THE miracle of WAITING

Agartala, 11.7.2015

My friend, Mr. Chandan waits for death. But, miracle happens in the end.

Of course, there are many beliefs about waiting. Some believe a miracle will happen by waiting. Some indulges carelessly, never worrying about what will befall. Some prepare themselves to be meek and understanding whatever be the outcome.  

  

W

aiting is a game each player play with, variously. Let me say it so!

I was in need of help and needed to approach for my friend’s help as I did not have anyone else to turn to. Mr. Chandan is a wealthy man and a helpful man. He helped many people, had never failed to help me before. However, as is the established fact of life, he has certain negativities to equilibrate his great helpful nature. All through the years, I had known him to have an innate problem of ‘trying to know everything.’ Many people called him ‘Mr. Knowing All.’ Any sorts of argument would not end until everyone submitted to his opinion. Talk about the future: he has the conclusion. Talk about pain and suffering: he is the painful antidote. Talk about beliefs, he will churn you in his own path of belief. When he met youngsters, he would say, ‘You have to study! When I was at your age, I gave tuitions and study at the same time.’ But, secretly I knew too well the number of exams he could not clear, that all his wealth was inherited from his rich father. 

There were times when I told him about my difficulties. But, he could not say out words which would comfort me. It is not in his nature. He is a born ‘know-all.’  He would say, ‘Why? Try to be a man! Try to forget things!’ I always consider him to be an idiot, only the smartest being in his own thinking. But all through I felt I was wrong. Just because I see him as a quarrelsome idiot does not mean that he is a bad person. The preciousness of a human is far too precious to be judged for one cannot read other people’s heart.  

The summer rain drops churns on the roofs as I walked along the empty street. People took temporary shelter under the awning roofs, streets cattle stood under the shade of roadside trees, waiting for the rain to subside. I walked under my raincoat uninterrupted towards my friend’s plushy house. When I pressed the doorbell, the door was opened by a male servant, who immediately helped me in taking off my wet raincoat. 

I asked, ‘Where is your master?’ He pointed toward a long corridor dimly lit at the end. I walked toward the direction and knocked at the already opened door. He slowly stood up and when he saw me, expressed welcoming gestures and said, ‘What the hell brings you here? You’re the least of person I expected to see in this moment!’

I replied philosophically, ‘The unexpected is what we need to expect all the time, Mr. Chandan!’

He said, ‘You’re damn right! The unexpected terrible surprise is what all these waiting will bring forth. And in my case, it’s cancer.’

I could not perceive his intended meaning. And so, I reconciled myself to believing that he meant nothing with those words. I emitted silent smiles as I sat and looked around. A half-cold food with a glass of wine by his side was left untouched. His hairs were tattered, uncombed. He was physically poorer. It was not delightful to see Mr. Chandan in such a sad state under his well fabricated house. Some instinct told me that this time round, I might not get the help I needed. And it was right. He was too much occupied by something else. He did not have time for me.

He looked up and said, ‘I lost my mind. I don’t have anything left in me.’

I said, ‘My friend! You are living in a mansion. You have a beautiful wife, a son, and anything you could think of. Yet, you said you have nothing left?’

He gave a stern look at me and requested me to close the door. He said, ‘I have totally lost my mind. Yet, I cannot tell my family. I can feel the pain as it approaches me. I know I am going to die a slow death. What will happen to my wife and my child?’ I had never seen him sobbing in peril like this before. 

I said, ‘What happened? Why are you in such a peril?’

He said, ‘I’m going to die of cancer, soon.’

I said, ‘What? You’re suffering from cancer?’

He said, ‘Yes! That is it! That is what I’m waiting. Why do I have to wait? Why doesn’t it kill me now, at this very moment? I hate waiting. I hate waiting and having all the time for thinking. I hate living with the burden, waiting for the news that will kill me. I hate living and having nothing to do…..nothing hopeful!’

I asked again, ‘Are you really suffering from cancer?’

He said, ‘Not right now! But I will be….soon enough! I’m waiting for my biopsy report,’ and he waved his mobile phone and continued, ‘The report will be received with this gadget. I’m scared of its every beeping sound. Oh! How I hate this waiting.’

My curiosity built up. I asked, ‘I don’t understand. You’re not yet having cancer, but your mobile message will tell you that you are having cancer and you’re waiting for that?’

He said, ‘Exactly.’

I said, ‘In that case I assume it is the most lousy make-up prediction about the unknown future. Let’s suppose, Mr Chandan, the reports is negative?’

He shouted, ‘How dare you say that? There can be no supposition. What do you know about my condition? Do you think you have even a small glimpse of what it is like to be in my condition?’

