posted March 22, 2006 06:15 PM            

Married at the age of four, an Afghan girl was subjected to years of beatings and torture, finally escaping to discover that within all the world's cruelty, there is also some kindness.

KABUL,
Afghanistan - Eleven-year old Gulsoma lay in a heap on the ground in front of her father-in-law. He told her that if she didn't find a missing watch by the next morning he would kill her. He almost had already.

Enraged about the missing watch, Gulsoma's father-in-law had beaten her repeatedly with a stick. She was bleeding from wounds all over her body and her right arm and right foot had been broken.

She knew at that moment that if she didn't get away, he would make good on his promise to kill her.
* * *

When I meet her at the Ministry of Women's Affairs I'm surprised that the little girl, now 12, is the same one that had endured such horrible suffering. She is wearing a red baseball cap and an orange scarf. She has beautiful brown eyes and a full and animated smile. She takes one of my hands in both of hers and greets me warmly, without any hint of shyness.

"She looks healthy," says Haroon, my friend and translator. I nod. But she looks older than her years, we both agree. In orphanages — first in Kandahar, then in Kabul — she has had a year to recover from a lifetime's worth of unimaginable imprisonment, deprivation and torture.

In one of the ministry's offices she sits in a straight-backed wooden chair and tells us the story of her life so far. She is stoic for the most part, pausing only a few times to wipe her eyes and nose with her scarf.

Her story begins in the village of Mullah Allam Akhound, near Kandahar.

"When I was three years old my father died, and after a year my mother married again, but her second husband didn't want me," says Gulsoma. "So my mother gave me away in a promise of marriage to our neighbor's oldest son, who was thirty."

"They had a ceremony in which I was placed on a horse [which is traditional in Afghanistan] and given to the man."

Because she was still a child, the marriage was not expected to be sexually consummated. But within a year, Gulsoma learned that so much else would be required of her that she would become a virtual slave in the household.

At the age of five, she was forced to take care of not only her "husband" but also his parents and all 12 of their other children as well.

Though nearly the entire family participated in the abuse, her father-in-law, she says, was the cruelest.

"My father-in-law asked me to do everything — laundry, the household chores — and the only time I was able to sleep in the house was when they had guests over," she says. "Other than that I would have to sleep outside on a piece of carpet without even any blankets. In the summer it was okay. But in the winter a neighbor would come over and give me a blanket, and sometimes some food."

When she couldn't keep up with the workload, Gulsoma says, she was beaten constantly.

"They beat me with electric wires," she says, "mostly on the legs. My father-in-law told his other children to do it that way so the injuries would be hidden. He said to them, 'break her bones, but don't hit her on the face.'"

Gulsoma's Scars

There were even times when the family's abuse of Gulsoma transcended the bounds of the most wanton, sadistic cruelty, as on the occasions when they used her as a human tabletop, forcing her to lie on her stomach then cutting their food on her bare back.

Gulsoma says the family had one boy her age, named Atiqullah, who refused to take part in her torture.

"He would sneak me food sometimes and when my mother-in-law told him to find a stick to beat me, he would come back say he couldn't find one," she says. "He would try to stop the others sometimes. He would say 'she is my sister, and this is sinful.' Sometimes I think about him and wish he could be here and I wish I could have him as my brother."

One evening, Gulsoma says, when her father-in-law saw the neighbor giving her food and a blanket, he took them away and beat her mercilessly. Then, she says, he locked her in a shed for two months.

"I would be kept there all day," she says, "then at night they would let me go the bathroom and I would be fed one time each day. Most of the time it was only bread and sometimes some beans."

She says every day she was locked in the shed, she wished and prayed that her parents would come and take her away. Then she would remember that her father was dead and her mother was gone.

But Gulsoma had an inner strength even her father-in-law couldn't comprehend.

"When he came to the shed he kept asking me, 'Why don't you die? I imprisoned you, I give you less food, but still you don't die.'"

But it wasn't for lack of trying. Gulsoma said when her father-in-law finally let her out of the shed, he bound her hands behind her back and beat her unconscious. She says he revived her by pouring a tea thermos filling with scalding water over her head and her back.

