writing in Afghanistan is like nothing
else in the world it’s it’s hot it’s
dusty you’re in layers and layers of
clothing and yet you’re surrounded by
these epic mountains it’s incredibly
beautiful but obviously also dangerous
for the past seven years I’ve been
working in Afghanistan on a variety of
projects focused on women’s rights and
access for girls but in 2009 I became
the first woman to mountain bike in
Afghanistan and at the time there were
no women that I could find anywhere I
asked in every village and every city
that I rode bikes in if their daughters
their wives their sisters could ride and
the answer was always no it was just not
proper they were okay with me riding a
bike because I was a foreigner but that
it was just not acceptable for their
women since 2009 essentially for the
past five years I’ve been trying to find
girls and bikes and up until recently
I’ve had no success my name is Shannon
Galvin and I’m the founder of mountain
to mountain mountain to mountain as a
nonprofit that works with women and
girls in conflict zones and right now
the majority of our work is focused on
women and girls on bikes in Afghanistan
so in the fall of 2012
I found the men’s national cycling team
and had a meeting with one of the
members who told me there were girls who
are riding bikes so I immediately went
to meet with the coach and found out
that there were young girls that were
college age starting to ride bikes
starting to learn how to pedal and that
there was full support from their
families and their community
these were the first girls I’d ever
heard of riding bikes in Afghanistan and
after five years of riding my own bike
there it was amazing to see this change
happening in Afghanistan
writing bikes for girls is one of the
most deep-seated taboos that’s left in
Afghanistan and it comes back to the
idea that riding a bike is controversial
straddling a bike seat is provocative
and immoral and it’s really important to
remember the risks of these girls put
themselves in they have been
slingshotted rocks or thrown at them
they’re insulted the families are
insulted while these girls are aware
that they are pushing on this boundary
they’re not doing it to be revolutionary
they’re simply riding a bike because
they feel they have the right to when
Liv heard about the work that I was
doing and heard about the team they left
in so far Liv has supplied us with over
fifty racing bikes equipment clothing
and they are also pledging their support
for the upcoming years most importantly
they have really stood behind the
mission they are looking at the fact
that these girls are not just racers
it’s not about competing it’s about how
do you use the bike to create change and
these girls in Afghanistan are proving
with every pedal stroke that change is
possible I got into this work primarily
because I wanted to work with women and
girls in countries where they had little
or no voice and Afghanistan is a country
that had been repeatedly ranked the
worst place in the world to be a woman
and so it’s where I decided to start
being able to work with these girls in
Afghanistan is so inspiring because they
literally are risking their lives for
the joy of riding a bike and now what’s
happening very organically is that these
girls are sparking a revolution and now
we see more and more girls riding bikes
in other areas of the country completely
unaware that there even is a national
team but that someone has ridden a bike
and they’ve seen that girl riding and it
just has kind of organically spread I
think that what is really important is
that this is an afghan-led program these
girls voluntarily decided to push on
these boundaries under doing so daily
with their family support with the
coaches support and so my role as a
foreign woman is not to take over the
program but to simply empower them to
bring them equipment bring them coaching
training anything I can do to support
and that’s where Liv has been
instrumental as well in supporting their
program and allowing it to grow
organically
one of the girls that rides with the
team is Miriam she’s I think the best
symbol of the team and that she’s
incredibly strong but has this huge
heart and she more than anything
believes that this is her right and that
nobody can take it away from her so when
she gets on the bike she rides knowing
that she’s pushing these boundaries
because she loves the freedom that the
bike gives her and she comes back to
that over and over that the bike equals
my work with these girls is really
focused on how bike can be used as a
vehicle for social justice
not necessarily racing but through the
sport of cycling these girls are going
to normalize bikes for the rest of the
country enabling young girls to go to
school and bikes Midwife to use bikes to
access rural communities bikes literally
can change lives
these girls inspire me to step outside
my own boundaries to remember that
pedaling a bike is a freedom and that
that feeling of freedom that we all get
when we ride bikes is at the core of
creating Chains is at the core of
women’s rights and so for me and the
work that I do with these women
it’s constantly comes back to freedom
I’m Shannan Galton and I live beyond
