“Yes, I shall remember,” I said. I was looking into his eyes, and they were getting watery. When he finished, he turned his face away and blew his nose with his pocket handkerchief. He looked at the walls and started reading what had been written on them. He said, “We need to leave our words, too.” He picked up a piece of charcoal on the floor and gave it to me. “Write, ‘Death only breaks the cage, but it does not hurt the bird.’”
It was a great relief to hear such a wise saying from him instead of these other despairing statements. I wanted to hug him, but his face was lost in his handkerchief.
The tall, thin guy unlocked the door and came in. He pointed his right hand at my grandfather. “Bring me four hundred thousand afghani, and I will let you go. But the boy will stay with us till you come back with the money,” he said.
“I’ll find you four hundred thousand afghani, but you will get none of it if you hurt my grandson!” Grandfather said.
“As long as you stand by your word, we won’t hurt the boy,” he said. Then he went out to talk to his friend, leaving the door open.
“How will you find the money?” I asked my grandfather.
“Don’t worry about money. It is not the issue. We have to get out of this situation,” Grandfather said.
“I think it is very good to be rich in such circumstances,” I mumbled.
“We were rich, and that is why we are here. Being rich from now on will be like cooking a sheep for dinner and inviting wild and hungry wolves with sharp teeth to join you. When the dinner is not enough for them, then they’ll invite themselves to eat you,” Grandfather said with a worried tone. “For now, we just have to keep them talking.”
The tall guy came back and pointed at my grandfather. “Are you Sunni or Shi’a?”
“Sunni and Shi’a are the two wings of one body, and thorns to enemies’ eyes. They are both believers in God and Mohammad, peace be upon him,” Grandfather said, his voice oddly relaxed. The separation of Sunni and Shi’a started with a dispute among those closest to the Prophet Mohammad, peace be upon him, over who would lead Islam in the years after his death. Both Sunni and Shi’a share the same Islamic beliefs and articles of faith.
The guy suddenly acted ashamed of his question and walked out, as if not sure what to say next.
The other guy, who had said nothing until now, came in and grabbed Grandfather’s collar and pulled at him. “I’m gonna make a deal with you. How much do you have to give us now?” Then he slapped my grandfather on the face. I stood up to defend Grandfather, but the guy pushed me in the chest and knocked me backward. He rolled up his sleeves to make his hands ready for more slapping.
My grandfather recited in Arabic one of the Hadiths of the Prophet Mohammad, peace be upon him: “The Messenger of God, Mohammad, said, ‘He is not one of us who does not treat our young with compassion or acknowledge the dignity of elders.’”
He stared at my grandfather fiercely for a moment, hesitated, then left the room without saying anything more. His tall, thin friend came and locked the room, leaving Grandfather and me alone again.
I looked at Grandfather. His face was red, and I saw the print of four fingers on his left cheek. If my father had been there, he would have punched those two guys brutally and changed the geography of their faces.
Grandfather smiled at me. “That was an adventure.” Then he began pacing from one corner of the room to another.
I thought about my death. What if my family receives my body without my head? Will they put my body in the grave without it? What will be in the grave? Only earth under me and big stones on top of me. I would be covered with a white sheet. I thought about how lonely a grave must feel. That was even more frightening than looking at the heads and legs that I had seen in that ditch. At least the heads were together. They did not eat and chat with one another, but they were not alone.
Suddenly I wished for oblivion, to be at rest. I would drink a glass of poison if that would take away the sight of those heads and send me to sleep forever.
I heard footsteps in the courtyard. I saw a third Hazara man through the broken window of our room. He was not wearing a bandanna, or even carrying a gun except for the pistol in his belt. He was a couple of years older than the other two, but probably not more than his early thirties. He was very muscular. His little finger was halfway up his nostril.
The tall guy unlocked the door and shouted to us, “Come out and talk to our commander.”
We went out. The commander was standing at the edge of the ditch, staring at the severed heads. He did not seem to mind the bad smell. He did not pay any attention to us for almost five minutes. The commander continued cleaning his nostrils, then rubbed his finger against his vest, which had little pockets and compartments for holding bullets and grenades. All his grenades had fuses hanging out. I thought for a moment of pulling one of those fuses and pushing him into the ditch.
He cleared his throat with a fake cough, still staring into the ditch, and asked my grandfather, “Do you know why I have kept all these heads here?”
“No,” Grandfather said.
“Do you want to know?” the commander asked.
“Do you want to tell me?” Grandfather replied.
“Do you want to know, young man?” the commander asked me.
“No. Because it is obvious. You are a killer,” I said sadly.
The commander turned toward us for the first time. He looked at me with dead eyes.
Grandfather squeezed my shoulder and hurriedly said, “He is a kid. He doesn’t know what he is saying.”
“Kids are honest, and they know exactly what they are saying. I like people who talk frankly. I also like to collect human skulls. Sometimes I plant flowers in them; they look beautiful that way. Do you want to have your skull become a nice pot for a rosebush?”
Grandfather said nothing.
“Your skull will turn to earth after a while anyway. Why not use it for something?” the commander asked with a smile. His little finger was still going in and out of his nose, searching for something. “A man should be happy to be turned into blossoms.”
