by Fawzia Koofi
There was no television or radio, so once the evening meal had been eaten and tidied away the family simply went to bed—normally by 7 o’clock each night. It was far too early for me. To occupy myself on those quiet evenings as I lay in bed, I would go over different math problems and formulas for chemistry and physics. It kept my mind occupied and helped me feel at least some connection with the lessons I missed so much. And as I remembered the numbers and symbols, part of me hoped I could soon return to Kabul and find it as it was when I had left it more than a year ago.
It wasn’t long afterwards that I asked Nadir to let me return to Faizabad. I missed my mother so much and really needed to be near her. I started discussing this with my family, but it was decided that instead of my returning to Faizabad, my mother, sister, brother-in-law and I would all move back to Kabul together. Mirshakay, my mother’s second son, was now a police general in the capital, and he had decreed that Kabul was currently safe enough for us to return. Nadir and I took the horse ride back to Faizabad, and from there we all took a flight to the city of Kunduz.
I was so happy to be back with my family, especially my mother. I did not tell her what I had been told about Muqim’s death, because I still couldn’t bring myself to fully believe it was true. When I felt the nagging, sickening waves of unease wash over me, I simply shut it out of my mind. My mother was very pleased to have me back too, and although neither of us knew what to expect in Kabul we were both very excited to be returning.
From Kunduz we had to take a three-hundred-kilometre bus journey. That July was very hot, even compared with the usual summer temperatures of Afghanistan. The sun scorched the mountains, and the rocks became so hot around midday that you could not touch them or you risked burning your hand. The wind whipped up the dust so that it swirled around in mini tornadoes, which got into houses, inside cars and machinery and constantly in your eyes. I was becoming used to my burka, but of course I still resented it. The dust had no respect for women’s modesty and it would find its way inside the blue cloth and stick to my sweating skin, making me itch and wriggle even more than usual.
At least on the horse ride to and from my brother’s house I had been in the breeze, but now I was crammed into a stifling bus with my family and dozens of other people trying to get to Kabul, and the temperature inside my burka was unbearable. The road from Kunduz to Kabul is one of the most dangerous in Afghanistan. It has improved over the years, but even now it can be a nerve-racking journey. The road’s narrow rutted surface spirals around the jagged mountains, which on one side pierce the turquoise sky and on the other plunge hundreds of feet down to the jagged rocks of the gorge below. Many unfortunate people have met their deaths down there. There aren’t any safety barriers, and when trucks and larger vehicles, such as our bus, meet going in opposite directions, they squeeze past each other a few centimetres at a time while wheels teeter along the crumbling lip of the cliff.
I sat in my bouncing, swaying seat listening to the roar of the bus’s engine, as the driver worked his way furiously up and down the gears, occasionally tooting his horn to remonstrate with passing motorists. Fortunately, I had my physics calculations and formulas to distract me and happily drifted off in a trail of numbers. Anything to keep my mind from the rivers of sweat that ran down my back and matted my hair inside the hood of my burka.
As the heat of the day began to wear off, the mountains turned lilac. The landscape softened, and now and then we passed a shepherd squatting near his flock as it grazed on the sweetest grass around the riverbeds and shadier spots. Donkeys snuffled among the wild poppies, and every few miles the burned and abandoned remains of a Soviet tank or truck littered the side of the road.
When we approached the outskirts of Kabul, tired, damp with sweat and irritated by the layer of dust that tickled our noses and made our skin itch, our bus slowed to a crawl in a long line of traffic that stretched out in front of us. Hundreds of cars, packed bumper to bumper, blocked the road. We waited, uncertain of what was happening. Without air flowing through the windows, it became unbearably hot once again. Many of the children were crying, pleading with their mothers to give them water.
