The Bloody Veil

The bloody veil

The novel-requiem "The Bloody veil" by well-known Uzbek writer Abdurashid Nurmuradov represents a truthful and bitter study of one of the most dramatic pages in our history – the Afghan war. The reader’s attention is drawn to the frank, reckless, but stirring the conscience of every honest man, stories about the day-to-day of this terrible war, about the afflicted Afghan warriors.

The writer is first and foremost interested in the moral side of the problem: war as a consequence of the unclean political game, war and youth, the war and the failed hopes, war and the hardening of the soul....

The book, intended for a wide range of readers, will not leave among them indifferent.

Translation from Russian by Mirigul Palwaniyazova

©Abdurashid Nurmuradov

© PPCH, 2023

Dear Reader!

The book you hold in your hands was written twenty-seven years ago and translated into many languages

A man is great in his memory. And human memory to some extent shapes public opinion, which makes conclusions from the mistakes made by this society, prepares the basis for the tomorrow to be more desirable.

The author called his work a novel-requiem. Indeed, the work from the beginning to the end is filled with great sorrow. It is felt not only with respect to those who died in the Afghan war, but also with regard to the surviving soldiers, who all their subsequent lives are forced to carry the cross of martyrs for their bloodshed.

War and war participants in different times were written differently. The written narrative of the events of the Afghan war cannot be compared to the works written about the Second World War. Soldiers of the Second World War died without thinking, defending and defending their home, their family. For them, war has become the meaning of life. There was no time for reflection here, for them, death in the name of the Motherland was the only right decision. The soldiers who fought in Afghanistan have a completely different perception of the war.

If in the past man was required to serve the faith and truth of the leading social ideology, today this ideology must serve man. Participants in modern bloody wars with a difficult character, it is impossible to write simply and formally.

The expression, "there are neither great nor small wars, all wars require very great sacrifices, they take human lives", which, along the lines of the entire work of the Bloody Flies, is suffered by the author and, one can say, is pacifist. At the heart of this statement lies the idea that nothing can justify the meaningless death of a person in a war.

In "The bloody veil" thoughts and experiences, repentance and protest, images of the most severe scenes of torture, which were the result of a destructive and unjust war, are raised to the rank of a pathos. Social, racial, biological, mental, psychological and psychological characteristics inherent in a person and considered a special product of social relations are correctly represented on the background of military events. There is no main character in the work, as is seen in traditional wars novels. It contains memories of more than 100 Afghan soldiers in the form of artistic narratives. In each of these memories are reflected the indelible terrible traces of this damned war.

The heroes of the novel are young people who, not by their will and desire, found themselves on the path of war. When they remember the deaths, the murders of innocent people, they lose self-control, and this ignorance alienates them from normal social foundations.

There have already been works in literature that told us about the "lost generation". This topic was also addressed by E. Hemingway and E. М. Remark. Abdurashid Nurmuradov in his work gives the image of representatives of the generation of the 80s of the 20th century, who under the influence of guilt before the dead alienate themselves and from society. Relying on the specific fates of people, the author in an emotional form showed how tragic the fate of the representatives of the military generation is.

In Uzbek literature until today did not reflect the fate of the participants of the Afghan war. Readers who lived near people with an unusual military fate were not familiar with the works of art about them. They were in ignorance of what was happening in fates, for them known and unknown people. The work "The bloody veil" is only so attractive that it fills this empty niche formed in artistic literature. Objectively and emotionally, every element, every feat, every tragic death in this war is reflected. In particular, this is the image of the mother's sorrow for the dead son, the death of the father due to the betrayal of relatives, the unrestricted aspiration to life of Kolya, who has no living place on the body, the suicide of Leonid, left without his legs, the fate of Sergey, Kadir, Ahmad, who die from the bomb explosion. This is a personal unique and psychological state and therefore has the all-absorbing power of empathy.

The image of death scenes in a detailed form serves to show the horror of the war: "Two human heads lay in the dust. Yes, they were lying next door. Per they were sleeping with each other. Their faces were turned up. Her hair burned and shed blood. Around the dust lay a hand cut off from the shoulder, in a word, large pieces of human mash. Everything is covered. The falling intestines resembled snakes. The exploding grenade split the human body into pieces".

In the scenes, which are depicted in the work "The bloody veil", the experiences of people whose souls have completely changed the war are revealed. All the tragedy of the war is in such scenes that they get their high purpose to be alarm-bell, warning what war is. Only a mentally unnatural person can rejoice that he has killed a person. Only war can turn a man into a murderer of unknown people. Only war can make a man who has not been able to give his life to someone else think that he has the right to take another’s life. This is the highest point of the spiritual crisis.

The novel retrospectively depicts the life of former warriors who cannot live a peaceful life, they do not have immunity to injustice, sometimes manifested in interpersonal relationships. Why so? Because the fate has taken away these guys today and tomorrow, leaving them only the memory of yesterday. This generation demonstrates the ability to live not according to the rules of peaceful life, but by the laws of war, not by the logic of everyday life, and by the requirements of special feelings flowing across their borders. This is the state of the soul of most heroes of the work.

The confession of one of the characters in Gafurjan Yuldashev is remarkable: "Later I came to the categorical conclusion that man comes to this world in order to fight and mercilessly kill his like." The point of view that war, as a phenomenon, can lead to spiritual collapse by changing moral orientations is of immense importance. In another place, combatant Bakhtiyar Asimov clearly expresses the dynamics of his spiritual collapse with the words: "I, before that timid enough, turned into a ruthless warrior, ready to crush and kill. My heart turned into a stone. This stone no longer felt pain or pity. The kindness, like a light smoke, disappeared from him. It is said that man is not born into this white light of evil. I understood it myself. Life has made me evil. In the face of death, I was constantly cheering and angry". This side of the war, despite its small appeal, is of great importance from the point of view of social morality.

In the novel prevails not the image of battle scenes, combat clashes, but the drama of human souls, caused by war, since the picture of fates of the heroes of the novel is in the form of a memory. The writer in relation to Afghan warriors uses the concepts "basmach", "bandit" from the lexicon of the Soviet soldier. All this adds to the novel of naturality.

The work is also significant by the fact that it convincingly affirms the idea that all cruelty always causes cruelty. If the Afghan soldiers treated the captured Soviet soldiers very harshly, then the Soviet troops treated their enemies no less cruelty. In the words of the soldier Habibula Assatullayev, the horrifying scenes of the war are depicted: "At night, the soldiers of our squadron caught two bandits. When the young soldiers led them to the commander of the battalion, the "old" turned them back, bound the prisoners and burned them. They burned for about an hour, but did not burn completely. We covered the remains with branches. Yes, the former man in me was not capable of that". The tongue does not turn to comment on such a picture. The novel-requiem of Abdurashid Nurmuradov on the example of the fate of the characters uncover the corrupt sides of the Soviet system.

In realistic tones is drawn the short-sightedness of the country’s leadership, their disinterest in the fate of people, lack of discipline in the army, moral decline among the management, sales among officers. The sale of weapons by officers for personal gain, the rewarding not of soldiers who did not regret their forces or lives, but of those who bought these awards, the bullying of the new recruits. The heartless attitude of the Soviet bureaucratic machine, the disinterest in human fates with some irony is transmitted in the words of Bakhtiyar Kuchkarov: "…The body of Sasha for fifteen days was kept in the refrigerator for some reason. And there was a turn that was an integral part of our lives". The decisions that were to affect the outcome of many battles were not taken by the field commanders themselves, but by officers who sat somewhere there, in various offices, reducing all the efforts of the fighters to failure and the death of the soldiers.

Now a few words about Abdurashid Nurmuradov. He was born in a large family. There were eleven children in the family. His father, a participant in the Second World War, because of his truthfulness did not get along with the big bosses and lived in narrow conditions.

Since childhood, being a smart and stubborn boy, Abdurashid worked a lot. He was a watcher on a cotton field, an ordinary collective farmer, he drove a tractor. In the army he served in airborne troops. The young man continued to play sport. He was a champion of the military district in sports gymnastics, had the h2 of master of sports. In addition, Abdurashid became the best sniper of the district.

After serving in the army he went to study at the institute. After graduation, he worked in publishers, magazines and television. At the same time, the creative work did not stop.

The novels "Nobel mukofotiga nоmzod" ("Candydat for the Nobel Prize"), "Kuk тerаklar" ("Green poplars"), "Oq qizlar" ("White Girls") belong to his feather. He is also the author of a TV series of 50 episodes, which tells about the difficult relations between Russia and Turkestan.

