Mother's Testament: 6 A letter of parting

The days continued to pass in their endless stream. Once Gyuli and the other women had finished digging the aryks they changed to irrigating the wheat. One hot day, as they took their lunchtime rest and were drinking tea in the shade of some trees, their ketmens laid aside, Tursun arrived unexpectedly and went up to Gyuli. ‘Kichik-apa, my mother has asked you to stop work for today and go home.’

            ‘What’s happened? Is something the matter?’

            ‘I don’t know’ is all that the boy let slip, and it seemed to her, as he turned and hurried away, that he was hiding something from her. For several days, ever since her bad dream, Gyuli had remained in an anxious state, and now she sensed trouble. A sudden weakness came over her whole body and she looked at her companions helplessly. When they saw her condition they all urged her to go. ‘Go home, go on, you should go and see what’s happened. It must be something or she wouldn’t have sent for you.’ Then Mervanam got up and said to Gyuli: ‘Whatever it is, I’m coming with you.’ She straightened up her dress and the two women set off.

            When they reached the house, out of breath, they were met by silence in the yard. The door to the house stood ajar. Gyuli crossed the threshold and found Kurvan-aka and the village elders, Mahmut-aka, Davut-aka and Zair-aka inside. They were all sitting with mournful faces, and Gyuli felt her heart break loose and begin pounding convulsively in her chest. She was barely able to bid them good day. Then she saw Hadzhyar, sitting by the window with tear-stained eyes. Unable to utter a word, Gyuli dropped her gaze to the floor and froze in that position, biting on a corner of her shawl. Silence filled the room until it was broken by the soft, sorrowful voice of Zair. ‘Daughter, as you know, “where there is life there is also death”. We have received news that Tair has died. Be strong!’

            It was as though Gyuli did not hear the last two words. Her face turned as pale as the wall, her lips went blue and then she fell unconscious to the floor.

            The old woman called out to Mervanam: ‘Get some cold water and splash her face.’

            The two women sprinkled Gyuli’s face and began to rub her hands and shoulders. She came to, looked round bewildered and broke down in tears.

            ‘Come now, my dear, be strong! Remember you’ve got three children.’

            The pain of loss was familiar and understandable for old Zair. He squatted down and began reading from the Qur’an. After this they all expressed their condolences to Gyuli and to old Hadzhyar and left the sorrow-filled house. Maysimyam came and tearfully embraced her sister. They wept together at length, clinging tightly to one another. The children came in, and without understanding what had happened, clung to their mother and cried with her. As she held them tightly to herself she wailed all the more. ‘My poor little orphans, my little lambs! Your mother’s suffering has still not come to an end. Your father has been taken from us – he’s been kept from us for ever! O Tair, my love! And he’s taken away the dreams we had together… O Lord, did you only bring me into this world in order to suffer?’

            ‘Gyuli, please, don’t grieve so much, you’ll frighten the children,’ urged Mervanam, though she was crying as well.

            The tragic news spread fast round the village, and one by one, friends and relatives began to visit. Again and again the air trembled with groaning and weeping. When Gyuli saw Tair’s menfriends also weeping for him, she howled in despair: ‘I’ve lost my Tair, Dzhelil! How much he longed to come home. Tair, your children have become orphans! My poor Tair, how much they tortured you, my Tair…’

            Old Hadzhyar looked tearfully towards Gyuli and tried to persuade her to calm down, but was unable to restrain her own weeping.

            The elderly Zaynaphan, who had come to give her condolences, thought back to the death of her own daughter and said tearfully to Gyuli: ‘We have to hold out through everything that we are sent, my dear. What can we do? Now you’ll have to act as the children’s father as well as being their mother. And may God make it easy for you.’

            The other women spoke in agreement. Then when old Rozihan arrived together with Alahan and Tadzhigul, who had been her companions during the difficult years in exile, another wave of lamenting filled the room. Each of them was also grieving for the suffering that had been their own lot.

            Gyuli’s friends Mervanam, Mariyam and Zaynaphan, who had taken charge of the kazan, began to prepare omach, a soup containing pieces of dough. So, although Tair’s body was somewhere far away, his people remembered him with a traditional omach and then went to their homes.

            Tair’s death struck Gyuli like a bolt of lightning. She could not come to terms with her loss, nor come back to her ordinary self. The dream she had continued to nourish, that one day he would come home and they would live happily together, was gone. Ahead of her lay nothing but tribulations. Would she have the strength to face them, or would she, like Tair, eventually succumb and cease living in this world? Yet if she – then what would become of the children? Horrified at having entertained such a thought, she said to herself firmly: ‘No, never think like that. I need to live, for the sake of the children – who are Tair’s and mine!’ She looked up to the sky, where the bright, joyful sun was casting its golden rays generously upon all.

            Less than a month after the arrival of the tragic news, the postman Masim-aka brought Tair’s last letter. Gyuli had just returned from the fields, stoked the fire in the hearth and begun to prepare the evening meal.

            She took the letter and pressed it feverishly to her heart, then opened the envelope with trembling hands. She read:

            ‘Hello, my dear ones! How are you? Have you returned home safely? Gyuli, my love, you are a courageous woman and I believe that you have great power of will. The very fact that you are bringing up our three children, despite all the hardships and humiliation, is heroism in itself. I am forever glad to have been able to spend those happy days with you in the house that we built together.

