The darkest night of my life

“January 17, 2014. The darkest night of my life. My mother fell victim to Taliban cruelty and inhumanity. She became one of the many civilian casualties of the insanity of the Taliban,” read the first few jarring lines of a Facebook status from a friend. “We had only seen this in the movies, but now it has happened to us. What did we ever do to you? You all will go to hell for taking innocent lives where you will rot till the end of your days — you psychopaths.” This status instantly accomplished something that 13 years of conflict in our region hadn’t managed to do: this was no longer a war in which “other” people we never knew died. This was personal.

“Irony of life: last time I was in Karachi, my mom bid farewell to me. This time I’m going to bid farewell to her. My heart is breaking into a million pieces,” wrote Sara Khan, 28, as she boarded her flight from the United States — where her family is settled — to bury her mother in Pakistan. Sara’s mother, Nasreen Jamal Khan — a humanitarian working to improve maternal and child health in Afghanistan — died in an attack on a popular Lebanese restaurant in Kabul earlier this year. “When she agreed to go to Kabul, I was the last person in the family to be told,” recalls Sara. “She knew as the eldest daughter, I wouldn’t let her go.”

“Afghanistan is safer than Pakistan,” Sara recalls her mother arguing to ease her fears. “No one shoots you for your mobile and there is no street crime. Besides, Afghanistan needs me.” UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon described the attack in which Sara’s mother died as “horrific.” In his remarks, Mr Ban said it was “another sad moment” for the UN as it mourns the four colleagues killed in the attack — Basra Hassan of the United States, Nasreen Khan of Pakistan, Khanjar Abdallah of Lebanon and Vadim Nazarov of Russia. Basra Hassan and Nasreen Khan worked with Unicef in Afghanistan. “The depth of our shock and sorrow at receiving this news — and the magnitude of our outrage over this senseless violence — is difficult to measure,” the agency said in a statement.

“I spoke to her that morning on the phone,” shares Sara, recalling the day her life would change forever. “I told her that I’d call her again at midnight because it was my brother’s birthday the next day and we were all driving to Boston to see him. But she never picked up her phone that night… the last words that I said to her in the morning were ‘I love you mama’ to which she replied back by saying ‘I love you mera beta.’”

“My mother was the glue of our family,” says Sara. “All of us had goals, aims and ambitions before her death but now we have no idea where to go from here. I feel like my family is trapped in a dark room with no light. Our family is shattered. They broke our family.” Dr Nasreen compromised her own career for her family, always declining better paying positions away from Karachi, her hometown, so she could be home for her children while they studied.

“I can’t cry in front of my dad,” says Sara as her voice begins to crack with emotions. “I lost my mother but he lost his companion. He gets so sad sometimes. So I have to be strong for him.” Sara marvels at the ability of her mother to have accomplished so much in her professional life while balancing her personal life. “I don’t know how she managed her career, raising children and keeping the entire family together. She made everything look so effortless. I can barely make it through one day. But I keep telling myself that if she could do this, then, as her daughter, so can I.”

After her experience, Sara only has one message for all of us: “Go back home and hug your loved ones one more time and tell them you love them. Kiss your children just once more, because you can never know when things will change. And believe me, they will.”

Published in The Express Tribune, April 10^th, 2014.

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