I stick firmly to my words and said, ‘To tell you the truth, I don’t see much thing to worry about. I just blankly hope that you will be fine.’

He gnawed his teeth, ‘Don’t dare give me advice. Healthy people should not give advice to the sick. You don’t know shit about what I have been through. It’s been a week I cannot eat nor sleep. I don’t have any energy to do anything. I completely lost hope.’

Any words for comforts were useless. And we sat there, gripped by the sorrow of waiting, waiting for the fatal disease---cancer---that may or may not come forth. 

I broke the silence, ‘I see nothing to worry about. You’re just caught up by the sorrow of waiting, the sorrow of expecting something terrible.’

He said, ‘I’m not to be blamed. Doctors! Doctors! They’re all convicts. See what they have done to me. They give me cancer. They are killing me.’

I asked, ‘How’s that possible?’

He said, ‘Four years ago, I got a tiny blister inside my mouth. I met a doctor who said that it was nothing and it would go away with simple medication. I took the medication, but the blister remains. I met the same doctor again. He gave me the same medication and advised me to chew with the other side of my mouth. Nothing happened. A year passed and then another. And then something happened. Instead of wanting to find the cure, the blister and I started to share some mutual affection. It had turned out to be a good companion. Whenever I felt lonely or something, I would touch it with my tongue and I would be reminded that I was still alive. I was kind of addicted to the low, soothing pain it gives. But then, it started to swell bigger.’

I started to take him seriously. I asked, ‘So….that’s the origin of all these sorrowful waiting…’

He said, ‘I went to a different doctor two weeks ago. The doctors used his special clinical light and examine the swelling blister for a good 15 seconds. I was shivering, and I know from the way he examined me something was very bad. I began to know that the earlier two doctors were hiding the truth. I had the proof that I have been infected with a very bad ulcer. When he was done examining me I said to him that the tiny blister had been malignant tumour, after all!. The doctor, to my disgust said that it was nothing, just a tiny papilloma and would get alright by excision.’

And then I laughed and said, ‘And so, that’s it! It’s not a tumour…after all….,’ with a bounty relief.  

He waved his index finger at me, over and over and said, ‘My friend, you don’t want to understand. You don’t want to know the gravity of the problem. But I understand you. Your kind will never know what this sick man undergoes. But then I urge you to listen! At least.’

I said, ‘As you wish!’

He said, ‘I shouted at the doctor! I screamed at the top of my lungs narrating all the occurrences with the earlier two doctors, telling him they are all convicts. I tell him to tell the truth, that I don’t want myself to fight my disease with the power of ‘not knowing.’ You know that right….Steve! When doctors want money they hide the actual facts and let the patient struggle with hope. And you should know….Steve, hope in medical terms means money. I don’t want myself to be in that boat of fraudulent conduct. If I’m to die, I want the fact. And if I can hope, I’ll know it.’

I said, ‘You’re very right!,’ and although I wanted to add the word, ‘Why? Try to be a man! Try to forget things!,’ But I did not. He is such a best friend and fighting for his own incorrigible way. 

 

He continued, ‘We did the excision after many attempts. It was painful. The terrible things I knew were right, even from the way the surgeon cut it out. But I couldn’t talk. The anesthesia numbed my tongue. I was rested in the operation bed for 3 whole hours. When I could talk, the first thing I asked was the lump. The surgeon showed me. And I said I wanted to take home as some sort of remembrance. He said that he would definitely give him. Inward, I was happy to be relieved of something almost permanent to my being, such a company, such a reminder, such an unforgettable blister and such a terrible tumour. And I wanted to keep as a memory, to stare and to teach my life what life’s all about; that waiting is just waiting for the permanent truth, death. But of course, in different ways.’

I was silenced by my friend’s deep thoughts. 

He said, ‘When I walked out of the operation room, I saw my doctor calling me. I sat on the chair opposite to him and he said that the tiny lump needed to be tested for biopsy. I was right then, filled with darkness. Everything was just blank and hopeless. In hysteria, I asked the doctor why he elongated the process, why he didn’t tell me the whole truth in the first place. He said that any tissue that is taken out of the body needed to be tested and is a prevailing law these days. I did not have anything to say more. I did not want to say more. I paid Rs. 3000 for the excision and Rs. 1000 for the biopsy test. I felt I purchase my death ticket for Rs. 4000. He said that the biopsy report will be known after seven days and that I needed not met him again, it would be sent to me through my mobile number.’

I looked at my friend, speechless. 

