Victoria was born in Kabul to a Nooristani mother and a Tajik father. During Taliban times she lived in Pakistan with her family. After hearing about the deaths of two of her aunts in childbirth, at age nine Victoria decided that she wanted to be a midwife. She finished her midwifery studies in 2002 and has worked with CURE International Hospital in Kabul since 2004, first as a staff midwife in the Family Health Center, then as midwifery supervisor at the hospital, and now as CURE's Head of Midwifery.
Victoria became an officer in the Afghan Midwives Association in 2006. Last year she attended a conference in Bangladesh as an AMA representative. She is grateful for the ways AMA has helped raise the profile of midwives in the country, strengthening their skills and increasing respect for their work.
She likes all kinds of music and is constantly on the hunt for new OB/GYN books in Farsi. She would like to get out more, but faces the challenge of living among very conservative, uneducated people who frown on women going out of the home. While her children now go to school in a tent with no chairs and no desks, she hopes that her daughters will become midwives and her son will grow up to be a surgeon in a rebuilt, beautiful Afghanistan.
No comments:
Post a Comment