Husna Asef Zada Husna Asef Zada, an afghani journalist tells the story of three women. Three women forced to leave their country and to rebuild a new life elsewhere. They share the complex feelings and sometimes contradictory of this traumatic experience. According to the United Nations, women represent 48,1% of the migratory flow.
[by Husna Asef Zada, published on 02/04/2025]
This is a tale of a mother’s separation from her three children. This mother, having endured pain, left part of her being in Afghanistan and traveled to Europe to create a destiny for her children, unaware that migration would place a larger obstacle in her
path, separating her from her children. Khadija Amin, Afghan journalist.
« But you are at home? » A question I had heard many times and had no answer for.
« Migration, with all its opportunities, carries its own pains and specific aspirations. Building a place in a new land, amidst all these hardships, is not easy. From the nights I slept in the park to returning to the world of journalism and writing news in Spain, I have traveled a difficult path, although now I work with a large Spanish company in the documentary production sector and also collaborate with a Spanish newspaper on Afghanistan. »
« Nevertheless, discrimination exists everywhere—sometimes expressed openly and sometimes in looks, jokes, or behaviors that make you feel like a ‘strange’ migrant; someone who should return to their homeland. In these years, I have had many work trips, both in Spain and abroad. But no pain has been heavier for me than the day my children’s father, my ex-husband, took them from Europe to Afghanistan, and I could do nothing. I screamed, I cried, I knocked on every door, but no one heard my voice. »
« With a heart full of sorrow and countless hopes, I went to the German police, crying, I said: « My sons are not at home. » « But they asked : « But you are at home? » A question I had heard many times and had no answer for. The pictures I had of my children were not enough to prove that I was their mother. »
« Ten years ago, when my eldest son was born, my name was not written on his birth certificate. In the official documents of all three of my sons, there was no trace of my name. I had no proof to establish my right to motherhood. This is the greatest pain of my life— being away from my children, a pain that burns my flesh and bones. »
Khadija has three sons, the eldest of whom is ten years old, and the twins are eight: « I don’t ask much of my ex-husband except to see and hold my children. He has taken this right from me, and since November 14 of last year, he has cut off all my relations with my children, and in this year, I have not even heard the voices of my children. I spend my days and nights crying and hoping to hear my children’s voices one day. »
Khadia attributes her separation from her first husband to traditional marriage and differences in opinion, with the pain of migration on one side and separation from her children on the other…
On the other side of this geography, a girl named Angizah also has stories about the world of migration and her fate after leaving her country, Afghanistan.
Angizah
We all know that the path of life is not the same for everyone, and each person walks the road they have chosen for themselves. However, we do not know that for some individuals, this matter takes on a different color, and their path is chosen by someone else, like the Angizah that forced them to leave Afghanistan after the Taliban regained power. According to Angizah speech, her name in dari language means ‘hope,’ but he has no hope for this life.
It recounts one of the hardest experiences; it says; living in Iran taught me that to survive, one must fight, even if that piece of bread is to fill our stomachs; it speaks of the most painful and hopeless memory: « When we first arrived in Iran, we would wait for hours in line in front of the bakery, and when it was our turn, the baker would ask us if we were Iranian or Afghan, and when we said we were Afghan, they would tell us to wait, and we would wait for hours, and after 15 to 20 people, when it was our turn, they would say the bread is finished. »
« Sometimes they would also say that you cannot get bread with cash; you need a bank card, and sometimes, despite much insistence, we could not get more than two loaves of bread.’ Alongside, we were still content with the bread we had earned, but our happiness here has an expiration date, and after every six to seven months, it runs out. What I mean by this temporary happiness is the « residency threat » we face in Iran.«
« We pay a huge amount of money annually to lawyers to help us obtain residency, yet we still wait two to three months for a response from the lawyer on whether we will receive residency or not, spending all our time in fear of being sent back to Afghanistan or being killed by the Taliban there. »
The beginning of a new life in a new country with a new culture, a new accent or language, and the difficulty of leaving behind one’s hometown, friends, and family, as well as letting go of dreams, is something that cannot be expressed in words.
Mashal
Letter from the Islamabad prison, another facet of painful migration: Mashal is yet another victim of this forced migration, having bid farewell to a world of law with his law degree and packed his bags for Pakistan. He has been living in Pakistan for nearly four years.
One could feel the depth of sorrow in Mashal’s words; according to him, if pain could be defined, perhaps its other name would be forced migration.
« I used to think I would become a successful lawyer and make significant progress in the legal world, but today I am struggling with pain in Pakistan. It has been a year since I came to Pakistan when I met a boy and took refuge in him from the pain of migration. Today, that same balm has turned into an inflamed wound and fate has colored my life differently. »
« Our relationship was good for nearly a year and everything was going well until he too came under severe emotional pressure and the world of migration, far from his family and friends, became unbearable for him; he began to excessively use drugs. »
« When I found out about this, I tried to help him get better, but he saw me as his enemy and distanced himself from me. In the meantime, my family decided that I should marry someone else, and since we live in a traditional and misogynistic society, I couldn’t express my opposition to my family’s decision. »
« On one hand, the pressure from my family and on the other hand, my fiance’s poor mental state, along with the hardships I was enduring in a foreign country, brought me closer to a breaking point every day. I told my fiancé about this to wake him up and think about his decision, but he got worse and contacted the person I was supposed to marry according to my family’s decision,
defaming me in front of him and also contacting my family, tarnishing my reputation in their eyes as well. Now I live every day in fear of his threats, and my life has turned into a dark hell. »
« For about six months, I have been starting my mornings with the fear of what his threat will be today and what pain I will have to endure. Sometimes I wish how much better it would be if life were not filled with these pains ! Today, I write this bitter fate of mine from the prison of Islamabad, Pakistan, and for three days, I have been in a refugee camp, or as commonly referred to, in the prison of the Pakistanis, due to the expiration of my visa and not renewing it. I left Afghanistan in hopes of starting a better life, perhaps in another country, but I did not know that the pen of fate was going to write something else for me. »
I have a saying in dari: « How far can I run from you, O pain, when you are always with me? » All of this is a glimpse into the stories of Afghan women and girls in a world of migration. It is hard for me to find words to express my feelings and conclude this text, and no word can convey the weight of the pain of the women and girls of my homeland (Afghanistan).
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