else in the world it’s it’s hot it’s
dusty you’re in layers and layers of
clothing and yet you’re surrounded by
these epic mountains it’s incredibly
beautiful but obviously also dangerous
for the past seven years I’ve been
working in Afghanistan on a variety of
projects focused on women’s rights and
access for girls but in 2009 I became
the first woman to mountain bike in
Afghanistan and at the time there were
no women that I could find anywhere I
asked in every village and every city
that I rode bikes in if their daughters
their wives their sisters could ride and
the answer was always no it was just not
proper they were okay with me riding a
bike because I was a foreigner but that
it was just not acceptable for their
women since 2009 essentially for the
past five years I’ve been trying to find
girls and bikes and up until recently
I’ve had no success my name is Shannon
Galvin and I’m the founder of mountain
to mountain mountain to mountain as a
nonprofit that works with women and
girls in conflict zones and right now
the majority of our work is focused on
women and girls on bikes in Afghanistan
so in the fall of 2012
I found the men’s national cycling team
and had a meeting with one of the
members who told me there were girls who
are riding bikes so I immediately went
to meet with the coach and found out
that there were young girls that were
college age starting to ride bikes
starting to learn how to pedal and that
there was full support from their
families and their community
these were the first girls I’d ever
heard of riding bikes in Afghanistan and
after five years of riding my own bike
there it was amazing to see this change
happening in Afghanistan
writing bikes for girls is one of the
most deep-seated taboos that’s left in
Afghanistan and it comes back to the
idea that riding a bike is controversial
straddling a bike seat is provocative
and immoral and it’s really important to
remember the risks of these girls put
themselves in they have been
slingshotted rocks or thrown at them
they’re insulted the families are
insulted while these girls are aware
that they are pushing on this boundary
they’re not doing it to be revolutionary
they’re simply riding a bike because
they feel they have the right to when
Liv heard about the work that I was
doing and heard about the team they left
in so far Liv has supplied us with over
fifty racing bikes equipment clothing
and they are also pledging their support
for the upcoming years most importantly
they have really stood behind the
mission they are looking at the fact
that these girls are not just racers
it’s not about competing it’s about how
do you use the bike to create change and
these girls in Afghanistan are proving
with every pedal stroke that change is
possible I got into this work primarily
because I wanted to work with women and
girls in countries where they had little
or no voice and Afghanistan is a country
that had been repeatedly ranked the
worst place in the world to be a woman
and so it’s where I decided to start
being able to work with these girls in
Afghanistan is so inspiring because they
literally are risking their lives for
the joy of riding a bike and now what’s
happening very organically is that these
girls are sparking a revolution and now
we see more and more girls riding bikes
in other areas of the country completely
unaware that there even is a national
team but that someone has ridden a bike
and they’ve seen that girl riding and it
just has kind of organically spread I
think that what is really important is
that this is an afghan-led program these
girls voluntarily decided to push on
these boundaries under doing so daily
with their family support with the
coaches support and so my role as a
foreign woman is not to take over the
program but to simply empower them to
bring them equipment bring them coaching
training anything I can do to support
and that’s where Liv has been
instrumental as well in supporting their
program and allowing it to grow
organically
one of the girls that rides with the
team is Miriam she’s I think the best
symbol of the team and that she’s
incredibly strong but has this huge
heart and she more than anything
believes that this is her right and that
nobody can take it away from her so when
she gets on the bike she rides knowing
that she’s pushing these boundaries
because she loves the freedom that the
bike gives her and she comes back to
that over and over that the bike equals
my work with these girls is really
focused on how bike can be used as a
vehicle for social justice
not necessarily racing but through the
sport of cycling these girls are going
to normalize bikes for the rest of the
country enabling young girls to go to
school and bikes Midwife to use bikes to
access rural communities bikes literally
can change lives
these girls inspire me to step outside
my own boundaries to remember that
pedaling a bike is a freedom and that
that feeling of freedom that we all get
when we ride bikes is at the core of
creating Chains is at the core of
women’s rights and so for me and the
work that I do with these women
it’s constantly comes back to freedom
I’m Shannan Galton and I live beyond
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