Unsaid

Contact me by: setaishhaidari1@gmail.com

  • Every little counts…

    It has been 5 years since I’ve been out of Afghanistan. Since the country is in civil tensions within itself, the only thing that provides a sense of belonging is my culture, Hazara culture. Yet I don’t know it well enough to know how to embrace it. Born and raised in Kabul, neither my city nor village nor traditions and stories. 

    I wish we had more writers about our stories. I wish we kept our traditions alive after Islam arrived in the country. I wish I knew more about those before me. I have so many questions about them, but my knowledge is limited to “there was a war going on at the time”. To know how they were taught, how they lived, and so many more, yet all became known to the next generation of us minorities, is the scent of blood that follows till later. 

    I usually tell a lot of people to write about their lives as if in a book; who knows who was that carried their life burdens for the betterment of all, the ones that we never got a chance to meet, but with a picture of the author, a text someone can read, no doubt how someone can be immortal. Even if no one reads the book, it’s here to say I existed, I was also a person with interests, ambitions, and dreams once…

    Many don’t realize that their life experience can be similar to many more, and some books can help other people more than you can imagine. It’s to keep living forever, in the tongue of those who read the book and the mind that remembers it.

    Every little thing counts, everything that makes you feel alive, art, music, poetry, dance, and for me, literature, if not to anyone, to yourself. For a better understanding of my means, the movie “Freedom Writers” portrays the central idea.  

    But I’m no more than a writer, it’s my idea as someone who writes, this view can be different for everyone, regarding what they are most interested in and know the best. So, to me, making yourself immortal is as simple as doing what makes you alive.

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  • Journal books

    Last year my freshman year, my creative writing class teacher would tell us to keep a little journal with us and write it down when something interesting happened or we had any sudden ideas that we might forget later on the day. I did mine as assigned, maybe sometimes rushing through when she was checking them, but I was sure I wanted the grade. 

    Eventually, she stopped checking the notes after a while, and so did I, but now, a year later, I got a new mini notebook and am writing again, just this time she isn’t my teacher anymore… I sometimes see her in the hallways and wave to her, hoping she would do the same, but either way, I’m always happy to see her; someone who brought change to my life this much, to be honest, I think everyone you meet is a teacher to you in different ways, regardless of age, rank, and gender, they leave something to you if nothing at least a memory.

    There are a lot of movies about good teachers and how they change students’ lives, but some are secret heroes to some, only known by their students, and can the same teacher in the same class be someone else’s hated teacher? Chances are, so and so it’s a two-sided bridge for the teacher to be someone’s hero or villain and for the student to change the teacher into better or worse…

    –Thought to me by those everyday simple sentences journaled every day. 

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  • I met many women with long stories and often the same end.

    I have met many women with long and complex stories, often leading to similar conclusions.

    My favorite actor, Bahram Afshari, once said, “Nothing ends badly; if it does, it hasn’t ended.” While I appreciate his perspective, I often find myself questioning it. In my brief life experience, I’ve noticed that many women I’ve encountered possess stories rich enough to fill books and even inspire movies. Yet, they seem trapped in a cycle where their primary hope rests in their children, often losing sight of their identities in the process.

    These women aspire to reclaim their lives, but they face judgment for wanting to prioritize themselves, often being labeled “selfish” for stepping away from their roles as unpaid caretakers. This is not true for everyone, but it reflects the reality for many. Their voices have been silenced by fear of their husbands and families, sacrificing their youth for the sake of their children’s bright futures, all while lacking supportive family dynamics themselves.

    I genuinely hope that these women are now on their journeys to becoming the best versions of themselves. When we meet again, I hope they embody the individuals they wished to be before they were taught to prioritize being a wife. I hope they have reclaimed a part of their lives, one that reflects who they truly are and what they deserve.

    But who is to blame? In many cases, I would attribute it to cultural and social expectations. For many, the idea of dreaming beyond what they were given was so uncommon that society took it upon itself to stifle those dreams. Some women broke free from these societal constraints, facing opposition from relatives who, lacking opportunities themselves, believed that a girl’s best path was marriage.

    On the other hand, some families encouraged their daughters to pursue education. Yet, even among those who were supported, they often encountered workplace barriers—lower-paying jobs and societal norms that funneled women into subordinate roles while men were more often groomed for leadership positions.

    To all the young women around the world who are fortunate enough to receive an education: “Society may try to restrict our rights, but let us remember that we are living out the dreams of countless others.”

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  • “…I’ve been away from home for 5 years now…”

    “Liar-“

    I learned about calling your country home in history class when many cartoons showed the US worrying more about civilizing other countries than “home”. Now it appears to me that I’ve never called my country home before this, but I missed our house where we lived in Afghanistan. Would that make me a patriot?

