Three hours after my flight landed in Peshawar, I was sitting on shredded1 upholstery in the backseat of a smoke-filled taxicab. My driver, a chain-smoking, sweaty little man who introduced himself as Gholam, drove nonchalantly and recklessly, averting2 collisions by the thinnest of margins3, all without so much as a pause in the incessant4 stream of words spewing from his mouth:
??terrible what is happening in your country, yar. Afghani people and Pakistani people they are like brothers, I tell you. Muslims have to help Muslims so...?
I tuned5 him out, switched to a polite nodding mode. I remembered Peshawar pretty well from the few months Baba and I had spent there in 1981. We were heading west now on Jamrud road, past the Cantonment and its lavish6, high-walled Homes. The bustle7 of the city blurring8 past me reminded me of a busier, more crowded version of the Kabul I knew, particularly of the KochehMorgha, or Chicken Bazaar9, where Hassan and I used to buy chutney-dipped potatoes and cherry water. The streets were clogged10 with bicycle riders, milling pedestrians11, and rickshaws popping blue smoke, all weaving through a maze12 of narrow lanes and alleys13. Bearded vendors14 draped in thin blankets sold animalskin lampshades, carpets, embroidered15 shawls, and copper16 goods from rows of small, tightly jammed stalls. The city was bursting with sounds; the shouts of vendors rang in my ears mingled17 with the blare of Hindi music, the sputtering18 of rickshaws, and the jingling19 bells of horse-drawn carts. Rich scents20, both pleasant and not so pleasant, drifted to me through the passenger window, the spicy21 aroma22 of pakora and the nihari Baba had loved so much blended with the sting of diesel23 fumes24, the stench of rot, garbage, and feces.
A little past the redbrick buildings of Peshawar University, we entered an area my garrulous25 driver referred to as "Afghan Town.?I saw sweetshops and carpet vendors, kabob stalls, kids with dirtcaked hands selling cigarettes, tiny restaurants--maps of Afghanistan painted on their windows--all interlaced with backstreet aid agencies. "Many of your brothers in this area, yar. They are opening Businesses, but most of them are very poor.?He tsk'ed his tongue and sighed. "Anyway, we're getting close now.?
I thought about the last time I had seen Rahim Khan, in 1981. He had come to say good-bye the night Baba and I had fled Kabul. I remember Baba and him embracing in the foyer, crying softly. When Baba and I arrived in the U.S., he and Rahim Khan kept in touch. They would speak four or five times a year and, sometimes, Baba would pass me the receiver. The last time I had spoken to Rahim Khan had been shortly after Baba's death. The news had reached Kabul and he had called. We'd only spoken for a few minutes and lost the connection.
The driver pulled up to a narrow building at a busy corner where two winding27 streets intersected. I paid the driver, took my lone28 suitcase, and walked up to the intricately carved door. The building had wooden balconies with open shutters--from many of them, laundry was hanging to dry in the sun. I walked up the creaky stairs to the second floor, down a dim hallway to the last door on the right. Checked the address on the piece of stationery29 paper in my palm. Knocked.
Then, a thing made of skin and bones pretending to be Rahim Khan opened the door.
A CREATIVE writing TEACHER at San Jose State used to say about clichés: "Avoid them like the plague.?Then he'd laugh at his own joke. The class laughed along with him, but I always thought clichés got a bum30 rap. Because, often, they're dead-on. But the aptness of the clichéd saying is overshadowed by the nature of the saying as a clich? For example, the "elephant in the room?saying. Nothing could more correctly describe the initial moments of my reunion with Rahim Khan.
We sat on a wispy31 mattress32 set along the wall, across the window overlooking the noisy street below. Sunlight slanted33 in and cast a triangular34 wedge of light onto the Afghan rug on the floor. Two folding chairs rested against one wall and a small copper samovar sat in the opposite corner. I poured us tea from it.
"How did you find me??I asked.
"It's not difficult to find people in America. I bought a map of the U.S., and called up information for cities in Northern California,?he said. "It's wonderfully strange to see you as a grown man.?
I smiled and dropped three sugar cubes in my tea. He liked his black and bitter, I remembered. "Baba didn't get the chance to tell you but I got married fifteen years ago.?The truth was, by then, the cancer in Baba's brain had made him forgetful, negligent35.
