Photo Credit - @edzionmedia
In her wide smiling face I saw defiance and intelligence.
My heart was snared and I didn't know it then but this woman had already won my attention and my allegiance.
I couldn't let August pass without marking the massive historical event that has unfolded in the last couple of weeks. On Sunday August 15th 2021 - after nearly 20 years the Taliban took back control of Kabul.
- My first knowledge of Afghanistan was through YWAM and reading about 'the hippy trail' that took wandering soul searching Western individuals on a massive road trip from Holland all the way through Europe and into Asia. Reaching high up into the mountains of Afghanistan looking for cheap accommodation, a place to belong in a commune and hopefully spiritual enlightenment - on their way to India.
As an artist I also knew this country for the fact it was the source and provider of the brilliant beautiful blue seen in the photo above, a colour found in the dyes created from lapis lazuli, a mineral found in the country, which when crushed releases a glorious blue pigment. Next time you admire Van Gogh’s blue impressionist Provencal skies, think of the Afghan mineral that gives them that alluring colour.
It wasn't until more recently that a book was written and then a film followed entitled ... ' The Kite runner.' I watched the movie in tears. Sobbing for the beautiful people it portrayed and the massive oppressive system they had lived through. Glad the oppression was coming to an end. Amazed that I had never appreciated the incredible scenery and rich culture of this mountainous nation. Shocked at the Taliban and the mean spirited hypocritical pharisaical men portrayed and the religious system they represented.
It was through working at Friends International in Guildford that I met my first actual citizen of Afghanistan. She joined us on one of our walks in the Surrey Hills attending with a male colleague who was a good friend, classmate and a colleague. We talked about the movie and she lit up, delighted to talk about her homeland and pointing out that she was one of the 'minority tribe' portrayed in the movie. Those whom the Taliban resented and persecuted.
In her wide smiling face I saw defiance and intelligence. My heart was snared and I didn't know it then but this woman had already won my attention and my allegiance.
I met ‘Sugar’ ( her English nickname for her actual name - Shakar. Dr Shakardokht Jafari ) when she was working on her MSc at the University of Surrey. Her husband and 2 daughters were still at home in Afghanistan. A year later she had completed her MSc and then continued her studies on her PhD while working on the details needed to move her family over to England.
To understand what led her to this country we need to go back to her childhood, living as a young refugee girl in Iran when Afghanistan was under the rule of the Taliban. Don't quickly gloss over that sentence. She was 'a refugee,' forced to flee, living away from home. A family displaced and adapting to change. Imagine the atmosphere at home. Mourning what was left behind. Adapting to a new culture. Possible identity crisis. Insecurity. A sense of resilience & survival. This is not an ordinary family and this is not an ordinary girl.
This strong willed child wanted an education. She wanted to learn. To study. To make her own way in the world.
And this is where the tragedy of the Taliban lies. Sugar told me that under Islamic tradition girls were not allowed to go to school after marrying age. (13 years old.) She told me that she had decided to defy her father, cancel two arranged marriages and go anyway. Off to school she went, wearing her head scarf. Hiding her feminine curves under a long black chador. Her father had to publicly disown her for her disobedience to the male authority in her life. Her defiance needed to be marked and not tolerated. She was no longer his daughter.
I write these words easily, but the remember that the reality would have been painful. For a father to have to disown his daughter due to religious pressure. This is an extreme and painful situation.
I don't know how this situation played out in reality - One day I will sit down and find out the details. But for now all you need to know is that somehow Sugar did manage to get her education and keep her father in her life. They returned to Afghanistan and built their home brick by brick with their own bare hands. Sugar even chose her own husband. Seeking him in a mosque where she asked God to lead her to him! A man of her own tribe. A man who she could partner with. A man whom God had chosen for her.
Sugar completed her Bachelors Degree in Science - And when her father was diagnosed with cancer later on in life, she was the one fighting for his healing. Carrying him across international borders to get treatment for his cancer. Her education and internal resilience fighting for a solution to his disease.
