April 11, 2004

We sat under the shadows of Pamir Mountains, in the far-flung valley of Sokhtarabad, by a glacier stream and listened attentively to the tales of bygone exploits of Abdul Latif, an old hunter who sat cross-legged in front of us.

The old gentleman could not converse in Urdu, hence his nephew Ahad, who was also our trek guide to the Kromber Lake and Darkut Glacier, translated his tales of the past.

“Almost seventy years ago we descended from those mountains and entered the valley of Sokhtarabad,” the old hunter pointed towards a high pass situated on the top of little Pamirs.

“I sat terrified on the back of my father’s horse as the animal almost out of control came tumbling down from the Pamirs. We just had one look at this valley and decided that this is where we will stay and make it our new home. There was plenty of water and thick grass and the mountains were teaming with wild animals.”

“So you came down from Russia?” someone inquired.

“No-No”, the old man shook his beard violently. “We came from our own ancestral land, Uzbekistan. We lived in a small town, Uzgin, which has been renamed Osh. My father Qazi Jani Beg was the Emir of Uzgin. Then the red Cossacks invaded our town and made an offer to my father; you can remain the Emir of Uzgin if you accept the authority of Soviet Union. My father refused the offer and escaped into the high Pamirs and there waged a war against the Russians for ten years. But he could fight an Empire with his few horses and old swords, for long. So, he crossed the Afghan Wakhan corridor and little Pamirs and entered the realm of the then British empire.”

“So your whole family settled in Sokhtarabad seventy years ago?”

“No, my brother Adalat Khan crossed the mountains of Kakaisia and went to Turkey; Mohammad Ibrahim did not have a heart to abandon his ancestral land and stayed there; Mohammad Ismail settled in Gilgit and I chose this valley.”

“Sir, what kind of food do you relish most?” the formal interview started.

“Whatever is available I thank Allah for that”.

“But is there anything particular for which you thank Allah most?”

“Milk, yogurt and meat — and tea.”

“What kind of meat?” I asked smilingly. “Lamb, goat and specially the wild markhor sheep if available.”

“Do you hunt the markhor yourself?”

“Not any more,” the old hunter said gloomily. “Although I can still climb vertical rocks and reach the heights where markhors are found, but my sons forbid me to do so. They say I am too old for such pursuits, you know your sons; just to prove their youth (they) forcibly declare you old and out of wits.” Every body laughed heartily including the old hunter’s sons.

“Now my sons, Saat Beg, Tulan Bai and Kainja Bai do the job. Kainja Bai is best of them all, his eyes are like binoculars and he can see during the night also.”

Kainja Bai’s Mongol eyes lit up by this compliment. That evening under the shadows of the Pamirs, how could we ever imagine that the same Kainja Bai would slip from a rock and fall to his death while pursuing a markhor.

“Sir, how many markhors have you hunted during your lifetime?” a banker trekker inquired.

“I don’t remember. They must be in hundreds, but I did not kill them just for fun, as some cruel people do. I only went after markhors when we were short of meat. However, I remember that I killed at least thirteen ferocious wolves.”

This was alarming news for us. “Sir, there are wolves around here, near our camp site perhaps?”

“Yes they are around, but never come down in the valley. Oh yes, I also killed a bear, the size of Pamir mountains. But it’s a long story and I will narrate it some other time.”

He was not too keen on sharing his exploits with us.

“Uncle sir, rest assured we have no intention of risking our lives again to reach Sokhtarabad and we can safely say that you will never come all the way to Lahore. You don’t even fancy going to Gilgit, so this is now or never. Tarar Sahib bores us to death by narrating his cooked up travel adventures. We are sure your stories will be much more interesting,” a trekker friend said, as his meanness reached its limit.

“I was thirty-years old” the aging hunter went back in times. “He was huge. A brown bear whose face strangely looked like a human came upon while I was climbing a rock to go up to a meadow. In those days guns were not very common and I had an old sword to defend myself. It was purely for self-defence that I had to attack him, he was wounded and from the gash that I inflicted blood poured like a mountain spring. He retreated to a safe distance and with his snout started uprooting the grass; he was trying to stem the flow of blood by putting the grass on his wound.

“He knew that I would not attack him in this critical condition because in this environment, by living together, we know the animals and the animals know our behaviour. Then he got up and started walking away from me and I followed him. I had to kill him at all cost otherwise he would have traced me right back to my abode and killed me to take his revenge. Finally he took refuge in a dark cave and I knew he was playing with me, luring me inside to kill me so I sat outside the mouth of the cave with the sword in hand. The night came and then the next day dawned and I sat there without having any food or water, I could hear his growls challenging me to come inside. Then another night came and the next day due to weakness I became delirious and started talking to him.”

“You mean you were talking to a bear? In which language did he reply? What did he say?” the excited trekkers asked in unison.

“As I have told you we live in the same world so we understand each others language. Many times a markhor would look at you and say it with his beseeching eyes that ‘please spare me in the name of your children’ and we will oblige and lower the barrel of the gun.

“Once in the high Pamir, a snow tiger suddenly appeared in front of me. I was totally unarmed and he could easily tear me apart. I just started talking to him, telling him that I am not his enemy and please let me go back to my children and he spared me.”

“What about the bear, what did you say to him?”

“Oh, the brown bear in the cave. Well I challenged him to come out in the open and face me like a man. ‘You coward hiding in a cave like a woman, come out you mouse hearted brown hunk, son of a doubtful mother’. The whole day I kept on insulting him and I could hear his angry growls in reaction. Finally as the third evening of our conflict approached, he suddenly emerged from the cave without a sound and fell upon me.

“It is not easy to kill a beast of that size with a sword especially if you had been starving for last three days and nights. I really felt very sorry after killing him and wept for him because he was a brave bear. We believe that a beast does not die until and unless it is his fate. So the fate killed the brown bear, not me.”

That evening in the remote valley of Sokhtarabad underneath the little Pamirs hunter Abdul Latif honoured us by inviting all of us for dinner in his mountain home. His aging wife, Afghan Bibi and their daughters prepared the classical Uzbek pulao and a roasted leg of markhor.

After dinner, talk again revolved around the tales of old hunter. All of us were interested in the mythical snow tiger, which was still found high above the Pamirs.

“I never killed a single snow leopard for the pleasure of it or to prove my bravery. At times I have to defend my flock and family and sometime I had to save myself.”

“There are certain heartless and cruel people who are involved in this heinous crime, they sell the hide in Gilgit to foreigners who pay a huge sum to procure it.”

During the night Kainja Bai left the valley to climb the vertical rocks to reach a small meadow by early next morning where during the day, through his binoculars (eyes), he had spotted two markhors. It was during such an expedition that he never returned to his aged father Abdul Latif. He was buried underneath the same cliffs which he used to climb during the night like a markhor.

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