The Women of Kabul

This week I visited my first Self Help Groups (SHGs) and their CLA's (the follow up of SHGs). Researching their impact on the women of Kabul is the purpose of my visit. Well I can tell you, life for them is extremely tough. You can see it on their faces, on the faces of the five children they've given birth to before reaching the age of 25. Did you know that every 29 minutes, a woman dies due to complications with pregnancies and births? There is no country with a higher rate. 85 % of the women has not followed formal education and 79 % is illiterate.
But although their lives are unimaginably tough, some of them have really managed to turn their lives around. One woman makes her daughter-in-law go to literacy classes while she takes care of the grand children. Another girl, after giving birth to five children, is now finally able to go to literacy classes also and she truly believes that with the same training she can be just as good president of Afghanistan as a man can. I doubt whether this would have really happened without the Self Help Groups.
The goal of the SHGs is to empower women on both economical aspects as social aspects of life. They learn how to save and after a few months they can take a loan and invest this in a small family business or a business of their own. On the social side they learn through group exercises about their self worth. And because they are able to bring money home for a small business they learn how to communicate with their husbands. And some husbands give them at some point more freedom to follow literacy classes, visit their families, bring the children to school. Through exercises they also learn to think and discuss about teenage marriages. Most women now see it is really unhealthy for children to marry at a young age and they want to prevent that from happening to their own children.

There is so much more to tell you, but I'll save some for a next blog. I recorded some interviews and I'll try to put little bits and pieces online. For the Dutch people, my article should be published in the ND some day this week, with pictures. I don't know exactly when but between the 6th and the 11th they told me! Als iemand dat artikel voor me zou kunnen bewaren zou dat geweldig zijn!

Well, bye for now!