Book: Life of An Afghan Hammam: Ignited, Extinguished, Rekindled
Author: Tanvi Maheshwari/
Publisher: Arch-i & Prince Claus Fund
How exciting can a book on the restoration of an old monument be? Not very, most of us would be forgiven for thinking — especially if that monument were not in India but in Afghanistan and just 165 years old, which is fairly young considering that our land is littered with hundreds of buildings that are centuries older.
Thus it reflects all the more creditably on Tanvi Maheshwari that she should succeed in making such a snappy read of this story of how the people of Kholm, a small town in northern Afghanistan, came together to save a hammam (public bath house), connecting with Western philanthropists to raise money and material support. Life Of An Afghan Hammam works because, even though it deals with a dry subject like heritage conservation, it becomes a parable about the triumph of a small, community-led effort over huge odds — war, poverty, indifference, obsolescence.
At the centre of the story is Hammam Khisht-i-Kopruk, a rather modest building compared to the richly-decorated Turkish hammams, which was severely damaged in flash floods in May 2010. Water had inundated the building, the sheer force of the torrent wrecking its domes, floor and underground heating system, but it was the mud that it left behind that, unless cleared, would cause the real damage — it would freeze in winter and expand, cracking up whatever was left of the ruins.
This story has immediate resonance in India, which has lost, or will soon lose several monuments of historical importance. Here monuments that are centuries older have been razed to the ground to make way for a private building (Lal Mahal, a 13th century structure, in Delhi, in 2008), a road (Wali Gujarati’s tomb in Ahmedabad in 2002), or to appease religious sentiment (the 16th-century Babri Masjid in 1992). This is not to count the many encroachments on monuments and the arbitrary changes brought about by thoughtless attempts at ‘improvement’, as also wilful vandalism of the kind that Aamir Khan preached against in his ads some time ago.
What saved the Afghan hammam was the fact that it was really needed by the people of Kholm — it was the only place in the bitter Afghan winters where they could have a hot bath, meet and gossip. Of course, they were lucky to have Dutch conservation architect Anne Feenstra in their midst.
Feenstra not just helped them get funding from the Prince Claus Fund — an international philanthropic body that looks to help out such imperiled monuments under its “cultural emergency response” programme — but he also hunted out and helped re-skill traditional brick masons and dome-makers.
But it was the poor villagers, battling the ravages of war, poor health, scarcity of food, water and employment who are the true heroes of the story. In fact, the most poignant part of this book is the letter that residents of Kholm wrote to their minister demanding the restoration of the hammam, which is covered entirely in thumb-impressions — since most of them were illiterate.
There is a lesson here for India and those who care for old buildings here.
For more details on the book, email rch.iplatform@gmail.com
No comments:
Post a Comment