    I lost Afghanistan early, when I realized a country doesn’t need to have beggars, working kids, and economic gaps between people so obvious. Of course, the economy is not all bad; there is always worse in it… Thieves in white collar are always worse. For those who know this, live in it, and feel it with each breath, staying silent because many more aren’t aware of it is the best way to lose your voice and lose it all for nothing. 

    I often recognize that what I used to see in Afghanistan is far different and somewhat not vary much of how the social norms have to be, and in particular, women’s rights and unprotected kids, lack of jobs, and most importantly, all violations of “natural rights.”

    If I could describe my country to someone unaware of the new emirate going on in Afghanistan, I would surely say, “In the country I was born in, religion was unaware of what it could be turned into. In the country I’m from, being born in an ethnicity other than the one favored is a crime sentenced to death. In a country once called ‘graveyard of empires, ’ they now dig us people of Afghanistan graves of our own, every kind. Women are seen as less than animals, born to obey husband, brother, father, and son all their lives long, hesitant to be somewhere the rules are set forever. Our neighboring countries love us no less than the group that resulted in all this. No belief of religion is real when terror is involved, innocent blood is shed, innocent kids are left orphaned by war, a mother’s eye is sewn to the door waiting for their beloved child to knock after school hours forgotten by her that no dead can come back all because the terrorist decided school isn’t for all to attend.”

    I wish calling the country I was born in home wouldn’t have made me a liar, it was never home, not to me, we are aliens belonging to planet earth. 

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  • Just a feeling

    …I want to be a lawyer someday…

    “But what if I couldn’t and left behind the words that now sound like a bluff? Could I then be ever respected?”
    I think so… In fact may have everyone has had a dream they left behind, whether being a princess or a doctor? Probably yes
    “But wouldn’t it be better not to say it all, just in case?” What if it were what makes you move forward to your dream… When you already have a dream and tell people about it, to me it seems like now you have more to lose if you want to give up because now, besides a given up dream, you have disappointment from someone who might have believed in you.

    Of course, it makes it more difficult to carry the burdens, can even hurt if you get asked about your dream. Are you a lawyer now? But what matters then is if you put hard work and consistency into it.

    There is no secret key to success other than hard work, although the message can be interpreted by some as thoughts of she doesn’t know it about my life, or that’s like every other motivational speech quote that never works for us in real life, think about it… There is no physical key to get what you want, and avoiding it just happens to lighten the idea of what you want in the face of judgments.

    “I want you to be successful but I can’t push you through it.”
    -Richard Andrade
    My 8th-grade math teacher’s words might as well be relevant in the thoughts of having consistency but courage within yourself.

    So, in complete words by me I don’t think telling your ideas to trusted people who you know wouldn’t want your downfall and can help you in your way would have that unforgivable ego-breaking curse on you, and as for one of my big concerns, that is… So now maybe I could say with pride

    …I want to be a lawyer someday…

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  • Borderlines

    “And that’s what happened during the Vietnam War. Setaish anything about Afghanistan you want to add?” 

    Yes… Then maybe I can repeat what I’ve memorized from the news just before coming to class. To be able to answer it as if my life depends on it, because most of the information known by others around me about my country doesn’t include anyone. From recognition questions like “Do you speak Arabic/Pashto?” to “Do all people like the current government?” However, the teacher asked permission if he could ask me questions about my country before, easily searchable questions that don’t need a living human attached to them

    But sometimes some teachers have their research ready and eager for a chance to point out on what I don’t have compared to countries like America, without standing me a chance to defend the dignity of the country that was once ruled by “King Mohammad Zahir Shah” rather than a terrorist group that uses religion as an excuse for savagery—changing the topic from book banning in the US to girls’ school banning in Afghanistan.

    Afghanistan was once the country I knew as the only country that existed. I watched Western cartoons, but didn’t think there would be a world like the cartoons were based on. For me, as far as I remember, our daily news was always filled with the seasoned with suicide bombings, stray bullets, and another breaking headline that meant someone else’s normal had died… So like the stereotypes I wish didn’t exist? In my version of life in Afghanistan, yes, but that isn’t to say I didn’t have people disagree with the fact that Afghanistan had mine in mountains and poverty deep in people’s blood because they had lived a rich life, and a sense of offence when someone talks about the real and everyday life of people there.

    As a kid I frequently questioned that why were beggars, poverty and suicide-bombers the first impression and highlight in news and articles instead of these nice restaurants and cool parks… until I met countries where I saw peoples everyday concerns are further different then us and it feels me two emotions at once: happy that some don’t have to think about whether they can eat anything tonight for survival and sad for those who worry for it all day. 

    So, back to my response to the teacher about the Vietnam War “Intervention in ongoing civil conflicts,” I said in front of everyone as if I hadn’t lived in one, just like I memorized…

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  • What An Anthem

    Growing up, I wasn’t much aware of the existence of different ethnicities in Afghanistan. Of course, they would make us sing the national anthem with our lungs, but that national anthem wasn’t in my language. I would sing it along with others because we had it on the first page of our school books, and they would take our entire class up to the stage to read it for all the other students once in a while. 

