By Azadah Tran
It’s the day before Eid. Two girls Shukria, 12, and Shegufa, 9, are standing in the full midday sun near the intersection of Pol-e Khoshk area in western Kabul.
They watch people passing by, holding shoe rags and a small tin can, hoping someone will give them shoes to be polished or drop some money into the tin.
When asked if they have any new clothes to celebrate Eid, both sisters exchange glances before the older sister laughs: “If we have bread, that itself is Eid.”
In Afghanistan, the biggest celebrations on the calendar are Eid al-Adha and Eid al-Fitr. These holidays are usually marked by enjoying sweets and delicacies and buying new clothes to honor the occasion.
Particularly for children, the Eid celebrations hold a special allure and vibrance. They celebrate with their families, don special clothes, and receive gifts from elders.
But for an increasing number of children, it’s no longer the case.
The United Nations stated in its latest report that the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan has deepened. International NGO Save the Children has reported that in 2024, one in every three children in Afghanistan will remain hungry on a daily basis.
This is the case for Shukria and Shegufa. Their father was killed in a coal mine collapse in Dar-e-Suf district of northern Balkh province a year ago. The older sister Shukria was in the fourth grade at the time and could have continued until grade six, but she dropped out to help earn money for the family.
Shukria says they leave home for work at sunrise every day. Their job involves polishing shoes and burning tins of esfand to ward off the “evil eye”, with both sisters sticking together and working together.
“We are constantly thinking about how we have to work more every day to pay for our household expenses, rent, and bills like electricity and water on time,” she says.
“Eid has slipped from our minds.”
Shegufa says they earn up to 150 afghanis (around $US2) each per day. She is in grade three and still attends school for half a day.
Their mother Latifa, 32, says unlike previous years, she couldn’t afford to buy new clothes for her daughters for Eid.
“Just this morning, my younger daughter asked me why I haven’t bought new things for our Eid. I told her, we don’t have the money. By the end of the month, we must pay the rent,” Latifa says.
Eid brings the embarrassment of begging
Across Kabul, families like Latifa’s are struggling to find ways to make Eid special.
For Marzia, 40, she’s been collecting little treats in preparation for her eight children by begging local shopkeepers, but it’s not enough.
She shows the small collection of cookies, raisins, chickpeas, and chocolate she’s keeping in a plastic sheet – the fruits of her begging.
Tears well up in her eyes.
“I’m embarrassed. I went to every shop today to ask for dry fruits and sweets for my children’s Eid,” Marzia says.
The west Kabul Tap-e-Shohada resident says her husband earns a living by carrying loads in his wheelbarrow. But it barely puts bread on their table, let alone allowing for new clothes or an Eid feast.
While Kabul city has been bustling with more people shopping ahead of Eid, for Marzia and her family, nothing has changed.
“I’m not prepared for Eid at all. God knows, we’ve even run out of flour. For dinner, I sent my daughters to the bakeries in hopes that someone might give them bread,” she said.
Since the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan in 2021, natural disasters, and the return of thousands of Afghan migrants from Pakistan and Iran, the Afghanistan’s economy has been declining into a serious humanitarian crisis.
Child labourers are more and more common, but the salaries for long days of work are paltry.
Marzia’s two elder daughters, 16 and 14, work in a carpet weaving company in Qala-e-Naw, Kabul.
“Both girls work from dawn to dusk. When a carpet is completed after two months or more, they only bring home 1,500 afghanis (US$21). Imagine how far 1,500 afghanis goes for a family of eight,” Marzia says.
A daughter talks in her sleep about new clothes
West Kabul resident Sabira, 30, says the arrival of Eid brings sadness, not joy, for her.
“Every Eid, my friends ask me to go shopping with them. I make excuses and don’t go. Every Eid that comes, I cry to myself,” she says.
It also hurts that she can’t take her four daughters to the market for new clothes. Her eight-year-old daughter talks in her sleep about going shopping.
“All the girls her age have new things. My daughter has asked me many times to take her to buy things, but I just tell her it’s okay, my daughter, I don’t have money, where would I buy them from,” Sabira says.
“It’s pointless to prepare for Eid when you’re poor. A poor person doesn’t have Eid,” she adds with a sigh.
They live in a rental in the foothills of Koh-e Chehil Dokhtaran area. Her husband has been unemployed and searching for work for months without success.
He used to dig wells for water in Maidan Wardak province, but after a stone fell on him from above the well, injuring his head, last winter, he hasn’t been able to work properly anymore.
Kabul shopkeepers have also noticed that there’s not as many people buying their goods anymore.
Market sellers notice people’s habits changing
Nawruz, 47, has had a dry fruit shop in the bustling Kot-e Sangi market of Kabul for over a decade.
“Eid is no longer as exciting as before. People are more concerned about putting food on their families’ tables than buying things for Eid,” he says.
“People only celebrate Eid when they have money in their pockets.”
Ehsan, 28, a pastry shop owner in the Pol-e Khoshk area of Kabul said that rising unemployment has impacted the significance of Eid celebrations for people.
“For people in Afghanistan, finding bread is more important than celebrating Eid,” Ehsan says.
Among the shop-goers in the Kot-e Sangi market, Sakina has come with some second-hard curtains and a few items of her household utensils to try to sell for money for Eid .
But none of the second-hand shopkeepers are willing to pay the price Sakina was hoping for.
Sakina says her family’s situation is worse this year than the last after her daughter stopped working in a sewing factory because of Taliban restrictions on her movement.
The wage was not much but it gave the family another six thousand afghanis (US$85) per month.
Sakina’s blind husband sometimes sells masks and plastic items in the Kot-e Sangi market in Kabul, but she says it’s not enough to support their family of seven.
Sakina is perplexed by the low offers buyers were making.
“I didn’t have money to buy Eid shopping. I brought my dishes and other belongings to sell, but everyone wanted them at a very low price,” she says.
“I don’t know what to do.”
