Posting our Voices on the City Walls

By Anita Haidary - co-founder, Young Women for Change - 24th December 2011 

Friday, December 23, 2011, Young Women for Change (YWC) filled the streets of Kabul with posters about women rights messages. 

It was another day of history, for the first time Kabul streets have seen women rights posters posted by Afghan men and women. We started poster advocacy from our Facebook page and website. Later, we decided to post it on the Kabul streets walls so it reaches every Afghan that crosses those streets.

I, like any other YWC member, was nervous about it, but as we moved through the city I felt stronger. It was rewarding when school students and every person on the street would read it, if they couldn’t read it, they would ask others to read it for them. After reading poster on the wall people would ask us to post posters on their cars.

I felt like my heart was going to melt down when we posted a poster and a shopkeeper who was there watching us posted it, couldn’t read it, and asked other person to read it.

When he learned what the poster said, he started fixing the poster and glued it harder on the wall. Two policemen walked to the other side of the road to read our posters.

Others thought we were working for money and belonged to a foreign organization, without knowing the fact that we are an Afghan group and this project is funded by individual Afghans.  Maybe there are not to blame. We, youth, have not had much of ground level work and in the media, youth complain about what the government or others have not done instead of talking about what we can do.

The poster day was an example of how and with whom YWC wants to work.

We want to reach every Afghan individually and work with them to change the stereotypes and bring the positive change to our country, ourselves.

It is time we realized our responsibilities.