Most of you don’t know that not only am I of Pakistani origin, but I’m also Punjabi.
Punjabis are a distinct breed on the subcontinent. I like to think of us as the “rednecks” of the Indo-Pak region. Down to earth, loud, vibrant… and, not really known for being extremely genteel.
That’s why Gatsby, who wrote the following post for me and happens to be my first cousin (who I am not married to, ha ha), is a bit of an oddity in the family.
He’s the guy that worries about where the salad fork goes at our family dinners while the rest of us are just eating with our hands and wiping our mouths on our sleeves. But, you know, I feel like what’s not to love about a straight guy who actually knows where the salad fork goes? So, without further ado, I present, Mr. Manners, a.k.a. Gatsby who in my book is more than just great.
To be perfectly honest, inherent love for my own gene pool aside, the primary reason I love this man so much is that he finds new and exciting ways to prove to me that I am, by far, not the most pretentious human being I know.
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While we were in the middle of our salads at dinner the other day, a woman from our assembled party excused herself from the table.
In response to this action I placed my hands on the arms of the chair and lifted myself slightly to indicate the standing position for when a lady excuses herself. For this action, I got a playful curtsey from my departing friend and a light backhand to my chest from another sitting next to me.
The whole exchange of actions was kind of funny, but it made me reflect on how my reaction to her excusing herself was taken. To my friend leaving the table, I’m sure it was taken as a playful joke. To my fellow males at the table, it was taken as an archaic custom that needed a light reality check.
To me, it was just the nice thing to do.
Despite the common saying, chivalry is not dead. I can’t purpose the contrary and say that it’s alive and well either, though. At best, it’s on a respirator in New York Medical wondering why the cab turning the corner didn’t put on the brakes a little earlier. In this picture, chivalry seems like a naïve figure struggling to find its role in a world that is ever-changing and always cutting out the inefficient parts of society.
Often shown as a man being the hero to some maiden, the act of being chivalrous has an inherit sexism to it. A woman can open a door on her own (and vote) without the assistance of a man. She also doesn’t really need a trumpeting action indicating permission to be excused.
Nowadays, she can usually beat her own dragon.
But to the notion of sexism, I offer this approach: “don’t do it for tail.”
It’s pretty straightforward, really; just perform your actions with an emphasis on manners rather than on gender roles and heroism. I acknowledge that manners have their own social implications and can lead to the support of habits both archaic and outdated, however what’s the harm if your intent is really just to make life easier for someone?
Handing your coat over on a cold night or leading a woman through a packed room are just ways to make the other persons life a little less stressful. And on that note, when you’re not in a crowded room – it’s best to let the woman do the leading.
Now here’s the twist. Why let it be a one way street or confined to just the opposite sex? If a woman gets to the door first, I’d say it’s chivalrous for her to keep the door open for a male friend so he can get his slow self in from the cold. If you’ve got a sweater and coat combo going and your buddy was dumb enough to wear a single layer, fork over your coat. If he denies it on the account of being too manly, respect his choice but remind him that a coat now will prevent medicine costs in the very near future.
Overdoing it is what makes you look foolish. Forcing a coat on someone, or jumping for the door are good examples of chivalry on crack. Every action and motion should come naturally, and shouldn’t be the equivalent of a circus show or pulling teeth.
When playing this whole chivalry card it’s important to realize what your actions mean.
There will always be people who think it’s sexist. There will always be friends who think you’re doing it for brownie points. But if you want to do it, do it right, be consistent and make it a part of your basic manners.
And, keep in mind, it’s also important to not dwell on the thing too much.
Years ago, I would look at myself in the mirror and feel completely… exhausted.
Because when I looked at myself, I saw my mother’s eyes staring back at me telling me that I would never, ever be good enough.
Since becoming a mother, I’ve realized we all have hopes for our children. Some of us simply hope that our children will become good people that make this world a littler nicer, maybe a bit more tolerable.
Others hope for much more. They hope for fancy careers, big salaries, great achievements and valor beyond compare. Somewhere along the way, I think some parents’ hopes evolve into expectations. And those expectations, to quote my least favorite author of all time, can be “great.”
So for many painful years, I saw myself as an unmet expectation, as the embodiment of false hopes. In my heart, I believed that my mother wished that I would have been more like her.
Like her, the woman who was a neurosurgeon before 30.
Like her, the woman who moved to a brand new country with a husband she barely knew and managed to create a life.
