30th April, 2011
Please meet my mother
by
Najma Sadeque
Yesterday was my mother's death anniversary – she passed away in 2007 – but the void she left has still not been filled and I know now it never will be. My greatest regret is that most of my friends never got to know my mother although she visited me every year for several months at a time; although she was a very sociable and hospitable sort and loved meeting new people, but I was always working, always too busy. It was thoughtless of me and now it's too late.
Her name was Syedah Fatima Sadeque and I belatedly want to share a bit about my mother with you, whether you are friend or stranger. Call it assuaging a guilty conscience or whatever, but she deserves to have been known and appreciated by some of my circle, and this is the least I can do. I want everyone to know the sort of person she really was because there was one particular side of her that she never flaunted – from something I did not discover until my late teens. A bit of background is first called for.
Shortly before partition in 1947, my parents had gone to England for their respective doctorates from the London University. Most of our relatives lived in Calcutta and they migrated to East Pakistan. My parents' house in Calcutta was exchanged for rural property outside Dhaka – there wasn't much choice and one took what one could get – and besides they were far away and there was not much else one could do. When they returned from England in 1949, they came straight to East Pakistan, not Calcutta. In some ways my parents were an odd couple. She loved to travel; he hated to get out of the house except to go to office which he loved as much. But he didn't mind my mother going off globe-trotting alone as long as it wasn't expected of him.
It was not until years later that my brothers and I took the trouble to go and have a look at the property my parents got in the swap. We were dismayed when we first did. In the first place it was difficult to see as it had turned into one vast jungle – foliage grew fast and thick in monsoon country -- because there was no one there to look after and maintain it. Urban children were not interested in rural countryside then as now, thanks to a degree of lopsidedness in colonially-inherited education. It lay on the outskirts of Dhaka city, all village. The entire area was without electricity or running water. There was no real estate mafia, perhaps because without utilities, it was not worth grabbing.
Only my father was delighted. Being an economist who loved his culture, he saw way beyond the material benefits. Although it could only be approached through an unmetalled road through the village, rutted by bullock cartwheels, the property opened up to a breathtaking view on the other side. The floodwaters had risen to the edge of the land, and country boats went slowly past, rowed painstakingly by hand, sails billowing in the wind. It was magical, like a tourist resort, and my mother agreed it had great prospects.
My father tried to explain to us youngsters that it just had to lie for a decade or so until development enveloped it, which was bound to happen since it lay just on the edge of the city. We didn't understand all that and didn't even try, and my father was not destined to see his dream realized. He died in 1960, barely 55 years old.
A few years later, when the property became part of Dhaka city and electricity was extended, my mother decided to build our home there. It was not an easy task getting rid of the jungle. It took a gang of men and many days to cut it down. But the end result was wonderful. About half the three acres was flat, while the other half sloped gently down to floodwater level at a wide landing place where the locals loaded and unloaded goods onto country boats.
My mother built a large tiled-roof house which fit in perfectly with the landscape and friends would pour in frequently, bringing new friends with them. My mother, who was a fantastic cook, also loved company. The enormous 'lawn' took up almost an acre and they especially enjoyed sitting out in the evenings watching the boats sail by. If it was too hot or sunny, they sat in the wide covered patio that went all round the house. Watching the sun set on a watery horizon, it was then that I decided: here is where I want to live for the rest of my life. It was not to be.
At the housewarming party, a German couple, close friends of my mother, brought her a pup, offspring of their Alsatians. They said she ought to have a guard dog since she was living in a big house cut off from the rest of the city. Outside the walls were only the sturdy but traditional, bamboo-and earth, tiled roof homes of the potter community.
My mother and the rest of the household knew nothing about dogs but got information from friends and followed instructions. It grew up to be big, good-looking and friendly but otherwise pretty useless because it never chased or barked at any stranger, probably because it never occurred to anyone to teach it to do so. During its first winter she made it a couple of flannel coatees because she was feeling cold and thought the pup would be too. Later she made a fancy brick kennel complete with a tiled roof, facing the distant main gate. But it refused to stay there, preferring the paved path or the least conspicuous corner of the patio, so that the gardener eventually turned it into a tool shed.
The locality was actually a potter's village, the centre of pottery-making in East Pakistan, which stretched a long way parallel to the river, and the boats would carry goods to other parts of the country.
