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Tuesday, June 22, 2004When the Snow Meltedby Ba Jin Ba Jin was born in 1904 in the city of Chengdu, Sichuan, China. His real name is Li Yaotang. In 1927 he moved to France and wrote his first novel, Destruction (1929). He has lived in Shanghai, Japan, and Korea. In 1978 he was elected a deputy to the National People's Congress and in 1981 chairman of the Chinese Writer's Association. In 1986 he was the honorary President of the China Literature Foundation. His novels include The Dead Sun, New Life, Love Trilogy: Fog, Rain, Lightning, Family, Spring and Autumn, the famous Rip Trilogy, and Cold Nights. In 1962 his collected works were published in fourteen volumes.  A spring breeze ruffled my hair; at the foot of the hills a thaw had set in.
It is usually cold when the snow melts, but today the long-hidden sun finally made an appearance. I put on a coat and started down the hill, bathed in sunlight. Few people used that quiet path, though we were not far from the city and the hill was not high. People here kept to themselves; aside from a trip down for their shopping in the mornings, they had little contact with the outside world. I found life up there pleasantly quiet. Because of my weak nerves, I could not stand the noise and the bustle of city life and had moved up to the hills two months beforehand. Life was regular: I ate and slept at scheduled times and did nothing all day long. I took solitary walks along mountain paths; I also went down sometimes to visit friends. The utterly tranquil and undisturbed life in the hills gradually restored me to health. My spirits rose too. I felt a joy in my heart, which seemed filled with love, love for the sun, the snow, the wind and the hills, love for everything around me. It was in this mood that I walked down the snow-covered path dotted with black footprints. Further down the footprints mingled and made dirty little puddles. I picked my way over the thickest snow because I loved the crunching of snow underfoot. With the sunlight pouring down and a breeze in my face I felt that balmy spring was coming to meet me. Halfway down the hill, as I rounded the corner of a villa, a Chinese woman climbing uphill came into view. Recognizing her at once, I stopped to greet her, knowing she was on her way to see me. She walked with her head bent, not looking up until she heard my greeting. Then she hurried over, panting from the climb, her cheeks rosy. “I can’t bear this any longer!” she cried in distress, seizing me by the arm. One look at her and I knew without asking that she had quarreled with her husband again. I would have to spend quite a bit of time talking her round. “All right, let’s go back to my place,” I said, frowning slightly, and we went uphill together. She said nothing on the way. I could see that she was still angry; flushed and pouting, she kicked the snow as if to vent her irritation. They must have had a real fight this time. They simply couldn’t go on like this. Even I could see that the more they quarreled, the wider the gap between them grew. These were not the usual quarrels between husband and wife: they never resorted to fists or to verbal abuse. One of them would generally pull a long face to show that he or she was upset, or exasperate the other by sulking. On the rare occasions when they had words, one invariably left the room within a few minutes so that the squabble couldn’t go on. I had seen it happen many times. They always came to complain, but not together. I would talk to them until both had calmed down before I sent them home. However, I never found out the cause of their quarrels. They seemed to be quarreling for quarrelling’s sake. Yet they were not a bad-tempered couple; both were gentle, good-natured and civilized. For instance, after a quarrel each usually began complaining about the other, but before long he or she would be taking the blame for not being considerate enough. Her eyes always filled with tears when she said this, while he looked most unhappy. Sometimes, meeting at my place after a quarrel, he would take his wife home with much tenderness. They began to quarrel more and more, as if these scenes repeated themselves. To all appearances it was the same thing happening again. But I was puzzled, for it seemed to me there must be more to this than met the eye. All this could not have happened by accident; there must be a special reason behind it. I wanted to find out what it was. My study of their temperament shed no light on the matter. She seemed livelier and warmer, while he by comparison was more reserved and serious. Of course this was mere superficial observation. I had not known the couple very long, but living abroad, and in the country at that, made us fairly close friends. I knew little of their past, only that his father was a not-too-high-ranking official and that both were college students. They had fallen in love and married three years ago but were as yet childless. It seemed to me there was no real barrier between them. They ought to be getting on very well together. They cared for each other and were comfortably off. Both were studying, he education and she literature, but this was no reason for a clash. I had never discovered the reason for their quarrels. This time too I found no clue. She kept her lips shut tight, but the grim lines around them faded. By the time we reached my door, she had calmed down. “What’s the matter? Had a fight again?” I asked casually as I took her in and hung up our coats. Nodding, she dropped despondently into a chair and stared dully at the painting on the wall, one hand absently smoothing her hair. I sat down opposite her. “What about?” I asked, seeing that she remained silent. I kept my eyes on her face giving her no chance to evade the issue. “What about?” she smiled, obviously trying to hide the pain in her heart. Her eyes rested on me for a second before returning dreamily to the painting on the wall. Leaning back, her head cushioned in her hands, she said half to herself, “To be honest it wasn’t about anything in particular. I don’t know what to do. I’m afraid we can’t go on this way . . . Perhaps we ought to separate.” “Separate!” I stole a startled look at her. She was in earnest; her voice held sadness, but no anger. Those words could hardly have been spoken at random. She must have thought about separating for some time. Separation was of course one way to solve the problem. But things must be pretty serious if such a drastic solution was contemplated. I was worried. To tell the truth I would hate to see this young couple separate, though I didn’t like to see them quarrel all the time either. “Separate?” I knitted my brows and then smiled to ease the tension. “Come, don’t get excited. Squabbles between husband and wife are really nothing unusual. If only both sides will compromise a little it’s quite easy to settle them amicably. To my mind, you two ought to make an ideal couple.” “I used to think so too,” she said wistfully. Then she sighed softly and a slight pause ensued before she continued, “But it hasn’t worked out that way. Just why, I don’t know. At any rate there is a barrier between us.” “Barrier? What barrier?” I asked, as if the idea were quite incongruous. “I don’t know either,” she replied in despair. “It’s something invisible and intangible, yet I feel it’s there . . .” She stopped and bit her lips. A look of grief, seemingly faint but in fact profound, clouded her pretty girlish face. And there was anguish in the depth of her eyes. When I saw the expression in them my own heart sank. “Zisheng, you must find a way out for me!” she begged. “I haven’t the courage to go on living with him.” I found myself in a most awkward position. I sympathized with her and was eager to help her—but her husband, Bohe, was my friend. Besides, I could see no good reason why they should split up. I was not ingenious enough to suggest a solution. “But tell me, do you still love him?” was all I could think of asking after some thought. I only hoped that they would be reconciled. “Yes, I do,” she answered positively after only a little pause. Her face glowed and I knew she was telling the truth. I was delighted, thinking that now the problem would not be difficult to solve. “Why speak of separation then?” I said bluntly. “If you love him then all’s well.” “But he . . .” she hesitated. “He. You mean Bohe doesn’t love you? No, that isn’t true. There’s no other woman,” I assured her. We were getting closer to the crux of the matter and I wanted to seize this chance to clear things up. Perhaps I could put an end to the conflict between them. “I don’t know. He used to love me very much but he’s changed. Sometimes he’s affectionate, at others he’s cool. He is often cold on purpose. For instance, this morning I was feeling cheerful and asked him to come and visit you. He not only refused but was annoyed for no reason. He used to do whatever I asked; now he ignores me for hours to read his books, or goes out alone and doesn’t come back till late. I can’t bear being treated like that . . . Maybe it’s my bad temper. I know I’m not considerate enough. But all the same . . .” Her calm tone showed that she was quite clearheaded and not overwrought. Her voice was quivering with distress, however, and the glow that had lit up her face was gone. There were tears in her eyes, and I could see from her face that she really blamed herself more than her husband. My heart softened again. Bohe shouldn’t torment her like this. Why did he want to make her suffer? Was he no longer in love with her? Yet I had noticed little gestures and looks that revealed his affection for her. He had no close woman friend; there had been no change in their lives. Then what was keeping him from loving her? What was that invisible barrier of which she talked? I longed to know the answer. But I couldn’t get it out of her. So I soothed her with the usual platitudes. “You mustn’t take this too seriously, Jingfang. I’m afraid there’s some misunderstanding. Bohe isn’t that kind of man at all. You know how it is, husband and wife always quarrel over trifles. I’m sure you’ll make it up again after a while.” “Zisheng, you don’t know how good he used to be, how considerate and loving. He respected and anticipated my every wish. That was why, for love of him, I was willing to leave my family and cross the