Grandfather was watching the commander, who in turn was enjoying the sight of those heads. The other two guys watched us from the side of the garden.
“And do you know what rotten human flesh is good for?” the commander asked.
“Tell me,” Grandfather said.
“It makes good fertilizer. Didn’t you know that?”
“No. I didn’t know that,” my grandfather said, almost as if he were interested. But I could tell he was afraid.
“Yeah, me neither. I just found out a few months ago when I put some in one of my skull pots. That rose blossomed like crazy; it’s still in bloom. Maybe you would like to see it?” he said, smiling, and looked straight at my grandfather for the first time. He cleared his throat again. “In fact, why don’t you choose which kind of rose you would like to have growing in your own skull?”
“As you wish,” Grandfather said very softly. “But may I ask your permission to visit my house across the street one last time?”
The commander laughed, much too loudly. I looked at him and wondered what he found so funny. “That is not your house,” the commander said.
“Actually, it is,” Grandfather replied, as if he were making a point to a customer. “I built it. I lived there, and it was my hope to return to it when you all go back from where you came.”
The commander narrowed his eyes and looked at Grandfather with disgust. “I told you I like people who tell the truth. I know the owner of that house, and he is not you. He is my teacher. And my trainer. I went there every day to train in his gym.” He drew his pistol. “You are a dishonest man, like all these people with money.”
“Are you speaking of Abdul Basir?” Grandfather asked quietly.
“Of course! Abdul Basir is a man of honor, a man of respect.”
“Yes, I know that,” said Grandfather.
“That is his house, not yours!” The
commander was shouting now.
“Abdul Basir is my son,” Grandfather said.
The commander narrowed his eyes again. “Don’t try to fool with me.”
“He is my father,” I said emphatically. “If he were here and saw you talking to Grandfather like this, he would have broken your nose by now.”
The commander looked at me. “This boy doesn’t look like Abdul Basir. He looks like a Hazara, like us,” the commander said to Grandfather.
“From his mother’s side,” Grandfather replied. Was that true, I wondered? I had never heard that before.
“Tell me about your son. Where is he a teacher?” the commander shouted.
“At the Habibia High School. He is a boxing trainer, too. He had one gym there and one gym in our house, at the corner. He used to train two hundred people in Habibia High School every day, and fifty people in this gym at home. He has been in many international boxing matches, and won most of them,” Grandfather said. “What else do you want me to tell you about him? What he eats for breakfast, or what color he likes to wear, or what kind of motorbike he rides?” Grandfather was on the edge of sounding disdainful.
“Tell me about his motorbike,” the commander said edgily.
“English. Four cylinders. Fifteen hundred cc. It was noisy and big. Two years ago, a tourist from Denmark came to Kabul and bought it from him. Then he used the money to buy a Russian Volga.”
The commander’s face changed. A small amount of life seemed to have crept into his eyes, but only just a little. “You are right,” he said in a low voice. His whole body relaxed. Then he took my grandfather’s right hand and kissed it and touched his eyes to it several times. This is how we were taught to kiss the Holy Koran and a holy man’s hand as a sign of respect and honor.
I was not sure whether to be relieved, or more frightened. Everything that had been happening was so strange. Now, just by his having said my father’s name, it was becoming even stranger.
The commander led us out of the courtyard. He seemed very embarrassed. His two friends followed. When we got outside, he asked my grandfather whether his men had treated us badly. His behavior had totally changed. He was not a bully anymore. He was acting like a servant to a king.
“Ask them yourself,” Grandfather said.
“Did you treat them badly?” he asked his men with a harsh voice. They were standing behind him, staring at their feet. He asked them once again, but very quietly this time. They still did not answer. He slapped one of them so hard on the face that mucus exploded out of his nose and all over the commander’s left hand.
The guy started wiping his nose, and the commander beat him on his back with his heavy fists. And as he was beating him he was saying, “Snot-filled bastard, do you know who you are dealing with? This holy man is the father of my teacher. His son was very kind to me. He has won more boxing matches than you have hair on your head!” The commander pummeled the man mercilessly, until he was on his knees wailing. The commander must have been a strong boxer.
Grandfather asked him to stop the beating.
The commander kicked his underling, then ordered the other to bring us tea. He asked my grandfather what type of tea he drank.
“Let me visit my house now; we will have tea another time,” my grandfather replied.
“I’m sorry; you can’t go to your house today.” His voice was much calmer when he talked to Grandfather. “Your house was the front line last week, and our guys put mines all around the courtyard.” Grandfather’s face fell. “They are fighting in Bamyan now but they’ll be back in a few days. By next week your yard will be fully cleaned, I promise!” the commander said.
Grandfather had just survived a near encounter with death, yet he was even more devastated to know that though our house was right in front of us, we could not go in. We walked into the street. We stood there and stared at our house and said nothing.
* * *
That street had once been full of joy. I watched as two stray dogs went into the house where only a few minutes ago we had been held captive. One of them came back with a forearm in his mouth. Our neighborhood had become a fast food restaurant for dogs.
