Enduring Freedom, page 5
But above the sound of their engines came a deep roar. Baheer felt his heart beating heavier.
“There!” Rahim pointed to the sky.
Baheer looked up, barely able to see the aircraft in the moonlight. But there it was, somewhat unreal, like a ghost, with its long fuselage, swept-back wings, and four big engines. It was the first time he’d seen the American presence in Afghanistan. A second later there was a flash like lightning in the distance, then the loud, hard boom as the American bomb exploded. It hit one of the Taliban’s trucks, and in a second the truck was reduced to dust, fire, and smoke.
It was hard to tell in the semidarkness, but there must have been six taliban in that truck. Now they were gone. Baheer breathed heavily through his nose, clenching his fists and watching the fire in the distance. How do you like it? Think you’re so tough picking on my uncle, picking on kids at school? Now there’s a bully bigger than you! Finally someone tells you to STOP!
“They’re bombing the Taliban!” Rahim shouted.
“Never cheer for a foreign invasion. Some celebrated the Russians, too,” Baba Jan said.
“The Americans must be better,” Baheer whispered. He couldn’t openly disagree with his grandfather. He wondered if they should take cover, but even some of the women had come to the roof to see what was happening. He couldn’t run away now.
The line of Taliban trucks fleeing Farah fired back with their rifles and, from the checkpoint outside of town, there was covering fire from the only Oerlikon heavy machine gun they had. It was a useless effort. They were powerless.
Baheer smiled. The silly far-off dream of the end of the Taliban’s power might at last have been coming true. Thank you, Allah the most powerful, for this miracle. A Taliban truck crashed into a big rock as its frantic driver tried to speed away. The monsters in back were thrown everywhere.
Baheer pressed his lips together, fighting to hold back tears. Tears of joy? Of relief? He didn’t know.
“Munir Khan?” Baba Jan’s brother said to him. “I don’t think it’s a good idea for you and your family to go home tonight. Please be our guests at least until morning.”
Farther off, the Taliban machine gun fired again as the enormous American bomber made another pass.
Baheer felt Baba Jan’s firm hand on his shoulder. “Come. Let us go to bed. This could continue for another two decades.”
Farah, Afghanistan
December 1, 2001
The merciless war of American revenge that Baba Jan had feared hadn’t arrived. Instead Baba Jan heard on the radio—a radio they no longer had to hide—that the Taliban fell quickly, with some holdouts fighting around Kandahar and Bagram. More and more American and British military forces poured into the country, but apart from a few aircraft flying overhead, they hadn’t seen any of that. One evening in Farah, men lined up at a barber shop to have their beards shaved off, something they hadn’t been allowed to do during the Taliban era. Music played, and it was a happy time, both around Afghanistan and in Baheer’s family’s compound.
Early one morning after the compound renovations were complete, Baba Jan called Baheer and Rahim to his study in the guesthouse building. Baba Jan sat on a narrow mattress called a toshak, leaning back on a pillow. He was reading Monajat-e-Khwaja Abdullah Ansari, a centuries-old book of poetic dialogues with Allah. The rest of his library had been proudly arranged on the shelves behind him.
Uncle Kabir had questioned whether it was wise to keep books in the guesthouse, but Baba Jan had responded, “The Taliban have fled. There’s no one to punish me for my books. Let our guests see them. This may encourage them to read as well.”
Now Baheer and Rahim waited for Baba Jan to tell them why he’d called for them, but he was so intensely immersed in his text that he didn’t seem to notice they were there. While they waited, Baheer marveled at Baba Jan’s library. Thick history books. Hardcover treatises on Islamic philosophy. A few gleaming, masterfully decorated volumes by the ancient master poets. Most important, and never far from use, was Baba Jan’s beloved Holy Quran. When Baheer was in Pakistan, he’d thought he might read these books, wondering if anyone besides his grandfather could read them all. But Baheer hadn’t touched a book since he and Rahim had been released from the prison of their Kabul school.
Baba Jan stroked his beard as he turned another page. Was he ever going to talk to them?
“Assalamu Alaikum,” Baheer finally said.
