Memories

Stories of Saagar and others like him

Fresh off the boat

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Twenty-two years ago, when I first landed in the UK, I arrived as a qualified anaesthetist. I didn’t think of myself as a ‘female doctor’. I did not classify myself as one from the ‘ethnic minorities’. Both of those things were incidental to the fact that there was a job to be done and I could do it well, even if it was in a completely different setting, four and a half thousand miles away from home, at Antrim Area Hospital, Antrim, Northern Ireland. I was nervous but being from an army family, I was accustomed to moving every couple of years from one state of India to another (states as different as Punjab and Bengal), making it my own, learning from a different way of life and moving on to the next. I was sure of my ability to adapt.

My belongings comprised of a family photograph in a silver frame, a suitcase, mostly filled with books and two hundred pounds in cash. From the window of the plane I could see forty shades of green, in a mesmerising patchwork across the fields and hills of Ireland. The sky was the deepest, most startling blue. My heart was up in my throat with the excitement of living and working in a country where everyone was educated (why wouldn’t they be if education was free?)  and well-mannered (why wouldn’t they be if everyone was well looked after by the Government?)

One of the secretaries from the Antrim Area Hospital, Mary, very kindly came to receive me at the airport. The drive from Aldergrove Airport to the hospital was like gliding through a picture postcard. After Delhi, I could fully appreciate the wide golden-green expanses gleaming in the sunshine with not one human being in sight. When I complemented Mary on how gorgeous her country was, she was perplexed, “Really?”

Saagar was 5 years old then. He had stayed back with his dad. My plan was to find my feet and have him join me as soon as possible. I wanted to get my post-graduate exams within one or two years and go back to work in India. In the next few months, as I settled into my job, I acquired a cheap second hand Renault 19, found a family home and an appropriate child-minder. In the tea room of the hospital, the nurses would tell me about their families and ask me about mine. When I told them that I had a 5 years old child back home, they would say, “How could you leave him there?” I didn’t know what to say to that.

I still don’t.

Optimism?

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Last Thursday night I had to think about what to wear as I was going out. Proper going out – to a gig at a small venue in Tower Bridge. Hugo, one of Saagar’s closest friends from school had released a single in his memory and was performing live and raising funds for Papyrus. I would be seeing our friends, have a drink and possibly dinner at a restaurant.  Wow! About time. It’s been ages.

Took a train to London Bridge and as I was walking out of the station, 2 announcements came on in quick succession –

“The 1831 to Peterborough has been cancelled due to a person being hit be a train.”

“The 1830 to Horsham has been cancelled due to a person being hit by a train.”

That Thursday was back again. It was Day 0 again. At this very station, an announcement was made to say my train home had been cancelled. I found an alternative route without thinking once why my train was cancelled.

It is spreading. Despite everything we do. It keeps happening. This morning I woke up to talk of another lock-down and my heart sank. I have an income and a home and someone to share my life with. How many don’t? I have hope and optimism. How many don’t? How many other hearts sank this morning?

The prospect of going on living in a world without a warm touch or hugs or smiles is nothing less than a punishment. The morning is greyer and colder than it has been in a long time. The days are shrinking. I am reminded of 6 years ago, at this time of the year, as autumn was fast approaching and Saagar was ill, I was optimistic. I didn’t have the slightest doubt. I knew he would get better.

Now, I doubt my optimism.

PS: Please listen to this song and share it on: “Lay down” by Hugo Hartley on Spotify

Many more songs by him on Youtube:

Thank you Ma’am.

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She was just over 4 feet tall but her voice boomed across the workshop as if it was arising from a big Bose speaker. She spoke, taught, lived, breathed Ikenobo, the oldest discipline in Japanese flower arranging, broadly known as Ikebana. 1400 years, to be precise. It was her life, her passion and she generously gave it to us, her students.

Initially I couldn’t figure out what I should call her. In India, I would have called her ‘Aunty’, but it didn’t seem right. Some called her by name but I couldn’t do that. I tried it but it felt wrong. She was nearly my mum’s age. I dug out the word ‘Ma’am’ from my college days, a term used to address female teachers. It felt right to me and seemed fine by her.  

She drew schematic diagrams of arrangements on a white board in front of the class, explaining the name, function, quality and significance of each component. She emphasised the relationship between different parts of an arrangement but mostly, she spoke of the importance of spaces between them.

Wood symbolized mountains while grasses and flowers suggested water. A natural landscape, in a single vase. It was a meditation of sorts, exploring the relationship between the sky, humans and earth, between the outdoors and indoors. It had philosophical representations of the past, present and future. It was about harmony and the laws of nature, a welcome break from the cacophony of London.

