Gulalai, 15, said in an interview last month that her family decided to leave Kabul for Peshawar because her father, a grocery store owner, “wanted us to continue our education.”
“We were living a happy life. Then, suddenly, the Taliban suspended our education, and our dreams were shattered,” Gulalai said, speaking on the grounds of her new school.
NBC News has agreed not to use her last name because of fears for her safety.
After travel agents demanded $2,500 for each visa — far more than her family of seven’s entire savings — their only option was to bribe officials and cross the border illegally, Gulalai said.
A relative eventually helped them settle in a two-room house on the outskirts of this city in northeastern Pakistan, she said, adding that her father had gotten a job at a store and that her mother was cleaning families’ homes to help make ends meet.
Gulalai, who said she dreams one day of being a nurse, said she was struggling to settle in her new school because she does not speak or write Urdu, Pakistan’s national language.
She added that she had lost a happy life of close friends, relatives and classmates in Kabul. “There was no more life in Afghanistan; otherwise, who can leave their birthplace?” she said.
Even those who manage to escape safely eventually find that going to school remains out of reach in countries like Turkey or Iran, where there are strict restrictions on granting asylum, according to Fetrat, of Human Rights Watch.
In Pakistan, the government announced in January that it would oust all Afghan refugees living in the country by March 31. From September 2023 to February, at least 844,499 Afghan nationals were deported, according to Amnesty International.
“My father took a risk by migrating us to Pakistan,” Gulalai said, adding that she did not know whether her family would be allowed to stay or be forced to leave.
In Afghanistan, the Taliban, which appeared to take a more moderate stance after they took power, has cracked down further on women’s rights.