کودک کنجکاو

Curious Child

A man woke up early in the morning at 4 o’clock. He went to outside to wash his face and hands to get ready for Morning Prayer called (Namaaz Subh). After his prayers in Arabic Language which he had no clue what it meant, he went to wake his 3 year old daughter up, before it is too late to leave for Bamyan. Because if it was late, there would be no cars available anymore to leave for Bamyan and they may miss the few cars leaving for Bamyan early in the morning when it is dark, because the driver prefers to travel half of the way without burning sunshine in the cold wind of Ghurband valleys. He also prefers to get to Bamyan earlier which can increase the chance of finding passengers for the return tomorrow.

The father moves the shoulder of her daughter and calls her name “Wake up Sakina! Wake up my dear, it is time to go”. She refuses to wake up. The father takes the bag in his hand and takes his child in his arms placing her head on father’s shoulder, they go out. There are no public transportation facilities such as trams or busses available. He walks along the street expecting a taxi to cross the street. After 20 minutes walk, there came a yellow taxi. The man put his bag on the street and pointed his hand the way that you shake hand with someone to make the taxi stop. The driver sees his hand and stops in front of him.  “Where are you going?” asked the driver. “To Bamyan station.” replied the man. “400 Afghani is that ok?” asked the driver.  “No that is too much. I can pay only 150 Afghani.” replied the man with his narrow voice because he was careful not wake his daughter up. They agreed on 200 Afghani and the taxi took them to Bamyan station. There were so many cars for different destinations but four or five of them were calling early morning in the dark “Yak nafar, yak nafar, yak nafar, yak nafar Bamyan yak nafar seat persh rooi yak nafar” which means “One person, one person, one person, one person Bamyan, only one person needed to depart for Bamyan in front seat”. He took the offer of one and started to leave for Bamyan from Kabul with his 3 year old child in a public car of Townace 95 Automatic 4 Wheel Drive.

The driver played the music which was “Jarajo” song by Dawod Sarkhush, a pure Hazaragi music. When you travel from Kabul to Bamyan, most of the drivers are Hazaras and that is why you will listen to Hazaragi music in the cars to Bamyan. The car moved inside Shamaali grapevine. Shamaali was once famous for its quality grapes which was once totally cut and removed by the Taliban in order to punish the resistance against the Taliban and now it has changed to a wide landmine where nobody can enter on both sides of the highway towards Salang Pass. Only the paved street is safe to travel but it also depends on the day. After the car passed Charikar, it did not continue towards Salang Pass but it turned left in Pul-e-Aashawa to enter Ghurband valley.  After a few miles inside Shinwari district, the man and his daughter saw that the road was blocked by American military vehicles. They were loading some weapons from the site into their own trucks. There were around 30 civilian cars waiting in one side and around 45 cars on the other side full of passengers to go either to Kabul or to Bamyan. Some drivers said that they found some weapons there and they want to load it in their trucks and take it to their base in Bagram. The daughter of the man in the front seat of the first vehicle woke up and asked his father “Why the car has stopped?” “The American soldiers have blocked the road” replied the father.

Curious child: Why did they block the road?

Father: I don’t know … they said they found out some weapons there … they are loading it on their truck and they take it to their own base in Bagram. 

Curious child: They can’t load it outside the road so that we should pass and continue our journey?

Father: I don’t know, let’s ask them.

The father opens the door of the car and gets out and walks towards American soldiers while he has his small daughter in his arms. Hello sir, what is going on here?

American soldier: (aims his gun at him and says) go … go … go back to your car … lock the door and never get out otherwise I will shoot you …

The father and the child are both afraid and they run back towards the car to reach their car and get in. They get back in the car and the driver and other passengers blame the man for going out.

Curious Child: Why did the soldier aim the gun at us?

Father: Maybe they are afraid.

Curious child: What are they doing here?

Father: They are here to protect us.

Curious child: To protect us from what?

Father: From the Taliban.

Curious child: Can they protect us without aiming a gun at us?

Father: They can but they don’t want that.

After two hours of waiting, finally they get a chance to go when the loading is finished and when the trucks start to move towards Bagram.

After driving a few kilometers they reach Siah Gerd district where the majority residents are Pashtuns the same as Shinwari district. Here some armed men with black turbans stopped the car and asked everybody to get out in Pashto. An armed man came to the car and said “Kata shay Hazaragyano!” which means “Get off the car Hazara people”. They asked all Hazaras to stand in one side. Most of them were Hazaras except the man in the front seat and his daughter. They asked the man to show his Tazkira to make sure that he is not Hazara. After showing the Tazkira, they let him sit inside the car and they started to beat other Hazara passengers with the guns and sticks asking them questions like who is the Head of Provincial Council of Bamyan? Nobody replied and they said we are not from the government authorities and we are ordinary civilians. They did not believe them and they started to look for their Tazkira or ID cards until they found the right person. They took him beside the road and fired several bullets at him while everybody was looking at the situation; even the 3 year old child saw that they killed the man. They all started crying and shouting and the men beat some more men and asked the driver to go and never look back. All others got in the car and they started to escape towards Shaikh Ali and then to get to Bamyan.

The child was crying nonstop for almost 2 hours. His father kept telling her “please stop crying my dear. It was not real. It was just a drama. It was just a film. They are making films here like this every day. It is not something to worry about. It is just a film. The gun was not real. The gun did not even have real bullets. The red color that you saw was not blood, it was just red color”.

Curious child: You are lying; I don’t believe you anymore, why all these other men are crying if it was a film? You are lying to me. You also said that Americans are here to protect us but they didn’t protect us.

Father: My dear, they were not here to protect us. They were many kilometers far away. And it was a film my dear. People also cry when they watch films.