Bibi Gul has given birth to thirteen children. When she was fourteen she had her first daughter, Feroza. At last life was worth living. She had cried throughout the first years as a child bride; now life was better. As the oldest Feroza never got any education. The family was poor and Feroza carried water, swept and looked after her younger siblings. When she was fifteen she was married to a man of forty. He was rich and Bibi Gul thought the wealth would bring happiness. Feroza was pretty and they got 20,000 Afghani for her.

The two following children died in infancy. A quarter of Afghanistan ’s children die before they reach five. The country has the world’s highest infant mortality rate. Children die of measles, mumps, colds, but first and foremost of diarrhoea. Many parents mistakenly think they must not give the children anything when they suffer from diarrhoea, it will all come out anyway. They think they can dry up the illness, a misunderstanding that has cost thousands of young lives. Bibi Gul can no longer remember what her two died of. ‘They just died,’ says Bibi Gul.

Then Sultan arrived, beloved Sultan, revered Sultan. When Bibi Gul’s son reached maturity, her position amongst her in-laws strengthened considerably. The value of a bride is her maidenhead, the value of a wife the number of sons she bears.

As the oldest son he was always given the best, in spite of the family’s poverty. The money they received for Feroza was used to pay for Sultan’s education. From the time he was small he was given a position of authority and was the one his father trusted with responsible assignments. When he was seven he was already in full-time work, besides his schooling.

A few years after Sultan, Farid arrived. He was a madcap who always got caught up in fights and came home with torn clothes and a bloody nose. He drank and smoked, of course without his parents’ knowledge, but was good as gold when he was not angry. Bibi Gul found him a wife and now he is married with two daughters and a son. But he has been excommunicated from the apartment in block no. 37 in Mikrorayon. Bibi Gul sighs. Her heart is torn apart by the enmity between the two oldest sons. Why can they not behave reasonably?

After Farid came Shakila. Cheerful, tough, strong Shakila. Bibi Gul sheds a tear. She visualises her daughter, dragging heavy water buckets.

Next was Nesar Ahmad. When Bibi Gul thinks of him the tears start to flow. Nesar Ahmad was quiet, kind and scholarly. He attended high school in Kabul and wanted to be an engineer like Sultan. But one day he never returned. His classmates said that the military police had grabbed the strongest boys in the class and forced them to enlist in the army. This was during the Soviet occupation and Afghan Government forces functioned as Soviet ground troops. They were put in the front line against the Mujahedeen. The Mujahedeen had better troops, knew the terrain and entrenched themselves in the mountains. There they waited for the Russians and their allied Afghans to roll into the mountain passes. Nesar Ahmad disappeared in such a mountain pass. Bibi Gul thinks he is still alive. Maybe he was taken captive. Maybe he lost his memory and lives happily somewhere. She prays to Allah every day that he will return.

After Nesar Ahmad came Bulbula who sickened with sorrow when her father was imprisoned, and who generally sits at home all day, staring into space.

There was more life in Mariam, who was born a few years later. She was clever, keen and a wizard at school. She grew up to be beautiful and had lots of suitors. When she was eighteen she was married to a boy from the same village. He owned a shop and Bibi Gul thought he was a good match. Mariam moved into his home, where his brother and mother also lived. There was a lot to do; his mother’s hands were useless, she had burnt them badly in a baking oven. Some fingers are lost, some melted together. Both thumbs are stumps, but she can feed herself, look after little children and carry certain things if she holds them against her body.

Mariam was happy in her new home. Then the civil war came. When one of Mariam’s cousins got married in Jalalabad the family took the chance, in spite of the uncertain roads, to travel there. Her husband, Karimullah, stayed behind to look after the shop in Kabul. One morning, when he arrived to open it, he was caught in crossfire. A bullet pierced his heart and he died on the spot.

Mariam cried for three years. In the end Bibi Gul and Karimullah’s mother decided that she must marry the deceased husband’s brother, Hazim. She had a new family and pulled herself together for the sake of the two children. Now she is pregnant with her fifth child. Her oldest son, from her marriage to Karimullah – Fazil – is ten and already in full-time employment. He carries cases and sells books in one of Sultan’s shops and lives with Sultan, to relieve Mariam.

Then Yunus arrived, Bibi Gul’s favourite. He is the one who mollycoddles her, buys her little presents, asks what she needs and ends up with his head in her lap in the evening, after supper, when the family sits or lies around on the mats dozing. Yunus’s date of birth is the only one the mother knows with certainty. He was born the day Zahir Shah lost power in a coup, 17 July 1973.

The other children have neither birthday nor birth date. Sultan’s year of birth ranges from 1947 to 1955, depending on which document you are reading. When Sultan adds up years as a child, years in school, years at university, the first war, the second war and the third war, he arrives at fifty-something. This is the way everyone works out their age. And because no one knows, you can be the age you want to be. In this way Shakila can be thirty, but she could easily be five or six years older.

After Yunus came Basir. He lives in Canada after his mother arranged a marriage for him there with a relative. She has never seen him or spoken to him since he moved away two years ago. Bibi Gul sheds another tear. She hates being far away from her children. They are all she has in life, apart from the glazed almonds at the bottom of the chest.

The last-born son was the cause of Bibi Gul’s eating habits. A few days after the birth she had to give him away to a childless relative. The milk kept seeping out and Bibi Gul cried. A woman gains stature by being a mother, especially of sons. A sterile woman is not appreciated. Bibi Gul’s relative had been childless for fifteen years, had prayed to God, despaired, tried every conceivable medicine and remedy, and when Bibi Gul was expecting her twelfth child, she asked to have it.

Bibi Gul refused. ‘I cannot give my child away.’

The relative continued to beg, whimper, threaten. ‘Have mercy on me, you already have a large family, I have none. Just give me this one,’ she cried. ‘I cannot live without children,’ she sniffled.

In the end Bibi Gul gave in and promised her the child. When her son was born she kept him for twenty days. She nursed him, cuddled him and cried over having to give him away. Bibi Gul was an important woman by virtue of her children. She wanted as many as possible. But she kept her promise and after the agreed twenty days she gave him to the relative, and though the milk flowed she could not nurse him again. All ties to the mother had to be severed and from then on he was only a relative. Bibi Gul knows that he is well cared for, but still mourns the loss of her son. When she meets him she feigns indifference, as she promised when she gave him away.

Bibi Gul’s youngest daughter is Leila. Clever, industrious Leila who does most of the family housework. She is the afterthought at nineteen and at the bottom of the pecking order: youngest, unmarried and a girl.

When Bibi Gul was her age she had already given birth to four children, two who died and two who lived. But she doesn’t think of that now. Her tea is cold and she is cold. She hides the almonds under the mattress and wants someone to fetch her woollen shawl.