In 1958, when I was under 30 and unmarried, I went on voluntary relocation to Afghanistan. You are making a big mistake, said several of my colleagues at the development agency in Delhi, where I worked. “Who would like to go to that forest?”
In the weeks that followed, I began to suspect that my colleagues were absolutely right. My flight to Kabul (in those days from Safdarjung airfield) was delayed by 10 days due to heavy snowfall at the destination. That was my first flight. The Dakota’s cabin was not pressurized and it was freezing cold inside. There was no tea or coffee, but the steward gave blankets to the three passengers.
The last part of the flight was over an endless range of snow-capped mountains. When we finally started to descend into a canyon, the land was just a sea of ice. There was neither a glimpse of any city nor the airport. There was no runway, only a patch cleared of snow. There was no terminal, only temporary adobe buildings for immigration and customs. As per arrangement, a friend of the Indian Embassy took me to his home and kept me with him as a paying guest till I found a suitable accommodation.
Heating, both in homes and offices, was done by Bukhari, a large drum-like oven near the wall. In front of it was a small door into which balls of coal dust mixed with clay were fed. A pipe was carried from its back into an opening in the wall for the smoke to escape but the smoke often chose to hang indoors.
After a cold week, my colleagues’ words rang in my ears. The heat was not too bad. In September, I rented a small house and moved there. I appointed an Afghan named Malik Jan as a humble, holy spirit for household chores. By then, I had acquired a smattering of Persian, to communicate with him.
One day in March, Malik Jan brought a worn-out man to me and told me that he was a gardener. It didn’t mean anything to me. By imitating the digging, planting, irrigation and smelling of flowers, Malik Jan told me that gardener I mean gardener. That would make me a nice garden in my backyard, Malik Jan said. He used to come in three times a week on salary which I thought was ridiculously low.
the smell of roses
In less than two months, my now desolate backyard turned into a lovely garden: well-trimmed rose bushes, dahlias, diverse flower beds, sunflower plants and other nameless beauties. I’ve never had the luxury of a garden. Flowers smiled at me. I used to walk in that garden morning and evening and admire his work gardener.
When my one year lease expired, I had to vacate the place. It was difficult to bid farewell to “my” garden, which still had few flowers. I wanted to say thashkur (thanks) to gardener. Malik Jaan told me that he had returned to his village. He had come to the capital only in summer in connection with work. “He’ll be back next summer,” he assured me.
This got me excited: something to see in my new backyard – another garden in the ‘woods’.
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