<
https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2023/3/5/cant-go-back-how-an-afghan-girls-principal-fled-the-taliban>
"On a cold November day, Aqila Tavakali and her 14-year-old son brace
themselves against an icy wind as they walk the several blocks from their
temporary apartment to his new school.
Abolfazl says goodbye to his mother at the corner, and Aqila watches as he
disappears through the yawning doors of the main entrance.
Newtonbrook Secondary, just north of Toronto, Canada, sprawls across an entire
city block. More than 2,000 students from grades eight to 12 attend the school.
With basketball courts, a swimming pool and a large auditorium, the school
offers the type of education 44-year-old Aqila could only dream of providing
when she was principal at a girls’ school in Kabul, Afghanistan until October
2021.
She wipes a tear from her eye in a futile attempt to stem a torrent from
streaming down her cheeks.
“Not a day goes by that I don’t think about my students at Sayed ul-Shuhada,”
she told Al Jazeera. “They were very poor economically, but they were also very
smart.”
Aqila, her husband Musa, a 47-year-old former taxi driver in Kabul, and their
three children, aged nine, 14 and 22, are among the estimated 1.2 million
Afghans who fled their country after the Taliban seized power in August 2021."
Via Frederick Wilson II.
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
