HEALTH (THE 1686 CONTAGION)

Khushal Khan Khattak, the 17th century Pashtun warrior-poet has recorded a historical event in the following poem. An anonymous translator initially translated it into English, a copy of which was sent to me by a friend. I tried to find out the name of the good translator with out success. I have modified the original translation on the insistence of a friend, who intends to recite it for the interest of those interested in the subject in view of the Covid 19 sickness that has engulfed the world at large in our present times.

It may be added here that Khushal Khan, who lived in a village on the Grand Trunk Road that in the present-day Pakistan has evolved into a small town called Akora Khattak, suffered miserably at the hands of the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb Alamgir who had the former incarcerated for long periods.

The original by the anonymous translator is reproduced here after the new one along with the Pashto text.

THE 1686 CONTAGION
Original Translation: Anonymous
New Translation: Nasser Yousaf

The 1686 epidemic that had us hit
Pray it may never is to revisit

My village folks were blighted by it
Young n old, men n women all alike

My son, Bakht Khan, also fell in it
His dear mother too fell prey to it

Bakht Khan had a comely son
Who soon followed his father to the ditch

This grief whom I may share it with?
This wailing n whining is all for nought

Thrown in the flames in the length and breadth
People were scorching to their death

From the far off Deccan to Kabul
The scourge had its tentacles spread

Hundreds of thousands perished in it
As cities were seen turned into deserts

A famine erupted, and then that contagion struck
All around there were cries of distress

Sarfaraz was the son of Saadath
In him a grandson with good looks I had

He knew the Holy Koran by heart
A calligrapher he was quite like an expert

A greyhound he had kept as a pet
Which got rabid without us being abreast

Quite of wont he tried giving it a pat
As he considered the canine an old friend

Instead the beast bit him on the hand
Hence letting him into the trap set up by death

In untold agony was the year thus spent
In suffering, woe and unremitting regret

The year finally ended and the scourge sent
Hardships thus also turned their back on us

Rains've started pouring down
Earth has taken a turn for the best

Sorrows and joys do not long endure
They take turns as foreordained

One must be thankful in weal and woe
So that the worse does not get worst

Suffering Aurangzeb is all that is now left
He's done his subjects such discredit

May he also vanish like the epidemic
Letting a just ascend the seat

God-willing, this prayer too
Will also soon be answered in aye

It's not me, Khushal, alone thus praying
In unison joins me all the rest



Khushal Khan Khattak (1613-1689)

👣👣👣👣👁👁👁👁👁👁👁

د کال 1686 وبا متعلق د خوشال بابا يو نظم و انګليسي ژبه کې ترجمه

THE 1686 CONTAGION

May the 1686 contagion
Never ever happen again
My co-villagers got perished in it
Both young and old; men and women
Bhakht Khan, my son, died in it
So did his mom
He had a beautiful son
Who also soon thereafter breathed his last
Who do I share my grief with?
What’s the use anyway of all this crying?
People are burning in this fire
In every nook and corner of the empire
The epidemic spread
From the Deccan to the Kabul province
Hundreds of thousands perished in it
Cities deserted and turned into ghost towns
First, it was famine, then this contagion
There was suffering everywhere
Sarfaraz was Saadat’s son
He was my handsome grandson
He knew the Holy Koran by heart
And was also a calligrapher quite expert
He had a pet greyhound
That suddenly got mad
Sarfaraz touched it unknowingly
As he took it for a friend
It bit him in the hand
Rendering him terminally ill
Kismet parted him from me
With great rue and regret
The epidemic ended in 1687
And so did my suffering
Rains started pouring down
Making the earth rejuvenated
Both joy and sorrow
Take their cyclic turns
One got to be thankful in every state
Praying nothing worse happens
The only curse there remains now is King Aurangzeb
He has made people to suffer as well
May he also vanish like the epidemic
So that a just ruler ascends the throne
I, Khushal, isn’t praying for this alone
All the rest also for the same yearn
God-willing, this prayer
Will also be responded soon