“Ah. Walaikum Salam. You kids are here,” Baba Jan responded. “Come sit next to me.” As the two of them took their seats, he leaned forward, turned a few pages, and began to recite the poem, rolling his index finger over the lines.
“‘O Allah. Bestow wisdom upon us to not stumble over Your path and confer Vision not to tumble in Darkness.’”
Baheer thought of the long drive from Kabul to Farah, a trip spanning most of his country. He remembered the sands blowing past the high mountains that had stood there since Allah created the world, and thought that the same poet who wrote those lines may have gazed upon those same mountains. For centuries, millions of people had read his poetry. Hearing these ancient words here in this new place helped Baheer feel more at home, connecting this strange city to his country and history.
Baba Jan smiled. “See the beauty of this verse. Every time you pray to Allah, make sure you ask for wisdom and vision.”
“And Allah will give these things to us?” Baheer asked.
“Through education, reading, books.” Baba Jan pointed at his shelves. “Speaking of books.” From behind his pillow, he produced two brown leather schoolbags, placing them on the floor in front of the brothers. One of the bags was Baheer’s. He’d tried to leave it back in Kabul, hoping to never see it again. Baheer’s hands ached with the memory of the blows his chemistry teacher had given him simply because he’d asked questions. This was it. With the work on the house complete, Baba Jan would send him to school.
“Your uncle Kabir found these books and your bags after we left Kabul. You must have forgotten them,” Baba Jan said.
O Allah. Please help me get out of this.
Baba Jan took the Holy Quran from the shelf behind him, kissed it, and turned toward the end. He began to read, reciting each verse first in Arabic then in Pashto.
“‘Read, in the name of your Lord who created you. Created all man from a cloth of blood. Read, and your Lord is the most Bountiful. Who teaches you the use of the Pen. And taught man things he did not know.’” He closed the book. “These were the first words of revelation to the Holy Prophet Mohammad—peace be upon Him. The significance of knowledge, wisdom, reading, and education are proven in our scripture.” Baba Jan waved the Holy Quran. “And in our literature.”
Baheer and Rahim kept their heads down. Despite the respect and belief Baheer had in Allah and Baba Jan’s words, dizziness rocked him. He couldn’t go back to school. The Taliban might be gone, but the cruel teachers remain.
Baba Jan pulled a chemistry textbook from Baheer’s bag and a small garden shovel from behind his pillow, placing the book and shovel side by side before him. “I cannot force you to study. The choice is yours. The book or the shovel?”
The sight of the book made Baheer’s decision easy, but he worried Baba Jan had a preference and might be mad if he chose wrong. Finally, he reached out to the shovel and pulled it toward him.
“We’ll both work,” Rahim responded.
Baheer smiled at his brother. He couldn’t imagine what he would do if Rahim had chosen school, leaving Baheer behind.
Baba Jan stared at them over his reading glasses. “You have made your choice.” He recited a line by Rahman Baba, a Pashto poet. “‘Without hardships you won’t have rest . . .’” He was quiet for a long moment. “The farm outside the city is overgrown with weeds and shrubs. We must water and take care of the vineyard and the wheat crop. That means digging kilometers of irrigation ditches. You’ll start right away.”
Baheer smiled. That was so easy. No more school! Fixing up the compound had been difficult at first, but it was kind of fun with Baheer, Rahim, their father, their uncles, grandfather, and even little cousin Yusuf all laboring together. He could have danced, but he sensed his grandfather wasn’t entirely happy with his choice.
Baba Jan ordered them to get ready, so they went to change clothes in their room.
“Should I let my father and uncles know we’ll be going soon?” Baheer asked.
Baba Jan stared at him silently for a moment. “Your father and uncles have enough to do getting the rug business established here in Farah. You and Rahim will work the farm by yourselves.”
Something in the man’s tone sent an edge of worry through Baheer. One look at Rahim told him his brother had noticed it, too. “Bale, Baba Jan,” Baheer said as he and Rahim hurried from their grandfather’s study.
“Why are you so happy?” Maryam asked after they’d put on work clothes.