Abdurashid Nurmuradov writes a lot about war. His works "Urush bevalari" ("Widows of War"), "Tutash Kalblar" ("Hearts touched") can be called the anthem of fidelity. Because these works reflect the difficult fate of more than a hundred women of many nationalities, who all their lives wait for unreturned husbands from the battlefields. The colorless lives of these women, which are a symbol of devotion, serve as a silent reproach to that cursed war. In the work "Bolalikda otilgan o'q" ("Shot in the child") reflects the fate of the innocent children sentenced by the war to miserable existence and hunger. The missing childhood of these boys serves as an eternal curse to those who lit the fire of war.

In 1993, on the basis of the lives of Afghan warriors, he wrote the novel "Qon Hidi" ("The Smell of Blood"). In it he on a high artistic level, on the example of the life of Wahid, the main character, describes all the complexity of the soul of the person who visited the war in Afghanistan.

Abdurashid, beginning in the second half of the 1980s, began seriously dealing with the problem of the Afghan war. In search of Afghan soldiers, he visited all the republics of the former alliance, began to study the spiritual world in detail, the lives of his heroes. Finally, in 1991, the first edition of the book "The Bloody veil" appeared.

The life of the Afghan war participants for Abdurashid is not only an artistic object, it has become an integral part of his life.

In 1990 he took part in the solemn meeting of the leadership of the former Union, dedicated to the 45th anniversary of the victory over fascist Germany. The President of that country awarded him a nominal watch for creative and practical work related to the fate of Afghan soldiers.

At the same time he meets Hero of the Soviet Union I.Kojedub three times, he helped solve many problems associated with the post-war life arrangement of Afghan soldiers.

Abdurashid meets with the heads of various organizations and employs more than a hundred Afghan soldiers in accordance with their vocation, helps in the registration of benefits when receiving medicines to more than one hundred Afghanistan soldiers. More than twenty Afghan soldiers, with his direct assistance, entered higher education institutions. Another 20 people also received benefits when entering the universities. Some of them helped buy housing.

If we summarize what has been said, we can say that Abdurashid Nurmuradov for a long time dedicated most of his creative and practical activities to Afghan soldiers.

A real reflection of the bitter truth of war will help to form the consciousness of the growing generation.

Kazakhbay Yuldash, professor

Afghanistan…

For decades, it has been at the center of the attention of the global public. For a decade, people around the world have been waiting for information about the bloody events taking place in this much-suffering Afghan land, hoping to find out the truth. However, it was not easy to catch her in the overwhelmed formulations of official messages. But those who tried to hide the truth did not take into account that it will always break its way, overcome all obstacles.

It is no secret that my people suffered enormous losses from this unwanted war, became the victim of a foolish and unfair political game. The Afghan truth was not told from the high tribunes, it is recognized by the burning tears of mothers whose sons became victims of that crazy war, by their bitter murmuring, their mental suffering in the endless black sleepless nights. And most importantly, it will be learned from the narrow stories of those who, by the evil will of politicians, were thrown into the cradle of death and, in spite of everything, avoided it.

In the preface to the novel “Goodbye, weapons” E. Hemingway said, “Those who, incite and wage war, pigs who only think of economic competition and what they can earn from it.” Today we know who is to blame for the Afghan massacre. But we are all guilty, because we were silent, and therefore we were ugly.

The pain for the dead fellow citizens, the feeling of guilt and compassion, the compassion for the loved ones of the deceased guys, all this prompted me to take the pen. And here it is before you the truth of what happened, the truth bitter, heavy, uncovered and undecorated in the reckless stories of ordinary guys who have undergone inhumane trials. Reading them is hard, painful, scary. In order for this to never happen again and ever, we need to fight for an active public position.

Closing your eyes to problems doesn’t mean getting rid of them. “ostrich politics” has not yet benefited anyone. So, my reader, shake your heart in your fist and read, read and think.

The Author

1991 year

THE PAIN LEFT IN THE HEARTS

For a few days, my mother barely moved her legs "No urine, my children. My head turns", she said. First of all, she tried to help us at home. Then she completely followed.

When I came to her after work, she repeated:

– The forces are leaving me, son. I cannot get up. The plane is damned. I always had a headache after he was pollinating the cotton fields we were working on.

I tried to comfort her:

– The chemicals have nothing to do with it. You are probably tired.

Sadly shaking her head, she replied:

– You do not know, son. This is a bad airplane.

Why do I remember my mom’s last days so often? Probably because since the day she came down, our family has left peace. In the hard days of my life, my mother’s broken voice always sounds in my ears: "This is a bad airplane".

From day to day, my mother’s face became more and more pale. In a brigade truck she was taken to the hospital. When we were about to go back, my mom repeated again and again:

– Visit your father more often. Whatever happens, the pressure is high. In those days, my father was in the hospital. My mother told me the disease of father was out of war.

Never in the post-war years the pressure of my father had fallen below two hundred. As soon as the bad days began, he had to go to the hospital to at least somehow ease his suffering. My soul was worried. After working for two days on a warp cleaner, I went to the brigadier and gathered with my mother.

I was walking, swallowing dust, in a cart attached to the tractor. I remember the days when we moved from a flowery, roasted chestnut to a whole. I was angry at my father – and what he could not share with the district management then.

"Why have we suffered so much pain, – I think. There was nothing on this whole. They lost their health".

Because of the dust raised by the wheels of the tractor, nothing is visible. When I closed my eyes, I was immersed in memories. Transparent water, the thick greens of the trees, the clean sky of the native shrimp, like on the screen, pass before my mindful eye. A bitter insult covers the heart. I am crying. Tears shake the eyes and frozen a dirty strip on the dusty face. The tears do not want to descend on the burned ground.

So we arrived at the bus stop. The tractor stopped. The driver pushed his head out of the cabin.

– We arrived. – I jumped to the ground, raising a cloud of dust. As I walk away, I cut off some clothes. Several students at the stop, stirring their nose, look at me. I rush to get my shirts, wipe out dust and dirty traces of tears from my face.

"A very decent guy, he could go to some city to study than to stick to the tractor", – I read in their eyes. A full children’s bus stopped near us. Afraid of pitting girls, I let them go ahead. With every push of the bus from my curly, like the wool of a bark, the hair will be dusted. And the girls unnoticedly try to move away from such a fool. The road is distant. And at every stop, those who get out of the bus and get into it at least once let them look straight at me. People like me went on the bus. One came out, probably right under the tractor, even his nose was in the oil. When the passengers saw him, they forgot about me.

Having recovered from the embarrassment, I surrendered to my thoughts again.

Finally, I got to the hospital. Fear crossed the threshold.

– Oh yeah! Oh stand up! Where are you? – I was blocked by a nurse in a snow-white coat.

– To my mom, – I broke.

– In this form? – She asked ridiculously.

I was frozen, not knowing what to answer. I looked, surely, very unfortunate, and she, smiling, noticed: – Your look is just inhuman. Where are you from?

…When I recorded these pages of the past, I found it unnecessary to tell about the events and experiences as novel’s heroes with book, high-parent words. I would fool myself and the past. I decided to speak, like a witness speaking at the court: "I swear to speak the truth, only the truth and nothing but the truth."

I stood down, lowering my head.

– Gulistan is a big city, – the nurse said. Bathroom is available. You would be bathed, and mother would be glad to look at you. I would get up on my feet faster.

Hearing the word "bath", I trembled, because over the years I have forgotten what it is. We swim in the muddy water of concrete arches. The dirty flow of water by autumn became transparent. But to get into the cold water at this time is no longer possible.

Apparently, noticing under my dust-gray eyelids confusion in my eyes, the nurse finally regretted:

– Okay, what, we have to tell your mother, but on the condition that you get to the bathroom on the first bus and wash there. – Then, noticing in my hands a knot with two leeches and a parvarda, added: – How is your mother's name? I’ll give your knot and tell her that you came.

I gave the knot to the woman and turned back. Life on dust whole has turned me into a savage. Therefore, when he sat in the bus again, all people rubbed with interest and astonishment on me dusty. I felt it sharply now. I walk, pulling my head into my shoulders. The amazed eyes of strangers completely confused me. I want to hide, hide. When I got out of the bus, I finally felt freer.

