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- Story Listed as: Fiction For Adults
- Theme: Family & Friends
- Subject: Family
- Published: 07/08/2015
The Boy
Prajwol Rajbhandari was a boy of eleven and a son of a poor farmer. He lived in a small village of Balkot, Bhaktapur with his parents and a younger brother Pramod, who was four. Unlike most of the houses in their village, they lived in a small ancient house which once belonged to his grandfather and after his death it was passed on to his father, as he was the only son. They were very poor and their house was the only priced possession besides a small field, near it. Life was always a struggle with never enough to eat.
Luckily, due to Prajwol's performance in the school, his education was free which was a relief for his poor family. He was a very bright boy who had a knack in sports and extracurricular activities. He was one of the best in his class, always on top in every subject. Despite his good academic background, he didn't have good terms with his classmates. They bullied and taunted him. They teased him. They did so because they were wealthier than him and lived in big concrete houses. They boasted about how much their fathers earned, how big their houses were, how many toys they had and where they went for vacations during holidays. This pricked Prajwol's tender heart like a sharp thorn. While his classmates talked about this and that and humiliated Prajwol, he wanted to pin every single one of them to the ground and beat the hell out of them. But there was nothing he could do except to escape those bullies. After all he was the son of an impoverished farmer.
His father was a very harsh man. He talked less. He was always in a foul mood and beat Prajwol on every occasion possible. His father poured out every ounce of his bitterness on the innocent boy. His one glance was enough for Prajwol to pee in his pants. One day, Prajwol came home with bruises and fresh wounds all over his face and with his right ankle twisted. He was limping and one could easily see fear dancing all around him. He was petrified as he knew what was coming. Actually, after the school he had had a hand to hand combat with one of the boys from his class who had called him a son of a whore. He couldn't bare it and jumped into the boy and they had a huge fight. That night father tied him to one of the wooden poles of the cow shed and treated him with Sisno paani (nettle leaves dipped in cold water).
Prajwol tried his best to explain everything.
"Baba, please don't do it. I swear to you baba, it was not my fault. Rohan started it all. He called mom a whore. Please baba please," he pleaded for mercy.
But father would not listen. He went on. From that day onwards, Prajwol hated his father and even his mother who did nothing to stop her husband's wrath on him. She just stood there, helpless, watching him being beaten like a donkey. She never spoke a word in his defence. Never...
Prajwol was growing into a very fierce little boy and started hating his parents even more. But he loved his little brother who was his world. Though he was seven years older than Pramod, they were like friends. They needed no one when they had each other. Every time Prajwol was beaten, it was young Pramod who sat beside him and tended his wounds and wiped his tears. They were like nails and flesh...Inseparable. Prajwol could never imagine being separated with his beloved brother.
***
It was Saturday and Prajwol was outside with his friends, the local boys of Balkot. His father was home, eating lunch with his mother and Pramod was taking a nap. His friend Sujal who liked to call himself Prajwol's best buddy, was also there, holding a chungi (bunch of rubber bands fastened with a string) in one hand and trying to choose a partner in the game. Saugat and Sagar were also there. They were twins and they knew very well, who Sujal would choose.
"Sujal, why don't you just start the game? We know who you're going to choose, so stop wasting our time." Saugat seemed irritated.
Sagar nodded in approval.
"Please yaar, we haven't taken a shower and mom's going to kill us if she doesn't find us home," Sagar confessed.
"Kati lyang lyang garxa yo Saugat pani (Why the hell are you complainig so much)?" Sujal said.
Sujal had earned the title of Drama Queen of Balkot as he loved throwing tantrums and lyang lyang was the new phrase he had learned from his older brother Sulav. But Prajwol was not in the mood to play that day. He was having a very strange feeling from the morning. He had had a very bad dream previous night where a stranger handed Prajwol an axe and he was chopping an old peepal tree very fiercely. He was anxious and worried.
Suddenly the whole earth shook and the houses looked like they were about to touch the ground beneath them. The ancient houses of the locality crumbled and he heard people screaming as they were buried in the rubble of their own houses. The house in which Prajwol and his family were living was a very old one, made up of clay, bricks and wood. The kids were scared out of their wits. The twins started crying for their parents. Prajwol, who was holding onto Sujal for support, started running towards his home as soon as the tremor stopped. When he reached there, there was no house left.
The house had come down and Prajwol's parents and his brother were buried under the debris of the house. He panicked. He saw people running out of their houses towards open fields. Some were trying to remove the scattered remains of the broken houses in search of the people buried under. A young boy like Prajwol didn't know how to react. His mind was buzzing with the sound of his father's lashes and slaps. He felt dizzy. Then he realised that his parents and his brother were never coming back. His BROTHER....
