Zest for life
When my mama was 21 years old, he lost his father. When he rushed home from the small college where he had just taken up a post as a lecturer, his littlest brother and sister, three and four years old, ran up to him crying "what will happen to us?" He put his arms around them and said, "I am here". That assurance became a lifelong promise that he upheld with everything he had.
When I first knew mama, my mother's eldest brother, those difficult times were in the past. All six of his younger siblings had been educated and settled well in life. Mama himself was left behind, with his old mother, in their portion of the ancient, crumbling joint family home; working odd hours at his job as a newspaper reporter, returning late at night to a cold meal kept covered for him after everyone else had eaten. He never married, never found a more prestigious job, never moved to a nicer house. My mother, who is now old beyond caring about most things, still cannot repress a sigh when she talks about her big brother. The facts of his life, the knowledge that he gave up any aspirations he might have had for the sake of his brothers and sisters, still weighs down her heart like bricks. "It was very hot that day," she says again and again, talking of the summer day he collapsed on the street with a sudden heart attack at the age of 57, "it's hot every year in May, but that year it was especially sultry." She pauses for a long time. "He never got anything in life."
If mama harbored any sorrow or bitterness in his mind, I never knew it. To me he was loud, energetic, argumentative and extravagantly loving. In the old days, kids usually lived year round with their father's families where they were subject to routines and rules. Mamar badi, your mother's family home, was where you went on vacations. In the imagination of Bengalis, it is the ultimate fun place, a place of unlimited freedom and indulgence. Not all mamar badis manage to live up to these mythical expectations. Mine did.
Of course, there was my grandmother who was generous with hugs, kisses and caresses. And there was mimi, my constant companion and temporary mother. But most of all there was mama. He was the source of practically everything fun in my childhood; the bearer of huge boxes of cakes, ilish mach (huge quantities that were fried and made into two kinds of curries, all eaten at the same meal) and other goodies, the leader of expeditions to zoos, restaurants, movies. Sometimes, as a reporter, he managed to gain special access - to the engine room of a train or a close up view of a tiger being fed at the zoo. I remember one outing where we went to watch the second world war movie "The guns of Navarone" with Gregory Peck. First, we ate at a restaurant where we had grilled chicken. Another time, during Durga puja, he appeared with a taxi late at night (when the streets were not too crowded) and we drove all around the city looking at the lights and the Durga images in different localities. This sort of outing was unthinkable with my parents. They were (understandably) cautious about spending money but also, their imagination could not conceive of anything more fun than visiting relatives. As for staying up late, forget about it - puja or no puja.
As I grew older, mama encouraged my love of reading and books more than anyone else I can think of. A typical gift was a pack of 5 abridged MacMillan classics. One late night when he came back from work, he found me devouring a detective story while my mother tried to make me stop and go to bed. "No, no, let her read," said mama, "it's no fun if you can't read a book all in one sitting." He himself was a joyous reader and sharer. You would hear him guffawing to himself while reading Great expectations and then calling out "come, listen to this....and they always begin by asking questions, ha ha ha!" (read here beginning at the second paragraph "It was Christmas Eve.." and also the next page). Sometimes it was a poem. I can hear him slowly intoning the iambic pentameter, "The curfew tolls the knell of parting day, the lowing herd moves slowly oer the lea, the plowman homeward plods his weary way, and leaves the world to darkness and to me." He was a good storyteller as well. Sometimes he would share his reporting experiences such as going to the airport to cover the arrival of the Prime minister. We would hear exactly what Indira Gandhi was wearing as she came down the flight of movable stairs and he would mimic for us her mannerisms and words.
Mama's love for us, his nephews and nieces, was totally overboard and beyond reason. Any poor kid in school who happened to score more than me in the exam would be roundly cursed out. Once I pointed out a mistake in his grammar (he wrote for an English language newspaper). He was so thrilled, he called up his office colleague and proudly told him all about it. He never, never, showed up at our house without a large plum cake from Nahoum's. I'm sure my cousins have similar stories to tell. My frugal mother would be upset, "Why do you spend all your money on these kids? Do you think they will look after you in your old age?" "My mother will take care of me", my very religious mama used to say. He had a large photo of the Goddess Kali in his room, she was his divine mother. And I guess she did take care of him like he said, carrying him off suddenly without a day's illness. The first heart attack put him in the hospital and the doctors managed to revive him but then he had a second massive attack, and was gone.
"All he did was give to everyone, he never got anything", my mother says. "But don't you think he got a lot of joy out of giving to us and taking us to places?", I protest. I also think of him, late in life, learning new languages, German and Urdu. I think of him reading spy novels (Le Carre) and classics with rollicking enjoyment, communing with his divine mother with complete faith in her protection and care. I find it hard to believe that his life was one of deprivation and sadness.