In the bath from the hot water intercepted the breath, the heart compressed. My body, for years forgotten about this feeling, first felt discomfort. But no, I gradually got used to it, and the warm water calmed me.

I did not want to wear my dusty clothes. But what will I do, no one has made clean clothes for me. I was sick, somewhat pulled onto myself. As I walked out, I felt an unusual lightness.

When I got back to the hospital, the nurse immediately said:

– Look! What a good guy. Why did you start yourself so? Go, your mom in the seventh chamber, waiting not to wait. Always come clean and neat.

I didn’t have time to look at the slightly opened door as my mother called me to her and, looking closely, cried out:

– My dear, my son. How I missed you. God, save him from the evil eye.

She looked at me and couldn’t look at me. All her joy was passed on to me, these were happy moments for me. In my soul, I thanked the nurse who sent me to the bathroom.

My mother’s white clothes highlighted her unnatural paleness. She asked about the family, about my father.

– I was told about my illness today. Anemia, they say. After lunch, the blood will be transfused. Yes, by the way, the doctor asked to come to him if someone came from the house. Go, son, while he’s here, maybe he’ll say something new.

This doctor’s request did not cause me any concern. I looked at the door with the sign “Department”. There was a great man sitting at the table. Without lifting his eyes from the papers lying in front of him, he said:

– Come in here.

I sat on a chair at the entrance. He raised his head and looked at me questioningly. I repeated my mother’s words.

– Yes, yes, – he said, – your mother has anemia. It needs to be taken to the center. In the Tashkent. It is very difficult to donate blood. There is a special hospital that deals with this disease. She will be thoroughly examined and will make an accurate diagnosis. The sooner you take her away, the better, but don’t tell her anything. The sick cannot be disturbed.

I entered to my mother. She was alone in the room, looking straight into the ceiling. I never saw her like that. Heart is shaken. I cannot take a step.

The eyes are fixed at her. Mom was lying down without noticing anything. As I control myself, I shouted with a trembling voice:

– Mom.

Only now she raised her head and turned to my side:

– Have you come, son? I thought of you, – she said, looking at me as if she had seen me for the first time. Then, leaning on her hands, she sat on the bed:

– I thought it was my Vahidjan. I forgot, I probably dreamed. God give him health. Day and night I pray that he will return from the army healthy and unharmed. Go, my son, what the doctor said?

– He said that he needs blood for a transfusion, so he wanted to know our blood group, – I replied outright.

– Will they take a blood from you? – She was worried.

– No, they have blood. But in any case, they should know our group too. The blood of relatives, they say, works faster, – I lied. She believed and then we talked a long time. Through the word she was repeated the name of brother Vahid, who was left to serve for four months. We were looking forward to his return. Recently, there were no letters from Vahid, and my mother was very worried:

– Maybe something happened. I see the disturbing dream lately. He could say two words: "I’m healthy?" – She was worried. When she said about it, my mom even cried. When she said goodbye to me, she asked again:

– Visit your father. No matter what happens to him. I lay down here.

I replied to the doctor that I would consult with my father and let him know when we could take her.

As I left the room, I reluctantly turned back. Mom was lying down, staring at the ceiling. She seemed to have forgotten about me. The heart broke. I had bad thoughts in my head. My mom changed a lot, and it seemed like she was replaced. In vain I tried to find the reasons for this.

I recovered from a sharp car signal. In front of me stood a man of the sight and shouted, waving with his hands:

– Brainless donkey! Just nothingness, but catch you, everything would cost me dearly! What would be, if I hit you?

In response, I only complained, with fear in my eyes, I looked at him. He shrugged his hand and sat in the car.

She touched the whistle and like a bullet went forward. I stood there for a moment, looking after him. I wondered why the driver stopped. I felt rather than realized that I was standing in the middle of the road and cars were flying past me. I quickly crossed the road and ran to the stop. In front of my eyes still stood my mother, staring to the ceiling.

I came home without being able to see my father. I missed the kids. I barely crossed the threshold, they ran to me like chickens. Wearing shirts, bare legs scratched, hands also in the web of cracks, dirty. It was the first time I saw my unhealthy brothers. I unwittingly remembered the words of a nurse from the hospital about my dirty dusty shape.

In general, our family was considered "below the average" Father is incapable of work, mother, working in the farm, received 70 rubles. Among the children the eldest in the family was I. In the summer I worked as a sprinkler, in the autumn I loaded cotton. The brothers are still very small. Vahid did not have time to become an assistant when he was taken to the army. He was one of the first in our state farm. Many of his peers left the house, but they were the children of the director of the state farm, the head of the branch and other important officials. In those years, in the military commissariats, fathers could repay their children. I have witnessed such cases myself.

When Vahid went to work, my mother was crying. She did not believe that my brother, a shy, unknowing young man, could become a soldier. "It will be hard, hard. At least squeeze a little first. What do they take in the army of the boys? Save him, Allah", – she repeated every time by dastarkhan.

These were the days when the Afghan war was still clothed with a state secret, and the soldiers who had passed through it had not yet returned to our state farm.

I asked the military, who accompanied the recruits, where they would be sent. Hearing the answer: "To the Baltic", – I returned home with a calm soul. But… But for a long time I could not forget my brother’s little figure, his sad eyes, his trembling gaze. A letter soon arrived. On the back address were indicated only field mail and part number. By the tone of the letter, by the way the brother says goodbye, there were doubts about what he serves in the Baltics. The grief of the motherland was felt at every word. After each of his letters, an unclear alarm settled in my soul, and sleepless nights began.

And now my mother’s unfamiliar look, her worrying thoughts about brother, made me upset. I watched the little kids holding up my hands. They interrupted each other and asked about their mother. And the little Gulnoz, with a dust-grey piece of sugar in one hand, with peanut peel in the other hand, pressing her cheek to my hand, cried, "Where is Mom, where is Mom?"

The watermelon peel, rolling on the scarf, was covered by flies. The sister was very small, she was not three years old yet, climbed to me on my knees and kissed my cheek with glued lips. There is no father or mother at home, only a bunch of babies, and I am now the only adult for them all. Anger to hopelessness and resentment swallowed my heart. I was crying. They remained silent for a moment, looking at me with amazement, surrounded me, hugged me, who was behind the hand, who is behind the neck, who are behind the shoulders, and, as if feeling something bad, they also cried. I could not take everyone into my hands.

Suddenly, my father appeared on the threshold. He was pale. Afraid of hearing the bad news, he slowly approached me and in a weak voice asked:

– What happened son?

– My mother was in the hospital, – I said, swallowing.

– Yes, I know, – he said after breathing, then, smiling as if nothing had happened, he turned to the younger ones:

– Well kids, get up. Who will say hello to me?

The kids came out of my arms and ran to my father. The black thoughts that took over me immediately withdrew. Later I realized that my father was seriously concerned about something, although he tried not to do so. I thought it was because of my mom. After drinking sweet tea with bread, the children stood up from behind the table and took up their games. We remained both. Quietly drinking tea, the father asked:

– What is the disease, what do doctors say?

After hearing my story, my father said:

– Don’t go to work tomorrow, take care of kids. I go to mother myself.

"How can I not go to work?" – He read in my eyes.

– … this virgin land, – silently said father, breathing deeply.

– When the mother recovers, we will return to our hometown. It’s been 10 years since I came here. Nothing achieved. On the contrary, we’ve all broken up here. And life is already over. I want to die in my homeland. I don’t believe we will anything here. I would put you on your feet and nothing else we need with your mother. We will not get into people here. The cradle is our land. We will start building life again.

We didn’t really get anything at all. And not only us, but also our Fergan relatives who came with us. In the middle of the bare steppe with spots of salt are white concrete houses. In the summer they heat, in the winter they do not hold the heat. Around us a thick stone. In the exhausting heat you will not find a fifth shadow to hide. The sun will not have time to bow to sunset, as the bushes of the clouds raise sharp mosquitoes, which do not spare anyone – whether it is the wrinkles of the old man's forehead or the bloodless face of a child – they relentlessly swallow their sharp grief. There will be no living space in the morning. It is impossible to look at the faces of children: everyone is in wounds, mothers pour their bites with ash.

From my father’s words, I stumbled. It feels like we are leaving tomorrow, went out. The little girl grabbed in the ground, laughing loudly. The joyful feeling in my soul seemed to have been passed on to them in some way.