"It was so painful," she says, dabbing her eyes with her scarf and sniffling for a moment. "I was crying and screaming the entire time."

Five days later, she says, her father in law gave her a vicious beating when his daughter's wristwatch went missing.

"He thought I stole it," she says, "and he beat me all over my body with his stick. He broke my arm and my foot. He said if I didn't find it by the next day, he would kill me."

* * *

Gulsoma found hope after escaping

She crawled away that night and hid under a rickshaw. When the rickshaw driver found Gulsoma, broken and bleeding, he listened to her story and took her to the police. She was hospitalized immediately.

"The doctor at the hospital who treated me said, 'I wish I could take you to the village square and show all the people what happened to you, so no one would ever do something like this again,'" Gulsoma says.

It took her a full month to recover from her last beating. But the fear and psychological trauma may never go away.

"I was happy to have a bed and food at the hospital," she says. "But I was thinking that when I get better they will give me back to the family."

However, Gulsoma says when the police questioned the family, the father-in-law lied and tried to tell them she had epilepsy and had fallen down and hurt herself. But the neighbor who had helped Gulsoma confirmed the story of her beatings and torture.

The police arrested her father-in-law and "husband." They told her, she says, they would keep them in jail unless she asked for their release.

"Everyone was crying when they heard my story," Gulsoma says.

Gulsoma says she stayed at an orphanage in Kandahar, but was the only girl in the facility. Eventually, her story was brought to the attention of the Ministry of Women's Affairs.

Gulsoma was then brought to a Kabul orphanage, where she lives today. She takes off her baseball cap and shows us a bald spot, almost like a medieval monk's tonsure, on the crown of her head where she was scalded.

She then turns her back and raises her shirt to reveal a sad map of scar tissue and keloids from cuts, bruises and the boiling water.

Haroon and I look at each other with disbelief. Her life's tragic story is etched upon her back.

Yet she continues to smile. She doesn't ask for pity. She seems more concerned about us as she reads the shock on our faces.

The Toll of Torture

"I feel better now," she says. "I have friends at the orphanage. But every night I'm still afraid the family will come here and pick me up."

Gulsoma also says that when the sun goes down, she sometimes begins to shiver involuntarily — a reaction to the seven years of sleeping outdoors, sometimes in the bitter cold of the desert night.

She says she believes there are other girls like her in Kandahar, maybe elsewhere in Afghanistan, and that she wants to study human rights and one day go back to help them.

As we walk outside to take some pictures, I ask her if, after all she's been through, she thinks it will be harder to trust, to believe that there are actually good people in the world.

"No," she says, quickly.

"I didn't expect anyone would help me but God. I was really surprised that there were also nice people: the neighbor, the rickshaw driver, the police," she says. "I pray for those who helped release me."

Looking directly into the camera, she smiles as if nothing bad had ever happened to her in her entire life.

posted March 22, 2006 06:28 PM            

Stories like this make me want to see the middle east turned into a glass-paved parking lot. Reactionary, I know - but...

I have read countless stories of women in Afganistan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Iran where this kind of thing is rampant.

How can anyone defend Islamic culture (NOT ISLAM AS A RELIGION) when this kind of stuff happens routinely? How can any self-respecting WOMAN defend a culture that propogates and perpetuates the abuse of women and their status as chattel?! (Yes, I'm referring to women in the US who vehemently argue that we have no business in the middle east.)

As far as I'm concerned, eliminating this kind of cultural phenomenon is the BIGGEST, BEST reason we need to be there...

posted March 22, 2006 06:51 PM              

Doesnt it just make all the other stuff that is being discussed here pale into insignificance

This is outrageous.....sickening.....

And pitiful that in this day and age its being allowed to happen.

God help those WOMEN and their babies that are being subjected to this mayhem......

It is f*cking disgusting......

posted March 22, 2006 08:31 PM              

Second, you are right this horrid story is not rare. However, this story is not-representative of Islamic culture. Such abuse stories can be found in any society, and are especially prevalent in poor, underdeveloped societies where war and lack of education are too common for this day and age. The man who abused this poor girl is a psychopath, and must have been raised on backwards and barbaric village mentality.