wide ocean with him. But now . . . now I’m sure I have very little place in his heart.” She went on complaining, paying no attention to my arguments. But that was not surprising, seeing I had used them half a dozen times already. “You don’t know, Zisheng, you just don’t know. I can’t bear to think of the past.” She was growing more agitated, letting her feelings run away with her. Her voice broke and she dabbed at her eyes with a handkerchief. I was feeling more embarrassed every second. I could find no words to comfort her and her distress went to my heart. Red and blue flames were leaping from the fire blazing in the grate. Golden sunlight slanting in through the windows made a bright patch on my desk. I sat half in the sun. But the room’s warm comfort was quite wasted on me. I longed for Bohe’s arrival to rescue me from a difficult position. I knew too that there was every hope of his coming. Bohe’s tall, spare figure soon appeared outside the window. He walked slowly, his steps heavy. Since we had last met, only two or three days prior, the man seemed moodier than ever. Having entered, he nodded to me and as was customary removed his coat. Then without a word he walked over to Jingfang. She remained in her seat, her face buried in her handkerchief. She knew he had come but ignored him. He perched on the arm of her chair, touched her shoulder lovingly, and whispered, “Come home, Jingfang!” She did not answer. He begged her three times, his voice more and more tender, until she muttered an indistinct reply. “Let’s go home. Don’t let’s stay here to trouble Zisheng. It’s my fault as usual.” He stood up and gently took her arm, bending down at the same time to whisper into her ear. I could see that I was superfluous and found some excuse to slip out. I don’t know what they said to each other, but by the time I returned he had his arm around her and they were ready to leave. Both were smiling. It was the usual happy ending. I sent them off with my blessing, thinking now they ought to be able to live in peace for a couple of days. But that same evening Bohe turned up alone. It was getting late. Outside a wind had risen and unmelted snow lay in drifts against the walls. I had just finished reading a biography and, stirred by the book, was sitting alone staring at the lamp, dreaming of unattainable things. When the doorbell broke the silence, I had already heard Bohe’s footsteps outside. As I went to let him in I wondered uneasily if they had quarreled again. His face was ruddy from the wind. After taking off his coat he went up to the fire, rubbing his hands vigorously and bending forward to get warm. His face, moody and somber in the firelight, was even darker than the sky before a storm. My uneasiness mounted. I was eager to know the reason for the stormy look on his face, but at the same time dreaded the revelation. Compressing my lips, I decided to wait, although the suspense was almost unbearable. He took a few steps round the room before he pounced on me and, seizing my arm in agitation, said, “You must help me, Zisheng!” I stared at him in amazement. The sheer misery in those dilated eyes boring into my own sent a shiver down my spine. “What’s the matter? Tell me!” I cried in alarm. The wind kept tapping on the window. A faint rustling in the quiet garden sounded as if someone was walking about and coughing. “Zisheng, I can’t go on like this. Tell me what I must do! Jingfang and I . . .” He let go of my arm and stood there wringing his hands. Jingfang’s name conjured up a vision of the round-faced girl in the light blue tunic and red belt who had wept as she poured out her woes to me that day. My heart warmed to her. “Sit down and let’s talk it over,” I patted him on the shoulder and pulled up a chair for him close to the fire. We sat down facing each other. “You shouldn’t torment Jingfang like this,” I began without waiting to hear more. “She still loves you. Why must you always quarrel with her? Surely you can let her have her way sometimes, can’t you? Besides, she’s not really difficult to get on with.” I spoke earnestly, sure I could move him. He blinked as I spoke, his mouth working. “You don’t understand,” he said finally, shaking his head with a look of despair. “But which of you is more to blame? You don’t mean to say it’s all her fault?” I countered, annoyed to have my friendly advice cut short this way. My words must have wounded him, for his face darkened further and he bit his lips. “It’s my fault, of course, I admit that,” he replied wretchedly after a pause. “She is not to blame at all.” This was unexpected, but I was not displeased to hear it. I hoped by following up this advantage to solve that problem of theirs. “Then why behave the way you do?” I pursued. “Since you know you’re in the wrong, it’s up to you to do something about it.” Without the slightest sign of gratitude or gladness, he continued to shake his head and muttered hopelessly, “You still don’t understand.” This puzzled me even more. I could not guess what he meant. Outside, the wind was still moaning. The fire was blazing and its leaping flames turned both our faces crimson, but I found him utterly inscrutable. “I’m tasting the agonies of love,” he muttered with a sigh. Suddenly he buried his face in his hands and I knew his mental anguish was beyond all I had suspected. Any clumsy probing into it would be useless. “Believe me, Zisheng, I am telling the truth,” he said at last, raising his head. “I did love Jingfang, I still love her, and I know that she loves me too. But . . .” he paused for a moment in painful thought, putting one hand to his temples, and my eyes were caught by the beads of sweat on his forehead. “But I don’t want to love her any more.” His hand swept down and he spoke with determination as if love were something he could no longer endure. “Love can be agonizing. She once gave me joy and courage but those days are gone. Now I find that tenderness, that domesticity, unbearable. You see, my outlook has changed . . .” I merely stared at him in bewilderment. I believed he was speaking the truth though. “I have new convictions. I cannot go on living as before. I want to take a new road completely different from the old one, which means I must abandon my old life.” He was absolutely in earnest but I still failed to understand. “However, she is incapable of going forward. She must have love, she must live the way we used to. It’s not her fault, and I sometimes think she may be right . . . But she makes it difficult for me to give up the old life. She loves me but she can’t understand what’s in my mind. So she’s making me miserable, making me hesitate.” He sighed, and I noticed the tenderness in his voice when he mentioned her. Although he was dissatisfied with her, at the same time he was evidently still in love with her. The whole thing was even stranger than I had thought. “It would be easier if she didn’t love me. But . . . as I’ve told you, I want to abandon my old life, I want to go back to China, I want to . . . But do you think she could stand that? Would she let me live the way I want to? ‘Leave her! Leave her!’ a voice seems to be whispering all the time . . . . But . . . .” His numerous “buts” confused me even more. However, his lined face and the strange revelations he was pouring out so brokenly enlisted my sympathy. My mental picture of Jingfang began to grow fainter. “Every day I resolve to leave her and every day I break that resolution. All because of her, because I love her! I’ve floundered so long in this life of contradictions, I can’t stand it any longer. I’ve thought of deserting her. But I haven’t the guts to do it, always because I love her! We quarrel and then, after a time, I can’t help but ask her forgiveness. Love has such a tight hold on my heart.” He let out a deep breath and clutched wildly at his chest as if he wanted to tear out the love in his heart. “I hit on a way at last. I must make her leave me. I made myself deliberately cruel and heartless, quarreling with her for no reason just to make her lose her illusions about me and stop loving me. I want her to hate me . . . .” He stopped suddenly and, breathing with difficulty, raised a face dark with misery, unrelieved by a single ray of hope and with something terrible blazing in the depth of the eyes. It was then that I understood the cause of their quarrels, but knowing the secret only put me in an even more difficult position. “This is how I’ve been tormenting myself and her, constantly increasing her agony. Everything was clear to me but she was in the dark. Still it was no use; it only made me more wretched. She still loves me, she won’t think of leaving me. I’ve failed. After each quarrel I have to comfort her. She has made me so weak that I simply can’t leave her!” His cries of despair rang weakly through the room, with no other sound to disturb them. Outside, the wind moaned in fits and starts; my room was growing cold too. I went to the fireplace to put on more wood. I did not interrupt him, but I couldn’t help wondering why he insisted on getting away from her. “But we can’t go on like this. I must get away from her, make her love someone else, yet I can’t. Zisheng, I can’t stand this any longer, I can’t go on acting. I never thought love would mean such agony. I don’t want love! I want nothing more to do with it! . . .” As if at his wit’s end he pressed his hands to his heart. Without waiting to hear my opinion, he stood up and went over to the sofa, burying his face in one of its arms. A fearful silence ensued. As the wind outside died down I could hear the wood in the fireplace sizzle. The air seemed stifling. The pain and horror of Bohe’s revelations had shattered my evening’s peace. I did not blame him; my heart ached for him, even though I could not see why he wanted to make the woman he loved hate him. “If what you say is true, Bohe, why do you insist on crushing her love for you? Why must you get away from her? Can’t you start living amicably together again? You ought to think things over carefully.” That was the advice I finally managed to offer. He stood up abruptly, his eyes hot and dry. “No, no!” he insisted. “I can’t. I want to go back to China. I have more important things to do. This life here is too full of contradictions . . .” Wringing his hands, he took a few steps, then darted over to seize my arm again. “Let me tell