I have three
very disparate connections to Afghanistan and yet there is a common thread to
be found in these. First back in the ‘70’s
on a visit to Bahrain from Saudi Arabia, a general in the Afghan army tried his
version of the 21st century hookup.
In a brief conversation-- and I don’t remember where this happened
precisely-- he made it clear what he wanted.
I brushed him off playing the wide eyed innocent and retreated to my
hotel room.
In 2003 I
was in a beauty salon in the Middle East and struck up a conversation with an
Afghan woman. With a sudden 180˚ turn and naked candor she told me she wished she had never
married her Afghan husband, that the only good that came of it was her son whom
she cherished. This was not new. Other women in other Islamic countries had
shared this view with me.
In 2005-2007
my husband was Chief of Party for the Higher Education Project for USAID. Much of his work had to do with improving
higher education for women especially in the outlying provinces. His tenure was fraught with danger in some
instances, but also filled with great
admiration for the women in higher ed who daily worked for their ‘sisters’ and
their right to an education while risking their lives in doing so.
When I left
Saudi Arabia in the waning days of 1981, and 2 short years since the Iranian
Revolution, I really thought the next revolution in SA would be a women’s
revolution. At the time of my departure
a 13 year old girl was the victim of an honor killing. She had brought shame on the family. An uncle had impregnated her. How could this continue?
Almost 40
years later we see some progress, but women still suffer in many of the same
ways that the women of Afghanistan suffer today. Yes there has been progress. In my almost 5
year tenure in SA, Western women had been given the right to drive on the
ARAMCO compound by the king. And today
Saudi women can finally drive despite some activists for this right residing in
prison for speaking out and driving without the blessing of the king. And while there has been progress in other
areas since that time, the domination of males over females remains.
As long as
the honor of the family resides in the vagina of a woman she is at risk of an
honor killing. As long as women are not
protected by law from male members of their family who interpret Islam through
the narrow lens of outmoded traditions and customs, women’s lives will remain
so bound up--their very existence at so much risk-- that only the rare few
women, willing to die for their sisters for their daughters for the mothers
will stand up to male authority.
When the
human species is so hidebound by custom and by the fear of losing its place in
the pecking order whether as individuals or nations, the world view will always
be so blinkered, so parochial that the wheels of change will like Sisyphus
labor to little avail.
So to all my
sisters around the world who struggle daily to feed, clothe, shelter, keep safe
and educate their children, who search within and sometimes find the courage,
the anger, the frustration to speak out, to act up, to stand before father,
husband, brother and shout I MATTER AND I AM YOUR EQUAL, to all of you I think
of you daily. If thoughts have wings to
find you and give you hope, if my vote and my small voice in my own country can
aid you in your Sisyphean task, they are
yours.
