And the World Changed (18 page)

He put Mariam's mind at ease. Give money to a needy person or perform another act of charity, making sure it is a fair exchange, he explained. Mariam already knew that was what she should have done, but receiving the
maulvi
sahib's approval made her feel better. And she also knew what that act of charity was to be.

“We should think of Jeena's marriage,” she informed her husband one night, a week after her conversation with the
maulvi
sahib. He had just eaten dinner and was getting ready to say his nighttime prayers.

At first he looked up in alarm, perhaps suspecting that she was planning to bring up the
mannat
again.

“She's old enough and too much of a responsibility,” Mariam continued, ignoring the expression of disquiet on her husband's face.

“Hmm,” he mumbled.

“Ghulam Din's son has a job as a clerk in the telephone department. He's educated and I've seen him, he's not at all bad to look at. I know our old caretaker will be happy that we're approaching him for his son. He knows we'll give Jeena a good dowry.” Mariam spoke with authority, as if Jeena were indeed her younger sister and hence her responsibility.

Mariam's husband had no objections. Why should he? Her
spirits lifted, Mariam began making arrangements soon thereafter. She had already spoken to the old caretaker, he had humbly and joyfully expressed his gratitude. True, his son was an educated boy, a clerk in an office, yet he would never have found a girl like Jeena who, even though she was a servant in this household, was nevertheless treated as a member of the family. No doubt this connection with a family of such high status would continue even after she was married. And she was young and beautiful. He brought the groom-to-be to meet Mariam's husband, who seemed satisfied after his interview with the young man. What was most important was that the young man had a government job and would also receive living accommodation once he was married. A wedding date was immediately agreed upon.

In addition to the five suits that Mariam specially had embroidered in gold thread and sequins for Jeena, she rummaged through her own things and brought out a dark red brocade suit that was too heavily ornamented with gilded trimmings and sequined designs for her own use, and added that to the young woman's dowry. The bridal
dupatta
that went with it was heavy with shimmering gold-and-silver-tasseled edging on all four sides. That, she decided, would be Jeena's wedding suit. She bought her a gold necklace and earrings, a lightweight set, but one that gave the impression of being heavy because of the way the design had been wrought. Jeena helped with embroidering tablecloths, bedsheets, and pillowcases, and stitched all of her own clothes herself on Mariam's sewing machine with Mariam's guidance at every step. There was no skimping on Mariam's part. She was no fool. Pledges made to Allah could not be taken lightly.

A week after Jeena's wedding, on a night that Mariam had slept in her husband's arms longer than any other night she could remember, the dreams, each one clearer and more disturbing than the one before it, returned.

DAUGHTERS OF AAI

Fahmida Riaz

Fahmida Riaz (1946– ) was born in Meerut into a literary family that migrated to Hyderabad, Pakistan, at Partition where she learned Sindhi, Persian, Urdu, and English. She earned her masters degree from Sindh University.

Riaz is a distinguished Urdu poet, feminist, and human rights activist. To date, no woman writer in Pakistani English literature has written either poetry or fiction with
a voice as powerful, fierce, and outspoken as Riaz. The recipient of the 1997 Hammett-Hellman Award from Human Rights Watch, she has published many collections of poetry and prose; including
Badan Dareedah
(Maktaba-e-Danyal, 1973), which was Pakistan's first book of feminist poetry and forged new directions in women's writing in Pakistan. Her use of the feminine gender for a poetry form that was usually written in the male gender caused a furor, and Riaz was accused of publishing eroticism.

In the 1980s Riaz was persecuted by the military regime of General Zia-ul-Haq, which led to many years of political exile in New Delhi. Here she began writing an English novel because she felt cut off from Pakistan's familiar Urdu milieu. Later she developed and published extracts of the novel as English short stories.

The English translations of Riaz's work include a poetry collection,
Four Walls and A Veil
(Oxford University Press, 2004) and her famous trilogy of autobiographical novels,
Zinda Bahar Lane
(City Press, 2000),
Reflections in a Cracked Mirror
(City Press, 2001), and
Godavari
(Oxford University Press, 2008), all translated by Aquila Ismail; Riaz has recently translated the poetry of Jalaluddin Rumi into Urdu. Riaz lives in Karachi, runs a feminist publishing house, WADA, and occasionally writes fiction in English.

