Shahzade

1. Burka - A long dress that covers women - typically worn by Muslim women

2. Afghani - Currency of Afghanistan - 45 to 1 US dollar

Shahzade
By
Raman Jalota

   Shahzade stood at the street corner with her hand held out. She was covered from head to toe in her old, faded blue burka1. All one could see was her eyes. There was that strange look in them - desperate, broken, hopeless and lost. She prayed for a passerby to drop a coin in her hand or a bullet in her heart, either would be fine. She smiled bitterly - Shahzade! What a damn name her parents had given her. A princess! Here she was wearing worn-out clothes and a burka that managed to cover her shame but exposed her poverty. Her face had grown haggard and old. She felt the burden of the world on her shoulders. Her callused hand suspended in mid air - begging for life or death. Shahzade indeed - what nonsense! She was thirty-five.
   The evening prayers had just ended and a small crowd started milling about the shopping center. She licked her lips. Maybe someone would give her something. She could go and buy some flour and cook some bread. She had some salt, oil and green onions left over from yesterday. She could have a full meal with just a few Afghanis2. She kept her eyes open for stray change. It was amazing how often she found coins on the streets. She preferred looking for them after cars pulled out of the shopping centers. These rich people had pockets full of coins that often dropped to the road for Shahzade and others who roamed the streets looking for morsels of food and coins that most people had no use for.
   She spotted a Taliban and shivered instinctively. Her scars started to hurt as he passed by her, barely acknowledging her existence. He spat as he passed her. She froze in fear. The memories of the past were still fresh in her head. No, he did not spit on her, just past her. But close enough for the demons to surface.

.....

   "No Sir!" She screamed. "For heaven’s sake, let me go."
   He slapped her. Not satisfied with the slap, he grabbed the burka from the top of her head, pulled it over her head and dropped it, exposing her face. She clutched it at her throat as tears ran over her face.
   "You whore." He screamed and slapped her. He laughed proudly at the loud noise that his hand made on her cheek. He raised his hand and slapped her several times, hitting her left cheek with his palm and then reversing and hitting her right cheek with the back of his hand.
   There were little kids watching the punishment. He screamed at one of them. "Go get me a stick to beat the skin off her body." A dirty little boy wearing a torn sweater ran from there either to get the Taliban a stick or to just run away.
   Shahzade collapsed at his feet crying and pleading.
   "No sir, I am just begging for a few coins or some bread. I have had nothing to eat for three days. I am not a whore. No sir I am just hungry. I am just poor and hungry."
   "Ugly old woman. Bad omen." He spat and walked away.
   She breathed a sigh of relief and pulled the burka over her face. Damn Taliban ... How did I miss seeing him? The bastard ... I have to be more careful next time. I don't want another beating with a stick. Help me God ... Give me food ... or give me death ... Just do something.
   She had heard the rumors. The Americans were coming. They were going to kill all the Taliban and free Afghanistan. Maybe there is hope for me, she thought. The Taliban had taken everything ... Her husband ... her children ... her dignity ... her life. They were just not merciful enough to finish her off. Perhaps they felt she would serve some purpose or perhaps they just didn't want to waste the effort it would take to kill an old, useless woman. No one knew Shahzade was only thirty-two and would have been in the prime of her life.
   The Taliban came first to the villages in the south and progressed north. Her husband was the first to irk them with his fearless talk against the interpretation of Islam by the Taliban. He openly spoke of the Taliban as heretics who were destroying the nobility of Islam by promoting violence to force their brand of Islam down people’s throat. He was one of the first they rounded up in the night.
   Shahzade shivered with the memories of that cold night. She was asleep with her husband's arms around her and her children sleeping nearby. The goats would move in and out of the backyard, as they wanted to feel the security and warmth of the family. The door flew open and she saw men with their faces covered, bearing torches.
   "Get the bastard out. He needs to be hanged. He dares oppose the teaching of Muhammad. He must die."
   They tied his hands with a rope and dragged him while kicking and spitting on him. He knelt bleeding and bewildered. No one from the village stirred to help him. They stood a little distance away watching with fear. One of the Taliban jumped off a horse and took a sword from the pack on the back of the horse. He murmured as if praying. He finally shouted, "Inshah Allah." With one stroke he separated the head from the body.

....

