to care for her always. Both wore several garlands of fresh red roses.
The next photograph was of the day Sahir had come into this world. Ammi was in a white hospital gown with dark circles under her eyes and an expression of unparalleled joy. I was in the center, my smile showing off a missing tooth, holding Sahir with an ounce of hesitation. Papa had his arms around all of us and looked perfectly content.
There was a picture of all four of us at my ninth birthday: me cutting the black forest cake, Papa helping me blow out the candles, and Ammi holding Sahir. Amna peaking in barely making it into the edge of the photograph. I could not recall what wish I had made that day before extinguishing the candles. Maybe I asked to be first in my class in the upcoming exams. Perhaps I asked for a house for my Barbie doll or a set of mystery Nancy Drew books.
“These are just things,” my father had always said. I wished I had asked for my father’s long life. I wished I had asked for the well-being and togetherness of my family. I wished I had asked for the preservation of what had been captured in that photograph.
I munched on some chocolate my uncle had bought for me, brushed my teeth, which had been recently freed from braces, and went to bed. I kept replaying the song and fell asleep feeling terribly lonely, with the Walkman in my ears and the words reverberating through my soul:
Papa are you near me?
Papa can you hear me?
The night is so much darker and
The wind is so much colder
The world I see is so much bigger
Now that I’m alone
.
Chapter 5
The next four years passed by uneventfully. In 1992, Pakistan brought home the cricket world cup trophy, and the nation found a reason to be proud. The captain, Imran Khan, sounded victorious as he accepted the trophy and announced his plans of opening a high-quality cancer hospital in Lahore in honor of his deceased mother. The win was celebrated across the nation, and a holiday was announced to celebrate. Sahir sounded jubilant on the phone. He told me how he had snuck a radio into school so he and his friends could follow every ball of the nail-biting match.
The balm that time was said to be had slowly begun to heal my sorrow. I missed my father. I missed my homeland. I was in a bigger, cleaner, more opportune, more organized, more scenic part of the world, yet I still missed my country. In the beginning I could not quite define what I missed about Pakistan. Over the years I came to understand that it was a little of everything: our neighbor knocking on the door because she had run out of tomatoes; the fresh guavas sold on the street, the vendors not allowing their enthusiasm to be vanquished by the heat; the Hasina Moin drama that aired from a single channel at eight o’clock at night, mesmerizing the city. I missed the
dhobi
or washman who arrived late each week with all the clothes starched stiff and a towel or two missing from the final count, the grand weddings that were five-day affairs, the
pakoras
fried at the onset of every monsoon, friends chatting and singing to the rhythm of the rain in the balconies of their homes, and most of all, the house full of people and full of voices.
What I missed was a little of everything but a lot of belongingness.
In keeping with the promise I had made to my mother, I spent all my summer vacations in Karachi. Part of me looked forward to it because I craved to feel a connection and I wished for my brother and half-sister to think of me as their older sibling. The person I did not wish to see at all was my stepfather. Time had not healed the wounds or cleared our differences, and my rage remained undiluted. Sara was my dear sister, and I loved her beyond expression. I did feel a pinch when my mother held her close, as it reminded me how her embrace had loosened from around me that dreaded night and had never returned. How I craved a hug, a look of reassurance, and a sense of security from her. It was still difficult to
The next photograph was of the day Sahir had come into this world. Ammi was in a white hospital gown with dark circles under her eyes and an expression of unparalleled joy. I was in the center, my smile showing off a missing tooth, holding Sahir with an ounce of hesitation. Papa had his arms around all of us and looked perfectly content.
There was a picture of all four of us at my ninth birthday: me cutting the black forest cake, Papa helping me blow out the candles, and Ammi holding Sahir. Amna peaking in barely making it into the edge of the photograph. I could not recall what wish I had made that day before extinguishing the candles. Maybe I asked to be first in my class in the upcoming exams. Perhaps I asked for a house for my Barbie doll or a set of mystery Nancy Drew books.
“These are just things,” my father had always said. I wished I had asked for my father’s long life. I wished I had asked for the well-being and togetherness of my family. I wished I had asked for the preservation of what had been captured in that photograph.
I munched on some chocolate my uncle had bought for me, brushed my teeth, which had been recently freed from braces, and went to bed. I kept replaying the song and fell asleep feeling terribly lonely, with the Walkman in my ears and the words reverberating through my soul:
Papa are you near me?
Papa can you hear me?
The night is so much darker and
The wind is so much colder
The world I see is so much bigger
Now that I’m alone
.
Chapter 5
The next four years passed by uneventfully. In 1992, Pakistan brought home the cricket world cup trophy, and the nation found a reason to be proud. The captain, Imran Khan, sounded victorious as he accepted the trophy and announced his plans of opening a high-quality cancer hospital in Lahore in honor of his deceased mother. The win was celebrated across the nation, and a holiday was announced to celebrate. Sahir sounded jubilant on the phone. He told me how he had snuck a radio into school so he and his friends could follow every ball of the nail-biting match.
The balm that time was said to be had slowly begun to heal my sorrow. I missed my father. I missed my homeland. I was in a bigger, cleaner, more opportune, more organized, more scenic part of the world, yet I still missed my country. In the beginning I could not quite define what I missed about Pakistan. Over the years I came to understand that it was a little of everything: our neighbor knocking on the door because she had run out of tomatoes; the fresh guavas sold on the street, the vendors not allowing their enthusiasm to be vanquished by the heat; the Hasina Moin drama that aired from a single channel at eight o’clock at night, mesmerizing the city. I missed the
dhobi
or washman who arrived late each week with all the clothes starched stiff and a towel or two missing from the final count, the grand weddings that were five-day affairs, the
pakoras
fried at the onset of every monsoon, friends chatting and singing to the rhythm of the rain in the balconies of their homes, and most of all, the house full of people and full of voices.
What I missed was a little of everything but a lot of belongingness.
In keeping with the promise I had made to my mother, I spent all my summer vacations in Karachi. Part of me looked forward to it because I craved to feel a connection and I wished for my brother and half-sister to think of me as their older sibling. The person I did not wish to see at all was my stepfather. Time had not healed the wounds or cleared our differences, and my rage remained undiluted. Sara was my dear sister, and I loved her beyond expression. I did feel a pinch when my mother held her close, as it reminded me how her embrace had loosened from around me that dreaded night and had never returned. How I craved a hug, a look of reassurance, and a sense of security from her. It was still difficult to
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