Once, while on this way, Takki Mamu had to take a leak. While most men often urinate standing up, men with a strongly Islamic upbringing do the job while sitting or squatting. If one is in such a place, like Takki Mamu was at the time, and there happens to be no water to clean up, then you put a dollop of mud to clean it. It was like insurance to guarantee that not even a drop falls on the pyjama, which is often pristine white—this way, neither the garment gets dirty on a literal level or polluted on a religious or spiritual level. Takki Mamu was rather religious. But even then, I was not. He had just finished reading namaz before going for the film. Out of izzat (respect) for him, a grown-up, I turned my face and pretended that I was looking elsewhere while he was peeing.
When he was done, we continued walking. More than four kilometres later, lights began to faintly appear on the horizon and consequently, our heartbeats quickened. Almost instinctively, Takki Mamu excitedly looked for his money safely hidden in his undergarment, as was common in those times to protect against pickpockets. It was not there. He could not believe it. Where could it have disappeared? And how? He checked again and found nothing. In panic, he dropped his pyjama altogether to take the best look possible at the inner folds and pockets. That’s when it struck him that he had probably left it behind while he was urinating and cleaning up!
Without uttering a word and with what seemed like telepathic coordination, we immediately turned around and began to run back. We ran all the kilometres we had just covered. Luckily it was worth it because we found the money and pocketed it instantly. Then, without pausing for even a minute, we turned around again and ran back the same route.
Really, part of the charm of Nani ka Ghar was Takki Mamu. He was my favourite maternal uncle; I would always get to watch a film when he was around.
9The Chemist Incident
Like a river swollen in the rain, life too is swollen with epiphanies, indeed, it is bursting with them. And there are a few of those that stay with you forever, like shadows, like the air in your lungs. One of these in particular makes you who you are, fuels you, propels you, while you are living out your part and you have no idea that it is doing so. Hindi cinema has often used this as an archetype: watch a classic Amitabh Bachchan movie and you’ll know what I mean. Cinema derives from life and life derives from cinema. Only that in life what often happens is that years pass before you can rest in the luxury of retrospect, and that’s when it hits you like sunlight swimming through to the surface of the sky on a crisp dawn. I call this chapter of my life quite simply: The Chemist Incident.
I was twelve. The school was closed for summer holidays. By now, you must be quite familiar with my parents who abhorred any form of awaragardi (hooliganism). They thought of some sort of a summer internship for me, except that they were not aware of the fancy term. They just wanted me to do something worthwhile with my free time, something that would help me learn some skill. I had this cousin, my tau’s son Firoz, who at the age of forty, was immensely older than me. Bhai Firoz, as I called him, was a chemist and had humbly named his shop after himself—Firoz Medical Store. Ammi asked me to go sit at the store and that he would help me with maths. I would also assist him as an apprentice of sorts. Like, if a customer came, I’d neatly pull out from the shelves whatever tablets were asked for and give them to him.
I was slow, very slow to understand, to learn. And he was quick, quick to snark. He would give instructions and almost instantly wait for me to make a mistake so that he could pounce on me with his scathing sarcasm and cutting criticism. I never let him down.
What’s more, often enough, there would be an audience to witness my humiliation. If I was stocking the shelves and a customer asked for something, he would immediately say something to the tune of: ‘Nawaz, do you remember where you kept it? Oh wait, you have no idea. You know nothing. You are a dimwit.’ Or if I was calculating with my fingers the exact change that was due to a customer who was waiting patiently, this cousin, delighted that he had an audience, would quip instantly to him, ‘Look at our chacha’s son. He is going to school but cannot do maths, not even first-standard maths.’
There would be something of this sort every five minutes. Once, he even accused me falsely of stealing a bottle of Hajmola; he made a hue and cry about it not only to my family, but also to passers-by. Luckily, my family knew I was innocent. But my self-esteem plummeted to depressing depths. I had no reason not to believe whatever he said. Children are like that. They believe easily, and they question out of curiosity and wonder, not out of cynicism. So I did not question him. This sense of worthlessness, of being a good-for-nothing was sheer torture; it was like being in prison.
And then, during one of those moments when I wanted the ground to open and swallow me up, I had an epiphany. Not just any epiphany, the epiphany that would shape my life. I realized that I might not be good at doing this particular thing, but this was not the only thing in the world. His was not the only voice that mattered. I could always do something