Third, to say that this type of story justifies America’s invasion and imposition of their philosophy of democracy is preposterous. If one want to use that logic they are over looking most countries in the world where to this day women are abused, raped, made into sex slaves and where infanticide of baby girls is indeed still present. The invasion and wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were not done for the liberation of women as the objective. Who knows these women may or may not be in a better position after the wars, and if it works to their benefit, God willing, that would be a bonus.

Fourth, Democracy comes from within, from it’s own people and through education. Not through invading, occupying and creating war. The people of Afghanistan in this instance must work to change the order of their society. To have foreigners think they can come in and tell them how to live is insulting, and will bring forth only further repression by different groups or factions. How can anyone be fighting for this sort of democracy when they are focused on fighting foreign invaders who want to control them and their resources? Who is thinking about the abuse of women, when women and children are being killed in war.

posted March 23, 2006 12:41 AM            

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First, let me start out by saying the man who did this and those who knew of this happening and turned a blind eye should be shot. Oops...maybe that’s extreme.

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Extreme? No! Not in the least! Rather, far more merciful than they deserve.

And now the girl worries that someday her family will come and pick her up. She's only 12, and she'll be dealing with psychological and physical trauma for the rest of her life!

No, shooting would be far, far too good for them. Anyone who inflicts that kind of horror on a child should be cut from humanity like the cancer that they are.

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The man who abused this poor girl is a psychopath, and must have been raised on backwards and barbaric village mentality.

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Well, either their culture produces an abnormal number of psychopaths or this guy really gets around. Like Isis pointed out - stories like this out of Islamic cultures are a dime a dozen.

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Fourth, Democracy comes from within, from it’s own people and through education. Not through invading, occupying and creating war.

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Remember Nazi Germany and Japan?

Of course, neither of these places were as horrendously backwards as most parts of the Islamic world are, but I still think there's hope.

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To have foreigners think they can come in and tell them how to live is insulting...

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Yeah, wouldn't want to hurt their feewings. Please.

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... and will bring forth only further repression by different groups or factions.

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Easy to solve, if we weren't such a bunch of PC pansies.

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Finally, if one is serious about changing the status of women it might be more productive to try to uncover and understand how these people's minds work. Think about how they developed that mentality, which by the way has developed from an arcane Jahalia/barbaric culture, not from an Islamic one. Once you figure this out then proceed to change these people's minds. It can be done.

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Um, no. You don't work to "understand" and change the mind of a serial child-abuser - you just deal with him. There is no excuse that could put this in any different light.

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As far as I'm concerned, eliminating this kind of cultural phenomenon is the BIGGEST, BEST reason we need to be there...

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posted March 23, 2006 02:17 AM              

It reminds me of Africa and Europe's views of Africa during colonization. The French took some, the Germans took another fistful, Brits entered, and they tried to divide up the continent which way they pleased, and in the process condemned every native ritual they could find without asking why it was done or what was the reason. Achebe's Things Fall Apart, one of the most brilliant African novels, does show that Nigerian society had some serious problems (including abuse of women), but which society doesn't? My moms been a doctor here in the US for 20 yrs and was in Pakistan for 10, and shes seen any kind of abuse possible, in both countries. She's seen children picked up naked and put on burning hot stoves, women dragged on concrete, fathers beating mothers and pulling out their hair, a father poking a thick construction rod in a girls vagina, and numerous other things, right HERE in california.

What people tend to forget is that America isn't exactly matriarchal either. And it isnt exactly equal either. Although most of these societies we are talking about are patriarchal and as DD mentioned, poor, aren't most of the places in the world with similar demographics, suffering the same things? It has nothing to do with Islamic culture. Ditto on the Jahiliya culture. For example I just gave a presentation last week about the Quran's stance on abuse of women. Someone brought up the verse about hitting women. Well it says 'nishoz hunna'--basically, a woman can only be physically struck if she is sexually perverted (committing incest or bestiality etc.) If not then dont touch her, the prophet mohammad said that a man who strikes a woman is a donkey. Doesnt get any clearer than that.