He said, ‘I’m to get the result any time now. Steve! I envy you. Indeed, I’m jealous of you to have such a healthy body, free from any rubbish diseases. But for me, it’s over. It’s all just some days or months of waiting….waiting for the final predicament. Every day for the past week I kept thinking, thinking about why I marry my wife just to make her a widow and my son, an orphan. I regret why I was such a selfish being, why I had not helped the needy much more. And most of all why I have to suffer from cancer, why me, amongst all the people in the world.’

I had not much to say more. I gasp and said, ‘I’ll pray to my God for your sake.’

I went back home with a heavy heart. I locked up in my room and pray the whole evening. The next day I didn’t hear from my friend. I expected he would inform me about the result. Two, three days passed, he was still silent. 

One day, I walked along the market and unexpectedly saw Mr. Chandan, holding his son dearly, running towards me. He said, ‘Steve! I’ll tell you what…I’m a new Chandan. I now find the real meaning of life.’  His wife, too, came towards us. They were very happy.  Chandan said, ‘It was not a tumour, just a congested fibrocollagenous tissue. And Steve….one thing! Why did you visit me that day? Did you need anything?’

I said, ‘Yes! I needed some loan from you!’

He said, ‘I’m so sorry. How much do you need? Can we settle it now itself?’

I said, ‘But now I don’t need it any more. The plot of land I promised my wife had been given to another person. I was a little too late.’

He said, ‘Oh! That’s too silly. Another plot of land will come. And then you will have it. My friend….Keep waiting for that miracle.’ I believed that was the sweetest, most encouraging words of advice I ever had in all the years from my friend Chandan.

Today, as I write down about what Chandan had been through, many questions come into my mind. Why did he say that he was a new Chandan? Was it because of the taste of the misery of dying while being alive? Or was it because of the killing of something so inborn in him by his agonizing waiting? Or was it the realization of the fragilities of life? Or was it because of the question of why we live rather than asking why we have to die?

As I am not in his shoes, and never will be, I will not know the real reasons. So, I leave the answers for him.  

Unsuccessful Pheikei

Stephan C. Hmar. 03.01.2015

The torture this winter gave to my ailing physique was worsened by the two fearless rats that constantly ransacked our kitchen. Day or night, they did not give us any break. They had already eaten away a big chunk of the plastic dust bin. They littered stuffs on the floor, collected fish bones and other items of their favourites inside unreachable corners. During any dead of nights, they would bang pots and vessels, raced around the gas stove, dived to-and-fro from one corner to the other, and on top of these, they would squeal with joy. We would listen these menacing sounds from the bed.

I don’t know how many times I gnawed my teeth in anger.   

I had seen them many times, these two rats. They were big, black haired, canny eyed rats and always prowled about in pairs.  Their strategy of looting was to watch and wait for the perfect time---when we were out of the kitchen or out of the house or late in the night when we were asleep. When the perfect time came, they would not waste a second, they would feast on anything they could lay their limps on, with their greedy appetite. Many times I had tried to kill them, but miserably failed always. They were as fast as a moving bullet. They would dash to the big hole beneath the wash tub and disappeared underground.    

The most sickening moment would happen when my wife would run out of the kitchen screaming, Rat!Rat! What shall we do? I am scared. Then she would ask me to check the kitchen if they were still around. This had become a common occurrence, and many times our kitchen errands would get delayed. My wife is hell scared of rats. They are like monsters to her. I am not scared, but disgusted by the sight of them. Whenever I sighted them, annoying saliva of distastes would pile around my throat and that would affect even my appetite.

We came up with many possibilities on how to get rid of them. First, ratʼs poison. But we learnt that poisoned rats usually die inside water tanks or in some secluded corners of the house and their dead carcass would stink awfully before they could even be located. So, poison was a bad idea.

Second, we thought of ratʼs trap. We went to the market to get one. The trap we found was in fact ʿRatʼs Prison,ʾ designed to house the trapped rats alive, inside the trap. How would I like that? I did not want the rats to be seen alive. I wanted them to be trapped, squeezed, bull-dozed, and I wanted to sing a song of triumphant hymn over their dead bodies.

And the story of how to kill the rats grew longer.

We had many things in mind. Like, setting a dynamite on their path. Like, planting a sticky moreah ratʼs glue. But nothing, as gruesome as I had wanted, could not be plotted. Out of frustration and irritation, an idea came up to me. I recollected that there was one type of snare call pheikei that can mercilessly crush rats.  During my teenage years, I used to come across people who would bring home their pheikeis with bundles of crushed rats. The pesky rats met with a brutal, fatal blows of the snare and I could remember them bleeding through their nose, eyes popped out, tongues sticking out between their teeth and some of them with ripped intestines. These brutalities exactly suited what I had in mind. And so, I decided to recreate this brutal ratʼs snare, the pheikei, and gave the worthy death sentence to the two prowling rats.

