AURORA, Colo. — When Fatema Samim's family got to Colorado, her 5 and 6-year-old boys wondered, where was Spiderman?
"He thought maybe when we arrived here we will meet the Superman or
superheroes," Samim said. "But still he's asking, 'mom, why we don't go to America?'"
Even though the superheroes haven't been spotted, Samim's family has been in Aurora, Colorado since July after a year-long journey they can't forget.
"Always they are asking why we left everything in Afghanistan," Samim said about her boys' questions. "We didn't bring anything with us, but unfortunately I don't have any answer for them."
Samim said their journey started when they began to hear bombing near their home in Herat, Afghanistan.
They moved to Kabul, but she said the Taliban took over about a week later.
After trying to get through the airport and board a plane to the United States three times during the immediate aftermath of the Taliban taking over, they weren't successful.
Samim said that because she was a woman who worked in higher education, she felt directly threatened by the Taliban.
After months of trying to get out in various other ways, Samim said the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine helped them get on a flight to Rwanda and helped get her a job at the University of Rwanda.
“It was really very tough time," Samim said. "We will never forget.”
Before the Taliban took over, she was the dean of the School of Civil Engineering at Herat University.
"I never thought that I would leave Afghanistan," Samim said. "I always tried to get promotion."
Only her male colleagues remain at the University now since the Taliban takeover.
In Afghanistan, Samim said her master's degree allowed her to work her way up in academia, but in the U.S. she needs a PhD.
"Now I start from zero, I start everything from the zero," Samim said. "So we have to try, we have to work, we have to study hard to reach that point."
Samim said she'll start by getting her certifications to be able to work as an engineer here. She hopes a recent application to a PhD program in Arizona pans out.
"I have to work harder because I don't want to lose what I am before," she said.
Little do her boys know, their superhero is with them in America.
"I have to show for the whole world that women in Afghanistan, they are able to do anything, and they are not weak," Samim said.