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

some sandwiches and
filled a thermos with ice and water and walked over to the
neighbouring house to deliver the refreshments. When I rang their
bell, Sarah’s husband answered. He shook my hand, which caught me
off guard, because Saudi men make a big point of avoiding touching
women not of their family. The husband was pleasant to me, and
speaking in fluent English he told me he was an air force pilot and
had received his training in France.
    I felt very pleased to have such nice
neighbours.
    The following day Sarah and Ali returned. Ali
ran straight to my garbage can and began digging around in the
trash. I assumed he was going through an inquisitive stage and
thought nothing of it, until I saw him pulling some stringy meat
off a discarded chicken breast and gobbling it up. Sarah started
pointing to her mouth, also asking for food. I quickly got a few
things on the table and watched while they wolfed down the food and
drank two big glasses of cold juice before they abruptly left.
    Late one evening when I was having trouble
sleeping, I thought I heard a cat howling. I looked out of the
window but saw nothing.
    The next morning I heard the noise again and
looked out once more. I was stunned to see it was Sarah making the
strange howling sounds. She was banging on a second-floor window
and I heard her calling my name through the glass. ‘Maryam!’
    I opened my window and shouted, ‘Sarah? What
is going on?’
    The poor woman began to weep. ‘We are locked
inside. My husband is away. We are hungry. We need food,’ she
cried. ‘My son will die without food. Can you throw us some through
the window?’
    What on earth?
    All homes in Saudi Arabia are surrounded by
high walls. Large metal gates secure the grounds. I walked out of
our garden into the street and tested their gate. It was locked. I
assumed that the front door was locked too, or Sarah would escape
rather than cry for help from an upstairs window. I gathered some
food from my kitchen then ran up the stairs until I was above the
walls on the same level. She opened her window as wide as she
could, and I began tossing her bread and cheese, although most of
it fell into the garden below.
    Khalid was away on a business trip, but when
our gardener came to work, I urged him: ‘Come! I need you to break
into my neighbour’s house. There is a woman locked inside. Her son
is hungry.’
    ‘Madam, I cannot,’ he told me in a shaky
voice, looking all around as though searching for an escape. ‘I am
a poor Indian who is in this country working to support my family.
If I break into a Saudi home I will never get out of prison and all
of my family will starve.’
    I understood migrant workers from India and
other Asian countries were frequently ill treated in Saudi Arabia.
I took matters into my own hands. What would the Saudis do to a
pregnant Muslim woman married to a Saudi? Nothing, I told myself. I
took a hammer from Khalid’s small tool box and carried a chair
outside, pulling myself up to the top of the wall separating our
houses. Remembering I was six months pregnant, I was extremely
cautious as I lowered myself to the ground on the other side.
    As I thought, all the doors to the villa were
locked, so I took the hammer and bashed in a large window at the
back of the house. After clearing away the broken glass, I crawled
in through the window and was hit by an airless heat. The
air-conditioning was turned off, although Jeddah was a hot, humid
city. I called out for Sarah, following the sound of her voice
until I reached a locked upstairs door. I smashed the padlock on
the door and released Sarah and little Ali. The room smelled
putrid.
    The three of us fled to safety to my
home.
    I felt their hot foreheads. After being
locked in a small house without air-conditioning for two days, both
were feverish. I insisted they take a cool shower while I prepared
a big meal.
    They devoured the food.
    ‘Sarah, I must call the police,’ I told
her.
    Sarah started weeping. ‘No! No! He will kill
me.’
    Before I could respond, Sarah’s husband burst
through the front door without the courtesy of ringing the bell. He
lunged for Sarah, slapped her two or three times around the head
and started dragging her away by her hair. Ali was screaming.
    The violent scene brought back for me
horrible memories of the many times Kaiss had beaten me while my
terrified son looked on.
    I shouted, ‘How can you lock your wife and
child in the house to starve? What is wrong with