Travel in Books - Balochistan: Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Iran

(Para versão em Português mudar o idioma na caixa no canto superior direito de EN para PT se estiveres num PC. No telemóvel clica no símbolo com as 3 barras horizontais no canto superior direito e depois muda de EN para PT na caixa no topo da página)

Books

• 📖The Wandering Falcon - Jamil Ahmad | 🌍 Baluchistan around 1950

  
  

The Wandering Falcon

by Jamil Ahmad

First, I must apologize to Portuguese readers, as I was unable to find a Portuguese translation of this book. However, as I’ve mentioned before, perhaps this is the perfect opportunity for you to begin learning a new language and explore literature in different languages! This book is certainly worth the effort, as there are few works from this particular region translated from the native languages.

About "The Wandering Falcon", it is a book about the life of nomadic tribes in Baluchistan. Baluchistan is a region located between Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran, composed of arid deserts and brutal mountains, where several nomadic tribes live.

The book describes the life of Tor Baz, a boy that wanders in the region and between the different tribes. The book captures well how people from this region need to deal with the sedentary people in villages, endure long survival journeys and how they need to be in constant vigil - for nature, for society and for its own people.

It is a raw book, it does not hide us what is the life of this people - the family values, the code of honour, the cruelty of being a woman, the harsh but at the same time fragility of being a man and the oppression of a society. It revolt us for them and for us that tend to interfere for example creating borders between countries - what is a border for a nomad? Nothing! What they see is a fertile land, a mountain, a desert and a survival opportunity for another season for them and their animals.

This is not an easy book to read, even if we set aside our criticism. The book remains an exploration of truth, if we can read between the lines of the tales written. Each chapter stands as a tale for itself, and the thread that ties them all together is Tor Baz, the wandering boy who lives through the tales.

In summary, it is a book about how wandering and human survival are closely tied together and makes societies evolve. It shows a truthful human essence when nothing is granted and survival is a matter of physical and mental strength or, as it often seems, a matter of luck in the genetic lottery. With this reality in mind, one must ask: If you were in their shoes, would you act differently?

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Some citations from the book:

About the nomadic life and the pressure from society:

"The Kharot tribe numbered about a million men whose lives were spent in wandering with the seasons. In autumn, they would gather their flocks of sheep and herds of camels, fold up their woven woolen tents and start moving. They spent the winter in the plains, restlessy moving from place to place as each opportunity to work came to an end. Sometimes they merely let their animals take the decisions for them. When the grazing was exhausted in one area, the animals forced them to move on to another site.

With the coming of spring they would start back to the highlands, their flocks heavy with fat and wool, the caravans loaded with food and provisions purchased out of the proceeds of work and trading; men, women and children displaying bits of finery they had picked up in the plains. This way of life had endured for centuries, but it would not last for ever. It constituted defiance to certain concepts, which the world was beginning to associate with civilization itself. Concepts such as statehood, citizenship, undivided loyalty to one state; settled life as opposed to nomadic life, and the writ of the state as opposed to tribal discipline.

The pressures were inexorable. One set of values, one way of life had to die."

"What can we tell him? The truth, replied the son. What else? How will it help him? The animals are going to die. Hundreds of them. They walked along silently for a while, thinking about the effect the new policy would have on them and their people. There was no way for them to obtain travel documents for thousands of their tribesmen; they had no birth certificates, no identity papers or health documents. They could not document their animals. The new system would certain mean the death of a centuries-old way of life".

About lessons of survival:

"Remember what the old man said? His face brimmed with laughter as he turned to you and answered in a serious manner. "The secret is raw onions. I eat raw onions and I survive". And then over your head his eyes met mine and we understood each other. What he told you that day was the secret of life itself. One lives and survives only if one has the ability to swallow and digest bitter and unpalatable things. We, you and I, and our people shall live because there are only a few among us who do not love raw onions".

About the reality of change:

"In the innocence of youth, he had imagined that he would not be a hypocritical mullah like his father, but would break away. But before he was too old, he realized with some little fear that his life would be no different from his father's. The learnt the scriptures and prepared himself for the life of a mullah, wondering whether his father too in his childhood had thought of breaking away but had given up his struggle when he found the mesh too strong".

If you have other book suggestions with stories that tell the History of Baluchistan but specially the people that lives in this area let me know and remember leave your can and explore the world!

By yours: Uncanned Sardine