* * *

The father came back late, in a depressed mood. I couldn’t overdo myself and asked what was going on. He drew to himself a balysh1, lying on him with a dirty cloth, sweating his forehead. He drank a cold tea until the last bite and only then turned to me:

– My son, it seems to have to go to Tashkent faster. She has given up very recently. The doctor advised to hurry. On the way, I went to the post office and took my pension. I leave money, buy something to eat and take care of the children. As long as I put my mom in the hospital, you’ll have to deal with it yourself. God knows when I’m running. Having said this, he gave me a dozen out of a bundled cloth pack.

Son’s heart told me that my father was tormenting something else. He closed his eyes and walked away from talking, which was not typical for him.

I could not sleep all night. In the depths of the room lies the father, my brothers sleep between us. From time to time, I hear the voice of the sister Gulnoz, calling her mother in a dream. Her voice wrecked my soul even more. It was tight in the room. It feels like walls on four sides are trying to squeeze me. I suffocate in the dark. I feel like my father is not asleep either. It seems, an invisible thread is stretched between us.

– Rashidjan, do not you get sleepy?

–Yes, – I am answering.

– You are not small anymore, you know a lot. For me and my mother, you are the only support in the world. You probably condemn me for having to leave our hometown and wander in the naked steppe. Having lived my life, having became old, I realized that there is no happiness for an honest man in that blind light. You do not know everything.

All the relatives from our village were fed and raised by my mother, Uzuk. And I myself, how many people helped come out, accepted, listened. At work, what happened, my chest stood up to protect them. I thought, "Bloody, who can help if not them?" It will not be said in disgrace, they gathered with us every morning and ate our bread. One after the other, they grew up. My efforts went to institutions, began to earn. Eventually, they bit the hand that fed them. Because of them, my son, we came here. Like unfamiliar dogs, relatives clinged to me, and joined in the harassment arranged by my enemies.

– That is so, my son. No book can contain this history. If you are healthy now, I have nothing more to ask of God.

– Well, what happened, it passed, – he breathed hard. After a long pause he said:

– A month ago I received a letter from Vahidjan. He exploded on a mine and now he is in hospital. I couldn’t tell to mom, and you didn’t dare to tell. I read the word “exploded” and it was like a cliff in my heart. The head went round, the pressure rose. After that, I do not feel the letter of life in me. What it is to explode, I have experienced on myself, son. It is impossible to come to him. How, I do not know. – My father’s voice changed. He was crying. I felt like the earth was falling from under my feet. The head swings. "Exploded, exploded" thousands of times the voice of the father sounds in my ears.

Something burning rose from the inside and approached the throat. Tears flowed on my cheeks, not obeying my will. My sister turned to me:

– Mommy, Mommy, – she whispered, stroked my face. Then she hugged me tightly behind my neck and, as if on my mother’s chest, fell asleep with a strong, peaceful sleep. I could only hear her quiet breath.

And before my eyes was a brother standing in the train, with sad, anxious eyes. And I could not at that moment find the strength to ask my father in more detail how it all happened. As if he wanted to keep his brother in memory as he had.

Man has such a condition. You don’t want to live, but you live. You don’t want to breathe, but you breathe. You don’t want to see anyone, but you see. You get used to everything. Must be!

I tightly pressed my sweet sister to my heart, as if I was seeking refuge in her fragile, pure soul. And she, as if wishing to calm me, rubbed her cheek on my cheek, quietly standing. But the words of the father "exploded, exploded" still sounded in my ears, rushing into me from all sides, burned my heart."My brother, my dear, dear brother; what have they done to you, how are you now?”

The soul is devastated. As if something was broken inside. I can’t even imagine how my father lived this month. How was he…

I had a dream at night. My mother was in white clothes, holding bread in her hand:

– You and your father are deceiving me. Where did you hide Vahidjan? I’ll give him at least the bread he left behind, – she said, stretching a slice to me. I was awake. The sister was sitting on the bed and staring at me.

– Sleep, sleep, my sweetheart, – I said quietly, hugging her by the shoulders. Turning her head, she laid her head on my chest and fell asleep. It was down. A pale light broke through the dusty windows. The light filled the room.

Carefully, not to wake up my sister, I released my shoulder, laid the girl on the pillow and went out. A cold morning wind was blowing. Never flying beyond the threshold of my house, my thoughts are now far away. Everything was not nice, everything around me lost its meaning in my eyes. Even the magnificent mansion of the director of the state farm, which proudly stood before me, now seemed to me to have collapsed, lost its majesty. With a mixed sense of embarrassment and amazement, I looked at the marble facade of this house, the brilliant new "Volga" in front of it. Having a house and car was the limit of my dreams. Not only mine, but everyone around me. Now, in the face of the impending trouble, these values somehow immediately dimmed, lost their significance. I don’t know how long I stood on the threshold. I woke up when I felt my father’s touch. In his hand he held a knot. My distracted face worried him:

– Son, take yourself in your hands. I am already old.

You will remain the head of your brothers and sisters. Here is a letter from Vahidjan. Write him a more pleasant answer to raise his spirit. I couldn’t, no matter how hard I tried, – he said and handed me a letter. – I will go to your mom. You will be alone, – he added and went out on the road. He walked heavily, slowly, tired, heading his head, as if he was searching for his once lost happiness on this dusty canyon road.

I was left with the letter in my hand, exhausted from reading, not finding the strength to uncover it, to find out where my brother was wounded. I stood unconsciously at the threshold. Someone pulled me by the sleeve. There was a sister next door. In her eyes was a childish anxious. I bowed and took her on my hands. The girl hugged me tightly and grabbed my cheek. She lacked the warmth and care of her mother.

We entered the house. I put her carefully, and she fell asleep again. My relatives were sleeping. And I was sitting next to them with a dying heart, looking at the letter. My patience has finally ended. Every word of grief entered my heart. I will never forget these simple and terrible lines.

"Hi, Dad! Your letter was read to me by my friend Samad. You wrote to the commander that I forgot you and didn’t write for four months. You asked him to punish me.

Father, forgive me for not being able to send you a message for so long. I was in the hospital without consciousness. Now I feel better, but I had to ask Samad to write a letter. Doctors say one eye can see. My hands were also shaken by the explosion of the mine.

Father forgive me. I feel how much damage I have done to you by writing the whole truth. How to? You are my father. You survived the war and shed blood, returned from the front crippled. Our fate is same, so I decided to tell you about my condition. Do not speak home. My mother did not survive.

How does she feel? I see her in my dreams every day. All in white clothes she approaches and sits next to me and, without saying a word, looks in my eyes for a long time. Tell me about her health. Mom, mom, from how many bad thoughts she saved me here.

Dad, do not burn up. Fate seems to be like that. You will not leave it. People like me are a lot here. The boys died no less. I’m not going to get out of the hospital soon. If I had been blind from birth, I have been so offended. It is hard to lose the white light in the night alone and plunge into the darkness. It is very difficult…

Goodbye, Dad. Say hello to my mother and brothers. Let Rashid-aka write me a letter in his free time.

Abduvahid.

September 13, 1982

My heart cried. And the younger brothers, not knowing anything, slept peacefully.

I sat for a long time like this. Thousands of thoughts revolved in my head. I cursed those who taught my brother. I powerlessly squeezed my fists, ready to break them into pieces. When my gaze fell on my sister, her hands were stretching up on their own, and I smoothed her confused hair. It seemed that her little face, her hair, her bracelets rejuvenated in my dark heart tenderness, love for family, for people. I felt like I was born again. Small care and worries gradually left me, giving way to those that were now the main ones.

Three days later my father came back. In his hands was knot with belongings of mother. Taking breath, he looked at us sadly, breathed hard. Gulnoz quietly clung to him. We were all looking forward to my father’s words.

– The mother greeted you all. She will recover soon and come. She asked to transmit that they would not joke and live together before her return, – finally, he said, glossing the hair of Gulnoz. As if only waiting for these few words, the younger brothers calmed down and stood up. Children cannot live in anxiety for a long time. There were my father, I and my sister. Gulnoz, rubbing her father’s beard, asked:

– Mommy has gone far?

The wrinkles on my father’s face became even deeper. The cheeks struck, and he, trying to cope with the trembling voice, said:

– Yes, she went far away. She will come, my daughter, your mother will come. I was upset by my father’s mood:

– Diagnosis is determined?

– Yes, my son. It seems to be a long time. Did you write a letter to your brother?

– I wrote.

Here is the whole conversation.

