Afghan Creative Arts Prison Project - First Report

In April Joanna and Anna spent a month in Herat launching the Creative Arts Prison Project. We are working again with members of Simorgh Theatre, with whom we collaborated for the Theatre for Social Development project in 2011. Here is Anna’s first report.

Together again!

Back in Afghanistan after four years. Back to Herat to see the girls of Simorgh again! How wonderful to have the chance to work together again. Four years is a long time, and yet it’s like yesterday. But going from 13 to 17 or 16 to 20 makes a big difference. They’re young women now, all grown up. I hardly recognized some of them! And others look exactly the same. (For me, I just look older, as one of them pointed out. Well, yes, time does that!). We had a happy reunion and then we met the new girls who have joined the group. All in all, we are working with six young women, and then two young men who are helping out -- who really just want to be part of the process, and I’m so glad to see them again too! They are great guys. But this project is specifically for women by women.

Getting ready for action

All of us jumped headlong into our work together with great excitement and energy. For the first nine days we did training to prepare the group for the upcoming program. Workshops practicing various theatrical exercises in the morning, and in the afternoon rehearsals to develop a performance. In between we have lunch together. During the week I think to myself, “We are having such a wonderful and fulfilling time together that if this is all we do with the project I will be happy!”

Enjoying lunch together the Afghan way. 

But we have much more to accomplish. The goal of our project is to bring theater workshops to the women’s prison and the juvenile correction center as a way to offer psychosocial support -- to give the women and girls a safe, creative forum in which to express themselves and process their experiences through play and physical action. Research and experience has shown theater to be an effective tool in helping people heal trauma, build self-confidence and manage daily challenges. Eventually the women will have the opportunity to create their own plays. The aim is for this to be an ongoing program throughout the year.

We are training the members of Simorgh Theatre to lead the program and teach the workshops, as we are only here for a month and after we leave, the project will continue. We are also preparing a play that we will present first thing as an introduction to theater. That is, the Simorgh girls will present it. Joanna and I are directing and they perform. Many in Afghanistan have never seen a live theater performance and have no idea what it is. We want to show them that they can create a play just like this with their own stories.

A Common Problem

The play is called The Backbiters and centers on two gossiping women who make life difficult for a young woman, Nafisa, who wants to go to university. They talk bad about her and spread rumors that worry her family. Nafisa’s friend, a younger girl of thirteen named Fereshta, looks up to her and dreams of herself becoming a doctor one day. But Fereshta’s father has other ideas. He has decided she’s going to get married to an older, rich man who will give the father lots of money. Fereshta is devastated. The mother can do nothing to prevent it, but finds an ally in Nafisa’s mother and together they speak to the mullah (similar to parish priest). This mullah is a wise, learned man who talks to the father about the laws of Islam and that a girl must agree to who she marries and that Fereshta is much too young and should get an education. He points out what happened last year when the neighbor’s wife almost died because they couldn't find a female doctor to treat her. It’s good that girls study to become doctors! The father struggles with the idea but finally decides to forego the marriage and let his daughter study. Meanwhile, the backbiters have had some backlash and decide they must mend their ways.

Our story has a happy ending, but unfortunately this is not the case for many girls in Afghanistan. This is a common scenario – forced early marriage. Even though Islam does say a woman must agree to marriage and should be educated, many villages follow old tribal ways that have become tradition and conflated with Muslim practice. The community listens to the mullahs who often are corrupt or ignorant. And people are very concerned with what the community thinks and says about them because honor is everything. Gossiping old ladies is a common problem and families can be destroyed by bad rumors.

Our talented actors in Simorgh made the play very compelling and also added lots of humor to it. The two women playing the backbiters were funny and forceful, and the woman playing the father (yes, women only-troupe playing all characters) didn’t hold back in her portrayal of a gross, old man. It’s exaggerated but all too real.

Joanna guides a discussion planning for our workshops in the prison. 

Showtime in the Prison

The day arrived for us to present our play at the women’s prison! I wasn’t sure what to expect, or how the women would take to the show or the idea of doing workshops.  How open and accessible will they be, or perhaps closed off, resistant, even hostile? No telling what will happen, we’re breaking new ground. Here we go – "hala hamagi hamabaham bedboard!" ("Now everybody all together, let’s go!")

