The Morning Light

"What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail."-Robert Schuller

An MBA Degree

I have done it! All those hours, days and months of slaving away at the desk, burning lamps, waking nights, having exam related nightmares for days on end when I was supposed to be dreaming of things a new bride dreamt of, all those days of hard rigorous work has finally paid off. I have passed my exams! I am a certified MBA graduate now. How happy my dad would have been to hear of this news! There was a different sort of satisfaction and joy that came from making my dad happy over the tiniest form of achievement in my life.

Perhaps because my dad was one person who had always made such noise over every trivial achievement. If he was still around, the first thing he would have done was to call all or most of our relatives and his friends telling them of the news with a deep brusque tenor. When I was younger, this particular trait of his had never failed to embarrass me. Now, I realise how much it had meant to me nevertheless. There was a happiness that stemed from knowing how I would have made him gleam with enough pleasure to be willing to proudly blow the horn to others about the smallest success of any of us kids in the family. Two days ago, Asha in her mail to me wrote "Nothing is accidental - the smiling picture is perhaps the way your dad wants to be remembered.... Though dad is no longer physically with you , but his love and wisdom will always be felt. He's just like one of those bright stars in the sky, watching over you all the time..."

I thought of her letter for a while, than I walked to my mom to tell her, after which, I promptly picked up the phone and dialled Emon to tell him the good news.

Privacy- An Issue

Privacy is a fundamental human right and a cornerstone of a democratic society. It lies at the foundation of the rule of law, the secret ballot, doctor-patient confidentiality, lawyer-client privilege, the notion of private property, and the value our society places on the autonomy of the individual. But, if we see it in a more basic form, privacy is required in an individual's life at much more minute issues than the ones given above. Bangladesh is one country where an individual's privacy is invaded as an aspect of general curiosity and it is expected to be exploited at all times as another's basic right of action, or thats the way they see it.

After my dad's demise more than a month ago, we have been asked a lot of questions. What are going to do, what are our next five year plans, what should my mother do, will my brother leave the country soon? What are we planning to do with my dad's business? And so on and so forth it went. Suddenly we felt very surrounded. We were surrounded by concerned friends and relatives providing us with moral support, ideas are flooding in, thoughts shared and discussed, as if suddenly our lives are all up for public discussion and debate.

A few ideas are good, most are general, some are infuriating. All in all, everyone comes in to keep tabs on which direction our lives are leading now. Its interesting because thats the answer I would like to find out too.

Friendship Day - My Father My Friend

Another incident rocked my conscious mind today as I opened another book to read. It was the Dan Brown's famous book "Da Vinci's Code" which I hadn't finished the last time I had started reading it more than a year ago. As I was flipping the pages, a picture fell out, I picked it up and stared at my dad smiling back at me in print.

In the beginning of the previous year, I had gifted my parents a holiday voucher for their marriage anniversary to the beach. This particular picture was taken with a young boy from the hotel, who had helped him and mom get beach chairs and ran small errands. The photograph was taken on the beach with my dad smiling and the boy smiling beside him. Somehow I had ended up using this picture as a bookmark for this particular book.

Now, all I could do was gape in surprise at the picture and wondered if he was trying tell me something. I looked at the picture for a long while and than carefully tucked the picture in my purse.

For now, I am adding a poem in memory of my dad on this friendship day. A day to be with friends and celebrate love, friendship and happiness. For me, I lost a great friend a month back, a friendship that is totally irreplaceble. This poem was sent to me today by Asha, a friend I had recently made in Hong Kong. I read the poem once, read it twice and reread it again thinking how true.

Those who have a father, love him while you may. For we wish with all our hearts, that ours were here today. A heart of gold stopped beating. Two laughing eyes at rest. God broke our hearts to prove, he only takes the best. For what it meant to lose him, no one will ever know. Love in death should let us see what love in life should always be !

Live your life over again!

I have finished reading the Anne Frank's Diary and got wholly inspired to search for my own journals. They are faded now, the pages are yellow and the ink in them are fading away. I wont like to publish mine though, the way Anne Frank did, (Note: I realised at the end of the story that she wasnt that much like me though except for a few traits). But I would definitely store my diaries though if I can, for myself instead to read and laugh out loud later.