But I felt that my father was not agreeing. By nature, he is a determined man, not a talkative. I never put my concerns on other people’s shoulders. I had to wait for him to say something.

My father suffered from insomnia. At night he wandered around the house, and during the day he went to the camouflage and only rotated in the dark. This lasted a week. Then he crowd together and in the morning twilight he set feet on the path.

– I will go to your mom, – he said.

This time he was in Tashkent for a long time. I was walking alone, not knowing what to think. My heart is drawn there, but I won’t leave the kids alone. I had to wait. The father came home late at night, tired, with a grown jaw:

– I am tired, my children, I will sleep a little, – he said, asking for a bed for him. He came and immediately fell asleep. I didn’t close my eyes all night, I couldn’t find a place.

In the morning after tea, my father said to me:

– Son, next week you will sit next to Mom’s bed. She is now being watched by Shafoat.

Only now I realized that the situation is very difficult.

I write about those days and my heart breaks out of my chest. Life has severely punished us. I don’t know what sins. Next to me are my brothers, a sister, one smaller than the other, in the army, crippled Abduvahid, my mother is in the hospital. Black days fell on my father’s old age. There seemed to be no sorrow in the world that did not fall on our family.

In the morning I went on the way. The first person I saw in the hospital was sister Shafoat. During that time, she became old, sad. I called her. Looking around confusedly, she finally found me, looked at me and did not recognize. A moment of her sad look slipped on my face:

– Rashid, my dear, is it you? She finally cried out and ran to me. She cried for a long time, hiding her face on my chest. Then she took herself into her hands:

– My mom is bad, so bad. I just don’t know what to do, – she said, the tears flowed on her cheeks.

We entered the chamber together. My sister wiped her tears quickly. My heart was beating, it seemed, now, something terrible, irreparable was about to happen. My mother’s eyes were tied to the door. I quickly approached her. Her pale face turned to my side. For a moment she looked at me:

– Oh my dear, you have come! How could I not recognize you, – she said, trying to get up from bed. I fell on my knees in front of her. She grabbed my head, began greedy kissing my face, my eyes.

– I was like that, son. How are you there without me? The kids, probably, were completely tormented? – she asked with a chilling voice. I calmed her. Shafoat was sitting on the side with her head down, her shoulders trembled…

My mother cuddled another. In those few days she has completely changed. Her face was slightly different from the color of her clothes. The voice seemed to come from somewhere deep. She asked about Vahid. Then she closed her eyes and whispered rather than spoke:

– He dreams of me every day. He calls me for help. I hear his voice, but I cannot find him. If only my son was healthy. Was there no letter from him? – she opened her eyes and looked closely at me.

– The letter has arrived. It was brought yesterday. He sends greetings to everyone. Soon, he said, he will come, – I hurried out.

– How soon he will come, – she was surprised, because three months and thirteen days before his arrival!

– For holiday, for good service, – the commander permitted.

When she heard it, my mother thought for a long time. Without closing her eyes, she looked into the ceiling. She seemed to have forgotten about me, and her heart felt deceived. When her gaze again fell on me, she opened her eyes widely, surprisedly said:

– How are you still here? Go, my son, go on. I am better now. Go home to Shafoat.

Shafoat stood up and approached us. She has calmed down a little.

– Mom, then we will go. I’ll be back tomorrow morning, she said.

– Go on, my children. Crossing the road carefully, kiss your daughters, Shafoat, – said the mother and closed her eyes, again immersed in her thoughts.

We went out on the street. My sister cried again. I asked her with a painful heart what happened to our mother.

– The tongue does not turn to say. You and I are the eldest in the family. Our mother has blood cancer, – she said.

I didn’t understand her words, not knowing what disease was blood cancer.

– It’s white blood, – Shafoat explained, no one has cured this disease yet. White blood cells eat red. Then the liver fails. Then…

Shafoat was a doctor. From her words I got stuck in place. My sister cried and took my hand. There was sweat on my forehead. The whole body was covered with cold steam. In just a few days, two such terrible events. One there, far away, outside of the country, the other here, in the native land.

I don’t know why, but I didn’t cry. When my mother died, I couldn’t cry too long. There was someone inside who was holding me back. It still seems like this someone is shaking my heart hard. But without tears on the day my mother died, then I cried every day, every hour. It was a cry without tears, silently crying soul. As a stranger, I watched her silently.

My sister and I went to my mother every day. Every day she was looking forward to us. She showed her hands and said with a sad smile:

– And the hands are all pale and pale. Blood is becoming less.

– Everything will be fine, soon. We will make a big celebration when Vahidjan returns. Repair as if nothing had happened, – the sister tried to reassure her.

– How do you know, daughter? They transfuse blood every day. No any changes. When I get up, my head turns. If only my Vahidjan would come alive and healthy. Only about it I think. He does not leave my dreams at all. Rashidjan, you should have visited all of them at home. Your father probably has his head around. And the kids missed you, – she said.

I could not even think about it. How could I leave my mom knowing what she was in?

Thus passed two weeks. In the morning, the sister took the children to the kindergarten. Her husband studied at the time in Moscow, in graduate school. So my sister and three children lived in town alone. The house, the children are all on it.

At ten o’clock we were finally in the hospital. When we entered the room, my mother was transfused blood. When she saw us, she shrugged her head and smiled. We passed carefully and sat down on our chairs. I quietly watched the glass hanging on the tripod from which the blood dropped. The drops slowly hanged, broke, hanged again, involuntarily I started counting them. I counted several hundred. Excited, I did not notice how the door to the chamber opened, how my mother's muddy pupils expanded.

– Son! – She cried, rushing up from the bed. I was encountered. There was a man in a soldier uniform on the doorstep. The soldier quickly approached and hugged her. Mother tightly grabbed the soldier’s neck, cried, her chilling voice filled the chamber:

– My dear son, have you come back? Thank God that I saw you. Now let him cleanse my soul. My son! Every day you dreamed of me. Thank God you are healthy. I have nothing to ask for now, neither from man nor from the God.

– Mom, go to bed! Go to bed! From the cry of my sister, I came in and looked at my mother. Blood flowed through her hands, sliding down, scattered over her clothes and painted it in red. I ran to her and took her shoulders, trying to lay down. But it was impossible to separate her from her son. A nurse came to help. Together we put my mom in some way. Taking the air in his hands, she was repeating: "Son! My dear! My son!" – she lost consciousness. I remember that day and I still hear my mother’s voice in my ears… What unfortunate days… What terrible days… I do not wish to survive them and my enemy.

In a moment, doctors entered the room. My mother was lying on white blankets. White sheets, white face, only on the chest was a bloody spot.

Strongly grabbing my brother’s hand, my native brother, in whose appearance I could not believe, I left the hospital. My sister followed us. Three of us, hugged, we cried long in the hospital garden. My brother’s face became unrecognizable. There is no eye. One hand is broken and we still don’t know what happened to it.

A cruel fate has thrown our family, so ignorant of fun or satiety, into the abyss called disaster. We walked along the wide city street, full of life, joy, cheerful faces and felt more unhappy. Everyone was busy with their thoughts. The blow of fate that has struck a man, sink in everyday worries, sharply changes him. The consequences of such a blow I passed through myself, from my own experience.

Both my sister and I thank God that my brother, though grieved, came back alive. Now he was another man. This is no longer the young man who looked at me frightenedly from the train. He was a warrior who exploded on a mine. He did not need instruction or consolation. In one word, he looked up, comforted me, his older, but now weaker brother. He was not my younger brother, but my older brother. Yes the elderly! And how could he, who had been between life and death for months, be the younger brother of a man who has been messing with dirt all his life and has seen nothing but his swamp.

My primitive, small words began to disperse like fog. What will grow in the deserted place is still unknown, but one thing is clear: there has appeared a powerful germ of life. He was raised by my younger brother.

* * *

Mother is dead. Completely freed from all earthly concerns, she lay in our house, in our hometown, where we returned. And the steppe, and dusty roads, and nasty mosquitoes, everything is already there, behind. Together with the shadow of the mother’s soul, we returned to our hometown. There were red maces, streams, green grass. My mom wanted to see them again.

My mother’s body lay on a new blanket. We, her children, were gathered around, all crying. Only Gulnoza smiled and repeated:

– Mom came, Mom came!

