remarked to me at the time, ‘Isn’t being an actor wonderful? You are paid to stay a child.’ Chafing as I was to grow up, I actually didn’t much enjoy being a child but have certainly enjoyed staying one as a grown-up!
The weekly letters home had become a chore, I had absolutely nothing to say to either of my parents. Nothing exciting ever happened to me. There were no achievements to report. No joys to share. No troubles to unburden myself of. I once tried writing a long letter to Baba about
The Old Man
but got a curt reply telling me to concentrate on my studies and that was what he wanted to hear about. He was ‘not interested in stories of pictures which you write to me’. As for his letters to us, seldom more than two or three sentences long, they’d be typed on his office stationery, always ending with his signature in full and his name typed in brackets below it. The only paternal touch in those letters would be ‘your mother sends her love to you’ and the ‘yours affectionately’ at the end. None of us could write Urdu legibly or read it at more than a snail’s pace, so communication with Ammi would be nonexistent when we were away at Sem, or it was via Baba. Not good enough. She always complained that he never read out our letters properly to her. They’d visit us once a year, normally in June, and these meetings, though enjoyable to a degree because we could go out of the school with them, would quickly turn into sharp interrogations about my progress in studies. Displeasure would be expressed, I would be reminded of the enormous expense going into my education, threats to pull me out of this ‘expensive’ school would be issued and tears invariably followed.
Around this time, the suffocating relationship with Baba made me start detesting and fearing his company. Ammi was emotionally supportive, and I could vent things on her, but with Baba it came to a point where all I got was sternness and disapproval. Though he never ever struck any of us, I don’t think I’ve ever been as terrified of anyone in my life. His desire to see us well educated consumed him, and he believed I was throwing away the opportunity to equip myself for life. The unanimous opinion of my teachers that I’d find it difficult to amount even to a small bag of beans made him begin to despair for me and, in turn, whatever I felt for him was replaced not by fear of his disapproval, which might have spurred me to do better, but by sheer undiluted terror of, and extreme hatred for, him. I don’t think either of us ever recovered what we lost, and I do know that I was never ever at ease in his company again, nor he in mine.
I had finally escaped Ma Perry’s clutches, but was still Burke’s favourite punching bag. One evening during games hour I found myself partnering him in a game of badminton, which I was reasonably enthusiastic about and not at all bad at, but being on the same side of the court as this gargoyle reduced my game to novice level, and I couldn’t do a thing right. We got creamed and a couple of hard knocks on the head was the reward for my pains. He once caught me reading
Billy Bunter
during study hour and the mandatory knuckles on the head preceded an order to stand in a corner and memorize three pages of my history book in the remaining time. He was probably slavering at the prospect of knocking me around some more when I’d be unable to accomplish the task. But to his utter astonishment (and mine) I managed it even before the hour was over. My recitation done, the disbelief in his voice is a memory I greatly treasure: ‘Ah caan nat oonderstandju, Teddy Bear, ‘ addressing me by this appellation which I abhorred but could never escape in Sem, ‘you cum laayst in yer claysss, yet you caan lurrn three pages so quicklyyyy!’ I didn’t remain in Sem long enough to be in Burke’s class or to get my nose bloodied by him again, but he did manage at the sports trials to disqualify me, unjustly I still
The weekly letters home had become a chore, I had absolutely nothing to say to either of my parents. Nothing exciting ever happened to me. There were no achievements to report. No joys to share. No troubles to unburden myself of. I once tried writing a long letter to Baba about
The Old Man
but got a curt reply telling me to concentrate on my studies and that was what he wanted to hear about. He was ‘not interested in stories of pictures which you write to me’. As for his letters to us, seldom more than two or three sentences long, they’d be typed on his office stationery, always ending with his signature in full and his name typed in brackets below it. The only paternal touch in those letters would be ‘your mother sends her love to you’ and the ‘yours affectionately’ at the end. None of us could write Urdu legibly or read it at more than a snail’s pace, so communication with Ammi would be nonexistent when we were away at Sem, or it was via Baba. Not good enough. She always complained that he never read out our letters properly to her. They’d visit us once a year, normally in June, and these meetings, though enjoyable to a degree because we could go out of the school with them, would quickly turn into sharp interrogations about my progress in studies. Displeasure would be expressed, I would be reminded of the enormous expense going into my education, threats to pull me out of this ‘expensive’ school would be issued and tears invariably followed.
Around this time, the suffocating relationship with Baba made me start detesting and fearing his company. Ammi was emotionally supportive, and I could vent things on her, but with Baba it came to a point where all I got was sternness and disapproval. Though he never ever struck any of us, I don’t think I’ve ever been as terrified of anyone in my life. His desire to see us well educated consumed him, and he believed I was throwing away the opportunity to equip myself for life. The unanimous opinion of my teachers that I’d find it difficult to amount even to a small bag of beans made him begin to despair for me and, in turn, whatever I felt for him was replaced not by fear of his disapproval, which might have spurred me to do better, but by sheer undiluted terror of, and extreme hatred for, him. I don’t think either of us ever recovered what we lost, and I do know that I was never ever at ease in his company again, nor he in mine.
I had finally escaped Ma Perry’s clutches, but was still Burke’s favourite punching bag. One evening during games hour I found myself partnering him in a game of badminton, which I was reasonably enthusiastic about and not at all bad at, but being on the same side of the court as this gargoyle reduced my game to novice level, and I couldn’t do a thing right. We got creamed and a couple of hard knocks on the head was the reward for my pains. He once caught me reading
Billy Bunter
during study hour and the mandatory knuckles on the head preceded an order to stand in a corner and memorize three pages of my history book in the remaining time. He was probably slavering at the prospect of knocking me around some more when I’d be unable to accomplish the task. But to his utter astonishment (and mine) I managed it even before the hour was over. My recitation done, the disbelief in his voice is a memory I greatly treasure: ‘Ah caan nat oonderstandju, Teddy Bear, ‘ addressing me by this appellation which I abhorred but could never escape in Sem, ‘you cum laayst in yer claysss, yet you caan lurrn three pages so quicklyyyy!’ I didn’t remain in Sem long enough to be in Burke’s class or to get my nose bloodied by him again, but he did manage at the sports trials to disqualify me, unjustly I still
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