Taliban closure of magnificence salons removes final protected haven for Afghan ladies

As I stepped into my native magnificence salon right here in England to have my nails achieved forward of my brother’s marriage ceremony, my cellphone pinged.

It was a catch-up message from a 23-year-old Afghan girl I’ve stayed in contact with since we met in Kabul final yr.

The irony of the timing of her message wasn’t misplaced on me.

I had been fascinated with her and the opposite younger ladies from Afghanistan I’ve met in the previous few years, when the Taliban ordered all magnificence salons in Afghanistan to be shut.

“Salons, gyms, universities, baths, it is all just an excuse,” she wrote, “they just want to destroy us, either to be their slaves like their mothers, or be killed.”

When we first met in August 2022, one yr after the Taliban’s takeover, she was already afraid of what would come. So afraid that she did not need her title or face revealed – not then and never now.

She and different ladies we spoke to likened their lives to “being in prison” nearly daily, being instructed what to put on, what to say, and what to do by the Taliban’s ‘morality police’.

The one place, although, all of them knew they might catch a break was inside their magnificence salons.

They had been one other world altogether.

When I used to be working in Kabul final yr, I visited certainly one of these salons together with a feminine journalist good friend of mine. No males are allowed inside.

We needed to see whether or not the salons had been nonetheless working as common, and we truly simply needed to be in an area the place ladies aren’t judged or vilified only for being a girl.

Mostly darkish, thick, ‘inoffensive’ curtains separated the salons from the streets – although some went for bold-coloured curtains, and I favored that, it felt like a small act of insurrection.

Painted nails and thin denims

Once ladies entered these curtains, for a second they had been free.

They had been free to take off their black abayas and niqabs and retailer them in a cabinet and as a substitute stroll round in skinny denims and a ‘good high’.

They had been free to have their nails painted in vibrant yellows, oranges, and pinks on the toes they don’t seem to be supposed to point out.

And they had been free to say something they needed to say whereas they chatted away and exchanged information as their hair was being reduce, colored, and blow-dried.

One group of younger ladies had been gathered in a nook of the two-storey salon preparing for a household marriage ceremony.

They had been sporting conventional, vibrant Kuchi attire and ornate jewelry and headwear, with sparkly excessive heels.

They appeared gorgeous, however they could not present their faces as a result of they did not wish to get in bother.

The salon’s proprietor, a feisty girl stuffed with confidence and optimistic vitality, was completely happy to speak as she managed her employees and dozens of purchasers.

She insisted she did not wish to cowl her face for the interview, she needed to talk brazenly, although she did not need her or her salon’s title revealed – simply in case.

At the time, she talked concerning the tense relationship between her salon and the morality police.

“The Taliban holds all the power, they could close my business at any time,” she mentioned matter-of-factly. But she hoped it would not come to that.

The salon proprietor is the primary breadwinner for her household and mentioned it did not make sense to close salons as a result of they function behind closed doorways and are a significant a part of the financial system.

She accurately identified that not permitting ladies to complete their increased schooling, run companies, or progress in society would have a profound long-term impression on the financial system.

I’ve tried to get in contact together with her since this newest edict was revealed, however I’ve but to make contact.

For now, I can solely assume the salon we stepped into has now been shut down.

Every day since overseas troops left Afghanistan, life has turn into worse and worse for girls and ladies.

The youthful technology, lots of whom solely knew life underneath the 20-year NATO command, are a tech-savvy group who – in Kabul particularly – aren’t used to not having their freedoms.

‘I simply wish to stay’

Last month, the United Nations revealed a report detailing simply how a lot these freedoms have been curbed.

“In Afghanistan today, girls and women are denied education beyond primary level, banned from working outside the home in most sectors, prohibited from accessing public baths, parks, and gyms, and moving freely around the country,” the report acknowledged.

It discovered that the Taliban has “severely restricted the rights of women and girls and suffocated every dimension of their lives”.

And that’s what number of ladies really feel: suffocated and invisible.

I nonetheless typically obtain messages like “nobody hears us”, “I need to get out of this scary and dangerous place,” and “I just want to live”.

There are clear divisions inside the Taliban, we discovered that once we had been final in Afghanistan.

The youthful technology of management realise that in the event that they wish to be allowed again on the worldwide desk they must give ladies and ladies their rights again.

But it will seem from the newest order that the previous guard are nonetheless holding sway.

It could look like frippery to mourn the lack of magnificence salons, however when each different proper and freedom has already been taken away, the lack of certainly one of your final remaining protected havens is one other large blow.