* * *

… We went to my mother’s grave. When he bowed over her, the father whispered:

– Your son is going to the city. Wish him a good way, let his spirit be hard and his head clear. May the spirit of your mother support you, son. Abduvahid hugged me by his shoulder with his scattered hands:

– Now you run out into people for our happiness. You wanted to be a writer. Write about our mother, about the people with my fate. – We said goodbye. They stayed at my mother’s grave. I walked along the road that led to the city with my old suitcase in hand. After walking a little, I turned back. Father and son. Two fates, repeating each other, relying on each other.

I don’t want to talk about my customs in the city. They survived every village boy who came to study in a big city. But wherever I worked, I remembered, kept in my heart, like a precious diamond, the words of my brother, which sounded at the tomb, as a will. At the time when I came to the city, it was difficult to write about the guys with my brother’s fate. But from those terrible places, one after the other, zinc boxes arrived with the inscription, weighing two hundred kilograms. In one house, in another, there was crying and worship of mothers. The people, with their shoulders down, listened silently to their heartbreaking cries.

Every time I came into the village, I looked at my brother, his frozen face, his eye, the place where his hand was, and found no place for myself, feeling my helplessness. His surviving, but submerged blurred eye looked at me, as if reassuring, sympathetic, as though wishing to say, "Don’t be sad. There will be days when you will be able to write about everything".

Every time I returned to the city, my father and brother accompanied me to my mother’s grave. This has broken up many times. Many times I returned to the city with a bitter feeling of dissatisfaction with life.

But you can’t be silent forever, everything ends someday and I exploded. I began to collect materials about the lives of Afghan soldiers. My hopes, the people with whom I was born remained in different parts of the country. For years while collecting material for the book, I listened to them and still listen now. I believed that their voice would be heard by my people.

* * *

The guys who were affected by my brother’s fate spoke reluctantly about themselves. I had to meet with them many times to recreate the picture of what they experienced.

– Give it up, they repeated. Why torment yourself and ourselves? Write better about our hard-working dekhkans. What have we seen? The blood? The broken bodies of friends? With these hands we gathered their bones and pieces of meat from the dust and placed them in the graves. At first, we cried. Then we stopped. Our hearts turned into stone. Day after day we lost human appearance, became angry. We were crushed, killed. The outcast friends gathered our bloody bodies. We returned home without feet, without hands, without eyes. And for all this, the medal "For Courage" and "The Order of the Red Star" were hanged on our chest. We killed completely strangers who were never our enemies, and they killed us. I thought we were doing this for the sake of our country. How about otherwise? After all, we were boys whose mother’s milk still did not dry out on our lips, and we believed what we were beaten in our heads.

What else to say? Please do not remember those days. These memories are too heavy. Again before my eyes is blood, death, horror. Why are you bleeding the hearts of people who have already suffered from this life? My lips trembled when I spoke these words.

The mother of a soldier wounded in the Afghan war with tears in her eyes could not withstand:

– Burn in hell who brought my child to this state! We did not have time to rejoice that our son grew up and became a support for us as this trouble happened. Who to curse, I don’t know, – she recounted, wiping the tears off the edge. Her son hurried to reassure her:

– Do not cry, Mom. I am alive. Think of the mothers whose children have not returned, and then you will understand that you need to thank fate, not curse it, – he said, trying to wipe her tears with his unburned hands. In those moments, I remembered my brother, my mother, my poor, beloved mother.

Over the years, I have visited thousands of people who have returned from Afghanistan. Many times I listened to their short, unimaginable stories. Hundreds of times I looked into the wrinkles on the faces of sedentary mothers who greedily listened to their children. They all seemed to me like my brothers and my mothers. In houses with lining, in poor housekeeping, in the restrained voices of the boys, in the restless gaze of the mothers, in everything I saw similarity to my family. It seemed that the bitter fate hit only children from poor families, destroyed, and returned them to their homeland. Every acquaintance with a new family left a scar in my heart. Then it seemed to me that I experienced something like this myself; I saw it all, experienced it, and became disabled. I have started having nightmares. My legs, my arms, and my broken eyes demanded that I bring them back to my bodies. I fell into this state only from the stories I heard, being a healthy person. And what might then happen to them as eyewitnesses and participants in this nightmare? It was difficult even to watch the boys when they painfully gave details of what happened to them. At such moments I silently lowered my head. These were hard, sad days in my life. It seemed as if I had become a part of their suffering heart.

It was as if my body was infiltrated by electricity when I saw guns in the hands of boys, machine guns and tanks in the toys department of "Children's World". In front of my eyes, the toys turned into real machines, guns, huge tanks. There was a continuous shooting in my ears. I was scratching. It happened, I did not endure and offended in anything innocent girls-sellers. In those days, I came home, trembling with my whole body, inflicting my anger on my relatives.

– Something is happening to your father. Probably found a girlfriend. He was never in such a state, as if he had been replaced, – my wife cried, pressing her children.

But it was more and more difficult for me to get rid of this compulsion, of my obsessive thoughts.

As an obsessed man, in search of Afghan soldiers, I wandered through the distant corners of the country and disappeared for months. I came home shocked from meetings, stories, pressed, like a madman, the button of our apartment.

"Go there where you have been overnight", – I heard the angry voice of my wife, and the door before me closed with a whisper. Not to forget the days when sad and tired, I turned back from the door of my home.

Muhammadrahmat from Khodjent told me that he involuntarily pulled his head into his shoulders and covered his face with his hands when the shells exploded in the cinema. At first I was surprised, but later I realized that there is nothing worse than war and there can be neither winners nor losers. Because both of them and others carry blood, tears, death. I began to understand why so many writers turned to the subject of war. L.Tolstoy, A.Barbus, E.Hemingway and Y.Bondarev… War brings unbelievable trials, countless miseries and suffering to man, and there can be no justification for it.

Now, when I think about war, I see my real heroes with wounded bodies and souls passing by. And once again I assure you: the warriors are those who sacrificed their lives to an unknown monster – to war, are my brothers, my relatives, my friends.

Sabir came to me, my cousin. I was very pleased. I know him from childhood. He was a simple, straightforward guy. With his father Muhammad once in childhood I pasture sheep. Then Muhammad-aka became ill and went to the hospital. He seemed healed, but soon the illness returned. He was treated again, but the disease never receded. He is still in the hospital. The mother was left with ten children in her arms. She raised them for her salary of sixty rubles herself. I brought Sabir to the army from Tashkent. He arrived in Afghanistan. It was not long before I received a letter from him. In the letter a few words: "Rashid-aka, I am in Leningrad. And I am injured. Be healthy". He spent a year in Leningrad. He returned crippled.

When he crossed the threshold of the house, my face was distorted by pain. Those long-standing memories came back to me again, my mother’s bloody shirt, my father’s silent cry in the middle of the night when he was known about his son’s injury, my brother’s whisper at my mom’s grave.

…A year passed.

Sabir said that he entered to the preparatory department of the law faculty of the university. His joy also calmed my heart. I hugged him, greeted him and filled my soul with tenderness.

At the table I asked him:

– Well, Sabir, tell me about it. Was it hard to take the entrance exams?

He strangely smiled:

– You know, Rashid aka, it turns out to be doing that to put your chest under the bullets. I passed literature and history, and at the exam in social sciences the teacher took and asked, "Say the truth, how did you pass the other exams? Who helped you, who asked for you?"

Who can ask for me? I had a stick in my hands, and I pointed to her, "With it, – I say, – I came." Then he "drawed" a deuce on the examination sheet, without changing his face. I look at the exam sheet and hear a teacher at the next table taking the exam from a girl:

– Your knowledge is even worse than your brother warned me, well, I will put you three, – he said in the tone of the debtor.

– Yes, Rashid aka, he had to. At that point, I felt that money was involved. Well, and my couple through the rector turned into a three. Yes, through the rector. Those teachers have neither shame nor conscience.

When in Termez, before sending to Afghanistan, a soldier offered to leave me for a thousand rubles and then I scolded him. And that teacher, who put the pair, stood up on me and said:

–You will come in spring.

Then I calmly, without raising my voice, said:

– Give me your health, I’ll feed the sheep at the village. – He was afraid.

Classes start tomorrow. I will come to you, Rashid aka. When I see you as if I was born again, I remember the house, my father, the desire to live.

I went to the village and my heart was shaken. And now, I never go through the streets again.

