And Then The Rains Came

Written:  7/25/12

No doubt many of you have not heard, and those of you who have, by the time you’re reading this, you’ve probably already started to worry about other things, but early yesterday morning the Tajik government launched a major offensive into its autonomous region.  This area of the country, which international news agencies are quick to point out, borders one of the more lawless regions of Afghanistan, and here in Tajikistan it stands alone, largely governing itself and for the most part minding its own business.  … except of course when it doesn’t.  In an attempt to avoid too much politics and dragging on for paragraphs with an analysis of this side or that, I’ll leave you to do a quick google search.  Suffice it to say that it looks a lot like war, and no matter which side you’re on there are losses.

This morning when I left my apartment, okay, to be fair … this afternoon when I left my apartment and walked to work the streets were somber.  These are not normally the streets of carnival, and I do not expect cartwheels and cheers, but on most days there will be smiles, stares, and bubbling conversations.  More importantly, there will be conversations.  This afternoon though, pedestrians are rare, and conversations are few. 

At work, talking with colleagues, the subject is entirely avoided.   When asked how I slept, I admit that I didn’t sleep well because I kept waking up worried, checking the news for updates, but more importantly checking my email and facebook.  I am not really worried for my safety.  In reality I am in no more danger than I was the day before, which is to say almost none at all.  I am worried that my family will worry.  That I will sleep through an email or a panicked facebook message which will spiral out of control while I slumber.  My colleague shakes his head and mutters how sad it is, and how my parents would worry so much if they knew what was happening here – obviously worrying about his own children.  If he were a cartoon character there would be a storm cloud over his head.

The day moves on, and no one talks. 

Hours later I find myself in the office alone.  It’s been this way for about an hour now … another rarity.  It is then that I start to hear it.  Pitter-patter, pitter-patter.  For the first time since I arrived the weather is doing something other than shining sun.  I opened the window and in came a cool breeze, a cloud burst, and a smile erupts on my face.  Then the winds come.  I thought it best to close the window and was glad I did.  The skies opened up and instantly the sidewalks became rivers.  Sheets of rain fell and more than once I heard glass shattering as the winds rearranged the furniture. 

Another colleague, who doesn’t speak much English, poked his head in the room with a big smile on his face.  “Ok?”  I laughed, “yeah, okay!” 

20 minutes after the rains had stopped the street was still a raging river, and a doctor I work with offered me a ride.  Passing downed power-lines and coursing through streets with inches of water on them we laughed as the water flew from the car’s tires.  People on the street were also laughing, and most didn’t even seem to mind the inevitability of the waves of water kicked up by passing cars. 

While the situation in the south isn’t gone, and the fear will return along with the dread from those who have already lived through one civil war, for now we are cleansed.  If only for a moment, we have remembered how to laugh, children are playing and old women run happily through puddles in the streets.