            ‘If you are wondering how it is for us here, then I will tell you that many have died, unable to survive the back-breaking work and the appalling conditions. And I too am lying down and am seriously ill. For the sake of the children and for your sake I ask Allah for good health, but who knows what will be? Gyuli, if something should happen to me in these distant lands, please tell the children when they are a little older that their father was a prominent man, kind and brave, honest, but never was he an ‘enemy of the people’. All that is a lie. The day will come when people will realise that we were pure and honest, that we worked for the people tirelessly. But for now, we – thousands of intellectuals along with ordinary uneducated people – have been made the victims of a loathsome policy. If I could come back home I would tell you how many good and worthy people have died because of this policy. How much I long to come home, to see you and to talk with you heart to heart! But with every day that passes I am growing weaker. Gyuli, the Tair you knew is no more. I am like a skeleton with skin stretched over it; my heart goes on softly beating, but the rest of my body died long ago. Gyuli, you are the dearest thing to me in this world. So now, although you are left without me, please bring up our three children. I ask Allah that you will be able to see them grow, mature and achieve something in life. Kiss the children and hold them for me. Please give my greetings to my relatives and friends. And be happy.’

            It looked as though Tair had wept as he wrote the letter. Tears were spattered on the paper, together with drops of blood from when he had coughed, which made some of the words impossible to read. Gyuli re-read the letter several times and stood fixed, deep in her thoughts. She then remembered the dream she had had the previous Friday. In the dream, Tair seemed to be lying beside her. He said, ‘Why is there such an enormous distance between us? I was only just able to reach you. Gyuli, my love, I cannot live without you, and that is why I have flown to you, to take you with me.’ After saying this, he caressed Gyuli and kissed her. She answered him sadly: ‘Tair, I would go with you without hesitating for a moment, but the children are still small and I cannot leave them.’ She lifted her hand to touch him, but Tair had vanished.

            Then Gyuli had woken, shaken, her heart beating wildly and her body shivering. Remembering the dream now, she let her eyes roam about the room. It felt to her as though Tair were here in the house. ‘He’s leaving, but Tair’s spirit has come to us.’ Wiping her tears on her sleeve, she got up. She had no right to sit idle – the children needed to be fed.

            That night Gyuli could not sleep. Whenever she closed her eyes she saw Tair lying withered and exhausted. The sight of him like this crushed her heart with pain and made her eyes fill with tears.

            Next morning she rose early, washed, whispered ‘Bismillah’ and filled a tea-bowl with clear cold water. She said a long prayer in remembrance of Tair, drank the water and then, paying no attention to anything, went out into the yard.

            From the cowshed there came the mooing of the calf. It was probably hungry. Gyuli’s first task every morning was to check up on the animals and chickens. But today, like somebody who was entirely carefree, with no obligations to anybody, she heard neither the mooing of the calf nor the clucking of the chickens…

            The sun rose higher. Gyuli went into the garden and breathed deeply of the cool morning air. Her gaze fell upon some trees in the garden that Tair had planted and upon the wattle fence of willow switches and thorny twigs that they had built together to enclose the garden. But then she thought: ‘It’s no use dreaming. I need to get busy if the children are to eat.’ She picked up the ketmen and began loosening the soil around the pumpkin and weeding among the potatoes, then brought water from the aryk to water the aubergine, tomatoes and peppers. She was so occupied with her work that she did not notice how much she was perspiring. A sense arose in her that together with the perspiration, she was also sweating away her suffering and anguish, and she began to feel more at ease.

            Old Hadzhyar came out carrying a cast-iron chugun and was pleased to see that Gyuli had had the sense to occupy herself with work. While she made tea, Gyuli went to milk the cow, took the cow out to the herd, then fed the chickens, cleaned out the cowshed and managed to mould a few more dung bricks.

            Now the whole family sat down to morning tea. ‘You must have got up with the sun,’ said Hadzhyar to Gyuli, ‘you’ve got so much done in the garden!’

            In the last few days Gyuli’s face had become even more brown and she had grown still thinner. Yet although her eyes concealed sorrow, she said, calmly and unexpectedly: ‘Yes, I couldn’t sleep any longer, and then when I went into the garden there was so much work staring at me. So I did some before going out to the field. Selimyam, would you and Saniyam please weed the two onion beds in the vegetable patch? The onions have done well, but there are a lot of weeds. But make sure you weed them carefully and don’t trample any of the onions, all right?’

            ‘Of course, mother. And you’ve sown osma and hina for us too?’

            ‘Yes, the osma is next to the onions. I sowed the hina along the side of the aryk, and I think it’s already started growing. And would you weed the flowers as well, but be very careful not to pull up the flowers together with the weeds. Yadikar, you’re not to go out in the street – just play in the yard.’

            ‘Mama, I want to go and play with Arup next door.’

            Hadzhyar finished drinking her tea, swept the crumbs from the table into a bowl and raised her hands for prayer. The others followed. Then Gyuli heard women’s voices in the street and stood up. ‘Be good children now and don’t be a nuisance to your moma, she said, then picked up the lunch that the old woman had prepared for her, placed the ketmen on her shoulder and went out of the yard.

            Though they were poorly dressed and half-starved, the women and girls did not complain as they went out to the fields, but instead kept their spirits up with jokes and banter. And today, once they had properly irrigated the wheat, they all gathered together for lunch and began talking. ‘Oi, boss, go and get some tea,’ called out Mervanam, seeing Shavdun riding past on his horse.

            ‘Thanks. And you, you can have a rest, but don’t forget about the water.’ He said nothing more and turned towards the village.

            ‘Poor old Shavdun. He’s got a lot older and so thin,’ said Adalyat sorrowfully, watching him riding away. Adalyat was a woman of medium height with a white face, attractive eyes and brows and a name that suited her very well. It came from the Arabic name adel, meaning ‘just’ or ‘fair’. People respected her – maybe because she was a little older than the others, or perhaps because she looked after them all.