    Despite my protestive personality, I never thought of it as unfair because they would write small subtitles under the Pashto version of the national anthem of the country I was a citizen of… Not to mention, there was another kind of that in my language, Farsi, which was rarely heard. I don’t know if it was my fault not to listen to the other one, although it existed, or is it that we didn’t know it existed? Do you want a reality check? Yep, the Farsi national anthem was never a thing during Taliban take-over and from the year I’m talking about 2015-2020. 

    In the other version, when I was an elementary school student, there was a phrase of “De Pashtona o Hazarao…” By that specific time, I had no idea of what they meant, and looking around me in school, I didn’t see a difference between myself and other people in my class; although we were of different ethnicities, we were just unique. 

    Everything changed when I came to the US, and by that time the #stophazaragenocide was also trending, a hashtag to hear the world the screams of many genocides that happened to innocent civilians. Then I was 12 years old, probably old enough to hear about it, here in the US. Then I recognized some faces like mine, with monolid and a shorter nose. Maybe it was all too direct when I heard all the genocide all at once like “Kale manaar” and about some king (Abdul Rahman) that decides to wipe out my people and land. 

    I often get mistaken for Chinese or Filipino. I used to love it a few years ago, but now it also shows me that we Hazaras don’t have enough representatives of ourselves out there. And another thing I hate is when I’m asked if I speak Pashto, or Arabic, like Farsi is a dead language already. 

    Shahid Mazari was the martyr of our rights. He chose to speak despite knowing what could have been the consequences, and he faced it, with his blood for us. So maybe if we are living somewhere, anywhere outside of Afghanistan, where we can talk without our throats cut, we can raise our voice. Shahid Mazari faced consequences, and we are responsible for him. uences, and we are responsible for him. 

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  • Alien

    “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!”

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  • A voice…

    I named my website ‘My thoughts’ because I wanted to be heard without the fear of judgment, to write about things I would talk about almost every day to people who either like to listen or those who try to avoid them. 

    I wrote to remind myself that I have a voice, too, and that I can always hold some power within myself and improve over time; ultimately, life isn’t just about school marks.

    For many years of my childhood, I wanted to see my name in a book someone would read with interest. I used to draw a little portrait of myself next to the one in my school book, pretend it was mine, and read it with my information. 

    You see in the movies, there is a part where the person in charge says something to the character, and it takes over a very big part of the other character’s mind and changes their perspective. For me, it was when my Mom said to me, “One day you’ll make it, one-day people will be fighting for a chair in the room you’re giving a speech, and that day I will yell out, that’s my daughter.”

    In teenage moments, I try to forget it, but it’s too late since it’s the scenario I grew up believing would happen. Sometimes I wish for her to forget that one memory, because what if I can’t make it? I believe in God and inner strength.

    I’m still getting ready for that important speech of mine in the future that would change lives for the better, every week in front of the mirror with a pencil representing my speaker. It’s a big deal for me to say all these, it’s the courage to continue and the fear of disappointment, but as my dad says, “Do your best, even if it doesn’t work, you know you did what you could.” Just as I said, God and inner strength. 

    I can quote all my parents’ advice, they are all based on years of experience. It’s what makes them capeless heroes, and me their biggest fan. Some changed my life, and I think I know a quote about everything we talked about in particular, “If you go in front of the mirror to find more insecurities and problems about things you can’t change, then you’re too bored, do something important. Read a book.” This made me worry less about how I look at what I can do, and I think it’s even more useful for teenage girls, because it was for me, very much. 

    Some things aren’t meant to be shared, and for me, I don’t know the border for them both but something I’m realizing as I grew older is that the world isn’t as cruel as I thought it would be, at least mine.

    “If God closes a door, he opens another door” I also believe that people all go through pain and hardship but it comes in different forms for everyone because we’re all different. It all depends on where you live but I’m sure everyone has someplace or someone to depend on, I’m lucky enough to have more than one, and also here, my website is where I can rely on, even if I don’t post much I know I have a voice, that someone would hear me with their choice.

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  • If I can just be

    I’m a 15 years old with a dream but unsure

    Unsure if my path is the right path, if I can ever get close to what I want and what would it cost.

    I go to check my grades and there I see a grade lower than I expected, when I remember the nights I stayed up for and that and the result in front of me says it all. My heart drops with the number and my dreams run away a few more steps away.

    “I shouldn’t have taken this class.” 

    “Why would I take an AP in something I don’t even like?”

    “I didn’t even know anything about this class”

    “This is just your freshmen year”

    These all seem like excuses to myself now because of how much I told them to myself but these are true and the world keeps on going. “I tried my best,” not very sure if I did. My blood pressure flies up to the skies when I think I can’t be the one I expected myself to be but, I’ll still comfort myself with the sentence “I’ll make it up…”