“We’re free!” Baheer said. “No more school.”
“At least you’re allowed the chance to go to school!” Maryam cried. “And you just throw it all away? You’ll regret this decision.”
“Let’s go,” said Rahim. “Forget this bookworm.”
Minutes later, Baheer and Rahim walked their bikes next to Baba Jan on the calm, peaceful street. Palm trees waved in the breeze, blessedly free of dust. Swallows sang brightly in the branches.
Two blocks from home, vegetable carts crowded the square. A burqa-covered woman inspected the cabbage and spinach. She was unescorted with no male relative, impossible during the Taliban time. And she’s causing no problems! Why were the Taliban so ridiculously strict?
“All these vegetables come from nearby farms,” Baba said. “You’ll sell ours here after harvest.”
“Bale, Baba,” Baheer responded.
Past the market, a group of boys wearing backpacks passed on the other side of the street, none of them wearing turbans. One of the boys laughed, pushing another, who shouted playfully and swung his bag at his friend. How could they be happy going to school?
“No turbans,” Baheer whispered.
“The Taliban really are gone.” Rahim smiled.
Music and high-pitched singing echoed from where a large crowd of people gathered outside a shop. A man sold ice cream out of a stall, and a TV on the counter showed Khuda Gawah, an Indian movie filmed in Kabul during the early nineties, when Afghanistan knew a little peace.
Baheer and Rahim smiled at each other as the people in the film danced their way down a popular bazaar in Kabul. Baheer laughed as a boy near the shop danced like the actors.
“They should have a blanket over that shop to muffle the sound,” Baheer joked.
“Harami Taliban,” said Rahim.
“Don’t joke about the Taliban, boys,” Baba Jan said quietly. “Your uncle’s head still bears scars from their razor. They hurt a lot of people.”
They turned onto the asphalt street of the bazaar. People swarmed the shops. On both sides of the street, men sold dry fruit, sweets, cakes, flowers, and jewelry. They kept walking, leaving the pavement and buildings and heading toward the open, barren land outside town, passing a deep, dry creek. Baheer spotted an enormous compound, its tall mud walls stretching on unbelievably far.
“That’s our farm.” Baba Jan laughed. “I have quite a bit of land here.”
Inside the compound, Baba Jan took them to a tool storage room. Feeble light shone in through one small hole in the middle of the dome ceiling and a window screened by thick, dust-covered, yellowed plastic.
“Get two wheelbarrows, two shovels, two sickles, and one pickax,” Baba Jan called in after them.
The boys stumbled in the shadows until they brought out the necessary items. Baba Jan locked the room and they went to work.
First, they ran the water pump to irrigate the vineyard. After clearing the trenches that carried water from the well, making sure the water flowed properly, they went to cut grass for the family cow.
The boys had never cut grass before. Baheer swung the sickle low like a cricket bat, but only knocked a few blades of grass in the air.
Baba Jan laughed, and although he meant it kindly, it made Baheer feel clumsy and stupid. He wanted to be good at this. He needed to be good at this. If he failed here on the farm, he might be sent back to school. More than that, he was sixteen, far from being a little kid. He needed to be good at something.
“Not like that.” Baba Jan took the sickle from Baheer. “Hold the handle firm and with your other hand grab the grass. Pull the sickle toward you close to the ground. It will cut. See? Like this.”
Rahim grabbed the other sickle and began smoothly cutting big bundles of grass.
“Be careful. It seems easy, but if you go too fast, you may cut your finger,” Baba Jan warned. “Once you fill one sack, we’ll take it on the wheelbarrow when we go for lunch.”
The cutting wasn’t easy. Baheer couldn’t cut as quickly as his brother, and once he nearly sliced his thumb.
An hour later, they heaved a large sack of grass onto the wheelbarrow and parked it under the shade of the berry tree as Baba Jan had instructed. But there was no time to relax. One of the irrigation trenches in the vineyard had collapsed, and water had flooded everywhere. Baheer and Rahim hurried with shovels, and as they tromped through the mud, Baheer wondered for a moment if perhaps he’d made the wrong choice. But the trenches wouldn’t collapse every day. This was just bad luck.