            ‘Well, find him a suitable woman and marry him off,’ chuckled Zaynap.

            ‘Who’d want him in the state he’s in at the moment?’ asked one of the others.

            ‘Well, heaven knows, he’s so pathetic because he’s on his own. But get him hitched to a good woman and she’d scrub him and dress him up and he’d soon be the big dzhigit again,’ said Adalyat, demonstrating with her thumb.

            ‘It’s so long since Zoryam died. Poor thing, and he’s left with two children. But at least he’s still got Zoryam’s mother – how’d he manage without her?’ said Maryam.

            ‘Well,’ said Adalyat, playfully, ‘why not marry him to  Saadat?’ She gave a crafty smile and glanced inquisitively at Saadat. Saadat’s eyes widened and she hid behind Gyuli.

            ‘What are you looking at me like that for? Isn’t Shavdun your type, then?’

            ‘No, he isn’t. When I want someone I’ll find him myself,’ said Saadat, hurt, and got up and went off with a friend to look for segiz.

            ‘Oi, just look at her,’ said Adalyat, finishing her tea. Then her look fell upon Gyuli who was sitting opposite her.

            Nobody dared to joke with Gyuli. Her face was serious and gloomy. Fearing that Adalyat might turn her attention to her next, Gyuli got up and tossed her ketmen onto her shoulder. ‘You go on and finish your tea. I’m off for a while.’

            Mervanam followed her. They walked along the aryk, directing water to where it was needed and gathered two large heaps of brushwood; these they tied up ready to take home with them. Mindful of the harsh cold of winter, Gyuli gathered a bundle of brushwood almost every day.

            That evening, when she had returned home with the bundle of firewood on her back, she found old Momun, Tadzhigul’s father, and her mother, the elderly Patam waiting for her. Once they had exchanged the traditional greetings and asked one another after their health and family affairs, the old man said: ‘Gyuli, we’ve only just heard the news about Tair. Tadzhigul told us today, so we have come to express our condolences, to remember Tairzhan and to pray for him.’

‘And you can’t change what fate deals you, so you will have to take courage and be patient,’ said Patam, wiping her tears. ‘It would have been wonderful if Tairzhan had come home to you, but what can you do? It wasn’t to be. So, daughter, you need to be strong. Let your children carry the light of Tairzhan. Good health to them all.’

Momun read from the Qur’an, remembered Tair and prayed at length. The old woman and Gyuli thanked him and then started discussing household matters. While they did so, Selimyam set the dzhoza table in the middle of the room and placed a cloth over it.

‘I’ve brought some things,’ said Patam, and put on the table a bowl of zhutta, four small nan, two packets of tea, material for a dress for Gyuli and a shawl for Hadzhyar. ‘Hadzhyarhan, Gyuli, please at least accept these little things. Don’t be offended that we weren’t able to come to express our sympathy at the proper time.’

Hadzhyar and Gyuli stood up and thanked her. ‘Why, you didn’t need to worry, Patamhan. We’re grateful that you have come from Zharkent to give your condolences,’ said Hadzhyar.

Gyuli and Tadzhigul went out to the kazan and poured out the suyuk ash that the old woman had prepared for them. To the four eggs she had fried in the kazan she added beans, pumpkin seeds and a little basil and coriander for seasoning. They then brought the tasty-smelling lapsha into the room and served it into bowls. Maysimyam arrived, and Gyuli noticed that she had come alone and asked why Kurvan-aka was not with her.

‘He only came home for a minute, he just had his dinner and went straight back out to the fields. They’ll be ploughing until dawn.’

They ate unhurriedly, talking about past times. When the old Patam and Hadzhyar started discussing their relatives it became apparent that they were in fact related.

Wiping the sweat from his brow with a white cloth after the hot food, Momun began to speak about the death of Tair. ‘In my seventy years I’ve seen much that is good and much that is bad. As far as I can see, these troubles have spared nobody. My own elder brother Akvyar, an imam, was condemned and then arrested. He was a believer and he never meddled in anything – all he did was pray to God and taught Islam in the medrese. But one evening in 1937 he was accused of issuing anti-Soviet propaganda. They interrogated him, they tortured him and in the end they branded him an ‘enemy of the people’ and sent him to one of the Siberian camps. After some time we received a document confirming that he was dead. My poor brother – in his declining years, clearly he couldn’t survive this torment. All this was a terrible ordeal, both for my brother’s family and for us.’ He wiped his eyes with the kerchief; they had begun to shine with tears.

Moved by the old man’s story, Hadzhyar now told them about her husband Mahammyat, tears also building in her eyes. ‘What didn’t we suffer, all of us? How much patience we humans have! And Tair also was no stranger to me – he was the son of Mahammyat’s sister. But now, here I am, grown old and living with Gyuli, looking after her children. I thank heaven for these times.’

‘You’re right, Hadzhyarhan, helping each other out and talking peacefully over tea – this is how we can comfort one another. What could be better, in fact? Our Tadzhigul could hardly work on the kolkhoz – she’s so weak she can barely look after the children. Grandfather and I have decided to take her and the children to Zharkent, where she can get treatment. God willing, Askar-zhan will come back home. And Gyuli, there is a saying – “a good thing is never forgotten”. For three years you did all you could to look after our daughter, and we will never forget that. May God grant that you will see your children’s good fortune in life.’ Tears ran down old Patam’s hollowed cheeks as she spoke, burning her face.

Gyuli served the zhutta that Patam had brought on plates and poured hot, freshly-made aktyan-chay into bowls. They went on talking for a long time, discussing the things they had experienced and suffered. Each of them began to feel a sense of ease. When, after the prayer at the end of the meal, the guests got up from their places, Tadzhigul embraced Gyuli tightly. ‘All good health to you, sister. I don’t know whether we’ll see meet again. God knows. Thank you again so much for everything.’