Its not even 'Islamic culture'. Its indigenous cultures--in Pakistan, the preIslamic culture (they still celebrate Basant, do mehndis and dholkis, blah blah, which is absolutely NOT from islam! In arabia they have all weird kinds of customs dating from pre-mohamad period like the mother in laws meddling and the handkerchief on the night of the wedding??).

The nature and extent of these abuses and tortures with women differs quite a bit across the middle east, lumping it together is just too ignorant. The reason it differs so much is because each place had its own indigenous culture. I mean look at the conflict between the Sunnis Shias and Kurds in Iraq, each one has a background before Islam that they are hanging on to.

I mean, Arab women consider it so backward that western women change their name after marriage to Mrs. (husbands last name). It was a European custom because women were considered property (do not covet they neighbors wife or ass, both being considered the neighbors property). In Arabia a woman is simply 'bint' (daughter of) her mother.

Everyone is disgusted by everyone else. But it happens everywhere in different form. Unless you're talking about a matriarchal society, like the skardu clan that my mum comes from. Boy is it different there I grew up thinking I was a princess because women are so dominant in that particular area, its a completley matriarchal society. I remember having boys salute the girls in school, and after weddings, men would bring around water bowls and wash the women's hands. There were even cases of husband abuse that used to come before the village elders, usually a committee that was predominantly female also. Ha what a world that was! Gotta go back sometime

posted March 23, 2006 08:40 AM              

DD,

I have to agree with the point that Johnny makes about this issue and Islam. If this is not a rare instance and stories like these are indeed a dime a dozen, then the issue is surely representative of Islam. I think it is an issue that the Islam world needs to embrace and stop covering up.

Have you ever heard the expression, "Don't air your dirty laundry"? Well... I think it's crap! It should really be just the opposite. We need to air our dirty laundry to get the stink out.

This issue is Islam's dirty laundry. We all have our dirty laundry... and it is typically representative of our culture.

SGA,

That must have been a wonderful experience... being in a matriarchal society.

Isis,

posted March 23, 2006 10:41 AM              

The Universal Laws take care of Karma..so going to war to kill..is not our job..it never was..Man/Woman created this..all this terrible stuff..

so whatever death we cause there..well don't you think that will happen here..that's how the Law's work..like Katrina..you get what you give..when does it end..when do we heal people..help the way they need to be..
What happened to that Father-in-law..that he would act in such a manner..was he a girl in another life and the same happend to him..or was it something much worse..

all I see..is people passing judgement..and blaming..
God does neither..and neither should we. ...

that is what the Universal Laws are for..they just are and they work..not matter what stupid things we do..

posted March 23, 2006 07:30 PM              

I guess some will say that Islam is the cause of this cultural backwardness, but I really don't think that's fair either. As outsiders, it's easy to look at this and draw that conclusion, but a quick look at Arabic and Persian history will prove it nonsense. The Islamic world seems to be going through it's own version of the dark ages. I wish I knew why.

posted March 23, 2006 10:35 PM              

People don’t realize that there are so called madresas that teach students how to read the Quran in Arabic, but miserably fail to teach their students it’s translation and meanings...so if you can imagine their version and understanding of Islam is based on their culture and what their ancestors have practiced for centuries.

And it's obvious this guy was a lunatic and his behaviour was unacceptable by that society. How else would the girl have been rescued by the rickshaw driver, treated by the Afghani doctors, get her father in law imprisoned by their police and have so many weep over her story? People in Afghanistan are human.

And gosh, I'm not going to toot the Taliban's horn. They were anti-Islamic in many ways. However, they came at a time when women were being raped and badly abused. Problem is they went to the other side of extreme and repressed their women, initially for safety concerns. Remember these men have mothers, wives and daughters too. And keep in mind Afghanistan was fighting the Soviet so after the war there were alot of messed up warlords running around and it wasn't safe for women. The Taliban also took care of the widows and provided for them. Some women are so desperate in those situations...it's do or die from poverty and the lack of basic necessities.

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Culturally, these women are taught from birth that they are inferior and their society is set up so that they don't really have a voice. They must feel so powerless and afraid. The men benefit from this and I do think women are kept "in line" with religious rhetoric.