you, Zisheng: she’s had two abortions but now she’s with child again and she won’t get rid of it. She absolutely refuses. What am I to do?” His eyes cornered me, demanding an answer. This came as a sudden, terrible shock to me, reviving all my sympathy for Jingfang and making it even harder to understand him. “She is right, you know,” I said, indignant at his heartlessness. “She has a right to have a baby. You can’t make her get rid of it.” “But this isn’t my fault. We are both victims.” My words did not anger him, though he was anxious to justify himself. His voice was softer now, less agitated. “Don’t you see I suffer too? Even more than she does. You must realize, Zisheng, that I’m not inhuman. I can’t help myself. Don’t you see how miserable it’s making me? I can’t find a single person who’ll listen to my troubles! Only you! Jingfang doesn’t understand me at all. I can’t tell her straight out.” He sighed again and muttered, more to himself than to me, “Now, I’ve tasted to the full the bitterness of love.” He straightened up and stood silently before me, as if to reveal to me all the misery lodged in that tall, spare frame. His words made me more confused than ever. I too am weak and find it hard to make up my mind. I sided now with Bohe, now with Jingfang. Though I had long wanted to reconcile husband and wife, I was completely at a loss now that Bohe stood in such misery before me asking for help. I wracked my feeble brains for some way out. After pacing about in silence for a while, he turned toward me suddenly with a strange look on his face. “Tell me honestly, Zisheng, are you fond of Jingfang?” he faltered. I nodded uncomprehendingly. Yes, I was fond of Jingfang, and ever since Bohe began making her miserable, I had felt a special sympathy for her. His eyes lit up and his clouded face brightened in a way that surprised me until the reason struck me. Then I leapt up as if someone had slapped my face. “How can you think of such a thing?” I raged indignantly. “It’s too ridiculous!” He backed away and smiled sadly. “Why get angry?” he protested. “I really want to know. I’m not suspecting you of anything.” “Get that idea out of your head right now. My advice to you is: Go home and live sensibly with your wife. Stop making yourselves miserable for no reason.” I suppressed my own irritation to give him this last piece of advice, wondering if he was going out of his mind. His face darkened again, that glimmer of light completely gone. He sank dejectedly into a chair and sat for some time with his head in his hands. Then he got up and, with a despairing “I’m going,” picked up his coat. I did not try to stop him, but stood up and followed him silently to the door. A cold wind rushed in as he opened the door and I shivered. The moaning of the wind was all I could hear. Though I wanted to detain him, he had swept out of the room. I felt sorry about the way I had treated him. He had come to me in great distress seeking help, but I had sent him off burdened with greater unhappiness. Full of remorse, I went back to the sofa and sat down. Looking up, my eyes fell on the painting that had drawn Jingfang’s gaze more than once earlier that day. A well-known picture entitled “Mother and Son,” it depicted a well-dressed woman with a two-year-old boy on her lap. This made me think of Jingfang, and I felt for her keenly in her present plight. But when I remembered the strange idea in Bohe’s head, I drove all visions of her out of my mind. That night I slept badly, troubled by strange dreams. Getting up very late, my head heavy, I had to make an effort to go downhill and visit Bohe. The day was fine, the sunshine warm, and, except for pockets of snow here and there under the trees and by the walls, the mountain path was dry. Stick in hand, I walked at a leisurely pace to my friend’s house. Bohe was ill and his wife hovered around his bed nursing him. They appeared to be closer than usual. He seemed only a little under the weather. Jingfang told me it was the result of drinking too much the previous evening and wandering about in the wind half the night. She seemed unaware that he had been quite sober when he came to my house and revealed so much. He obviously hadn’t told her. Now, ill in bed, it was even easier to fool her. As a matter of fact, even I was taken in by his manner toward her. I began to wonder whether I had been dreaming. I was glad, of course, to see them reconciled. During my short visit I said not a word about what had happened the previous night. There was a gentle smile on his face all the time I was there. Home again, I thought about their strange relationship. I still wanted to know the answer to their riddle, but the more I pondered the more puzzled I became, until finally my head was aching. All this excitement was too much for my nerves. My health deteriorated. For a fortnight or so, I was laid up in bed. By the time I was well enough to stroll down hill with the help of a stick, the bright spring days had come. My friends did not come to see me during my illness. At about the time of my recovery I received a letter signed by both of them and posted in Marseilles. They had booked a passage on a boat due to sail for China. There were no more letters from them after this, so I did not know what they were doing at home. I still remembered the young couple sometimes when loneliness overwhelmed me. I sincerely wished them happiness. Four years later I went to spend my summer vacation in a seaside town in the south of France. I often went to the beach to bask in the sun. There were very few Chinese here, and one day the sight of a Chinese couple with a little boy on the beach caught my attention. They had just come out of the water. The woman led the child to a beach parasol. Her profile and figure were familiar, and so was her voice as she talked to the boy. As I approached, full of curiosity, she turned and I got a good look at her face. “Jingfang!” I exclaimed, pleasantly surprised. She got up and ran over to me crying happily, “So it’s you, Zisheng! I didn’t know you were still in France.” She gripped my hand and shook it warmly. She was not much changed except that she seemed in better health, more cheerful and happy. “When did you come?” I asked, impressed by her healthy tan. “Why didn’t you send me word?” Then I pointed at the little boy who was coming toward us. “Is that your son?” “We came more than two months ago. But we’ve been here only a few days. You must see my baby.” She fetched the child and made him greet me. He was not quite four and the image of his father, particularly about the mouth and eyes. I patted the boy on the shoulder, mumbling something, and wondered why Bohe hadn’t come over to join us but was napping there under the parasol. “I must go and say hello to Bohe,” I said. Without a word she followed me back to the parasol. The man there, who stood up at once, was a complete stranger. I stood woodenly in front of him, not knowing what to say. “This is my husband.” Jingfang introduced us, giving a name that I hardly heard. I mumbled a few polite remarks and left. Jingfang agreed to accompany me a little way. When asked for news of Bohe, she had none to give. She couldn’t tell me anything about him, not even whether he was alive or dead. Noticing that these questions distressed her, I desisted and we parted. The young man with Jingfang was gentle, strong, and tall. She must be happy with him. I don’t know whether Bohe is dead or alive, but if he knew how she was getting on he ought to be satisfied. For this was just what he wanted. All pages created with 100% recycled electrons posted by CoolSoulSmith a.k.a Rinci|ak --------------------------- Tuesday, May 25, 2004I Pity the Gardenby Forugh Farrokhzad Forugh Farrokhzad was born in 1935 to a middle-class family of seven in Tehran, Iran. In a society where women have historically had few rights, she married at seventeen, divorced within three years and was forced to relinquish her only son to her husband. She never remarried, instead pursuing an independent lifestyle and a career in poetry. Her expressions of physical and emotional intimacy, much lacking in Persian women's poetry up to that point, placed her at the center of controversy, even among the intellectuals of the time. She was subjected to tabloid gossip and portrayed as a woman of loose moral character. Considered work of great audacity and extraordinary talent, Fraokhzad's poems are today much loved and revered by Iranians, and she is regarded by many as one of the most important female poets in modern Persian literature. On February 14,1967, her car was struck by a military vehicle, killing her instantly. She was 32 years old.  No one thinks of the flowers. No one thinks of the fish. No one wants to believe the garden is dying, that its heart has swollen in the heat of this sun, that its mind drains slowly of its lush memories. Our garden is forlorn. It yawns waiting for rain from a stray cloud and our pond sits empty, callow stars bite the dust from atop tall trees and from the pale home of the fish comes the hack of coughing every night. Our garden is forlorn. Father says: My time is past my time is past, I've carried my burden I'm done with my work. He stays in his room from dawn to dusk reads History of Histories or Ferdowsi's Epic of Kings. Father says to Mother: Damn every fish and every bird! When I'm dead, what will it matter if the garden lives or dies. My pension is all that counts. Mother's life is a rolled out prayer rug. She lives in terror of hell, always seeks Sin's footprints in every corner, imagines the garden sullied by the sin of a wayward plant. Mother is a sinner by nature. She prays all day, then with her "consecrated" breath blows on all the flowers, all the fish and all over her own body. She awaits the Promised One and the forgiveness He is to bring. My brother calls the garden a graveyard. He laughs at the plight of the grass and ruthlessly counts the corpses of the fish rotting beneath the sick skin of shallow water. My brother is addicted to philosophy he sees the healing of the garden in its death. Drunk, he beats his fists on doors and walls says he is tired, pained and despondent. He carries his despair everywhere, just as he carries his birth certificate diary, napkin, lighter and pen. But his despair is so small that each night it is lost in crowded taverns. My sister was a friend to flowers. She would take her simple heart's words --when Mother beat her -- to their kind and silent gathering and sometimes she would treat the family of fish to sunshine and cake crumbs. She now lives on the other side of town in her artificial home and in the arms of her artificial husband she makes natural children. Each time she visits us, if her skirt is sullied with the poverty of our garden she bathes herself in perfume. Every time she visits she is with child. Our garden is forlorn Our garden is forlorn All day from behind the door come sounds of cuts and tears sounds of blasts. Our neighbors plant bombs and machine guns, instead of flowers, in their garden soil. They cover their ponds, hiding bags of gunpowder. The school children fill their backpacks with tiny bombs. Our garden is dizzy. I fear the age that has lost its heart, the idleness of so many hands the alienation in so many faces. I am like a schoolchild madly in love with her geometry books. I am forlorn and imagine it is possible to take the garden to a hospital. I imagine I imagine And the garden's heart has swollen in the heat of this sun, its mind slowly drains of its lush memories. All pages created with 100% recycled electrons posted by CoolSoulSmith a.k.a Rinci|ak --------------------------- Wednesday, April 28, 2004Siti Nurhaliza's Sakti
