Free Dear Zari: Hidden Stories from Women of Afghanistan by Zarghuna Kargar Page B

love stories I grew up with.
    Perhaps it is inevitable then that the idea of real love between a man and a woman that my friends and I believed as children came totally from these over-romanticised stories. I’ve since realised that these tales do not, of course, match reality. In the romance films I grew up watching, the elders in the local community helped pave the way for the young lovers to come together – they extol the virtue of two young people in love overcoming all obstacles to be together. These stories are a celebration of love.
    Like so many love stories, Nasreen’s involves the boy next door. They actually lived in the same house as many Afghan families do. Nasreen wasdiscovered by one of our local reporters in Kabul but she didn’t want to speak to her, and insisted she would only talk to me, so I interviewed her down the line from a BBC studio on the local reporter’s mobile phone.
    My name is Nasreen and I live in Kabul. I’m about forty years old and have spent much of my life crying and suffering, and here’s why. Have you ever wondered about those women who are married to a man whom they never loved and were never suited to?
    When she asked this question I hesitated. I wanted to shout out, ‘Of course I know!’ I knew just how it felt to pretend to be asleep when my husband came to bed so as to avoid having to talk to him.
    My husband is sixty years old and I haven’t seen my parents for a long time. When I was thirteen years old we shared a house in Kabul with another family, and although they were Tajik and we were Pashtun, my mother and father got on with them very well and I really loved that family. They had a son who was about eighteen years old and some daughters, too, and sometimes I’d play with them. It was a carefree time. In fact, looking back, it was the happiest time of my life. I would often go to the boy’s mother and she would take care of me in a special way. Her son’s name was Abdullah and he was in love with me, and I used to flirt with him. We were both young. My heart would beat harder when I heard his voice and I would find any excuse to take something to his room. It was easy to fall in love with Abdullah because he was so handsome, and because we were able to spend so much time together .
    The afternoon was a special time for us because most people in Kabul – especially older people – take a nap after praying. I would pretend to my mother that I was going to sleep but as soon as I heard her snoring, I would get up and go to meet Abdullah. I would wait for him under the shade of a tree, and then we would sit leaning against a wall and talk and talk. My love for him was pure, as was his for me .
    And do you know, Zarghuna Jan, Abdullah didn’t ever spend his pocket money on himself. He liked to see me wearing colourful glass bangles sohe spent all his money buying them for me, and I loved every single one of them. They symbolised his love for me and I always took great care of them .
    Nasreen’s voice sounded choked, and then she started crying.
    Zarghuna Jan, our love was so innocent. I would only have to look at him and he would gaze back at me, and we knew just how much we felt for each other. He had already told his mother that if she wanted to marry him off then it would have to be to me, because he was in love with me. His mother had agreed to this and that’s why she gave me special treatment, because she had already begun to see me as a future daughter-in-law. It was easy for her, wasn’t it?
    I didn’t understand what she meant.
    It was easier for her because it was her son who was in love, not her daughter. For boys to have these feelings is something for a mother to be proud of and celebrate. It shows that a boy is maturing, so mothers would make sure other women heard that their son was in love and becoming a man. And just as Abdullah’s mother was full of joy, so too was I blissfully happy. I felt free as a bird and when I imagined Abdullah as my