Kabul in Winter by Ann Jones

Author:Ann Jones
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.
Published: 2012-07-27T00:00:00+00:00

AT MADAR, WE ALWAYS START THE DAY WITH AN ENGLISH LESSON for the staff women. Even on March 8.

“Today we have a party,” I say. “Why do we have a party?”

“Because today International Woman Day!” one woman says, stumbling over the clutter of “international.”

“What do we do at the party?”

They call out answers in a swift, imperfect review of simple verbs: “We dance. We sing. We happy. We eat. We drink tea. We beautiful. We talk.”

“What do we talk about?”

“We talk about women’s rights,” Moska says.

“What are women’s rights?” I ask. Silence. Everyone but Moska looks blank until Nilofar the dressmaker ventures, “What we want? Go to job?”

“Yes,” says Hosai. “Go to office.”

I write on the chalkboard: The right to work.

“Maktab,” says the widow Meryam. “Stoody Inglesh.”

“School,” says Taiba. She helps Meryam write the English word for maktab in her notebook. I write on the board: The right to go to school. The right to education.

Happily married Hosai offers, “Right to husband cook.”

“Right to husband clean,” crows Taiba, who escaped from a violent marriage to a powerful mujahidin commander. “Right to husband sweep.”

There’s no need to tell them about Western feminists’ renegotiation of housework nearly half a century ago; they’ve come up with the idea themselves. Besides, I see that in Hosai’s household, headed by a gentle man, ideas of fairness already arise.

Nadia says, “Right to no husband,” and everyone laughs. She points to the chalkboard, and I write: The right to choose your husband. A discussion in Dari ensues about the meaning of the unknown word “choose,” and heads begin to nod seriously. Here’s the crux of the issue for them: who picks? Of all the women in the room only the widow Meryam selected her own husband. Hosai’s parents arranged her engagement when she was five and married her at age thirteen to her twenty-two year-old fiancé. Later, after she’d given birth to three children, she went through a period of hating her husband for stealing her youth. Like many Afghan women she’d been living “shir ba shir” (from milk to milk)—from lactation to pregnancy to lactation and pregnancy again, with no menses in between. But later still, after three more children, and the death of two, she somehow grew to love her husband and think herself a lucky woman. They had become companions.

I write on the board: The right to vote. This is 2004. All faces turn to me eagerly, anticipating something new, and Homaira asks, “What means vote?” I pantomime writing on a piece of paper, folding it, and handing it over, saying, “Karzai. No Karzai. Vote. Choose the president.” There’s that word “choose” again. “Karzai. No Karzai.” Light crosses their faces. “Oh, vote. Baly. Yes. Vote.” They’ve got the word, and the concept, but I see they’re not impressed. What can choosing a president mean to women who cannot choose a husband? Other things are more important. The right to survive, and the thing nobody mentions: the right to their own bodies—the right to safety, security, freedom from violence, peace.

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