Malika is the oldest sister of the family, who confronts/experiences the hardships the oppression brings to her and her family. However, by the end, Malika successfully rises above the despotism against women.
The Taliban regime took control of Kabul and implemented their interpretation of Islamic laws in the year 1996. The arrival of the Taliban marked a timeline completely different known to the women in Afghanistan. Paul Watson wrote an article in the L.A. Times about a doctor who experienced and witnessed the many medical mishaps due to the Taliban laws. Watson stated, “The Taliban were so obsessed with hiding women from men’s eyes that even a male surgeon could not see his dying patient’s exposed flesh” (Watson1). This statement describes how the women couldn’t be seen by the men, even if it was a doctor trying to save his female patient. In public the women had to wear a burka that covered their body from head to toe. Exposure of their bodies would lead to the women getting beaten, stoned, and raped by the Taliban. These actions were very much extreme for the women in Afghanistan to live by. They were not just supposed to wear a burka,