Desperate circumstances can force people to stray from their firmest principles.  That’s what I observed during the six months I spent following a family from Pakistan’s Swat Valley who live under the influence of the Taliban. I’ve told their story as I observed it in a two-part documentary for The New York Times.  In Part 1, titled “Class Dismissed,” the father, Ziauddin Yousafzai, owns a girls’ school that went bankrupt in January when the Taliban forced him to shut it down. His 11-year-old daughter, Malala, lost her education.  Part 2, called “A Schoolgirl’s Odyssey,” chronicles the family’s journey into exile when the Pakistani military invades their Taliban-controlled city, Mingora, the largest city in the Swat District of Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province. After several months away, the family returns home, anxious to discover whether their home and school survived the war. During our time together, Mr. Yousafzai refused to allow me to film his wife because, as is local custom, women are shielded from men outside the family. Whenever I visited, his wife would stay in the bedroom. I never saw her.  But that changed one day when I was filming Malala. Her mother was in the adjacent bedroom and her father was in another city. Suddenly, Mr. Yousafzai called to ask if I could give his family a ride to a nearby relative’s house.  I gently pointed out what I perceived to be hypocritical, saying, “I thought I was not allowed to see your wife.” He laughed, but as a principled man, he seemed slightly embarrassed.  Moments later, I sat in the passenger seat of my car making a conscious effort not to rotate my neck. Mr. Yousafzai’s wife then stealthily entered the back of the car. When I dropped her off, she didn’t thank me, or even acknowledge me. I did notice the silhouette of her burqa enter the house.  For Mr. Yousafzai, the situation highlighted one of the prevailing conflicts in his life: he’s undeniably attracted to the personal freedoms in the West, but also loyal to his own religious traditions.  A month later, in Swat, I was filming the family’s first meal in their house after almost three months in exile. Suddenly, Mr. Yousafzai brought his wife out in front of the camera. She faced the other direction, and I never saw her face, but it was a bold and courageous move, and he beamed with pride.  “Not even my lifetime friends have seen her,” he said, wide-eyed.  It seemed to be his way of thanking me for the ride. Or maybe he was trying to justify his guilt. Either way, his wife was gone 20 seconds later.
A six-month journey following a family's flight from and return to its home in Pakistan's embattled Swat Valley.