Manizha Talash knew the moment she first saw a video of a man spinning on his head that she would dedicate her life to breaking – a style of street dance.
But it is a dream for which she has risked her life, and the lives of her family, in order to fulfil. It has forced her to flee her country, and hide her identity.
Now, as she prepares to step out on the world stage at the Paris Olympics, Manizha reveals her fight to become Afghanistan’s first female breaker.
Manizha came to breaking late.
She had initially tried shoot boxing, turning to the Japanese martial art that mixes wrestling and kickboxing as a way to protect herself as she worked alongside her father, selling groceries from his cart in the streets of the capital Kabul.
But a few matches in, she broke her shoulder and had to give up.
Then, aged 17, she saw the video of the man on his head – and soon discovered the Superiors Crew, a breaking collective based in Kabul.
She fell in love.
“I couldn’t believe it was real,” she says.
At the same time, she heard breaking would make its debut at the Paris 2024 Olympics. The dream was born – she just had to get there.
But it clearly wasn’t going to be easy from the start.
She visited the Superiors Crew’s training club in western Kabul, which was considered the country’s pioneering centre for hip-hop and breaking, but it was not quite what she expected.
“When I entered the club it was full of boys,” Manizha recalls.
The Superiors Crew’s coach, Jawad Saberi, was also quick to size Manizha up too.
“She was so small,” he remembers. “I was doubtful because there were other b-girls who didn’t stay long,” he says, using the term for a female performer.
But her size was the least of their troubles.