Farkhounda  0:10  
Afghanistan, a country that has been battling war and violence for more than 20 years has been stripped away from its glory. The people of Afghanistan shed tears shed dreams and shed blood, their human rights are being taken away from them every day. This is Red Voices, and I'm your host thought Farkhounda Azizullah. In this series, I will be talking to Afghan students who are raised in Afghanistan and in Canada to share their stories on the importance of education. I will show how the threats of the Afghan political situation affect human rights by talking to people in this field. I want to remind people why we as a world need to acknowledge this issue and bring more awareness.

Rukhshana Ahmadi is a student at Toronto Metropolitan University that came from Afghanistan last year, she was in her graduating year for English Literature at Kabul University. And she was also studying Civil Aviation at Afghanistan Civil Aviation Institute. However, she escaped the violence caused by the political situation of Afghanistan. But there are many like her who still face the struggles of getting an education today.

Rukhshana  1:20  
There was a lot of problem. But to be honest, I was always optimist about getting an education, they don't have the equipments for getting an education when they don't have enough pens and paper, to write down like when their assignments their homeworks. And when I came here, I found it like, okay, stop how it is like we had none of this

Farkhounda  1:47  
Omrah Faqiryar is an Afghan Canadian student, also studying at Toronto Metropolitan University. She's in her fourth year of sociology, passionate about her African identity, she bases, many of her work on Afghan issues. 

Omrah  2:01  
Honestly, like the opportunities here, like, there's a lot, like there's a lot that you can do. And there's like a lot of things that you can just push yourself to get into. But like, at the same time, like, it's just so hard, like knowing that we have family back home, that's like not able to, they literally have to go, they have to put their life on the line just to go and get education. Like how scary is that to be in a world where like, you can be killed just for wanting to learn something, or to become something for yourself. 

Farkhounda  2:36  
For many, like Rukhshana, leaving their home and family to go to school was difficult. Because walking back through the same doors, they left in the morning with their backpacks full of hope, to have a simple educational experience was unknown. And in 2021, when the Taliban took control in Afghanistan, this fear just became greater. 

Rukhshana  2:54  
Actually, it was not good even before coming Taliban because everyday there was bomb blast every day there was attacks on school, hospital, education centers. But after that, when Taliban took over the country it got worse and worse, and still it's going on, to be honest, I should say about myself when I was going to university and when I was leaving home. I was I was telling to my mom like Khudahvaz it means I bye I was not sure because that I can get a chance to come back home or not.

Farkhounda  3:30  
 This nightmare had somewhat become real for Shana. And on that day, when she was on campus at Kabul University, just trying to get an education. She heard the bomb blast. She recalls calling her mother and explaining how she was stuck down there. As there were fights outside with the Taliban in the military. Rukhshana was able to escape, but there were many like her who weren't. She had no words to explain how she felt about the situation that had happened. 

Omrah  4:02  
It's honestly heartbreaking. Like it's just it's so sad like to know that like some of these women like they're like pushing so hard to get to where they want to get they're being like killed while being at school. They're they're not allowed to leave the house most of the time. How would How as a country look, how are we gonna progress? Like how are we going to like catch up to the rest of the countries we're just so like left behind. You know?

Farkhounda  4:30  
Hadisa Gowhari is an Afghan woman who traveled to the United States from Afghanistan. She has a similar story to Rukhshana's when it comes to experiencing violence in education and having to leave everything behind.In Kabul, she worked for two small startups for women's empowerment. Now Hadisa is currently doing her MBA at Willamette University in Oregon. And with her firsthand experience of the political situation Afghanistan Hadisa emphasizes the validity of the issue.

Hadisa  5:01  
Unfortunately, you might know like the world now knows that Afghan women have been banned from getting an education, they cannot go to universities anymore. We have always been marginalized from all these things from our right like our basic human right of, like getting education. If we continue like this, then another generation of women would be like, without any education

Farkhounda  5:29  
With Rukhshana's big dreams of having an education, she got the opportunity to come to Canada in August of 2021. I grew up in Canada, education was always handed to us. So to sit next to a woman who came from Afghanistan, it gives you a newfound respect for learning a human right you never really had to fight for.

Rukhshana  5:49  
When I left Afghanistan, I was the main point that I was thinking about was going back to school. That's the main point I am back to school and especially to journalism school, because I want to be the voice of those who are still back home and fighting for their rights.

