Bracing against shifting landscape
HERITAGE SITE: Afghan cave-dwellers face relocation with move to protect grottoes
MARZIA and her husband, Qadeer, thought themselves lucky when they moved into a 1,700-year-old Buddhist cave hand-carved into the side of a mountain in Afghanistan’s central highlands.
It was clean and dry, warm in the winter, cool in the summer and there was plenty of work on local farms. But now, even this barebones way of life is threatened.
The family, along with 242 other cave-dwelling households dotted around the capital of Bamiyan province, also called Bamiyan, could be forced to move soon. They are what’s left of around 10,000 families who have been relocated over the past decade as part of the local government’s programME to protect the unique man-made grottoes that it hopes will transform Bamiyan into a tourist destination once Afghanistan’s war with the Taliban, now in its 16th year, is finally over.
The couple moved here from neighbouring Maidan-Wardak province because they believed it was a stepping stone to a better future.
“We had no money and my husband couldn’t get a job. We left because we were poor,” said Marzia, 30.
But 12 years later, they are still living in the cave, along with their five children, aged between 10 months and 8 years.
Any original features, such as the brightly-coloured geometric murals painted by the monks who created these caves, are long gone. They’ve been destroyed by time, the elements and the wear-and-tear of hundreds of years of habitation. “Life here is difficult,” Marzia said. Water must be fetched from a stream, and a 9-volt battery charges a solar panel that provides light after dark. Cooking is done on a stove fuelled by a gas bottle.
The cave-dwellers do what they can with their meagre resources, determined that the next generation will have a better life. As Shia Muslims of the Hazara minority, they have suffered historic persecution, but have also benefited from immense largesse from international charities and governments.
Amid an intensifying Taliban-led insurgency, Bamiyan is a haven of peace, as the Shia Hazaras have successfully kept the war off their territory since the end of the Sunni Taliban’s regime — under which they were persecuted and much of the province’s Buddhist heritage destroyed.
Bamiyan was once renowned as the site of two massive Buddhas, one 55m-tall, the other 38m-tall, that were carved into the cliff face between the 4th and 6th centuries, but were destroyed by the Taliban at the urging of al-Qaeda in early 2001.
Their memory lingers now in gaping niches where the magnificent statues stood as part of an extensive monastic centre that included up to 12,000 caves used by monks as devotional getaways. It formed an elaborate network of monasteries, assembly halls, residencies and large sanctuaries that were decorated with frescos and statues, many produced with techniques unique to
in blue, talking to her neighbour near her cave in
this part of the world, according to archaeologist Rasool Shojaei, who worked on their restoration with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco).
Unesco has classified the “cultural landscape and archaeological remains of the Bamiyan Valley” as a world heritage site representing Buddhist and Islamic religious and artistic developments from the first to 13th Centuries.
The provincial government is working with Unesco to restore the valley’s eight significant sites, including Ghulghulah fortress, believed to be Bamiyan’s original staging
Afghanistan.
post on the old Silk Road that linked China to India. The fortress was razed by Genghis Khan’s hoards in early 13th Century and never regained its glory.
Determined to develop on its own terms, the province hosted around a dozen international events a year, said Information and Culture Ministry local office head Kabir Dadras.
Events include a marathon, skiing competitions and cultural festivals.
“Bamiyan is popular with Indians, Japanese and Koreans because of its Buddhist heritage,” he said.
As part of those plans, he said, the people who were still living in the grottoes and assessed as sufficiently poverty-stricken to qualify for the government’s land redistribution programme, would be moved to new townships on the outskirts of the city by 2018, he said.
For Marzia, it’s been a lot of talk and no action.
“I’ve spoken with the governor, and officials have been here to see us. They keep promising that they will give us a flat, but we’ve no idea when, or even if, it will happen.”
Her daughter Shepha Qah, 8, harbours hopes of becoming a doctor.
“I have belief in my daughter’s ambitions, that’s why we left MaidanWardak. So that our children could go to school and have a better life.” AP