When mama died, my aunt said to us, "no one else in your life will ever love you as much as he did". It wasn't much of an exaggeration. That kind of fierce, all-encompassing love is not so easy to find.
When I first knew mama, my mother's eldest brother, those difficult times were in the past. All six of his younger siblings had been educated and settled well in life. Mama himself was left behind, with his old mother, in their portion of the ancient, crumbling joint family home; working odd hours at his job as a newspaper reporter, returning late at night to a cold meal kept covered for him after everyone else had eaten. He never married, never found a more prestigious job, never moved to a nicer house. My mother, who is now old beyond caring about most things, still cannot repress a sigh when she talks about her big brother. The facts of his life, the knowledge that he gave up any aspirations he might have had for the sake of his brothers and sisters, still weighs down her heart like bricks. "It was very hot that day," she says again and again, talking of the summer day he collapsed on the street with a sudden heart attack at the age of 57, "it's hot every year in May, but that year it was especially sultry." She pauses for a long time. "He never got anything in life."
If mama harbored any sorrow or bitterness in his mind, I never knew it. To me he was loud, energetic, argumentative and extravagantly loving. In the old days, kids usually lived year round with their father's families where they were subject to routines and rules. Mamar badi, your mother's family home, was where you went on vacations. In the imagination of Bengalis, it is the ultimate fun place, a place of unlimited freedom and indulgence. Not all mamar badis manage to live up to these mythical expectations. Mine did.
Of course, there was my grandmother who was generous with hugs, kisses and caresses. And there was mimi, my constant companion and temporary mother. But most of all there was mama. He was the source of practically everything fun in my childhood; the bearer of huge boxes of cakes, ilish mach (huge quantities that were fried and made into two kinds of curries, all eaten at the same meal) and other goodies, the leader of expeditions to zoos, restaurants, movies. Sometimes, as a reporter, he managed to gain special access - to the engine room of a train or a close up view of a tiger being fed at the zoo. I remember one outing where we went to watch the second world war movie "The guns of Navarone" with Gregory Peck. First, we ate at a restaurant where we had grilled chicken. Another time, during Durga puja, he appeared with a taxi late at night (when the streets were not too crowded) and we drove all around the city looking at the lights and the Durga images in different localities. This sort of outing was unthinkable with my parents. They were (understandably) cautious about spending money but also, their imagination could not conceive of anything more fun than visiting relatives. As for staying up late, forget about it - puja or no puja.
As I grew older, mama encouraged my love of reading and books more than anyone else I can think of. A typical gift was a pack of 5 abridged MacMillan classics. One late night when he came back from work, he found me devouring a detective story while my mother tried to make me stop and go to bed. "No, no, let her read," said mama, "it's no fun if you can't read a book all in one sitting." He himself was a joyous reader and sharer. You would hear him guffawing to himself while reading Great expectations and then calling out "come, listen to this....and they always begin by asking questions, ha ha ha!" (read here beginning at the second paragraph "It was Christmas Eve.." and also the next page). Sometimes it was a poem. I can hear him slowly intoning the iambic pentameter, "The curfew tolls the knell of parting day, the lowing herd moves slowly oer the lea, the plowman homeward plods his weary way, and leaves the world to darkness and to me." He was a good storyteller as well. Sometimes he would share his reporting experiences such as going to the airport to cover the arrival of the Prime minister. We would hear exactly what Indira Gandhi was wearing as she came down the flight of movable stairs and he would mimic for us her mannerisms and words.
Mama's love for us, his nephews and nieces, was totally overboard and beyond reason. Any poor kid in school who happened to score more than me in the exam would be roundly cursed out. Once I pointed out a mistake in his grammar (he wrote for an English language newspaper). He was so thrilled, he called up his office colleague and proudly told him all about it. He never, never, showed up at our house without a large plum cake from Nahoum's. I'm sure my cousins have similar stories to tell. My frugal mother would be upset, "Why do you spend all your money on these kids? Do you think they will look after you in your old age?" "My mother will take care of me", my very religious mama used to say. He had a large photo of the Goddess Kali in his room, she was his divine mother. And I guess she did take care of him like he said, carrying him off suddenly without a day's illness. The first heart attack put him in the hospital and the doctors managed to revive him but then he had a second massive attack, and was gone.
"All he did was give to everyone, he never got anything", my mother says. "But don't you think he got a lot of joy out of giving to us and taking us to places?", I protest. I also think of him, late in life, learning new languages, German and Urdu. I think of him reading spy novels (Le Carre) and classics with rollicking enjoyment, communing with his divine mother with complete faith in her protection and care. I find it hard to believe that his life was one of deprivation and sadness.
When mama died, my aunt said to us, "no one else in your life will ever love you as much as he did". It wasn't much of an exaggeration. That kind of fierce, all-encompassing love is not so easy to find.
Comments
Post a Comment