The commander insisted that we have lunch with him, but Grandfather wanted to go.
“You seem to be a good man,” Grandfather said. “Did you really kill all those people whose heads were in that ditch?” His voice was very calm, like he was talking to one of his sons.
“No, Uncle. I’m not a good man anymore. I am a killer. I used to be a good man, but that seems like a very long time ago.”
“What happened?” Grandfather asked.
“I used to be a student in Habibia High School. I always got the highest scores in the class. I was preparing for the university. You can ask my teacher, your son, Malem Abdul Basir. I was also one of the best boxers in the school gym. But this war has destroyed everything good in my life. It has taken everything from me.” He sighed and looked at the mountain.
“It is not just you,” Grandfather said. “It is everybody in Afghanistan.”
“No. It is not true. For centuries we Hazaras have been treated like slaves in this country. Pashtuns and other tribes always thought of us as outsiders, and treated us like dogs. A few months ago, one of my cousins was captured. He had an air hose put in his ass, the kind you use for tires. They pumped him full of air until he exploded. Do you know who did that? Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. And who is he? A Pashtun, who hates Hazaras. Then one of my brothers had a nail hammered into his head by one of Masoud’s commanders. They laughed while he screamed. Do you know who Masoud is? A Panjshiri who hates Hazaras. Everybody in this country looks down on us. What have we done to this country to be treated so badly? Name me one Hazara who is working in a high position in this government. I assure you there is none.” His face was getting red with anger.
“But what you are doing is not good either. You cannot clean blood with blood,” Grandfather said.
“I want revenge.” He said those words very slowly. His voice was getting higher and louder. “I want revenge! My whole family has been killed by Gulbuddin, Masoud, and Sayyaf. Their commanders raped my mother and my sisters before they killed them. Do you want to know how I know that? They made me watch them! One of my sisters was only seven years old. I am the only one who survived, and I know that sooner or later I will be killed, too. But before I die, I’ll kill as many of their people as I can. I will rob them, rape them, and murder them,” he said, getting even louder.
“This is not a very smart way to solve the problem,” Grandfather said.
“I think this is a very smart way. Other tribes should count Hazaras as Afghans, as one of them. If they think they can do all these bad things to us, now they should learn that we can do bad things, too. We tolerated too much for too long, for centuries. Now the bowl of our patience is overflowing.”
Grandfather did not say anything and the commander was silent, too. The commander was looking at the mountain. Grandfather was looking at his house. The commander broke the silence. “I am sorry that you cannot visit your house today.”
“Thank you,” Grandfather said.
As we walked around the corner, I automatically looked for my good friend Muhammad Ali, as I always did at that place. He had lived in a nice house across the street from ours, but it looked empty now. He and Wakeel were the same age and were friends in school together. He was one of several Hazara neighbors we had. He taught me how to ride a bicycle, and he was very good with kites. I wondered where Muhammad Ali was now. Many of his relatives had gone to Germany. Was he there safely with them? Or had the Hazara-hating warlords done terrible things to him and his family?
“I can drive you halfway back from where you came,” the commander offered.
Grandfather nodded. The commander walked ahead of us, and we followed him to a Russian jeep that was parked along the road. The commander climbed in, and we did, too. We sat in the car and the commander drove us along the road past the yellow silo where we had walked
an hour and a lifetime before. He stopped near the bus stop, where no bus had stopped since the fighting had begun. He stepped outside. “I cannot go farther than this. This is the front line between Hazaras and Panjshiris. They will kill me if I go past here,” he said.
We climbed out of the jeep. The commander did, too. He came around to our side of the vehicle. He kissed me on my cheeks and urged me to give my father his warm regards. He told us his name. His breath smelled so bad that again I nearly threw up. Once more, he kissed Grandfather’s hand. He stood watching us for a long time as we walked away.
* * *
When I got home, my mother was cooking dinner. As soon as she saw me, she ran and kissed me on my cheeks. Her hands smelled of onions, and that scent meant everything that is good in the world.
She kept asking me how our house was, but I could not talk. I thought of the pile of skulls, and the dogs. My grandfather went into his room without saying anything. My uncles and aunts quickly started gathering there to hear about what he had seen. My cousins stood outside the door, watching me but saying nothing, waiting for me to say something.
My mother insisted that I tell her what we had seen, but instead I started to cry, sobbing uncontrollably, and I could not stop. My mother cried, too, but without knowing what had happened to me. My sisters cried softly also, except my older sister, who had a wicked gleam in her eyes.
My mother was one minute shaking my shoulders and the next hugging me. “What’s wrong?” she asked me forcefully. I sobbed even louder to try to release the grief in my soul.
I do not remember when I stopped, but I do remember falling asleep with my mother holding my head on her chest and rubbing my back, while my older sister was smiling at me. I knew why she was smiling at me. She was planning to tease me with “fountain eyes” for the rest of my life.
* * *
The next day when I woke up, I felt so ashamed that I had cried in front of everybody that I did not want to see anyone. I tried not to look them in the eye, but everyone was nice, even my older sister. By now they all must have heard about what had happened to us.
A Fort of Nine Towers: An Afghan Family Story Page 9