AUTHOR'S NOTE

This is the story of Opana who was born in a very small village of the undivided Punjab, lived and grew up there till he could live there no longer. He partook of the rich culture of the land of Waris Shah, Buleh Shah, Kabir, Farid, the ten Sikh gurus and lived through those tumultuous years before Punjab was partitioned and then, in youth, was driven out of his village Kandan Sain where he was born, his small town Daska where he had grown up and Lahore where he had got his education. Uprooted at the age of twenty-three this village boy wandered about aimlessly till the Indian Army offered him a career which ended at the United Nations. He never forgot his village, his town and the varied and rich culture of the simple folk. Opana's story tries to re-capture and relive those beautiful days and nights spent in the land which became Pakistan.

The story begins in 1947 at Lahore, at the time he became homeless and goes back over nearly twentyfive years to relive in the past. His memories are built around Kandan Sian, the Chhathi Gali, Tootian Wala Khoo, red blood maltas, (hard skin oranges) freshly cooked gur (jaggery) and abu (roasted wheat sheafs); and the unforgettable personalities encountered in the early years around Daska in the Qabar Bazar: Baba Wadhaya, Rama Mota, teachers like Hussian Bux the sadist, Faqir Chand the Maula Bakhsh expert, Mool Chand, Gurdit Chand and Head Master Sham Sunder Singh and those in Lahore: Om Mohan, Professors Diwan Chand, G.L. Datta, Shanti Swaroop Bhoomitre and friends like Pashi, Gobinder, Madan, Zaffar and Hafeez.

Life took many turns always with something fresh, always for the better, always more challenging than before and always more rewarding. In his twilight years Opana has endeavored to re-capture the highlights of his childhood and adolescence that relished the several culture of pre-partition Punjab. These have always stayed with him for he has not been able to forget them.

(The land where I was born, there,

I cannot sow any more seeds of desire,

I once belonged there but today I cannot

Belong to that land where my awareness was awakened).