Months after jumping on a military plane to escape the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, Bahara Samimi was rushing to catch trains to early appointments with Melbourne real estate agents.
The 23-year-old Afghan women’s national soccer team player and dentistry student was evacuated by the Australian government, landing in Brisbane for processing, then eventually settling in Melbourne in September 2021.
As a temporary protection visa holder, she was not allowed to work and relied on Centrelink payments to rebuild her life.
“It took us two months to find a place which we could afford,” she tells AAP.
“We searched on Google for rentals and applied online, which was very different to how you rent in Afghanistan and an unfamiliar process for us with references and so, but we just had to do it.”…