Dust rose around young Zarmina Ahmadi as she stood beneath the spinning blades of a military helicopter hovering above her mountain village in Jaghori, Afghanistan. She did not shield her eyes or step back from the wind.
“When I saw the plane with those powerful blades, I did not care about my dress and my eyes. I stayed in the dust just to look at it,” she recalled.
As the aircraft lifted and disappeared beyond the valley, she made a decision that would shape her life: she wanted to fly.Zarmina Ahmadi was born in 1994, in Jaghori, a mountainous district in Afghanistan’s Ghazni province, home to the country’s Hazara minority. The Hazaras, who are predominantly Shiite in a largely Sunni nation, have faced discrimination and targeted violence. Under Taliban rule, schools for girls were shut down. But that did not stop Zarmina or her family.
“Every Hazara woman wants to respect themselves and believe in themselves,” she said. “In a Hazara family I am sure there is no restriction to be what you want.”
Zarmina’s passion for learning new things was so strong that she walked two hours to get to school. When her mother asked her to stay home to help with chores, she refused. School was not optional to her.
“Study English and then you can be a pilot,” her uncle told her.
Her discipline paid off. She consistently ranked at the top of her class, determined to prove that her ambitions were not misplaced.
After graduating high school, she moved to Kabul to train to be a midwife, working in a hospital for more than four years. But the sky still beckoned her. Encouraged by her uncle, she joined a military hospital and soon found herself enlisted in the army.
Ten months into joining, she was one of the two women who were sent to the Czech Republic for flight training.
It was here that Zarmina took her first flight. With her instructor sitting beside her, she held her breath as the plane took off. When they reached flying altitude she took over. At first she felt overwhelmed with all the things to keep track of. But soon, it was everything she dreamed of. It was what she had planned to do and she was doing it.
The training lasted 15 months. When she returned to Afghanistan in 2020, she had been promoted to lieutenant. Zarmina was one of only five female pilots in the Afghan Air Force. The dream born in a cloud of dust had become reality.
Before returning to her duties, she visited her village. She remembers how overjoyed her friends and family were.
“The whole village was proud of me, and I was so happy,” she said.
But she had no idea how her life could change in a second.
More than a year after finishing her training, the Taliban took over. Zarmina knew that she would be an instant target, and that under Taliban rule, she was at great risk of being killed.
“As a military woman we were not safe,” she said.
Zarmina was left with limited choices. Her commander urged her to leave, but leaving her country meant a difficult choice: Either she could either take her parents–or if married, her husband.
Zarmina had met Reza during her training in the Czech Republic. They had not yet married at the time, but knew they wanted to build a future together.
But, under Afghan custom, their families would have to meet before marriage.
The sudden regime change gave Zarmina little time to think, much less make such a momentous decision. She was in danger in the country she had pledged to protect.
Her parents refused to leave, as they had to take care of her little brother who had a mental health disability. Once again, Zarmina was left with an awkward choice: Leave the country alone. Or forgo her customs and marry Reza so they could leave together.
With only hours to act, she chose to marry him.
“I didn’t know if I should go alone or go against all tradition and go together, and we decided to go together,” she said.
She boarded a plane with her limited belongings, discarding items to make room for others trying to flee.
Landing in Abu Dhabi, Zarmina and Reza were thrust into an 18-day quarantine due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It was here she and Reza spent their honeymoon, the first days just the two of them, as husband and wife.
Later, in May 2022, she and Reza moved to Independence, Oregon, staying with a host family. Two months later they welcomed their daughter, Sara.
After living with their host family they found an apartment together in Salem.
The contrast between the narrow choices she had as a child and the range of opportunities open to Sara could not have been more stark.
“My baby is an Afghan girl, being in the United States she can do what she wants, as long as she wants to do it,” Zarmina said. “We will support her.”
After settling in the U.S., Reza started working as a non-emergency medical transport driver, while he worked towards becoming a Certificated Flight Instructor pilot, teaching the next generation to fly.
Meanwhile, Zarmina worked as a phlebotomist, and now holds a U.S. commercial pilot’s license, working toward flying professionally again.
Zarmina never forgot the little girl who would look at the helicopter blades, constantly wondering if she could ever fly. In her new world, girls do fly.