For Fathers

 (This piece is enriched with my personal memories and philosophy, as well as my father’s. There’s also considerable self-praise in this writing. Naturally, many readers may find it irritating. I humbly request that those who are uninterested skip this lengthy piece entirely. Thank you.)

We, quite possibly, will never be able to surpass our fathers.

My younger uncle served in the army. One day, some of his colleagues came looking for him and reached our village home. In the front courtyard, they saw a middle-aged man clearing soil with a sickle to plant flowers. At that time, 12 gardeners and servants worked at our house. They assumed this man was one of our household staff. With a touch of condescension, they asked him, “Which is Sachindra Mohan Pal’s house?” The man replied, “This is it. Who are you looking for?”
“We’re friends of his son Swapan. We’ve come to see him.” Our sitting room was on the outer side of the main house. The man very warmly showed them the way and seated them there, called someone to bring water for washing hands and refreshments, then returned to his work. A little later, my younger uncle came to the sitting room and began chatting with them. About an hour later, that same man was walking past the sitting room.
“Come here, let me introduce you to my father.” When they saw grandfather, they felt deeply embarrassed and said, “Uncle, sorry, we didn’t recognize you then.” “No, no, what are you saying! Don’t worry about it, please rest. Swapan, show them around everywhere. Did they give you refreshments? We’ve cast nets in the pond; food is being prepared for you. Take your baths and freshen up.” I’ve seen grandfather work with his own hands right until his death. Throughout his life, he spoke to people with great respect. Whether strangers were younger in age or status, he always addressed them with the formal ‘you’. My father is a lawyer. When grandfather lived with us, I saw as a child that when father’s clients came, if grandfather opened the door, he would say, “Please sit, I’ll call the lawyer. He’s resting a bit,” and go to the inner room with a smile. He would address unknown women as ‘respected mother’, speaking politely in a low voice. He would shower small children with affection and always give them some gift or another.

Father and my uncles inherited many of grandfather’s qualities. I’ve never seen father make anyone else do his personal work either. Now he’s fallen ill, his body can’t manage like before, yet he still does his own work, and even when he needs something, he doesn’t really call anyone. If I could have learned even a fraction of father’s art of respecting others, that would have been everything. I’ve reflected and realized that several pointless forms of pride have lodged themselves quite firmly in my mind. When I pursue my PhD, I might academically surpass father in education, but truly surpassing him is beyond my capacity.

Let me share yesterday’s incident. I had to go to court to testify for the plaintiff in a gold smuggling case. Right next to Chittagong’s judge court is the District Commissioner’s office. My very close younger brother Abhijit works there (I address him informally, and he calls me for advice or decision-making on almost everything). He ranked 5th in the combined merit list of the 33rd BCS examination and 1st in the BCS Administration cadre. An extremely talented student who studied at RUET. Anyway, I met him during lunch break. After chatting in his room, we came out together. While passing the lawyers’ club, I went in to see father.
“Father, this is Abhijit, a magistrate; he works in the DC office. He’s been to our house. Do you remember?” Father doesn’t recognize people quickly these days. After I told him, he looked at Abhijit, left his chair, stood up, bent slightly to shake hands and said, “How are you? Please sit! Sit here!”
(Though there was no empty chair available. Father was indicating his own chair for Abhijit to sit in.) “No no, uncle, I won’t sit. I’m going to the airport on some work. I just came in with brother for a moment.” “No no, my boy, how can that be? Please sit for a moment, I’ll have tea brought, it won’t take long. Have something to eat before you go.”
“I’ll come another day, uncle, not today. I’ll leave now.” Father again shook hands with him and saw him off. I stood silently watching all this, and tears came to my eyes with pride and joy at being the son of such a father. I kept thanking God that my father is so much, much greater than me. Being as simple as father truly isn’t simple.

In certain matters, lineage works. Perhaps that’s why people still inquire about family background during marriages. My father’s grandfather was named Purnachandra Pal. His ancestors were established merchants who lived in Kolkata. He founded our village home, so everyone knows our house as ‘Purnachandra Pal’s house’. He was primarily a landowner. In those days, no one in the surrounding villages owned more land than him. He was a learned man who studied extensively, gave generously with both hands, and was accustomed to a very aristocratic lifestyle. He was extremely handsome and had a robust physique. Probably father’s grandmother was also very beautiful. Why do I say this? Father’s grandfather died long before father’s marriage, and grandmother died just 5 months after the wedding. Mother had seen father’s grandmother. Today at the dinner table, I asked mother in conversation, “Ma, what did she look like?” “Very beautiful!” “More beautiful than you?” “Oh, what are you saying! I’m not even close to being as beautiful as her.” When a woman sincerely says another woman is more beautiful than herself, you must understand that the other woman was indeed much more beautiful. Women aren’t very generous when it comes to calling another woman beautiful, whether mother or daughter. It was to fulfill his grandmother’s wish that father became a lawyer instead of taking a high-paying job at the then-leading multinational company Lever Brothers (now Unilever). Father had ranked first in that job’s examination. My grandfather’s height was over six feet. His physical build was many times better than any modern gym enthusiast. He ate abundantly and worked hard. Even at 85, I saw him walk with a straight spine, effortlessly carry a 50-kilogram sack of rice from one room to another. He died at 92. He worked in his office until just before his death. He was a legal assistant by profession, working at Chittagong Judge Court. Like his father, he was generous, charitable, spent freely, and was among the most respectable landowners in our village. He loved education, enjoyed studying, and sent his younger brother to study at Kolkata’s most prestigious Presidency College. Looking at my grandfather and his brothers’ physiques and features, we quite possibly are of Aryan lineage. The same applies to father and uncles—all around six feet tall. (I won’t write about the uncles from mother’s side today; I’ll write another day if I remember.)