Baba Jan pointed at a row of shrubberies by the compound’s center wall. There must have been hundreds of the twisted, stubborn things. “All those bushes must be dug out.”
Baheer stared at the plants. He shivered as a cool wind blew over his soaked body. OK. Maybe work on the farm will be harder than I thought. But I’ll get used to it. Insha Allah.
Every day, they watered the vineyard, cut a sack of grass, and dug up more bushes. Sometimes Baba Jan would demonstrate how to better do a task or encourage them to keep working, but mostly he sat in a chair near the well, reading The Interpretation of Quran by Khwaja Abdullah Ansari.
After a week, Baheer had many bruises. His hands swelled. “Man, this hurts.”
Rahim sliced some grass. “At least we’re free, out in the sun and fresh air, working like men.”
This did not feel like freedom anymore. Baheer had chosen the shovel to avoid the pain of the teacher’s whip. Now instead of temporary pain from lashes on his hands, Baheer’s whole body ached. All the time. He looked at Baba Jan, who glanced up over his book with a frown. “You’re right,” Baheer said and returned to cutting.
Through the winter and into the spring, the brothers spent most of their time on the farm. They were never given the chance to have fun or explore the bazaar except when they went there to sell some of the family’s extra produce. Baba Jan allowed no free time at home. After the morning prayer, he’d send them on their bikes down that same muddy route past the dried creek.
One morning on the way to the farm, Baheer noticed a girl wearing a black shawl, carrying a bundle of books, standing on the upper edge of the creek right before him. He saw girls heading to school every day around here, unthinkable only months ago, but this girl was different. As he looked up at her, she unveiled her face and smiled. Baheer nearly crashed his bike into a rock. What was she doing? Never in his life had a girl outside his family been so forward with him. Baheer quickly turned his face away and pedaled harder, thinking about the girl the whole way to the farm.
By the end of March, Baheer and Rahim had settled in to the tough, monotonous fieldwork. Baba Jan no longer accompanied them to the farm. They knew what to do. They were like donkeys, functioning automatically, unthinkingly, ceaselessly.
There has to be more to life than this. Baheer rubbed his sore shoulder as he moved quietly through the moonlit front courtyard late one night after everyone else had gone to sleep. He couldn’t just eat, sleep, and work.
Knowing the metal door to his grandfather’s guest room squeaked loudly, Baheer lifted the door a little as he opened it, taking pressure off the bad hinge. Moonlight spilled into the room, but the books remained in shadow. O Allah, the most merciful. Please help me pick the right book. Something to bring a little meaning and brightness to his days. He pulled a volume from the far end of the top shelf, having no idea what he’d taken.
Baheer opened the small hardcover and held it close to his face. He breathed in the warm scent of old paper and deep wisdom. The scent of hope. Insha Allah.
The next morning Baheer discovered that by luck or by the will of Allah, the book he’d found was Ferdowsi’s Shahnama, the epic poetry of Persian kings. He had heard Baba Jan speak of or quote from Ferdowsi countless times growing up, so he knew he’d found something good. He only hoped his grandfather didn’t discover it missing before he could read and return it.
The farm work continued, but now the days were brightened a little. He even found himself working faster to finish tasks and steal more time to read. During their traditional rest period after lunch and prayer, Baheer would read from Shahnama. On one hot afternoon, he looked at the book in his hands.
This. This was what learning was meant to be. It was different from school. Reading Ferdowsi’s Shahnama, which was about Rostam, a warrior, and his son, made him think of the Citadel that loomed over the bazaar in Farah. Like that fortress, these words were ancient, a thousand years older than the copy of the book he held in his hands. These words had spoken to people long before the Taliban sought to destroy them, before the Soviets tried to destroy Afghanistan. They were older by far than the Americans who had come to his country now. Unlike all of the empires and ages of history, these words had lasted.
Ferdowsi spoke to him from across the centuries, and although Baheer wasn’t sure what all these couplets meant, he could feel in his bones, just as surely as he could feel Afghanistan’s winds, that they were important.
