DATELINE AFGHANISTAN: Thursday, May 2, 2002:
06/13/2002
They came to this field from Jalalabad, about a 90-mile trip. It's taken more than a month and five pair of shoes.
They walked.
The Kochi make the trip every spring, with about a hundred sheep and goats, four camels and one very large tent to house their families and -- at the other end -- their flock.
I meet them on a stretch of grass, sand and rocks, next to a junkyard of abandoned buses, a few miles south of Kabul.
Abdullah, 30, and his black-bearded brother, Khumar, 28, pull a thatched carpet out of a cool, dark tent and spread it under the blazing sun. Abdullah says the family plans to leave this place tonight and continue their journey to Maidanshar -- their summer residence.
They leave Jalalabad in eastern Afghanistan when the weather becomes too hot and head west, stopping along the way to feed their animals and to sell their milk and yogurt.
"Grass and water, those are the only two things we are looking for," Khumar says.
I stand up and look around. My translator, Ahmad Wesal Zaman, advises me not to go near the tent where the Kochi wives sit. I am welcome, however, to visit the goats lounging at the opposite end of the canvas shelter.
Tea is served in clear glass cups. A bowl of candy -- that looks like brown sugar but tastes bitter -- is placed in the center of the carpet.
Khumar is fascinated with my watch. He uses the sun to tell time. He asks whether I will marry one or two wives and whether there are cows in my country. "Do you want to take me to America?" he asks.
The Kochi are tired of war.
Tired of their goats being eaten by hungry Russian soldiers. Tired of their sheep being blown up by land mines. Tired of taking detours on their route to Maidanshar because of fighting.
"Muslims are suffering many problems in this world," says Akbar, Khumar's cousin. "But in another world we will be happy."
The Kochi learned about Sept. 11 on the radio.
"We were really sad that those innocent people, not guilty of anything, were killed," says Khumar. "They were terrorists who destroyed those buildings."
A taxi tears across the field, kicking up dust, and pulls up to the tent. A man wearing a turban hops out of the front seat and drops a large sack on the ground.
It's Daulatkhan, 40, the eldest brother in this Kochi klan. He's back from Kabul with flour for the last leg of their trip.
Akbar, 20, says he's tired of being a nomad. He dreams of owning a house in the city.
Abdullah wants his daughters to go to school. Right now, the children have no education because the family is always on the move. This group of Kochi want the United States to help them obtain money and land.
Khumar wants me to give him my watch.
"The Americans are here to give us dollars," says Abdullah. "If Americans don't help us, what good are they."
Michael Corkery