She was very pale and thin. Every now and again she would cough and break out in sweat. Gyuli saw that the spark of hope in her eyes was fading, and said to her: ‘Tadzhigul, sister, don’t cry. You’ll recover. Tell yourself you’re going to live for the sake of your children. Then you’ll get better.’

But Tadzhigul’s eyes were like a dying flame. The two women, who had overcome all the tribulations of three years of exile, both sensed that they would not see each other again.

Some time later came the news that Tadzhigul had died. As though she had lost a member of her immediate family, Gyuli cried out bitterly: ‘What sort of a treacherous world is this? They say that death is indifferent to young and old, but who’s to blame for Tadzhigul, still so young, going down with an incurable illness? What have her parents done to deserve this, and her children left as orphans? What will happen to them?’ She tried to puzzle these questions herself, then, finding no answer, broke down in tears.

* * *

‘My story isn’t boring you, is it?’ Mehriban looked over at Ruth.

‘No, of course not! Far from it – the characters of your book are becoming real for me. I’m impatient to know what happens to them all later.’

‘You know, we were brought up in the Soviet system, which taught us to show great respect to people who wear medals and decorations on their chests. This is because they fought at the front for our peace and safety, and we are well aware of this fact. And yet, just think how much effort was also expended by the women who stayed at home in the villages, who replaced the men in the fields – and how much their health was sacrificed, working outside in the rain, in the cold, and knee-deep in mud. They grew wheat and carried sacks of grain on their frail shoulders, along with all the hardships of those times! None of them got medals or decorations, and many people nowadays have no idea of how much, through their hard work, they helped bring Victory Day closer. They worked from morning to night and were paid only a scoop of roasted wheat per day, yet those women never gave up – on the contrary, they put their will to the test and held out. We are still amazed today by their resilience. Today’s young people simply can’t imagine the conditions in which those women had to live. For them it’s just a legend.

‘And yet they had reasons to be grateful for their lot. They could sell vegetables from their plots and take eggs from their chickens to the shops, and they became skilled at buying meat and butter at the bazaar and tea, salt, soap and sweets in the shops. They thanked God for all this, saying they’d go through anything for the sake of the children, to ensure that they never know war and could live in peace. There were women from our village like this, who were able to live through anything, regardless.’

‘I saw a film,’ said Ruth, ‘that highlighted the heroic efforts of Russian women during the Second World War. Your tale has only confirmed this.’

Mother's Testament: 5 The scent of the home country

In Koktal Gyuli and Tadzhigul again shared a house, and were well used to helping one another. Alahan, with her mother and her children, also managed to make the move. Things were a little easier here, as they were allowed to see their relatives and friends.

Tadzhigul’s parents and relatives began to visit her and bring food. When they learned from their daughter how Gyuli had helped her and the children, they vowed to pray for her good health every day.

Gyuli’s sister Maysimyam also soon came to Koktal together with her elder son Tursun. She gasped when she saw how Gyuli had aged and grown thin over the past two years. The two sisters held each other and wept for a long time.

‘Well, the worst is behind us,’ said Maysimyam eventually. ‘At least the children are healthy. And life in the village is slowly getting back to normal as well.’

Gyuli asked her about old Hadzhyar.

‘She’s still living in your house,’ said Maysimyam. ‘She’s planted the garden and is keeping chickens. My sons Tursun and Turgan built her a chicken coop. She’s getting quite old, but she’s still coping by herself.’

‘How is she managing with the animals?’

‘After you were sent away, people from the government came and announced that all animals owned by enemies of the people now belonged to the kolkhoz. We wept and made a fuss and eventually persuaded them to let us keep the calf. It turned out to be a heifer. She calved just a few days ago. Hadzhyar-ana does not have the strength to milk her, so Turgan does it. And so, thank God, we’re alive and well. And now, you tell me about your ordeals.’

‘What haven’t I gone through in these two years?’ said Gyuli quietly. ‘Look at me and you’ll see. I lived only for the children and worked round the clock to put bread on the table. I endured it all for the hope of coming home.’ Tears were running down her cheeks.

           

Now Selimyam and Saniyam came rushing and shouting into the house and threw their arms around their aunt. Little Yadikar huddled up to his mother and watched Maysimyam in silence.

Tursun picked Yadikar up and exclaimed. ‘Well, well, Yadikar, what a big dzhigit you’ve become already!’

Maysimyam meanwhile was doting on the girls. ‘My my, mama’s little helpers, how you’ve grown!’ She kissed and hugged them repeatedly.

Tadzhigul offered them all tea. They sat down at the table, talking excitedly, and their anxiety faded. The two sisters kept looking at each other and talked unceasingly. Maysimyam and her son spent the night with Gyuli and returned home next morning.

Gyuli threw herself into work of all kinds in Koktal to provide for the children. At the same time she also applied in writing to all manner of official posts for permission to return home; she longed to go back to the little house she and Tair had built and where they had been happy. Another year passed. Then, in springtime, the three exiled families were granted permission to return home. The women and their children joyfully loaded up a truck and by evening they were back in Bolshoy Chigan. Old Rozihan lifted up her wrinkled hands and exclaimed: ‘Oh, my Allah, thank you! We’ve come home alive. There is nothing else for us to wish for!’

The sentiment that there is no place like home is surely true for most people if not all, and the older a person gets, the more he or she appreciates it. Longing for home is most poignant for those who are forced to remain far away. And that evening the three returning families would be able to breathe deeply the air of their native village and inhale the aroma of the food they had known since they were children. By the time they arrived, however, it was growing dark. They would have to wait until the next day before they could take a look around the village to see what had changed.