I have time. Be healthy, – he said, raising his hands for prayer. I wish him health. He asked to visit me more often. He has gone. It was like bringing joy with you. The four walls of the room, among which I was left alone, pressed on me. In front of my eyes passed the faces of people with similar fate, whom I met over the years. Sabir was one of those people I was looking for to meet, whose sad confessions I listened to with pain in my heart.

I remember Ravshan from Bekabad, I remember how he told, holding his head with both hands:

– It has already been twenty months I went from one hospital to another. Unfamiliar people think I’m perfectly healthy. But day by day I get worse and worse. Recently I met an experienced doctor. "The shell that protects your brain from external influences is dried out. Therefore, a little noise gets on your nerves" – he said.

I asked him what I should do, and he replied, "Try to forget those days".

But how can we forget? As I start to become a little anxious, in my dream, people start to suffocate me in bushes. In horror, I jump out of bed and can't recover for weeks.

Where is the declared publicity, democracy? There is still a strong mechanism, the parts of which are connected with one blood, soul and money. It will take a long time to divide this bureaucratic mechanism into pieces, to throw it into a burning oven. My brothers, Abdurashid, Sabir, Ravshan and other men who were born with me, were the victims of this machine.

Unfortunately, we all often have to deal with people who do not step without benefit. Sitting in luxurious chairs, they gather from their subordinates. They filled their stomachs at the expense of sacrifices, and still shouted at every step:

– We are rebuilding! We are rebuilding!

In fact, these “reconstructors” actively “rebuilt” everything for themselves. The military from Termez, who demanded a thousand rubles, is probably also in some part engaged in rebuilding.

To prevent new misfortunes, new wars, new evils, we must separate ourselves from such Chameleons. As the saying goes, "what comes in with breast milk, comes out with the soul". Those who luxuriated in featherbed in those years, and now drink our blood. Let us be careful. Let us save our younger brothers who have not had time to walk, but who have already sat down.

* * *

It shines. The soul is filled with a feeling of satisfaction. In my ears there is an echo of my mother's echoed voice, a father's plea at the tomb asking for blessings for the children, the whisper of my brother: "I am with you with my soul, the spirit will support you."

My brother Vahid, I have fulfilled my duty to you and your comrades. Sorry not as fast as you would like, but it’s time.

Dear contemporary! I put the last point. And you turn the page and hear the voices of people with wounded hearts, worthy of the deepest respect and sincere sympathy.

WOUNDS OF THE EARTH

"SPARKS IN THE NIGHT"

Muhammad Sadikov, born in 1969. From Andijan region, Uzbekistan. Wounded during a battle in the village of Chelkar.

– I arrived in Afghanistan in the autumn of 1987. After two months of preparation, we were thrown into the defense of the village of Chelkar. The food supply was poor. We have to sit hungry for days.

On the very first day, they put me on post. I was very afraid then. There were few soldiers, and I was not relieved for fifteen days. As night falls, it seems that an enemy is waiting around every corner. Then I start shooting with a machine gun at this terrible darkness. My head is buzzing, and my ears are popping. Then I stopped hearing. I walked like a mad sheep. My friend, on the same call with me, asked the commander:

– Muhammad needs to be replaced. He's deaf; I'll take over the post in his place.

After that, I was removed from my post. After a month, I recovered a little. The service went on as usual. Different things have happened; we've seen enough of everything.

Once I stood on duty. There are four days left until the end of the service. I'm thinking about meeting in Termez with my own. I imagine how schoolgirls run out to meet us with flowers, and my heart almost bursts out of my chest. I began to count minutes, than hours. Well, what are four days? And then they seemed so long.

I had a girlfriend I loved. During these years, I wrote to her in letters while I was serving in Poland. Only my brother Nizamiddin, who studied at the institute, knew where I am actually. And even then, he found out at the military commissariat. In every letter, he asked me to take care of myself.

Three days before that night, for some reason, my eyelid began to twitch. For no reason at all, my heart suddenly squeezed, and I could not find a place for myself. It's the darkest night I've ever seen, even with my eyes closed.

That night, for some reason, I remembered everyone in turn. I talked to my mother in my mind and stroked the heads of my younger brothers and sisters. They all came out to meet me in Termez. I was looking for my favorite girl. She is not among the greeters. Then I heard her voice behind me: "Muhammad aka!" Everything happens as if in reality. Before I could turn around, I saw a burst of fiery sparks in the night. Pain burned my leg. It seemed that the voice of my beloved froze in the air. Then everything went quiet. I fell. I felt the wound with my hands; I felt a warm, viscous liquid. "Why, why shoot at me? After all, I want to go home! What am I going to do now?" I shouted without ceasing. Then someone took my hand and dragged me.

As it turned out, three bullets hit me in the thigh. An operation was performed at the hospital. Then they were brought to Tashkent by plane. The thought that the leg would be cut off was spinning in my brain. Only Nizamiddin from relatives found out about my injury. I wouldn't have told him either, but he saw it himself when they bandaged the wound.

– Don't say anything to my parents, – I asked him. When the parents first came to the hospital, they said that in those days they sensed trouble in their hearts. Yes, probably. Parents, wherever their children are, always feel the grief that has fallen on their heads.

– You asked me what I would do if I met that enemy now. Nothing. But if I had run into him at that time, I would have torn him apart. After all, life was at stake. If he hadn't shot at me, I would have put a bullet in him. This is the absurdity of war: that one person is ready to kill another, not knowing who he is or who is to blame for him. Actually, I don't understand these cases. Why did we go there? Why I came back wounded. And it is always more difficult for the locals. There are corpses of children, women, and old people everywhere. Whose bullet killed them, no one can know…

"MY FAMILY BEGGED ME…"

Timur Saidov, born in 1969. From Karshi, Uzbekistan.

He was blown up by a mine in the village of Piramakon.

– There was a tank in front of me. My friends Victor and Mamur climbed it. It was the road we traveled every day. When the tank was two hundred meters away from us, suddenly there was an explosion. I saw my friends being thrown up, and they fell to the ground. The tank was engulfed by fire. This happened there often, and every day we lost one of our comrades. But I haven't seen it up close until now. They were thrown a dozen meters above the tank. For a few moments, they hung in the air and then fell down. It was terrible. I lost consciousness for a moment. I was sure they were dead, and coffins appeared before my eyes. We held a lot of coffins.

       We all ran to the burning tank. The guys were lying in the dust, one to the left and the other to the right of the tank, twenty meters away from him. I jumped over a mine crater, and I didn't have time to take two steps, heading towards Mamur, as a terrible explosion stunned me.  I was floating in the void for a long, very long time.. Then I fell on the soft ground, like a feather bed. I didn't lose consciousness. I tried to get up, but… I didn't feel any pain at that moment. I lean on my hands and don't understand why I can't get up. My gaze fell on an object a few meters away from me, which looked like a piece of wood. Somehow reaching out, I pulled him towards me. Surprised that the piece of wood was soft and warm, I peered into it and saw that it was someone's foot. I felt it move in my hands, thought it was Mamur's leg and was scared. Frantically looking around, I searched for him and did not find. Another leg was sticking out of the pit opposite. Blood, mixing with something whitish, dripped from her, and I still did not understand what had happened. I felt that something terrible was happening to me, too. Gathering all my strength, I tried to get up again. But…

Now I could never get up. The leg that I held in one hand and that died in my palms was mine.

And the one sticking out of the pit was also my leg. They were torn off above the knees.

No, I can't tell you everything that I saw then. There are no words in the world that could convey all this.

I felt dizzy. I lowered it to the ground. The huge blue firmament disappeared, but a dot remained—a small black dot. "Now, now I'm going to get stuck" I thought. It was probably a miracle. Yes, yes, a miracle. When I opened my eyes, my father, mother, and all my relatives gathered together and told me:

– Son, don't do this; we beg you, don't kill yourself.

Until now, this day, like a living picture, has risen before my eyes. I dream of them at night; they are begging, begging…

"DON'T CRY, GUYS, I'll BE BACK…"

Pyotr Krysyuk, born in 1962. From Ukraine

– The three of us were driving in the car. We left the groceries at two gates and headed for the third. That's why the driver Babayev asked us not to go then. "Don't be afraid, – I told him, everything will be fine".