"You are married? To whom??
"Her name is Soraya Taheri.?I thought of her back Home, worrying about me. I was glad she wasn't alone.
"Taheri... whose daughter is she??
I told him. His eyes brightened. "Oh, yes, I remember now. Isn't General Taheri married to Sharif jan's sister? What was her name...?
"Jamila jan.?
"Balay!?he said, smiling. "I knew Sharif jan in Kabul, long time ago, before he moved to America.?
"He's been working for the INS for years, handles a lot of Afghan cases.?
"Haiiii,?he sighed. "Do you and Soraya jan have children??
"Oh.?He slurped37 his tea and didn't ask more; Rahim Khan had always been one of the most instinctive38 people I'd ever met.
I told him a lot about Baba, his job, the flea39 market, and how, at the end, he'd died happy. I told him about my schooling40, my books--four published novels to my credit now. He smiled at this, said he had never had any doubt. I told him I had written short stories in the leather-bound notebook he'd given me, but he didn't remember the notebook.
The conversation inevitably41 turned to the Taliban.
"Is it as bad as I hear??I said.
"Nay, it's worse. Much worse,?he said. "They don't let you be human.?He pointed42 to a scar above his right eye cutting a crooked43 path through his bushy eyebrow44. "I was at a soccer game in Ghazi Stadium in 1998. Kabul against Mazar-i-Sharif, I think, and by the way the players weren't allowed to wear shorts. Indecent exposure, I guess.?He gave a tired laugh. "Anyway, Kabul scored a goal and the man next to me cheered loudly. Suddenly this young bearded fellow who was patrolling the aisles45, eighteen years old at most by the look of him, he walked up to me and struck me on the forehead with the butt46 of his Kalashnikov. ‘Do that again and I'll cut out your tongue, you old donkey!?he said.?Rahim Khan rubbed the scar with a gnarled finger. "I was old enough to be his grandfather and I was sitting there, blood gushing47 down my face, apologizing to that son of a dog.?
I poured him more tea. Rahim Khan talked some more. Much of it I knew already, some not. He told me that, as arranged between Baba and him, he had lived in Baba's house since 1981--this I knew about. Baba had "sold?the house to Rahim Khan shortly before he and I fled Kabul. The way Baba had seen it those days, Afghanistan's troubles were only a temporary interruption of our way of life--the days of parties at the Wazir Akbar Khan house and picnics in Paghman would surely return. So he'd given the house to Rahim Khan to keep watch over until that day.
Rahim Khan told me how, when the Northern Alliance took over Kabul between 1992 and 1996, different factions48 claimed different parts of Kabul. "If you went from the Shar-e-Nau section to Kerteh-Parwan to buy a carpet, you risked getting shot by a sniper or getting blown up by a rocket--if you got past all the checkpoints, that was. You practically needed a visa to go from one neighborhood to the other. So people just stayed put, prayed the next rocket wouldn't hit their home.?He told me how people knocked holes in the walls of their Homes so they could bypass the dangerous streets and would move down the block from hole to hole. In other parts, people moved about in underground tunnels.
"Why didn't you leave??I said.
"Kabul was my Home. It still is.?He snickered. "Remember the street that went from your house to the Qishla, the military bar racks next to Istiqial School??
"Yes.?It was the shortcut49 to school. I remembered the day Hassan and I crossed it and the soldiers had teased Hassan about his mother. Hassan had cried in the cinema later, and I'd put an arm around him.
"When the Taliban rolled in and kicked the Alliance out of Kabul, I actually danced on that street,?Rahim Khan said. "And, believe me, I wasn't alone. People were celebrating at _Chaman_, at Deh-Mazang, greeting the Taliban in the streets, climbing their tanks and posing for pictures with them. People were so tired of the constant fighting, tired of the rockets, the gunfire, the explosions, tired of watching Gulbuddin and his cohorts firing on any thing that moved. The Alliance did more damage to Kabul than the Shorawi. They destroyed your father's orphanage50, did you know that??
