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A cross-border marriage, 25 years on

Wednesday, January 7, 2015

By Ilmana Fasih

We argued, we
fought, like any
other couple. But we
made it, thanks to
our conscious
decision to not let
cross-border politics
derail our
relationship

aaney kya tuu ne kahi, jaane kya

main ney suni, baat kuchh ban hii
gayee
(Wonder what you said, wonder what
I heard, but we still made it.)
I am sure I am not the only South
Asian who finds a Bollywood song that
feels like it was written for them.
This month, on 29 January 2015, it will
be 25 years since we got married. Time
seems to have passed in a blink. Not that
it has all been a smooth walk through a
garden of roses. But, occasionally
traversing thorny paths, we have managed to emerge more resilient.
Being politically aware individuals,
and as a Pakistani and an Indian respectively, both my husband and I knew it
would be hard to prevent cross-border
politics from affecting us. However, early
on, after many thoughtful discussions,
we vowed not to make our home a battlefield of political taunts. At the same time
we used our political concerns to rise
above emotional rhetoric and develop an
objective outlook. When pessimists dismissed our aspirations of peace we
would come up with statements like:
When fractured bones can heal why
cant India Pakistan relations?
We learnt to be sensitive enough to respect the idiosyncrasies of our extended
families on either side, and ignore those
who used our presence as a cue to trigger
India-Pakistan debates or even, I dare
say, hate.
To my good fortune, my husband was
strong enough to not take to heart the
mocking of everything Pakistani by some
of my Indian relatives when he visited
India. I had my share of outbursts with
his family in Pakistan only to mature with
time and learn that what really mattered
was our relationship and not what rest of
the world said.
Looking back I can say we worked
hard, really hard, to maintain our sanity.
At times we went out of our way to shield
each other from the hyper-patriots of our
respective sides. And then consoled each

On Eid soon after the wedding: finding harmony

other with, Pity their ignorance; they
dont know what they are missing.
We argued, we fought, like any other
couple, but never over border politics.
We needed to raise children who were
confident and not confused about their
identities and who could stand up as beacons of harmony, not hate. We are honoured that our two children grew up loving both countries, both peoples, and
cherishing the beauty of their differences.
India-Pakistan moments came to our
home only as jokes.
My son would ask his father, Why did
you have to marry an Indian who cooks
bhindi?
Pat would come the response, Because she wore a bindi.
As little children, they made valiant
warriors and proud ambassadors for

both sides. What more could a mother

want?
My Indian family still remembers how
a cousin joked with our five-year old Fatima during a picnic in
Delhi: Tumhara
Pakistan ganda
hai. (Your Pakistan is dirty).
She responded
innocently: But the roads are dirty in
India too. And like this Qutub Minar, Pakistan has a tall Minar-e-Pakistan. It is in
Lahore. Mummy says Lahore is like
Delhi.
And how my son came to my rescue
when in Pakistan, an extended family
member in a gathering remarked, The
Ghauri-II missile has a range to reach up
to New Delhi.
My wide-eyed six-year old Ismail

Re-visiting the past

Some years ago, a cricket match between India and Pakistan
provided me my first opportunity to visit my birthplace, Rawalpindi

Pakistan travels-1

By Yash Pal Sethi

ome years ago, a
cricket match between India and
Pakistan
at
Rawalpindi and Lahore provided me my first
opportunity
to
visit
Rawalpindi, my birthplace
that I had left 59 years earlier.
By then, my parents, grandparents and uncles had
passed on, and I was the only
male member in the family
who had seen the upheavals
of Partition. I had almost, but
not quite, forgotten the place
of my origin.
It was September 2006.
My son Rakesh and I reached
Wagah border early one
morning. Checking on Indian
side was stringent and
lengthy. The rude and authoritative customs staff finally
allowed us to cross the invisible border. The Pakistan
checkpost staff was courteous and cooperative.
Our host, Bashir Ahmed,
who had especially come
from Rawalpindi, was anxiously waiting to welcome us.