After Saagar passed away, she gently encouraged me to join her classes. She knew this art form would help. Mondays became exciting because they were the day of the lessons. Couldn’t believe how little they cost. It definitely was not about money. I joined this community of aspiring flower-arrangers who like me, were constantly baffled by how minor changes made by her, transformed our arrangements into spectacular creations.

Ma’am was a walking-talking Encyclopaedia on all things garden. She had looked after award winning gardens for most of her life. She knew wholesale flower markets intimately and could predict and cherish the floral offerings of every month, every season accurately. But last week, an unfortunate accident suddenly took her away from us, from this earth.  

“Not only beautiful flowers but also buds and withered flowers have life, and each has its own beauty. By arranging flowers with reverence, one refines oneself”, she would say.  

We will miss you and your finesse, Ma’am. My head bows to the space left by you. Thank you for helping me see beauty in everything.

Vite Vine

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Darling Saagar,

You learnt your English in the UK from English-speaking people. I learnt it in fits and starts from Hindi/Punjabi/Bengali-speaking folk in India. It was not a surprise that you were only 10 when you took it upon yourself to start correcting my English. All the time.

“Saagar, please would you close the vindow?”

“The parent’s meeting is on Vednesday. No?”

“Where does the best Vite Vine come from?”

You would be all over the floor. What was funny? These were simple questions. In Hindi, there is an equivalent for ‘v’. None for ‘w’. The sound of ‘w’ is learnt. I learnt it and can apply it to everything except nouns. Must be a genetic aberration. I had a huge sense of achievement when I made you laugh, given my sense of humour was nothing compared to yours.

Other words that I spoke wrongly were – rebel (re-bell), adolescence (a-doll-essence) and such.

Sometimes I knowingly uttered incorrect sentences, so you could correct me, playing with your predictable pleasures.

“Bought a really nice t-shirt today.” you said.

‘What colour?’

“Not ‘what colour’ Mamma. It’s ‘which colour’.”

‘Ah. Right. What colour?’ I asked again with a crooked smile.

Rolling-up your eyes, shaking your head from side to side.

“Parents!”

Laughter.

We’re in lockdown at present, Saagar. Long story! I can’t help thinking how fab it would be to have you home. We would have so much time together to try new recipes, to exercise and laugh, play carom and do some gardening, relax and watch funny cat-videos and so on…

Time … tic-toc, tic-toc … gone forever.

My mind plays silly monkey-tricks with me. The rascal. I watch it. Holding my own, I am not getting carried away with it. I am being the witness (vitness).

You are here, with me always.

I love you.

Yours,

Mamma.

The good times.

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Once again I found myself sitting in the waiting room at a Healing Centre in Wales. I sat facing a wall covered with effusive and colourful thank-you messages plus baby pictures. They were addressed to the acupuncturist who had helped these women become mums. I was here to connect with my son through the beautiful, Moya, whom I have seen twice before. She is compassion personified. Each time I have met her, I have found great comfort in her readings and felt close to Saagar. So, despite Storm Dennis, train disruptions, a brewing respiratory infection and a serious jet-lag, I made my way up in water-proofs and a big red polo-neck jumper.

The first thing she mentioned was Varanasi. A seat of learning. A place of pilgrimage, where the temporality of this human body is clear to see. Of course, Varanasi, where Saagar’s ashes are immersed in the Ganges, where we had a prayer ceremony with 5 priests simultaneously chanting and carrying out various rituals for 5 hours to help Saagar’s soul transcend peacefully into another realm. Where my ashes will go.

Then came a string of other places and memories: Playing catching-catch on a beach in Port Rush, stepping over multitudes of hexagonal stones at Giant’s Causeway, crossing the flimsy Carrick-a-rede bridge, the 3-day trip on a narrow boat one beautiful summer, shopping in New York, visiting his Uncle, Aunt and new-born cousin in Chicago, admiring the moon and stars through the big Velux windows in his large loft conversion space. All these sweet things came up.

He wanted to present me a Cherry blossom. Did that make any sense to me? Yes. Coming up to March, we would be using Sakura in our Ikebana arrangements, bringing nature into our homes. A very special time of year for this Japanese art.

Moya said he is peaceful where he is. He understands that sometimes I breath deep and hard to stay alive and sometimes it feels like I am breathing glass and sometimes I wish I could just stop. He understands. And he holds all these happy memories and places that he cherishes.

He’s reminding me of the good times. I need to look at them and cherish them much more than I do. They were ours. They will always be ours.