15

It's been a week since I came home for winter break. There are many many things I love about being here, but also some that I don't.
Yesterday, while watching the news, I couldn't watch the news.
I was watching, watching, and watching, until I couldn't bear hearing any more.
The tipping point was the news about a fifteen year old girl, who was forced into marriage when she was 13 so that her parents could get money in return for her. She left her husband, and returned home a few months ago, but her family did not take this well at all. She was raped by two of her cousins and got pregnant as a result. Therefore, her family gathered together and decided that she was now 'dirty', and had to die. So they drowned her and the four month old baby in her, in the river.
When her body was found, no one in her family claimed it.
Her uncle was asked to come down to the morgue to confirm her identity. He refused that he was related to her in any way, and put her in a black trash bag, and threw her in a trash bin outside the morgue.
Ten women from her town claimed her body, but even they didn't take the necessary steps to make sure she was buried according to the rules of Islam (cleaned, covered with a piece of cloth, buried with a ceremony). So she was thrown in a hole on the ground in a trash bag, and covered with some soil.

I don't have any words to describe how this makes me feel.