This book is dedicated to the girls and women of Afghanistan, who continue to fight for human rights and gender equality. In the midst of perennial war, they endure and they hope, drawing courage from those who have come before.
Contents
PART 1: SEEKING ASYLUM 1989–1991
Chapter 3: The Road to Terai Mangal
PART 2: THE MELTING POT 1991–2009
Chapter 6: Taliban Nightmares
Chapter 7: Inspired by Oprah
Chapter 8: The Power of Song
PART 3: THE MOZHDAH SHOW 2009–2011
Chapter 9: Nasrin’s Bold Move
Chapter 10: An Explosive Welcome
Chapter 11: The Oprah of Afghanistan
Chapter 12: Making Television History
Chapter 13: Kafir
PART 4: A WOMAN’S POWER 2011–2019
Chapter 14: A Bitter Farewell
Chapter 15: Highs and Lows
Chapter 16: A Dance in the Dark
Chapter 17: A Mother’s Burka
Acknowledgments
References
Prologue
“CUT!” YELLED THE director.
Mozhdah Jamalzadah flipped the front of the burka up over her head, breathing in the fresh, sagebrush-scented breeze blowing off the parched hills of Kamloops, feeling the heavily beaded sweat along her hairline dissipate. The addition of the heavy dark wig made the burka almost unbearable in the baking heat. Mozhdah sighed. There were many hours of filming still ahead for Red Snow—a movie about a Canadian Armed Forces soldier who is taken prisoner by the Taliban in Kandahar while fighting for peace and security in Afghanistan.
The blue burka belonged to Mozhdah’s mother, Nasrin, and as Mozhdah wore it, she couldn’t help but think about the journey it had taken. Many years ago, Nasrin, along with her husband Bashir, escaped from Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, as civil war ravaged what was left of the country following the Soviet Union’s ten-year battle against fierce mujahideen warriors. At the time, Mozhdah was just five years old. The Jamalzadah family fled disguised as peasants, with Nasrin donning the burka, transforming her from an educated urbanite into a silent and obedient Afghan wife and mother. The ruse had worked; Mozhdah and her family eventually made their way to Vancouver, Canada. This symbol of female subjugation had been a means to freedom, and Nasrin had kept it carefully wrapped in tissue paper until now, like a talisman.
But arriving in Canada had been the beginning—not the end—of Mozhdah’s odyssey. Growing up, she faced racism and struggled to fit into her new country. Later, as a teen, she learned to sing, with Afghanistan as her muse. Obsessed with the thought of helping Afghanistan—and especially Afghan women—Mozhdah returned to the country of her birth to launch her own television talk show, based upon The Oprah Winfrey Show. But to some Afghans, Mozhdah was just another foreign invader, and she was eventually forced to flee, brutalized and defeated.
Today, surrounded by film cameras, under the shimmering heat, with the director poised to call “Action!” Mozhdah pulled the burka back down over her head. Yes, she thought, this blue burka—this is where the story truly begins.
PART 1
Seeking Asylum
1989–1991
CHAPTER 1
Betrayal
THE KNOCK ON the door was hard and authoritative, startling Bashir Jamalzadah and causing him to draw a sharp intake of breath. The students looked up curiously. Bashir, who was at the board writing the outline for the day’s lecture, put the chalk down, brushed his hands against his carefully pressed dress pants, and smiled, despite a feeling of foreboding, at his students. He walked to the door and opened it only slightly so that his students couldn’t see who stood outside.
Outside, dressed in regulation pillbox cap and sand-colored uniform, stood a soldier. “Professor Jamalzadah,” the man said brusquely in Farsi, Afghanistan’s official language alongside Pashto.
It was a statement, not a question. Bashir took in the soldier’s clear green eyes, his sun-baked face, and how the uniform hung in folds on the gaunt frame. These days, with intellectuals and opponents to Afghanistan’s Soviet-backed president Mohammad Najibullah Ahmadzai’s government disappearing without a trace, a soldier at your workplace meant only one thing: arrest. Yet there was something vaguely familiar and nonthreatening about this thin young man with leathery brown skin.
Bashir forced himself to remain calm, professional. “I am Professor Jamalzadah. May I help you?”
The soldier introduced himself as Hadi. “Do you remember me,” he asked, lowering his voice, “from your psychology and English classes three years ago?”
Of course—those green eyes. Hadi was one of the young student teachers who had come through Bashir’s classes at Kabul Pedagogical Institute. It seemed Hadi had been recruited into the Afghan National Army to fight the mujahideen opposing President Najibullah Ahmadzai’s government. The battle between the national government and mujahideen—Islamic guerrilla fighters who battled the Soviet Union following its 1979 invasion—had turned Kabul into a heap of rubble from shelling and rocket bombardments. Yet students still came to Bashir’s pedagogy classes, clinging to any semblance of normalcy and the desperate hope that the violence would someday end.
“I remember you,” Bashir said. He looked at the young man. What could he possibly want? Bashir opened the door just wide enough to slip through. He ensured it clicked shut behind him to prevent them from being overheard. “Why are you here?” Bashir asked.
“The Afghan army is coming to arrest you. They are on their way. You must leave—immediately.” Hadi looked fearful.
Bashir stuttered in alarm. “Why? When? Now?”
“I don’t know the reason, but why does it matter? They are coming. I am risking my life to tell you this. You must go!”
Bashir looked at Hadi. “Yes, I will go now. But I have to speak briefly with my students first. Tell me, Hadi, why are you warning me? You’re a soldier of the Afghan army.”
Hadi’s face softened slightly. “Because you are a good man and a good teacher. You taught me a lot. Maybe one day, insha’Allah—God willing—I will be a teacher once again—if the mujahideen