When the house was finally built and the grounds took on a semblance of order, my mother began to grow every possible vegetable, of which there is an enormous variety in Bengal, on the sloping side of the property. Not that she knew much about vegetable gardening except for herbs and lemons and chillies which every self-respecting Bengali grew in her kitchen garden. But it was tended by her peasant-turned-gardener and she experimented with great success. The entire property was already dotted with mango, plum, jackfruit, guava, tamarind, neem, sajna and banana trees, and a solitary, ancient, enormous banyan harbouring bats and reputedly, the ghost of a dead witch, so that I steered clear of it.
The soil was naturally rich and bountiful and one could have opened a thriving shop to sell the produce, which many of her friends urged her to, but my mother was not commercially-oriented. She grew things for the joy of it and because she drew great pleasure from sharing. The gardener, bearer, and cook (then a young woman who today still works part-time for my younger brother's family) all lived on the premises with their families. They were free to pick and use as much as they wanted but even they couldn't consume so much. She shared with all our friends and relatives and the poor of the locality. But she didn't wait until things began to grow to start sharing. She began to share their fruits of the already mature, fruiting trees.
On her first visit with workers to direct the clearing of the property, a bent, old woman, all of four feet high, who looked at least a hundred years (but we were assured she was only sixty) hobbled up to her. My mother stared at her dumbstruck as the woman explained that she was poor and had nothing and no one in the world, that she lived in a little room on the property because it was empty for many years, and no one bothered her, and she begged to be allowed to stay on for the remaining years of her life which could not be many.
How did she survive? my mother asked. By begging, she replied. What happened to her relatives? All died, one by one. She had no family of her own as her betrothed died when they were still children and she was married off to a tree that represented him – they were Hindus. She was constantly shunted from one family to another that was willing to keep her, and she tried to win their support doing any kind of household chore. And one day, there was no one left, and she found herself on the street. But the villagers were kind although most were themselves poor. She almost always got a free meal; and the neighbourhood children would readily knock down some fruits for her.
Tears came into my mother's eyes and she asked the old woman to show her where she was staying. It was a small room attached to the outer wall, so it was probably a guard room of some sort. The door and windows were long gone, and the tiled roof needed some repair. There was no furniture; just a mat, some sparse bedding, a tiny bundle containing a change of clothing, a crude earthen cooking stand, a clay water pot, and a couple of clay pots to cook in. My mother took her aside in private to give her some money, and assured her that she would live there for the rest of her live, and asked her to visit every week, and any time for any needs.
Before she started building the house, my mother fixed her room so that the roof no longer leaked, and installed new windows and a door, then put in a comfortable cot, new bedding and mosquito net, new plain white saris as required of widows of her religion, utensils, and a whole lot of other things for normal living. To the old woman, it was luxury, and her blessings alone would have been enough for a lifetime.
Wouldn't it be easier for us to look after her, I asked, if she lived within our walls and she would be safer too? No, explained my mother patiently. It would take away her privacy and her sense of independence. It would be far away from the main gate and it would be too much for this frail old woman to have to walk a much longer, roundabout way to visit her friends. We couldn't take that away from her.
What if a robber came? I insisted. People who share don't generally steal from one another, she explained; I don't think there are any thieves in this village; and besides, what has she got to steal? But she still has to cook, I argued. She needs that little bit of exercise and some routine, my mother replied. And she will be able to receive a visitor and share a meal. I couldn't imagine that, but I call that real sensitivity.
But my mother turned out to be right. On several occasions we found her with an equally elderly visitor or two, happily chatting away and enjoying some fruits or snacks.
There was only one condition my mother placed on her – she made her promise she would never beg again. She could have anything and as much she wanted from the vast vegetable garden. She was too old to pluck them herself but she could choose and the gardener or one of the family would carry them back for her. She would get an allowance regularly for all her other needs.
But my mother wasn't finished. Soon after, she passed a whole lot of people around the village well, the women struggling to get their turn, while the men kept pushing them aside until they were done. The very next day she called in a contractor to sink a tubewell at an inconspicuous corner, as close as possible to the main gate. A wide concrete platform was made around the handpump, which in turn was sheltered by potted plants for privacy until bushes planted around it grew to the necessary height.
The community's women, girls, and boys under twelve, were then invited to use it during the day. They could hardly believe their ears. There they could bathe themselves in privacy, wash their clothes and bathe their children in peace, and collect water quickly without being thwarted by the men. My mother had only one requirement: that they keep the main gate closed at all times to prevent stray animals – cows, goats or dogs -- from wandering in. The gardener would unlock the gate at dawn, then lock up again at sunset.
It completely changed their lives. All day long, there were women and children coming and going. They never took advantage of the situation and even the children never forgot to close the gate. Most of the blessings were Hindu and my mother gave them equal ranking. I began to see my mother -- a pious, five-times-a-day-praying, Muslim woman -- who never imposed her beliefs on others including her children which some considered risky, in a new and far more respectful and appreciative light. But as she explained, parroting the articles of faith without any conviction was meaningless if not hypocrisy.
