Five-year-old Tamkeem Sharer was watching TV in the living room of his family’s house in Kabul on a Friday morning in September 1992 when he heard a knock at the front door.
Submitted photo – Executive members of the Afghan Students’ Association include, from left, Sardar Hyder Khan, VP Communications; Khalid Ulomi, VP Finance; Mojgan Hasan, President; Jassamine Tabibi, VP Social Events; and Tamkeen Sharer, VP Administration.
What was waiting on the other side would shatter the life he’d come to know and leave his family scrambling to flee the country they’d always considered home.
The door burst open, and Sharer’s mom was tossed aside by two men – one with an AK-47, the other a machine gun – who barged in claiming they had a warrant to search the residence.
They were mujahedeen, militant members trying to overthrow the Afghan federal government, who were posing as legitimate secret service officers. They knew Sharer’s father was a wealthy businessman so they were coming to plunder the house.
Sharer was terrified and ran to the backyard for safety. There, he says, another mujahedeen member was waiting. The man grabbed Sharer, pulled out a gun equipped with a silencer, and held it to the young boy’s temple. By this time Sharer’s mother was also in the backyard.
“My mom (was) going crazy. She was screaming at them … and I’m crying, and I’m telling my mom, ‘Don’t shout.‘“
Soon the local authorities arrived to try to stop the unfolding chaos, says Sharer. After a few more tense moments, the authorities were able to chase the mujahedeen away. As the group fled empty-handed one of the authority personnel fired his bazooka sending a missile after them.
Two weeks later, Sharer and his family were en route to India where they stayed for the next eight years before moving to London, Ont. in 2000.
Although Sharer left Kabul on bad terms, he still considers Afghanistan his home and he says he would love to move back someday to contribute to his homeland’s society.
But right now it’s not safe to do so. So Sharer, 23, in his final year of a joint degree program in business administration and visual arts at the University of Western Ontario, joined the Afghan Student’s Association.
The Af.S.A. was established in 2000 as a registered club at Western. Today it consists of 40 members and five executives, including Sharer who is the vice-president of administration.
The mission statement of the Af.S.A. “is to raise awareness about the Afghan culture, and to achieve a level of unity among Afghans and non-Afghans alike.”
Club president Mojgan Hasan, 22, is optimistic the club will fulfill this purpose through activities such as weekly Dari language classes, potluck dinners, a fundraising gala to support the women and children of Afghanistan, and an annual volleyball tournament organized in collaboration with 10 other Afghan student’s clubs from universities and colleges across southwestern Ontario.
Khalid Ulomi, a business managerial student at Western who left Afghanistan at the age of seven and is now the club’s VP of finance, says the Af.S.A’s presence is important because it helps develop a balanced representation of Afghanistan in Canadian society.
“When people think of Afghanistan, they think of bombs, beards and burkas,” says Ulomi. “But there’s so much more to Afghanistan than that.” This includes a number of traditional customs, as well as lots of current generation Afghan cultural trends, says Ulomi.
Although many Canadians don’t know it, says Ulomi, there’re presently lots of Afghan pop singers who are making and selling their music.
Ulomi thinks the Af.S.A. will help highlight some of these unknown aspects of Afghan culture, and help people see beyond the stereotypical images. And according to psychology professor Victoria M. Esses, who is also the director of the Centre for Research on Migration and Ethnic Relations, Ulomi’s right.
Esses says clubs not only foster a sense of identity and a feeling of belonging amongst members, they also improve the level of understanding between those in the club and the general community.
“It’s an empowering way of getting the word out about your group,” says Esses.
The western media’s depiction of Afghanistan is overwhelmingly negative, focusing on tragedies and violence, says Esses adding, “we don’t get to see the individual Afghanis that are just like you and I.”
But Esses says an organization like Af.S.A. that are visible to the public and are open to anyone regardless of his or her ethnic background, provide Canadians with an opportunity to see a positive image of Afghanistan and come to a deeper understanding of Afghan life and culture.
While Sharer, Hasan and Ulomi seek to celebrate Afghanistan through their involvement with the Af.S.A., all three say they feel thankful to be living in Canada and going to school at Western. Here they have safety and freedom that they wouldn’t in Afghanistan.
“I’m happy, and feel fortunate to be here,” says Sharer adding he still loves Afghanistan and hopes the club will help others learn more about the country he once called home.
The writer is a graduate student studying journalism.
