The Dressmaker of Khair Khana: Five Sisters, One Remarkable Family, and the Woman Who Risked Everything to Keep Them Safe

“She struggled to see out through the small eye vent, which was just two inches long and three and a half inches wide.” 

The threat of not wearing the veil is clear to Malika: She will be beaten in the streets, but her unfamiliarity with the garment and the discomfort it causes demonstrates just how long it has been since Afghan women were forced to wear a veil. The Taliban are about to change everything in Kabul, forcing women to adhere to practices that many considered forgotten in the distant past. 

“Kabulis watched helplessly as the Taliban began reshaping the cosmopolitan capital according to their utopian vision of seventh century Islam.” 

In this quote, the text separates the characters into those from Kabul and the Taliban fighters. The two groups have radically different interpretations of Islam and culture; but because the latter has the guns and the power, the former group is obliged to comply. The central tension of the text emerges from the two groups attempting to live alongside one another. 

“For the first time in years, Kabuli could sleep with their doors open.” 

As the situation in Kabul deteriorates, Woja and his family are facing a difficult decision. Flee, losing everything they have and putting their whole family at risk, or stay and be subject to the harsh new religious laws. The quote above is an example of reasoning—trying to justify adhering to the laws in the name of civil order and ignoring the moral abjectness of the Taliban’s means of rule. The streets may be safer but at a huge moral cost. 

“A copy of Maulana Jalalludin Mohammad Balkhi-Rumi’s classic Divani Shamsi Tabrizi, an epic poem of forty-five thousand Dari verses, floated constantly between the sitting room and the girls’ sleeping chambers down the hall.” 

At a time when their rights are forcibly diminished and they are locked away from society, the girls in the family find that literature is one of the few means of escape that they can indulge. The escapism offered by epic poetry transports them to a different world, one not beholden to the strict ideology that now surrounds them. The girls turn to literature because it can help them imagine the kind of world where they are no longer oppressed. 

“In Kabul, all the joy had gone out of shopping as well.” 

Shopping, the social enterprise that was once a feature of every person’s life, has now been turned into a dangerous venture. As if to emphasize the almost comic maliciousness of the Amr bil-Maroof, who have banned rustling clothes and laughter, even a necessary chore like shopping has been turned into a potentially violent situation. The Taliban are slowly robbing the women in Kabul of anything resembling fun, happy, or sociable activity. 

“They didn’t just need income; they needed a purpose.”

The necessity of the dressmaking business extends beyond the financial. Kamila understands that her family cannot wallow in despair and that—as the ostensible head of the household—it is her responsibility to provide them with a direction and a purpose. By making dresses, the family has an objective to work toward and a task that will take their mind off the Taliban occupation. 

“But as soon as the shop owner had spoken she realized it was too dangerous to use her real name.”

Kamila demonstrates her strong instincts and her resourcefulness. When asked her name, she takes advantage of the strict clothing laws and provides a fake name. Her answer provides an additional layer of security, lessening the risk to her and her family if the shopkeeper is asked about her identity. Though she is suffering under the rule of the Taliban, Kamila is still able to use the regime’s oppressive laws against them. 

“They were both young people caught in circumstances they had had nothing to do with, who were fighting as hard as they could to take care of their very large families.” 

Even amidst the constant threat of being caught, Kamila pauses for a moment when she is struck by the empathy she feels toward Ali the shopkeeper. Her desperation and determination to help her family has narrowed her focus, and she is reminded that her family is not alone in their struggles. Everyone in Kabul is feeling the bite of the Taliban regime. As they stand and talk, Ali’s words seem something of an omen of good fortune to Kamila. 

“The girls said nothing to each other, but their forced calm spoke volumes: surprises were unwelcome and fear was now the normal reaction to any unexpected visitor.” 

Despite the apparent success of the women’s tailoring work, even an innocuous knock on the door reminds them of how precarious their situation has become. Even though they are obeying all of the Taliban’s draconian new laws, the arrival of the guards could not only spell the end of their business, but could lead to them being beaten and imprisoned. 

“This business was her best—and right now her only—hope for helping her community.” 

Kamila feels a sense of duty to her family, friends, and community. Kamila knows that she does not possess the ability to fight back against the Taliban in any meaningful sense. Instead, however, she can do whatever she can to help the community prosper in difficult conditions. 

“If we’re strict about following these rules, and only work with honorable girls from around here, I think we’ll be okay.” 

Planning her sewing school, Kamila’s ambitions are becoming grander and grander in scope. In discussing how she plans to avoid trouble from the authorities, she demonstrates her inherent naivete. Even if the school obeys the rules and does everything as they should, they will not be guaranteed protection. The vindictive, unpredictable nature of the Taliban’s austere interpretation of religion means that they will be under threat, no matter what. Kamila is yet to grasp the true nature of the people who are in control of the city. 

“They wanted more than anything to work invisibly, but this was becoming increasingly difficult.” 

