Unsaid

“Deport Afghani!” Almost under half of the Afghan Hazara content creators were people from Iran who wanted Afghans back in their country, after the Iran and Israel situation now it feels less like an insult and more like genuine advice. I wish I could say yes Auntie I will just get back there like I never left but will you guarantee me a good and safe life over there? 

From how far I remember I asked my Mom to tell me about her childhood racism which was on top of her memories. I always felt like I was a secondhand human because I wasn’t Iranian but then because my accent was Iranian in a country I lived in for 10 years. 

From mom and aunt’s memories, I felt like I should never step foot in there, I didn’t want basketballs thrown by kids to my head and them saying their ball got dirty because it touched an Afghan. Listening to their memories would usually last me 10 to 20 minutes and after I got confused if I should hate them for saying that all to the most precious people of my life, my Mom and aunts, or if my blood was the problem. 

Our dear country would be written in school books, I never believed that I would just write Afghanistan same for Turkey but there it wasn’t that I didn’t believe it, it was just not my country. 

For the 10 years I grew up in Afghanistan I always thought I would be hated by Iranian people, I didn’t know the other way around, no one talked to me about them being kind and nice to Afghans which wasn’t my priority either, hearing different parts of Kabul in the fire with another suicide bomber was daily news. 

Everything changed when we traveled to Turkey, we were all immigrants over there. I realized that people are just people, and our countries are just geographical borders that give us different accents. Or maybe I saw these because now and in the Iranian families I knew, we had someone else who didn’t want us in their country. My enemy’s enemy is my friend I had heard this once, and now it feels relevant. 

M. Samira was one of the most special people I met, she and M.Raziye both. I realized not all people are the same nor do they think the same. Even if they’re raised in the same country with the same system some can see outside the box and so when I told my Mom she said “Even in the smallest society, there are people who think differently that’s why we humans live together.”

Racism happens, especially when the government can’t control the situation they need to blame someone, an immigration lawyer told me that. I think for some people, it takes a war for them to see, to feel, and maybe then they can understand the weight of their words and actions however we’re like aliens. 

Years passed, and my mindset changed but still under the posts of Afghans I read “Deport Afghani!”