Kabul Beauty School (ARC)

by Deborah Rodriguez, Kristin Ohlson | Biographies & Memoirs |
ISBN: 1400065593 Global Overview for this book
Registered by morsecode of Woonsocket, Rhode Island USA on 4/14/2007
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3 journalers for this copy...
Journal Entry 1 by morsecode from Woonsocket, Rhode Island USA on Saturday, April 14, 2007
Advanced Reader Copy
uncorrected proofs

Deborah Rodriguez, known by Kabul shop owners and Michigan prison inmates alike as “Miss Debbie,” first came to Afghanistan in 2002 as part of a group from the Care for All Foundation, a Christian Humanitarian Organization. A hairdresser by trade, Rodriguez is deemed significantly less useful than her medically-trained compatriots and is given any number of odd jobs and a good deal of free time to explore the city. Little did she--or the relief group--realize exactly how desirable her skills might be in that war-torn city.

When the expatriate community discovers a hairdresser in their midst, Rodriguez is swamped with requests. One woman summed up the situation quite succinctly: “We have literally risked our lives for highlights. […] Once I drove ten hours over the Khyber Pass to get my hair done in Pakistan” (39). During Taliban rule, hair salons and their feminine space were banned. In 2002 salons were only just starting to reopen, struggling without the supplies and skills needed to be truly successful.

As she begins to befriend both westerners and Afghans in Kabul, Rodriguez begins to see a niche that she can fill. She returns to Michigan hoping to find a way to open a teaching salon in Kabul. Armed with her dream and a lot of gumption she manages to get $500,000 worth of donations from Paul Mitchell and other large beauty companies. Just when Rodriguez is at a loss as to how to proceed, she discovers Mary MacMakin and her nonprofit, PARSA. Aligning herself with PARSA, she returns to Kabul in Spring 2003 as a founding faculty member of the Kabul Beauty School, eventually becoming its lead instructor and administrator.

While Rodriguez’s story of an American woman helping to make a difference in the lives of Afghan women is not unique, it is both moving and powerful. Kabul Beauty School is compulsively readable. A strong opening chapter illustrates both the struggles of modern Afghan women and Rodriguez’s inimitable blend of brazenness and kindness, leaving readers with a desire to know more about this spunky, resourceful hairdresser and her students.

The stories of Rodriguez’s students fill the pages of this memoir: the wife of a Taliban-aligned opium addict, the bride who must fake virginity, and the young girl sold by her parents to an older man, just to name a few. The author, however, is just as interesting as her students.

One of the things that sets Rodriguez apart is her ability to empathize with her students. Having suffered an abusive husband, she is attuned to the indignities--both large and small--that affect Afghan women every day. Rodriguez is dynamic and personable; more than that, she clearly loves Afghanistan and its people. As she so elegantly puts it, “as soon as I set my foot on this soil, I knew I’d somehow managed to come home. I’ve been renewed by the spirit of this place and roused by its challenges” (269). While Rodriguez maintains both her personality and independence throughout the period covered in this memoir, she becomes ever more a part of the Afghan community, even allowing her friends to arrange a marriage to an Afghan businessman.

The history of the school--and Rodriguez's life in Kabul--is not without drama. The school has political and financial problems. There are cultural misunderstandings, most perpetrated by the clueless, but well-meaning Rodriguez. At the memoir's end, we learn that both the school and affiliated salon have been closed. Nevertheless, the reader is left with a sense of hope: if anyone can turn things around, it is Rodriguez.

The narrative is a bit uneven (for example, the handling of her son’s stay in Afghanistan is cursory, simply tagged onto a story about one of her students). However, that is almost to be expected in a first effort and the natural charisma of the author, and the compelling tale of the school, will be enough to keep readers interested.


I'm mailing this book off to msjoanna today.
She stole it out of the game in our April 2007 Yankee Book Swap.

Journal Entry 2 by msjoanna from Columbia, Missouri USA on Friday, April 20, 2007
This has arrived in NYC. I'm looking forward to reading it.

Journal Entry 3 by msjoanna from Columbia, Missouri USA on Monday, November 5, 2007
The writing was mediocre, but the story was extremely compelling. Hearing the perspective of an average American who found herself compelled to do something to help people was extremely interesting. The book's strength was in the author's forthright description of the cultural clashes that came up and her examination of her own feelings about them. Without flinching, the author describes times where she was completely unable to read the cultural signals and times where she simply found the cultural norms to be wrong and antithetical to her beliefs (especially about the independence and equality of women). Overall, I found the book compelling.

My husband is also reading it, then it'll be going to irenic, who won it in a swap quite some time ago. (mailed to irenic 11/15/07)

Journal Entry 4 by irenic from Hamilton, Ontario Canada on Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Thank you

Journal Entry 5 by irenic at -- controlled release in Hamilton, Ontario Canada on Sunday, March 10, 2013

Released 11 yrs ago (3/8/2013 UTC) at -- controlled release in Hamilton, Ontario Canada

WILD RELEASE NOTES:

I left this in the lunch room at work.

Journal Entry 6 by irenic at Burlington, Ontario Canada on Sunday, March 10, 2013
I tried to read this book but it did not grab my interest, so I left it at work.

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