Qudrat Wasefi, Afghan Fellow

I was born in Farah, Afghanistan in 1999. Farah is a rural province of western Afghanistan.

I attended primary school for two years then moved to Kabul with my aunt, where she took me to an orphanage called the “Afghan Child Education and Care organization” (AFCECO) so that I could receive sponsorship to continue my studies in Kabul. 

As a child born in war and growing up in an orphanage, I perhaps better understand the painful life of Afghan kids, who are undoubtedly the prime victims of the ongoing conflicts in Afghanistan. My upcoming music album “Kid of War” will depict a glimpse of this tragedy and each song in it narrates a true story of the thousands that most Afghan children have experienced in this era. 

Out of the growing pool of young leaders raised in the AFCECO orphanages, I am one of the examples of this investment that now comes to fruition. I was born into one of the most impoverished families affected by wars and population migrations. I would describe my childhood as being almost completely devoid of happiness when my destitute parents had literally abandoned me at the age of five. I was a wandering boy searching through an alien world for a place to live. In a stroke of luck, I found a new home, the Sitara Orphanage in Kabul, a happy place where my life got a new turn. The new home housed two hundred kids from all parts of Afghanistan where they learned tolerance, respect for diversity and for the rights of others, and strong values of integrity, honesty and compassion. Each brought his individual rootedness to the orphanage. 

The orphanage reshaped my life and helped me to become a young artist. Since 2011, I have been studying music at the Afghanistan National Institute of Music where I established a professional music career for myself. Besides being a trumpet player and a resident faculty teacher at ANIM, I write and compose songs for children as well. I now work on my first album titled “Kid of War”, which I described it in this Facebook post:

"I opened a music class in the orphanage and established an amazing choir made up of the little girls who have recently joined the orphanage. I expressed my feeling during a stage performance with the kids choir."

Now when I see it, it becomes a certainty — my belief that all these kids are able to change the worst situation for this country. They struggle against all ethnic and racial issues they faced for more than a hundred years and in return they give the lesson of humanity, right struggle, and battle for others’ right: a free Afghanistan in which all could live as brother and sisters.

Tomorrow, we, the children of the orphanage, will not be judged by how many awards we have received, how much money we have made, how big the stage was that we performed on, how prestigious was the university we studied in, or how many followers we have on Instagram or Facebook.

​We will be judged by what we give back to what the orphanage gave us.