In this instalment of The Daily Hustle, AAN’s Rohullah Sorush hears from a woman who did most of her growing up under the first Islamic Emirate which banned girls of all ages from going to school. She came late to education, but strove to be a good student and managed to graduate from high school and secure a teaching qualification. Then, administrative corruption and bureaucracy under the Islamic Republic blocked her path into teaching and she had to put her dream of being an educator on hold. Instead, she began a tailoring business, working from home, in order to support her family. It is a reminder that barriers to Afghan women and girls fulfilling their dreams predate the current government’s restrictions on their work, education and movement.This research has been funded by UN Women. The views expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of UN Women, the United Nations or any of its affiliated organisations.
A difficult start in life
I was born in Jeghatu district of Ghazni province in 1988. My parents had moved back to our village from Kabul because of the war and also because my father didn’t want to serve in the communist regime’s army. We didn’t have much money and our family always struggled to make ends meet. I didn’t have an idyllic childhood. There were no carefree moments of child fancy and no time for kid’s games. It gets cold in our area long before winter arrives elsewhere in Afghanistan and children like me are sent to the hills to collect wormwood [artemisia, rawana in Dari] to burn as firewood. This was a very difficult task. For several hours each day, we gathered wormwood and other twigs, tied them up with twine, carried the bundles home on our backs and stacked them in a small shed.
I didn’t go to school back then because, by the time I was old enough in 1994, the Taleban had come to power for the first time and the only girls’ school in our area closed. But I went to classes at the local mosque to read the Quran and learn to read and write a little bit of Dari. My family stayed in Ghazni until 1999 when we moved to Kabul, where my father, a master tailor, had found a job working in a tailoring shop.
The chance to get an education
In 2001, two years after we moved to Kabul, the first Islamic Emirate fell and the transitional government led by Hamid Karzai was established. This marked a turning point not only for Afghanistan but also for me and my education. In 2002, my parents took me to one of the newly reopened schools in Kabul’s Dar ul-Aman neighbourhood. I had to sit for an assessment test and [at the age of 14] was enrolled in grade four. I can still remember my excitement on that first day of school. I wore my brand new uniform and white headscarf with pride and bore the weight of the books in my bag with delight.
In those early days, the schools were in a sorry state. Most of our classrooms didn’t have roofs and we had to sit on the floor because there were no chairs or desks. Things improved later when the government started building schools and hiring qualified teachers. I was determined to do well in school, but some classes, like maths and physics, were more difficult for me. Our school had a hard time finding qualified teachers to help us learn these subjects and I took to studying at home, spending most evenings pouring over textbooks. My efforts paid off and I quickly became one of the top pupils in my class.
I graduated from high school in 2010, but the gaps in my learning were not without effect and I didn’t pass the university entrance exam. This was a huge disappointment and it took me a couple of years to recover from the setback. But my parents encouraged me to look into enrolling in one of the private colleges that had opened since the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan was established. Unlike state universities, these colleges weren’t free, but I’d been working weaving rugs since childhood to help with my family’s expenses and I knew I could earn enough to pay the fees. My mother too had been putting a little money aside every month for a rainy day. This, they said, was that rainy day. The matter was settled. My earnings as a rugmaker and my mother’s nest egg would be an investment in my education, which would pay for itself a hundred times over once I graduated and found a steady job.
By then, I’d lost one brother and his wife to the conflict and my sister and brother had married and settled in Iran with their families. They did what they could to send money to Kabul, but they had very little to spare. It was up to me to plan for the future and make sure our little family would be on financially solid ground when my father was too old to work.
This was how, four years after leaving school, I enrolled in a two-year teachers’ training course at a private college. The tuition was 15,000 afghanis [USD 200] for each semester. Money was tight and, on top of my studies and weaving carpets, I had to get a second job working for a woman in our neighbourhood who ran a tailoring shop from her home.
Bureaucracy, corruption and unfulfilled dreams
I will never forget the pride on my parents’ faces when I graduated in 2016. All the years of hardship had finally paid off. I had dreams of getting a job teaching Dari literature, which I’d studied in college along with the teachers’ training course. Being a teacher would afford me a place of respect in the family and the community, and a steady pay cheque would finally help ease the financial hardship my family had endured for so many years.
Armed with my degree, I headed to the Ministry of Education to apply for a position. But my enthusiasm quickly gave way to frustration as I discovered that securing an application form would prove nearly impossible. On my first visit to the ministry, the staff informed me that all application forms had already been distributed. “Come back next week. We’ll have new ones by then,” they said. But when I went back the following week, they informed me that the forms had not arrived. I visited the office several times, but the response was always the same. People said I needed a contact at the ministry to let me know when the new forms had arrived, but I didn’t know anyone there. Then, one day, as I walked up to the counter, an employee reached under the counter and handed me an application form.
When I submitted my application for a teaching position, I was informed I’d need to wait for a call inviting me to sit an exam, and if I passed, I’d then enter a more formal hiring process that could lead to a placement at a school. I went to the ministry several times to ask when the exam would take place, but they kept telling me that I’d get a call when it was scheduled. It felt like they were giving me the brush-off. In conversations with family and friends, I learned about the unspoken realities of navigating the government’s hiring process. People said that only those with a waseta [contact] could secure government jobs. “If only you knew someone or had money to pay a bribe,” they’d say, their voices tinged with resignation.
Finally, I gave up on the idea of getting a job teaching at a state school and decided to try my luck with private schools instead. I can’t even remember how many schools I went to. They were all very polite as they looked over my transcripts and my college degree, but explained they couldn’t hire me because I didn’t have any teaching experience. But how was I supposed to gain teaching experience if no one was willing to hire me as a teacher?
A dream differed
I’d learned tailoring at my father’s knee when, as a little girl, I watched his fingers deftly move over pieces of cloth to fashion clothes for his customers as the rhythmic sound of the sewing machine filled his workshop. During my two years of working for the tailor, I also honed my skills in the delicate needlework and embroidery required for women’s party dresses. Other than my teaching certificate, weaving carpets and sewing were my only marketable skills. I had to put away my dreams of teaching and start using my tailoring skills to make a living. I began to sew clothes for people in the neighbourhood at home.
Every morning, after prayers and helping my mother prepare breakfast, I get to work. I take a short break for lunch and, after a quick bite, I go back to my sewing machine and keep working until the call for the evening prayer. I do fine work, even if I say so myself, and my prices are reasonable. A simple dress costs around 200 Afghani [USD 2.30] and a more elaborate one is 350 Afghani [USD 4]. My reputation has grown with customers coming from all over the city to place orders not only for everyday dresses but also for garments that require fine workmanship – elaborate wedding dresses, elegant ones for special occasions like Nawruz or Eid and even smart overcoats. A couple of times a year, I get lucky and get an order for an entire wedding party – the bride, her sisters and mother as well as her in-laws. On those occasions, I can afford to bring on some help and teach my young helpers the finer points of tailoring.
Business is not as brisk as it used to be before the economy went bad. People now have a lot of financial problems; many, especially women, are unemployed, and new clothes are not top of their priorities. Still, I’m grateful that I have enough customers to give me financial independence and that the business gives my family and me a living, a roof over our heads and food on the table. That I can earn a living and care for my ageing parents is a blessing I don’t take for granted. Yet, I still dream of being a teacher one day, whenever that becomes possible. I hope such a day comes when all Afghan women and girls can work in their chosen fields and take up the work that interests them.
Edited by Roxanna Shapour
Afghanistan Peace Campaign