insisting that we had to stay

with him. He would not take
no for an answer. His wife
was eagerly waiting to welcome us in the hospitable
Punjabi way.
A jovial, talkative lady,
she was a retired Inspector of
schools and treated us like
close relatives. Her son and
my daughter were immediate
neighbours at Muscat and
lived as one family. We discussed many things except
religion and politics in a very
close family atmosphere over
a long-drawn out dinner.
The following morning
after brunch our host
dropped us to the cricket stadium. There was a great rush
and no special entrance or
sitting area for foreigners.
Actually my mind revolts at
the word foreigner in this
context. How can I be a foreigner to the place where I
was born and spent my initial
sixteen years maujj masti?
Legally and technically I may
belong to a foreign country
but my mind refuses to accept this. I did not need any
interpreter to translate my
language or my feelings to
anyone I met in Pakistan, as
they all belonged to the same
culture to which I belong.
We found two seats
amidst the enthusiastic
crowd in the packed stadium.
India won the toss and opted

The writer in Rawalpindi

He drove us to a hotel to collect our tickets for the Lahore match before heading
onto the highway towards
Rawalpindi. It was dusk
when we reached. After
going to a hotel to collect
tickets for the match the next
day, we asked Ahmed to drop
us to our hotel. He refused,

to field. Slogans like Pakistan Zindabad, Hindustan

Murdabad began resounding in the stadium.
When Indian player Ifran
Khan was in action we heard
loud sarcastic remarks: O
nakli Pathan. Amidst a
Hindustan Murdabad slogan I smiled and casually
THE FIRST STEP
LET US KNOW WHAT YOU THINK

Going home: Arriving at Wagah

mentioned to my neighbour
that I am from Hindustan. He
immediately reacted with:
Mafh karna janab, tussi tey
sady mehman ho (Forgive
me, you are our guests), and
got three bottles of Coca
Cola, one for each of us.
Soon we noticed a change
in the pattern of slogans in
our section. We heard Pakistan ki Jai, Pakistan Zindabad but no more Hindustan Murdabad.
Our new friend was eager
to get us something from
each hawker who passed
through. A bit disappointed
to learn that we are vegetarian, he managed to find
potato chips from somewhere. A florist by profession, he invited us to stay at
his house and offered to pick
up our luggage from our
hotel. He only stopped insisting when we explained we
were already staying with a
friend. We never felt that we
were in a hostile country.
At one point General
Musharraf, then President of
Pakistan, arrived at the stadium. This became known
only due to the hectic movement of the police forces. By
this time there were clear indications that Indian team
would carry the day. We left
1.00 p.m to meet our host
Ahmed who was waiting for
us outside the stadium so we
could fulfill our real mission

Feedback, contributions, photos, letters:

Email: amankiasha@janggroup.com.pk
Fax: +92-21-3241-8343
Post: aman ki asha c/o The News,
I.I. Chundrigar Road, Karachi

The writers ancestral home: deserted now

- to see the place where I was
born.
We went to Raja Bazaar,
the biggest shopping centre
of my time. On the way I refreshed my memory as we
passed Rose Cinema, Subzi
Mandi, Dana Mandi, Singh
Sabh, Dingi Khui, and roads
leading to Dehri Baba Sarab
Dayal, Sardara da bagh and
Quila. We parked and headed

to Bazaar Sarafan, less than a

mile away. As we walked, I
told Ahmed the names of the
roads we passed. The name
of Bazaar Talwara, he told
me, had been changed to
Urdu Bazaar.
The bazaars were the
same and so was the rush but
the people were quite different. The bazaars and shops
did not match my emotional

came running to me and whispered in my

ear, Ammi, no one can bomb Delhi.
Dont worry, Nani and Nana will be safe.
All my anxiety and anger dissipated as
he gave me a tight bear hug, insisting,
Hold me tight too Ammi.
When they were little, the children
were also teased in school that their Indian mother was a traitor. There were
tearful moments for them, but there were
far more occasions to rejoice and be able
to enjoy the best of both places.
As adult now, my daughter takes pride
in introducing herself as the daughter of
an Indian mother and a Pakistani father,
who learnt very early that there are loved
ones and not enemies on the other side.
My son enjoys supporting both cricket
teams, and even switching loyalties depending on which team is performing
better.
Visa for us have not been a challenge
except for occasionally. However, it is always painful to see how other divided
families struggle for an almost impossible-to-obtain visa.
What hurts is the hatred spewed on
electronic or social media that is so unnecessary, when what the region needs is
positive energy.
It hurts that the nave on both sides
fall easy prey
to rhetoric,
not realising that
conflicts
feed only a
few hawks both sides. Why dont
they understand that with peace, everyone wins and with conflict we all lose.
It hurts that vested interests refuse to
resolve age-old issues or move on to
strive for a bright future for the billion
strong youth of the region.
It hurts that our meager resources are
spent on nuclear arsenal and war mongering, rather than being channeled to alleviate hunger, disease and poverty.
I often quote the poet Kunwer Mahinder Singh Bedis eloquently asked ques-

tion to hawks on both sides:

