ANGER, DESPAIR SEEDS OF HOPE

BY JESSICA YOUNGMAN

Leaving dust in their wake, the young Afghan women set out for a miles-long run along a trail riddled with rocks and, every so often, a spent bullet. The casings and an occasional rusted Soviet tank served as reminders of their country’s history of war.

The women embodied its resilience.

Just a generation before, under the Taliban, they would have faced punishment, even death, for exercising in public. Women were forbidden to participate in sports or leave home without a male escort.

This fact was not lost on the women who ran together at dawn. Nor was it lost on Adriana Curto.

She is among alumni who have lived, worked or served in Afghanistan as soldiers, diplomats, humanitarians, attorneys and educators who share in anger and despair following the summer’s withdrawal of U.S. troops and subsequent Taliban coup.

From January to June 2021, Curto served as the Afghanistan country manager for Free to Run, a nonprofit that empowers Afghan women to participate in sports such as running to reclaim public spaces and to reconsider the roles they can—and should—have in society.

“These girls are experiencing so much trauma,” says Curto, who earned a degree in international relations and citizenship and civic engagement in 2016. “It is so unfair. I can’t help but think about what it must be like for them.”

Taliban leaders tried to assuage fears with claims they would rule with fewer restrictions. Yet, days after they claimed the capital, Kabul, The Ministry of Women’s Affairs—a building Curto drove past most every day—was turned into a headquarters for the Taliban’s ministry for the “propagation of virtue and prevention of vice.”

‘TRANSFORMING AFGHANISTAN’

Adriana Curto heard about Free to Run through a friend who had worked for the organization in Iraq. She developed an interest in sports as a pathway to empowerment while serving with the Peace Corps in Morocco. During her two years of service, she helped develop programming for an outdoor youth leadership program.

Adriana Curto ’16 B.A. (IR/CCE) is shown in Afghanistan, where she served as the country manager for Free to Run, a nonprofit that empowers women to run and participate in other adventure sports to reclaim public spaces and reconsider the roles they can have in society.

“It sounded incredible,” she says of the Free to Run opportunity. “I didn’t know much about Afghanistan, but I learned so much being there. It is an incredibly complex place.”

Most impressive were the young women. “In the news we never see the newer generation in Afghanistan—girls who are 15, 16, 17—who have grown up in this postTaliban era and have worked to fight for a lot of different freedoms,” says Curto.