My younger brother and I are quite like father. But we’ve fallen short of being like him more than we’ve succeeded. I don’t have the capacity to understand God’s ways, but I can say this much: perhaps because fathers are so much greater than us, living with them and bowing our heads before them brings such joy. Fathers must be greater—this seems to be the eternal law.

Father, thank you!

………………………………………

I’m very fortunate that we didn’t have an IPS at home during my childhood. When the power went out in the evening, father would bring us two brothers to sit on the veranda. We would wait eagerly every evening for the power to go out. Little me and my little brother would sit on father’s lap and listen to him tell us how electric lights had stolen the moonlight and kept us confused and deceived. Father taught us to recognize stars, how to touch and feel moonlight, what it looked like when moonlight slipped and slid across tree leaves—father would tell us all these things. How many rhymes father would recite from memory—I can’t even remember those rhymes now. There wasn’t a single holiday when father didn’t help mother with household chores like cutting fish and vegetables, sweeping and mopping, washing clothes. Father might not have brought the most expensive food home from court, but we ate that food in the most precious way. Father would say, it’s because your mother manages the house all day that I can work outside. I never saw father criticize mother’s cooking. In fact, father never personally attacks anyone. Father doesn’t have a judgmental attitude. We too learned from childhood to hate the act of judging. If you like something, accept it; if you don’t like it, avoid it. That’s it! Why are you doing all this pointless research? Don’t you have work? I’m sharing a completely personal opinion on this matter. Yesterday (04-09-2017) at 10:30 PM, ATN Bangla aired a solo musical program by Dr. Mahfuzur Rahman, Chairman of ATN Bangla & ATN News. I had already felt that there wouldn’t be anything in that program that I would enjoy watching. I didn’t watch the program for my own benefit. What I won’t enjoy, I’ll avoid. I’ll accept the good, reject the bad. Simple! I don’t have the time or taste to jump in and then excavate its entire lineage. I’ve seen many people who couldn’t resist the temptation to write absolutely ridiculous things about that program and the singer to lighten themselves. That group includes not only fools but also many intellectual carriers of civil society who, despite being so respectable themselves, produced verbal excrement by disrespecting and personally attacking the singer due to some mysterious subconscious urge. I respectfully pose some questions to them—

One. Did someone force you to watch that program at that time? Was there a law passed that you’d lose your job if you didn’t watch it? Your business would shut down? You’d have to abandon your studies? You’d be dragged off and thrown in jail? Couldn’t you bear to waste your precious time on such a ‘utterly vile, cheap, low-grade’ program (by your standards) that offended your taste? Or couldn’t your sick, jealous mind resist the temptation to belittle a wealthy, well-established, confident person, because you could never possibly reach his position? He sang to satisfy his passion, you listened to satisfy yours. Done! Why all this fuss about it? The Facebook denizens of this wretched country can cheerfully digest murders, rapes, robberies, and all manner of injustice, but they can’t digest the temptation to demean others. The height of sensitivity from these damn hypocritical Facebook mob-followers!

Two. The singer sang to find joy himself and to give joy to his listeners. You became his listener and fulfilled his wish. I’d say, he is a damn successful artist! How many artists in this country can you find who have such successful songs with so many highly educated listeners? I wish him well. He’ll sing more, we’ll listen. We’ll be entertained again and again, and we’ll speak ill of the one who’s entertaining us. Of course, there are some people who can’t find anything else worth saying except nasty things. They live nasty, they die nasty. That’s the truth. It’s easy to be a worthless, cheap critic of a Rajnikanta or Ananta Jalil, but becoming like them is incredibly, incredibly, incredibly difficult. Did all those virtual organizations’ ten thousand Facebook saints combined contribute as much as one Ananta Jalil did to the recent floods? A two-taka goat always dreams of devouring a lakh-taka garden! There’s a song, probably from 2008. ‘Tumi diyo na go bashor ghorer batti nibhaiya’ (Don’t you extinguish the bedroom lamp). This song, made by copying a Hindi tune, I’d never heard before. Just the other day I suddenly found it on a friend’s timeline. I might never have imagined such a bizarre thing existed in this world. My taste and sense in music are both very sharp. Yet while listening to that song on YouTube, I ended up listening to some other songs from the right-side song suggestions, which don’t align at all with my self-imposed, self-proclaimed ‘refined taste.’ That song came out long ago. I never heard it. I didn’t know of the song’s existence. To live in this world, you can’t know about the existence of everything. Those who produced the song didn’t force me to listen. No one compelled me to hear it. I consumed that inedible thing and some other fraternal inedibles entirely on my own responsibility and made my place among the listeners of such songs. If those listeners are of lowly taste, then so am I. Sometimes, in private moments, I find myself humming, ‘Tumi diyo na go bashor ghorer batti nibhaiya’ or ‘Amar doyal baba kola khaba, gach lagaiya khao’… Why I do this, I don’t know, truly don’t know. How many gentlemen are truly gentlemen when nobody’s watching? Investigate and see if you can find even one in a hundred thousand! Most gentlemen are merely hypocrites. I listened to those songs. They seemed to me unworthy of immortalizing in one’s heart as a mark of good taste. But trolling those songs’ artists, constantly judging those involved in the songs’ production, is undoubtedly an even worse and cheaper mark of taste. Brother, you can’t even write two decent lines in your life. Why are you so skilled at writing nasty things about someone by name? Do you have the qualification to sit and share a cup of tea with him? Stand before him and perform this Facebook goat-dance of yours in the public interest—let’s see how broad your chest really is!