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Yes that may be the issue for some women. But people who are not part of this culture seem to not realize that some women are just as guilty for perpetuating old and backwards traditions and thinking.

SGA, thank you for giving those examples and pointing this out:

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The nature and extent of these abuses and tortures with women differs quite a bit across the middle east, lumping it together is just too ignorant. The reason it differs so much is because each place had its own indigenous culture. I mean look at the conflict between the Sunnis Shias and Kurds in Iraq, each one has a background before Islam that they are hanging on to.

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posted March 24, 2006 01:18 AM              

And would everyone PLEASE stop calling it Islams problem or Islams dirty laundry, its really the cultural problems that are country-specific! What in the world else could explain why Kashmiri women are so dominating versus Punjabi women versus Urdu speaking women all over Pakistan? What about the Sunni and the Shia Arabs? Very different treatment and roles of women there as well. And how would you explain the similarity in roles of Arab CHRISTIAN women in Palestine and Egypt to the Arab muslims? It is an ARAB thing in that case, not an Islamic thing. Islam totally condemns all this!

And yes as DD said this abuse is not acceptable. At least in Islamic perspective (Thanks TINK for mentioning that!). I don't know if its acceptable on the majority basis or not, frankly I haven't polled the people. On a government basis, most governments vehemently are against it, proven time and again by Musharraf's women rights advocacy, Hosni Mobarak's secular liberation of women movement, and the Jordinian and Lebanese women's roles in government. Also, UAE and the periphery of Saudi peninsula countries are making progress, although Ill be the first to admit that Kuwait, Saudi and Afghanistan are still backward as anything.

Love
SG

posted March 24, 2006 02:42 AM            

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Johnny how’s the state of women in Afghanistan post-war? The state of women in these villages hasn't changed much.

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I didn't say we were doing a great job of it. I said anyone who does do something to stop these types of things has my respect, and that we could do better if we didn't worry so much about PCism. But I'm all for doing better.

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And actually I find foreigners who try to impose their values and beliefs on others as the right way insulting.

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If these people are beating their children, they definetly need someone to come in and "impose" their non-child-beating ways on them. I bet the little girl wouldn't be insulted.

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And you must be living in a dream world if you think that’s “easy to solve.”

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Um. I was insinuating that a good tactic to use to combat this kind of abuse in these backwards little countries would be the same type of tactic that has proved so effective in combating crimes since the dawn of history. Prison. Execution. Justice

You lock up or kill the violent criminals, you stop them from tormenting their victims. Tell me, Daydreamer, how is this a dream?

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By the way do you know any Muslim Afghani, Pakistani, or Saudi women personally?

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I've known several, yes. What does that have to do with a little girl getting beaten to within an inch of her life?

I do love how you consistently try to paint anyone who argues with you as an ethnocentric, brainwashed American. Yes, I've known foreigners. No, I don't watch FOX. Can we get to the point?

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Obviously in this case there’s no excuse and the abuser must get his due punishment!

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Darn right.

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But like SGA said there are different levels of abuse.

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Eh... maybe. But child abuse on any level is beyond vile and deserves no mercy. No cultural phenomenon can justify it or make it in any way more tolerable.

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And as I pointed up above women help carry this on through the generations as well.

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Whoever said this is just a men's game? Lock the women up, too!

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That’s why proper education for everyone is important.

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I'm all for education, but I don't think that it's going to stop child abuse terribly effectively. There are sickos like this all over the world, though their do seem to be an abnormal number of them in these *Arabic* countries.

posted March 24, 2006 06:44 PM              

How many Pakistani Muslims will stand up for Augustine Mashi? How many American Muslims would protest his death sentance if some crazy judge tried to pull that insanity here?

posted March 25, 2006 06:18 AM              

Thanks AG and Johnny....

MMMM....

A pity though that other male knowflakes find vast amounts of energy and time to rant on about economics, politics etc and yet I dont see their comments here......

Says it all really doesnt it.....

How are we supposed to unite, without compassion and support for our sisters and brothers who are suffering atrocities that thanks be to God, we may never go through.

God this really makes me sick....

posted March 25, 2006 10:25 AM              

You mean like you always do......

Oh thanks for telling me Lotus

Yes I NOW understand