I am a Bacha Posh: My Life as a Woman Living as a Man in
Afghanistan
Ukmina Manoori
Skyhorse Publishing, Oct, 2014
176 pp
$9.99 Ebook
$11.99 Print
$19.99 Hardcover
About the Book
"You will be a son, my daughter." With these
stunning words Ukmina learned that she was to spend her childhood as a boy.
In Afghanistan there is a widespread practice of girls dressing as boys to play
the role of a son. These children are called bacha posh: literally
"girls dressed as boys." This practice offers families the freedom to
allow their child to shop and work—and in some cases, it saves them from the
disgrace of not having a male heir. But in adolescence, religion restores the
natural law. The girls must marry, give birth, and give up their freedom.
Ukmina decided to confront social and family pressure and keep her menswear.
This brave choice paved the way for an extraordinary destiny: she wages war
against the Soviets, assists the mujaheddin and ultimately commands the respect
of all whom she encounters. She eventually becomes one of the elected council
members of her province.
But freedom always has a price. For "Ukmina warrior" that price was
her life as a woman. This is a stunning and brave memoir about a little known
practice that will challenge your perceptions about gender and the courage it
takes to live your life to the fullest.
My Review
I am a Bacha Posh is memoir with necessary autobiographical
elements. It is not fiction and thus will not have fictional elements of rising
and falling tension. Manoori shares her life, the only life she knows, of
growing up in a small rural village in Afghanistan during the 1980s. Russian aggression,
US intervention, and the rise of the Taliban are experienced through the eyes
of a child and young adult who wonders what they ever did to the government or
the Russians to deserve the bombing and destruction of their way of life.
As Ukmina saw the disparity in the way women and children
were, by custom and religion, treated, she chose, perhaps first in innocence but
later in growing conscience, to lead a revolt. Manoori lives out the strange
custom of allowing a daughter to dress and act like a boy until puberty to
allow the child freedom to travel and work to support the family, and even
attend school. When puberty comes, Manoori isn’t ready or willing to give up
the freedoms allowed a boy in a Muslim community. Although everyone around her
knew she was a woman, she lived a warrior life, taking on the two-faced facets
of ethnic religion and politics and forcing the troubled ideologies into the
light.
I don’t know that the story makes me rethink gender. Manoori
is not a lesbian, or even sexual, self-identifies as a woman, and not
transgender. She’s more of an Amazon, a woman unafraid to be a frontrunner in
defiance of ridiculous false male dominance. Manoori saw how traditional male
and female roles didn’t even pretend to work in a society where men were
supposed to take care of their family and women were supposed to be homemakers.
When a husband has daughters who are not allowed to be out unescorted in public
and traditionally not allowed to work or get an education, he can arbitrarily circumvent
society by changing the “norm” and treat a daughter as a son. Manoori learned
that her culture did not practice the laws it passed, such as women had the
right to vote since the 1960s, and decided to help women—everyone—create a safe
and relevant environment in her beloved country.
Told in a haunted voice from her gut, Manoori’s tale is a
plea both for understanding and acceptance. It’s a call to action to rise above
uncertainty and injustice and to live true.
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