The Scheherazade Foundation Mini Podcast

When we asked Afghan women what they most needed, we expected many things. What came back, clearly and consistently, was a single answer: an internet connection.In this conversation, Tahir Shah and Jason Webster — co-founders of The Scheherazade Foundation — talk about Azada Women, the Foundation's campaign to fund mobile internet access for women living under Taliban rule in Afghanistan. They discuss how the project began, how it operates, and why something as simple as a data connection has become, for millions of women, the difference between isolation and the world.Today, 20 million women and girls in Afghanistan live under more than 250 Taliban edicts restricting their freedom to work, study, move, and speak. One hundred dollars connects a woman for a year — including secure access tools to keep her safe online.Azada — from the Dari word for free.🔗 Support the campaign: https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/azada-women🌍 Learn more: https://www.sf.charity/azada-women📧 Contact: [email protected] Scheherazade Foundation is a UK-based cultural organisation harnessing the power of traditional stories and wisdom to address modern global challenges.#AfghanWomen #Afghanistan #AzadaWomen #WomensRights #HumanRights #Crowdfunder

Safia Shah grew up with the same tales her brother Tahir did — teaching stories passed down by their father, the writer and thinker Idries Shah. Those stories, she says, work differently at every stage of a life. As a child you understand one thing. As an adult, decades later, you find something else entirely waiting inside them.In this conversation, Tahir and Safia talk about what it meant to grow up in that tradition, how Hoopoe Books has distributed over five million illustrated editions of those stories in Afghanistan alone — and millions more in dozens of languages worldwide — and why that work feels more urgent now than ever.The UN has called the situation facing Afghan women today "gender apartheid." Safia doesn't flinch from the phrase. This conversation doesn't either.Hoopoe Books & Hoopoe Share: hoopoeshare.orgSupport Azada Women — the Scheherazade Foundation's campaign to fund internet access for women inside Afghanistan: crowdfunder.co.uk/p/azada-women🌍 Learn more: sf.charity/azada-women📧 Contact: [email protected] Scheherazade Foundation is a UK-based cultural organisation harnessing the power of traditional stories and wisdom to address modern global challenges.#AfghanWomen #Afghanistan #AzadaWomen #WomensRights #HumanRights #Crowdfunder

Darya grew up in Afghanistan, became an artist, and eventually had to burn everything she had made — on a rooftop in Kabul — when the Taliban returned to power. Creating art had become a crime.She made it out. Most of the women she knows did not.Today, from Canada, Darya runs online art therapy sessions for women still living inside Afghanistan. In this conversation with Tahir Shah, she talks about her journey from refugee life in Pakistan to Kabul, the reality of women's lives under Taliban rule today, what it cost her to leave, and what it means to stay connected — however tenuously — with the women she works with.At the heart of it is a simple truth: for Afghan women, internet access is not a convenience. It is a lifeline.Azada Women is a project of The Scheherazade Foundation that funds mobile data connections for women inside Afghanistan. A connection costs around $100 a year. 🔗 Support the campaign: crowdfunder.co.uk/p/azada-women🌍 Learn more: sf.charity/azada-women📧 Contact: [email protected]'s website: https://soulwomen.org/The Scheherazade Foundation is a UK-based cultural organisation harnessing the power of traditional stories and wisdom to address modern global challenges.#AfghanWomen #Afghanistan #AzadaWomen #SteveMcCurry #WomensRights #HumanRights #Crowdfunder

Steve McCurry first went to Afghanistan just before the Soviet invasion. He was there when the Soviets were driven out. Over decades, he fell in love with the country and its people — hospitable, funny, generous, alive.He has watched what has happened since 2021 with horror.In January 2026, the Taliban passed a law making it legal for an Afghan man to beat his wife — provided he doesn't break her bones. McCurry's response is unequivocal: "You wouldn't even do that to a dog. That kind of behaviour is unacceptable."In this conversation, one of the world's great photographers talks about Afghanistan across half a century — the country he knew, the people he loved, and the women now living under more than 250 Taliban edicts stripping them of the right to work, study, move, and speak.He also talks about Azada Women — The Scheherazade Foundation's campaign to fund internet access for women inside Afghanistan. One hundred dollars connects a woman for a year.🔗 Support the campaign: crowdfunder.co.uk/p/azada-women🌍 Learn more: sf.charity/azada-women📧 Contact: [email protected] Scheherazade Foundation is a UK-based cultural organisation harnessing the power of traditional stories and wisdom to address modern global challenges.#AfghanWomen #Afghanistan #AzadaWomen #SteveMcCurry #WomensRights #HumanRights #Crowdfunder