00:00It's not just me at stake right now, it's a lot of girls at stake right now,
00:03and I'm sure they would love to meddle in the lives and the futures of those girls,
00:09but they shouldn't be meddling in the education of those girls.
00:22So women and girls going to school, women teaching in schools, girls going to schools,
00:26that's important for me. If you make a girl miss less than one month,
00:30you cannot recover that easily. That's not possible.
00:41I do get this a lot, you shouldn't be talking, it's your safety, blah, blah, blah.
00:45But then at the same time, there are some things that are important and you prioritize.
00:49You go through all this roller coaster of emotions in just one week,
00:53and then post that, you just have to stand up and start fighting again,
00:59because there is no alternative or no way out to it.
01:02The cases are being plunged off, people are telling women not to return to media
01:24houses to work there, but public spaces are shrinking for women.
01:32How would I believe them if they haven't opened up a school, if the school was supposed to open?
01:55How would I believe them if they were supposed to let the women work? How would I believe them
02:00if they're not asking women, 50% of the country, in whatever the political process they are going
02:06through? They have changed in a sense, they can speak good English, they have a very good PR
02:10system right now, and they are on every news. They are trying to fish for public legitimacy,
02:16they are trying to fish for government's legitimacy. They want that, they want to
02:20be recognized as a government, and they're trying to be conscious of their PR right now.
02:24Girls' education or education in general wouldn't be banned, because they want their image,
02:28but they won't run the schools the way schools are supposed to run, because anyone can claim
02:33that schools are open, anyone can claim that students are going to go to schools, but then
02:37what are you teaching in those schools? What is the liberty that they will be practicing post that?
02:43And also, you can claim that you are teaching them, but then you are teaching them just one
02:47subject. So for that, you have to understand that they might not ban the school, but they might ban
02:54like, you know, academic liberty or academic freedom within that.
03:15I am on several evacuation lists, but no, I don't want to leave as of now that we speak,
03:21because there are a lot of other people who depend on me. And there are a lot of things that
03:25I am supposed to do and continue with my organization, no matter what, no matter where I
03:29am, because that's something that I want to do for the rest of my life. So I'll just stick to that.
03:33I do fear for my family's safety, I do fear for people around me, the people who have worked with
03:39me, the people who have given up on their amazing times to the work that we do. I do fear about them,
03:45about their lives, about their dreams, about their goals, because nobody should be suffering
03:50just because they volunteered or like, you know, work for the betterment of their country.
04:02There were amazing women who have run amazing schools back in the past, and they have
04:07had amazing graduates like Shabana Basij-Raseekh or like, you know, ladies that I look up to.
04:13In the 90s, there were fierce women who had continued working with the
04:17the girls of Afghanistan, and they have run underground schools.
04:29We had a lot of political, civil and social representation. There was a lot of civil
04:34mobility, social mobility. And at the same time, civil society was in charge, and they made changes
04:40and there was a progress. Of course, it was very limited, and it was very elite. I'm not going to
04:44lie about that. And it was limited to the urban areas, but it was still a progress. A step further
04:50is a progress. I just wish we had more sustainable and stable political system
04:55to continue to accommodate these changes and this progress.
05:03It's like, you know, you have a parent that is on deathbed, but you still cling to the hope that
05:07they will recover and like, you know, get back to their lives. So that's what I'm thinking about
05:13Afghanistan right now. I'm just clinging to that hope that they will get back to life.
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