The lakes, mountains and brisk air of Uzbekistan’s Bustanlik district lie just a few dozen kilometers from the urban sprawl of Tashkent, and tourists as well as conference delegates retreat there for a break or to learn and exchange ideas. Sometimes, people attending a hotel conference barely get outside to absorb the beauty of the surrounding national parks. That’s what happened to me, a reporter for The Times of Central Asia. But then, I found some inspiration within the hotel’s bland walls. I was attending a training course on data journalism for a few days in Bustanlik. During dinner, hotel employees mentioned that Dilorom Yuldasheva, an Uzbek woman internationally acclaimed for her resolve and accomplishment after a catastrophic injury, was also staying there after appearing at an event in Tashkent. Soon after, around 50-60 people in the hotel restaurant applauded as a bouquet was handed to Yuldasheva. It seemed that the hotel administration had arranged the small celebration because most guests weren’t aware that she was there. I approached her table, introducing myself and asking if she’d be willing to talk. She smiled and agreed. Yuldasheva wore light makeup and spoke softly. At the start of our conversation, I mentioned that I already knew her from media coverage. Then I asked if she could share something she had never told anyone before. “There’s nothing left untold,” she said. “But if you’d like, I can tell you the same stories again, just for you.” ----- The BBC released a list of 100 influential and inspiring women for 2024, highlighting women who “have had to dig deep and find new levels of resilience” while facing violence and humanitarian crises in Gaza, Lebanon, Ukraine and Sudan, as well as polarization surrounding a record number of international elections, and the growing challenges of climate change. On the list are stranded astronaut Sunita Williams, rape survivor Gisèle Pelicot, actress Sharon Stone, Olympic athletes Rebeca Andrade and Allyson Felix, singer Raye, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Nadia Murad, visual artist Tracey Emin, climate campaigner Adenike Oladosu and writer Cristina Rivera Garza. Also on that list is Yuldasheva, a 41-year-old seamstress and entrepreneur from Denov, in Uzbekistan’s Surkhandarya region. The village where she lives is mainly engaged in livestock raising, crop farming, and gardening. In 2021, while helping with the grain harvest, she lost both her legs in an accident. That day, she had been wearing a long robe to protect herself from the sun, a common style of dress among rural women, many of whom consider it shameful for them to wear trousers. As she worked near a combine harvester, the fabric got caught in the machine’s moving parts, pulling her in. She struggled frantically, and in vain, to escape. “I didn’t even have time to scream, and when I opened my eyes, I was sitting on the combine harvester, but this didn’t last long. The combine harvester blade spun and threw me several meters away,” she said. In August 2022, Yuldasheva was fitted with prosthetic legs...