After the explosion, the driver lied motionless in front of me. Foreman Dolinskiy was writhing on the ground. The car was smoking. "Are they alive?" flashed through my mind. Sand grated on my teeth. I open my mouth, but I can't make a sound. As if something was stuck in his throat, a wheeze escaped. "Are you alive?" –  I either shouted or croaked. I didn't know if I had injured myself because I didn't feel any pain. But, chained to the ground, I could not get up. When I somehow turned to the foreman, my gaze fell on a dark puddle under my feet. I was scared. I looked at my feet…

Have you seen meat chopped with an axe? In the same way, my legs were chopped into small pieces. The severed feet were sticking out of a bloody puddle, and it seemed to me that fingers had grown out of the ground. Chunks of meat hung on rags of skin that had not been torn from the legs yet. I looked at the driver and the foreman. The foreman lay motionless, and the driver got to his feet. "Shoot the machine gun" – I told him. "They will hear us on the IFV and take away". He took a step and felt like he had a hamstring. I heard the hum of engines. Then I lost consciousness. I woke up when they put me in the car. I felt cold. I was trembling all over. One of the soldiers who came for us took off his greatcoat and covered me with it. Then the second one did the same. When I opened my eyes, both of them were sitting next to me, undressed. Then they said that when they heard the explosion, they quickly threw their pea jackets over their shoulders and hurried to help. I saw how cold they were and told them to take their overcoats, but they refused. When I was brought to the medical battalion, all the soldiers, for some reason, averted their eyes, some tried to hide their tears. I encouraged them: "Don't cry, guys, I'll come back again to you". I was really sure I'd be back.

When they brought me into the ward, my consciousness was already clouded. My strength was draining away, and my eyes were getting dark. Finally, everything was plunged into darkness, and my eyelids closed.

When I woke up, the bright light hurt my eyes, It had been five days. The soft touch of someone's fingers on my forehead opened my eyes. This was a nurse.

– They fought for your life, but there was no way to save your legs, – she said in a trembling voice. I had no legs.

Recently, I saw my guys on a TV show, and it burned like fire. I found out that the foreman was also left without both legs. The decision to enter this country was a cruel mistake. But what to do? Fate so ordered that we guys of the sixties had to pay for this mistake.

"WE WERE NAMESAKES"

Abduvahid Ergashev, born in 1963. From Tashkent, Uzbekistan.

We cleared the roads of mines. One company was allocated from each battalion of our regiment for this purpose, and a new battalion was formed. We also had to clear the territories of the exploded warehouses of mines, shells, and other ammunition.

When we came to the village where the warehouses exploded, there were no people there. Only cows and chickens, left without owners, wandered through the deserted streets. Houses are destroyed, and trees are charred. Even the ground was scorched underfoot, like ashes.

We set up tents. The next day, we went to our destination. We got off the cars. There was nowhere for the feet to step – shells, grenades, damaged mines, and other dangerous weapons were scattered everywhere.

We were taught how to collect all this. We split into groups and started working thirty meters apart from each other.

At the sight of this terrible place, none of us hoped to survive. When I was collecting shells, I saw my relatives one by one in my mind's eye. Two days later, the first mine exploded, and the guy from the next company was left without legs. Like that, it went on. Explosions were heard here and there, soldiers were injured, died. On my return from this exhausting, hellish work, my nerves were already at their limit. I had nightmares, the guys were delirious, screaming, moaning.

         In the morning, we went to work again, and the more dangerous it was, the more thoughts rushed to my relatives. At the very sight of this infernal black wasteland, the heart shrinks, skips a beat. You remember that you haven't seen anything in this world yet, you haven't even kissed a girl yet, and you feel so sorry for yourself. But you can't relax.

On October 18, I had a dream. I can't really tell now, but I remember that it was very scary. I woke up to the voice of a daycare worker shouting, "Rise!" After breakfast we went to work. As if I felt something was wrong, I didn't want to go. But, as you know, no one considered your wishes there. We were going. My comrade – Muhammad from Krasnogorsk, was walking next to me. The ground was covered with a thin layer of snow overnight, and the fatal wasteland turned white. Again, at a distance of thirty meters from each other, we began to collect ammunition. I picked up two pistols, and when I picked up the detonator of the mine, there was an explosion. Everything went dark. I looked at my hands. They were covered in blood. Staggering, I took a few steps and dropped. There was a new explosion. My family flashed before my eyes, everyone was looking at me with tears. Then everything was plunged into darkness.

Someone picked me up, put me in the car. I was getting worse and worse. We drove for a long time. On the way, the car stopped. Someone sitting next to me started swearing: "Do the Soviets have normal cars at all? Wheels fly off anywhere! Go fix it, rascal!" They stood for a long time. I'm freezing. The pain intensified. I started swearing, cursing everyone and everything, not sparing words, and cursing those who dragged me here. I saw wounded soldiers in the movies. It's all a lie. There are no such wounded people. The wounded man curses everything in the world.

In one movie, I remember that the Germans forced the prisoners to drag a jagged iron block through a minefield. We were treated the same way. After all, who can distinguish a damaged mine, grenade, or detonator from an undamaged one? The bosses initially knew that someone had to die…

Then we were transferred to another car. Now the wind was hitting us in the face. While we were getting to the hospital, I was remembering my school years: "Now I can't see their faces, I'm only eighteen, and what have I managed in life? What's the point of living now?" I asked myself. And so I would like to enjoy life, see relatives, friends, classmates, talk to them…

An operation was performed – fingers were cut off. I was conscious. They probably operated without anesthesia, I felt my fingers being cut with a crunch. I was losing a lot of blood, and the doctors were afraid that I would not survive anesthesia.

The analgesic injection didn't really work, and when they pressed something hard on my bone, I couldn't stand it and started swearing at the top of my voice in Uzbek. "My son, my son, calm down", – someone said. It just spurred me on. Why calm down now. Silence and complacency have already done their job, brought them to the last line!

Probably, blindness from birth is not as terrible for a person as for a sighted person who went blind in an instant. I want to tear to pieces all those who invented, created these mines, grenades, shells, everything—everything that cripples, kills. May they be cursed forever…

I do not remember much of it. I remember drinking compote through a hose, my mouth probably wouldn't open. My heart ached when I thought about my parents. Mom would have the hardest time of all… After getting a little stronger, I got out of bed and groped in the direction from which the cold air was blowing. I was told that our ward is on the third floor.

"Don't mention it with a vengeance", – I whispered to my family. I mentally hugged and kissed my mother. I groped for the window and put my foot on something. I found out that it was a bedside table. It fell. Someone grabbed my hands tightly:

– What are you doing, everything is still  ahead, – he said, trying to calm me down.

– What is ahead? –  I shouted desperately. Almost crying, he said, pleading in his voice: "Please, let me put you in your place".

       From the tension, blood rushed to my head, and everything around me began to spin. I have lost consciousness. For the next two weeks, I was only put to sleep with injections.

Once, I asked the nurse who gave me an injection:

– Do I have eyes?

– Yes, yes, there is one, but we don't know about the second one yet, – she replied.

It says that it's not customary for doctors to say that. But she, at least to calm me down, did not even say that everything would be fine. I felt very hurt. Out of frustration, I started kicking.  Together, they gave me an injection. I fell asleep…

I was having a dream. And every time I try to squeeze something tightly with my wounded hand. Then I wake up and remember that I have no fingers. I want to take a look and try to open my eyelids. I don't know if my eyes are open or not. I cry out. People come running to the cry. But no one can help me.

Two months have passed. It seemed as if it was morning, the doctor dropped medicine in my eyes. Suddenly, the total darkness turned into a white fog. Then the outlines of someone's face appeared. Afraid to frighten this vision, I was silent. Then, trying to figure out whether it was in a dream or in reality, I stretched out my surviving hand, touched it. A hand slid over the warm cheek.

After a while, my attending physician flew into the room, hugged me:

"Things will come right now, things will come right" – he kept repeating.

It was my second birthday. I wanted to live again.

My company commander came and said that he had received a letter from my father. "Why don't you make sure that your soldiers send letters home, – my father wrote. – If our son forgot about the house, remind him properly, punish him". I asked him not to write letters to my father.

Gradually, I began to see better, but with one eye. The face, because of gunpowder and shrapnel, has changed beyond recognition.

I will tell you that in these two months, it seemed I had lived for twenty years. I felt much older than my age.

Shortly, after I was admitted to the hospital, my friend Muhammad was also brought there. Neither of us knew that we were lying next to each other. But we were blown up at the same time. We were namesakes. Doctors cut off one of his hands, and he could not see well because of a fragment that got into his eye. Then Muhammad became my closest friend…

At the end of Fe