Gyuli jumped down, took some of the sacks containing their belongings and started down the familiar little path to her house. Behind her rushed Selimyam and Saniyam, all the while outrunning each other and gripped by an irrepressible joy. They were the first to burst into the yard, and began trying to outdo each other in banging on the door. Inside, old Hadzhyar had dozed off. She got up and came to the door, worried by the unexpected arrival. Seeing the two girls, however, she stood, overcome, unable to believe her eyes. With shaking hands she pulled them to her. ‘O my Maker! Is this really you?’

Now Gyuli caught up and also embraced the old woman. ‘Will you have us back, my dear?’ She was smiling and weeping at the same time. ‘We’ve come home!’

Hadzhyar-ana came to her senses and began fussing about and chattering. ‘Well I thought I’d die without seeing you again. But here you are at last! My little nanny-goats have come home. O Allah! How long these three years have been!’

The excited group went inside. Hadzhyar sighed deeply when she saw how dark and thin Gyuli had become, and even wept a little out of pity for her. Then she began fussing again and put everything on the table that she had managed to gather and preserve: milk, cream, curd and kurt.

Soon the whole family was sitting and drinking hot, fragrant tea. They looked at each other over and over, smiling with happiness. Selimyam and Saniyam laughed and ran from room to room. Yadikar tried to run along after his sisters, but fell, then got up and got back to running after them. Gyuli looked round at the familiar walls, where every corner and every detail reminded her of her youth and her love, of Tair’s tender glances and of the birth of her children. Soon, however, their warmth and happiness brought on tiredness and they began to fall asleep. Their faces were softened by hope and joy, and they were protected in their sleep by their own home.

           

Early next morning Gyuli went out into the yard. Greedily she gulped in the cool fresh air of her home village. She paced about the yard, looking at everything closely. The crowing of cocks, the barking of dogs, the birdsong and the smell of smoke from the chimney in the morning silence gave the village a homely feel and heightened her sense of relief. She sat down on a bench in the arbour and remembered her father’s words: ‘Love the land where you were born. Value everything, from the sky to the smallest blade of grass. Respect all people, and obey your father and mother, your husband and your relatives.’ She wondered where her parents were now. Were they even alive?

As Gyuli sat there deep in thought, the old woman came out of the house with the kumgan for performing her ablutions. ‘You’re up early, daughter… Couldn’t you sleep?’

‘I slept soundly in my own house,’ smiled Gyuli. ‘But now I can’t get enough of this fresh air’.

‘The old people say: “In your own home the heart rejoices and the feet are free”. I’ve planted pumpkin and convolvulus around the edge of the shed, and on the other side of the ditch I’ve put marigolds.’ Hadzhyar-ana proudly showed Gyuli her handiwork.

Gyuli washed herself, then went to the cowshed, bucket in hand. Just then Maysimyam’s son Turgan ran into the yard.

           

‘I’ll do the milking for you, apa!’ he called out. When he saw Gyuli, the boy stopped and threw up his hands. ‘Why, kichik-apa! When did you get here?’ He ran to hug her. ‘I’ll tell mother, and then I’ll take your cow out to the herd.’ He darted away.

Gyuli woke her daughters. No sooner had they put away their bedding and put the table in place when Kurvan-aka arrived with Maysimyam and their children. They all embraced and began smiling and gazing at one another. Eventually they settled down. Kurvan-aka, sitting in the place of honour, glanced at Gyuli, then at her children, and said: ‘You’ve suffered a lot while you were away. Still, true heroes that you are, you held out through it all and have made it safely home. You should spend some time settling in and recovering – take ten days to rest – and then you will have to join the women working in the fields. We’re at our busiest time at the moment. I’ll tell the brigadir.’

Gyuli nodded gratefully. ‘There is only one thing I ask of God, which is that our children never have to face such evil times as we had to undergo.’

Rumours of the return of the three families sent to Chilik now spread all through the village. Gyuli’s friends came by to welcome her home and to hear her tales of life in exile.

After just a couple of days Gyuli started working, filling in the places where the plasterwork had come away with a mixture of wet clay, planting vegetables in the garden and sowing seeds for flowers. Old Hadzhyar warmed herself in the sun and admired her hard-working daughter. ‘The old people say that work loves the young,’ she said. ‘Gyuli, when you came back, happiness returned here. And everything started to shine, in the house and in the yard.’

‘And thank you, ana, for looking after the house so well,’ Gyuli replied. ‘You’ve taken good care of it for these three years. Thank you a thousand times, and may you live for ever!’

‘Well, in the meantime, Rihanbuvi and her daughter Saram and her children were living in my own house,’ said Hadzhyar-ana. But back in the spring one of the walls fell in. My house got damp all through and has completely collapsed.’

‘Don’t worry about that. You’ll come and live with us, won’t you? You’re like my own mother to me, after all.’

‘Hmmm. Once I was considered to be the hardest-working labourer in the village, but look how decrepit I’ve become.’ Hadzhyar-ana looked at her wrinkled hands.

Gyuli stroked the old woman’s grey hair. ‘Ana, you can grow old with dignity if you stay with us. You’ve never been a burden to anyone and you help other people out. Everybody still looks up to you today.’ She kissed the old woman repeatedly.

From the hen-house came the voices of Selimyam and Saniyam: ‘Moma, we’ve given the chickens their grain. They’re all pecking at it, but the white broody one won’t move.’

‘Leave the white hen alone. She’s hatching her eggs,’ warned Hadzhyar. ‘When she’s ready she’ll get up by herself and will eat and drink.’