Oh how could he forget his brother, his life? He started crawling on his four, searching through the heap of mud and bricks, looking for the sign of his brother. He was becoming selfish. He didn't care whether his parents were dead. Right now. ..he needed to find his brother. Another shock shook the ground beneath him. He stumbled back. He felt two rough hands on his shoulders, pulling him away from the ruins of his house. He fought back, trying to free himself from the person who was dragging him.
***
After an hour of search and struggle through the wreckage, the locals finally managed to retrieve the bodies of half a dozen dead ones. Three of them belonged to Prajwol’s parents and his dear brother, Pramod. The bodies were lain on an open field which belonged to Saugat and Sagar’s father. Prajwol went near their bodies. All three of them were covered in dust. Their eyes were closed and except the fact that they were not breathing, they looked fast asleep. Prajwol was in a daze as if his brain was unable to process the image in front of him. He looked at the limp body of his father. He took his hand in his hand. Those rocky hands which rained slaps and abuses on him once, felt soft and useless to him. He then threw a side glance at his mother’s body. Oh! How helpless she was. Always scared of father. She was a weak creature he thought, a COWARD... He sounded harsh. Then finally he came near to his brother. Such a young boy, so innocent. DEAD... He had just started to see the world. Hot tears trickled from his eyes. He felt ashamed for crying. Then he felt rage boiling inside him. He felt angry on that particular Him who had stolen his whole family from him.
“How could you, God? How could you do this to me?” he cried inside. The poor boy.
***
The aftershocks shook the land from time to time. That was nothing compared to the emotional earthquake that was going on inside Prajwol's heart. He felt helpless without his family. He missed his younger brother Pramod. Tears found home in his eyes. He tried to stop them but they forced their way out. Now he realised how alone he was. He remembered how his father used to beat him with bamboo sticks, how he used to cry and his brother used to cry along as if he felt the pain himself. Prawol was suffocating. He could not bear to see his brother lying on the ground. So he ran away from them, away from everyone. What else could he do? He was only eleven.
He roamed around the city of Bhaktapur where the houses were nothing more than heaps of bricks and mud. Even concrete houses, of which the bullies boasted, had gone down. From Rags to Riches was more like From Riches to Rags now. He saw a middle aged man as he reached Lokanthali Chowk, a mobile radio in his hand, listening to the news. That's when he heard the details of the earthquake and the destruction caused by it. 7.8 magnitude. Dharahara gone down, hundreds and more dead and still counting, Durbar squares nothing more than old ruins. Houses destroyed. More aftershocks shaking the ground. Ah! How the news agitated him. It was frightening.
The whole day he roamed the city, looking at people who were living under tents. Their faces grim. This made him angrier than before. He wanted to meet the creator and he wanted answers from Him for all the losses, pain and destruction. How silly he was. He thought he was capable of turning things around. He didn't know the time but it was almost dark. He was hungry and thirsty when he reached the Pashupatinath Temple. He knew the way very well because he had visited the temple with his family many times before.
There he stood on the bank of holy river Bagmati, toying with a small pebble he had found. All his anger and questions in store had faded with the extreme hunger and thirst. He watched the view on the opposite side of the river. There were people, lots of people and children with a few women as well. Some of the men and even a few children were wearing plain white clothes. Dressed down, not up. Prayers and hymns were being chanted by the Hindu priests. People were crying frantically, a few sobbing silently, tears rolling down their cheek,s and few were consoling those in pain. Prajwol wondered why they were crying. Then he saw rows of bodies laid on heaps of woods. They were covered with long yellow pieces of cloth and flowers. Now he knew what was happening. They were mourning for the dead ones, their loved ones. For their children. For their husbands. For their wives. For their lovers. For their friends. Their bodies lifeless on heaps of woods, ready for the cremation. A memory flooded back to his mind. During one of those visits to the temple, he had watched a body being cremated with a fire sacrifice. And he remembered something...
His father, whom Prajwol rarely heard speaking, told him this, when he was nine, "son, life is short and no one can live forever. I am becoming weak and my hands useless. So if I die, it is your duty to cremate my body. You have to take care of your mother and brother. I know how harsh I have been to you. I am a terrible father. But if you fail, son, my soul will never find peace.”
'Your hands, useless? What a terrible joke! They might not be strong enough to work in the field now but they will always be strong enough to flog me,' though not aloud but he had mocked his father at the time.
Then a terrible truth hit him. The abuses, the flogging and harsh glare of his father, didn’t matter anymore. His mother’s silence now seemed meaningful to him. He realised that his family was dead and he was the only one alive. He felt like he was being crushed with something hard and heavy. He couldn't breathe. The world turned bleak and dark. Then he ran... ran back to the place where his whole family laid lifeless. He didn't stop. He didn't look back. He went on. He knew he had to reach there. After all, he was the only one left, the only one left to pay a last homage to his dead parents and his beloved brother.
