Marjan (born 1976 – died January 25, 2002) was the most famous resident of the rundown Kabul Zoo. The lion witnessed Afghanistan’s turbulent history, from the 1978 murder of King Zahir Shah’s brother-in-law, Sardar Mohammed Daoud and his entire family, to the arrival of the communist People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan that launched another coup, Great Saur Revolution, the USSR invasion, state of warlordism, and the fall of Taliban. Once the...
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Marjan (born 1976 – died January 25, 2002) was the most famous resident of the rundown Kabul Zoo. The lion witnessed Afghanistan’s turbulent history, from the 1978 murder of King Zahir Shah’s brother-in-law, Sardar Mohammed Daoud and his entire family, to the arrival of the communist People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan that launched another coup, Great Saur Revolution, the USSR invasion, state of warlordism, and the fall of Taliban. Once the western forces moved into the country, devastating conditions in Kabul’s once well kept Zoo were revealed. Marjan, the one-eyed lion, became an instant celebrity.
Marjan, which in Pashto means coral, was born in 1976 and was given as a gift to Kabul in 1978 by the Zoo in Cologne, Germany. He arrived in the Afghan capital and, soon afterwards, a lioness by the name of Chucha joined him. During the USSR invasion, Kabul's Zoo was somewhat spared from the total destruction of the city around it. However, once the Russians left the country, the...
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