TAJ MAHAL--memoir-in-progress
TAJ MAHAL
by Nighat Na-koja
The night I arrived in Karachi, I asked Hashmat to drive me to the graveyard to visit Ammi’s grave, but it was nearly midnight, and the qabrastan gates were locked. We drove home, and, mindful of the lingering Covid anxieties, I washed and sanitized my hands, donned my face mask, and then entered Abba’s room.
He lay in bed, eyes closed.
Abba, asalamalaikum, I’m home, I said, bending close so he could hear.
He opened his eyes, took my hand, and kissed it.
His hair had thinned considerably, revealing patches of pink scalp amidst the snow-white strands. His beard was unkempt, in dire need of a shave. He was so changed, so unlike his former self, that it was almost a relief to see his mind, at least for the moment, still functioning, even if his questions circled back on themselves.
Why did you have to fly to Dubai first? he asked. Why didn’t you take a direct flight from Delhi? How was the flight?
I explained, or tried to explain briefly the less-than-ideal India-Pak political situation and the pandemic travel restriction, but within minutes, the same questions arose again.
You haven’t had dinner yet? I asked, attempting a conversational detour.
Sahib eats late, the night nurse interjected. There’s no fixed time for his dinner.
Abba, let’s have dinner, I said, despite my fatigue and lack of appetite. I’ll change and come down to have dinner with you. Theek hai, Abba?
***
I was tired beyond tired—bone-deep weariness had settled in after ten hours spent in Dubai. Even the recliners in the transit lounge had offered only fleeting relief. My back yearned for the firmness of my orthopedic mattress. But an unspoken pull led me downstairs to join Abba for dinner. I noticed two enlarged black and white photographs of a very young Ammi, positioned directly in front of him on the dining table, as if she were joining him for his meals. He ate very little: a couple of spoonfuls of rice and a bit of chicken curry.
Is that all you're going to eat? I asked, dismayed.
He grumbled about the food. I can’t eat this fellow's cooking. It has no taste. You should get another cook.
I'll look into it, I said, anticipating the complexities of finding a cook who could satisfy Abba's exacting standards.
Where's that photo? Abba asked suddenly. The one of your Ammi, you, and me in front of the Taj Mahal.
Oh, umm…I know which one you mean, I replied, but I haven't seen it in ages.
I always kept it with me, he said. In my bedside table drawer. But now it's gone.
It felt reassuring that Abba was remembering an old photograph, a relic from decades past! As I sat with him, a strange sense of peace settled over me. It was as if all the delays, the hassles, the obstacles—all of it—had happened for a reason. To be sitting with Abba at the dining table in the quiet of the night felt like reaching the summit after a long, arduous climb. I am finally with Abba. I’m finally home! I repeated to myself in disbelief.
The Covid travel ban, the rejected PCR test, the missed flight, the near-cancellation due to the Taliban takeover of Kabul…. I had navigated it all. I had arrived, unscathed. It was as if these obstacles had appeared to underscore a truth my rational mind stubbornly refused to acknowledge: that so much of life is simply beyond our control. Thomas Merton's words, copied into my notebook in Dubai, echoed in my mind: in spite of all your misgivings, you realize that you are going somewhere, and that your journey is guided and directed and that you can feel safe.[1]
My journey definitely felt guided and directed. So much had seemed to go wrong. And yet everything had gone right in the end! In that moment, I felt very safe, simply being with Abba.
***
Abba still had clear memories of his early adulthood, as I would find out the next morning. Over the next few months I heard many stories from him, some of them for the first time. About his first job as a teapacker in a Kolkata tea factory, his discovery of Hindustani classical music at a free concert outside Metro Cinema in Kolkata.
At breakfast the next day, Abba repeated the same questions that I had already answered the night before.
Which airline did you take?
Fly Dubai, I said. I had a ten hour wait in Dubai.
Why didn’t you take the direct flight?
There’s no direct flight to or from India anymore, I said.
I didn’t repeat the details of why direct flights to and from India had stopped. No point, I thought.
I was glad that my books were still on the shelves in my room. Nobody seemed interested enough in my books to steal or misplace them. Nor had anybody thrown them out as junk in my two-year absence. Abba used to save the Books and Authors from the Sunday DAWN. He would ask somebody to slide them under my room door. This time none had been slipped under my door.
***
A few months later, on Eid in 2022, Ishu phopi, Abba’s youngest sister, came to visit. Most of his surviving siblings made the annual Eid visit, but the rest of the year, he had very few visitors. While we were talking, phopi mentioned she had recently unearthed a very old photograph of Ammi, Abba, and me in front of the Taj Mahal.