Poochhna hai ab mujhe ye Hind-oPakistan se,
Peit bhookon ka bhoroge kya jang ke
samaan se.
(I wish to ask both India and Pakistan,
Will you fill the hungry stomachs with
weapons?)
It hurts that we exchange dead soldiers and arrested fishermen instead of
exchanging of knowledge, expertise and
resources from each side.
It even hurts that the people who are
so close culturally and geographically are
kept miles apart by almost impossible
visa policies.
More than everything else what hurts
is the fools we make of ourselves in front
of rest of the world by our reputation as
nations with multiple common enemies
including poverty and violence against
women, yet we are fighting each other.
Outsiders often ask, Dont you share
a common history?
I retort as always, Yes, we have the
same DNA too.
Do you think peace is possible between your countries?
Do we have any other choice, but to
peace? We have fought three wars and
been involved in several conflicts. Its
time we give peace a chance for regional
cooperation and coexist as peaceful
neighbors.
To those who understand Urdu, I simply quote Jagannath Azads couplet:
Siyasat ne jo khenchi hain hadein
qayam rahein beshak,
Dilon ke hadd-e-faasil ko mitaa dene
ka waqt aaya.
(Let the lines that are drawn by politics stay,
But it is time for hearts to mend the
gap).
The writer is an Indian gynecologist
married to a Pakistani. She dreams of
a world without wars.
Email: ilmana_fasih@hotmail.com.
Blog: http://thinkloud65.wordpress.com

B R I E F S

IndiaWithPakistan
frame. Rationally I knew that
all those people had left
when my-this land became
non-India (Pakistan). By the
time we reached my birthplace in Mohalla Shah Chan
Chirag facing Bazaar Sarafan
no inner urge was left.
Our house was bounded
by three streets. The ground
floor had been modified. A
lane between the Deodi
now linked it to the back
street and four shops were
constructed on either side
under its roof.
When the resident-shopkeepers came to know that I
was an original resident and
that was my birthplace, they
welcomed us warmly. They
invited us into a shop, seated
us comfortably, arranged refreshments and asked about
our welfare.
They were happy to see
us and excitedly told everyone who came by about us.
They asked many questions
about Indias political and
economical conditions and
told us about theirs, which
they didnt seem very happy
with.
They took us to the back
of our house from where new
stairs led to the upper floors.
The door of the stairs was
locked. They anxiously offered to bring the keys to enable us to go up see the
rooms on the upper floors
where I was born. But by
now, my emotions were
numb and I had no urge to
see anything.
This house had been good
when I lived there with my
father, mother, brothers and
sisters. Now it was a lifeless
structure of bricks and mud.
We could see self-grown
plants and trees inside and
on the outer walls of many of
the houses. I took a few photos. The back street looked
deserted without my playmates. Even otherwise it
seemed as if nobody lived
there.

Kolkata kids demo for Peshawar

embers of Rebecca Belilious English Institution In

Kolkata participated in a rally on December 20 to
express their condolences for the victims of the attack on the Army Public School in Peshawar on Dec. 16,
2014, and in solidarity with the fight against terrorism.
Photos contributed to Aman ki Asha by Danish Akhtar? in
Kolkata

Maa is Maa in all religions

(To be continued)
The writer is a retired
banker born in Rawalpindi
in 1931. He studied in
Murree and Malakwal, and
at DAV High School,
Rawalpindi. He lives in Yamuna Nagar (Haryana),
India. This account is
adapted from his posts to
the Aman ki Asha Facebook
group.

et to the song Maa by Lahore-based musician Bilal

Saeed, Rahul Aryas beautiful animated video starts
with the words: An honest tribute from a common Indian to all school children and families who lost their loved
ones in the Peshawar attack. View it at:
http://youtu.be/RM2LCO2DxTM.

A peace initiative whose time has come...

Destination Peace: A commitment by the Jang Group, Geo and The Times of India Group to
create an enabling environment that brings the people of Pakistan and India closer together,
contributing to genuine and durable peace with honour between our countries.