"Why??I said. "Why would they destroy an orphanage??I remembered sitting behind Baba the day they opened the orphanage. The wind had knocked off his caracul hat and everyone had laughed, then stood and clapped when he'd delivered his speech. And now it was just another pile of rubble51. All the money Baba had spent, all those nights he'd sweated over the blueprints52, all the visits to the construction site to make sure every brick, every beam, and every block was laid just right...
"Collateral53 damage,?Rahim Khan said. "You don't want to know, Amir jan, what it was like sifting54 through the rubble of that orphanage. There were body parts of children...?
"So when the Taliban came...?
"They were heroes,?Rahim Khan said. "Peace at last.?
"Yes, hope is a strange thing. Peace at last. But at what price??A violent coughing fit gripped Rahim Khan and rocked his gaunt body back and forth55. When he spat56 into his handkerchief, it immediately stained red. I thought that was as good a time as any to address the elephant sweating with us in the tiny room.
"How are you??I asked. "I mean really, how are you??
"Dying, actually,?he said in a gurgling voice. Another round of coughing. More blood on the handkerchief. He wiped his mouth, blotted57 his sweaty brow from one wasted temple to the other with his sleeve, and gave me a quick glance. When he nodded, I knew he had read the next question on my face. "Not long,?he breathed.
"How long??
He shrugged58. Coughed again. "I don't think I'll see the end of this summer,?he said.
"Let me take you Home with me. I can find you a good doctor. They're coming up with new treatments all the time. There are new drugs and experimental treatments, we could enroll59 you in one...?I was rambling60 and I knew it. But it was better than crying, which I was probably going to do anyway.
He let out a chuff of laughter, revealed missing lower incisors. It was the most tired laughter I'd ever heard. "I see America has infused you with the optimism that has made her so great. That's very good. We're a melancholic61 people, we Afghans, aren't we? Often, we wallow too much in ghamkhori and self-pity. We give in to loss, to suffering, accept it as a fact of life, even see it as necessary. Zendagi migzara, we say, life goes on. But I am not surrendering to fate here, I am being pragmatic. I have seen several good doctors here and they have given the same answer. I trust them and believe them. There is such a thing as God's will.?
"There is only what you do and what you don't do,?I said.
Rahim Khan laughed. "You sounded like your father just now. I miss him so much. But it is God's will, Amir jan. It really is.?He paused. "Besides, there's another reason I asked you to come here. I wanted to see you before I go, yes, but something else too.?
"Anything.?
"You know all those years I lived in your father's house after you left??
"Yes.?
"I wasn't alone for all of them. Hassan lived there with me.?
"Hassan,?I said. When was the last time I had spoken his name? Those thorny62 old barbs63 of guilt64 bore into me once more, as if speaking his name had broken a spell, set them free to torment65 me anew. Suddenly the air in Rahim Khan's little flat was too thick, too hot, too rich with the smell of the street.
"I thought about writing you and telling you before, but I wasn't sure you wanted to know. Was I wrong??
The truth was no. The lie was yes. I settled for something in between. "I don't know.?
He coughed another patch of blood into the handkerchief. When he bent66 his head to spit, I saw honey-crusted sores on his scalp. "I brought you here because I am going to ask something of you. I'm going to ask you to do something for me. But before I do, I want to tell you about Hassan. Do you understand??
"Yes,?I murmured.
"I want to tell you about him. I want to tell you everything. You will listen??
I nodded.
Then Rahim Khan sipped67 some more tea. Rested his head against the wall and spoke26.
