beyond the burqa

Months ago, Old School Hejabi encouraged me to do a piece on fashion in Kabul, showing how women express themselves in Afghanistan outside of the stereotypical perception: the burqa. I have been working on it and hopefully one day will do a proper post on the topic. The hardest part has been to amass enough real life photos. But the other night, awake at 2:00 AM I flipped on the TV. Because I can speak Farsi, I have no problem watching the local channels and actually watch regularly to strengthen my comprehension of the Afghan accent on Persian, although, honestly, I always gravitate towards the Iranian dramas... but anyway, it occurred to me that many of the women on TV reflect the current fashion sense in Kabul, and it's a lot easier to take pics of them than on the street! So here is a taste of what is fashion in Afghanistan is like, beyond the burqa (which i realized is totally a cliché title to use, but hey, it's too perfect!).


First let me clarify that a lot of non-halal stuff in reference to the way women should dress by Islamic standards does make it on Afghan TV. Most of the time, especially in the CRAP Indian soap operas shown, they just "censor" what shouldn't be seen, like this:

As you can see, the hair is okay; go figure! And both these pics are of Afghan women from abroad. But in the case of this post, I'm just focusing on images of local women on locally produced TV shows.

So these two ladies are what originally gave me the idea. This is from a cooking show, where an older woman is teaching a younger woman how to cook various dishes (notice the Aunty is wearing sunglasses on her head!).



Now usually, the younger girl is wearing very tight and flashier stuff, but the last time I saw the show, she was playing it down a bit more...



These next three do a better job of showing what a Kabuli fashionista would wear, skinny jeans with either a skirt or an Iranian style manteau over it, and a loose & colorful head scarf.






This next series is from a commercial for Sogol Jam. This is a locally produced commercial. The premise is: this hot chick is shopping,



and there is also a young guy in the shop and he is checking her out



and she's checking him out, it's getting really intense now



and finally he starts walking up to her, but as he approaches her, he reaches forward and....goes for the Sogol Jam instead of talking to her; he was mesmerized by the jam!



Her outfit, specifically her scarf, is more the style of an Iranian girl in Tehran pushing the limits than Afghan style, but still it's interesting and even more interesting that the Afghan girl in Kabul wouldn't go to jail for this 'fit like the Tehrani would...although her reputation could get tarnished and perhaps she'd get murdered...yes, but more on that at the end of this post...

The next pictures is from a show I caught this morning. The one on the right is the hostess and the one of the left is some kind of Quaranic recitation champion:



Now you do see women who wear hijab in this kinda Arab-originating wrap style, but really, most of them let the top of the hair show; from older women to younger ones exploring their sense of style, it's super common. And this is reflect in this next series of pictures, all of various talk show hostesses:












Finally, I caught this last one when I went home early the other day. This is a children's program. The young hostess was wearing a pink hijab, very properly wrapped with a pink and white jilbab. I guess the younger hostesses still have a responsibility to present a more modest image...



So there you go, a very current taste of what Afghan women are wearing on TV and on the streets as well, although in small numbers and only in Kabul, a little in Herat. But it doesn't go without saying that these women are indeed risking their lives being on TV. I wasn't joking with my earlier comment, as there are several cases I can think of, where women in the media have been murdered and their killers have not been caught or served with justice. The most famous case is that of Shamia Rezaie, who was a veejay on the famous video clip show called HOP. It's said she was killed with one bullet to the head by her brother in her home. Another is Zakia Zaki, she wasn't on TV but was a journalists who produced a popular radio program. In 2005, armed assailants riddled her body with bullets in the middle of the night as she slept with her young son.

In her article, which I later realized is also titled Beyond the Burqa, Zuhar Bahman writes "Most people who, to an untrained Western eye, appear liberated and educated may have had to choose a severe injustice in order to gain and practice freedom that we see." I've heard a lot of bad things said not just about women on TV, but those who work as airlines hostesses and are members of parliament, that they all essentially slept their way to the top. It's weird, like really modern people think this about them. What ever your opinion is on hijab, or how it should be worn, no one deserves to die over, and I think it goes without saying a lot of work still needs to be done when the mentality of, not all, of course, but many men and women is that a woman who operates in the public eye is a shameless prostitute that needs to be murdered for the honor of her family. This is a country where women who are raped are imprisoned rather than the men who rape them.

But I also think, especially as someone who, although i live here, is still on the outside looking in, it's important to remember it takes time to change an entire nation. Bahman writes, "This mentality on women is embedded in the traditions of Afghan society. These customs are extremely hard to change, as most Afghan people and institutions either passively endorse or actively follow them...It is hard to achieve a balance between maintaining tradition and accepting change, especially during a time of war. The first step is for Afghans to recognize the practices within their culture which are against human rights and then find ways of dealing with them that are not too much of a threat to traditional institutions and customs. The international community, too, must recognize that Afghanistan’s traditional systems have survived for hundreds of years and they cannot suddenly be swapped for Western ones. Only working within the existing systems, with patience and understanding, bringing about change slowly, and with subtlety, will succeed." Well said. And for that reason, I have a lot of respect for any woman out here who is trying, and even more respect for the family members, especially men, supporting her. They are the pioneers. It's not about getting rid of Islam, don't get me wrong, but it's about ensuring rights, especially rights guaranteed under Islam, and that women acting on those rights are properly protected.

oooo, am I getting too political? this was suppose to be about fashion! Well, in Afghanistan, there is as of yet no separation of the two. So hopefully this was an interesting peak of fashion Afghanistan style, and i'm looking forward to one day putting up another post that JUST deals with the current fashions on Kabul streets...no politics, i promise...so keep checking back!