Read the previous day's exchange
Sally Armstrong, journalist: Good morning Sarah. Women like Shukufa in today's instalment give me reason to cheer. She's like many of the women I've met in Afghanistan, even during the "Taliban time," as they call it, who against all odds find their way into civil society. And she represents other women in Kandahar, which surely is the heart of darkness in Afghanistan today, who are working as teachers, embroiderers, soap makers, civil servants and professionals.
There is a piece of all of these interviews that intrigues me. I'm never quite certain about the message the women and girls are delivering. Shukufa, for example, says she took this job because she was poor and needed work. But now she loves it. Others say they work because their husbands are "open-minded." I sometimes get the impression the women are answering the questions by saying what is expected of them rather than what they think. There's an expression in Afghanistan that translated says, "I can't answer your question because my mouth is full of water." It means, "I can't tell you the truth because someone may be hurt or get into trouble."
I think if The Globe reporters could have conducted these interviews, we would have had more interesting dialogue. What do you think?
Sarah Hampson, Globe columnist: Interesting point, Sally. When women are devalued, would they value their own feelings? Would they say what's on their mind, when many have been encouraged not to think for themselves? I'm not sure it would matter who conducted the interviews, frankly. Some women speak with candour - saying that brides are treated like slaves doesn't sound like a careful statement. But I agree that others respond with bromides. And in the circumstances of the video interviews, they seem nervous and sometimes a bit suspicious of why they are being asked these questions at all. It made me wonder how hard it was to get ten women to speak.
On a separate note, I have to say that today, I feel disheartened again about the struggles of women in Afghanistan after reading the story and watching the video. It is such a rollercoaster of emotion this series. One day I read something that gives me hope. (Yesterday, the idea that education for girls and opportunities for women can happen when elders see they are not a threat to the culture and the family.) And the next, like today, girls being doused with acid on their way to school? And women who endanger their lives by going to work - like the embroiderers or Shukufa, the 19-year-old police woman - but have no choice because they are poor?
I once interviewed Khorshied Samad, wife of Omar Samad, the former Afghanistan ambassador to Canada. Born and raised in California, she had gone to Afghanistan, where her father was from, after 9/11 to work for a news outlet. That's where she met her husband. She wept a little when she spoke of the strength and hope of the Afghan people, and the women especially. Don't give up on us, she said. The country's history of strife is heart-breaking, and there is a need for the international community to prevent another power vacuum, to give the country a chance to get back on its feet.
