Can Recreating A 16th-Century Garden Heal Kabul?

"Does beauty matter in a country torn by war? That question confronted conservationists when they started rebuilding the renowned Babur Garden in Afghanistan's scruffy capital city. After all, the country has many more urgent needs. Even in Kabul, the biggest and most advanced city, only half the garbage is picked up every day, just one household in 10 has piped water and the air is said to contain more fecal matter than in any other city in the world, the consequence of having four million people and no sewage system."

"Could Afghanistan and its backers really afford to spend time and money on recreating the horticultural vision of a long-dead Mughal emperor? 'People said: ‘You guys are daft to be doing conservation when there is so much humanitarian work to be done,'' says Jolyon Leslie, the urbane South African architect who directed the restoration for the Aga Khan Trust for Culture."

"Deciding that a city does not live on bread alone, Mr. Leslie and his collaborators went ahead, and the result is a small miracle: a corner of loveliness in the heart of Kabul. Now open after more than $5-million (U.S.) of work, the garden – at 11 hectares, the size of 20 football fields – draws hundreds of visitors on Fridays, when Afghans begin the Islamic weekend. Families picnic under beech trees. Children chase each other on the lawns. Old men stroll up stone steps past cascades of water."

"The garden is a reminder of what Kabul once was: a delightful city of colourful bazaars, tree-lined avenues and grand palaces and mosques. One of its glories was the garden, built in the early 16th century by Emperor Zahiruddin Muhammad Babur."

"When warlords fought over the city in the 1990s, it fell into ruin as factions burned its stately buildings and cut its trees to deny cover to their rivals."

"The Baghe Babur (Babur's Garden) became a symbol of Kabul's devastation. The Aga Khan, spiritual head of the world's Ismaili Muslims and a friend of the government of President Hamid Karzai, led the effort to fix it up. The German government pitched in. The hope was that the garden, restored to its former splendour, would become a symbol of the city's renaissance."

"That now seems idealistic, given all of Afghanistan's troubles. Even so, if a fractious people such as the Afghans are to succeed, they will need more than new bridges and a better electrical supply. They will need a shared history and culture. Babur and his garden are part of that heritage."