--------------------------- Sunday, April 25, 2004The Villa in Acibademby Ahmet Hamdi Tanpinar Ahmet Hamdi Tanpinar (1901-62) has been called the most important Turkish novelist of the twentieth century. Born in Istanbul, he traveled widely in Anatolia before returning in 1919, after the First World War, to Istanbul to study literature with the poet laureate Yahya Kemal. Deeply influenced by Paul Valéry and Bergson, Tanpinar created a cultural universe in his work, bringing together Western forms of writing and the sensibilies of a decadent Ottoman culture. He taught aesthetics, mythology, and literature at the University of Istanbul.  The villa in Acibadem left a clear mark on every stage of my life. It isn't just that it touched my tender years like all those miracles of childhood are bound to do. It influenced my way of thinking, my character. The house belonged to my mother's uncle. Sani Bey was of medium height and had a greying beard when I knew him; he was a wide-shouldered, well-built man with blue eyes. He had once served as captain in the navy. But was he a regular or a graduate of naval engineering? That I don't know. He was fond of reading and writing, curious about what was going on in the world, a man who believed in progress and was ready to serve its cause.
Life is strange; given the most ordinary circumstances it whips up a comic opera for you. In a district of Istanbul famed for its idyllic scenery, these kindly people, husband and wife--he married a rich relation--had set up, in accord with their truly remarkable personalities, the strangest, the most comical, and especially for a child, the most entertaining household in all Istanbul. From the moment you entered this elegant villa, from the outside quite indistinguishable from the many villas of the reign of Abdülhamit the Second, freakish things would take place one after the other. Nevertheless, as a child I wasn't much aware of this. In those years when I went to stay with them, I tasted the first shivers of fear firing my imagination. These authentic fairy-tale-like moments took place in that villa, in its richly mirrored interiors with curtains half drawn, furniture gilded as in a palace and cordoned off. I used to spend days with Dervis, another remarkable character of the household. This one horse pulled my great-uncle's carriage, and it was a creature chagrined to have stopped midway in its development from horse to man-he had a human psyche imprisoned in a horse's body. He loved human conversation, and it saddened him to be far from human company. All house chores were done in his presence. In summer the cook cleaned the vegetables in the garden where he stayed, plucked the chicken there, and trusted the plucked chicken to his care should he go away for something; the ladies of the house would sew in his presence; guests would be entertained there; Raci, the only son of the house, would study for medical school exams in his company. As for me, he was my best friend. I stayed with him until evening. Then as Great-aunt's migraine took over I would go upstairs to one of the rooms, and in the strange silence entombing the house, would invent fairy tales, looking into the grand shadowy mirrors into whose depths would seep shadows trickling from the cypresses in Karacaahmet. From down below Dervis would now and then remember me, neighing docilely; me, upstairs, far richer for the memory of this friendship, would let myself drift into fancies that resembled a journey into one of the mirrors. As I grew older and inevitably exchanged these vague shivers for the pleasure of knowing and learning, the role of this house in my life also changed. This was around the years 1907 and 1908. I started seeing the house in Acibadem with different eyes. Only now did I realize that there were free and so called prohibited zones in this house, mysterious doors and locks, exasperating complicatons with entrances and exits, and alas, by inconceivable contrast, all kinds of conveniences counterbalancing the difficulties. So it was in and through that house that I met the why and how of things which form the basis of all thought. Consequently, my thought never loitered on metaphysical problems. Thanks to the house, I speculated on reality itself. Why, although great pains were taken in locking the doors, were fire escape windows--Uncle was one of the first people in Istanbul to use a fire escape--on each floor's hall always left ajar? Why, although he was afraid of everything that would come from the streets, did Uncle consider the garden side surrounded only by low walls so safe that he did not object to the kitchen door being left wide open day and night? How come, although my uncle was so interested in locks and bolts, none of the keys in the house would fit the locks? Evidently, my capacity for curiosity was absorbed with this house. But to count its oddities would really put me to task. These did not just consist of additions arising from harmless experimentation. They were revealed even in the house's architecture. For instance, in this villa there was not one continuous staircase. For fear of robbers, my mother's uncle had each floor's staircase starting from a different point. Accordingly, entering the house from the main door and following straight on you would end up at the top floor; from the stairs to the right at the second floor; whereas the stairs to the left would take you to the basement. The unfortunate who might desire to go up to the third floor from the second had first to go down one floor, and then up. Still more puzzling, beside the carefully locked doors to each of these stairs there were three ornamented, gilded, highly polished closet doors identical with the stairway doors. The inhabitants would easily confuse these doors in the evening hours, particularly in those days sans electricity. Others would have a definitely difficult time of it. On the other hand, most rooms had interconnecting stairs to the rooms directly above and below them from inside the linen closets. Therefore a thief who lost his way at the top floor could take the secret stairs inside the linen closet of Uncle's mother-in-law's room and easily descend into the room of Uncle's mother, who would always sleep with her face to the wall. Were he then to enter Raci's room right across the hall without being seen, he could descend from the closet there into Uncle's study, and from there to his workshop, where he could easily tiptoe into the garden from the window right under the nose of Uncle, who would stand there lost under the spell of some new idea. Besides, any person who could endure hunger could hide in the workshop for days on end. I had first come into this forbidden zone of the house via this route, and stayed. Uncle and I almost always worked together. I didn't disturb him and he didn't ever take notice of me. The workshop was a very apocalypse of broken tools spilling out everywhere. Being a former captain of engineers, Uncle loved machines and inventions of every kind and would pick up every useful and useless machine part he found on the street or in peddlers' stalls, under builders' scaffolding, in workshops at Haydarpasa train station, at auction sales, or in waste iron shops, and bring them here. Pieces of broken steering wheels or propellers, wrecked molding, wheels, pipes, nuts, paddleboxes, studs, sheet iron, rusted pistons, boilers made of sheet iron, and many other things I don't know the names of were assembled here. In the center of the room there was Uncle's large working table, and around it other small tables with tools on them. Can I say that I understood the child's expression on Uncle's face that used to attract and frighten us, when I first saw him in his workshop? Was I old enough? I don't know. But it took an effort to keep from laying my hand on his shoulder and asking, "Uncle, can I play with you?" This could have proven a veritable catastrophe; I might have provoked one of Uncle's terrible furies that made the whole household tremble. No one except Uncle was allowed to enter the workshop. Except maybe Kerim A?a, servant, horse keeper and coachman rolled into one. Kerim A?a collaborated with Uncle on his work. The second prohibited zone was the bathroom--or hammam--Uncle was busily trying to complete. This bathroom was located just under Uncle's bedroom and a passage separated it from the great courtyard on the ground floor. Besides a door that opened into the passage, it contained an inner staircase that descended from Uncle's bedroom. The hammam without a doubt was Uncle's masterpiece; or maybe his most important work next to the invention that was the crowning achievement of his life. Uncle was born with an authentic genius for invention, and his industrious life was really and truly crowned with a great, incomparable invention the fruition of which only he was destined to enjoy. But later of that; first, the hammam. Let me tell you beforehand that the day this bathroom was opened to all of us in a most ceremonious manner, my