I carefully checked my remembrance: Pheikei is a snare that makes use of stored potential energy in a bending bamboo. First, you trim a bamboo so that it can bend perfectly, and then on the base of the bamboo, you clutch a strong circular iron railing for the unknowing rat to walk in. Then in between the circular iron, you fix a strong iron wire connected to a strong thread, which in turn is fixed on top of the bamboo. Then, you bend the bamboo, and you equilibrated the potential energy of the bending bamboo by another small bamboo, which will trigger the bamboo, to release its potential energy. This ʼtrigger-bambooʼ is holding both the wire and the thread together. Then another small bamboo is placed in the middle of the circular iron, weakly guarding the ʻtrigger-bambooʼ from  setting off, and also acting as a bait for the unfortunate rat. When the rat walk through the circular iron, it displace the small bamboo placed in the middle, which in turn cause the trigger-bamboo to set off, which in turn cause the bamboo to release its potential energy. It pulled the wire dead tight against the bamboo, trapping the rat in between, giving a slow, painful, gruesome, death for the rat.

I had never made pheikei in my life, and this was how I remember from my teenage years.

First, I needed bamboo, which I easily got. Locking up inside my room, and checking keenly my remembrance, I started recreating pheikei. I collected all the parts needed---a strong iron railing, a strong wire, strong thread, and a pliers for bending the iron rail.  That day, in no time, I recreated the pheikei of my memory. But, it won’t set off. I blamed the bamboo, maybe it was not strong enough. The next day, I collected a better bamboo and started trimming again. My hands started to ache. After another whole dayʼs work, I built the second pheikei. That night I placed the ʿready-pheikeiʾ at the entrance of the rats. When I checked the next morning I saw that the pheikei set-off, but the wire was gone. The rats had eaten away the wire and escaped, leaving the pheikei in shame with a hanging thread.

I did not want to give up the battle. I decided that I should start from the beginning, checking each step minutely, use stronger wire and stronger thread. I collected new bamboo, re-started the process again by trimming. My hands could not bear anymore. There were painful blisters on my palm, my fingers bled. But I carried on saying, No Pain, No Gain. The picture of those ugly rats in my brain had made my determination stronger. After completion of the third pheikei, I had a strong feeling that it would work perfectly. Again, I placed the ʿready-pheikeiʼ with the best of hopes. The next morning I jumped out of the bed with good expectation. I found the pheikei set-off, but half of the bamboo was pulled inside the hole. I slowly pulled out the bamboo, with a hope that the ugly rat would be mercilessly trapped and squeezed. But alas! No rat! The wire was gone completely. The trigger-bamboo was half eaten. The whole thread was gone. I could also see teeth-marks on the sides of the bamboo.

I wiped my face in deep despair. In all, I had invested three days to make three pheikei, but they miserably failed all along. My hatred for the rats grew, I wanted to cry out loud. My wife consoled me, but it was of no use. My hands were steaming with blisters and cuts, I had to eat food using spoon. The squealing sound of the rats in the kitchen grew wilder. We just sit in the room, listening helplessly to the persistent, annoying sounds.

New year day was about to arrive, but I could not be happy. I failed to kill the rats in my house. The pangs in living with the fact that my enemy number 1—rats---still prowling around my house was unbearable. And for that reason, I embarrassingly consider the year 2014 an unsuccessful, unfruitful and one cursed year.  

On the night of 31st December 2014, my wife and I were alone in the house, waiting for the clock to strike midnight. The two rats howled about the kitchen with joy. When the clock struck midnight, my wife prayed, thanking God for all the blessing He showered upon us in 2014, asking Him to renew more of His blessing in the coming 2015. I was deeply touched by her prayer. After the prayer, I went to the kitchen, switched on the light and looked around. I saw the two rats escaping through the hole. I saw a bucket full of rice. I saw two bottles of oils---refined and mustard oil. I saw a packet of salt, a packet of daal, plates, spoons, sugar, frying pan, pots, pressure cookers, buckets full of water, dustbin full of eatables, etc.

Suddenly, strange questions set-off in my mind: Was there any single day in 2014 when I go hungry? Was there any day when my kitchen was without  rice, daal, salt, plates, spoons, water, frying oils? Was there any day when I go begging for food? Was there any day when the plates and curry bowls were deprived of rice and curries?

The answer to all these questions was a big NO.

