Awista Ayub - However Tall the Mountain: A Dream, Eight Girls, and a Journey Home

Reborn

America, June 2004

Return to Kabul

Samira, Kabul, August 2004

Come Back, Come Back

Samira, Kabul

Nice Kick, Bad Aim

America, June 2004

That I May Play Soccer

Robina, Kabul, September 2005

The Quiet Leader

Robina, Kabul and America

Between Two Worlds

Sisters

Freshta and Laila, from Pakistan to Kabul

Gathering of the Girls

Freshta and Laila, Kabul, December 2005

Far Afield

America, July 2004

A Team of Their Own

Ariana, Kabul, December 2005

On the Road

America, JulyAugust 2004

Stars

Kabul, December 2005

Life Can Be Different

Miriam, Kabul and America

Winning

Miriam, Kabul, December 2005

Flying Away

August 2004

The Journey Home

Kabul, April 2006

Toward the Goal

Kabul, July 2007

LIKE THE AFGHANISTA girls soccer team, this book was the product of a collaborative effort. I want to thank two people without whom this book would not have been made, Veronica Golos and Sophia Hollander.

As a poet and editor, Veronica Golos brought to the book a keen editing eye, and a deep understanding of and extensive research about Afghanistan. Her attention to language and nuanceand her extraordinary patiencehelped to add a literary dimension to the book.

And writer Sophia Hollander was instrumental in the writing of the first draft of this book. She traveled with me to Kabul and came to understand not only these girls, but the culture of Afghanistan. Through the intense hours of interviews and research, the stories of the girls would not have been as true without her contribution.

It is to them that I am most grateful.

TODAY, AFGHANISTA is in the throes of grappling with the profound issue of the type of country it will become. This healthy self-questioning in the aftermath of nearly three decades of war brings with it conflict and debates about the preservation of tradition versus modernity, and has descended at times into harsh accusations and actions.

To protect the girls, aspects of their stories have been changedincluding names and certain identifying details.

The first-person narratives are based on my memories, bolstered by interviews with those who experienced it with me including (but not limited to) the girls, coaches, school administrators, Afghan officials, and my own family. The chapters of the girls reflect extensive interviews with each girl and her family. These stories are as accurate as memoryand my knowledge of their lives and householdscan make them.

Still, at times, nailing down the exact dates or chronology was a challenge, as sustained war has destroyed records, along with the countrys school system.

Throughout this book, I have sought to capture each of their lives as truthfully as possible, while preserving their privacy, security, and personal peace.

AFTER BEING BUILT in 1923, Afghanistans Ghazi Stadium in Kabul became the site of numerous mens national team soccer games and national celebrations. But from 1996 to 2001, during the Taliban regime, those caught stealing, committing acts of adultery, or even lesser offenses were punished openly on the stadium grounds. Men and women were brutally executed in front of crowds gathered at the stadium, as a reminder of the fate that would befall anyone who dared to make the same mistakes.

Today, while the memories of the executions are not yet forgotten, Ghazi Stadium has once again returned to its glory hosting national parades, but this time the crowds also gather in support of Afghanistans first womens national soccer team. Though the struggle for freedom continues, there is a glimmer of hope on the green fields within Ghazis walls.

The white ball bounces down a stark rutted slope in Kabuls Old City, dust rising in a plume as it tumbles past a well surrounded by a gaggle of children, their water pails glinting in the intense sun. The ball careens off a series of footholds carved by hands or geologyor a recent explosion. From behind plastic-sheeted windows, in brick clay homes perched precariously on the hillside, curious eyes follow the falling globe .

Almost red with dust, the soccer ball finally stops on the well-traveled dirt path below. Three boys, thin and laughing, stop also, and stareas if it had been dropped from heaven.

A soccer ball, one boy exclaims.

Whose is it? asks another.

The boys look around, squint up the hillside.

Lets play! yells the third.

Thirty feet above, a girl watches the boys with amusement. She sips from her cup of tea. Ill get the ball later, she says to herself. And show them how to kick it.

O N THE MORNING of April 28, 1978, my father woke up to the radios newscast: The previous government has been removed and the new revolutionary government now represents the people of Afghanistan. The Marxist Afghan-led Peoples Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) had launched a coup against the government of Mohammed Daoud Khan, whoalong with most of his familyhad been shot inside the Presidential Palace.

Overnight, life changed for millions of Afghans. The coup divided the country, fractured families and friendships.

Within a week, my father lost his engineering job.

Soon after, a former colleague of his from the Ministry of Power and Water stopped him at the bazaar. Your life is in danger, he told my father. You should have supported the regime in a more demonstrative manner.

My father didnt wait to see what would happen; he went straight to see his father-in-law, Mohammad Iss-haq Babai, who refused to acknowledge the new government, or the redistribution they planned for his five hundred acres.

Things are getting bad, my father pleaded. We must save our lives. Please, the entire family should flee to Pakistan.

What? You want me to leave my house, my city, my country, to go and live there? Babai replied. I will never do it.

But I am going and I am taking my family with me.

My grandfather, unwilling to leave his land, was shot and killed outside of his home in Kandahar a few months after my father left the country.

My father left for Pakistan from Kandahar. Riding on the back of a motorcycle, whose driver hed paid to help him cross the border, he bypassed the main roads and headed for Quetta, Pakistana 115-mile ride through rough back roads, so as to avoid military checkpoints. Helicopters prowled the border constantly.

Once inside Pakistan, my father went to the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad and joined the thousands of Afghans massed outside hoping to come to the United States. He was right to have traveled alone. It would have been nearly impossible in the chaos of so many clamoring for passage to have his wife and three young children with him. He waited outside from early morning to evening for two weeks, amid much pushing and shoving, part of the hazard of getting noticed. Finally, he was able to get a meeting.

Thinking it might help, hed brought his papers from an irrigation training program hed attended at the University of Hawaii. This connection proved to be enough; embassy officials agreed to allow our family to emigrate.