Non-fiction
(Not) Meeting my Londoni Mama
Since my boyhood, I remember our family being proud of having relatives abroad. There were levels, though. Having an uncle or aunt - first or second - in Calcutta (Kolkata) was not something worthy of mentioning boastfully, while having them in New Delhi or Bombay (Mumbai) might cause someone's eyebrows to be raised high. But the best was having one in London. So my paternal aunt, at her crooked age, in Delhi, my maternal uncle, senior in age, in Mumbai now, and today's Mama, some three years older to my mother, were like people from fairy tales. Mama is seventy five now, and I then felt unworthy at not having had a chance to meet him. During my boyhood and early teenage years, handwritten letters from my London Mama created much tumult among us -- the huge number of we siblings, though that was not to last long. The letters were usually addressed to my Ma, sometimes making queries about others, but at all times crisply worded. On occasion those letters would even carry small cheques ranging from £20 to 50. That would become big news -- to us family members, our neighbours and even sometimes to the heavyweights of our village society, since that needed to be cashed through the local bank. What a pleasure, when I grew much older and had a family of my own, I was able to create an environment to share that sort of sheer joy which I found in those eyes crowding around us in those bygone days. Sometime in the first half of 2002 (am I recalling correctly?) two bideshi (foreign) women came to our village haat of Kamarkhali in Faridpur. They were looking for someone whose name they kept pronouncing in their British accent as 'ghita'. Being whites, they drew many people around them, some of whom took them to our village home. Sorrowfully, no one was able to understand them. So they began to wander around and at last again they were directed to our house since many people knew that we had a relative living in London. All tears suddenly broke into laughter when it was discovered that those two bideshi women were in fact uttering the name of our Ma, Geeta. I came to know the incident from a letter by my Ma. It said that two foreigners came on an NGO programme to Dhaka. After finishing their official schedules, they began their expedition to find a place that sounded something like Kamarkhali. Their local NGO colleagues suggested they try Kumarkhali, a comparatively more known place of Kushtia. From Kumarkhali, some other clues pushed them to Kamarkhali, not a negligible distance from Kushtia, especially for foreigners. Thank God that they did not stop till they met up with a Geeta of Kamarkhali of Bangladesh. Those two foreign girls were the friends of Ajay, my Mama's son. My Ma in her letter provided me with the address of Ajay that the bideshi women had given her and thus began my own association with my Mama and my newly discovered cousin. Soon I contacted Ajay by email that turned to phone calls also. So many things unknown about the family, so much talk to be exchanged!! So much eagerness craving inwardly! And to my utter surprise Ajay, with his little knowledge in Bangla, came to Bangladesh in October 2003, aged 33 years odd. Prior to Ajay's visit to Bangladesh, I had requested if Mama would come with Ajay. I explained that the visit would give us a chance to have a look at him. But ill heath and old age did not allow Mama to travel. After Ajay's arrival we really began to learn about Mama from a firsthand source. We got to know that Mama lived in a city some 200 hundred kilometers far from London. In Kolkata during the liberation war days we came to know that Mama had turned into a sannayashi, left all his London properties and come back to India. He had also married and had a son and ... so many things were unclear, ambiguous and mysterious!!! During the soronarthy days my Baba went to meet him at Sreerampore. Ma, along with our second brother Shyamol, also went to meet him at Hrishikesh. All these we had dimly heard and partially remembered. Now, during these last four or five years, we began to know about him with certainty. On 18 April 2003 (the date confirmed by the letter sent as a reply) I wrote a very long letter to my Mama I had never ever met. I wrote it deliberately to know more about him. In the letter I made many queries to him and requested him to answer those as elaborately as possible. But his reply wholly frustrated me since all I received was a tiny note with very sketchy information. With due respect to my Mama, I want to say that the illegible handwriting and horrendously incorrect spelling created considerable confusion in me. Okay, I thought, so he had had no practice of writing Bangla for a very long time, but why was Mama avoiding writing in detail? Wasn't he literate enough that he couldn't to ventilate his ideas and thoughts!!! Much later when I received his email, my doubts became a certainty: He was not an educated man. Below is what he wrote in that thin letter in Bangla (translation mine): "My body was born in a poor family. First my father worked as a teacher of a village school, and later on as a mohuri (an accountant) at a shop and at last as a nayeb at the Zaminder's. He married for the second time when my mother died. As he did not adopt family planning, in the next few years, he had more two sons and two daughters. My own mamabari (maternal uncle's house) was just adjacent to ours. So we would spend most of our time at our mamabari. Since he did not have any permanent income, the condition of the family of ten members including eight siblings gradually worsened. "Completing my schooling of class 7, I went to West Bengal. At the age of 16 I joined the merchant navy training when I was in the West Bengal Volunteer Force. Later I visited many more sea ports as a sailor and at last settled in this country in 1956. During my sea days and first days in the United Kingdom I was helped by Bangladeshi Muslims, and therefore I will remain grateful to them forever. "In the foreign lands I have been in problems as I am not much literate in English. What I learnt is to just manage the situations. The next events included getting citizenship