What? You have that photo? No! I can’t believe it! Abba was asking me about that very photograph.
The photo, it turned out, had a story—a journey, really. It had traveled from Bangladesh to Pakistan, by sea, all the way from Chittagong to Karachi, tucked away in my aunt’s small suitcase.
But how come you have that photo? I asked.
I asked bhabijaan (Ammi) to give me one when she and Bhaijaan (Abba) came back from their trip to India, she explained. I saved it in my photo album. I brought that album with me in my attaché case on the ship when we came to Karachi.
That must have been around the time of Bangladesh’s independence, when my aunt, a little girl at the time, boarded a ship with her family and sailed from the Bay of Bengal to the Arabian Sea, a voyage of many days before reaching the port at Karachi. We were living in Dhaka then. Abba, ever the optimist (or perhaps just in denial), had no plans to leave Bangladesh. He believed the political situation would soon normalize, and life would continue as before. But it didn’t.
You can’t imagine how happy Abba will be! I exclaimed to phopi. He’s been telling me about that photograph. I don’t have a copy. He used to have it, but he can’t find it anymore.
My aunt generously offered me her copy, though she admitted she’d have to search for it in her closet. A few days later, she texted—she’d found it! She even attached a photo of the photo.
One evening, Hashmat and I braved the urban jungle of Karachi traffic to retrieve this treasure from her. Exhausted but triumphant, I returned home that night, clutching my purse inside which I had carefully placed the tiny, cracked, torn, 2x2 inch photograph. The black and white image was yellowed with age, torn in the right corner, and crisscrossed with cracks. It was one of those photos taken by itinerant photographers who preyed upon tourists near historical monuments.
I stared at the little photo for a long time. Three faces, three intertwined stories. Abba, in an immaculate white shirt, black pants, black socks, and black leather shoes. His thick black hair combed in a Kennedy-esque style, parted on the left. How could he afford such pristine white shirts back then? And a very married, very contented-looking Ammi, in a traditional Memon long-frock, sitting next to Abba on the marble bench. In the background was the majestic Taj Mahal. And a three-year-old me, perched between them on the white marble bench, close to Abba, in a sleeveless summer dress, looking somewhat lost…and with bare, slipperless feet. Abba—an ambitious young man with clearly defined life goals. No trace of small-town provinciality, no hint of the tea packer. Instead, a firm resolve to transcend his circumstances.
What he lacked in formal education, he more than made up for with his insatiable zeal to learn and adapt to a rapidly changing world. He was supporting a large family—seven siblings, his parents, his wife, and child—on a small income from one full-time job and several part-time gigs. But as soon as he’d saved a bit of money, he whisked us away on a holiday. He loved traveling. In those days, no visa was required to enter Indian West Bengal from Chittagong. Train travel was inexpensive, and we stayed in modest guesthouses, except in Kolkata, where we lodged with his eldest sister. Abba told me we had visited Bombay, Delhi, Agra, Ajmer, and Kolkata on that trip. It took planning and organizing, but Abba loved to travel and he was a good planner and organizer.
***
I showed Abba the torn and yellowed Taj Mahal photo. He held it for a long time, peering at it through his magnifying glass.
Where did this come from? he asked, sounding pleased.
Ishu phopi had it, I said.
Where did she get it from?
Ammi had given her a copy. It travelled with her by sea, all the way from Chittagong to Karachi.
You should get enlargements made. 7 by 5 is a good size, Abba issued instructions and precautions in his old, authoritarian style. Don’t leave the original at the shop. And don’t give it to Hashmat. Get it done yourself.
Ji, Abba. I’ll get it done myself.
From the way Abba emphasized that I should handle the enlargement myself, I knew it was a matter of utmost importance, and that his trust, in this instance, extended only to me. Don’t leave the original in the shop, Abba repeated, just to be absolutely clear.
No, no, Abba, I won’t leave the original in the shop, I reassured him.
The next day, Hashmat and I ventured into the bustling Khadda Market, to Dossaani’s, which, according to its sign, boasted a "Canadian graduate photographer." Of course, to make the enlargement, I had to leave the original with them—a detail I omitted from my report to Abba. Without a negative, creating a copy was impossible, and the cracks, along with the torn corner, would require the original for their magical retouching.
When I collected the enlarged duplicates, I framed one for Abba and presented it to him. He didn't place it on the dining table with Ammi's portraits. Instead, he took it to his room and placed it by his bed. And there it remained until he passed away. I retrieved the photograph from his bedside table after he was gone. Now it sits on my writing desk, next to a photo of a young Ammi and a photo of Abba holding me in his arms as an infant.
***
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