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A family's search for freedom
By MARY JANE PARK SOUTH PASADENA -- Hila Ghorzang is only 10 years old, but she understands more than many other fifth-graders do about freedom. She was a young girl in Afghanistan when the Taliban rose to power. Bombs dropped on her school and killed some of her classmates. The regime shut schools to girls and forbade women to hold jobs. Hila's mother, Rona, well-educated and a broadcast news producer and director, defied authorities by giving lessons to her children and others behind closed doors. If they carried books outside, they hid them underneath the waistbands of their pants. "My mother was hit by a Talib soldier when she was pregnant with my sister because her hand showed outside of her burqa," Hila wrote in a recent essay. She titled it Let Freedom Ring. Hila's father, Sher, a newscaster whose last job was with the BBC, was jailed and frequently beaten. The Taliban took nearly everything the Ghorzangs had: their house, their car, their money. Sher's brother sold his own home to get money enough to free him. The family escaped to Pakistan and got protection from the United Nations. Rona gave birth to Savera, now 16 months old, before they could come to the United States. On July 11, 2001, Sher, Rona and their four children arrived at Tampa International Airport, where they were greeted by members of Pasadena Community Church, a United Methodist congregation that is helping them to settle in the United States. Finally, the Ghorzangs were safe. Two months later, airplanes slammed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and the Pennsylvania countryside. Fingers pointed at Osama bin Laden, the terrorist financier, and the Taliban, which ruled Afghanistan. Rona Ghorzang became a target once more. As she went to bring the garbage can back from the end of the driveway, a red automobile pulled up in front of the house. A woman got out and started asking questions. Yes, Rona Ghorzang answered, she was from Afghanistan. The woman started to yell. She slapped Rona Ghorzang several times and knocked her to the ground, then punched her, pulled her hair and spat on her. For several weeks, the same car circled the block. The Ghorzangs' phone rang, and the caller or callers hung up without speaking. As Hila and her brother, Maseh, now 8, left their school bus one afternoon, the woman tried to grab the boy. She was never apprehended. The woman was "crazy, maybe sick," Rona Ghorzang says. "sick like the Taliban. This is not the American people. This is one (person)." She feels welcome in St. Petersburg, where the family has developed a strong network of friends. She and Sher are studying English at St. Petersburg College; Hila and Maseh are in school at Maximo Elementary. Their young daughters Asra, 3, and Savera greet a visitor with bright eyes and laughter. Sher and Rona Ghorzang hope to become fluent enough in English to one day resume their journalism careers. Rona may write an autobiography. "My life is very big," she says. "A very big story." They have relatives in Pakistan and no hope of returning to Afghanistan. It's too dangerous, they say. "This is my idea: I now live in the United States. This is my country," Rona Ghorzang says, "A new life for me and my children. I'm so glad my children can go to school."
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From the Times South Pinellas desks Jeff Webb Letters |