Like her, the woman who became a successful businesswoman in a field that, in her time, was largely dominated by good ol’ boys.
Like her, the woman who raised two children in a culture with which she was completely unfamiliar.
Like her, who is tough and smart and hardly ever cries.
I was not, am not, and never will be… like her.
As children, we absorb expectations and we translate them into a perimeter which represents our parents’ approval. Some people dash by that perimeter without a single regret. I, on the other hand, have spent the majority of my existence trying to stand squarely in the middle of that space.
Just before I was blessed with a daughter of my own, I stopped and really listened to my mother’s voice echoing inside my head. I realized that what she was saying was not exactly what I was hearing.
When I thought I heard, “You aren’t good enough.”
She was actually saying, “You can be better.”
Yes, there is a difference. And I know, now, that she was right.
I realized that she loves me. She loves me and she’s not wrong in her hopes for me, just as I’m not wrong in the hopes I have for myself. Hope is not a condition to be set upon love. It is just… hope. I also realized, that more than often, I overemphasized the times when she told me to do better, and I swept all the times she told me was proud of me under the rug of convenient dismissals.
Much of my problems with my mother resided in the fact that I didn’t view her as a real person. She was Ammi (mom), all powerful, superhuman, above everything. When I saw the human being, the woman with all the flaws, the guilt, the regrets, the loneliness, the sadness…
I stopped worshiping her and started loving her.
Despite those revelations, every now and then, I’ll revert. I question myself and I wonder if, maybe, I didn’t just cop out of achieving anything of meaningful significance. Of course, I don’t think I’m insignificant. But, I do wonder if I’m significant enough.
Everyone has their struggles, and that has been my greatest.
A few weeks ago, I was helping her clean out her garage and she put her hand on my shoulder. She looked into my eyes and said, “You are the reason I asked God for a daughter. I could not have been blessed more by you in my life. You know this, don’t you?”
“Shhhyeah, mom, I know. But, thanks.” I said that as casually as is humanly possible. I think I may have even rolled my eyes. Funny, no matter how much of an adult I become, she can magically transform me into a fourteen year old.
We grow up, we tell ourselves that it doesn’t matter. Our parents will not define our motives as adults. They will not dictate who we are as adults. We’ll live our lives and be happy with our choices. We think that their approval, although nice, is unnecessary.
But, that day, I went home and cried quiet tears of relief when I replayed her words in my head. I was, after all, what she had expected.
It mattered, and I’m not ashamed to admit that. I may not care much for what other people think of me, but, for better or worse, I will always care about what she thinks of me.
Now, I think of my daughter and I promise myself that I’ll always hope the best for her. As I see it, that’s an important part of my job as her mom. Hoping for my child, seeing her potential, and helping her realize it. I will not underestimate her, nor let her underestimate herself.
This has been my mother’s gift to me.
That doesn’t mean I won’t do things differently, though. I’ll try to be a little more human, a little messier, and a little less “perfect” than my mom tried to be when I was growing up. I’ll make sure I wear my imperfections proudly when I see even the faintest hint of worship in my child’s eyes.
I will also be absolutely certain not to wait too long to tell my daughter that she’s already better than anything I could have expected.
This photo of my dad’s family (I wrote about them in the last post) predates the partition of India and was taken in Malerkotla, a Punjabi state that my family, ahem, er, this is awkward, ruled for about three centuries.
Far right, my grandfather. Grandmother in the middle and the two ladies on the far left are my father’s half sisters. My grandfather’s first wife died of TB, I think. The child on the far right is my dad, far left is his brother.
My father is the only person in this photo who is still alive. I wonder how that must feel for him.
I feel lucky to even have it. You know, maybe since I have it and others like it, the quest to instill a little sense of family history in my progeny won’t be a total failure? Heh, I know you love how I worked the word progeny in there.
Incidentally, Eid ul-Fitr is on Tuesday or Wednesday and marks the end of Ramadhan.
So, go wish all your Muslim friends “Eid Mubarek.”
What do you mean you don’t have any Muslim friends?
We got the plane tickets and travel visas in order, a process which spanned over four months.
I could’ve gotten liposuction at a celebrity spa clinic for the money we spent.
Then, the border firings in Waziristan started. Unfazed, we kept to our plans. I mean what’s a little gunfire between shaky allies? In fact, we were so unfazed that we booked additional tickets to go to Saudi where Tariq’s family currently lives.