           

The old woman felt lightness in her heart. God had not granted her children of her own, and yet, in her twilight years, she had been given these wonderful children. She was grateful to Gyuli for what she had said and felt happy.

‘Gyuli, Maysimyam’s invited us for tea today,’ she reminded her daughter, then bustled happily off to the chicken coop.

Maysimyam served her long-awaited visitors with large flatbreads fried in butter with onion and poured out fragrant aktyan-chay. Everything showed that her home life was falling into place. Now that Kurvan-aka had assumed his function of tractor-driver and worked by the sweat of his brow, the kolkhoz management had begun to appreciate him. Yet he always remained his old self: he was taciturn, even-tempered, open and direct. Life had not indulged him. When he had been a boy Kurvan had had to give up school in order to help his parents. He respected educated people and did everything to enable his sons to continue their education in Zharkent once they finished school. ‘Go on studying,’ he would say to his sons Tursun and Turgan, ‘or you’ll end up like me, breathing dust and overburdening your back.’

When they were not studying, his sons joined the other young people working in the fields or digging aryks. In the villages, children as young as ten would go out to help the adults. When Tursun finished school, Kurvan-aka said to him: ‘Balam, there’s a pedagogical college in Zharkent. You should go there and train to be a teacher – and then you will be respected. Teaching children is sacred work.’ The son’s wishes coincided with the father’s desire, and Tursun entered the college. His parents were very pleased and his sisters, anxious not to be left behind by their brothers, also did well at school.

Gyuli delighted in hearing this news and was pleased for her sister and brother-in-law. ‘I wish I could educate my children too, so that they could be of service to others,’ she said wistfully.

‘You can do that now, Gyuli,’ said Kurvan-aka. ‘There’s been a decree that from now on, “children are not answerable for the deeds of their fathers”. Sepiyam’s teacher told us about it. So now your girls are allowed to go to school.’

Gyuli felt her spirits rise. Then Hadzhyar also broke into a smile. Meanwhile Kurvan-aka went on unhurriedly. ‘It’s been hard for us as well. We didn’t manage to bring in the cotton in the autumn, so had to go out and pick it in the snow. The villagers were out there knee-deep in snow, half-clothed and without shoes, working their fingers to the bone. A lot of them died as a result. But as of this year – at last – we won’t be sowing cotton. Let them grow it where it’s warmer. We’re changing over to wheat, oats and maize. This will be a massive relief for everyone.’

Next morning Gyuli cleaned out the cowshed and then set to moulding wet dung bricks on the wall, ready to dry out in the sun. While she was doing this, Shavdun rode up to her fence on his horse and announced: ‘From today you will take your ketmen and go out to the fields. Our women are digging the aryks and irrigating the wheat.’ He then turned his horse abruptly and rode off.

Shavdun looked haggard and was covered in dust. He had tried to avoid eye contact with Gyuli. Clearly, she thought, he had not recovered after his wife’s death. Meanwhile Gyuli was secretly pleased to have been called to join the work brigade; she longed to be part of the communal work again and to be alongside her friends.

‘Very good, my dear,’ nodded Hadzhyar when she heard about Shavdun’s order. ‘If they’ve called you, then go and work. I’ll look after the house and the children.’

Gyuli told Selimyam and Saniyam to keep a close watch on Yadikar. He was a playful and curious little boy. His mother tied some lunch up for herself in a shawl, threw her ketmen over her shoulder and went out into the road. Some of her friends were already coming towards her: Mervanam, Mariyam, Zaynaphan and other women. They thrilled to see Gyuli join them, and they chattered cheerfully as they walked, scarcely noticing when they arrived at the work site.

Out in the field, all was a frenzy of brightness and colour and the air was laden with the scent of flowers. This multi-coloured world was bewitching and stirring to the soul. How they loved these places! They could never get enough of admiring the beauty here. These vast fields, these trees with their spreading crowns of branches. Gyuli kept seeming to see Tair, as though he were somewhere beside her…

Here, working again alongside her friends as they laughed, joked and sang, Gyuli felt her heart, long frozen, begin to warm through. Once more the days rushed by, barely noticed, and the horrors of the past years gradually began to fade. One Friday, however, Gyuli had a bad dream. She woke up in the night, shaken, and could not get back to sleep before morning. Inside her she sensed trouble. She did not, however, mention it to anybody.

* * *

‘So what was her dream about?’ asked Ruth with concern.

‘I’ll tell you about that later on,’ smiled Mehriban. She was pleased that Ruth was happy to go on listening.

Mother's Testament: 4 Wool and Clay

During the journey the mothers, surrounded by their crying children and gripped by the most morbid sense of foreboding, tried to make sense of their desperate plight. Among them was Alahan-hada, the mother of seven children. Her mother, the elderly Rozihan, was in tears the whole way. Alongside Gyuli was Tadzhigul with her two children. From time to time she would be overcome by bouts of coughing. 

           

‘Where are you from originally?’ Gyuli asked her.

‘I’m from Donmiallia, just outside Zharkent. We were a peasant family. My husband Askar’s parents crossed the border. They arrested Askar – they accused him of having contact with China, although he never received so much as a letter from there –’ Tadzhigul broke out in a fit of coughing that prevented her finishing. She put a handkerchief to her mouth to try to stifle the coughing.

           

Gyuli gave her some water and saw that the handkerchief was stained with blood. ‘I see you really are unwell. So how will you manage away from home?’

           

‘If I can just survive until Askar comes… I don’t want to leave the children as complete orphans.’ Tadzhigul looked at her son asleep in her arms. For the rest of their journey, Gyuli tried to help her wherever she could.