mental life entered its third phase. If my friends don't find me serious enough, criticize me for making light of everything or complain that I am indifferent to issues that excite and fill them with great hopes, in short if I lack the virtue of being like everybody and keeping relatively sane along with everybody (as one must do in order to succeed in life)--for this I can only hold responsible my mother's uncle and his Invention, this masterpiece of a bathroom. Uncle had given shape to his masterpiece in one year, but it took him another two years to perfect it. There will always be those who will find three years too long to wait for a bathroom. But this is not fair. An invention like this could rightfully claim thirty or forty years. God, what perfection. What a marvel it was! And the first time we set foot in it, how astonished we were! Then how I laughed when Uncle began to tell us how this perfection functioned! How we all laughed! We started with smiles. Then one by one, these smiles turned into laughter. At that point even my father began making strange faces. What we did not do to hide our laughter! Finally we all started to congratulate Uncle. Father fell on his neck, we grabbed his hands, we fell on our knees in front of him. And we laughed; we shook with laughter. Embracing each other, kissing Uncle's hands, falling on the floor, we laughed. Even Aunt, who paid the vast sums this bathroom required, laughed; she laughed deliriously. Although something like forty years has passed since then, the same delirious laughter swells in me as I write this. From that day on laughter never died out in that house. When any two of us came together, we laughed; whenever there was mentionof water, washing, or soap, we laughed. Suddenly the gloomy atmosphere of the suburbia of old Istanbul vanished. Now everyone laughed at every opportunity; everyone laughed falling on each other's neck. Uncle joined in the laughter: --You rascals . . . he would say. You would laugh, of course; from now on you will take better baths! Oh, yes from now on we would take better baths! Everything in this bathroom promised us that. As I have mentioned, Uncle was born with an authentic genius for invention. According to him, properly functioning human intelligence had mainly three objectives: invention, reform, and alteration. Nevertheless, these were not necessarily clearly separate categories. As invention was possible through alteration and reform, alteration through reform and reform through alteration were also possible and advisable. In a small pamphlet he had written in old script in his youth--until recently it was possible to come across this twenty-page pamphlet consisting of a single sentence in secondhand bookstalls--Uncle had, so to say, philosophized on this Idea of his. Starting from the monotheistic character of Islamic mysticism he proceeded to the basic unity of matter and form, and following a rather complicated theory of identity, explained the main tenets of an idea of progress that should underlie mechanics. According to him, everything in the universe could change function and character. This was necessary for the public good. One should go on inventing; that was the main thing. But one needn't despair when one couldn't invent. Humanity had already come up with a lot of inventions. Now we had entered the phase where these inventions were to be reformed and altered. According to Uncle, to reshape a sewing machine into a knife grinding machine was an invention worthy of genius. A meat chopper and a coffee mill should be able to serve the same function. Unfortunately, in addition to this love--or genius, as my father would have it-for machines and invention, Uncle's personality bore two serious faults. First, he disliked the simple; furthermore, he was one of those people who easily lost sight of their objective. His imagination was of the runaway kind. Anything his eye met he could incorporate into his invention or "work in progress." Such an intellect would naturally lose its sense of true function. Thus the bathroom was the fruit of not only his imagination but also of his faults. In all truth, with its stove and boiler which resembled a locomotive standing on its head, with all the paddlewheels, big screws, faucets, pipes and spiral pipes on its walls, all the gadgets jutting from its corners, it resembled, rather than a bathroom, a ship's brand-new engine room, or a central heating system burning some unknown fuel, or a place where all kinds of highly delectable and cruel tortures were being carried out. The last of these descriptions fit perfectly. Once a naked person was delivered to the ruthlessness of soap and water, the torture of swiftly forgetting everything previously learned, of not being able to see around, took over. First, the stove that was burning surreptitiously right up to the moment one had taken off one's clothes started whistling furiously. This strange whistling only heightened one's confusion, and as the heat became more intense and the water hotter, the confusion became a tangle beyond imagining and the person drowned under a deluge of steam, hot and cold water before rushing to the hand pump outside. The reason for this was that in the relaxation that came with taking one's ablutions it was not possible to operate the complex apparatus of this bathroom. Yet the matter was not as insurmountable as that. Once the stove was blazing hot, to make sure that water flowed into the boiler without interruption one had to wrench open the paddlewheel and most important, turn on the switch by the boiler. Later, the bather was simply to sit in front of the basin mounted to the wall further down from the miniature locomotive and fiddle with the hot, cold and warm water taps. These taps did not function by themselves, however. Since this crucial operation took place under the supervision of various wheels and instruments embedded in the wall, one had first to turn a big wheel on the left wall, then lightly touch the pendulum on the same level, tighten the four screws on the boiler, and turn on its five faucets. So you could start making your ablutions when everything was ready but still face the consequence of catching pneumonia outside by the water pump or suffer from smarting eyes for days on end because of having to get dressed without washing the soap suds from your eyes. Since my great uncle had lent to this bathroom not only his very complicated taste for mechanical invention but also his fanciful spirit, right after the first soaping the pranks of a very mischievous God of Coincidence would take over. Now the sweet water well that supplied the bathroom would suddenly dry up, now due to a wrong turn the water in the boiler would sprout out of a gyrating sprayhead three meters away and flood the bathroom with steam and hot water, as if watering a winter garden. At other times the water would refuse to warm or all the wheels, screws, cogs, little vents, pistons, all sorts of manometers on the walls, in short all the devices Uncle had collected from the ships on which he had served, from street stalls, from friends from the shipyard, and repaired, altered and rectified would somehow not be able to cope with the boiler. Or the faucet would just not stop or the taps over the basin would refuse to yield a drop of water, cold or hot. One would just sit there and watch the water that was supposed to wash you and take away the dirt and exhaustion streaming very aesthetically down the marble wall cascade Uncle had had built in imitation of the one in the Kuchuk Dag kiosk of the Beylerbeyi Palace. Unfortunately our faculty of aesthetic appreciation is very closely related to a certain amount of mental preparation, to our attitudes and garments as well. Therefore when you were sitting stark naked by the basin this play of water did nothing to enhance your happiness but instead of a mystic meditation on water filled you with fury and impatience. Yet this wouldn't last; the fact that hot water was being transported to the wall cascade was a kind of silent alarm--it was the proof the same was storming the boiler. At such moments, should one be far too occupied with aesthetic appreciation and speculations on the architecture of the Villa and not run out of this exceedingly complex bathroom with each of its functions separately thought out, in eighty cases out of hundred one would be suffocated in steam. Carefully considering every possibility, Uncle had designed this heating and washing apparatus in such a way that a few minutes after the play of hot water began on the wall, the water in the boiler would attack the stove according to a mechanism no one knew anything about, and one would be lost in a horrid smell of smoke and steam. At that point the big whistle would sound, informing the household of the catastrophe and Uncle would, coming to the head of the stairs, order us to leave the place at once. Common sense is the true estate of man. My aunt repaired the strange temper of the bathroom with her common sense. She too was interested in constructing things and had a fireplace built next to the bathroom. So, for those washing themselves in the doomed bathroom, water would be heated in this fireplace and carried inside in buckets. The members of the household could therefore take their baths in that very safe manner which has not changed a whit since the invention of the hammam bowl and soap, yet surrounded by the illusion of automatism and luxury supplied by the vast machinery. Suffice it to say, I entered this bathroom only after I was eleven and only three times at that. On the first occasion I scalded a shoulder, the second time I caught pneumonia standing in front of the hand pump. The third time I entered was, alas, to pull the half- dead body of my Uncle from out of the place. * I had mentioned earlier on that my great uncle had made a discovery or invention other than this bathroom, something bigger, more capacious, the crowning achievement of his busy life, as it were. In fact, my uncle is the second-time inventor of the horse-drawn cart the second time around, an important invention the Mesopotamians were already familiar with six thousand years ago. Nevertheless, secondness does not matter at all here, and the honour of the invention lies solely with my uncle, since he arrived at the idea of the horse-drawn cart via improving