Two years on from Taliban takeover, Afghan women are being ‘erased from everything’

When Zahra thinks back to her life before the summer of 2021, it seems like another reality.

As a student in Afghanistan, she had “lots of friends.”

“We were happy together,” she recalled. “We were studying, sometimes we were gathering together … we were riding bikes.”

Zahra, 20, doesn’t ride bikes anymore. Or go to school, or walk outside without covering her face, or see friends who have fled the country. All she can do, she says, is sit at home and worry about a future that has unraveled before her eyes.

“When I stand in front of the mirror, when I look at myself, I just see a different Zahra from two years ago,” she said. “I feel sad for my past.”