           

The three families, none of which had previously travelled further than Zharkent, were taken to the settlement of Chilik. They were dropped outside the Kolkhoz Workers’ Club, where many women, old people and children had already arrived from various districts: all members of the families of ‘enemies of the people’. There they were left to fend for themselves. The local inhabitants had learned from bitter experience and were wary of helping the new arrivals, so avoided them. There was no work here for the mothers, nor was there a chance of education for their children. The mothers begged for help, but their appeals went unanswered.

           

Their first task was to find some kind of shelter.           Gyuli with her three children, and Tadzhigul with two, settled in a half-ruined building with a single room. They did what they could to make it habitable, washing it out and putting the stove and kang in order. Gyuli took to walking through the village in search of some kind of work; the food they had brought from home had already run out. So she was delighted one day when, walking around the periphery, she discovered clay. Her mother knew how to fashion tono ovens from clay; she and her sister had used to help her when they were small. So, now the women would mould these ovens and sell them in order to feed their children.

           

Tadzhigul seized on the idea excitedly. The two women began heaping clay into sacks and dragging them to the house. Gyuli ripped open a quilt, made long ago by her mother, which was stuffed with wool. While she tore the wool up into small pieces, Tadzhigul and the girls fetched water from the aryk. After combining the wool with clay, Gyuli added water and began to puddle the mixture until it became a homogeneous mass. The heat and the heavy work caused her to sweat profusely, but there was nothing for it; they had to earn money and to feed the children.

           

To make a tono oven it was necessary to turn the clay mixture they had prepared twice a day, morning and evening. They sprinkled a little water over the place where the clay had been and covered it with old sacks to prevent it drying out. After six or seven days like this the clay mixture could be considered ‘ripe’. Now they would dig a hollow in the ground to suit the size of oven required, in which they laid the first layer of the mixture. Small pebbles were placed on top of each layer that would become very hot when the oven was fired. Each morning they added another layer, and a further each evening, with a slightly smaller diameter each time. The result was a dome-shaped oven with an opening in the top – a tono. Now the oven was built, it had to be thoroughly dried out in the sun. Anybody who bought an oven was advised to carefully light a fire of dry dung bricks in it for six consecutive days, as this would cure the inside of the oven properly and give it a protective coating of carbon. Only after following this procedure should they fire the oven with wood to bake their nan flatbreads.

           

Despite the laborious work and the heat of high summer, Gyuli did not wait for the first oven to dry before she started on the next. And one by one she began to sell the ovens to the local women.

           

Selling the tono became a profitable undertaking for Gyuli. She was happy because this gave her an income with which she could support her family.

           

One day on her way home she bumped into Alahan, the mother of seven.

           

‘Good heavens,’ Alahan exclaimed, ‘how thin you’ve become! Have you been ill or something?’

‘Not at all, my dear Alahan, I’m in good health. It’s just that I’ve been making clay ovens in this heat. And thanks to that I’ve been able to go to the bazaar and buy flour, meat, butter and vegetables. And how are you? How are you managing to feed your children?’

           

The two fellow-villagers got talking. Alahan remarked that Gyuli had not only lost weight but was also sunburnt. Her eyes had become sunken and she had wrinkles that extended to her temples. She had aged by ten years.

           

‘Gyuli, come and see us this evening,’ Alahan said to her. ‘I’ll teach you some lighter work.’

           

Gyuli nodded agreement and went home. Scarcely had she opened the door before she heard Selimyam’s voice:

           

‘It’s Mama! Mama’s back! We’re hungry! Tadzhigul-hada has fallen over again.’ The girl was holding her baby brother Yadikar, whom she now held out to her mother.

           

Gyuli put down her sack and picked up little Yadikar, then went to see Tadzhigul. She felt the other woman’s forehead.

           

‘I’m already feeling better, sister. Please don’t be angry with me for being such a burden,’ she began.

‘Don’t you ever say such things! It is important that we are here for each other.’

‘Well, you know the saying: I’ve no strength, but can’t tell you where it hurts,’ Tadzhigul said, trying to smile. ‘My sight went dark and I fainted.’

‘Let me go and make some noodle soup, or we’ll all be fainting with hunger.’

           

Selimyam and Aminam rushed to peel vegetables. Instead of squabbling, Gyuli’s and Tadzhigul’s children looked after Yadikar, played together and did domestic tasks. Yadikar could already crawl and was even trying to stand up.

           

The keen aroma of grilled, seasoned meat so taunted the ravenous children that they would have jumped into the big metal kazan; they did not take their eyes off it for a moment. As soon as the noodle soup was poured into the bowls the children fell upon the food greedily.

           

‘Sister, I will remember your kindness for the rest of my life. You have taken care of me like a mother.’

‘Enough words, hada. Eat up – you need to build up your strength,’ Gyuli replied.

           

While they were eating Selimyam remembered:

           

‘Oh yes, apa, an old woman came today asking for a tono and she said: “I’ll come by tomorrow by cart. Make sure your mother’s at home.” Apa, if you sell one and buy some flour, will you make us some nan?’

‘Yes, my little one, I’ll make nan, and I’ll buy you clothes for winter.’

           

Gyuli then also remembered that Alahan had invited her to visit. She ought to go and see what kind of light handicraft she had in mind for her.

           

After dark, Gyuli made her way stealthily to where Alahan lived. It was quiet all around, with only the occasional soft whistle of the night birds. She entered the house to find grandmother Rozihan surrounded by her grandchildren.

           

‘Ah, Gyuli, is that you? Alahan’s been waiting for you. Come in, sit down.’

           

Greeting her, Gyuli went in and sat down beside the old woman. Alahan brought some Uighur tea and started to talk about her life and situation.