A man with an AK-47 rifle approached the bus, sticking his bushy black beard and brown paqul hat through the door. His shalwar kameez was sweat-stained and dirty. The passengers strained their ears to hear the conversation. The delay, the gunman told the driver, was because a Mujahideen commander, Abdul Sabur Farid Kohistani, was being appointed prime minister of the new government and the roads in the capital had been closed as a security precaution to let his convoy through. I took it as a bad omen of what was to come. Not even the Russians had needed to bring an entire city to a halt to move dignitaries around. Afghanistan was in the control of the Mujahideen, who were veteran fighters, not politicians or civil servants. Yes, they had bravely relieved our country of the Russian invaders, and for this I respected and admired them. But I wondered how men with zero political experience could run the country efficiently.
When the roads were eventually reopened, we made our way through the city. There were signs of recent fighting—destroyed buildings and burned-out vehicles. Mujahideen fighters stood at checkpoints, guns at the ready. We went to my brother Mirshakay’s apartment in an area called Makrorian, a series of Russian-built apartment blocks. He lived on the fifth floor.
Mirshakay had been given a very senior job at the Ministry of the Interior, where he was helping run the police force. When we entered the apartment, the living room was full of guests, mostly men, waiting to speak to him. Some were there on official police business, some to plead the case of jailed friends or relatives who were in jail and others, many from Badakhshan, to make a social visit. It was a chaotic scene.
My brother came to meet us on the third floor, and I burst into tears. The city had changed so much since the last time I was there. I was really afraid of what it meant for my family and my country. But I was most concerned that Muqim wasn’t there to greet us too. His absence confirmed my worst fears, yet nobody seemed prepared to acknowledge the fact of his death. When I asked where he was, I was told he had gone to Pakistan and planned to go to Europe. “When?” I asked. About forty days ago, I was told. But I knew I was being lied to. Then I saw his photograph on a shelf in the living room. The frame had been decorated with silk flowers. It was an ominous sign, the first outward confirmation of Muqim’s fate.
“Why did you decorate the photo frame with flowers?” I asked my sister-in-law. She squirmed uncomfortably. “Because, you know, since Muqim went to Pakistan, I just miss him so much,” she replied. I knew she was lying. In Afghanistan, we decorate a photograph with flowers as a sign of mourning, as a tribute to the dead. My family was trying to protect me. But I didn’t need protecting—I needed the truth. My mother, who had absolutely no idea of the truth yet, believed the story about his going to Pakistan.
Later that evening, I was casually exploring the apartment, picking up the books and photographs that lined my brother’s living room. I found a diary and opened it out of bored curiosity rather than genuine suspicion. Inside was a poem. It laid out the terrible truth in verse. Written by a man called Amin, who had been my brother’s best friend, it was a poem of lament, describing how Muqim had been killed. I had read only the first three lines before a scream exploded from my lips. It was more a wail of anguish than rage. Here was eloquent proof of Muqim’s murder. My mother and brother rushed into the living room to see what was the matter. I was crying uncontrollably and barely able to talk. I just stood there, holding the journal in my hand, waving it at my mother. She took it from me with trembling hands. My brother looked horrified, as my mother stared uncomprehendingly down at the poem. The time for lies, no matter how well intentioned they were, was over. When my mother finally heard the truth, her scream was heartbreaking. Its piercing crescendo echoed off the concrete walls, drilling down into our brains. The irrefutable evidence of my brother’s death had struck me like a hammer blow. For my mother, it
was almost too much. My family gathered in the room, the secret of Muqim’s fate now in the open.
That evening, our grief bonded us—I, my mother, my sister, my brother and his two wives plus my three aunts wept and asked why such a good, healthy young man had been taken so unjustly from us. Why? Another of our family’s brightest shining stars had gone.
Dear Shuhra and Shaharzad,
Family . . . It’s a simple word but possibly one of the most important a child will ever learn. Family is the home that a child is born into, the place where it should be kept safe, warm and protected. Whether hail or rain or even rockets and bullets pierce the night air, a family should be there to protect a child. Safe in the house, a child should sleep soundly in its mother’s arms with a father standing by.