   Amina was only nine but the Taliban took her too. Shahzade remembered it well. The Americans were coming. They could all hear the planes as they would fly nearby, frequently. She even found a pack of food that they dropped. Her children tried to eat it but spat it out. It wasn’t what they felt food should taste like. The Taliban didn't come in the night anymore.
    They saw her with her daughter as she was doing her daily round, searching for food and handouts. A group of the Taliban targeted the two and came walking towards them. She took Amina's hand and started walking fast, away from the Taliban.
    "Stop woman."
    She stood motionless, terrified. One of them, twirled his big mustache and took Amina from her hand
    "Sir. Please don't. She is just nine."
    "Nine is good. I like them young." He spat on the ground and picked her up. Amina was petrified and crying loudly.
    “She is only nine. Please let her go. Sir.”
    He kicked her and raised his hand as if to hit her. She stood there crying and pleading.
    Amina was raped and torn up. In five days she had suffered more than her body could take. Shahzade found out from her youngest son who heard it from a kid he was playing with, who knew who his sister was. She cried and cried. My Amina. My innocent, little Amina. Why did this have to happen? As if answering her, a group of planes flew overhead and started dropping bombs on the little village.

.....

    She heard a commotion and turned towards it. There were TV cameras and an American woman with a microphone talking to Afghanistani women who were moving about without their faces covered. Shahzade leaned forward to listen.
    "Are you happy?"
    "Yes, I am very happy. We get to vote today. The Americans, they have freed us and now we can cast our vote for our favorite president candidate."
    "You don’t wear a burka! When was the last time that you wore a burka?"
    "Five months ago. I am not afraid any more. We are free."
    The interviewer spotted Shahzade.
    “Ma'am, do you speak English?’
    Shahzade looked at her blankly. An interpreter came to them.
    “How old are you?”
    “I am thirty five.”
    “Who are you voting for?”
    “I don’t understand.”
    “Who are you for?”
    “No one, I don’t know.”
    “What do you want to happen?”
    “I want my children.”
    A group of protesters were coming down the street, shouting slogans, mostly against the Americans and sometimes against the puppet government. People started to move hurriedly. As the protesters realized there were TV reporters from the American press, they ran towards them.
    In the panic, everyone ran every which way. Shahzade was pushed and shoved. She fell and rolled to avoid being stomped on. She got up and slowly moved towards the other side of the street. She saw it then. There was an elegant black bag lying on the street, obviously lost by someone in the riot that was going on. She picked it up and pushed it inside her blouse.
    She got to the other side of the street and slowly moved away from the crowd. She walked past the shops, avoiding any attention to herself. She walked past the homes and towards the slum area. She made her way to her shack at the far end of the slum, moved the cloth hanging on the front in lieu of a door and sat down on the torn sheet that she used as her bed. She breathed deeply till her heartbeat became normal. She removed the burka and sat in her old worn out clothes. She poured herself some water from the plastic container that she used to draw water from the hand pump in the slum. She sipped it and opened the black bag.
    There were several pieces of legal papers in it and several bills. Her eyes stared unblinking. She had never seen a thousand Afghani note before. She counted the money. There were forty-three thousand Afghanis and a few coins. Oh my God! What am I going to do with this?

.....

    She walked around the store, picking things and placing them in her cloth shopping bag. The shopkeeper looked at her suspiciously.
    "You are going to steal all that, old woman?"
    "No sir. I will pay." She carried her bag full of flour, beans, rice, onions, salt, sugar and tea and placed in front of him. She took out a five hundred Afghani and gave it to him.
    "Hey. Did you kill someone to get this much money? I have never seen you with any money before."      He laughed and made change.
    She avoided looking at his eyes and moved out from the shop quickly. And then she cooked herself a feast. Sipping hot tea with her rice and beans, she was in heaven. I thank you God. And I thank whosoever it is whose money I found.
    She was feeling decadent. She made another cup of tea and added a generous helping of sugar. Oh yes! This is indeed heavenly. Only beaten by her memories of her life with her husband and children. The thought of a life of peace and happiness was so overwhelming; she started crying helplessly.
    Where oh where has everyone gone? Why have I been left behind? Are my sons alive? Are they safe? I don't care if the Taliban has them, as long as they are safe. God knows I can't do anything for anyone anymore. May God keep them safe and put a thousand thorns in the eyes of any Taliban that dares to harm them.
    Darkness was descending as she rocked herself to sleep. It was the middle of the night, pitch dark, when she suddenly woke up. Something had been bothering her all along. Her forehead wrinkled in thought. She knew she could find out whose money it was. She lit the lantern and took out the bag from its hiding place. She pulled out the papers from the bag. She didn't know English but her Farsi was quite good. There were typed pages with names and addresses. She leafed through them and read what she could. Her face became serene as she came up with her resolution. She finally laid down, started breathing normally and slowly drifted into a peaceful sleep.

