school . I found a job at a pasta factory . That was too hard for me because I was only 13 years old . All the other coworkers were adults , and they were strong . Every day I grew older my family believed that I shouldn ’ t continue karate . Unfortunately , one day my family told me that I could not do karate any more because that was too strange for our society . I was the only girl in our tribe who played sports . Many times our relatives told my mother and my brother that this was immoral , sports are not for girls , sports are for boys , and that they should not let me do sports .
Then my mother told me just to go to school . She told me she did not have enough money for my karate class . At that time I did not work so I did not have money to pay for karate class . I left karate for 3 months , and then I found a job . The job was not easy to get . I worked as much as two people and with very little income I could only pay for my karate class and my school supplies . After 3 months , I went back to karate class . I worked so hard and learned karate very quickly because karate was my dream and my future . I really liked karate . I attended the Afghan National Championships , won Silver , and became a member of the national karate team of Afghanistan . After one year , again my family told me that now that because I was young , I had to stop doing karate . It was not good that society did not allow my family to let me do karate but that was only the beginning of challenges .
I managed to tell my family that I could succeed and make them proud of me . Later , I participated in many competitions and won many medals . Many TV programs in Afghanistan appreciated me and my achievements . In 2016 , I became the best female karate player in Afghanistan . In the same year , I experienced my first competition abroad , and I won Silver in my first foreign competition . Later , I became a karate teacher in a private school . I became a teacher of the same class where I trained , and began to train underprivileged girls and boys for free . Until 2019 , I participated in Asian and World competitions in the UAE , which was among 31 countries , and I won 3rd place in my weight class . In 2020 , I started working for Afghanistan National TV . That was a big risk for me because we had a traditional and religious society . Everything was going well but then …
On August 15th 2021 , everything changed again . The Taliban took over the country that day . I was in college and we returned to our home because we were all scared . When I returned home , I burned some of my documents and buried some of them . Then , I went to my aunt ’ s house because it was a little safer . After a week , I went past my karate club , and I saw that all the windows were broken and the photos were torn . I was so sad when I saw all my hard work of many years ruined like this . I saw my mother . Every time she heard a gunshot , she got up like lightning and her whole body trembled . The first thing she said was : “ they came ”. My mother and my family were worried about me and did not have a moment of peace until I left the country .
Everyone has a different story but for me in my whole life , nothing has been more difficult and excruciating than leaving my homeland , burning my dreams , and leaving my family .
I left everything there and left Kabul with a backpack . I did not know where it would end . I went to Pakistan illegally because of an emergency . I lived in Pakistan for 14 months and in October 2022 , I came to the U . S . In the U . S . I started a new life . I started Carlos Rosario School to learn English and found a job . There are many opportunities here . I ’ ll try to find a job for my own skill set when my English is great .
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