Sadly, many children, you included, don’t have two parents. But at least you have a mother who loves you and tries to make up for the loss of a father in your lives. Some children don’t even have that. So many poor Afghan children lost everyone in the war and have no one left to care for them. Siblings are also such an important part of family. I had so many brothers and sisters I almost lost count. Our extended family had rivalries and jealousies, especially among my father’s wives. But never were the children made to feel unloved. Each mother loved all the children equally, and it was a wonderful thing to know I was loved by so many mothers. When my father, your grandfather, died, my mother took responsibility for trying to keep all the children together so that we stayed a proper family.
My siblings and I fought and argued and sometimes we would kick, punch and tear each other’s hair, but we never stopped loving each other. Or looking out for each other. I battled hard against my brothers to remain in school and be independent, and even though they didn’t like it they loved me and let me do it. Of course now they are so very proud of their little sister the politician. They are also proud of themselves for having been open-minded enough to help me achieve my dreams. By doing so, we have helped to keep our family status and our political honour.
I wish I had given you a brother. A fine, decent young man who would have loved his two sisters so much. I am sure you would have squabbled and fought with him too. But I know you’d have loved him. I would have named him after the brother I lost.
Muqim.
With love,
Your mother
· · SIX · ·
When Justice Dies
{ May 1992 }
A SHORT STORY for Shuhra and Shaharzad
The wind and the rain lashed down from the Hindu Kush mountains onto Kabul that Friday night. The dusty roads quickly turned to mud, thick and slippery underfoot. Open sewers filled with brown water and burst their filthy banks, forming ever-growing stinking ponds. The streets were deserted, except for a barely discernible movement in the shadows. A man breathed heavily in the dark, the rain catching in his beard and forming rivulets that cascaded into the ankle-deep puddle he was standing in. He loosened his grip on the AK-47 assault rifle. The Russian-made gun was heavy and slippery. He made his way slowly, deliberately, through the black quagmire, placing each foot carefully, testing the ground before trusting it with his full weight.
Then he turned to face the six-foot-high compound wall and delicately lifted his gun onto the top. Even on a night like this, the clatter of a badly controlled weapon could carry a long way. Steadying himself, he paused, arms held up at shoulder height, before springing like a cat, grasping the top of the wall cleanly with both hands. He dug his toes into the bricks, searching for purchase on the wet surface. The muscles in his arms and back strained as he fought to control his weight. Throwing his right elbow onto the top of the wall, he pressed his face into the rough cold cement, swinging his left leg in an arc to catch the high edge. Heaving the rest of his torso onto the top of the wall, he panted silently, scanning the dark compound for any sign of guards. Seeing none, he dropped to the ground, his feet splashing noisily as they made contact. He pushed the safety lever on his AK-47 down with his thumb, clicking it into the firing position.
Crouching low, he used the cover of the shadows of the fruit trees to move towards the main house. Inside, everything was dark. The rain obscured his vision, and he fumbled at the brass door handle. It turned with a scrape of the bolt. He held his breath now, easing the door open a crack, slowly widening it as his eyes adjusted to the dark room. It was quiet inside. The sound of the rain was muffled against the heavy roof tiles, but he was aware that he was dripping loudly on the tiled floor. He moved across the living room in his crouch, gun poised. The tap-tap, tap-tap of his sandals on the floor was amplified against the close brick walls of the hall. He found the bedroom door and paused. He readied the gun, holding it pistol style in his right hand, and with his left he tested the knob. It gave and opened a crack.
And then, the man murdered my brother in cold blood.
The assassin had emptied his gun into Muqim as he lay sleeping in bed. A Kalashnikov’s magazine holds thirty bullets. The gunman held the trigger down until the gun was empty. Then he fled.
My sister-in-law woke to the sound of gunfire. She and my brother were asleep upstairs on the other side of the house. My brother tried to calm his wife, assuring her that the firing was probably just someone shooting in the air to celebrate a wedding or the victory over the Russians. Then a terrified neighbour started shouting from outside the yard that Muqim had been shot.
He was only twenty-three when he died. Tall, handsome and clever, a law student with a black belt in karate—very unusual at that time, even in Kabul—he was one of my favourite brothers. We had grown up playing and fighting and loving and falling out. A kind word from him would make me smile for hours; a harsh one would bring tears to my eyes in an instant. He, Ennayat and I had been playmates our entire lives. Muqim had narrowly survived being murdered as a little boy when he was hidden from would-be assassins under a woman’s skirt. This time, there was no one to hide or protect him.