The sum total of the religious instruction I received directly from her was just once when she pointed to a few shelves of books on Islam and Quranic interpretation, and said: "Please read all of these – take your time, but read them all." I tried, but for a teenager unfamiliar with the terminology and the abstractions, it was pretty daunting. She had noticed how I had always been absorbed by my maternal grandfather, also an Arabic scholar and an educationist, who talked philosophy to me in a language I could understand – he later left me his library of books on philosophy and religion -- and probably assumed I understood more than I really did. I started reading them all, ended up skimming, and never completed any of them. It would be many, many years before I would understand.
An elder recently told me that it was a fact that generosity always begat more from the source of the person's generosity. I believe it was my mother's generosity that caused the soil of her mini-farm to become more and more bountiful. I was unaware at the time as I was seeing without seeing, but my initial lessons in organic gardening unconsciously began there. What was once alive – plant or animal -- simply had to be buried in the soil to be recycled into new life. I remembered it only decades later.
The municipality did not serve that area but there were no garbage dumps anywhere, neither on the property nor in the village. Everything was recycled or sold. There were no plastic bags in those days, and my mother would stack paper bags – then mostly made of newspaper, on a shelf. All kitchen waste had to be put in these paper bags which would get composted as well, and twisted closed tight to keep off flies before being put into the bin, a habit I continue to this day. The only thing missing is the ground to bury and compost the discards in as she used to do. – I live in an apartment building.
Today the knowledge that was handed down by simply doing is ignored and forgotten. Now, one has to write project proposals for donor funding to enable us to teach what was once common sense, a given. What should be in school textbooks is completely absent in them. And there have to be global campaigns for the reintroduction of natural, organic farming to restore soils degraded and poisoned by chemicals, and to be able to eat healthy, chemical-free food. She would be surprised if she knew what I was trying to do now. She used to feel sorry for us for the tasteless vegetables we had to eat here, and on every visit she would bring an extra suitcase of fresh vegetables and organically-produced foods from Bangladesh. Now she's no longer around to do that.
There's a lot more about my mother I'd love to share that she's put in her own words. She was seventy when the computer came round, and having done her own typing and for my father all her life, she quickly learned to use it. The first thing she did was to type her autobiography and even she marveled at the speed with which she was able to proceed. She revised and updated it several times and it was finally complete a couple of years before she died. But I wanted a concluding chapter from her. By then she was too ill, too frail, and unable to sit for long. I asked her to dictate, but even that she found difficult and kept postponing the effort.
She kept requesting me to write the concluding chapter from my point of view, but I didn't want to do that, as it would depart from her style. She kept begging me to publish it while she was alive, and I believed she could not go away without doing that last chapter. But she did. The films are still lying with me.
I am remorsefully writing that final chapter – just filling in gaps about her that she didn't mention, along with a bunch of disconnected cameos which was all she could manage before she gave up. Her autobiography will finally be printed this year, and I hope to send a copy to all my friends who I think might be interested, and anyone else who would be interested.
I hope you read it. Because of the present times, you'll smile over, among other things, her encounters with madrassah mullahs who constituted half her students in the university, and to whom she introduced unfamiliar concepts, such as annual picnics and sandwiches, as incongruous as the thought of mullahs picnicking with my mother might be. Her descriptions would send us, as children, into peals of laughter.
Yes, I am unabashedly proud of my mother with her Ph.D. in classical Arabic of the Quran (so she knew what she was talking about, and knew when someone else was fabricating), and Islamic History, although I understood little of it myself. Which daughter wouldn't be? When she returned from the School of Arabic and Oriental Studies, still in her early thirties, she became the first Muslim Ph.D from East Pakistan. Her teacher and supervisor was Dr. Bernard Lewis, the internationally acclaimed Orientalist, and a Jew, said to be anti-Muslim. But that's not what my mother found. She and other students found him to be a very fair man who treated all his students the same, irrespective of their faith, and he treated her with great respect, not least because she scored an A-class Ph.D with a thesis publishable as presented. Today that might have gone against her, and her degree accused of being tainted.
But it gives me no end of satisfaction, that with the mullahs at least, she always got the last word with respect to Muslim women. We were unfamiliar with the term 'feminist' at the time. But she was a feminist alright. "What do you think I am?" she would thunder as loudly as her small voice would allow. She could out-quote them with accuracy and logic any time. And they would have to shut up.
- Najma Sadeque
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