Between Fear and Survival
This gallery is a brief selection from a much larger body of work. The remaining images and full narrative are reserved for my forthcoming book. For commissioning or licensing enquiries, please contact me directly.
Arriving in Kabul on New Year’s Day, I was trapped in the airport by a bomb blast—an ominous prelude to a country a year into Taliban rule. International headlines fixate on sweeping bans: women barred from NGOs, girls kept from school, decrees that drove aid agencies out. On the ground the picture is messier. Many Afghan women still work—some openly, others from home—while nearly everyone agrees corruption has fallen since the previous government’s collapse.
Markets illustrate the contradiction: hijabs and burqas mingle with uncovered hair; conversation is candid yet cautious. Families describe livelihoods wiped out, not only by Taliban edicts but by sanctions and the NGO exodus. A once‑thriving dairy cooperative is gutted, guesthouses stand nearly empty, Kabul freezes under rationed electricity. Women are chased from public parks; children wash car windows to eat; bread stalls can’t sell their naan.
Yet resilience persists. Hazara sisters sew intricate embroidery in unheated rooms, mothers patch garments for sale, and night‑long conversations reveal a populace stitching life together despite fear. Afghanistan is not collapsed—it is bruised, caught between Taliban authoritarianism, Western withdrawal, and an indomitable will to survive.
This gallery is a brief selection from a much larger body of work. The remaining images and full narrative are reserved for my forthcoming book. For commissioning or licensing enquiries, please contact me directly.
Arriving in Kabul on New Year’s Day, I was trapped in the airport by a bomb blast—an ominous prelude to a country a year into Taliban rule. International headlines fixate on sweeping bans: women barred from NGOs, girls kept from school, decrees that drove aid agencies out. On the ground the picture is messier. Many Afghan women still work—some openly, others from home—while nearly everyone agrees corruption has fallen since the previous government’s collapse.
Markets illustrate the contradiction: hijabs and burqas mingle with uncovered hair; conversation is candid yet cautious. Families describe livelihoods wiped out, not only by Taliban edicts but by sanctions and the NGO exodus. A once‑thriving dairy cooperative is gutted, guesthouses stand nearly empty, Kabul freezes under rationed electricity. Women are chased from public parks; children wash car windows to eat; bread stalls can’t sell their naan.
Yet resilience persists. Hazara sisters sew intricate embroidery in unheated rooms, mothers patch garments for sale, and night‑long conversations reveal a populace stitching life together despite fear. Afghanistan is not collapsed—it is bruised, caught between Taliban authoritarianism, Western withdrawal, and an indomitable will to survive.
© Liz Loh-Taylor