Today, as I was talking to my old colleague and friend Farhana, through our conversation, I also realised that "If we write our life down, every time we read it, we can relieve our life again and again, so that we dont live just once but many times over and over again"

In our lives there will be incidents we would forget, incidents we had forgotten and incidents we dont want to forget. So, if we do write down every moment through, indeed if we have time. I know most of us do write journals or have written one at one point of time or the other. Once we read them, it has the ability to transport us back in time and we can almost feel that moment again, for a second we can feel exactly what we felt when we wrote it, most times, its a great feeling.

I came across my dad's diary too. In it he had been very concise, just events were written and dates and venues visited. But, in the midst of all those entries was one, a two and a half page entry, about his visit to Bangalore when I was a student living there. The entry was not as brief as the others and it made me realise that he must have wanted to really relieve those moments. He had even noted down what we did each day. It made me feel really strange, as if he was alive and talking to me through his entry in the diary. I wish he was still here with us. I miss his presence more and more each day. May Allah rest his soul in peace.

What's In A Name?

Today, as I was reading the "Anne Frank's Diary - The diary of a young girl" I came across a lot of similarities between the character in the book and myself. Is there something behind possesing the same personalities by having similar names?

Selecting a name for a baby is a huge deal in the new millenium. Trends come and go, the fastest rising or falling baby names mirror cultural trends, changing fashions or world events. Today's baby names are influenced by celebrities, tv shows and even by popular brands. Both me and my sister were named after a notable queen and a princess. Whether we share the qualities and personalities of these famous people is yet another story. Names can have lifetime consequences and thats a fact. A name can set up a child for social acceptance, school yard teasing or ridicule. This effectively giving a child the ability to choose which name they're known by in future years as they grow older. My real first name is Marufa, but in school I was called Maruf in short, which later turned into 'MyRoof'. This resulted in a reluctance to use my first name unless for official purposes and instead, I reverted to using my nickname, which was much simpler and easier.

With celebrity being the new royalty, celebrity baby names are increasingly finding their way into 'normal' society. Using family names in this way is a wonderful way to keep ancestors alive down through the generations. I was named "Begum" which was retained for maidens and handed down over generations. But, the dictionary meaning of "Begum" meaning wife had given rise to a lot of ridicule too in growing years. So I suppose its important to realise and make sure that the names would be something the child will be happy with.

Recently, the internet has given rise to a huge dictionary of names to select from including the meanings of these names. Some not only allows you to search by name, but also by all sorts of fantastic categories including 'celebrity', 'pop culture', 'the classics' and 'imaginative'. Once you've narrowed your selection down to an individual name, the site, for example "parenting.com" gives you the meaning and origin of the name as well as the popularity rank over time.

Another thing you can add on to the list, if you believe in numerology is what kind of personality the baby could have once given such a name. One similar site I came across long ago was http://www.kabalarians.com/index.cfm where you can find out what kind of personality you have depending on your first name. According to the site it says that "The Kabalarian Philosophy teaches that mind and language are intimately linked. When language is used to attach a name to someone, certain specific forces of conscious intelligence are combined".

You can try out the site and check whether it works for you. I have found a few similarities in character as stated. But whether I truly believe that Anne Frank and Anne (me) have similar personalities due to the similar names is still a debatable issue.

Remembering My Dear Dad

About two weeks ago, on 2nd july 08, Wednesday, I received a sms from my dad where he wished me and my husband happiness. I looked at it and thought, “Gee, since when did dad become so formal?” I even mentioned it to my husband when he came back home that day. After receiving the sms, I thought of replying immediately but found out my mobile phone had run out of credit. As it was too late to get it recharged I waited for my husband to get back home so that I could use his phone to call home. But, when he did arrive, I forgot until it was too late to call that night. To justify my forgetfulness, I thought it would be just alright to talk for an extra lenght of time durimg the weekend, on Friday, as we usually do call our parents every weekend.

I felt guilty about not replying that sms on the fated Wednesday night but did nothing to remedy it, even thought about it all night and tossed and turned knowing I should have replied, late as it was, and wondering why I hadn't. Little did I know that the same thought would ring through my mind for far more than just one night after that day. I even remember how my guilt prompted me to ask my husband much later whether he thought my dad would worry that I hadn’t replied. He smiled and told me that it was about time my dad stop worrying about me. I laughed and replied with utmost certainty “but abbu will never stop worrying about me!”.

On Thursday night, abbu passed away suddenly following a massive heart attack and I flew back home on Friday. The same day I was meaning to call and talk to him.

