent, brave women.
and a lot of activists haven’t re-ally been able to talk about these issues. There is a hotline in Af-ghanistan where people can call if they’re facing violence, some people have said it’s been helpful but it’s understaffed. There are also great organizations helping but there’s a gap in knowledge between women and these orga-nizations. If women don’t know their rights, they are not likely to turn to one of these organiza-tions and this guide fills that gap.Can you describe the distribution process of the book? Does this book pose any risk to you?
Women in Afghanistan des-perately need books that em-power them. The book is already being circulated on so many different platforms online that there’s a clear interest in it. We haven’t published the hard cop-ies in Persian and Pashto yet. We want people who have ac-cess to the Internet to first read it online. We’ve had over 1,000
The Tempest: You described You Are Not Alone as groundbreak-ing and unprecedented in Af-ghanistan. What has the journey been like working on it?
Honestly, there isn’t any-thing like this in Afghanistan. My friend Maryam and I wrote it together in English and Persian almost simultaneously. It was an accumulation of our knowl-edge as activists and the women we met through Free Women Writers. It’s guided by Afghan women themselves and we talk about issues other people don’t talk about that often. We inter-viewed women who have faced violence in Afghanistan and two women who have gone through the justice system seeking justice for themselves as survivors of violence. It’s very hard for many Afghans to admit that we have a problem with sexual harassment of children but this book talks about that. It’s very different in that a lot of other organizations
Meet the activist telling the stories of Afghan women that usually never get heard
Editor-in-Chief: Ali Reza YasaEditorial support: ROYA Online Writing Center and Jonathan GreenburgDesigner: Hamid QablanyDistribution: Najibullah Malikpoor 0785103920
C Branch: Abdul Rahman 0744046052B Branch: Rahmat Doorandish 0787372650Bamyan: Essa Omid 0773609598Daikundi: Hamid Naderi 0771991057Ghazni: Essa Jamal 0787126362Institute: Zahra Wahidy 0783356637
By Natalie Ornell and republished from: https://thetempest.co
Outspoken Afghan human rights activist Noorjahan Akbar has recently published You Are Not Alone with Maryam Laly, a book which aims to help Afghan women facing gender-based violence. Based on
years of field research and real accounts of Afghan women and girls whose names and locations have been changed to protect them, the book will be distributed throughout the country this March. Both women are part of the Free Women Writers group which edited the book, a collective of Afghan writers and student volunteers working for gender equality and social justice in Afghanistan that does not receive government funding. English copies are available online. Now based in Washington, D.C., Noorjahan has been featured in Forbes’ 100 Most Powerful Women of the World, the Daily Beast’s Women Who Shake the World and she was named Glamour Magazine’s College Woman of the Year in 2013. She has worked with Afghan and global organizations focused on women’s empowerment and has led nationwide protests and campaigns in defense of human rights. She has been featured in outlets from the New York Times to Al Jazeera and The Tempest recently named her one of our 40 Women to Watch in 2018.
Noorjahan Akbar on #metoo and how she is working to empower survivors of harassment and abuse
