F. Faham*

For reasons of safety F. Faham's photo cannot be displayed. Content Warning: Sexual and gender-based violence. Please take care.

My mother had to fight to let me go to school. She reassured my uncle: “It’s only until she is ten.” When I turned ten, she bought me a burka. So I could keep going to school. Unrecognised.  

My mother cleared the way for me – and I fought my way through. At the beginning of every main school holiday, my father insisted: “That really is enough now.” But every time I managed to get his permission for another school year. When I was due to sit my maths exam, my brother threatened: “If you go, I’ll break your legs.” I went. To university, as well. I had to sit the final exam of my law studies in secret.  

Later, I made sure my youngest sister could complete training to become a midwife. And I helped other women to fight and gain a bit more freedom for themselves. Women who had been beaten. Women who were stuck in prison. Women whose life had been threatened because they reported their violent husbands.  

For many Afghan women, their difficulties did not begin when the Taliban took over the streets. They began much earlier – at home. This is why we visited women in their homes, knocked on their doors, sat in their living rooms.  

We offered family mediation to couples. But our support was not over when the conversation was over. We kept up the contact and asked: “How are you now? Is he sticking to the agreements?” And if the women decided they wanted a divorce, we provided legal support. Today, when I think back, I am surprised how well I dealt with it all. Sitting opposite a man who was willing, at any moment, to destroy the woman next to him because she dared to complain. I will never forget one young woman who reported her husband to the police. When I met her, she had fractures in her arms and legs, and even in her skull. Her husband was convicted, and she filed for divorce while he was in prison. However, upon release he forced his way into her house and murdered the young woman and her mother. 

Part of our work in the prisons was to assist women to re-integrate into everyday life after the end of their prison sentence. This was often difficult, since their imprisonment was considered to have ‘disgraced’ the family. So they were by no means free in the eyes of the patriarchal society. If we saw that the risks to them were too high, we arranged a space for them in a safe house.  

During my work I stared into hell. Often, the only way out from this hell was the solidarity we showed the women.  

Many men saw us as a threat. And they became a threat to us when the Taliban seized power.

So when they took power in more cities in August 2021, some of my colleagues and I fled from Herat to the apparent safety of Kabul.  

I had only packed a small bag with a change of clothes – not even a second pair of shoes. Enough for a week, I thought, until everything calms down and I can go back to Herat. In fact, I have not seen my home city since then. 

On August 16, my husband joined me in Kabul. In mid-October we managed to get visas for Pakistan, paying 400 euros for the piece of paper that had previously cost 80 cents. We took minibuses eastwards from Kabul. We waited nine hours at the border crossing in Torkham, standing in the dust clouds and chaos created by cars, buses and desperate humans. My elegant shoes from Herat were not suitable at all for these hours of waiting around.

Eventually I was able to leave my homeland, coated in layers of dust and walking in pink plastic flip-flops.  

In Germany it took me a long time to realise we were safe. One night there was a loud bang from the recycling depot next door. Panicking, I woke my husband up: “A bomb went off!” “No,” he said, calming me down, “there are no bombs here.” 

Germany was my way out. But I paid a high price for this: the loss of my identity. In Afghanistan I had achieved changes in society through my efforts. But who was I now? Without profession, family or language?  

There are opportunities and I am trying hard to make use of them. 

In October 2023 our son was born. Two days before his birth I submitted my thesis at the Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences. Six days after the delivery, I was already back in my German classes – online. As quickly as I can, I want to be able to support other women in Germany, too. Because life is not possible without solidarity between women. 

It was always women who had my back. My mother, who fought to let me go to school. My colleagues. The women at medica mondiale. We need more solidarity so that one day the women of this world can live in freedom. 

*For reasons of safety, the name has been changed.