The Boy(Anita Ghimire)
The Boy
Prajwol Rajbhandari was a boy of eleven and a son of a poor farmer. He lived in a small village of Balkot, Bhaktapur with his parents and a younger brother Pramod, who was four. Unlike most of the houses in their village, they lived in a small ancient house which once belonged to his grandfather and after his death it was passed on to his father, as he was the only son. They were very poor and their house was the only priced possession besides a small field, near it. Life was always a struggle with never enough to eat.
Luckily, due to Prajwol's performance in the school, his education was free which was a relief for his poor family. He was a very bright boy who had a knack in sports and extracurricular activities. He was one of the best in his class, always on top in every subject. Despite his good academic background, he didn't have good terms with his classmates. They bullied and taunted him. They teased him. They did so because they were wealthier than him and lived in big concrete houses. They boasted about how much their fathers earned, how big their houses were, how many toys they had and where they went for vacations during holidays. This pricked Prajwol's tender heart like a sharp thorn. While his classmates talked about this and that and humiliated Prajwol, he wanted to pin every single one of them to the ground and beat the hell out of them. But there was nothing he could do except to escape those bullies. After all he was the son of an impoverished farmer.
His father was a very harsh man. He talked less. He was always in a foul mood and beat Prajwol on every occasion possible. His father poured out every ounce of his bitterness on the innocent boy. His one glance was enough for Prajwol to pee in his pants. One day, Prajwol came home with bruises and fresh wounds all over his face and with his right ankle twisted. He was limping and one could easily see fear dancing all around him. He was petrified as he knew what was coming. Actually, after the school he had had a hand to hand combat with one of the boys from his class who had called him a son of a whore. He couldn't bare it and jumped into the boy and they had a huge fight. That night father tied him to one of the wooden poles of the cow shed and treated him with Sisno paani (nettle leaves dipped in cold water).
Prajwol tried his best to explain everything.
"Baba, please don't do it. I swear to you baba, it was not my fault. Rohan started it all. He called mom a whore. Please baba please," he pleaded for mercy.
But father would not listen. He went on. From that day onwards, Prajwol hated his father and even his mother who did nothing to stop her husband's wrath on him. She just stood there, helpless, watching him being beaten like a donkey. She never spoke a word in his defence. Never...
Prajwol was growing into a very fierce little boy and started hating his parents even more. But he loved his little brother who was his world. Though he was seven years older than Pramod, they were like friends. They needed no one when they had each other. Every time Prajwol was beaten, it was young Pramod who sat beside him and tended his wounds and wiped his tears. They were like nails and flesh...Inseparable. Prajwol could never imagine being separated with his beloved brother.
***
It was Saturday and Prajwol was outside with his friends, the local boys of Balkot. His father was home, eating lunch with his mother and Pramod was taking a nap. His friend Sujal who liked to call himself Prajwol's best buddy, was also there, holding a chungi (bunch of rubber bands fastened with a string) in one hand and trying to choose a partner in the game. Saugat and Sagar were also there. They were twins and they knew very well, who Sujal would choose.
"Sujal, why don't you just start the game? We know who you're going to choose, so stop wasting our time." Saugat seemed irritated.
Sagar nodded in approval.
"Please yaar, we haven't taken a shower and mom's going to kill us if she doesn't find us home," Sagar confessed.
"Kati lyang lyang garxa yo Saugat pani (Why the hell are you complainig so much)?" Sujal said.
Sujal had earned the title of Drama Queen of Balkot as he loved throwing tantrums and lyang lyang was the new phrase he had learned from his older brother Sulav. But Prajwol was not in the mood to play that day. He was having a very strange feeling from the morning. He had had a very bad dream previous night where a stranger handed Prajwol an axe and he was chopping an old peepal tree very fiercely. He was anxious and worried.
Suddenly the whole earth shook and the houses looked like they were about to touch the ground beneath them. The ancient houses of the locality crumbled and he heard people screaming as they were buried in the rubble of their own houses. The house in which Prajwol and his family were living was a very old one, made up of clay, bricks and wood. The kids were scared out of their wits. The twins started crying for their parents. Prajwol, who was holding onto Sujal for support, started running towards his home as soon as the tremor stopped. When he reached there, there was no house left.
The house had come down and Prajwol's parents and his brother were buried under the debris of the house. He panicked. He saw people running out of their houses towards open fields. Some were trying to remove the scattered remains of the broken houses in search of the people buried under. A young boy like Prajwol didn't know how to react. His mind was buzzing with the sound of his father's lashes and slaps. He felt dizzy. Then he realised that his parents and his brother were never coming back. His BROTHER....