And then I began to realize that the two fearless rats found my kitchen worth visiting because there was food always. There were ample supplies for them and for their pups too. Summer, winter, spring or autumn, the stocks was always full. Oh! After all, I was a very blessed man. And the rats were there the whole time to tell me that. And then suddenly I regretted why I tried so hard to kill them. I was their saviour, supplier, life-giver. What position was more important than that? And then, I shouted uncontrollably, I love you, my dear rats!

I looked at the three unsuccessful pheikei. I prayed to God in my mind to let all the bad and dreadful things that await to trap me in 2015 to be as unsuccessful as my three very usucccessful pheikei.

THE END

COOKING

Stephan C. Hmar, Agartala, 21.11.2014

I

t may sound unexiciting to mention the word cooking. It is such a complex art where one need an elaborate studies---how to use knife, how to cut vegetables in an appetizing shapes, the right temperatures for different meats, the right duration for cooking, etc. I do not have any basis for all these. But as the saying goes, ignorance is bliss, maybe, my ignorance makes cooking irresistible and let me involve delightfully to it. When evening come, you will always find me cooking in the kitchen. My wife would budge, telling me that it is a sissy indulgence for men to cook and that she would rather do the cooking, I would elbow her out of the kitchen. I do not want the happiness I enjoy in cooking to be dwindle by any stereotype comments.

All my cooking knowledge gets their strong base from my childhood background. In fact, even the tastes I appreciated, those specific aromatic herbs, those specific meats and vegetables I liked, had established during my childhood. The aroma I knew were pure, not artificial and the vegetables were fresh, collected directly from the adjoining kitchen garden. All the meats I used to devour were of house-reared animals. Those experiences of the freshness and purity of dishes, now make me roll about in the mire of unsatisfied tastes. All I can find now, in the office or elsewhere, are the dishes prepared with complicated smells of over-mixed masalas, excess oil, half-cooked meats, etc. I find them quite difficult to eat. All I use to long for, in front of these costly, over-prepared dishes is my simple home-made curries.    

I heated the oil, put a little onion and turmeric powder and after 4 seconds added the well-washed daal. I stirred the mixture and added warm water to it. As the mixture heated up, I could see different chemicals and elements slowly blending like a symphony, without any imposition, just the way they should be, just the way I wanted them to be. I would wonder at the subtleties of their conformity, how each individual ingredients bonded together to produce such a unified taste, as simple and light as mountain air. All these thoughts would let me see two worlds in the pan----the past and the present world.

In the past, I remembered my parent cooking in the chulha (an earthen stove) any edible leaves from the kitchen-garden. All the curries were of simple boil, but the tastes provided natural satisfaction. And on the first week of every months (just after father’s salary), there would be a big shifts from these curries. We would get a meagre supply of potatoes, certain costly pulses such as daal, arhar, tur, etc. which was cooked with insufficient oil, local turmeric, and heavily diluted with water. I would eat to my heart content, felt proud to have eaten the best dish in the universe I knew. In a month, we would have meat twice or thrice, which was distributed by pieces on each of our plates. I would shift the piece of meat around my plate, pricked out one small bit stingily each time. Those tastes that flow down my oesophagus were just indescribable.

Now, life has change enormously. I am circled by bogus things, I suppose. Market vegetables taste different to how I knew them. Sometimes, I use to notice the smell of fertilizers.  Meat seems threatening. To add to these, all cookings were exacerbated by artificial/factory made ingredients that the simple originality I knew of them are totally destroyed. And this is the one strong reason that would drag be back to my own kitchen, trying to produce the simple curries that are strongly established in me.

Most of my friends claimed they do not know how to cook. I think that it is a pretence. Who would not know how to knead roti, boil rice, or cook simple curries? Instead, they employ masi, who do the cooking and most of the household chores for them. But, still they are unsatisfied. Whenever the topic of cooking themed up, they would complain about their masi, saying that she did not know how to cook, that she added excess masalas, that her rotis were as hard as tin-roof. I would tell them to prepare by themselves. And the next sentence would be, “You know how to cook? You cook by yourself?,” to which I would reply downrightly, “Yes!” And the scene would take its normal pattern: I would see an outlandish looks, kind of  demeaning gestures, or a curtly shrug. So, my advice is that if you happen to be passionate about cooking like myself, you better meticulously guard your invaluable secret unless you have a natural flair for accepting oddities within your own circle.

I believe some of my colleagues are ʿheredity governed,ʾ that believed in the dogmatic theory that cooking is a sissy indulgence for men. And maybe for that reason they find it self-degrading to prepare their own foods. To me, it is entirely different. I find them to miss one of the greatest zeals of life---a world that abridge this complex present to the purity of our childhood, an art that can renew originality and purity by simple ingredients.