and modifying the so-called bicycle. He arrived at it not through imitation but step by step by dint of his genius for invention. It was around 1911. When Raci passed his exams in his fourth year at the School for Medicine, Uncle bought him a bicycle. For a long time Sani Bey remained indifferent to this instrument. Then all of a sudden he began going on about the Infidels' brilliance of mind, their genius for invention, and one day we saw him drop whatever he was doing, and sink into contemplation. Then one day I heard him mutter to my father something to the effect of : "A perfect invention, this bicycle, Hayri Bey, perfection itself! Only--one is out in the open under the rain, under the sun, and one tires one's arms and legs. . . . It needs improving!" From that day forward, the atmosphere in the house changed.The carriage and the horse were sent to be auctioned off; how much did they bring? We were never able to find out. They had simply disappeared! Sani Bey said to his wife: "I am going to take all of you for a ride on the bicycle of my own invention. Don't you worry!" Everybody mourned the loss of Dervis. Uncle kept his promise. One day I saw a carriage with slightly inverted wheels standing in the center of the workshop . At night, preliminary experiments with Kerim A?a were being carried out. But as the experimentation progressed Uncle was losing his cheer, pulling more and more of a long face. One night, at dinner, his wife had to ask: --What is wrong with you, for God's sake? --Nothing . . . he replied. It is just that I am thinking about this four-seater bicycle. It keeps the riders busy all the time. Some with the steering wheels, some with the gears. And on an uphill, Kerim A?a has to go down to give it a pull. I am looking for a way to improve it . . . --Such as? Sani Bey looked at my father as if to say, How can you not understand! --Well, he said; just something to make it easier. The vehicle operates perfectly, but it tires you out. I was just thinking--in order to avoid the exhaustion, how about putting a horse in front of it, instead of making use of our bodies? We were all dumbfounded, me looking at Raci, Raci at me and then at his mother. --Well and good, dear, but why get rid of the perfectly good carriage then? This was more than enough to make Uncle lose his head; throwing his napkin on the table, he stood up: --How can a woman understand? he shouted. Yet, the promissory note for two hundred gold coins he had persuaded Aunt to sign only the other day made him come to his senses. --That is different, . . . he said. That is different. My idea is something else. The other already existed. I've arrived at this by improving, modifying and reinforcing something else. First I've turned the bicycle which has only two wheels into a carriage with four wheels. Then I've covered it, made it possible to sit in it comfortably. Now I am thinking of giving a rest to your arms and legs. That is what the horse is for! Aunt was still skeptical: --Well and good, dear . . . still, how is it different from a horse carriage? Uncle slapped the table with his palms: --They are the same . . . Only I have not arrived at it according to the same logic, the same mentality. The method is different, even though the result is the same. Therein lies the heart of the matter. You are condemning my work because the result is the same. You think I am a failure. I am not. I have given the world a new invention. I've altered the bicycle. Altered, improved, modified, reinforced it. Instead of thanking me-- There were tears in his eyes. He was about to break down. We all regretted having hurt his feelings, my aunt most of all. Father ventured an explanation: --Your wife does not condemn your work at all, Sani Bey, he said. It is just something she has observed. Please calm down. --No, he answered. It is not that, she doubts my work. . . .She thinks I've failed. Yet it was my aunt who knew how to calm him down: --Dear, she said, if you are worried about the horse, don't be. I didn't sell Dervis. Uncle went through another stage of amazement: --You didn't . . . defying my instructions? You didn't? Aunt answered, perfectly cool: --As you very well know, it falls to the wife to be circumspect, dear. Well, here you are . . . --But where is he?. . .Where did you hide a whole horse? --Here, in the house. In the upstairs room. Suddenly I knew. That distant neighing I thought was coming from the neighbor's, the overpowering smell of horse dung, the phantom visage I had seen in the evening in the upstairs room window which had frightened me so . . . We all rushed upstairs with my uncle. Dervis received us in his room, full of joy. That spring, my uncle went to Kadiköy with Dervis whenever he had to go on an errand there. On one of these outings, the carriage had an accident colliding with a motorcycle, a relatively new arrival. My father and Sani Bey were in it. Sani Bey asked my father: --What is this? Father said: --A motorcycle. An improved version of the bicycle. Yet Sani Bey, who more or less knew about the automobile, disagreed: --No! It can't be . . . This, if anything, could only be a miniature car. Not the same thing as a bicycle . . . The driving forces are different. Sani Bey was the only person I've known who had mastered the trick of being happy and died very happy believing in his genius in spite of all his futile labors, his squanderings which brought the household economy to nought, his idiocies, his obstinate refusal to listen to advice. None of those attending the deathbed where he was lying half burned would, I think, seeing the deep serenity on his face, fail to compliment him silently: --Now, here is a man who had no uncertainty whatsoever about having done his duty in life . . All pages created with 100% recycled electrons posted by CoolSoulSmith a.k.a Rinci|ak --------------------------- Saturday, April 17, 2004Three PoemsBy Ahmad Shamlou Ahmad Shamlou (1925-2000) is recognized as one of Iran's greatest modern poets, writing in the new mode of expression pioneered by Nima Yushij. Born into a military family, he spent an itinerant youth being transferred from one remote town to another, with schooling left unfinished. During World War II, he was arrested by the occupying Allied forces and imprisoned for supporting the German war effort. On his release a year later, he was arrested again along with his father, and together they faced a firing squad and last-minute reprieve. In the 1950s he spent six months in hiding and another year in prison for his support of Mossadegh's nationalist movement. Eventually, in 1977, political oppression moved Shamlou to leave Iran, and he lived for two years in Princeton and in England. Like so many who at first believed that the revolution heralded new freedom and stability, Shamlou returned to Iran in 1979. Throughout these vicissitudes he wrote continuously. In addition to twelve collections of his own poetry published between 1948 and 1978, he has also written several plays and a major analytical survey of Iranian folklore Ketab-i Kucheh [Book of the Street], is the editor of an important edition of Hafez as well as other volumes of classical Iranian poetry, and has translated many French authors into Persian. Shamlou's third marriage lasted from 1964 until his death, and his wife Ayda figures prominently as the muse of many of his later poems. Translated from the Persian by Zara Houshmand Existence If this is life—how low! and I, how shamed, if I don’t hang my lifetime’s lamp high on the dusty pine of this dead-end lane. If this is life—how pure! and I, how stained, if I don’t plant my faith like a mountain, eternal memorial, to grace this ephemeral earth. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Elegy on the death of the poet Forugh Farrokhzad Searching for you on foothills of mountains, on thresholds of oceans and meadows, I cry. Searching for you in windy passes I cry at the crossroads of seasons in the weathered wood of a broken window frame that contains a cloud-stained sky. ..... Looking for your portrait in this empty book— how long how long will pages keep turning? * To embrace the flow of wind, and love who is sister to death— eternity has shared with you this secret. And so you have taken the shape of a treasure: earned and enviable another kind of treasure which, claiming the earth, these lands in this way has made the heart embrace them. * Your name is a white dawn that passes over the sky’s brow blessed be your name!-- And so we repeat the round of night and day in this way even now . . . -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Fish I think my heart has never been like this so warm and red. I feel even in the worst moments of this fatal night several thousand sun-springs in my heart surge up from deep certainty. I feel in every nook and cranny of these salt flats of despair several thousand wonderfully wet forests suddenly spring from the earth. * Oh certainty gone astray, oh runaway fish in the ponds of slippery mirror within mirror! I am a clear lagoon; now through the enchantment of love, find a path from the mirror-ponds to me! * I think my hand has never been so glad, so grand: I feel in my eyes a cascade of bloody tears that stirs a never-setting sun to breathe a song; I sense in my every vein in every heartbeat now the bells of a passing caravan ring: wake up! * She came one night, naked, through the door like water’s soul At her breast, two fish, and in her hand a mirror her wet hair smelling of moss as if braided with moss. I cried out from the threshold of despair, “Oh, certainty now found—I won’t neglect you again!” All pages created with 100% recycled electrons Cuneiformby Kader Abdolah  Kader Abdolah (born 1952 in Iran) studied physics in Tehran and was active in the student resistance. He published two novels about life under the Khomeini regime before fleeing his homeland in 1985. At the invitation of the United Nations, he arrived in the Netherlands as a political refugee in 1988. He quickly mastered the language and has now written and published four books: The Eagles (1993), a collection of short stories which won an award for bestselling literary debut; The Girls and the Partisans (1995); The Journey of the Empty Bottles (1997); and Cuneiform (2000). In 1997, Abdolah received the Dutch Media Prize for his collected columns from De Volkskrant.
