Eid ka Safar by Muhammad Umair

About this afsana

Eid Ka Safar (Urdu: عید کا سفر) by Muhammad Umair is a short Urdu afsana about Hamza, a six-year-old boy from a poor family. It shows Eid through the eyes of a child who has already learned to bury his wishes.

“He was a traveller,” the story begins – a traveller named Hamza, only six years old. From the very start of his life he has seen poverty, and at six he has already started working to fight it. Hardship isn’t his alone: his parents, two sisters and a brother share it too. His father is a labourer whose daily wages barely provide two meals a day for his children.

Time passes, but things don’t get better. One day, on his way to work, Hamza sees children his own age enjoying their childhood. Childhood, the writer reflects, comes to everyone, and some get to spend it with ease; it’s the most memorable time of life, when a person is free from worries and responsibilities. But it isn’t like that for Hamza, who walks that road carrying thousands of dreams in his heart. His father spent his own childhood as a labourer too, and so Hamza had to start working early. Poverty has always forced him to give up his wishes.

نئے کپڑے اور عیدی کا خواب، اور ایک چھ سالہ مزدور بچے کا صبر۔

Then Ramzan arrives, the blessed month when people bow before Allah in repentance and the month’s blessings bring joy to all. With it comes Eid ul Fitr, which for most people means new clothes and eidi. But that isn’t possible for Hamza, because his life is clouded by poverty. A day before Eid, he passes through a street and sees children in new clothes and shoes, and his heart breaks; he quietly prays to Allah for better days. On the second day of Eid, wearing his old, torn clothes, he sees a father buying toys for his children at a shop, and tears fill his eyes. Back home, he asks his mother about his father, and when his father comes into the courtyard, Hamza tells him, “Baba Jaan, I just saw something very painful.”

Muhammad Umair writes simply and movingly about poverty, patience and what Eid truly means. A short, heartfelt Eid story.

You can read Eid Ka Safar online here or download the complete PDF for free. You may also like Eid Saeed by Usama Rehman Mani and Chaman Zahra by Noor Shaal, or browse more Urdu afsanay.