Afghanistan Peace Campaign 
One of the first things the Taliban did after returning to power in August 2021 was to ban girls from going to school beyond grade six. Nearly five years later, the ban remains in place. For many, the classroom they had sat in only days before was suddenly out of reach. In this instalment of The Daily Hustle, Freshta, a girl from Ghazni who was about to finish grade nine when the Taliban closed girls’ secondary schools, tells Rohullah Soroush how she refused to let her education come to an end. Unable to afford private tuition or reliable internet, she found an unexpected classroom on the radio. Through educational broadcasts, determination and the support of her family, she has continued to study, even without exams or certificates, while preparing for the day she hopes girls will once again be allowed back into school.
The last time I sat in a real classroom, with a teacher standing by the blackboard and my classmates sitting all around me, I was about to finish grade nine. Then the Taliban came back and the classroom door closed on me.[1] At first, they said it would only be temporary and that girls’ schools would reopen soon, but weeks turned into months, months into years and schools are still closed for girls like me.
Where my story begins
My name is Freshta and I’m 20 years old. I was born in Malestan district of Ghazni province, but my family has lived in Ghazni city since I was seven. My parents thought the provincial capital would give us better access to school and other services than our village could offer. I still live here with my parents and younger sisters and brothers. And it’s also where I started going to school.
We’re not a rich family. We have some land in Malestan, which my father used to farm, growing wheat and potatoes. After we moved to the city, he went back and forth to the village, working the land. The harvest paid for our expenses and he brought some home for the family. My mother used the wheat to make bread and we had potatoes to eat all year. But several years of drought have taken their toll and there is not enough water for my father to keep farming. So he had to take a job in the city and later he opened a small grocery shop in our neighbourhood. My brothers are still in school and too young to work, so my father is the only breadwinner in the family. Because of the wars during their own childhoods, neither of my parents had the chance to go to school. That is why it’s so important for them that all of us children to be educated.
The day classrooms fell silent
I had just turned 15 and was about to finish grade nine when the Taliban returned to power. Almost immediately, they began putting restrictions on women and girls. One of the first things they did was stop girls going to school beyond grade six. From one day to the next, I could no longer go to school, and everything changed.
I remember the feeling that settled over our house in those early weeks. It was heavy and quiet in a way that is hard to describe. Everyone in the family was worried about the future. But for me, the main concern was that girls’ schools were closed. Every day, I asked my parents whether there was any news about schools reopening.
Here in Afghanistan, Nawruz is not only the start of the new year; it’s also the start of the school year. That year [March 2022], Nawruz didn’t feel the same. There were no celebrations, just waiting to see if girls would be allowed to go to school. We weren’t, and every year since then, Nawruz keeps coming and going without girls’ schools opening their doors.
When one door closes
My parents looked to see if there was another way for me to keep learning. We knew there were online courses, but they weren’t an option for us. We couldn’t afford the cost of an internet connection. Even if we could, internet service in Ghazni is unreliable. Sometimes it’s so slow that pages won’t load and sometimes it stops working altogether. Trying to follow online lessons is almost impossible because they keep cutting out. So internet courses were out of the question for me.
I also knew that some teachers were secretly holding classes. I talked it over with my parents and with one of my former classmates. We worked out how many teachers we’d need to cover subjects like maths, science, Dari, history and English, but when we added up the cost, we realised there was no way we could afford it. And money wasn’t the only problem. If a teacher came to our house, or if we went to theirs, the neighbours would notice. In Afghanistan, people talk, and gossip spreads quickly. When you’re a girl, the gossip can follow you and it doesn’t have to be true to damage your reputation or your family’s standing in the community.
Finding hope on the airwaves
Then, one day, that same classmate told me she’d found some radio stations that air educational programmes. “We don’t need a classroom or a computer,” she said, “we can just listen to the radio. It’s a different way of learning.” Her words stayed with me and I started looking into what I could learn on the radio.
It seemed easy enough, but not all radio stations have a strong enough signal to reach Ghazni. In the end, I found only two that I could tune into consistently: the BBC’s Dars )Lesson(, a programme which teaches English, and Radio Arman FM, which airs lessons in other subjects. Now, I study English, science and other school subjects on the radio. For maths, physics and chemistry, I listen carefully and follow the lessons using the official school textbooks that my father buys for me.
I learn a lot from the programmes, but it’s not the same as being in a classroom. Nothing can replace having a teacher in front of you and classmates learning beside you.
I also follow a weekly psychology programme on Radio Arman FM. It’s not a school subject, but it helps me understand people and also manage my own anxieties – the ones that come when you don’t know what the future holds.
The way I learn from the BBC’s Dars programme, which airs on Saturdays, is different. There are no textbooks or handouts to go with it. I have to take extra care to make sure my notes are accurate. I listen carefully and write as quickly as I can because I don’t want to miss anything.
I’ve heard that some radio stations offer exams at the end of their courses, but none of the programmes I follow do, at least not in Ghazni. I’ve never heard the BBC’s Dars programme mention any exams. Anyway, I’m not sure it’s even possible to organise exams for girls learning through the radio. So I study without any certificate or official proof of what I’ve learned. I take notes. I review them. I keep going.
Making every second count
One challenge is that the programmes are broadcast at fixed times, but life at home doesn’t always follow a strict timetable. We often have guests visiting us from the village, people who come to the city to see doctors or for other business. As the eldest daughter, I have to help my mother with cooking, cleaning and other chores around the house. When guests arrive, everything else has to wait.
Fortunately, most of the programmes air again later in the week. That makes a huge difference because I don’t have to worry about missing a lesson, I can listen late at night or early in the morning when the house is quiet. I also record the lessons so I can listen again and check my notes to make sure I haven’t missed anything.
A father’s greatest gift
For a while, things were going well. I listened to the education programmes on my phone. It was just a simple phone with an FM radio and I had to plug in my earphones to get a signal. For the first time since the schools closed, I felt as though I was moving forward again. Then one day, my phone broke. The screen went black. Just like that, the door to learning seemed to close on me once more.
I knew my father couldn’t afford to buy me another phone, so I didn’t even ask, but after a few days, he realised something was wrong.
“What’s going on?” he asked. “Why are you so upset?”
I told him my phone had broken and that I could no longer listen to my lessons. He didn’t say anything. He just reached into his pocket, took out his phone – his only phone, the one he uses every day to keep in touch with relatives, friends and the suppliers for his shop – and handed it to me.
“Here, use mine,” he said.
Waiting for the doors to reopen
Now my father and I share his phone and I’m back on track learning again. Every day I tune in, take notes and keep studying.
I don’t know when the Taliban will let girls back into school and going to university feels like a distant dream. Radio lessons have kept me learning and I’m very grateful for them, but I keep waiting for the day when schools reopen for girls. The radio can never replace the excitement of a real classroom – the sound of a teacher’s voice explaining a lesson, the questions from other students or the sound of chalk on a blackboard. These are the things I miss most.
For now, I keep my mind active. I read geography and history books, revise my school subjects and go over my notes again and again. I want to be ready for when girls are finally allowed back into school. I want to sit the exams for grades 10, 11 and 12. After that, I want to go to university. That is the future I am preparing for.
The classroom door may be closed to me today, but I will keep learning until the day it opens again.
Edited by Roxanna Shapour
References
| ↑1 | The Taliban announced the reopening of secondary schools on 17 September 2021, but only for boys and male teachers, effectively excluding girls from secondary education (Reuters). The ban was reaffirmed by the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan on 23 March 2022, when girls who had returned to school expecting classes to resume were sent home hours after schools reopened (Reuters, Amnesty International). |
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