Well, it went fantastically well. About ninety women in all gathered to see the performance. They laughed and applauded and listened intently, and a few cried. Afterwards we did a talkback where they had a chance to speak about the show and go up on stage and engage with the characters. This is where I wasn't sure how it would work. But it worked very well. The women didn’t hesitate to engage. Some stood up and talked about their own personal circumstances. Others got up on stage to confront characters, especially the father. They argued with the father for not letting his daughter go to school and marrying her off so young. The woman playing the father stood her ground and said “Everyone in my family married before the age of 13, it’s no problem.” The prisoner countered, “And this is why we’re all in here!” Spontaneous applause broke out in acknowledgement. Another woman wanted to speak with the mullah and proceeded to rail against mullahs who are bad and want money and don’t follow proper Islam. She was animated and passionate in her speaking. All the women spoke with great passion. It was clear the play really resonated with them. It reflected and acknowledged their situation and gave them a chance to have a voice and speak out.

Afterwards, several women came up to me and exclaimed over and over again, “I’m so happy, I’m so happy, thank you for being here, thank you for presenting this play to us.” One woman seemed particularly taken and keen to connect. She asked my name and where I was from, I said USA and Sweden, and then she wanted to know which I liked better, Afghanistan or Sweden. I told her they are very different, and that I really like the people of Afghanistan -- they are so friendly and hospitable. She said, “We are friendly because you are. We respond to you. You are so nice and friendly, and we want to be friendly back.” At the end, she took a ring off her finger (a crocheted band with black beads) and put it on mine and told me, “This is a memory from me.”

I wonder what happened to her, what she did that she is here in prison. Did she run away from home? With her lover? From a threatened forced marriage? Or was she forced into marriage? And did she run away from an abusive husband? Was she raped? Did she kill somebody? These are many of the possible scenarios and circumstances that land a woman in prison in Afghanistan. I did not want to ask this woman right away, but Joanna and I have heard many stories since that first day.

More to follow! 

No photos beyond the barbed wire!

Creating the Productions in Herat

From Michael:

All is still well as we are finishing up on week three here in Herat. Our adopted parents are still providing us with excellent meals and room to sleep, and our health and morale are good. There has been a slight yet tolerable increase in the fly population, although there is a lovely breeze that has kept them at bay. Unfortunately, it has also brought the dust, much to the chagrin of our laptops.

We have been working on two new productions, which actually start performances next week. Yikes! Well, no, not really “yikes”; it’s all going well with the art, too.

The task has been is to create a show promoting peaceful solutions to violence and oppression – after all, one of our sponsors is the United States Institute for Peace. We have a choice of topics, from the heavy (domestic violence; racial / tribal discrimination) to the light-yet-also-significant: support of democracy, literacy, health and hygiene. There is no easy choice; even a seemingly “no brainer” can be more than it seems.

Take for example: in our last project, in Myanmar, we (along with our local partners) decided to do a show about hand washing—always an important message, especially in tropical climates where germs multiply and spread fast. Okay, so we create this fun show telling kids to wash their hands and head into the schools and monasteries. Well, at one school, post-show, one of the older kids commented: “Thanks for the show; it was good, but we all KNOW we are supposed to wash our hands. They’ve been telling us that for years. The problem is the water doesn’t come out of the pipes and nobody gives us soap!” Oh. So our message should have been directed to the authorities: “Hey! Fix the pipes and give them soap!”

Aside from trying to troubleshoot show topics, there is also the troubleshooting that goes into the staging. Here in Afghanistan, you have probably heard that the gender issues are complex. It is a pretty conservative society, and even though there are many progressive and liberal Afghans, the line of tradition has been drawn deeply in the dry, rocky soil.

In general, the actors and actresses we are working with have no problem working together (without physical contact, that is); sharing dialogue on stage is fine with them. But they know it won’t fly with most religious or government authorities who give or withhold permission to perform. In fact, Simorgh Theatre (our partners here in Herat) face constant opposition from the local conservative forces. But there is one high ranking and respected Mullah firmly on their side. Actually, he was originally a naysayer, until he witnessed one of their performances at a girl’s high school, and he saw the social benefits of issue-related theatre. He even told us in conversation that he would like to see theatre performances brought into the Mosque! Religious stories, of course; think early church morality plays. But for here that’s pretty damn progressive.

