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

the social highlight of
Afghan family life. The floor is covered with a large clean cloth,
surrounded with cushions. The meal would be set out on the cloth by
our male servant, and everyone would help themselves with the right
hand, as is customary in our culture. Once everyone had their fill,
the same servant would appear with a jug of water, a basin, soap
and a supply of clean towels draped over his arm for everyone to
wash their hands. The servant would make the rounds, starting with
the eldest in the family, finally making his way to me, the
youngest.
    This after-dinner hand-washing takes only a
few moments, but I always took the greatest pleasure in extending
the ceremony, holding family and guests captive, for it is improper
for anyone to leave the family circle until all have finished. I
would insist that my hands were not clean yet or that the soap was
not suitable. My poor family would wait impatiently while the
servant dashed back and forth filling the water jug or emptying the
basin.
    This quirk of mine lasted until one day when
my father had taken us for a family gathering at the home of Shair
Khan. Although my parents no longer lived in Shair’s galah outside
the city limits of Kabul, my father had not totally cut his ties
with his older brother. Our little family still travelled back for
various family events. I remember we had gathered for a big meal.
After our meal I started with my routine of washing and rewashing
my hands. My own family members waited as usual for the ritual to
complete. My father’s family was not so patient. Exasperated looks
were directed at me. Loud sighs and questioning grunts were heard
from aunties and cousins.
    My father’s irascible brother, Shair Khan,
quickly lost his temper. He was not a man who would indulge any
child, especially a female. As I sat merrily enjoying my little
rite, I was suddenly confronted by his tall figure glaring down at
me. My little hands lathered in soap, I froze in place, looking up
at what I thought was a most forbidding monster of a man. He had
hypnotic eyes, a long straight nose and thin lips. His loud voice
boomed, ‘You! Satan’s daughter! You are finished! From now on, you
will wash your hands only once. Otherwise –’ he leaned down to make
his point, gruffly threatening – ‘you will lose your fingers,
little girl.’
    He was very convincing. I believed him fully
capable of cutting off my fingers with his ceremonial sword. He so
frightened me I was instantly cured of my very annoying
hand-washing addiction. Although my parents did not believe in
threatening their children, I’m sure for once they felt grateful to
Shair Khan. My father’s miserable childhood filled with fear,
threats and beatings had made it difficult for him to admonish his
daughters, even when he knew he should. My sensitive parents were
undoubtedly too tolerant when it came to disciplining their two
willful daughters when we were little, although my mother became
stricter when we reached our teens.
    And, of course, there was the issue of my
determination to be accepted as a boy, which created one drama
after another until I was forced to stop the masquerade. I really
do not know how my parents coped with me. Looking back, I now know
that I was one of the luckiest girls in Afghanistan, a land where
females are made to feel unwanted. Although there were female
horror stories in our own family, until I was a teenager I was
lucky enough to live in a bubble of innocence.
    Few other Afghan girls were so fortunate.
    *
    I was born in 1960, only one year after the
emancipation of women came about with the abolition of the veil and
the chador. Three years before that, female announcers began
broadcasting for Radio Afghanistan for the first time. During
Independence Week in 1959, the wives and daughters of the royal
family and wives of other government dignitaries appeared without
their veils, signifying a new era for Afghan women. Although the
mullahs rose in furious protest, our Prime Minister Mohammed Daoud,
father’s old friend from school days, threw them in jail.
    The 1960s was a very special time when all
over the world people began to fight for human and civil rights,
and women had gained new freedoms. But my country was so backward
when it came to all things female that Afghanistan lagged centuries
behind most other countries. Afghanistan remained predominately
feudal. Although industry was being introduced, most families still
lived as they had for centuries,