Somaya Ebrahimi

They were terrible decisions we had to take.  

From Spring 2021 onwards, the Taliban were conquering one province after another. So we had to start planning how to continue the work of Medica Afghanistan under the most difficult of conditions. On August 14, we switched to a shift system where only half of the team were working in the office at any one time. So only half of us were at risk.  

This meant I was at home on August 15, 2021 – but unprepared despite all the preparations! When these men on their motorbikes spread through the city like a virus, I was paralysed with fear.  

That evening a message from medica mondiale came in with the first glimmer of hope. We were going to be evacuated. However, only my husband, our daughter and I could go on the list. My husband has five younger sisters. Was he supposed to flee with me and leave behind his sisters, his mother and his grandmother? How do you make a decision when it cannot be the right one? When every possible decision feels wrong?  

The family said: “Go. We will be happy if at least you are in safety.” So this was the decision. My heart was bleeding.

It is still bleeding today. Because of my family, but also because of my colleagues: How does a mother feel who has to leave behind her adult children? Or a daughter faced with the decision whether to save her aged parents or her younger siblings?  

My father drove us to the airport. The white flag of the Taliban was everywhere. I could barely breathe. We were already on the way when we got the instruction: “Don’t drive to the airport but stay nearby.” So my father took us to stay with one of my cousins. The farewell was horrible. That night, our daughter developed a high fever, but we could not find any medication. I sat there, my daughter in my arm, the phone on the floor next to the mattress, in a constant state of alert. They were the worst hours of my life. 

With the first rays of light in the morning, the feed on my phone was showing horrible images: people clinging to the undercarriages of planes as they took off, falling to a death they preferred to life under the Taliban.  

As it became clear that the evacuation by air would not be possible very soon, we returned to our apartment. Day after day we hoped for an opportunity to leave the country. Weeks passed in vain. First, we could not get into the airport, then the borders closed, then I had to renew my passport, then we were refused a visa. Time and again I lost hope. It was not until December that we were able to leave via Pakistan and fly to Germany.  

The first months were difficult. We were living in overcrowded refugee accommodation. Locked in, because Covid-19 had the world in its grip, but also locked out, because of the language barrier preventing contact with people. However, medica mondiale organised German courses for us. I took postgraduate studies at the Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences. In March 2023 I started my involvement with the ‘Self-Care and Collective Care Platform’ project set up by medica mondiale to provide psychosocial support for refugee Afghans and activists in Afghanistan. That year we also eventually found an apartment for ourselves. And at the beginning of 2024 my former colleagues and I set up Hami e. V.

I have been working since I was 16. While at school I was also an assistant in a doctor’s practice. Later, in a psychosocial clinic. In 2017, I started work at Medica Afghanistan supporting women affected by violence. We went into hospitals and prisons, supporting injured and convicted women. It was not a rare occurrence for a women seeking protection at a police station to be raped, or to be imprisoned for filing a complaint against her violent husband. It was brutal – and our work was so important. 

If I had tried to imagine being locked in my house without work … I would have killed myself if we had not been able to leave Afghanistan, if we had to stay there. However, even the relief of escaping hell and the joy of being able to work as a psychologist again are not enough to completely block out the anxiety. I often wish I had a magic lamp and could transport my family to me, to this peace, to this safety.  

To all the political players involved I say: Just take your piece of the Afghan cake, divide up the country, but let the people have some peace at last! Especially the women. Fate has played a nasty game with them. But they have survived. And hopefully they will also prevail over the current situation. Because Afghan women are simply heroes. And heroes never lose their power.