By Somaia Walizadeh
The room is small, almost bare. A thin beam of Islamabad’s morning light creeps through the curtains, touching the face of a young woman sitting quietly on the edge of a mattress. Her hair is short, her eyes tired—but beneath that weariness lives something unbroken.
Her name is Ada, a transgender woman from Afghanistan. For over a year and a half, she has lived in exile, her life suspended between survival and hope.
“This was not migration,” she says softly. “It was fleeing death.”
Childhood in Mazar: A Quiet Knowing
Ada grew up in Mazar-i-Sharif, in a well-educated family. Her parents, both engineers, believed knowledge could build safety — but Ada learned early that knowledge couldn’t protect her from who she was.
As a child, she preferred the company of girls and felt drawn to boys. “I was nine, in fourth grade,” she recalls. “I already knew I was different. My body, my mannerisms — they told a story I couldn’t hide.”
At school, Ada’s brilliance shone. Among two thousand students, she ranked first, year after year. Yet, in the conservative corners of her community, success could not erase what they saw as an unforgivable truth: she was not the boy they expected her to be.
The Taliban’s Return: Fleeing the Unforgivable
When the Afghan Republic collapsed and the Taliban returned, Ada’s quiet difference became a death sentence.
She remembers the threats — the whispers first, then the direct warnings.
“They said I was corrupting youth,” Ada says. “They accused me of promoting prostitution, of being against Islam — only because I stood up for queer people.”
Her father, desperate to protect her, sold the family’s belongings to help her escape. It was an act of love that cost him dearly. Seven months ago, he passed away — a wound Ada still carries in silence.
Exile in Islamabad: Shelter and Betrayal
When she arrived in Islamabad, Ada thought she’d found safety. A local NGO placed her in a shelter, and for a short while, she could breathe again.
Then, management changed hands.
“The head of the new company asked me for sex,” she says. “When I refused, they threw me out.”
That night, Ada slept on a park bench — no pillow, no blanket, only the cold sky and the hum of traffic for company. Days blurred into hunger. Sometimes she survived on biscuits; sometimes, on the kindness of friends.
“No one — no human being — should go through this,” she whispers.
Waiting Without End
Today, Ada rents a tiny room offered by a kind woman who took pity on her. She spends her days in limbo, checking her email for a message that might change her life.
For over a year, she has been waiting for Germany’s immigration office to decide her fate. There was one email — a flicker of hope — but no final decision. Each passing day feels like the slow closing of a door.
A World Divided
While Ada waits, the world argues over the very right of people like her to exist. Across the ocean, new anti-trans laws echo through American legislatures. The same debate ripples from Washington to Tehran, Moscow to Kabul — a global tug-of-war between recognition and repression.
Caught in this divide are countless lives like Ada’s: exiled, silenced, unseen. They are refugees twice over — first from war, then from the war on identity itself.
The Spark That Refuses to Die
And yet, Ada dreams.
“I want to study fashion design,” she says. “To use Afghan fabric and colors to show the world that trans women are creators, not sinners.”
There’s a light in her eyes when she speaks of it — a small rebellion against despair. Her dream is not just survival, but dignity.
For now, she remains in that small room in Islamabad — a woman displaced by ignorance, but defined by courage.
Ada stands for all those who fight to exist, to love, and to be believed — even when the world offers them nothing but shadows.
