Kabul Beauty School by Deborah Rodriguez

Through these and other stories, Rodriguez found the strength to leave her own unhealthy marriage and allow herself to love again, Afghan style. Yet within the small haven of the beauty school, the line between teacher and student quickly blurred as these vibrant women shared with Rodriguez their stories and their hearts: the newlywed who faked her virginity on her wedding night, the twelve-year-old bride sold into marriage to pay her familys debts, the Taliban members wife who pursued her training despite her husbands constant beatings. Well meaning but sometimes brazen, Rodriguez stumbled through language barriers, overstepped cultural customs, and constantly juggled the challenges of a postwar nation even as she learned how to empower her students to become their families breadwinners by learning the fundamentals of coloring techniques, haircutting, and makeup. With the help of corporate and international sponsors, the Kabul Beauty School welcomed its first class in 2003. Yet she soon found she had a gift for befriending Afghans, and once her profession became known she was eagerly sought out by Westerners desperate for a good haircut and by Afghan women, who have a long and proud tradition of running their own beauty salons. Surrounded by men and women whose skillsas doctors, nurses, and therapistsseemed eminently more practical than her own, Rodriguez, a hairdresser and mother of two from Michigan, despaired of being of any real use. All of these women have a story to tell, and all of them bring their stories to the Kabul Beauty School, where, along with Rodriguez herself, they learn the art of perms, of friendship, and of freedom.Soon after the fall of the Taliban, in 2001, Deborah Rodriguez went to Afghanistan as part of a group offering humanitarian aid to this war-torn nation.

There is the newlywed who must fake her own virginity, the twelve-year-old bride who has been sold into marriage to pay her family's debts, and the wife of a member of the Taliban who pursues her training despite her husband's constant beatings. Woven through the book are the stories of her students. When Rodriguez opened the Kabul Beauty School, she not only empowered her students with a new sense of autonomy-in the strictly patriarchal culture, the beauty school proved a small haven-but also made some of the closest friends of her life. Now, Rodriguez tells the story of the beauty school she founded and the vibrant women who were her students there.

Deborah Rodriguez is one of the very few who lives life smack in the middle of Kabul. Most Westerners now working in Afghanistan spend their time tucked inside the wall of a military compound or embassy.

Kabul Beauty School by Deborah Rodriguez