Comparison: Burqas and Short Skirts

Rasheed is the reason why we clutch to the stereotype of Pashtun husbands abusing their wives. He forced Mariam into an intimate relationship she didn’t want, he makes Mariam wear a full-out burqa when they are in public, and (above all else) he beats her. Mariam, who is the victim of all of this, has never seen a women that doesn’t wear a hijab or burqas. When Rasheed and Mariam leave the house to explore the city, Rasheed asks her to wait outside of a shop while he chats with the shopkeeper. As Mariam waits, she scans the crowd.

“But it was the women that drew Mariam’s eyes the most. The women in this part of Kabul were a different breed from the women in the poorer neighbourhoods – like the one she and Rasheed lived, where so many women covered fully. These women were – what was the word Rasheed had used? – ‘modern.’ Yes, modern Afghan women married to modern Afghan men who did not mind that their wives walked among strangers with makeup on their faces and nothing on their heads.” (Hosseini, 75)

                Mariam thinks of them as a different breed of women the same way that Rasheed thinks of himself as a different breed of man. They are like the rich 1% of Americans: unlike the middle class, they have the ability to afford more although this is in the sense that the women marry men who are more “Westernized” in their ways. This allows them to put on makeup and knee-length skirts without being forced to change their ways or scolded by their husbands. They can also get college/university degrees, smoke, and drive cars. All in all, this different breed of women is the type of women which men like Rasheed despise. To compensate for that, he forces Mariam to wear a burqa and takes control of her life. Mariam will unfortunately never get to experience the freedom of being an educated and loved women in her lifetime.