Still, in order to maximize our performance possibilities we decided to create two separate shows: one for men by the actors, and one for women by the actresses. Both shows deal with types of domestic violence that are statistically all too prevalent: husbands and fathers abusing wives and children, and mothers-in-law abusing daughters-in-law. (Married women traditionally live with the husband’s family).

The hand-washing show presented a topic fairly easy to communicate physically, without much dialogue. But domestic violence is complex, and we are relying on the playwriting expertise of the Simorgh directors Monireh and Hakim to create the dialogue with input from the performers. Since we Americans are not appearing in the show (taking co-directorship roles) the local language can flow freely.

But here’s a hitch: how can you present family issues when you can’t have male and female actors working together on the same stage?* Hmmmm. To an extent, women can get away with impersonating men, but on the flip side we’ve seen the male actors at the Kabul University theatre department try to impersonate women, and it was a painful, absurd mockery. They couldn’t get away with it even when they were supposed to be funny, and there is nothing funny about our topic. How do we do it?


TO BE CONTINUED!

*Well, in fact we could probably get away with having male actors in performances for women, but we don’t want to condone the double standard.

Anna's First Update from Herat

From ensemble member Anna, April 7:

Salam! Chestor asti? Khob astom! Here I am in Herat, and am picking up some good Dari phrases. After a month of living here, I’ll be speaking like a native. Not quite. But little by little, able to do some simple communication.

We are living with our theater hosts’ family. Monirah, the director of Simorgh, the theater company we're working with here in Herat, is fantastic. She’s 26 years old and has already produced several plays and films, together with her husband Hakim. Well, actually they’re not quite married yet, though they finally got engaged, a bit of a scandal here.

She’s a free-thinking modern young woman, but is having to adhere to local customs (which she gripes about). To that end, she dresses in the chador whenever she is out on the street, like all women here. This is basically a large sheet, black or with white flowers or sometimes grey, swept around the body and held tight with the hands under the chin, so only the face shows. There are still women who wear the blue burqa, too. When inside, all women (and girls over 9) still wear a head scarf if there is a male present who is not close family. So because Michael is in the house, her mother and herself and her younger sister wear head scarves, but otherwise they wouldn’t. Joanna and I don’t bother when in the house. Since her father said to me: “You’re like my daughter!” I figure we’re family now and I don’t have to. And Michael is family to us too (me and Joanna). So there. But the grand father came for a visit the other night, and the father ran up to me quickly and said: “Anna, Anna!” and gestured to put my head scarf on. Because the grand father is very old school, very conservative. He does not, by the way, approve of Monirah’s choice of husband (to be), and has not spoken to the family for a long time.

In any case, the family is very welcoming to us, the father is really great and good-humored, and the mother is sweet. They cook us fabulous Afghan food. We are eating like kings -- yummy vegetable dishes, salad, yoghurt and great bread. We eat on the floor on a plastic table cloth (called the ‘sofra’), that’s the Afghan way. And drink lots of green tea –wherever we go, we’re offered tea, even in a shop.

We are in a new suburb to Herat called Jabraiel (it's being built as we speak, everywhere partial structures in process of construction). It’s where all the Hazara live. The Hazara are an ethnic people in Afghanistan and are very much discriminated against, especially by the Pashtuns (who consider themselves the only true Afghans). The Hazare are supposedly descendants of Djengis Khan, and have Asian features. The day after we arrived was a holiday and Monirah’s family and many many others went to a picnic area near a mountain. There some Tajik guys took a photo of a Hazara girl (and you do not take photos of girls!), so her brothers asked them to stop and to delete the pics; some soldiers came up (who happened to be Tajik too) and suddenly opened fire, and two random Hazaras got killed. This was extremely upsetting to Monirah, who started crying when she heard. It’s distressing because this kind of thing happens a lot. Of course, it didn’t help that we were in the midst of an intense political discussion about the state of Afghanistan and its future, as she got the news.