Yesterday, my wife and I spent the whole day working in our kitchen garden. We sowed the seed of dhania, peas, and mustard. And the whole time was a rapture.

DREAM CHILD

Stephan C. Hmar, 08/11/2014

The winter sun moved up the midday meridian and bathed the cold mountainous landscapes with its  warm light. Below the bright sunlight,  you  could see canyons and the blurry mists and fogs pouring out from the gorges, and slowly flowing into the deep chasm below.  I looked at the beautiful scenery from my bamboo hut located on the side of  the steep village. Sunlight penetrated my window and I could feel the chilling winter air being blended warm in the sunlight.  Along the road next to my hut, I could hear children playing, chasing thin fogs that were receding quickly into nothingness.

I lay over the bamboo floor, my back subjected to the warm sunlight, and in no time I was overtook  by the spell of unprepared nap. The  pleasant warmth quickly  seized me to deep sleep. I did not know how long I slept when  I was woken by a continual twitch on my legs. I straightened my neck and opened my eyes. I could see my only son, looking intensely into my eyes, murmuring, ʻDaddy! Daddy! Wake up. I am home.' I then realized that I had slept for over three hours. I looked at the face of my five year old son and I was filled with happiness and more, with pride. His straight, glossy hairs matched suitably to the hue of the blue skies above, and his round mystic eyes were an exact copy of mine and a sense of satisfaction on how he could have such a perfect delicate nose was overwhelming for me. I looked at him speechless. My son said, ʻDaddy! Don’t stare at me like that. You are making me nervous,' and he giggled with a sound that was most pleasing to my ears. I stretched out my arms and he strode toward me, and I gave him a long kiss on his soft cheek. I whispered in his ears, ʻYou are the only world I have…Son! What did you learn at school today?ʼ

ʻYou know, dad…I learn addition and subtraction. I also learn twinkle, twinkle, little star, and my teacher said that I am very good.ʼ

I said pridefully, ʻI know it. My son is the best in the class, the best-looking,ʼ and I held him tighter. My son, too, held me with earnest longing and asked me the most bizarre questions he ever asked. 'Dad! Can we touch the sky? My teacher said that the stars are bigger than the earth. Dad! When we die, we will go to heaven… no? Dad! I miss you so much. I was thinking only about you at school today.ʼ  Secretly, my mind was pleasured up by the undisguised nature of my kid, that he openly asked questions and answered himself satisfactorily. But I could sense something not quite right, the way he held me, the way he longed for me was mixed with incompleteness, as if he could foresee the incompleteness in our upcoming future. To add to my uneasiness, he asked, 'Dad! Will you promise me that you will stay with me forever? '  

I held him up, and looked at him in surprise. 'Son! I will be with you forever, like we are here today. I will not leave you.' He fixed his eyes to my eyes, and I could see gloomy face, and his small Adam's apple convulsed with overflowing bile, and misty tears collected in his eyeballs. I then said, 'Don't think of what will befall. Everything will be alright! ʼ Something had been just different. My son never looked at me this close. I never looked at my son so depressed as this.

In order to break the silence, I asked him to change his school uniform. He curtly negated my command. 'Dad! Let me wear them for a while. If I change them, I will soon leave for the sky. '  I said, ʻYou better change your dress fast. I don’t want you to make them dirty. You are going to wear it again tomorrow.' He did not move on my request, and fixedly said, ʻDad! Please, let me wear it for a while. I will not dirty them.' I could not understand the quick change in the nature of the boy, nor the inexplicable emotions he had. However, I reacted indirectly, hiding my real feeling and continued with my raw command as an ideal father should. I said, ʻThis is going to be my last request. Go and change your dress.' He looked at me for a good three seconds, and after acknowledging my seriousness, he whimpered, thumped his feet on the bamboo floor, and lazily walked in the direction of his back, towards the room. Along the walk, he fixed his eyes strongly to mine, and the revulsion in his looks was nothing natural, but daunting. I could hear the sound of his murmuring complain and I was wondering at this sudden  change in the boy. The sun had way crossed the meridian and obliquely shone over the trees standing on the mountainous landscapes.

To my further surprise, my son walked out of the room, dressed in his Sunday attire and standing in front of me said, ʻDad! Let us go to the market now, as you promised.' The smartness of young kids is marvelous, they can keep it in their heads any promised you made to them. Last week, I had made an unmindful promise that I would take him to market if he acted well, and he still remembered that. Now that I was held in custody by my own promise, I had to take my child to the market, whether I was prepared or not.

