She Was Told to Marry or Be Silent Forever — So She Got in a Taxi and Fled Across Afghanistan

Told to marry in a country banning girls’ education, Alia got in a taxi and fled. She traveled hundreds of miles from her village to Kabul with her cousin, covered head to toe, only their eyes visible. Taliban inspectors routinely stop women traveling long distances without a male relative. They were not stopped. They made it.

Alia is 19. She told her family she was visiting friends and former classmates in the capital. That was a lie. The truth is that if she had stayed in Daykundi, she would already be married. Instead, she arrived in Kabul with a plan. She enrolled in an English language course. It is not formal schooling. It is the best she can get.

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It has been almost five years since the Taliban banned girls over 12 from attending school. Five years of reasons and delays and promises that never materialize. Five years in which millions of girls have watched their futures shrink down to a single option. Marriage.

Alia’s family is unusual. They have money. They supported her education before the ban. Her parents told her she could become a pilot. Now they tell her marriage is the best path because she cannot go to school, cannot attend university, cannot even work. The proposals are coming. She is terrified she will have to accept one.

Some families can be very restrictive. They could tell her to forget her dreams. She said she will resist until her very last breath. She is 19 years old and fighting a government, a culture, and a ticking clock.

Shama did not escape. She is 22 now, mother of two girls, married four years ago at 18. Before the Taliban takeover, she wanted to be a doctor. She turned down marriage proposals because her education was more important than anything. Then the schools closed. Her mother Kamila, a widow who worked as a cleaner to put her daughters through school, felt she had no choice.

Kamila feared what would happen if her daughter stayed single. She feared the Taliban foot soldiers would question why an unmarried woman of marriageable age was walking around. She was illiterate. She had wanted her girls to learn. Shama had so many dreams. It did not happen.

Shama is treated well by her husband. The grief still does not leave her. She says having a husband is not the only dream a woman has. She needed to stand on her own feet first, become independent, then marry. She went into her new life with none of that. Her dreams remain unfulfilled. She feels trapped in her home. She lives only for her children now.

Her 18-year-old sister Nora is watching this happen and seeing her own future. She is too young to get married. She wants to continue her education. She said it feels like being in prison. She fears going out because of the government. At home, her mother tells her she must get married. She still dreams of being back in school. She does not believe it will ever happen.

The Taliban said schools are closed for girls until further notice. That was four and a half years ago. The notice never came.

The United Nations says if the ban continues until 2030, more than two million girls will have been deprived of education beyond primary school. Afghanistan already has one of the lowest female literacy rates in the world. The numbers are almost too large to feel. Alia, Shama, and Nora are what those numbers look like up close.