In early 2019, an 18-year-old Saudi woman, Rahaf Mohammed, snuck out of her family hotel room in Kuwait and bought a plane ticket to Bangkok, beginning the most extraordinary journey of her young life. The welcome she received, however, met her deepest fears. With her father and brother in hot pursuit, and Thai airport authorities, working in collaboration with the Saudi embassy, all determined to send her back, Mohammed barricaded herself in an airport hotel room, took a deep breath and decided to tell her story to the world.
Using the smartphone that had been her only respite from a windowless, repressive existence in the conservative heartland of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed detailed her plight in a series of posts on Twitter. If she was forcibly returned, she would disappear or be killed, she wrote. She needed immediate help to apply for asylum.
