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Kabul Beauty School: An American Woman Goes Behind the Veil    by Deborah Rodriguez Amazon.com order for
Kabul Beauty School
by Deborah Rodriguez
Order:  USA  Can
Random House, 2007 (2007)
Hardcover, Softcover, CD, e-Book
* *   Reviewed by Mary Ann Smyth

Deborah Rodriguez had a degree in cosmetology. She went to Afghanistan to join the Kabul Beauty School. Her reasoning? She wanted to help Afghani women take their rightful place in their own world. She taught the first class of 2003.

Women are not treated the same there as they are here. Rodriguez had a hard time adjusting to the very different culture. But managed to fit in. She left behind a broken marriage. Her story of the school relates the struggle she went through to teach and then help graduates open their own salons, thus improving the women's families' lives. I was very intrigued by the portion of the book describing a typical wedding and the preparations for the nuptials. The bride and groom never having met!

Deborah Rodriguez continually traveled back and forth between Afghanistan and the United States. It must have been very hard to leave behind her two sons and her mother. But she became a part of the community of the women of Afghanistan and eventually married Sam, an Afghani so she could stay in his country. Rodriguez writes with an open heart, telling it like it was. Living within another culture must have been very hard but she believed in what she was doing. And did it.

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