Shattered Hopes, a Promise for Another

Salam & Good day to all,

What a minute, do not get me wrong. It has nothing to do with my emotional-affective bricks of my mind - but just a simple book review (err... should i used this word ~ review?). Like the former, i've finished reading another Khaled Hosseini masterpiece ~ " A Thousand Splendid Suns". It was his second novel - after his top rated "The Kiter Runner" book. Err..... i guess i should form a reading group later (anyone?). A pile of journals, reading materials needs to be viewed, but still managed to grab this reading. (Hopes both of my supervisors did not read this blog ~ if they did "Jan and Michel, i am so sorry!"). OK, where are we? .... orait well, whereas “The Kite Runner” focused on fathers and sons, and friendships between men, but “A Thousand Splendid Suns,” however focuses on mothers, daughters, and friendships between women. Like its former, it portrays the fallout that Afghan's violent life on many, ending in one character, and the promise of a new life for another.


Mariam and Laila ~ two women shared their life, under diverse circumstances of life. When these two characters connected, it have shaped entirely the way of their fate in this book. Mariam, an illegitimate child whose whole life is torn between a father she had her pride on and an abusive mother faces tragedy. A rushed marriage ensues with the antagonist role, Rasheed that physically and emotionally abusive when she fails to conceive him a child. She patiently endures her fate within her pious devotion and faith. A life within an endless path of vexation and pain.

My descent way to review all journals, papers and articles
- without reading it! :-) - i became the journal burger!

Hmm, then comes next is Laila, - a deeply loved daughter by his father, an intelligent and dutiful daughter. The war shatters her loving family and bringing her in Mariam’s home where the unthinkable happens. These two women start of as rivals and end up as inseparable allies, working together for their reciprocal faith, and fate. In the end, one sacrifices her life, so that the other will have a chance to experience life as she may know it.One of the portions that i like most, when the author relates this book, with one of the poems, that was written by Saib Tabrizi, the 17th century poem about Kabul; i just strike a few lines here.

"Every street of Kabul is enthralling to the eye
Through the bazaars, caravans of Egypt pass
One could not count the moons that shimmer on her roofs
And the thousand splendid suns that hide behind her walls"

I guess, it has more than a single meaning. Well, one thing for sure, it relates to Mariam. Like Laila remembers Mariam, who had so few to love her in her own life as a bursting radiance of a thousand suns. Giving others a hope, while she was in vain. I guess, life works that way. Definition of vain might be unfair, if we are trying to put all these into a single perspective. I reckon, by her decision, her sacrifice ~ Mariam did indeed finds her ending as a beacon of hope to others. Something in reality might happened to many of us.

Pakcik said: "Our sincere soul is like a rock in a riverbed, our intention is not tarnished but beautifully sculptured by the violence turbulence of life that washed over us again and again. It the end, it has something deep inside in our heart only us might know, that anyone could not break. The real intention and only God knows what. ". A beacon of hope to the others, perhaps?