Oh how could he forget his brother, his life? He started crawling on his four, searching through the heap of mud and bricks, looking for the sign of his brother. He was becoming selfish. He didn't care whether his parents were dead. Right now. ..he needed to find his brother. Another shock shook the ground beneath him. He stumbled back. He felt two rough hands on his shoulders, pulling him away from the ruins of his house. He fought back, trying to free himself from the person who was dragging him.
***
After an hour of search and struggle through the wreckage, the locals finally managed to retrieve the bodies of half a dozen dead ones. Three of them belonged to Prajwol’s parents and his dear brother, Pramod. The bodies were lain on an open field which belonged to Saugat and Sagar’s father. Prajwol went near their bodies. All three of them were covered in dust. Their eyes were closed and except the fact that they were not breathing, they looked fast asleep. Prajwol was in a daze as if his brain was unable to process the image in front of him. He looked at the limp body of his father. He took his hand in his hand. Those rocky hands which rained slaps and abuses on him once, felt soft and useless to him. He then threw a side glance at his mother’s body. Oh! How helpless she was. Always scared of father. She was a weak creature he thought, a COWARD... He sounded harsh. Then finally he came near to his brother. Such a young boy, so innocent. DEAD... He had just started to see the world. Hot tears trickled from his eyes. He felt ashamed for crying. Then he felt rage boiling inside him. He felt angry on that particular Him who had stolen his whole family from him.
“How could you, God? How could you do this to me?” he cried inside. The poor boy.
***
The aftershocks shook the land from time to time. That was nothing compared to the emotional earthquake that was going on inside Prajwol's heart. He felt helpless without his family. He missed his younger brother Pramod. Tears found home in his eyes. He tried to stop them but they forced their way out. Now he realised how alone he was. He remembered how his father used to beat him with bamboo sticks, how he used to cry and his brother used to cry along as if he felt the pain himself. Prawol was suffocating. He could not bear to see his brother lying on the ground. So he ran away from them, away from everyone. What else could he do? He was only eleven.
He roamed around the city of Bhaktapur where the houses were nothing more than heaps of bricks and mud. Even concrete houses, of which the bullies boasted, had gone down. From Rags to Riches was more like From Riches to Rags now. He saw a middle aged man as he reached Lokanthali Chowk, a mobile radio in his hand, listening to the news. That's when he heard the details of the earthquake and the destruction caused by it. 7.8 magnitude. Dharahara gone down, hundreds and more dead and still counting, Durbar squares nothing more than old ruins. Houses destroyed. More aftershocks shaking the ground. Ah! How the news agitated him. It was frightening.
The whole day he roamed the city, looking at people who were living under tents. Their faces grim. This made him angrier than before. He wanted to meet the creator and he wanted answers from Him for all the losses, pain and destruction. How silly he was. He thought he was capable of turning things around. He didn't know the time but it was almost dark. He was hungry and thirsty when he reached the Pashupatinath Temple. He knew the way very well because he had visited the temple with his family many times before.
There he stood on the bank of holy river Bagmati, toying with a small pebble he had found. All his anger and questions in store had faded with the extreme hunger and thirst. He watched the view on the opposite side of the river. There were people, lots of people and children with a few women as well. Some of the men and even a few children were wearing plain white clothes. Dressed down, not up. Prayers and hymns were being chanted by the Hindu priests. People were crying frantically, a few sobbing silently, tears rolling down their cheek,s and few were consoling those in pain. Prajwol wondered why they were crying. Then he saw rows of bodies laid on heaps of woods. They were covered with long yellow pieces of cloth and flowers. Now he knew what was happening. They were mourning for the dead ones, their loved ones. For their children. For their husbands. For their wives. For their lovers. For their friends. Their bodies lifeless on heaps of woods, ready for the cremation. A memory flooded back to his mind. During one of those visits to the temple, he had watched a body being cremated with a fire sacrifice. And he remembered something...
His father, whom Prajwol rarely heard speaking, told him this, when he was nine, "son, life is short and no one can live forever. I am becoming weak and my hands useless. So if I die, it is your duty to cremate my body. You have to take care of your mother and brother. I know how harsh I have been to you. I am a terrible father. But if you fail, son, my soul will never find peace.”
'Your hands, useless? What a terrible joke! They might not be strong enough to work in the field now but they will always be strong enough to flog me,' though not aloud but he had mocked his father at the time.
Then a terrible truth hit him. The abuses, the flogging and harsh glare of his father, didn’t matter anymore. His mother’s silence now seemed meaningful to him. He realised that his family was dead and he was the only one alive. He felt like he was being crushed with something hard and heavy. He couldn't breathe. The world turned bleak and dark. Then he ran... ran back to the place where his whole family laid lifeless. He didn't stop. He didn't look back. He went on. He knew he had to reach there. After all, he was the only one left, the only one left to pay a last homage to his dead parents and his beloved brother.
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