This is The Writer's Voice, new fiction from The New Yorker.

I'm Deborah Triesman, fiction editor at The New Yorker.

On this episode of The Writer's Voice, we'll hear Jamil John Cochai read his story Occupational Hazards

from the May 23, 2022 issue of the magazine.

Cochai's first novel, 99 Nights in Logar, was published in 2019 and was a finalist for the Pan Hemingway Award.

History collection, the haunting of Haji Hotak and other stories, will come out in July.

Now here's Jamil John Cochai.

Occupational Hazards

1966 to 1969, sheep herder, they now logar.

Deuties included, leading sheep to the pastures near the Black Mountains, measuring the distance between the shadows of Chinatris on dirt roads,

naming the sheep after profits from the Quran, who, according to Haji Hotak, were all sheep herders at one point in their lives,

reciting verses from the Quran to dispel jins, borrowing fruit from neighbors orchards for sustenance, watching sheep, counting sheep, loving sheep,

understanding the nature of sheep, protecting sheep from bandits, witches, wolves, rapists, demons and half-brothers, nicknamed the Captain and the King,

taking younger brother, Watthuck, along to the pastures, swimming in a stream with Watthuck instead of watching sheep, losing to sheep,

getting beaten by the Captain for losing sheep, leaving Watthuck at home and never taking eyes off sheep again.

1969 to 1975, grade school student, they now logar.

Deuties included, sneaking away from home on the first day of school to sign up for classes without permission from Haji Atal,

who thought school was for communist and kafir, registering identity with the government minister at the local school office,

existing for the first time in the official records of King Zayed Shah's modernist regime, begging Haji Atal for forgiveness,

walking two miles to school, barefoot without a notebook or a pencil or Haji Atal's forgiveness,

sitting on the bare clay of a small room filled with dust and dirt and the eager panting of 50 pairs of lungs,

fashioning a pen out of chinar branches, mixing white clay from the riverbeds with water and berries to create ink,

...