Welcome to Breaking Down Patriarchy. I'm Amy McPhee Allabest. During season three of this podcast, we aired an episode on the history of Afghanistan with Dr. Bihar Jalal Ali.

I learned so much during my research for that episode, so if you haven't heard it yet, you may want to queue it up after this one.

Dr. Jalali talked about long periods of thriving, prosperity,

and advancement in Afghanistan. She talked about international meddling that destabilized

her country over and over again. She talked about the tensions between conservative

religion and progressive values and between diverse rural tribal cultures and urban centers.

And above all, she talked about the dramatic back and forth of women's civil rights,

sometimes granted and sometimes violently taken away.

Today, I am so excited to zoom in on one woman's story through the book, Defiant Dreams, the journey of an

Afghan girl who risked everything for education by Sola Mahfuz and Melina Kapoor. And I'm thrilled to

welcome to the podcast, the authors of this book. Welcome, Sola and Malena. Thank you for

having us. I'm so excited to jump into the discussion. First,

as I always do in the episodes, I'll just read your kind of official biographies and then I'll let

you tell your personal stories after that. Sola Muffoos was born in Afghanistan and immigrated

to the United States in 2016 to attend college. She is currently

a quantum computing researcher at Tufts University Quantum Information Group. In her free time, she is

focusing on reading and studying different styles of fiction, as well as writing about the rugged

homeland she's left behind. She lives in Boston. Malena Kapoor is a writer

from Redwood City, California. She previously served as a fellow at Penn America, where she

advocated for international human rights, press freedom, and election integrity. Melena served on

the management team of a refugee resettlement organization and was the producer of Inde,

a nationally syndicated public affairs radio broadcast program.

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