           

‘Two of my older sons work on the plantation, harvesting melons. The foreman, Akhmat-aka, tells everyone that they are his relatives. Two of my daughters knit clothing, and I help them if I have spare time. I also managed to bring a hand-operated sewing machine from home. I sew all sorts of things on it – dresses, suits, quilted jackets. I cut down old clothes for the children. People give me vegetables or flour for this.’

‘Tell her about Big Dzhanyat,’ old Rozihan threw in to the conversation.

‘Big Dzhanyat lives on the next street. One time she brought her old coat to me and said, “My daughter’s getting married. Would you turn this old coat inside out and alter it for her.” I worked sewing that coat for four days, and when I gave it to her she did not even say thank you. Today I sent my daughter round to her, but she threw her out of her house grumbling “I’m sick of these orphans!” But that’s life – you do meet ungrateful people like this.’

‘If you haven’t experienced something like this, daughter, you’ll never understand somebody who has. They say the full man doesn’t understand the hungry, and for a good reason,’ grumbled grandmother Rozihan.

           

Alahan now leaned towards Gyuli. ‘And the light work I was talking about is yarn and knitting. In our house mother combs wool and spins thread, and the girls knit.’

           

‘When you get to my age spinning isn’t easy. Afterwards your hands ache all night,’ complained Rozihan. ‘Gyuli, I can teach you to spin.’

‘I’d be very happy for you to teach me a little.’

‘It’s easier than making ovens,’ Alahan remarked.

‘Tomorrow I’ll go to the bazaar and buy some wool, then I’ll come here for a lesson,’ Gyuli promised.

‘Are you getting letters from Tair?’ the old woman asked.

‘I’ve only had one, from Siberia. I wrote back straight away and now I’m waiting for a reply.’

‘It’s a harder life in those penal colonies than we have here. May Allah grant him strength and patience.’ Alahan drew breath. ‘I haven’t had any letters from my husband at all.’

           

They went on sitting together, drinking tea and sharing their burdens and concerns.

           

‘It’s getting late, I’d better go,’ Gyuli remembered suddenly. ‘Tadzhigul’s very ill and I’m worried about her.’

‘May Allah grant health to us all and may He preserve us,’ said grandmother Rozihan, raising her hands in prayer.

           

From that time onward, Alahan often sent her sons to Gyuli with a melon or watermelon, asking how she was.

           

The days passed in their appointed order. Gyuli and Tadzhigul had a single aim: not to allow their children to die of hunger. The children were growing fast and were doing everything they could to help their mothers.

           

Every evening an old woman selling milk would pass their window. Catching sight of her, Selimyam would shout out: ‘Apa, the old woman’s here who sells milk!’ and rush outside. Aminam, who was her age, would run along beside her, and behind, with short, mincing steps, came Saniyam, holding on tight to the hem of her sister’s dress.

           

The girls nurtured Yadikar. He grew stronger and stronger on his legs and was already starting to talk. Tadzhigul’s son Omar was a quiet, shy boy.

           

This year Selimyam and Aminam would have gone to school, had they not been branded as belonging to ‘the families of the enemies of the people’. This injustice outraged Gyuli to the core. But she herself was secretly teaching her children to count, to read and to write the letters of the alphabet. Imitating her mother, Selimyam took it on herself to teach the younger children. Her sincere desire to help and to be seen as a grown-up greatly pleased Gyuli and Tadzhigul. And in a short time there grew up the illusion of a normal life.

           

The hot summer reached its end; now autumn arrived and plunged the world into gold. But with it came new worries. Gyuli and Tadzhigul began to lay in a stock of firewood, collecting brushwood from the land outside the village, sawing up dry branches and stacking them. In the evenings they knitted. Gyuli, having mastered the craft, also taught Tadzhigul to knit. By the dim light of the lamp the mothers held heartfelt conversations and knitted children’s clothes. On bazaar days, they sold the clothes, and the proceeds sustained them. They were grateful to Allah that this winter they would not go hungry.

           

One evening as they sat at their knitting, Gyuli gave Tadzhigul a worried look and said: ‘The good days are ending. The wind’s changed and there’ll be snow soon. We need to save up for a stove, or the children will catch cold.’

‘Why don’t we give up milk? We can survive on tea. That way we’ll save money,’ Tadzhigul replied.

‘But if the children get nothing but tea and a scrap of bread, they’ll be completely emaciated. Look, they’re already just skin and bone.’

‘So let’s buy a stove, and then there’ll be money for food again.’

           

Without reaching agreement on the matter, the two women sighed.

           

‘Whose fault is it that there is no happiness in our lives and that our families have been scattered about the earth like millet?’ said Gyuli. The two women lay their work aside and sat without speaking. After a while, they lay down beside their sleeping children and fell asleep themselves.

           

Life in exile from their village was becoming intolerable. Yearning to be allowed home, Gyuli and Tadzhigul began to haunt the doorways of various offices, begging and weeping, and eventually, in 1940, ten families were given permission to return. They were told to move to the village of Koktal, some seventeen kilometres from Zharkent.

* * *

‘But why didn’t they just let them go back to their own villages?’ asked Ruth, shaken. ‘Why torture the children so much, children whose fathers had been sent to prison for no crime? How was it possible to trample the rights of people so much?’

‘I think those politicians and officials had hearts of stone,’ I replied. ‘I’m not sure they could really be described as humans.’

           

I looked out of the window. Dusk was gathering; the clouds below us were turning grey. We were brought dinner, but Ruth declined any food. I soon finished my meal and put down my fork and napkin. When I looked round, Ruth was giving me a questioning look.

           

‘Would you like to hear more?’ I smiled. ‘Well, then, carry on listening.’