Cuneiform has been published in Germany, France, and Norway and will soon be published in Italy, Denmark, and Spain. Translated from the Dutch by Sam Garrett Hadjar bore seven children. Aga Akbar was the youngest, and he was born deaf and mute. She knew it even in the first month. She saw that he didn't react. But she didn't want to believe it. She never left him alone, and no one else was allowed to stay with him for long. For six months she kept that up. Everyone knew the child was deaf, but no one was allowed to speak of it. Until, finally, Kazem Khan, Hadjar's eldest brother, felt it was time to get involved. Kazem Khan was a free man whose habit it was to travel through the mountains on horseback. He was a poet who lived alone on a hill outside the village, but always had a woman. In the light of his window, the villagers saw a different woman every time. No one knew what he did, or where he went on his horse. When the light was on, people knew he was at home. The poet is home, they said then. Nothing more was known about him, but when the village needed him he was always there to help. At moments like those he was the voice of the village. When the riverbed suddenly filled and flowed over and the water ran into the houses in the village, he was there on his horse and knew how to stop the flood. When several children had died unexpectedly and the other mothers were fearing for their own, he suddenly appeared on horseback with a doctor behind him. And any bride or groom of the village was honored to have him show up at the wedding. It was this same Kazem Khan who came riding into Hadjar's courtyard. Without climbing down. he sat in the shade of the old tree and shouted: "Hadjar! My sister!" She opened the window. "Welcome, Brother. Why don't you come in?" "Will you come to me this evening with your child? I want to speak to you." Hadjar knew that he wanted to talk about her son, and realized she could no longer hide him. When evening came she bound her child to her back and climbed the hill to the house that the villagers called a fallen jewel among the old walnut trees. Kazem Khan smoked opium, which was generally accepted and even seen as a sign of his poetic nobility. He had prepared the burner, his pipe was lying in the fresh, warm ash, and the fine slices of yellowish-brown opium were on a plate. The samovar bubbled. "Take a seat, Hadjar. You can warm up some food for yourself in a bit. Feed your child if you like. What was his name again? Akbar? Aga Akbar?" Hesitantly, Hadjar handed the child to her brother. "How old is he? Seven, eight months? Go and eat, I'd like to be alone with him." She felt a heavy load on her shoulders. She couldn't eat, and she began to weep. "No, don't cry. Don't act so pitiful. If you hide him away, if you simply give up, you'll make him stupid. For the last six or seven months he's seen nothing, done nothing, he's had no real contact with his surroundings. Everywhere I go in the mountains I come across deaf, mute children. We have to let everyone talk to him. All we need is a language, a sign language. And we'll have to come up with it ourselves. I'll help you. From tomorrow on, you've got to let others to take care of your child as well. Let people make contact with him, each in his own way." Hadjar took her child into the kitchen. There, once again, she burst into tears. Tears of relief. Later, after Kazem Khan had smoked a few pipes of opium and was light and cheery, he came and sat beside her. "Listen, Hadjar. I don't know why, but I feel that I must have something to do with this child's life. I never felt that way about your other children. Especially since their father was that nobleman. And I want nothing to do with him. But before you go, I must tell you a few things, things that are important for your child's future. That nobleman must also know that I am Akbar's uncle." The next day Hadjar took Akbar to the castle. Never before had she shown one of her children to his father. She knocked on the door of his study and went in, with Akbar in her arms. She stood there for a moment, then laid him on the desk and said: "My child is deaf and mute." "Deaf and mute? What can I do to help?" It took a moment before Hadjar could look him straight in the eye. "Let my child bear your name." "My name?" he asked, then fell silent. "If you give him that, I shall never come here to ask you for anything again," Hadjar added. Still the nobleman said nothing. "You once told me that you favored me, and a few times you said you respected me. You said I could always ask you for what I needed. So now I'm asking you; let my child bear your name. Only your surname. I am not asking for an inheritance. Let Akbar's name be put on paper." "Feed the child, don't let him cry like that," the nobleman said after a while. Then he stood up, opened the window and shouted to his servant. "Bring the imam to me. Immediately. I'm waiting." The imam was not long in arriving. Hadjar had to wait in another room. The conversation took place behind closed doors. The imam wrote a few lines in his book. Then he drew up a document for the nobleman to sign. It was finished in no time. The imam went home on his mule. "Here, Hadjar. This is what you asked for. But there is one thing you must not forget. Keep this paper hidden, and keep it a secret. When I die, then you may show it to others." Hadjar hid the paper under her clothes and tried to kiss his hand. "You don't have to do that, Hadjar. Go home now. And come see me often. I have always said it, and I say it again. I do favor you, and I will always want to see you." Hadjar bound her child to her back again and left. As she went down the mountain, she knew that she was carrying a child with an old and important name: Aga Akbar Mahmoodi Gazanvia Gorasani. The document proved a worthless piece of paper, for when the nobleman died his heirs bribed the village imam to scrap Aga Akbar's name from the will. But that didn't matter, for Hadjar had not expected an inheritance for her child: the name alone was enough. His father was famous, and his roots lay there in that old castle on the mountain at Lalezar. When Akbar grew up, he married and had children. And although he was a lowly carpetmaker, he remained proud of his lineage. He carried the paper with his long name wherever he went. Akbar often talked about his father, and especially wanted his son Ismael to know that his grandfather had been an important man, a horseman with a rifle on his back. The nobleman was killed by a Russian. But exactly who his killer had been, no one knew. Was it a soldier? A policeman? Or a Russian thief who had sneaked across the border? The mountains where Aga Akbar and his forefathers lived were on the border with Russia, at that time a part of the Soviet Union. The southern side belonged to Iran; the northern slopes, with their perpetual deep snow, belonged to Russia. But what that soldier, or the Russian army was doing there in those mountains, no one knew. The only reminder of the murder was a story that lived on, thanks to Aga Akbar. Whenever he and his son were home alone, Akbar would tell the story to Ismael, who then had to play the horseman. He himself played the Russian soldier, with a long army coat and a cap with a bright red hammer and sickle. Ismael rode on a cushion and wore a wooden rifle on his back. Aga Akbar put on his coat and hat and hid behind a big cupboard. A rock on Saffron Mountain. Now Ismael had to ride his horse. Not too fast, not too slow, but with restraint, like a nobleman. He rode past the cupboard, and at that moment a head appeared. The horseman had to ride on for a few yards, until the soldier jumped out with a knife in his hand. He took two or three giant steps and planted his weapon between the shoulders of the horseman, who fell to the ground dead. The story was probably based on fantasy, but the death of his mother was one thing Aga Akbar had experienced for himself. "How old were you when Hadjar died'?" Ismael gestured. But Aga Akbar had no sense of time. "She died when a flock of strange black birds came to roost in our almond tree," he signed back. "Strange birds?" "I had never seen them before." "But when was that, when those black birds roosted in the tree?" Ismael signed. "My hands were cold and the tree had no leaves and Hadjar no longer spoke to me." "No, I mean, how old were you? How, how old were you when your mother died?" "I, Akbar. My head came up to Hadjar's breast." He was nine or ten at the time, Kazem Khan told Ismael later. Hadjar lay in bed and was deathly ill. And Akbar crawled under the blankets and held her tight. "Were you holding your mother when she died?" Ismael gestured. "Yes, that's right . . . but, how did you know?" "Uncle Kazem Khan told me." "I crawled under the blankets. Whenever she was sick, she would talk to me and hold my hand. But she wasn't talking any more, and she didn't move her hand either. I was afraid, very afraid, I stayed under the covers and didn't dare to come out any more. Then someone grabbed me, a hand from outside, and tried to pull me away. I held Hadjar's body tight. But Kazem Khan pulled me away. I cried." The next day the oldest woman of the family spread a white cloth over Hadjar's face. Men came with a coffin and took her to the graveyard. All pages created with 100% recycled electrons posted by CoolSoulSmith a.k.a Rinci|ak --------------------------- Wednesday, April 14, 2004Malaysia Boleh Again!!! The Sarah Marbeck wayWORLD EXCLUSIVE: The Becks affair - stunning model tells of new two year affair. MORE cheating, MORE sex, MORE txts I'm Becks' lover No2 By Neville Thurlbeck The News of the World can sensationally reveal that David Beckham bedded a SECOND mistress behind his wife's back. 