in the UK, building the house, buying the cars, getting married, losing one eye in an accident in the factory where I worked, suffering from asthma, selling my house and vehicles and going back to India. As every year I began to suffer severely from asthma, I decided to return to this country again." A small note, yet poignant and pregnant with information. And truthfully speaking, this was the longest letter that I ever had from him: this mythical figure of my childhood and our family. The other letters said only hellos, wishes and nothing else. But the letters were nonetheless something precious for me: I discovered a very kind heart in them - kind to his sister (my Ma) and to his native land. In April 2004, he wrote a letter that I should share with my readers: "Every day I watch reports of the devastating flood of Bangladesh on television and radio and get upset. Today I have sent to you £200 for the flood-affected people through Money Gram. You please do use that money as you think best." Later he gave me the necessary code numbers, etc. I handed over the amount to a relief committee. The letter also said: "I have decided to donate some money to Lohagora (his native village) College. I sent a letter to the principal but got no reply." The desire to do something for his native land was ever present in him. In August of 2004 he wrote: "For more than 50 years I have left my birthplace, and now I am 73, as the office documents say. To date I have got no opportunity to make a donation for the welfare of my motherland." Dear readers, I felt elated that he is my mother's brother, that my Mama feels so deeply for his own land! In July 2005 when the London bombings created huge panic in the city I got the first email from him: "I am safe and sound. Tell your mother. Learning computer and internet." Thus started the online era with Mama. On the Kali Puja, Durga Puja, Doljatra and Noboborsho he sends greetings that makes our whole family happy. In 2006 there appeared the possibility of at last getting to meet my Mama. I was invited to attend a symposium at Mondialogo School Contest in Rome, to be held between 4-7 November. I had to collect the transit visa for the UK, as per the direction of the Mondialogo team. On the flight back, since it would be a fourteen-hour transit in London, British Airways sent me all the necessary information regarding hotel arrangements. As we had decided over email, Mama and I would get to spend the whole time together at the hotel. I would present him with the naru, amsotto, patali and the other Bangladeshi village delicacies that my Ma gave me to hand over to her brother. I was elated, it would be so nice, so memorable, this getting together for a night. And so with great expectations I got down at the Heathrow Airport at 1800 hours on 7 November. At the terminal, the British Airways people indicated the hotel location just over my heads. With breath-stopping excitement, I rushed to the immigration counter. Seeing London for the first time did not count -- the only thing flowing through my mind was the sweet thought of the forthcoming moment to meet Sanat Majumder. I would tell about him to my Ma, show her the photos, the videos, and so much more. But then the lady at the immigration counter told me that I was not allowed to go outside the airport. I was outraged: How dare she! This ugly witch! Didn't I have the transit visa! Her reply was: "Your visa is airside, not landside." For the first time I became aware of the distinction of the two terms and asked the why I needed a transit visa if I was not allowed to go out of the airport! With great gentleness she explained that without the transit visa I would not be allowed to board any flight bound for the United Kingdom. My sequel question: "Millions of peoples are crossing Heathrow every day. Are all of them seeking similar transit visas?" It was only then that the mystery was unveiled: "You're from a country that is blacklisted." All my dreams and plans were shattered with soundless pangs. What to do then? I went to the British Airways office again but they could not help me. They said that only the people at the security could help me. I rushed over to the security staff. What a lucky man I was! They gave me the patient hearing, but explained that there was no such place in the whole airport where they could place my Mama and me even on opposite sides of a glass door. But they did not disappoint me totally. They contacted the the airport lounge and requested them to make an announcement for Mr Sanat Majumder to attend to the information desk. After some half an hour a positive reply came from the other side. There was my Mama consoling me over phone though I could not control my tears. I just told Mama not to leave, as I kept alive a very slight hope about somehow being able to send the naru, amsotto and patali to him. A lady at the security told that as they were allowed to carry food stuff from outside, she could try to reach those, only the food items, to my Mama. She then checked, and re-checked, all those things, took them, and went away. I did not wait there any more. The other security people advised me to spend the night in the upstairs waiting area along with other passengers. While I was roaming around thre heavy with grief that cutest lady of the security staff came to me and informed me that Mama had been overjoyed on receiving those things, though she also sadly told me that she could not bring over the many gifts that my Mama had brought for my family members. I have never ever liked any lady, acquainted for so small a time, so much!!! After some days a package reached our home. Among the items there was a small note: "Subrata, the Bangla letters inscribed on the nice cup given by you recalls many things of my boyhood years in Bangladesh." Suddenly I remembered the cup that I bought for Mama from a Dhaka shop that I had not been able to find in my baggage on return. Did that go with the food stuff? Then surely it reached the person it was destined for. Mistakenly or rightly so? Subrata Kumar Das, a teacher, has also set up www.bangladeshinovels.com.
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