Khushal Khan Khattak (1613-1689)

👣👣👣👣👁👁👁👁👁👁👁

د غواص د کال وبا

د غواص د کال وبا
خدای يې مه راوله بيا
اکوړ خېل مې پکې ومړل
لوی هلک مرد و نسا
بخت ناک مې پکې ومړ
مور يې هم بوته قضا
يو هلک يې و راپاتې
ورپسې شو زر پنا
چاته ژاړم له دې غمه
سود مې کم دی د ژړا
لور په لور په دا لمبو کې
عالم پروت په واوېلا
تر دکنه تر کابله
راخوره شوه دا بلا
په لکونو عالم ومړ
چې ښارونه شول صحرا
اول قحط بيا وبا وه
په هر لوري وه غوغا
سرفراز د سعادت و
ښه لمسی مې و زېبا
هم حافظ د درست قرآن و
هم په خط و بې همتا
د ښکار سپی يې و ساتلی
لېونی شو بې غوغا
لاس يې وروړ بې خبره
چې ګاڼه يې خپل اشنا
دی يې و چيچه په لاسو
لا علاج شو لادوا
په دا کال له ما قضا کړ
په ارمان ارمان جدا
کال حصغ شو وبا ولاړه
هم عسرت کړه راته شا
بارانونه دي ورېږي
وداني شوه په دنيا
نه تل غم وي نه ښادي وي
وار په وار وي حغه دا
په هر حال شکر بايده دی
چې بد تر نه شي لا
اوس څه غم د عالمګير دی
چې عالم يې کړ رسوا
د وبا غوندې زر ورک شوای
بل يو ښه شوای راپېدا
يو خوشال دا دعا نه کا
درست جهان کا دا دعا
اجابت به يې زر وشي
که د خدای وي پرې رضا

NEWS OF SUBSTANCE

Update on Afghan children and scavengers:

By: Nasser Yousaf

Last night, I went out in my car to fetch some grocery. Rain was really pouring down. The so called upscale Jadoon Market in Abbottabad was closed from one end to the other except for a vegetable shop where a six or seven year old Afghan boy was standing right in the middle of the road, not even caring to take shelter from the rain that was falling down in torrents. This child is a common sight at this particular spot. I wonder who his father is 🤔; today, I will try to check with the vege seller if we could locate him.

If this child hasn't got fever and cold after having got himself exposed to the elements in this manner then he must be a supernatural being, made of steel.

Elsewhere scavengers could be seen rummaging through the garbage as usual while the other Afghan children, who beg while pretending to be selling green coriander and mint, could now be seen selling masks 🎭 made from cloth. Life thus goes on in the Time of Corona 😏.

COMMUNICATION (PESHAWAR RICKSHAW)

Peshawar Rickshaw

By: Nasser Yousaf

Readers may find it most interesting, if not altogether incredible 😊.

In several novels that I have read, I have found Peshawar, and in one or two Khyber, pop up out of nowhere. But the one that I am reading now titled 'FREEDOM, by Jonathan Franzen, an American, there is a reference to Peshawar that is really very funny. At one point, one of the lead characters, Richard Katz, a musician and a carpenter, is asked if his music has had any influence from the PESHAWAR RICKSHAW.

While this makes me feel proud of our boisterous little Rickshaw 😂, I simply can't stop help wondering how on earth did Jonathan come to know of this comical creation because knowing him from his writings, I believe he'd be the last person to ever even think of visiting Peshawar.

I read THE CORRECTIONS by Jonathan more than twelve years ago when the world was reeling from one upheaval or the other.

Perhaps, he might have read about the Peshawar Rickshaw in some post 9/11 travelogue 🤔 or watched it revve and trundle in one of the many documentaries made in those days by the hordes of media people visiting Peshawar.

BOOKS (THE POWER OF FICTION)

Abbottabad's only bookshop of yester years now selling shoes and garments. 

