Janadgur Basiri arrives at 4:00 A.M. in the cold and dark, with his oldest son Akmal. They ask me to wear local clothes, which comprise an absurdly large pair of trousers, a long-sleeved vest, and a thick cloak. This is partly for warmth, partly for security (since we’ll be traveling in local taxis without an escort) and partly so that we don’t get overcharged by the taxi driver who will drive us to Jalalabad. We take a local taxi down to the main road, and hire another taxi for the next three days. I make myself scarce while they negotiate the fare.

Sayed Husein Pasha, defender of girls education.

The road to Jalalabad is a rutted path that winds up and over a mountain. Somewhere down below in the valley the European Union is building a new highway that will connect Kabul to Jalalabad, but up here we might just as well be the moon. Scores of massive oil tankers line up at either end to make the trip, and many of them succumb along the way. Their drivers sit beside the road on their haunches, covered in dust and waiting for who knows what. This will be one of the country’s main arterial roads until the highway is finished.

Jalalabad is warmer, smaller and more tropical than Kabul. Sadiqa opened up an office for the Afghan Women’s Network here in 2003, and it was during this time that she began to hear of villages that wanted to open schools. When the funding for Omid came through, she began to visit villages. She identified two, but dropped them after they started feuding with each other. She was then introduced to the Fatima Zahra school and was deeply impressed by the headmaster, Sayed Husain Pasha. We’re going to visit his school first.

*

On the roads, we stop briefly at a large government school that lies about five kilometers from Fatima Zahra.

Although the two schools have no formal contact, they are intimately connected to each other. Fatima Zahra has been trying to get government registration since 2002, but been turned down on the grounds that the Ministry of Education cannot register two schools that are within three kilometers of each other and serve the same area. Sadiqa asked the parents whether they would be willing to send their children to the government school, but they refused. They said Fatima Zahra offered a much better education, and that they had great respect for the headmaster.

They’re just preparing for classes at the government school. It has two large UNICEF tents. But they can only accommodate a small fraction of the pupils, and large mats are being laid out under the trees where classes will be held. Children begin to drift in from all sides. We approach one teacher, who looks wary at first but then relaxes.

He says the school has 35 teachers for 5,000 students. This cannot possibly be true, but we have no chance to follow up because the children quickly see through my disguise and pandemonium ensures. As we retreat, the teacher is frantically laying about him with a cane at the horde of excited youngsters. We made a big mistake by just dropping in for a visit, but this school is clear struggling.

*

Waiting for class at Fatima Zahra.

The fact that Fatima Zahra exists, let alone is offering a good education to its children, is due to the perseverance and vision of its headmaster, Sayed Husein Pasha. His own story is quite remarkable. He graduated from university at the age of 23 and joined the Afghan resistance (mujahadene) when the Russians invaded. He rose to a senior position but was crippled by a Russian rocket, which put him in a wheelchair for the rest of his life.

After the Russians left, Sayed Husein Pasha was appointed Minister for the Disabled. He organized the Afghan team for the 1996 Olympic Disability Games in Atlanta and was in the United States when the Taliban entered Kabul. He returned to Jalalabad to find that the Taliban had taken over his house.

In an unusual move, Sayed Husein Pasha then turned to teaching girls at precisely the time that the Taliban declared war on girl’s education. Schools were closed and teachers sent home, but Sayed Husein Pasha had such widespread support from locals that the local Taliban allowed him to open a girls’ school – on condition that it followed a strict Islamic curriculum. He taught religion in the afternoon, and (unknown to the Taliban), math and languages in the afternoon.

He took in 13 girls the first year, 1997, and has added a class every year since. It will be interesting to see how many girls have made it all the way through.

Perhaps only in Afghanistan could a battle-scarred veteran become a champion of girls’ education. Yet Sayed Husein Pasha is no ordinary man, and he has completely stamped his personality on his school. Without his drive and determination it would never have survived this long.

He prepares to introduce me to his teachers and students with a twinkle in his eye and no small amount of pride.