A Different Kind Of Daughter
Raphael
For every woman and child of war and oppression the world over, struggling
to play and learn in peace.
May these pages help to light your dark paths to freedom...They send girls like me to the crazy house—or simply stone us to death.
Lucky girls might get married off to a rival clan, in the hope of tainting the
tribe’s blood. I am the product of one of those punitive tribal marriages. In a
sentence meant to damn them both, my maverick mother married my
renegade father having never laid eyes on him until their wedding. The tribal
elders did not foresee the instant love match or the combined force of my
parents’ courage and shared ideals. They certainly did not foresee me. And
they could not stop our brazen family of Pashtun rebels from multiplying.
Even among my own, I was considered a different kind of daughter. I
hated dolls, was miserable wearing fancy dresses, and rejected anything
remotely feminine. My ambition would never come to life in a kitchen, or
flourish within the four walls of our home. Just to stay sane, I needed to be
outside, under the open sky and running free—the very thing that tribal law
forbade.