The Power of Fiction

By: Nasser Yousaf

Some years ago, Peshawar’s three leading bookstores lay close together in such a geometrical proximity on the small stretch of a lane called Arbab Road in the cantonment area that the threesome seemed to have formed a right angle. The little that we have by way of literature these days is owed to those right times.

In 2014, as part of our efforts to resuscitate the dying tradition of reading in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, we conducted a reading session at the residence of a respectable lady in Peshawar. At the end of the session, the host took us round to her bookshelf to show us a hardbound copy of one of the earliest editions of ‘Les Miserables’. ‘I am holding on to this like a relic,’ she informed us with a big smile.

Of the three, MJ Books was the first to breakaway after the owner shifted to some foreign land followed some years later by Saeed Book Bank when the owner, on the pretext of declining security situation and dwindling sales, shifted his store to Islamabad. Only London Books has survived though the prospects of it standing its ground for long looks bleak in view of frenzied construction taking place in the area where it is located.

There are valid reasons why reading good literary books could not become a part of our culture. Simply put, we failed to hold on to the few bookshops that we had with any kind of devotion as we helplessly found them slipping away from our grasp. It is fashionable to bewail the lack of our reading habits, but then how often do we care to hold a book in the presence of our growing up children and in fact do we ever care to take them round a bookshop. Reading books in the presence of children has a profound effect on the younger ones as they are known to emulating their parents, and lovingly at that.

ARTICLE CONTINUES AFTER AD

There are now 35 administrative districts in KP which by all means should have been enough to testify to some kind of urbanisation taking place in the province. Sadly, however, the creation of new districts is little more than political gimmickry at great public expense, KP continues to be a rural land by any stretch of the definition that the word ‘rural’ allows.

The provisional findings of the census conducted in 2017 reveal that KP, together with the seven merged districts of the tribal belt, has more than 35 million people living on its fertile soil. Such a massive number of people ought to have been a boon considering the fact that many developed countries have attained their present level of progress with far fewer people.

But then we have to consider that all these developed countries, despite having stagnant or even negative population growth rates, have the distinction of selling millions of copies of famous, and not too famous, titles. On the other hand, a Pakistani author, stature and repute notwithstanding, cannot even dream of such sanguine prospects. Some of our best known present-day writers may not have been able to sell more than a couple of thousands of copies of their highly rated books to the readers at home.

While literature festivals in Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad do help to some extent keep afloat Pakistan’s image in the literary world, KP on the other hand cannot draw comfort even from such ephemeral events.

ARTICLE CONTINUES AFTER AD

For its aforementioned size of population, KP has just one major bookstore in Peshawar which caters to the requirement of the avid readers. Oxford University Press has its sales offices in Peshawar and Abbottabad but Oxford deals only in its own publications. Rest of the province appears to be wearing a mantle of sepulchral silence.

Literature in general and fiction in particular is the least discussed of the subjects in KP. People, by and large, laughingly if not deprecatingly, refer to fiction as oft-repeated ‘qissekahaniya’. This kind of attitude now appears to be so deeply ingrained in the society that it literally discourages one from venturing any talk of books out of apprehension that it might be construed as showy.

The power of fiction is real although saying it brazenly may sound something like an oxymoron. We all know that Einstein produced the theory of relativity, but many of us do not know that the scientist had also read Dostoevsky’s ‘The Brothers Karamazov’, a 19th century’s philosophical Russian novel. Our off the cuff reply to any suggestion about reading a good work of fiction would be: Oh, I don’t have time for novels.

A TIME magazine’s recent cover story on Iran informed us that ‘Les Miserables’, by Hugo was Ali Khamenai’s favourite novel. Wise people worldwide draw strength from wonderful fiction. It was the power of fiction that Jews relied on to move the world to their cause. Naguib Mahfouz employed prose to enthral the world with the tales of Nile Valley’s civilisation. Will we also use good fiction to improve our lot?