Abbu’s face beams at me everywhere ever since I last saw him lying peacefully asleep forever. He was always smiling, a serene calm person who raised the three of us siblings in a very strict, but not too strict manner. He was always there, encouraging us, allowing us to realize our fullest potentials, never once berating us for stumbling in our ways. He was hard working, mom used to say that dad lived his life on roller skates, never pausing to enjoy life. His favorite word was “Later”, “shob hobe..pore”, (Everything will happen later). If we wanted to all take a family trip, he would say “later”. We grew up, had our own circle of friends…we never did have that family trip. Neither did I get to buy him the leather rocking chair I promised him either. “Later”, I had thought, it would be a surprise birthday present…”Later” thus became “Never”.

What can I do now to unwind time? How can I call those moments back? Why do we all live for tomorrow planning things in the future, when it’s a future we have no control over? After all, tomorrow is what abbu lived for all his life but never lived to see. He never took that world tour he wanted to go on with my mom, he never took that long holiday to relax in the countryside like he always thought he would. He worked dutifully and dilligently without rest all his life without leisure or pleasure when all along he could have lived like a king!

Every time I think of my dad, I can feel the pain he must have felt when he had had the attack, the pain that he would have felt when they were rushing him to the hospital, the thoughts that would have chased his mind. If only I could have shared a little of that pain that day, I might have felt better today. If only he would have allowed us to share a little of his worries, perhaps allowed us to carry his burdens maybe. There he was, totally giving up his entire life, his time and his strenght, focussing all his energy and living his life...just for us!

Gone is a person who knew me inside out, who was my best friend ever, who was the only person I could spend 30 pages of handwritten letters on, the one person who called people to read out my sms to him. He still has a glass shelf with all my gifts to him stored in them which he never used. He stored every scrap of thing I gave him including a file full of cards and letters I used to write to him from college, years ago. And while I am still trying to figure out what I gave in return to him all these years for all that he has done, I feel totally bereft for being so ungrateful as not to have a few seconds to even reply to an sms, and for all the things I could have done to make him smile all these years but didnt.

He was my light, he gave me strength. In me, he shall live forever.

HE HAD SO MUCH TO DO, HAD SO LITTLE TIME

"To God we belong and to Him we shall return." (Qur'an 2:156)

Time Flies By

This time the clock ticked away at break neck speed. When one is happy or extremely busy, I guess time flies faster. For me, busy was past tense and happy would certainly determine present tense.

The exams are over, the long sleepless nights studying and worrying have swished past. The hundrum of the busy schedules of a office are a thing of the past. Now, the other phase of my life has began. My married life!

For starters, I never knew marriage would be the way it is. It's just way better! My first trip with my husban, Emon to Malaysia was lovely with just the right scenic beauty giving it an ethereal touch. We met up at the KL airport, where we accidentally bumped into each other right under the sign board stating the flight details to Langkawi even though we had plans to meet up at the boarding counter. And that was the beginning of the rest of my life!

Malaysia was exactly what I had expected it to be. But of course, I had internet and a map to give me details of the trip. From it, I could choose the destination I wanted to visit, the tourist places and the weather details and I could pack accordingly. If our entire life could be planned out through the help of the internet, would it have been boring? I wonder.

Langkawi is a beautiful city, very romantic for some. It provides just the right amount of relaxing and stress-free time without the hub of the crowd and the noise. People are friendly and the ambience is calm. The food is not as great as Bangkok if I may say. But, if anyone wants a tranquil holiday, Langkawi is certainly the place.

I also met up with my childhood friend Tanmi and her beautiful babies after and before my trip to Hong Kong at Kuala Lumpur. I felt, starting off a new married life was very exciting and something to look forward to, especially when I met Tanmi and her happy family. As I boarded the flight to Hong Kong, I was happy and content. Hong Kong called the fragrant harbour, is aptly named. The only word to describe Hong Kong is "spectacular"! The beautiful skyscapers, the wonderful blue ocean, the surrounding green mountains all come together to form a scintillating view, one could almost smell the frangrance of tranquilty in the air.

And so, here I am, a month has passed by, I am a wife now and here are some of my observations on marriage till date:

* Its never what you expect. If you expect less, you will only get better.

* Its a beautiful way to be yourself with a person who will love you for who you are.

* Every day is a learning experience.

* Doing a new thing every day suddenly has a whole new meaning.

* Just watching TV is more enjoyable than it used to be before.

* Respecting the other person and giving each other a little breathing space is very important.

* Its important to make each other feel totally at ease and comfortable without feeling obligated.

