- A mother from Oklahoma helped rescue members of the all-girl robot team from Afghanistan.
- Allyson Reneau had previously met these girls at a conference in 2019 and hoped to help them escape.
- Reneau told Insider that the girls who landed in Qatar this week looked “safe, healthy and happy.”
- For more stories, please visit Business Insider.
A 60-year-old Oklahoma mother helped several members Internationally recognized all-women robot team The fugitives from Afghanistan said they felt “very grateful” to get out.
On Tuesday, 10 so-called “Afghan dreamers” between the ages of 16 and 18 were able to leave Kabul on a commercial flight to Doha, Qatar after repeated unsuccessful attempts to flee the country.
One of the people who helped them leave was Allyson Reneau, the mother of 11 children from Oklahoma, who first saw them at the Human to Mars Summit in Washington, DC in May 2019 girl.
“They set aside everything to pursue their dreams, to be free and educated,” Renault told Insider. “They seem to be safe, well, and happy now.”
Reneau graduated from Harvard University in 2016. She said that she has been in touch with the team since meeting with the team at the conference.
“As the mother of nine biological daughters, I was immediately attracted to them, and I think it is mutual,” she said.
The 60-year-old said that for several weeks, girls had been texting her about the situation in Afghanistan. One morning in early August, she woke up “with an overwhelming and terrible feeling, feeling that things were true.” Something went wrong”.
“Somehow, I feel they are in great danger. I can’t shake it,” she said. “It’s so obvious, I have to take action.”
For several days, Reneau has been trying to talk to her senator and other local officials to find a way to get the team out.
But after encountering many obstacles, she decided to do it herself and go to Qatar in person. Shortly before takeoff, she contacted an old roommate who lives in Qatar and works at the embassy.
This friend was able to submit all the documents and, with the help of the embassy, began the process of taking the girls out of Kabul. Reneau himself decided to stay and help the distant world.
When she learned that some girls had left safely earlier this week, Reynolds said that she was “collapsed.”
“I received a text message from one of the girls, and she said:’We did it.’ All the emotions of two weeks of work, constantly hitting the wall, burying your feelings, bearing your feelings for the girl, hit me all at once. “
All-women Afghan Robotics Team Makes headlines in 2017 When they went to Washington to participate in an international robotics competition.
They were initially unable to obtain travel visas, but the intervention of former President Donald Trump allowed them to fly to Washington to participate in the competition.
Reneau said the girls are now considering where to go from Qatar, but they have already received “a large number of scholarships from incredible universities” in the United States.
“This is the first time in their lives. I really believe that they have the freedom to choose and become architects of their own destiny and future,” she said. “Knowing that they can go somewhere and get an education wherever they want to go is a feeling of freedom for me.”
