On the 26th of October, 08:30 pm, the Mahalla Festival hosts:
“AY KASH / ای کاش / IF ONLY / Keşke”
A Theatre event of the ‘Under the Starry Afghan Sky’ collective in association with Cosmino Productions at the Tatavla Stage as part of the Mahalla Festival in Istanbul.
Eleven girls – using their pens, paints, and voices to share their memories and experiences since the Taliban took power in 2021 and share their hopes and dreams for a better future.
Under the Starry Afghan Sky are eleven young women aged between 14 – 23 living in Afghanistan under Taliban rule. The collective evolved out of the work of Herat Online School founded by the educational activist Angela Ghayour who herself fled Afghanistan in 1992 and is facilitated by Rachel Karafistan of Cosmino Productions who has been working with the young women virtually from their bedrooms, since September 2022.
Eleven girls
With our hearts full of hope and desire.
With tears in our eyes and trembling legs, with no way to escape.
We are sitting in our bedrooms in Afghanistan and slowly dying.
Every time we rise to show ourselves, our legs are showered with bullets.
Eleven girls who only ask to be allowed to study, to travel, to let our hair fly in the wind and, from all the riches in this world, own a bicycle. Is it too much to ask? Is it too much if I want to become a psychologist? Or a painter?
Too much if I want to fall in love and have my heart broken? Too much if I prefer freedom over longing?
What it my hair turns grey, and my lips are never kissed?
We never wanted our share of the sky to simply be able to gaze at the moon from our bedroom windows.
I want to swim in the sky. Do I want too much?
Eleven brave warriors, standing against the Taliban’s oppression with our pens, art, poetry, and music.
Ay Kash is the voice of a nation sleeping in blood, the voice of a wounded geography.
Don’t let our desire to swim in the sky, rot in our hearts.
Don’t let the desire to take hold of our pen and fight, disappear.
Text: ‘The Writer’
ABOUT THE PROJECT:
Since the withdrawal of the Western forces in August 2021, the situation for women in Afghanistan has spiralled into despair. They do not even have rights to be violated. Women have lost the ability to learn, graduate, fall in love, travel alone, go for a walk in the park, ride a bicycle, or speak in public. ‘Ay Kash / ای کاش / If Only’ is a hybrid performance featuring live on-stage action by Rachel Karafistan of Cosmino Productions and filmed ‘interaction’ with eleven young women aged between 15 -23 who are in Afghanistan. Their true identities must remain hidden because it is simply too dangerous to do otherwise, but what they want to tell you will be given life and poetic space. And they want to tell you many things: they want to tell you their personal stories since the Taliban have taken power, the stories of women who have shaped Afghan culture, the tales of their mothers, their grandmothers and their hopes and dreams for the future. All this and more bursts into life with the help of song, object theatre, storytelling, and AI. Everything that appears in the performance has been filmed and created by the young women themselves. The performance also features animations designed to protect the identities of the eleven young women, by Berlin artist Anna Benner.
The production AY KASH / IF ONLY was recently awarded the prize for best direction at the prestigious International Theatre Festival ‘Valise’ in Łomża, Poland which this year celebrated its 37th year. The jury commented on ‘the courage of the performance and the power of its artistic expression, which is more accurate than any journalism’.
Ağa Hamamı Cad. Taktaki Yokuşu 2B Cihangir Beyoğlu / İstanbul
The event is free of charge, you can reserve places at: 0090-530 113 52 30