Soon, we were on our bicycle, my son sitting pillion and holding tightly on my waist. The mountain road was scanty of people, we did not come across any people, except the hanging leaves and twig of trees by the roadsides. Along the way, he said, ʻDad! I really miss you.' I retorted, ʻI miss you too, dear. I miss you more than you do!' He held me tighter, and silence followed. This time, my uneasiness was made worse. I felt that the strange way he acted was some sort of omen, of something bad. I asked him, ʻSon! Why do you always say that you missed me?' He quickly replied, ʻI don’t know, Dad. Drive slowly, if we reached the market sooner, I will go to the sky sooner. Dad, I don’t want that. So drive slower. ' I could not stand his spooky prediction any more. I said, ʻDo not repeat those unbelievable crap anymore. You will not go to the sky. I will not leave you. Do you hear that?' The next silence made the journey along the only mountain road more lonelier. My son held me tighter, not having the bravery to talk more, and I drove the bicycle with a heavy, pessimistic speculation.

I believed in omens, birds can know nature's language and bring signs to us. Maybe my child too, knew something of the future. He heard and saw things in a different perspective. Deep down, I tried to know in my own way about my present, and what the future would entail. I was at a loss. So, I chose not to listen to my son even though my mind was clear that something unexpected was to be expected. I blamed myself for this. Why couldn't I be undisguised like him? Why couldn't I tell my true feelings? Why didn’t I have the courage to ask what he really knew? Why did I ignorantly curtailed  him? But these contritions were irreparable,  I continued to hide my real feelings and always tried to corner him and told him about the market that awaited us, promising anything he liked.

The local market was small, located on the top of a flat mountain. As we were early for its timing, the market was bare, only nine or ten shops were open, and few vendors strewed in some corners. My son walked ahead of me, holding my hand, leading me to the shops one after another. He would stand in front of one shop, stared the saleable items, and would walk  me to the next shop. I remembered my son  to be fond of toys and eatables whenever we happened to be in this market, but today he acted differently, detesting anything. We walked about like that, staring shops from a distance until out of compulsion, I asked, 'Son! Just tell me what you want, we will buy it!ʼ But he was silent, and again walked me up to the sixth shop. We stared for a while and then pulled me to the seventh shop where they sell mirrors. We saw mirrors of different sizes hanging on the walls of the shop, and then I could feel my son's shaking hand. He stood still, looking at the one mirror that reflected my face, and my sight was fixed on the mirror that reflected his face. We looked at each other in contemplation for a few seconds, and he said sadly, 'Dad! I am going to miss you a lot. Dad! Don’t ever forget me. Dad, I love you.ʼ I could not control my emotion, I squatted before him, held his face close to mine and asked, 'Son! Please tell me anything you need, letʼs purchase it and go back home!' He said, 'I don’t want anything. And I want you to remember that face in the mirror. And sorry, dad, it's time for me to leave. Dad! Please say that you will miss me, please say you will remember me. '

And like the mists receding quickly into nothingness, my son changed into mists and slowly disappeared into nothingness in that lonely market. My son disappeared before my own eyes never to be heard or seen again.

I felt a twitch on my leg, and suddenly woke up. I saw the face of my wife saying, 'Wake up! It's time. You'll be late for office.ʼ I looked around the room, the ceiling fan revolved like the wing of a helicopter. I variously looked for the hazy mists, mountain canyons and the billowing clouds through the gorges, they were all gone. I only saw the sweet face of my wife, my reliable auxiliary, who walked with me through all the immeasurable miles of sufferings. And then, I knew I was back from dream to reality. And then I also knew that my 'dream sonʼ will be forever twinkling in my heart, like that 'twinkle, twinkle little star,' my 'dream sonʼ rhymed about in a school in my dream.  

*The end*

PROSOPAGNOSIA

Stephan C. Hmar, 12.09.2014

Of the many gifts I haven’t had, recognizing peoplesʼ face is one. I guess I kind of have what people called prosopagnosia or face-blindness. Whenever I happen to be in the crowd, I simply get mixed up with faces, and I cannot recollect any of the faces I come across unless they are exceeding odd or interesting enough to install special interests in me to focus on them.

This has turned out to be a horrible disadvantage.  Just a few years back in Guwahati, one fine young man bumped into me with an indicative well-known-close-association-gestures. He smilingly said, Oh God! How are you? Itʼs been a long, long time now. I got a job and got married just two weeks back. Whatʼre you doing here?

I replied to this stranger, Iʼm on my way to Shillong. Iʼm here waiting for the next bus.

He continued, You ought to come and see my family; you ought to spend the night with us and continue your Shillong-business tomorrow. You deserve it.

I was rather deadened by his pushing into my numb territory. I asked, Whoʼre you?, in a blunt direct tone.