The day we arrived is when they had protests because of the Koran-burning. However, it was pretty small here in Herat (although later I was told there were up to 3,000 protesters and that is still quite a crowd). We were advised not to hang about town for a couple of days. But everything is fine. Things are peaceful here. It’s down in Kandahar, and in the east, Jalalabad, and now up in the north too, Mazar-i-Sharif, where the Taliban are causing trouble. We walk down the street and nobody bothers us, although we got lots of looks. There aren’t any other foreigners here, so we are quite a sight. And Joanna and I are not wearing the chador-sheets, although we of course wear long tunics and loose pants, or long skirts, with head scarf. People stare at us like we’re aliens, men, women and children alike. Some looks do appear a bit disapproving and hostile, from some men in particular, but mostly it’s just shock and awe. In general, people here are friendly and welcoming.

We have started teaching workshops, and are working with a group of very talented young girls, age 12-20, and some boys, too. It is really fantastic that there’s a theater group here, I must say, and with so many girls, and that their families let them come and be part of it! Considering how conservative and traditional the area is, one might expect any such activity to be entirely suppressed here in Herat and certainly if involving girls. And yet Herat has historically been the cradle of Afghan culture. For sure, engaging in theater here is not without controversy, without its risks and problems. Theater is certainly not considered a respectable activity here, let alone profession (nor did it use to be in the US or Europe, and perhaps still isn't). Really, theater is a foreign concept, and thus suspect. For certain, it is not something respectable young girls should partake in. Women are not supposed to show themselves (off) in public, so to be on a stage and be looked at – unthinkable! And who knows what kind of untoward activities they’ll have to engage in… Moving their bodies – scandalous! Being loud and expressive – outrageous! And, God forbid, intermingling on stage with the opposite sex. At Kabul University where they have an acting department, there is not one single female acting student among about 200 male students. In fact, Monirah's sister Tahira is just now entering the university and she will be the first female acting student ever! Go Tahira!

Michael's First Update from Herat: On Youth

Greetings friends and family.

We are into week three in our six week project in Afghanistan, the last 9 days being here in Jabraiel, near Herat. (Jabraiel is the Afghan name for the angel Gabriel). It’s good work; the members of Simorgh Theatre and Film are completely enthusiastic, soaking up all our exercises, and totally wearing us out. There are 35 members, ages 12 to 24. It’s a young company, but very well organized with a number of international performances, including Germany and India.

Simorgh is the first of four companies around Afghanistan that we will be working with over these two years. The project, sponsored by the US Institute for Peace and the US Embassy in Kabul, is to create with each company a series of issue-related performances that they can market to NGO’s and government ministries. Basically, we are giving the companies the tools to generate earned income. This week we were sharing various theatre techniques with the Simorgh actors and Monireh Heshemi, their Artistic Director. At 26, Monireh is smart, devoted, and well respected by her actors. Her command of English is quite good, so translation has not been a problem.

As it happens, the members of this acting troupe are all Hazara, the ethnic minority of Afghanistan’s four main tribal groups. Actually, almost all the inhabitants in Jabraiel are Hazara (think Chinatown, Spanish Harlem, or other such neighborhood). As this project requires the company to do 10 performances, and ethnicity can be a hot issue, we asked the company if there would be a problem if we booked a performance in another community of, say, Tajiks or Pashtuns. So check out the answer of sixteen year old Rahelah:

“When we choose to do theatre it is our task and duty to reflect on the problems and pains in society. It is not important who is the audience, if we have an opportunity to affect a good change in people and society it is our task and duty to do it."

Right on! That’s a pretty impressive quote, and to hear Rahelah proclaim it makes all the stress of our travels vanish like the fog in a breeze. Her answer is testimony to the very real desire of many Afghans to transcend the conflicts and build a peaceful society.

Rahelah is a young woman enjoying the opportunity to pursue her interest in acting. That she is allowed to do so in her immediate society of family and friends, and that there is a local theatre company here for her is pretty remarkable. Yeah, there is a certain stigma in this conservative society about women appearing on stage, but the real issue is the economic one… theatre is just not considered a viable career. Sounds familiar. Which is why we’re helping with possible solutions, working with NGO’s and schools and government ministries. It’s a start.

We’ve just started working on the specifics of the performances, and that will be the subject of the next entry.