| Description |
1 online resource (streaming video file) (44 min. 53 sec.) ; 271482867 bytes |
| Summary |
The story of a young woman's confronting journey back to the war-ravaged country of her birth.Born in Afghanistan, raised in Britain, Nel Hedayat talks and thinks like a child of the West, but something in her life doesn't quite make sense. In her words, she's not English and she's not Afghan. Britain is the only home she has known but she wonders what her life might have been like had her parents not fled the violence of her homeland. Now she's about to find out, as she goes back to Kabul and the country she left behind.Nel Hedayat was just six years old when her parents left Afghanistan to make a new home in Britain. Life has been good. She's gone to school and university. She's had all the things a young Western woman might desire, but Nel always had the feeling she was a little different:"I found myself trying to reconcile my Afghan identity and my British one and somehow synthesise something new, an identity that was a mixture of these two contrasting worlds. Trying to do what is right, but not knowing what right was, often made me confused and angry."In an attempt to reconcile the different parts of her background Nel decides she wants to return to Afghanistan. She knows that many of her friends and relatives who stayed behind have suffered terribly. She knows that the country still has many problems and that life can be dangerous there. Despite this, Nel still believes it's possible that Afghanistan may hold the key to her future life:"Being 21, having to kind of now think about the big life decisions, you know, having kids or... where to settle down. Could my future man... be Afghani? Is that possible, could I make a life there?"Nel is in for a big shock. Her first awakening comes when she hears what her grandmother has experienced in the wars that have raged across the country.Still she thinks Afghanistan is changing. She visits the set of the TV show "Afghan Model" and she begins to think her dream of a 'home away from home' may be coming true. Then reality bites. The truth of Afghan society and its attitudes to women become clear as she hears what ordinary people think about the girls who appear on the program.She quickly realises that most of the young women she meets will still have little chance of a full education. Even those who go to school and university must accept arranged marriages. This is only the beginning.Outside the capital Nel finds women have even less freedom. By law, women are free to travel without a man's permission but the reality is quite different. She visits a jail and discovers that simply disobeying your father or husband can put you behind bars.Nel also wants to investigate the consequences of forced marriages, where young girls are made to marry older men or men they do not know. She meets one teenager who at 12 was forced to marry someone she had never known. She was severely beaten. After two years of abuse she tries to burn herself to death. Now she is in hospital and may never walk again.For Nel this is a life changing moment:"I don't see why I'm crying, I shouldn't be. I don't go through that. I don't face that. I'm very comfortable with the way I live and it's so hard to see people that way."Nel's story provides a remarkable insight into Afghan society but it does something more than that. This documentary shows the change a young woman experiences within herself as she confronts a dream and discovers the reality |
| Notes |
Closed captioning in English |
| Event |
Broadcast 2010-05-17 at 20:30:00 |
| Notes |
Classification: NC |
| Subject |
Women -- Identity.
|
|
Women -- Social conditions.
|
|
Young women -- Family relationships.
|
|
Afghanistan -- Kabul.
|
| Form |
Streaming video
|
| Author |
Hedayat, Nel, contributor
|
|
Staton, Rebekah, reporter
|
|
