I learned more about Afghani culture after interviewing my partner and old friend, Iqra Iqbal, a 21 year old college junior from Essex Community College in New Jersey. We met in high school in our gym class and it took me a while to remember her. She was very joyful and pleased that I chose her. She moved to the United States in the end of 2009 for more opportunities in careers and education instead of Afghan women making clothing and rugs in factories (I. Iqbal, persona; communication, February 14, 2016; Khinjani, 2012, p. 56). She was born in Nangarhar, Afghanistan, next to Pakistan. She was from a minority area, which used to not require strict dress for women in public until 2001 (Jackson, 2014, p. 43). She moved to Pakistan at the end of the Afghanistan war in 2001, and had the opportunity to move to America (I. Iqbal, personal communication, February 14, 2016).
Pakistan and her region in Nangarhar are the culture she preferred, where women can dress more western and modernized, and are not required to wear the burka, but instead, wear long tunics and baggy pants. Iqra, like other Afghans in America, currently prefers some aspects of the culture in America, and in Nangarhar that she and her family share. She dresses in some Afghan fashions, and follows her family values but not Islam nor…show more content… People wear long colorful dresses, sometimes in green, style or cut their hair, and clean their homes before socializing. In the evening, there are fireworks, women dancing, cooking, and singing (Robson, & Lipson, 2002, p. 37). Families fly kites, and have picnics, which are extremely popular, and also common family activities. Other common family activities including the parents reading stories and folk tales, dancing, listening to the radio, or playing inexpensive outdoor games with their children (Lee & Nadeau, 2011, p.