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shredded
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| shred的过去式和过去分词 | |
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averting
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| 防止，避免( avert的现在分词 )； 转移 | |
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margins
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| 边( margin的名词复数 )； 利润； 页边空白； 差数 | |
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incessant
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| adj.不停的，连续的 | |
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tuned
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| adj.调谐的，已调谐的v.调音( tune的过去式和过去分词 )；调整；（给收音机、电视等）调谐；使协调 | |
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lavish
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| adj.无节制的；浪费的；vt.慷慨地给予，挥霍 | |
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bustle
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| v.喧扰地忙乱，匆忙，奔忙；n.忙碌；喧闹 | |
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blurring
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| n.模糊，斑点甚多，（图像的）混乱v.（使）变模糊( blur的现在分词 )；（使）难以区分 | |
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bazaar
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| n.集市，商店集中区 | |
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clogged
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| （使）阻碍( clog的过去式和过去分词 )； 淤滞 | |
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pedestrians
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| n.步行者( pedestrian的名词复数 ) | |
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maze
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| n.迷宫，八阵图，混乱，迷惑 | |
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alleys
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| 胡同，小巷( alley的名词复数 )； 小径 | |
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vendors
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| n.摊贩( vendor的名词复数 )；小贩；（房屋等的）卖主；卖方 | |
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embroidered
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| adj．绣花的 | |
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copper
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| n.铜；铜币；铜器；adj.铜(制)的；(紫)铜色的 | |
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mingled
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| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
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sputtering
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| n.反应溅射法；飞溅；阴极真空喷镀；喷射v.唾沫飞溅( sputter的现在分词 )；发劈啪声；喷出；飞溅出 | |
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jingling
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| 叮当声 | |
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scents
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| n.香水( scent的名词复数 )；气味；（动物的）臭迹；（尤指狗的）嗅觉 | |
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spicy
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| adj.加香料的；辛辣的，有风味的 | |
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aroma
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| n.香气，芬芳，芳香 | |
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diesel
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| n.柴油发动机，内燃机 | |
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fumes
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| n.(强烈而刺激的)气味，气体 | |
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garrulous
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| adj.唠叨的，多话的 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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winding
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| n.绕，缠，绕组，线圈 | |
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lone
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| adj.孤寂的，单独的；唯一的 | |
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stationery
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| n.文具；(配套的)信笺信封 | |
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bum
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| n.臀部；流浪汉，乞丐；vt.乞求，乞讨 | |
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wispy
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| adj.模糊的；纤细的 | |
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mattress
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| n.床垫，床褥 | |
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slanted
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| 有偏见的； 倾斜的 | |
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triangular
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| adj.三角（形）的，三者间的 | |
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negligent
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| adj.疏忽的；玩忽的；粗心大意的 | |
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nay
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| adv.不；n.反对票，投反对票者 | |
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slurped
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| v.啜食( slurp的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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instinctive
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| adj.(出于)本能的；直觉的；(出于)天性的 | |
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flea
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| n.跳蚤 | |
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schooling
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| n.教育；正规学校教育 | |
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inevitably
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| adv.不可避免地；必然发生地 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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crooked
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| adj.弯曲的；不诚实的，狡猾的，不正当的 | |
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eyebrow
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| n.眉毛，眉 | |
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aisles
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| n. (席位间的)通道, 侧廊 | |
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butt
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| n.笑柄；烟蒂；枪托；臀部；v.用头撞或顶 | |
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47
gushing
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| adj.迸出的；涌出的；喷出的；过分热情的v.喷，涌( gush的现在分词 )；滔滔不绝地说话 | |
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factions
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| 组织中的小派别，派系( faction的名词复数 ) | |
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shortcut
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| n.近路，捷径 | |
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orphanage
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| n.孤儿院 | |
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51
rubble
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| n.（一堆）碎石，瓦砾 | |
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52
blueprints
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| n.蓝图，设计图( blueprint的名词复数 ) | |
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53
collateral
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| adj.平行的；旁系的；n.担保品 | |
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54
sifting
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| n.筛，过滤v.筛( sift的现在分词 )；筛滤；细查；详审 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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spat
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| n.口角，掌击；v.发出呼噜呼噜声 | |
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blotted
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| 涂污( blot的过去式和过去分词 )； （用吸墨纸）吸干 | |
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58
shrugged
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| vt.耸肩（shrug的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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enroll
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| v.招收；登记；入学；参军；成为会员（英)enrol | |
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rambling
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| adj.[建]凌乱的，杂乱的 | |
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melancholic
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| 忧郁症患者 | |
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thorny
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| adj.多刺的，棘手的 | |
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barbs
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| n.（箭头、鱼钩等的）倒钩( barb的名词复数 )；带刺的话；毕露的锋芒；钩状毛 | |
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guilt
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| n.犯罪；内疚；过失，罪责 | |
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torment
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| n.折磨；令人痛苦的东西(人)；vt.折磨；纠缠 | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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sipped
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| v.小口喝，呷，抿( sip的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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