Ironically, Kamila and the Taliban seem to share the same desire for the women in the tailoring school: Both want the women to remain unseen and unnoticed. For Kamila, however, the reasoning is morally sound. She fears retribution if the authorities discover the sewing school. As invisible as they might try to be, they will never be entirely safe while the Taliban are in power. 

“There are just all these women working together and talking and sharing stories.” 

In discussing why she loves the school so much, one of the students reveals one of the hidden benefits that Kamila and her sisters provide: a means of escapism. The school is a safe space where women can gather without fearing the wrath of the Taliban. 

“Like Kamila and her sisters, she refused to turn any woman away.” 

The spirit of community and mutual assistance is not limited to Kamila and her sisters. Dr. Maryam’s efforts to treat every woman who comes to her clinic is further evidence of how all the women in Kabul are banding together in the face of oppression. They know they lack physical power to combat the Taliban, but they have strength in community. 

“She would do all she could to keep it that way.” 

After delivering the rushed order for the Taliban wedding, Kamila is forced to confront the truth: No matter how secretive she has been, the Taliban are aware of her business; they are permitting her to continue, but the veil of secrecy has fallen away. Kamila is not working against the Taliban but with their permission. Her quiet act of rebellion has turned into another cog in the machine of the abusive state, but she has no choice but to continue. 

“Kamila was struck by how tired [her mother] looked.” 

The war is inflicting a heavy toll on everyone involved. Both Malika and Kamila have been told that they need to rest more, while their mother arrives home and her exhaustion strikes Kamila. Having not seen her mother in months, the extent of this toll is shocking. It forces Kamila to confront awkward truths (her parents’ mortality and the never-ending nature of the conflict) and makes her realize that, on a grander scale, her dressmaking is almost inconsequential. 

“Everyone seems to have become an entrepreneur.” 

Kamila overhears women on the bus as the Taliban’s grip on Kabul tightens. Everyone is suffering, and many have turned to making whatever they can in their homes in the hopes of selling it. To Kamila, this is both hopeful and worrying. She can take joy from the fact that her success has inspired others but, in a market economy such as Kabul’s local industry, these women may now be competitors. Kamila is facing threats from every side, hoping her business will not be squeezed. 

“I know that you know what you are doing and that you think all the tailoring work has taught you how to move around the city as if you’re nearly invisible, but remember that they only have to catch you once to destroy everything.” 

As Kamila takes on more responsibility working for the UN, she puts herself more at risk from the ire of the Taliban. Malika warns her of this and notes that, just because Kamila has a lot of practice, she is not immune to danger. This hints at the notion that Kamila might have become arrogant or comfortable amid all the danger, thus opening herself up to greater threats. The timely warning from her sister seems foreboding, forcing Kamila to confront the precarious nature of her situation. 

“If things got quiet, then they were in real danger.” 

Kamila’s experiences in dodging the attentions of the Taliban in Kabul have given her a heightened intuition of how to deal with such situations. As their bus is besieged by Taliban guards, Kamila finds herself tallying the current situation against her own past. That the guard is talking, she reasons, is a good sign. However, Malika’s words from the previous chapter loom large in the audience’s minds: For the first time in the narrative, Kamila could be in trouble. 

“When she returned to Kabul, Kamila told her family nothing of what she had encountered on the way to Pakistan.” 

After a lucky escape from the situation with the Taliban guard, Kamila is chastened. Rather than return immediately to Malika and admit that she was right, Kamila keeps the entire experience a secret. To admit to such a thing would be to contravene her own pride. She would have to admit to being wrong, even though her quick thinking and experience did allow her to escape the situation. Kamila does not want her family to worry and does not want to impinge upon her own inflated ego. 

“The Taliban’s standard arsenal of weapons proved useless against Titanic.” 

The movie Titanic becomes a cultural sensation in Kabul and heightens the citizens’ awareness of the extreme nature of the regime’s laws. The wicked, immoral influence of the film cannot be stopped by guns or by shouting, so the Taliban find themselves lost and befuddled. 

“For years Afghanistan had lived as a pariah nation, utterly forgotten by the rest of the world. Now no one on the radio talked of anyplace else.” 

The ending of the book points to the ultimate irony of Kamila’s story. Though she has worked hard to bring together a community under the oppression of the Taliban, her story quickly becomes lost. Her narrative is subsumed into a greater, grander geopolitical issue following the events of 9/11. Though she has worked hard for years, pushing back against the Taliban as best she could, events that take place many thousands of miles away will now dictate the course of her life. 

“To most of Kabul’s women, however, the party outside felt decidedly premature.”

The women of Kabul—those who have suffered most under the rule of the Taliban—are the most guarded about celebrating the Taliban’s departure from Kabul. Whether it is pessimism or good instinct, the women can tell that this is not the end of a war, but the beginning of a long and bloody struggle. By the time the book is published, peace in Afghanistan is still relative and the Taliban are still a concern.