SmokeLong Quarterly

She is seeking brightness in the darkness of the night while her heart is as shiny as sun in early morning. Her singing voice is my sleeping pillow, searching everywhere to be a bird.

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Smoke and Mirrors with Wahida Amiri
Interviewed by Jemimah Wei

Can you tell us about your own relationship to writing?

As an artist expresses her/his feelings and thoughts in a piece of drawing or painting, others express by singing, or other ways. But for me, writing is the only way I can express myself. My feelings, my thoughts; especially my dreams. I can interpret my thoughts and feelings on paper within which each word has special and strong meaning for a writer.

در مورد اینکه یک هنرمند احساسات و افکارش را در قطعه ای از نقاشی بیان می کند، برخی دیگر

با آواز خواندن بیان می کنند، یا برخی راه های دیگری را بیان می کنند. اما، برای من نوشتن تنها راهی است که می توانم خودم را بیان کنم، احساساتم افکارم به خصوص رویاهایم. با نوشتن می توانم افکار و احساساتم را در یک تکه کاغذ درون برخی کلمات و جملات تفسیر کنم که هر یک از کلمه برای یک نویسنده معانی خاص و قوی دارد

What is the first thing you remember feeling really strongly that you wanted to write, and why? 

My life has always been challenging and sometimes even lead to disappointments and sadness. In these situations, the first thing that always kept me strong and inspired was planning and dreaming for my future. That led me to have feeling of the happiest person on earth.

In very sad and disappointed moments, thinking of my dreams was like a best friend saving me from sinking into disappointment. With the passing of time, I became able to interpret my feelings into words and pieces of writing.

As an artist, as a writer, how would you like the world to know you? 

If I was asked this question back when I was in my homeland Afghanistan, I would answer  “I want the world know me as a flying bird whose wings are broken down and not able to fly for its whole life”

But now, living in Indonesia, I had and still have lots of difficulties, disappointments and struggles. “I want the world know me as a flying bird with broken wings who has started to grow and treat her wings, started to build dreams for a better future, still going through more struggles with strong will and positive thoughts”.

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I am Wahida, from Afghanistan, 17 years old, a dreamer who lives in Indonesia as a refugee full of dreams, and goals to turn them into reality. In this piece which is written by me, “searching everywhere to be a bird” best describes me to a reader. I am not a writer; I just write and interpret what I feel, what I dream and what I think of.

Photograph by 卡晨