* It easy to feel special without even having the other half telling you how wonderful you are.

Make it through another day!

While I am busy doing my final assignments due in four hours time, I am listening to a beautiful song titled "GOOD MORNING BABY by Runga / Wilson which is completely in sync with my situation.

You can get the lyrics of the entire song here

Blissful Coincidence!

With my statistics exam being scheduled for the day after tomorrow, I have been thinking a lot about statistical issues until I finally embarked on a startling discovery. So now, what could be the rate of probability that some of my very close friends including me would decide to tie the knot at the same time? Lets say, if I have about 300 friends around the globe, the probability that six of us could be getting married at the same time would be 0.02 or only 2%. So, shall I say it’s a coincidence now, or a stroke of fate that if I wasn’t busy attending my own wedding, here are the muslim, hindu and christian weddings held around the globe that I would have definitely attended.

Saud and Karishma tied the knot in January 2008 in Nepal and Bangalore. Karishma and I go back a long way, ever since hostel days in 1997. This pair has a eleven year long relationship that has finally successfully culminated in wedded bliss. I had promised Karishma that I would attend her wedding what comes may. How was I to know that I would be tying the knot the same month. This goes to show that planning in advance is good but we should bear in mind that there might be another fork in the road which might be better. I have had a long history of good days with this lovely pair of people. We have trekked and camped atop a hill in Kerela, went on tiger sighting at the hills of Bandipur on a tata Sumo in the middle of the night. We had barbequed burnt and raw chicken at a campsite atop a hill called "babyhill" which was no baby by comparison. We explored several tea gardens, waterfalls and beaches aligning the coastal belt of the beautiful country of India. Karishma and I have also received sharp reprimands from our hostel warden while breaking hostel rules. With all my fond memories, I hope I to see this pair in Dubai in future and I wish these two the best of luck ever and a happily married life. Perseverance does have its seeds of victory!

Nislin and Saw got married in Bangkok, Thailand. Nislin was my flatmate and a spirited young lady when I knew her so many years ago. One thing I would always remember about Nislin is how she often confused my potato curry with "tomato curry". She also repeated each sentence three times in quick succession which was so cute. When we parted six years ago, little did we know that we would meet up again two years back when I visited Bangkok on an official tour. This of course teaches me that the world is really a small place, and the reoccurance of events is highly probable even though we think it not to be.

Shripal and Yamini got married in Ahmedabad. They met more than three years ago and amidst several obstacles finally tied the knot. Shripal was my classmate when we were both struggling to achieve an MIS degree. The first thing that Shripal had told me was "I have a twin brother who looks exactly like me, isnt that cool?". In time, I was friends with not only his 'lookalike' twin brother but his sisters and his parents too. I remember how he used to send me and my roommate free packets of glucose from his dad's sugar factory when he finally moved away from town. Talk about innovative ways of keeping in touch! I wish this pair the best of all worlds possible.

Rahat and Aly's wedding was held three days prior to my wedding. We had plans of what to wear in the others' big day but as it turned out, I was getting my mehendi done when she was tying the knot. So, I have this beautiful photo of them to treasure instead. What makes this wedding special is that Rahat had made a monumental decision and had changed her plans of boarding the flight a few years back. The flight would have taken her away from Aly and lead her to a different destination if she hadnt listened to him on the morning of her flight. At that time, she had not envisioned that Aly would be her predestined groom and neither did he. A significant statement I would remember always when I had met the pair at Bella Italia was "Always tell the other person what you feel no matter what the situation". Here is cheers to this lovely couple who has made destiny their world and helped me with mine!

And finally, here is Shayan and Dilruba. I don't even remember how I first met Shayan, it was way back in school when I wore my long hair in ponytails. We had common friends and would all meet up during Eid holidays to have ice-creams at the famous "Dolce Vita". One thing that I would always remember was when Shayan was generous enough to allow the 12th graders to celebrate the prom night at his premises which was such a hit. We planned costumes for months!!! Shayan met Dilruba and in a whirwind romance got married almost the same time as I did in the city of Dhaka, so it was impossible for both of us to be attending each other's weddings. I hope them all the best for years to come!

Nothing in this world is impossible. Either it's about meeting a person we would spend the rest of our lives in the most likely or unlikely ways and places or being in a certain place in a certain time on a certain day. But that's all too intense, so for now, all I just wish that, I wish I may, I wish I might, I wish I have these friends for life!