For the Love of a Son: One Afghan Woman's Quest for Her Stolen Child

he could.
    I laid flowers on Papa’s grave, said a few
prayers, talked to him and felt better for the experience.
    I felt so lonely for Papa that I began a
habit of visiting his grave once a week, although I never revealed
these visits to Khalid. My driver soon accepted the situation and
the cemetery caretaker relished the extra funds. It was a great
comfort to me.
    I didn’t care that I was flouting Saudi
Arabia’s silly taboo against women visiting graveyards. Such
preposterous rules are made to be broken.
    Living in Afghanistan, and then in Saudi
Arabia, taught me over and over that when women have no control,
their lives are always in danger. And so it proved for a dear
friend, an Iranian/Saudi woman named Soraya. She and I had met in
Egypt before I arrived in Saudi Arabia. We had been fast friends
since that time.
    Soraya called me one day and told me she was
in the hospital. She asked me to come quickly. I ran to her side
and was startled to see that she was extremely ill, wheezing for
every breath. In between each gasp, Soraya began cursing herself
for coming to live in Saudi Arabia.
    ‘Soraya! Save your breath! But do tell me
what happened.’
    Soraya gasped out her story, that she had
become ill in the middle of the night with a raging fever. She had
called an emergency number for an ambulance to take her to
hospital.
    ‘Where is your mahram?’ the man answering the
emergency line had said, asking for her male guardian.
    ‘He is my brother, but he is out of the
country on business.’
    ‘Then you must wait until he returns,’ the
man said. ‘Your mahram must sign for you to be taken by ambulance
to the hospital.’
    ‘I will be dead by the time he returns. I
think I have pneumonia,’ Soraya said.
    The man said unapologetically and
matter-of-factly, ‘If you are not dead when he returns, then call
us back.’
    Poor Soraya. I nodded at my friend in
sympathy. I had not been allowed to sign for little Duran to be
circumcised. I had not been allowed to accompany Khalid’s family to
Taif, because Khalid had been out of the city on business and
unable to sign for me.
    But Soraya was a resourceful woman. She
slowly dressed then stumbled out of their villa to the main road
where she hailed a taxi and somehow convinced the driver to take
her to the hospital. Once there, she faced more obstacles, being
refused treatment because her guardian was not there to sign for
her to be admitted. Thankfully, a western physician intervened and
Soraya was finally admitted to the emergency ward and given
medication.
    Tragically, the delay had given the pneumonia
time to overwhelm Soraya’s system. My dear friend did not survive
the day, dying soon after my visit. Another good woman was dead
only because of the country’s absurd restrictions against
women.
    Once again, I was not allowed to attend
Soraya’s funeral. But Khalid was feeling guilty about my bruised
feelings, so he offered to take me to the cemetery to visit my
father on that day. That’s when I bragged to my surprised husband
that I had been visiting my father routinely.
    Poor Khalid slapped his forehead a couple of
times, but then drove me to Eve cemetery.
    ‘Why are we here?’ I asked, puzzled.
    ‘I thought you wanted to visit your father’s
grave.’
    I felt a rush of anger that my husband had
forgotten where his father-in-law was buried. ‘He is at Qasuim
cemetery.’
    Khalid looked at me in astonishment. ‘Is that
where you have been going? To the Qasuim cemetery?’
    ‘Yes. To my father’s grave at the Qasuim
cemetery.’
    ‘Maryam, your father is not buried there . He is buried here , at Eve cemetery.’
    ‘How can that be?’ I stammered. ‘That is
where Stalleh took me.’
    Khalid started laughing. ‘Maryam, Stalleh did
not attend your father’s funeral. I sent him on errands on the day
of the funeral. He obviously thought your father was buried
at Qasuim but he was mistaken.’
    My temper flared, thinking of the many times
I had bribed the caretaker at Qasuim, the flowers I had placed on
what I had thought was my beloved father’s grave, the prayers I had
made, the long hours I had sat on the ground beside his grave –
talking to a stranger !
    ‘ You and your stupid country! ’ I
screamed at my husband. ‘If I were living in America, I would know
where my father was buried and I could visit his grave openly! Even
in Afghanistan I would have been permitted to bury my father and
visit his grave.’
    Khalid found the incident