Three. Could you manage, even with a lifetime of effort, to create such a solo program and keep so many viewers seated before their TVs? You couldn’t. Because you don’t have that much money or power, and perhaps never will in your lifetime. What are you trying to prove by saying nonsense about Dr. Mahfuzur Rahman? That you’re vastly refined in taste, which you’re announcing to everyone by beating drums? That you’re more worthy than him? Everyone’s belittling him, personally attacking him—in this opportunity, if you don’t do a little of the same, how will you prove yourself ‘civilized’—is this burden itching at your conscience’s elbow? Or do you simply find joy in that pettiness? Dear hypocrite, if you have the courage, sing a song in your voice and share it! But then again, what if you do? Who are you that even a goat’s third offspring would dance to your song? You might say your voice isn’t good, so you won’t share, won’t bother anyone like he did. Wrong, boss! He didn’t bother anyone. If you were bothered, you were bothered entirely on your own responsibility. Did you receive an invitation to watch that program? Or were all other TV channels shut down at that time? Yesterday at that time, the country’s ‘patriotic’ TV viewers watched a local channel’s program instead of some Indian channel. Instead of foreign channels’ TRP increasing, our channel’s TRP increased. Did any of us thank him for this achievement? Can you show us anything like this? He has the ability to buy and keep dozens of public like you and me in his pocket. He has provided employment for many people, pays substantial taxes to the government, contributes to Bangladesh’s media. What are you doing for the country? How easily Facebook elevates a shoe sole to a crown’s peak! In real life, the shoe sole remains under the foot.

The weak dwell on others’ weaknesses; the strong learn from others’ strengths.

Let me return to my father’s words. Father used to call mother (and still does) the Home Minister. Mother was often unwell. Even when only lentils and mashed potatoes were cooked at home, I never learned to sit at the dining table and ask mother, “Isn’t there anything else?” Instead, father would repeatedly acknowledge how mother spent busy days with us two brothers despite her ailing body. He would praise all of mother’s work. Mother would become happy like a small child, forget all her troubles, and sit down to tell father stories about what happened throughout the day. Father says women are quite childlike. If you hurt their hearts, it returns many times over. My mother taught children at a kindergarten school. She did this purely for joy. Running around with us, managing all household work, maintaining social relations—mother had to do all this too. I think if you give your wife the respect she deserves, even if you don’t reap the benefits, your children will. I can say this with certainty. The family member who doesn’t earn money also feels just as tired as you do. There’s no connection between earning money and feeling exhausted. I’ve seen that if all household work were paid for, my mother’s salary would have been at least double mine. If life’s small joys can be savored with love, then not only does life’s accounting balance out, but you get bonuses too. Food tastes good not because of flavor, but because of love. That’s why everyone’s mother’s cooking is the most delicious in the world. Those who’ve been away from home for long periods know how easily they’d say goodbye to all the world’s riches just for the desire to eat their mother’s hand-made lentil curry and fried eggplant!

Why did all this come to mind? I read a story from President Abdul Kalam’s childhood. I’m writing it in my own way.

One day at dinner, Abdul Kalam’s mother served his father a burnt roti and a bowl of vegetables. Little Kalam waited to see if father would say anything. As if nothing had happened, father ate the roti and vegetables with such satisfaction and kept asking little Kalam what happened at school, what friends and teachers had said. Kalam’s mother was regretting and apologizing for burning the roti. Then Kalam’s father said, “Ah, beloved! I love eating burnt roti. Today’s roti turned out wonderful!” Mother went to sleep with a smile. Later that night, before going to bed, little Kalam asked his father, “Father, do you really like eating burnt roti?” Father said, “Your mother worked all day today and is very tired. That she made roti for us—this wasn’t done with physical strength, son, but with the strength of love. Burnt roti doesn’t hurt anyone, but harsh behavior does. Listen, boy! In this life, the people you’ll live with, the things you’ll live with—none of these are perfect. Yet even with all this, you can live very beautifully. Boy! Life is short! How many days will we live, tell me? Where’s the time to sleep with regrets?”

After reading this story, I silently said once more, “Father, thank you!”