His face reddened, not believing my question. He screamed, What? You don’t know me? I was one of your students, and not only that, I was your tutee for two continuous years.

I could not recognize him. I said, I still don’t  recognize  you! He gnawed his teeth, looked at me in a very offended gesture and said, Good! Carry on!, and walked away.

The more I tried to improve my performance, I seemed to perform worse. Some months back, I went to one distant village to visit a friend. Because of the remoteness and scarcity of the inhabitants, vehicles plying between the nearest town and the  village are less. And so I went by bike. The only road available was perfectly empty. I drove on, trying to get absorbed by the calmness and the lushness of the village road under the broad daylight. Along the curve, I saw two men. The other guy talked to me, and I stared at them. And then on second thought, I accelerated my bike suddenly and drove away from them, terrifyingly frightened. I thought they were going to kill me. After 10 minutes, my phone buzzed, It was from my wife.

I asked, ʻYes? What is it?ʼ  

She said, What happened to you? Aakarʼs wife called,  asking me whether you had gone crazy! Sheʼs really worried about you and asked me to take you to a doctor as soon as possible.

I asked, Why?

You met her husband just a moment ago, on an empty road and you ran away startled.

I replied, in disbelief, Who? Mr. Aakar? It was Mr. Aakar? I…I… thought theyʼre bandits!ʼ

My wife screamed, Could you forget their faces? We met them just one week back and we had a nice mutual introduction with interchanged handshakes.

That incident was an eye-opener. Since then I always kept vigilant to act pretentious and talked like I knew them whenever ʻout-of-the-recognizableʼ people bumped into me without warning. Yeah! Why not? I know you….You have grown taller and fatter than the last time I saw you. I know you…yeah…yeah!

Oh! That’s good news! I have been expecting that out of you.   

It is a good practice. One could magically renew the sweetness of the unrecognizable past just by simple acts of acquaintanceship.

But, even that did not solve all the horrible encounter due to this face-blindness. One night, around 8 PM, I came back from work, walking towards home with my laptop bag. One man approached me with a polite behavior. He was tall, slim, and agreeably dressed up.

He asked, in an undeniable accuracy, So late? Howʼre you by the way? Itʼs been a long time I didn’t see you around.

I politely replied, even though I didn’t know him. Busy schedule! What more to say? And how are you?

He said, Iʼm fine. But I have a little problem here. I forget my purse at home, and itʼs already late to go back home and come back for market. So, to cut that short, will you just loan me 500 rupees, I will repay you tomorrow?

I said, Fine! Fine! And loaned him the money. I didn’t recognize the face, but I found, after those horrifying experience I better trust his recognition of me rather than my unfamiliarity of him, to avoid another bullshit happening.

Itʼs been two years now. I never see that face again, nor I get back my 500 rupees.

My wife and I made it a habit of gifting any immediate couples having a newborn child. Six months ago, one of our immediate couple had a new baby boy. We called the couple telling them that we were going to visit them. We set out to the shop, Mom and Me, and purchased a pair of shoes for the baby boy. We gift-wrapped it and very truly and certainly gifted the new boy. Two months later, we visited the couple again and oh, dear me! I could not be sure whether the baby was a boy or a girl. I just risked on the gender (as it was going to be very odd to inquire on the gender of the baby after such a true and certain gift) and asked the father, How is she? Can she sleep well? She is growing more prettier!

Both the couples were silent. My wife was pinching me secretly.

Along the journey back home, my wife scolded me, You always embarrassed me. How could you ever forget that the baby was a boy? Don’t you remember that you were asking the shopkeeper of ʻMom and Meʼ to give you the best shoes for a baby boy?

I told her, Maybe, my mind was drifting elsewhere that time!

She said, Try to remember people. Otherwise, people will think that they are insignificant, that  you are proud or indifferent or something.

I said, But you know me the best. All my life has been the opposite of pride or indifference. It is just about living insignificantly  with pains,  that are constantly eating me alive, and busy taming them all the time!!

She said, But no one knows that. They could wrongly take you to be that way if you always failed to recognize  them.

I thought without uttering more words, What the hell am I doing here on Earth?

***

I came across people whose ability to recognize faces is super-amazing; that they could recognize persons they happened to see in a mall even after three months. It’s a gift, scientists say so.  My wife can be registered in the group of mega-recognizers. It is very easy for her to have distinctive face perceptions and to keep track of information about people. Sometimes she is unclear a bit, but, on longer thinking she can always say something close about the personʼs  history, which could interest them and that’s the reason why I guess she is such a friendly person and can socialize normally with others.

THE END