Afghan groups helps train women for life outside the home
By Andrew Marshall
2/19/02

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Armed with four chairs, two sewing machines, a few plastic dolls and some textbooks on reading and writing, a
small Kandahar office is trying to end years of isolation for southern Afghan women.

The Kandahar Women's Association is one of the few places in the city where women do not wear the all-enveloping burqa veil while outside their homes,
and speak freely with outsiders.

Its mission is to provide women with the skills and knowledge to play a greater role in male-dominated southern Afghan society, after years of
warlordism and Taliban rule.

In the conservative Pashtun heartland in the south, almost all women wore burqas and stayed indoors even before the Taliban took power and imposed
this social code on the whole country.

In Kandahar, thousands of girls now go to school and veiled women walk freely in the streets without the risk of beatings by Taliban religious police,
but otherwise change has been slow.

"We are encouraging women to come out of their homes, to learn skills and improve their lives," said association director Safia Gulali, a
43-year-old Pashtun woman.

"It is hard for us -- we have hardly any equipment, and there are only four chairs in the whole building. We lack everything. But we are doing what we
can."

LEARNING TO SEW

In one room, a group of women is huddled over a sewing machine, learing from male tailors. The floor is littered with templates and tape-measures, and
fashion pictures are pasted on the walls alongside clothes the women have made.

Another group is being shown how to make traditional handicrafts. In the next room, 17 women -- some in their teens, some elderly and white-haired --
are being taught how to read and write, a rare skill here where most women are illiterate.

The association also runs a kindergarten so women who attend its classes have someone to look after their children. Toddlers sit on the floor clutching
plastic dolls.

"Under the Taliban we could not even leave our houses most of the time. Women could not learn and could not work. But now they can be given these
opportunities," Gulali said.

UNICEF has asked the association to help with its "back to school" campaign by sending educated women from village to village persuading local people
of the benefits of educating their daughters.

"We are working step-by-step to get more girls into education," Gulali said. "That's the start of a better life for them."

The United Nations co-ordinator for southern Afghanistan, Leslie Oqvist, said the region's conservatism did not preclude women from gradually playing
more of a role in society.

"If you look at photographs of Kabul a few decades ago, some women wore miniskirts and high heels. If you look at photographs of Kandahar, they
were wearing the burqa," he said.

"But what is important is that families here now have the choice. If women want to work, want to go to school, there are no laws to prevent it. It is
up to them, up to the family."