Afghanistan

Faqirullah Hamidi, 45, with two of his children in their new home. Photo: Chris Herlinger/CWS

Story by Chris Herlinger/CWS

The stories of two families living on the hilly, wind-swept terrain of the outskirts of Kabul illustrate the challenges of displacement and the ways Church World Service is helping to provide solutions.

There, CWS has worked with its partner, the Afghan Development Association, on a shelter project that has provided housing for dozens of families.

One family – parents Malik and Bassri and their four children, ages 5 to 14 – recalls a tortuous journey of displacement that is all too common in Afghanistan.

The family was first uprooted from their home community – in this case, the city of Jalalabad – and headed east to a refugee camp in Pakistan. The family then returned to Afghanistan, first to Jalalabad and then eventually to Kabul, where they have lived since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

Any sense of normalcy proved elusive, however, as Malik, Bassri, and their children lived in a lightless, cramped hillside cave – an uncomfortable, if not downright dangerous and threatening place. Bassri says that the cave’s possible collapse was a constant and draining concern for the family as they eked out a living.

“Now we don't have those worries,” Bassri says, noting that their new home has four rooms in all, with an exterior water pump and latrine. “We are happy.”

Another family experiencing a bit of comfort and safety is that of Faqirullah Hamidi, 45, and his wife, Nafisa. Faqirullah must navigate with crutches – the result of leg wounds he sustained during what he calls “the Soviet time.” As a result of the injuries, he is also the principal stay-at-home parent – Nafisa is employed by a government agency – and tends to the couple’s eight children, ranging in age from a month old to 12 years.

The family’s life together has been immeasurably easier with a new CWS-supported home. It is still a bit tight for a family that large, but it is a place the family can call their own, and they are not, as is so often the case in Kabul, going from rented space to rented space.

“It’s a fundamental change that I have my own house,” Faqirullah Hamidi says, describing the family situation now as a happy one.