This is when I met her as a MSc and then PHD student who was specialising in the area of cancer treatment. An area she had a huge vested interest in having watched her father die of the disease.
Sugar reduced the treatment failure and complication rate for cancer patients by measuring the beam of radiation inside the patient body into the exact spot needed to be treated - using the material of a glass bead. With this fine tuning treatment, errors can be detected early and correction applied quickly to the area under radiation.
Sugar's breakthrough was very simple but also vital. In many ways it was just an easy God given inspired idea. The thought was triggered by the memory of her childhood playing with glass beads in Afghanistan. By harnessing the beads quantum mechanical properties she could pinpoint the exact area needing further treatment and reduce the damage done to healthy tissue.
Her discovery could have been used to make money. Instead she chose to give the knowledge away. Carried by the conviction that she wanted everyone to freely be able to receive what she was clever enough to understand.
I will always remember the joy when she finally managed to bring her husband and daughters to join her here in England. How she hunted for a tiny barely liveable expensive flat to live in with her family in Guildford. All 4 of them sharing a tiny space with only one bedroom, followed by another year squeezed into a small studio flat. I remember her daughters being enrolled in a local school when they spoke barely any English. She worked hard to help her husband get a job. A clever man who had previously work in a prestigious position worked at Kentucky Fried Chicken. Later on he worked as a private driver when he needed a more flexible job and after he had to retake his driving license in a foreign language. This was to work around helping Sugar who was by now pregnant with their third child and had her own battle to fight with cancer.
Of course Shakar and her family would have preferred to remain in Kabul and contribute to their countries development. But knowing the reality of life in Afghanistan Sugar had the foresight to fight to get her family out.
She is now living in Portsmouth and has added a son to the family and survived her own encounter with cancer.
And therein lies the sorrow of this past fortnight and the terror that has followed the Taliban in their return to power. The intellectual brain drain. The most talented who would have contributed so well to the country they love - forced to flee. Women who tend to channel their energy into fighting for family and community, suppressed by male ego and a self-righteous power struggle.
" Instruments at Kabul school for music smashed by their own students as they did not want to be found with them by the Taliban." - David Loyn, International NEWSWEEK.
I watch the news through her eyes. Remembering her sister and the wider extended family left behind. The pain of not being able to get them out. The pain of 20 years of freedom all washed down the drain in a fortnight. Families locked behind reinforced doors. Staying away from the scrutinising eyes of the Taliban. Trying to keep hidden and left alone. Not just for one day or one week, but possibly for the rest of their lives. Hoping the gun they have hidden will never have to be used! Wondering if they will ever be free to wander carefree and relaxed in those beautiful mountains again.
This is how one woman has forever changed my understanding of Afghanistan.
You may think that her country is far away and removed from yours, but next time you, a friend or a relative are facing the terrifying word ‘CANCER’ - you can be grateful that you will possibly be receiving radiation treatment that she has improved.
I will leave you with a memory which I will always remember as a highlight of our acquaintance.
The afternoon I took her and her family to a local barbecue in my old convertible Mercedes SL 280. A glamorous beautiful beast of a car, heavy on petrol, chrome & leaded paint. On a semi sunny day, with the roof down and no seat belts in the back. I looked across at Ibrahim in the passenger seat and Sugar and the girls behind us and smiled apologetically.
"Are you alright? Sorry about the lack of seat belts! I hope you & your family feel safe. "
She beamed at me ...
" Yes, we are fine. I am sooo ... happy. This reminds me of driving in Kabul."
Her heart and her home will always be in those mountains and I will forever feel humbled and awed by her resilience and strength. Glad to have met her.
We need to tell our stories. 'The Kite runner' educated me and gave me a tangible understanding of a distant country. It led me to connecting on a deeper level with Sugar. And because of this one woman and her life story - Afghanistan will always have my attention and allegiance.
( Photo Credit - Dr Shakardokht Jafari )
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