Author: Farah Bashir
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So, after the winter of 1990, when the schools did not reopen until May and we could not resume classes after the three-month long vacation, Bobeh’s words rang truer than ever.
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March was just an in-between damp month, filled with the sound of drizzle, and the part-harsh, part-soothing music of the occasional heavy downpour on the slanting tin roofs of our home. The mornings were ideal for sleeping in and waking up early to attend school felt rather cruel. Winter, on its way out, cast an unending sense of foreboding. To expect change in the season in a month’s time felt less like a reality but more like rumours of spring.
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Some stains, even after being scrubbed off, left behind a ghostly grey shadow. Somedays, I’d wish for our uniform
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Somedays, I’d wish for our uniform to be changed into the camouflage print of the troops. Neither mud nor bloodstains show on camouflage. ‘How lucky are the ones who wear it,’ I’d think, but was quick enough to dismiss the thought. I’d shudder as I remembered my grandmother’s warning about wishes coming true. EVENING SALUTE BOBEH SPENT HOURS ON THE second floor, sitting behind different windows. In the mornings, behind the wire mesh of the window in the kitchen, she watched me leave for the bus stop with
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Somedays, I’d wish for our uniform to be changed into the camouflage print of the troops. Neither mud nor bloodstains show on camouflage. ‘How lucky are the ones who wear it,’ I’d think, but was quick enough to dismiss the thought.
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Somedays, I’d wish for our uniform to be changed into the camouflage print of the troops. Neither mud nor bloodstains show on camouflage. ‘How lucky are the ones who wear it,’ I’d think, but was quick enough to dismiss the thought. I’d shudder as I remembered my grandmother’s warning about wishes coming true.
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Whenever there were protests, which was sometimes a few times a day in our part of the town, people turned out in large numbers chanting, ‘Ham kya chahte? Azadi!’
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Father’s sitting posture changed too. Normally, he would sit back relaxed against a large cushion which had a Chinar leaf embroidered on it; he rested his elbow on a bolster next to it, smoking his cigarettes at leisure while reading newspapers or attending to his daily ledger. Almost like a royal, I’d think. Since the winter of 1990, he began crouching, as if always in a hurry and almost ready to get up. Perhaps
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Father’s sitting posture changed too. Normally, he would sit back relaxed against a large cushion which had a Chinar leaf embroidered on it; he rested his elbow on a bolster next to it, smoking his cigarettes at leisure while reading newspapers or attending to his daily ledger. Almost like a royal, I’d think. Since the winter of 1990, he began crouching, as if always in a hurry and almost ready to get up.
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The sound of boots on the wooden staircase would spark off a series of tremors in me. I would break into a sweat and panic so violently that I’d feel as if I could vomit my heart out. The reaction of troops upon seeing the music system was usually, ‘Iss ke liye paisa kahaan se aata hai, saale madarchod aatankvaadiyo?’
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To an extent, the scarf made me feel protected, and yet, that feeling of unease never quite left me completely. And so, I began to ignore caring for my skin. I thought maybe if I looked ugly and less pleasant, the men would not look at me and I’d be safe. I wouldn’t wash my face for days. I didn’t want to look attractive in any way, at all, lest it invited undue attention and that indescribable guilt.
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at night, was unthinkable! The curfew had its own way of slipping indoors. It was impossible to move about anywhere in the house without causing alarm. All the staircases inside the house were made of wood. Even tiptoeing on those made them creak. Who knew which of those noises would travel outside and alert the troops to barge inside the house? Sounds could attract a volley of bullets fired in your direction, unwarranted.
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The curfew had its own way of slipping indoors. It was impossible to move about anywhere in the house without causing alarm. All the staircases inside the house were made of wood. Even tiptoeing on those made them creak. Who knew which of those noises would travel outside and alert the troops to barge inside the house? Sounds could attract a volley of bullets fired in your direction, unwarranted.
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It was impossible to move about anywhere in the house without causing alarm. All the staircases inside the house were made of wood. Even tiptoeing on those made them creak. Who knew which of those noises would travel outside and alert the troops to barge inside the house? Sounds could attract a volley of bullets fired in your direction, unwarranted.
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Doctors diagnosed the condition as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or PTSD, like they did for everyone else. Mir, a friend of mine, once joked that the acronym’s expansion needed a revision in Kashmir. It should have stood for Perennially Traumatic Stress Disorder, he said.
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In Islam, dreams are accorded great importance, as a lot of messages in the Quran were revealed through dreams.
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On the deserted streets of my neighbourhood, in the presence of so many military bunkers and the gaze of the unknown men inside them, I suddenly became aware of my body and its contours. My breasts had just assumed their distinct, slightly protruding shape. I felt naked. I tried to fold into the school bag clutched in front of me. That was how I developed a hunch in my upper back. After I reached home in a rather dazed state, I packed a wide dupatta into my school bag. Since then, I never left home without a chador that could cover my body.
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‘Besides, there are fewer soldiers manning the lanes and alleys there. Not like here, where they seal the areas so no one gets in or out. They have to … All the ministers live there … They want to tell them that everything is under control.’
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I wore my favourite capris, the colour of potassium permanganate, and a long T-shirt.
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Then, as usual, our annual squabble began: he wanted to give the books to the binder to get them hardbound and I didn’t want to part with my books. ‘What if the shop is gutted in a gunfight? What if the owner is killed and they never open the shop again? What if the binder goes missing and never returns?’ I worried, selfishly.
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I looked through piles of broadsheets in the storage under the staircase. Though the writing in Urdu looked appealing and calligraphic, it also meant wrapping notebooks with unending deaths, killings, arrests and protests printed on those broadsheets.
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I opted for the pile of Indian English dailies, which, other than the local news, also carried large sections of full-colour advertisements. These print ads had men posing with colognes, couples grinning wide to show their perfect dentition, young women posing even as they’d wake up in their fluffy beds to morning rays of the sun or slightly older women beaming at their children and their laundry, celebrating their motherhoods and everyday chores alike.
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Unsure of the outcome and the uncertainty that prevailed around the siege, I had lost the resolve to do well in my exams. What was the point? People were struggling to stay alive. How did my distinction matter?
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Before 1989, nights were for celebrations and days for funerals. Then curfew took over all our nights, and both mourning and celebrations moved to the days.
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Arrange a gun from somewhere, they’ll kill me otherwise.’ He had begged her to ‘procure a gun’ for him as that is what the troops had demanded. That was the last time he had spoken to her.
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Since the 1990s, most funerals of militants or civilians were followed by demonstrations, protests and big marches.
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Thank God for the black-and-white newspapers where blood appeared grey.
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I’d find it consoling to know that people were still dying of old age, illnesses, under ordinary circumstances, of natural causes and some from accidents too. They were fortunate to go without being blown into pieces, dying of stray bullets, or from torture, in massacres, I thought. That
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I’d find it consoling to know that people were still dying of old age, illnesses, under ordinary circumstances, of natural causes and some from accidents too. They were fortunate to go without being blown into pieces, dying of stray bullets, or from torture,
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I’d find it consoling to know that people were still dying of old age, illnesses, under ordinary circumstances, of natural causes and some from accidents too. They were fortunate to go without being blown into pieces, dying
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I’d find it consoling to know that people were still dying of old age, illnesses, under ordinary circumstances, of natural causes and some from accidents too. They were fortunate to go without being blown into pieces, dying of stray bullets, or from
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I’d also do something strange that perversely brought a smile to my face. Most obituaries carried a photograph. I hurriedly signed my name over the tiny portraits of the deceased. To the signature, I added the date and wrote ‘Attested’ in a running hand.