Farkhounda  6:10  
 Some of us have the opportunity to see the country we come from. But some of us are left with this fighting identity. The stories our parents or grandparents tell us is all we have, we listen and start to consume the same hope in their eyes, that one day we will go home

Omrah  6:26  
Knowing that other women that look like me, they can't even go on a platform to speak about how they feel. They can like they don't even have the opportunity to go on Instagram and rant, or go on Snapchat, go on Tik Tok, or do any of these things like even have the opportunity to come into like a podcast room to talk about how they're feeling. Everyone has the right to learn and become something like what they want to become. And it's a human right for people to learn how to read and write. You need to learn basic things in life. And when people aren't allowed to do so. It just pushes them in a box or in like in locks them up, and makes them feel like they only have one path, especially for women. Education is like a key to the rest of the world. It's like it's like a pathway to go and do anything you need to do. Like, obviously countries who have a free education more developed are getting to do stuff. And Afghanistan like, like we we're not developing. How are we in Canada? We think that our life is like so hard here. Yes, it can be hard, different circumstances have hard, but look at people back home. And we're here complaining that there's inflation, there's this there's that, okay, but like look at your family back home. Are you helping them come here? Are you sponsoring them? Are you doing anything? Like we need to be doing stuff like policy work, like actual like, going to like government officials and being like, listen up, like we're tired, sending out petitions, talking to a school or university school to like send out like stuff for and university students who are actually Afghan finding ways to work around them as well.

Farkhounda  8:19  
Every person has dreams, a vision for their life. Afghan girls are stripped from these thoughts and left with a feature that has been chosen for them. Freedom is out of the question. Afghan women have followed the covering policies that the Taliban have implemented with their hijab, but their conformity has gained nothing for their rights. This leaves them with hopeless futures. 

Rukhshana  8:39  
And when I'm talking with my friends back home, they are telling me you are the lucky one who has the opportunity that can go to school. And you can study what you want. Because there is a lot of students who wants to do the same thing I am doing here because right now I have the right of doing everything that I want. But they don't have even they accept it to go to university and cover and cover their self completely with black scarf or black dresses. They just because they love education, they just want to get an education. They were going to street and doing protests because they want to go they want to have, its, it's their rights to get an education its their rights to go to school or university. But, I mean they are risking their lives. They are risking their lives because who can do it and I am so proud of each one of them that they can do it. It's not easy. And I can say I am the weakest one that I couldn't do that that and I couldn't stay because I cannot fight it as they are doing right now in Afghanistan for their rights. And they are the bravest woman they are the bravest  girls that I have seen in my life

Farkhounda  10:02  
Protest clip from Tolo news. I always knew that life for girl my age was different in Afghanistan, I started realizing that Afghan women have such a passion to learn, because they were given a template that they should follow their whole life. It's sort of a reality check.  About the things we have that slipper mined every day, while others wake up. And it's the only clear motive for their day. 

Rukhshana  10:25  
I love learning. So it doesn't matter. It's something from the book, it's something from the chapters, or whatever our teacher was saying. It's also learning from my teachers, my classmates, what's their mind is, and how I can learn from them. Not just me, all of us wanted to get our master's degree and, and then after that doctorate.

Omrah  10:56  
I always looked at university, I'm like, this is a time frame of my life, like I'm in my 20s, I get to go do whatever I want. But they're like, their expectations and stuff like is like so different from ours. For us, it's like party time, have fun for them. It's like, like fear. 

Farkhounda  11:14  
Imagine leaving everything familiar to you. The streets you grew up on the food you would savor after a long day. The home your parents built for you, your family, your people. It's hard, right? However, for Afghans, this is a common story, leaving everything in order to gain a human right. for Rukhshana, that was education.

Rukhshana  11:37  
I left everything behind not just my family, my friends, I left my culture, and left my language .I left my mom there, I leave my brothers there. I hope that if they cannot do anything else, the girls and the womango back to school and do what they want. And I am extremely grateful for the Canadian government that saved my life and gave me another opportunity another chance to go back to school to live my life. 

Farkhounda  12:16  
One day, I will be sitting with Afghan women who are around my age. And it is unbelievable to me that the girls of my generation might say, I didn't get the opportunity to study. My mom didn't and I know why. But I refuse and no longer choose to understand why the Afghan girls of this generation don't get the human right of learning. So this will be a war we continue to fight. Thank you for listening to Red Voices and I'm your host Farkhounda Azizullah

Transcribed by https://otter.ai