Goftegus 100 and 101
15 years Armanshahr, celebrated with Simorgh peace prize awards
A caravan of books leaves; a caravan of affection returns
The 15th anniversary of the establishment of Armanshahr Foundation/Open Asia was celebrated in its 100th Goftegu meeting during which the winners of the first and second Simorgh peace prize were announced. Furthermore, the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Tajikistan and the National Library of Tajikistan were praised for two decades of publishing services and cultural achievements, respectively. Two thousand books were donated to the National Library.
The National library of Tajikistan hosted the 15th anniversary of Armanshahr on 7 December 2012. During the celebration, Tajik actors performed a play with the title of the Simorgh Peace Caravan based on the winning poems of the Simorgh Peace Prize as well as a selection of poems by well-known poets. More than 100 cultural activists of Tajikistan took part at the meeting, which was covered by the media in Tajikistan as well as the international media, e.g. BBC, Radio Azadi and Radio Zamaaneh.
The play started with “I pray to God for the grapes to ripen,” a poem by Elias Alawi, a winner of the 1st Simorgh Peace Prize. The final sentence of the play created many questions for the audience: “Perhaps we have not realised yet that we are the Simorgh, it is the blessed peace of Simorgh that conquers the hearts; it can be accepted unconditionally as a law.”
The play concentrated on the contrast between peace and war, which kept recurring on the stage. War went, peace came, peace went and war came. Sometimes: “War ended. That was the last news they had heard on the radio. They had returned home in dirty attire/nobody waited for them/nobody said hello/nobody opened the door.” However, there was a reply: “They do not wish to answer your hello/heads are bent into the collars/nobody raises their head to answer and meet friends…” The ending of war does not mean its conclusion. It is the beginning of a cold season during which the past must be redressed. Achieving peace is not the final destination. The consequences of war must be eradicated. “The world must get drunk/the streets must stumble/Presidents and paupers most rub shoulders / the world must get drunk/ the borders must get drunk and Mohammad Ali can meet his mother after 17 years.”
“Drunkenness must spread to objects.” The evil brothers of Joseph must be told: “This was not expected/ throwing in the well, okay, but why kill?” The war films must be watched: “The camera filmed two corpses/the frame was shut and the woman was on the other side of the window.” One must be concerned with the war to protect peace: “Don’t go out, the gutters are not void of blood, my blood is flowing where your blood is flowing where his blood is flowing.” We should not forget that: “Mother was still whispering, don’t say anything, silence was medicine as well as sickness.”
The whole text of the play was not as bitter as this, especially when sisters and brothers from the three corners of this great lingual geography came together and joined hands, “without the Earth going crazy and the Heaven falling apart,” when they cried out: “There are a thousand Khorassans in my heart,” and “the rain washed away the 40-day grief/ it washed clean my heart and eyes/ it washed every window/ it washed the mirror of my heart/ Ringing passed the rain/ agile and young passed the rain.”
Despite all the joy and grief, all the peace and war, the truth was still the final sentence of the play: “Perhaps we have not realised yet that we are the Simorgh, it is the blessed peace of Simorgh that conquers the hearts; it can be accepted unconditionally as a law.”
After the play, two special sculptures were awarded to the Ministry of Culture and the National Library of Tajikistan. Subsequently, Ms Golrokhsar Safi Ava, mother of the Tajik nation, spoke sweetly about 15 years of Armanshahr’s activities. She described Armanshahr as an institution that had stood by the people of Tajikistan in the most difficult days of the suffering land.
The caravan of 2,000 books of Armanshahr, thousands of poems and stories of solidarity and common language went to Tajikistan and returned to Kabul as a caravan of affection, memories, friendships, and love and set up its 101st meeting with a good number of the people of pen, poetry and literature.
On 17 December 2012, the participants of the meeting at the Culture and Civil Society Foundation in Kabul heard a report about the 1st and 2nd Simorgh peace prizes, when the statutes of Simorgh and plates of honour were awarded to the winners. They then watched a film of the play performed in Tajikistan.