It was such a devastating blow. I felt like a part of me had been killed. After my father’s death, all my brothers had taken on a much greater role in my life. Muqim relished his new patriarchal powers and would order me about, telling me to wash my socks or brush my clothes. I was his adoring little sister and I didn’t mind his bossiness. All I wanted was his approval and attention.
Most of the time, he encouraged my education and would say to me, “Fawzia, I want you to become a doctor.” Knowing that he had such belief in me always made me feel very special. But sometimes, if he was upset or frustrated, he would forbid me from going to school the next day, wagging his finger at me sternly and declaring, “Tomorrow you stay at home. You are a girl. For girls, home is enough.”
So he could be very traditional in his outlook—but I always forgave him for it because it seemed to be his way of dealing with stress. He was a bit like my father that way. Usually the day after he’d banned me from going to school he would come home with a gift—perhaps a new school bag or pencil case. Then he would ask me to go back to school and remind me of how smart he thought I was and what great things I was going to do with my life. If one of my other brothers said I couldn’t go to school, they really meant it. But with Muqim, I knew it was just talk.
From the clothes he wore to the food he ate, Muqim was always very particular about what he wanted. So when he told me he was in love with a girl he had met at university, I knew he was serious. He was in his first year of law school, and she was starting her medical training. When he told me she was very beautiful, I didn’t doubt that either. He used to point to my prettiest doll and say, “This girl is as beautiful as that doll. Except she has blue eyes.”
He had loved her for four years, but in all that time he had never been able to tell her how he felt. He used to spend hours hanging around outside her house, hoping for the merest glimpse of her. Muqim had sent her letters declaring his love, but she sent them back unopened. She was a very traditional girl, and a traditional girl doesn’t open letters from unsanctioned suito
rs. But he was hoping to change that. He was looking forward to my mother’s return to Kabul because she was going to visit the girl’s family and propose the match. If my father had been alive he would have done it, but instead it fell to my mother in her role as matriarch. But he was killed before the proper, decent approach could be taken.
It is always hard to come to terms with the death of a loved one. The sense of loss is enormous, and the hole the person’s absence leaves feels like it will never be filled. The ache of knowing you will never see that person again throbs like a bad tooth. Except there’s no painkiller you can take to relieve the pain.
The fighting between the Mujahideen forces and the government meant the police were unable to mount much of an investigation. Even my elder brother’s status as a senior police commander could do little to bring Muqim’s killer to justice. The only evidence the killer left was a sandal dropped by the wall as he fled. But it was the type of sandal worn by men all over Afghanistan, and this was long before the days of DNA testing and forensic evidence. Afghanistan was in a state of war, and during wars people die. The fact that Muqim’s death was murder meant little under the circumstances. Hundreds of people were being murdered every day, women were being raped and homes were being looted and destroyed. Food and water was scarce. Justice was in even shorter supply.
Mirshakay blamed himself for Muqim’s death. Not only had he failed him as a policeman by not capturing his killers, but he also felt personally responsible. As a police general, he had a team of bodyguards. They would travel with him everywhere, and at night their job was to guard the house as he and his family slept inside. Because it was a Friday, the day of prayer and observance, and such a horrible, wet night, my brother had felt sorry for his bodyguards and dismissed them early, telling them to go home to be with their families. Muqim got home from the gym at around 10 P.M. He was soaked to the skin in the rain and complaining about an eye infection. My sister-in-law fetched her kohl from her makeup bag. In Badakhshan, women often use a type of kohl eyeliner made from herbs found in the mountains that are said to be very good for treating eye infections. She put some on his eye, then he went to bed. That was the last time anyone saw Muqim alive. If the bodyguards had been on duty, there’s no way the gunman could have entered the house and Muqim would still be alive. Mirshakay was torn apart with fury at himself that he had let the guards go home early.