I jokingly started calling our travel plans the “Department of Homeland Security Terror Tour.”
A week later, a bomb exploded in the Marriott Hotel in Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad. I watched the flames pouring out of the windows of that hotel and the sinking realization came to me that the danger was real. Followed by the sinking feeling that everything had changed.
Again.
Last time I felt that way was after 9/11. Obviously, I’m not equating the Marriott Hotel bombing with the Twin Towers, I’m just saying that the way I felt was the same.
Before 9/11, I had a very specific construction of who I was and how I fit into the world. I knew that construction would be dramatically challenged and irrevocably changed when the identity of those terrorists became public knowledge. Same thought, everything has changed.
I’m aware that a lot has happened in Pakistan before and even since that bombing. But, for some inexplicable reason, all this nonsense started feeling real for me on that day. My family and I still didn’t cancel our tickets, though.
We talked, and talked, and talked about canceling, but we couldn’t do it.
I know now that the root cause of our indecision was based wholly on denial.
We wanted to believe that we could go to Pakistan and be safe this time, too. We desperately clung to the hope that we would travel to Pakistan during this time of unrest and find, as we had in the past, that the media had blown things way out of proportion.
We’d get off the plane and find that everyone was carrying on business as usual.
But, this time, everything was shaking us. The question was, should we act on these doubts or not?
I remember being at a dinner party last Saturday and talking to a friend’s mother, who is visiting from Pakistan, about the situation. I asked her what I should do, what did she think?
She couldn’t give me a straight answer. We live with this, we’re used to it. It’s harder for you, you’re not used to these things, she said.
She’s right.
If we went through with our plans, we would be in a constant state of fear. Every moment would be spent looking out for suspicious cars, suspicious packages and shifty characters.
I called my cousin in Pakistan at 3a.m. on Monday morning and asked him what he thought. I expected him to laugh at me. He would say I was acting paranoid, and to get a grip and just calm down. He ended up confirming the worst of my suspicions. We’re always looking over our shoulders these days. And we’re used to this.
How sad.
To have to live in a country where you become used to bombings.
I felt sorry for them.
Then, I felt sorry for me.
I was done being in denial and I knew I had to cancel those tickets.
Last year, I canceled my trip because of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination. So, in December, it will have been four years since I last set foot in Pakistan. I’m starting to forget about that place that has always been so important to me.
I always visited in the summer, and the nights in Lahore were and, I imagine still are, amazing.
My favorite place to be was a garden designed by my grandfather who had died years before I was born. Jasmine, guava, roses, mangoes and fruits that I don’t even know the English names of perfumed the air. My cousins and I would lay on the grass and breathe in that sweet air as we listened to my grandmother tell us stories about our grandfather and our parents when they were children. As the night slowly passed, my grandmother would go to bed, but we would stay there, laying on the grass and quietly staring at the stars.
I saw so many shooting stars during those summers in Pakistan. More than I had ever seen in America in all of my life.
Probably because I never really look at the stars here.
One of my cousins told me that whenever the devil tried to sneak back into heaven, the angels threw stars at him. And that’s why there were shooting stars. I guess even the devil, though he chose the place he calls home, sometimes misses the place where he came from.
I have opinions on the politics of Pakistan and its relationship with America. But, today, I don’t care about them.
Today, four days after I canceled my tickets, I mourn, no, I weep, for the memories I have not touched with my hands for four long years. Another year will pass and I won’t touch the guava trees that my grandfather planted in his garden over fifty years ago.
Touching those trees was the closest I have ever come to touching him, and, in many ways, to knowing that he was a real person.
I just want my daughter to touch those guava trees, too.
I want her to touch our past and know that it is real.
That it is part of her.
I want so badly for that to happen, and I’m so afraid that canceling these tickets means that she will never experience that.
Because it will become easier and easier to slip into fear, to rationalize the distance, the time away… until a few years will become decades and my daughter will file Pakistan away in her mind with places like Wonderland and stories of my grandfather with people like Aladdin.
Fictional people and fictional places that exist only in the imagination.
That same mother of a friend said something else that has been echoing in my ears for the past week. What a shame, she said, what a shame that we worked so hard to build a country which our own children now fear.
From the outside, I just look like a paranoid American who canceled a ticket. On the inside, I feel like the child that’s afraid to go home. Or maybe, I’ve just become someone whose gotten tired of dodging stars just so I can see the place that I came from.
