Alice* was 23 years old, and not long out of university, when she decided to go to Kabul to teach music.
Key points:
- Alice and her husband are desperately trying to get family members out of Afghanistan
- The young couple has written to several governments to try to secure refugee visas
- Despite the unfolding crisis, they are trying to remain upbeat
It was 2015, and the Adelaide resident had no inkling that she was about to fall in love twice over — firstly with Afghanistan, and then with one of its residents.
The decision to move was prompted by an encounter with the work of ABC Classic FM presenter Eddie Ayres, who was then teaching at the Afghanistan National Institute of Music (ANIM) — the only school of its kind in the country.
“It was an article that I read that was written by him about the school, and that’s where I first got this idea that I’d look up the school, send them an email and see if they’d like to have me volunteer,” Alice said.
“When I first arrived in Kabul, it was Eddie who came and welcomed me at the hotel.”
Like many others in Australia, Alice has watched with horror at the unfolding crisis in Afghanistan.
After dozens were killed in Friday’s suicide bombings at Kabul Airport, violence has since continued, with a US drone strike on the terrorist group responsible: ISIS-K.
American news network CNN reported that nine members of one family, including six children, were killed in the strike.
“To see the country be destroyed is just completely heartbreaking,” Alice said.
But for her, her family and her in-laws — several of whom remain trapped in Kabul — the Taliban’s takeover has had deeply personal consequences.
It was while teaching singing at ANIM that Alice met her husband-to-be, whose father also taught there.
“The school promotes gender equality and education for girls. My father-in-law, as part of his role there, changed the lives of many, many children. Some of the students were selling lollipops on the street, and now they’ve performed at Carnegie Hall,” she said.
“He was a teacher there for many years, over a decade, and the school in that time received multiple threats from the Taliban, and one of them ended up in a suicide bombing.”
Alice and her husband later moved to Australia, and the couple — who now have a young child of their own — fear the potential consequences of speaking out, hence why steps have been taken to protect their identities.
Alice’s father-in-law died last year, from COVID-19, but her husband’s mother and other relatives are now effectively in hiding.
“My sister-in-law studied at university, [but] women have been told not to go back to work … there’s no way for them to earn an income or receive money.”
In Afghanistan, music has political consequences.
The philosopher Plato once observed that “when modes of music change, the fundamental laws of the state change with them”.
Jazz and the works of Jewish composers were banned in Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union waged a propaganda war against “petty bourgeois” art and classical musicians were persecuted amid China’s Cultural Revolution.
In 1996, the Taliban muted most forms of music when it took over the country. Instruments were destroyed and those found with cassettes were punished.
“The power that music holds to be a soundtrack for revolutions, or to encourage people or discourage people from certain things, that’s what people fear about music.”
But for now, the fate of the country’s hard-won musical freedom is not Alice’s biggest priority — it is what will become of her in-laws that is causing her the most distress.
For the past few days, she and her husband have been frantically filling in forms “applying for visas for different countries”, including Australia, the United States, the Netherlands and India.
“We’re trying everything. I’ve contacted politicians here to ask them to help with our case, but the whole Afghan community is in a similar situation, so it’s really tough,” she said.
“Sadly, for most — all — people in Afghanistan, conflict is not necessarily something new to them, but they’re very frightened. We were hopeful we might be able to get them out on an evacuation flight, but we haven’t heard anything back yet from any government.”
The deadly suicide bombings at Kabul Airport, the subsequent termination of Australia’s evacuation mission, and the looming August 31 deadline set by the United States to withdraw its remaining troops mean that time is fast running out to secure passage from the country.
“Ideally that [deadline] should be extended because it seems like an impossible task that all these countries are up against,” Alice said.
“All we can do at the moment is wait and just hope for some miracle to get them out. Without getting them out of Afghanistan, there’s almost nothing we can do.”
For now, Alice and her husband are doing what they can to stay upbeat.
“He’s obviously extremely worried and concerned about [his family’s] safety, but he is quite hopeful. I think we’re both quite hopeful that we will get them to Australia, and that’s the only thing we can hold onto,” she said.
*Name changed to protect identity.
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