BEAUTY: Beck's second mistress> She is barrister's daughter Sarah Marbeck. And in a shattering world exclusive interview, Sarah tells how he seduced her with the same techniques he used on his other lover Rebecca Loos. Sarah's testimony reveals for the first time the WHOLE TRUTH about David's marriage to Victoria. It explodes any thought that his fling with Loos was a one-off mistake and exposes the Beckhams' ‘perfect family life' as a troubled, affair-ridden sham for over TWO YEARS. News of this second affair will come as a bolt from the blue to millions of fans and a bodyblow to Posh. Malaysian-born beauty Sarah said last night: "Sleeping with David Beckham was a momentous day for me, not just a one-night stand. "I certainly didn't take our affair lightly and nor did he. This is probably the most famous father, family man and husband in the world and he changed my life. "I know I meant something to him because, on and off, we continued our relationship month after month after month. When we made love David told me, ‘I know what we're doing is wrong, but I can't help it'. Evidence 
FIRST NIGHT: Sarah and Becks at Singapore party where they met "The first time he took me to bed he kissed me everywhere. I looked down and there was David Beckham kissing my breasts! David Beckham!" In the week since the News of the World revealed his affair with his former PA in Spain, the Beckhams put on a carefully-staged show of unity on the alpine ski slopes of Courchevel and David tried to dismiss an affair as ‘ludicrous', while never actually denying it. But, like Rebecca, who reveals her story for the first time in the News of the World today, Sarah has the hard evidence to support her story. He sent her hundreds of erotic and sometimes filthy TEXT MESSAGES. At one stage he was texting Sarah and Rebecca at the SAME TIME. Becks SEDUCED Sarah on a Man United tour of the Far East He got her a seat to watch him play Italy in England and MET her "all hot and sweaty" in the players' tunnel. He MADE LOVE to her at the team hotel that night. At the time, Posh was PREGNANT with baby Romeo. Pool Sarah's close friend and representative, top Australian lawyer Michael Brereton, said: "Sarah has thought long and hard before telling her story. What she has to say is true and hugely significant. Beckham is an idol to millions—his fans should know the truth." 
INVITATION: Coveted card that gave Sarah access to VIP party Becks and 29-year-old Sarah first set eyes on one another at a party thrown by Singapore socialites Frank and Mavis Benjamin during Man United's pre-season tour of the Far East in 2001. It was July 26. They had their picture taken ...four hours before they had sex. Sarah, who has worked for Armani, Gucci and Calvin Klein, explained: "I was invited to the party through my modelling agency. The Benjamins have a palatial house, and I first saw David as I was walking down the stairs to the pool. He just stood there staring at me. So I went up to him and said, ‘Hi, how do you find Singapore weather?' He complained ‘It's a bit hot." "I started laughing at his outfit — all the players had been told to wear white T-shirts and shorts. He agreed, ‘We all look stupid'. Soon, David asked me to meet him in the private movie theatre under the house. He'd obviously checked the place out. "We sat at the back and I asked, ‘How's your wife?' He said, ‘She's fine, yeah, she's well'. Then he said to me, ‘Look, I don't usually do this but I'd really like your company later tonight. Will you come to my room on your own?'" He gave her his room number at the Shangri-La Hotel but the conversation was cut short when a bodyguard came into the room and told Beckham that the United bus was ready to leave. "I didn't know what to do," said Sarah. "I stayed at the party another half an hour thinking about it, then, I thought, ‘Right, I'm going to go through with it'. "I ran back to my apartment and got changed into T-shirt and wide-leg purple cargo pants. I didn't wear any make-up because I didn't want him to think I was getting dressed up for him. But I did put on nice lingerie ‘just in case'-black lacy Calvin Klein bra and knickers." At the hotel, Sarah discovered she was expected. She was escorted to a room and suddenly received a startling insight into the secret world of soccer stardom. She explained: "There were some players I didn't recognise. They told me to sit with them for a while and someone would be seeing me soon. I asked them why the secrecy and they just said this was the way it always was. "Then this big bodyguard came in and said, ‘Ok, are you ready? I'm going to take you up now. But I'm going to have to take your bag and shoes'. He was treating me like a terrorist. We went up a couple of floors and knocked on a door. "David opened it and gave me a big smile. He closed the door behind me and said of the security, ‘Look, I'm really sorry. That's just the way it is. Would you like a cup of tea?" Becks told Sarah that United boss Alex Ferguson always made sure alcohol was taken out of mini-bars. "It was a bit awkward at first," she said. "I sat in a chair and he sat on the bed, the TV was on. Then I said, ‘Well, now what?' Without saying anything, he gently took my hand and led me to the bed. He lay down and asked me to lie down too." As she settled on to the coverlet, Sarah noticed a card on the table from the hotel. It read: "Welcome David Beckham. Please give our best wishes to your wife and child." She had little time to feel uncomfortable. "After a few seconds he started kissing me," she said. The couple then spun around so that, while they were still pressing their hips together, his feet were in front of her head and his hands could slide up her cargo pants. "I liked it," she said. "Then he started kissing my legs before he turned me round again and started kissing my hair and neck. He said he loved my neck and kept saying how beautiful and long it was. I was becoming very aroused. Massage "Then he gave me a very slow full body massage. It was so sexy. He kept saying he loved my long legs. "He slid his hand inside my trousers and said he thought the fabric of my knickers felt nice. ‘Can I see them?' he asked. "By now I certainly wanted him to see them. I sat astride him and began to explore his body too. I could feel he was very aroused. "We fantasised on the bed about having sex. I told him I'd like to be taken by surprise and to be made love to fast and furious while he held my face in his hands. It made him more and more excited. "He said he wanted to make love to me and said if I did, I'd never want another man. But it wasn't cheesy, it was wonderful. "Our hands were everywhere, inside each other's clothes. Then he took my top off and when we were both naked we made love. It was perfect, really passionate. "I've no idea how long it lasted-when you're in bed with David Beckham you're not looking at the clock, believe me. He liked to be on top and that was absolutely fine by me." Flawed Sarah, who now lives in Australia, added: "He said he felt he'd been hit by a sledgehammer from the first time he saw me. He said he loved the way I tied my hair back." His other mistress Rebecca Loos also recalls being impressed by the compliments he showered on her too. But Sarah thought every word was for her. It was 3am before she was ready to go home and asked for the bodyguard to return her belongings. "David wanted me to stay the night," she said-echoing another line he would regularly give Rebecca, "but I needed to be on my own to get my head together." Today Becks is expected to play for Real Madrid against Atletico Osasuna, and Posh plans to be there to see him in another choreographed show of unity. But Sarah has hundreds of text messages which show that unity is flawed. She said: "The first time he said he loved me was after we spoke on the phone and he said he didn't think the lines were safe so he'd send a text. He sent one saying, ‘I love you'. She had no idea then that the next time they'd have sex would be on the other side of the world-with Becks' team mates just feet away... All pages created with 100% recycled electrons posted by CoolSoulSmith a.k.a Rinci|ak --------------------------- Sunday, March 28, 2004Art Collaboration - "Soul Speak: Artist and Children"
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