FROM AFGHANISTAN TO AUCKLAND

Soghra Habibi got engaged at 10, married at 14, and went into hiding from the Taliban at 20 with her six-week-old baby. She and her husband Askar are Hazara, an ethnic group that’s been continually persecuted by the Islamist militants. Years later, Askar worked as an interpreter for the New Zealand Defence Force and was offered a visa to New Zealand. They moved here in 2013.

When Soghra arrived in New Zealand, she had never used a pen or paper. Now 43, she spent the last two years writing a book about life as a woman in Afghanistan, escaping the Taliban, and the difficulties and triumphs of settling in a new country. It’s called Halfway Round the World: My Life Journey in. We talked to her and her husband Askar, 50, about their experiences and the struggles of watching from afar as the Taliban retake Afghanistan.