Chap­ter 10: In this chap­ter, Par­vana faces a deeply trou­bling deci­sion when Shauzia per­suades her to join in a grim task: dig­ging up bones from a grave­yard to sell. Par­vana strug­gles with the moral­i­ty of their actions but ulti­mate­ly agrees, know­ing that the dire cir­cum­stances they live in leave few options for sur­vival. They trav­el to a grave­yard in Kab­ul, where the dev­as­ta­tion caused by bombs has left the earth exposed, reveal­ing the bones of the deceased. Parvana’s heart is heavy with doubt as she con­tem­plates what they are doing, but the need for mon­ey to sur­vive weighs more heav­i­ly on her mind than the trou­bling nature of their task. In this moment, Par­vana must come to terms with the harsh real­i­ty of sur­vival in a war-torn world, where des­per­ate mea­sures become nec­es­sary to endure.

Upon arriv­ing at the grave­yard, Par­vana is struck by the somber sur­round­ings: piles of rub­ble are scat­tered through­out the area, and the air is filled with the stench of decay. In this grim set­ting, she learns about a bone bro­ker who pur­chas­es the remains they dig up, fur­ther high­light­ing the dark­ness of their sit­u­a­tion. Although Par­vana is hor­ri­fied by the idea of uncov­er­ing human bones, the urgency of their finan­cial need forces her to push aside her dis­com­fort. As they begin their work, Par­vana voic­es her fear of encoun­ter­ing remains, but the neces­si­ty of earn­ing mon­ey to sur­vive in such a hos­tile envi­ron­ment trumps her fears. This chap­ter high­lights the des­per­a­tion Par­vana feels, and her moral con­flict reflects the toll the war has tak­en on her sense of right and wrong, forc­ing her to make deci­sions she would nev­er have imag­ined before the con­flict.

While they work, the task becomes even more unset­tling as they dig up bones, some of which include skulls. Despite the macabre nature of their task, Par­vana and Shauzia attempt to light­en the mood by jok­ing, refer­ring to the skulls as “mas­cots.” The lev­i­ty in their humor is a way to cope with the hor­ror of their sit­u­a­tion. At one point, the girls are inter­rupt­ed by the need for bath­room breaks, and Parvana’s anx­i­ety about the poten­tial dan­ger of land mines sur­faces. How­ev­er, despite the fear of land mines hid­den in the ground, she brave­ly steps into what she knows could be a haz­ardous area. She returns unharmed, and this brief moment of courage serves as a reminder of the con­stant dan­ger they face in Kab­ul, where every step car­ries the risk of dis­as­ter. The chap­ter illus­trates Parvana’s grow­ing resilience, despite the emo­tion­al and phys­i­cal toll the war has tak­en on her and her peers.

As the day pro­gress­es, sun­light breaks through the clouds, cast­ing a strange light on their unusu­al task, and Par­vana reflects on how strange it is that they are engaged in such work. The sun­light offers a brief sense of hope, and the girls real­ize they will like­ly remem­ber these moments for the rest of their lives. Their bond deep­ens as they earn a sig­nif­i­cant amount of money—more than Par­vana could make in three days. Despite their suc­cess, the girls agree to hide the full extent of their earn­ings from their fam­i­lies, choos­ing to secret­ly stash away part of the mon­ey. This deci­sion reflects the harsh real­i­ties of their world, where sur­vival often requires secre­cy and choic­es that might not be under­stood by those around them. The girls’ abil­i­ty to main­tain some con­trol over their earn­ings high­lights their desire to assert some auton­o­my in a life marked by loss of free­dom and per­son­al agency.

By the end of the chap­ter, Par­vana and Shauzia plan to return to the grave­yard the fol­low­ing day to con­tin­ue their work. Despite the finan­cial gain, the phys­i­cal act of dig­ging up bones weighs heav­i­ly on Parvana’s con­science. She strug­gles to shake off the emo­tion­al impact of their work as she heads home, try­ing to wash away the mem­o­ries of what she has just done. The chap­ter poignant­ly high­lights the loss of inno­cence that Par­vana expe­ri­ences as a child in a war-torn coun­try, forced to engage in dis­turb­ing actions for the sake of sur­vival. It is a pow­er­ful com­men­tary on the impact of con­flict on chil­dren, strip­ping them of their child­hood and forc­ing them to con­front the grim real­i­ties of their envi­ron­ment. Through Parvana’s jour­ney, the read­er is remind­ed of the resilience required to nav­i­gate such extreme cir­cum­stances, where moral­i­ty and sur­vival often col­lide in com­plex and dif­fi­cult ways.