…..

   Shahzade approached the tea vendor cautiously. He looked at her with contempt.
   "No, I don't have any free tea for you." He spat on the ground.
   "No sir, I am just wondering what happened to the people yesterday? In the stampede here ... Did many people die?"
   "No, no one died. Not yet. There are several people in the hospitals. Why? Why do you want to know?"
   "I am curious about that. Even I was pushed to the ground but did not get hurt, by the will of God. Do you know which hospital these people were taken to?"
   He looked at her with a strange interest. She averted her eyes and just stood there. He took a sheet of newspaper from under his clothes and handed it to her.
   "It's in the paper. First page."
   He spat and walked away from her, looking for customers.
   Shahzade took the Kabul Press and started reading about the disputed election; the demonstrations and then she found it. Indira Gandhi Hospital was where most of the women and children were taken, while the men were taken to the Ataturk hospital. She knew from her begging routes where Indira Gandhi was. She hurried home and hiding the bag in her clothes she slowly walked towards Indira Gandhi.
   It was a large and somewhat foreboding building, but chaos reigned here. There were children lying in the halls and crying mothers everywhere. The meager staff soothed the patients and the children the best they could. Shahzade approached the receptionist.
   She got her attention by clearing her throat. She pulled the veil over her head. "Can you tell me if you have a Sultana Tawoos here? She was injured in the demonstration yesterday."
   The receptionist looked at her faded clothes, shook her head disapprovingly and thumbed through the register.
   "Yes she is here, third floor, general ward. Who are you?"
   "Oh, I … er … I was sent to see if she needed anything … anything from home."
   "OK. Check with the nurse on duty there."
   She heaved a sigh of relief and climbed the stairs to the third floor. She walked past scores of relatives lining the corridors to the main ward. It was a large hall where several patients lay in their beds, some surrounded by relatives, some not. She spotted a desk with two nurses arguing with several relatives.
   "Salaam Valekum, Can you tell me where Mrs. Tawoos is?"
   One of the nurses pointed to a far corner. Shahzade approached the bed that she had pointed to. There was a heavily bandaged woman in the bed. An old woman sat on a chair beside the bed. She was surprised to see Shahzade.
   Shahzade pointed to the patient, "Is that Sultana?"
   "Yes. She is sleeping. They gave her a heavy dosage of medicines for her pain."
   "How is she?"
   "She has woken up a few times. She is not very coherent. How do you know her?"
   Shahzade had planned this out, "I am a neighbor of Mrs. Tawoos. I just wanted to see if she needed anything. Has she asked for anything?"
       "No. But she seems to be worried about her money. Apparently she had some important thing she was trying to do when she got caught in the stampede."
   "Ah, do you know if she will awaken soon? Has she been sleeping for a while?"
   "She drifts in and out. Do you want to wait? I can use some tea and a walk. My old bones."
   "Please, go ahead. Take your time. I will stay here and take care of her, if she needs anything."
   "Thank you, my friend."
   The old woman left the hall and Shahzade sat in the chair. Sultana lay sleeping fitfully. She tossed and turned a little and then opened her eyes.
   "Where is Ama? Who are you?"
   "I am Shahzade. You do not know me but I found a black bag in the street yesterday. I think it is yours."
   "God bless you. That is the most important thing in my life. It has my money and papers to pay off the installment for our house."
   Shahzade took the bag out and handed it to her. Sultana opened the bag and thumbed through the papers and then the cash. A smile lit up her face.
   "You are so kind. God must have sent you to help me and my family."
   "I am so happy for you."
   She gently patted her hand. Sultana closed her eyes and drifted back into sleep. She seemed relaxed as if a big burden had been lifted off her. Shahzade smiled at her restful face and walked out of the ward.

…..

   Shahzade stood at the street corner with her hand held out. She was covered from head to toe in her old, faded blue burka. All one could see was her eyes. There was a strange look in them - the tinkling of a smile. She stood light-headedly, praying for a passerby to drop a coin in her hand or a bullet in her heart, either would be fine.

The End            2844 words

Copyright © 2004 Raman Jalota. All rights reserved. No part of this electronic publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the author.

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