This narrative has been published in partnership with the Guardian.
My day begins at 4:00 in the morning. After waking up, I pray and read the Quran until the sky begins to brighten. Then I pick up empty water containers and walk to the nearby kariz and spring to collect fresh water.
I have breakfast with my son—tea, sugar, and tandoori bread. We live in a remote village in Daykundi province, and unlike many other villagers, our table is not filled with eggs or dairy products.
My name is Sediqa*. I am 41 years old, and I have been teaching at my village’s girls’ school for 18 years. I also studied at this same school. I was among the first girls in my village to return to school after the fall of the previous Taliban regime, when Hamid Karzai came to power in the transitional government and girls’ schools reopened. Although I was over 20 years old at the time, I started my education from first grade.
I studied education at the teacher training college up to the 14th grade. After taking the Kankor university entrance exam in 1391 (2012–2013), I was accepted to study chemistry at the Faculty of Science at Herat University. However, because I had no financial support, I could not move to Herat to continue my studies. Instead, I continued working as a teacher until I got married and had a son. After my marriage, my husband no longer allowed me to continue my education.
Before marriage, I lived in my brothers’ home. I married a man who promised to support my work and education because I hoped to build an independent life. But after my son was born, he not only failed to support me, he also placed the entire responsibility for household duties and living expenses on my shoulders.
He did not allow me to study at a private university, and he opposed my going to work. For a long time, I went to school to teach with a broken heart and returned home carrying an even heavier burden—the money I earned came home with more bitterness than relief.
Toward the end of the previous government, my husband began working in one of the security institutions. But it was not long before the government collapsed and the Taliban took power. My husband left Afghanistan, and my son and I became displaced, moving from one person’s home to another.
The house I had built through years of hardship and with the money I earned from teaching was taken away from me. My husband’s family refused to let us enter that house. We eventually settled in a mud house near the school where I work.
Every morning, after we clear our small dining cloth, I take care of the household chores. I collect the water we need from the kariz or from my neighbors’ wells. After preparing the dough, I go to the area among the trees belonging to the owner of the house where I live to gather firewood. I then put it into the clay oven and bake our bread.
After we eat lunch, I put on my prayer shawl and leave for school with my son.
My son’s school is about an hour away from our home. He walks that distance on foot. The school where I teach is about 45 minutes away from our house. We each take separate mountain paths and walk to our schools alone.
My school is a girls’ school where, 18 years ago, many girls and I gathered under a single tent. At that time, I was both a teacher and a student. There were no professional teachers, and only a small number of girls and young people were educated. Our community used whatever educated people were available to create opportunities for both girls and boys to learn.
Our school had no building. The only roof over our classrooms was a tent, which became unbearable in both the heat and cold. Yet we gathered beneath that roof with great enthusiasm and a deep desire to learn.
Today, our school has a building, classrooms with desks and chairs, and even a water well. But our girls can no longer study beyond sixth grade. I am a first-grade teacher, and my students are girls beginning their first year of school.
The school uniform has now been replaced with large black prayer garments, which we call chadornamaz. Education officials who occasionally come for monitoring and inspections tell us to follow the hijab rules. All girls—from first grade to sixth grade—must wear these large coverings.
The first-grade girls, despite their young age and the long distances they travel to reach school, must carry these heavy garments while also enduring the difficulties of the journey and the heat and cold.
The girls who are starting school for the first time are happy, energetic, and full of dreams. Being around them gives me a sense of joy. They remind me of my own childhood—a childhood I never truly experienced, although I was still happy and full of dreams.
My teenage years were spent during the first Taliban regime, when, just like today, no girls were allowed to attend school. At that time, our only dream was to read even a single word from the Holy Quran or from the poetry of Hafez.
But today’s girls, alongside learning modern subjects, are also interested in sports. Physical education is included in our school timetable, but we do not have the facilities or a dedicated sports instructor. The only sports activities available to girls during official physical education hours are running and occasional races. From time to time, we organize competitions between classes.
The girls dream of practicing martial arts, but there is neither an opportunity nor permission for that. There has never been a women’s sports club in our village or its surrounding areas, and now that sports for women have been completely banned, even the official sports period remains one of the few moments of joy and excitement for the girls at school.
My day also ends with the happy laughter of these young girls.
After the final school bell rings, I walk home. Sometimes I arrive before my son and wait for him. At the end of the day, I prepare dinner, and my night comes to an end after helping my son finish his homework. Then the two of us go to bed.
Sometimes, before falling asleep, anxious thoughts take away my peace. I worry: if my salary is not paid on time again, how will I cover our household expenses? Or what if another order is issued that prevents me from teaching at school and takes away even this small income? What will happen to the future of my son and me?
Life is not easy for a single mother who depends on a teacher’s salary. If I had been able to attend university and study in a better field, perhaps I would have been in a different and better place today, and my biggest concern would not simply be receiving a small salary.
I earn 8,000 Afghanis per month. When we had many students, I taught full-time with this same salary and without any additional benefits. Yet I was happy because no classroom was left without a teacher and no girl was left without an education.
Nahid Naji is the pen name of a Zantimes journalist who is based in Afghanistan.
