Kabul's Quiet Resistance: Young Afghans Navigate Life Under The Taliban

Just before the Afghan capital fell to the Taliban in August 2021, RFE/RL spoke with several young professionals in Kabul who voiced their fears and anxieties about the future. We reconnected with them again this week to see how their lives have unfolded.

KABUL -- Ahmad Dawood juggles several jobs, from selling fruit on the street to working as a kitchen porter, to make sure he can put food on the table.

Dawood, a dressmaker by profession, had to close his small tailoring shop in Kabul's vibrant Lycee Maryam shopping district four years ago. Afghanistan's new rulers, the ultra-conservative Taliban, don't allow men to interact with women who are not their close relatives.

"I took my sewing machine home, so I still sew dresses for some of my old regulars," Dawood said.

Dawood's customers arrive "discreetly" at his house on a backstreet of the Khairkhana neighborhood, where the 28-year-old dressmaker lives with his elderly parents.

A tailoring shop in Kabul. Under the Taliban, male tailors are banned from making clothes for women.

But Dawood's business has dwindled significantly, "not only because of the fear of the Taliban" but also due to the crippling economic crisis and poverty that have plagued Afghanistan.

"Who thinks about new dresses when they don't have bread?" Dawood said.

A lack of jobs and stringent restrictions of women and girls' rights are key concerns under the Taliban-led government, according to several young professionals in Kabul who spoke to RFE/RL.

The Taliban, which returned to power after the collapse of the Western-backed government in Kabul in August 2021, has notoriously banned girls' education beyond the elementary school.

Women are not allowed to travel without a male guardian, dine out on their own, or work for the foreign aid groups that once employed thousands of women across the country.

No Time For Hobbies

"Nowadays, the majority of the people of Afghanistan, including the middle class, survive on bread and tea," said Naseem Karimi, a 29-year-old former teacher who lives in the Karte Se neighborhood.

Karimi worked at a private school in downtown Kabul and dreamt about writing a novel and traveling abroad. He described his life before the Taliban as "comfortable," with an "adequate salary" and "plenty of free time" to spend on his hobbies: reading and attending poetry nights.

The school lost half of its students -- the girls -- after the ban on their education. Dozens of male students left the school, too, as their families could no longer afford private education.

Karimi quit his job in early 2022, as his "new salary didn't even cover [his] bus fare." He did not elaborate on what his current occupation is but said he has since worked "in various projects" and jobs, including physical labor.

"I don't have a hobby or a dream anymore. I haven't read a book for a long time," Karimi told RFE/RL.

"I come home late and am tired from work. I eat and then go to bed and wake up early again for work the next day. I don't even have time to chat with my family," he said.

Karimi, who lives with his parents, wonders if he "will ever be able to get married," because he has "become too poor to provide for a family" of his own.

Work Is For 'My Freedom And Mental Health'

Zainab Ramz, 26, makes 10,000 afghani (about $150) a month working for a private radio station in Kabul.

Ramz lives with her parents and two younger siblings and said her modest salary barely covers the essentials of food and the minibus fare to commute to work. Her "occasional luxury" is ice cream with her friends on a sweltering summer day.

"But work is not only about money for me. It is about my freedom and preserving my mental health, [and] it gives purpose to my life," she told RFE/RL.

Young men and women talk over tea at a restaurant in Kabul in January 2019.

Ramz didn't leave her house for nearly six months after the Taliban took over the capital, just weeks after she graduated from the Kabul University with a degree in journalism.

"There were rumors that Taliban fighters rape or forcibly marry young women," Ramz said. "People were very afraid in the first weeks and months, but it gradually changed."

"A Taliban fighter once told us that when he first came to Kabul, he was surprised that the people of Kabul are Muslim and 'normal' too, contrary to what he and many of his fellow fighters had imagined," she recalled.

Ramz is among the Afghan women who have returned to work in media, banks, hospitals, primary schools, and other state and private institutions. She wears a wide, ankle-length dress and a head scarf, the dress code dictated by the Taliban-led government.

"As a female journalist, I am not allowed to have one-on-one interviews with Taliban officials. I leave a message on officials' phones asking for comments and they respond with voicemail. I can ask questions in press briefings," Ramz said about her work.

Working in the Afghan media under the Taliban involves self-censorship, she said, such as avoiding strong criticism of the group's leaders and its policies.

"We are not allowed to call them 'the Taliban' anymore in the media. It's 'the government' now," Ramz added.

'There Is Less Corruption Now'

In Kabul's Makroyan neighborhood, Sara Atazada attends a private English-language course and hopes to become a teacher at an elementary school for girls.

Private courses are the last remaining route to higher education for girls in Afghanistan. Atazada was unable to finish her studies at Kabul University due to the Taliban ban on educating females beyond elementary school.

Beauticians put makeup on customers at a Kabul beauty salon in April 2021. The Taliban has now closed all beauty salons.

"To sum it up: Our lives turned upside down in these four years. The economy is in turmoil. The health-care sector is collapsing. People struggle to find food," Atazada said.

"But I have to hand it to the Taliban that security has improved under this government," Atazada said, echoing a sentiment shared by the other young Kabul residents who spoke to RFE/RL.

"Also, there is a lot less corruption in the government structures now," according the journalist Ramz.

In addition to the two decades of military conflict, Afghans faced the daily risk of suicide attacks and roadside bombings mostly blamed on the Taliban as it fought against the Western-backed government between 2001 and 2021.

"Yes, we achieved peace finally, but we also need to eat, we need opportunities and freedom," said Karimi, the former teacher. "For now, it feels like we are missing out on the best years of our lives."

Note: Because of safety fears, all of the people RFE/RL spoke to in this article are using pseudonyms.

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