In “Daughters of Aai,” a story told to her by her sister, Riaz explores a disturbing, worldwide, and little-discussed issue: the sexual exploitation of the mentally challenged. However, Riaz's tale, set within the sociocultural context of rural Pakistan, assumes its own dynamics. Contrary to popular myths of cloistered, helpless women she describes a “typical village” where women retain a strong sense of gender and self, despite the patriarchal system within which they live. Her reference to the women's
chunri
head coverings, gauzy materials with vivid patterns created by them with an age-old tie-dye technique, hints at their inherent creativity. The contrast between female ingenuity and male notions of what is permissible or not runs through the story.

Riaz juxtaposes the lack of modern institutional support, training, and facilities for the mentally challenged Fatima—and the sexual threat to her—against the act of great love and faith that enables Aai and the village women to find refuge in ancient superstitions and create a space and shelter for the innocent and
the guileless who do not conform to society's norms. Riaz also explores Muslim laws of inheritance and the mandatory
iddat
, the prescribed months of seclusion that a widow must observe immediately after the
Qul
, the final funeral prayer, has been read on the third day of her husband's death. The
iddat
ensures that if the widow is carrying a child, no one can dispute paternity, but in Riaz's hands, this seclusion leads to quite a different twist. The reference to Tolstoy transposes Riaz's story, across the centuries, from the culture specific to the universal, because Tolstoy belonged to a similar feudal, patriarchal society and through the translations of his work, influenced many literatures, including Urdu.

• • •

There they sat weeping, their heads buried in their knees, sometimes glancing at me with bloodshot eyes.

They were sitting in my courtyard, the women of her village and Aai. Her daughter wasn't there, it would have been difficult to bring her. Perhaps she was in hospital, perhaps in a mental asylum. Even if she were still at home, it was difficult to bring her all the way to Karachi. She was pregnant again.

The village women had come to seek assistance from me. They sat on the floor gazing at me wildly. Their heads were covered with green, blue, orange tie-dye
chunries
. We sat gazing at one another: me, looking at their dark feet, their thick silver anklets, arms full of clinking glass bangles, and the glimmering, glinting nose-pins and heavy nose-rings.

“Why are you weeping?” I wanted to ask. “Is it only for Aai's daughter that you cry?”

“What do you mean?” My sister, Shahbano, was wide-eyed, puzzled.

Aai bit her lips and wrung her rough hands. She worked at Shahbano's house. My sister was married to a landowner. She lived in the farmhouse, surrounded by mango orchards, by the Asthla Canal. Beyond its tranquil cool waters, as far as the eye
could see, stretched green fields. The colorful huts of these peasant women were scattered on the canal bank.

Aai lived in one of those huts. How old was she? No one could tell. Could be 35 or 40. Not a wrinkle on her smooth fair face. Slim and tall, with tight round breasts jutting out of her kurta. Hard physical labor had kept her fit. Her husband was a drug addict and did very little. Theirs was a typical village when, in the months between sowing and harvesting, all the hard labor was done by women. Once when Shahbano had taken me for a walk through the fields, I had been amazed at the sight of all the men relaxing on their cots. I exclaimed, “These men, what kind of work do they do?”

A woman, her bangles chiming on her wrist as she balanced a large bundle of dry twigs on her head, said, “Madam, the men halal the chickens.”

They all burst out laughing. I too had laughed. How could I forget! It always took a man to say, “
Allah-u-Akbar
,” to decapitate a chicken or goat, to make the meat halal. Women could not perform this important religious task.

Aai had seven children. Her eldest daughter was severely handicapped mentally, the rest, simply malnourished. What cruel tricks fate plays: a female child and mentally handicapped! Fatimah was a beauty, growing up so fast the hand-me-downs from the landlord's house could hardly keep up with her filled-out curves.

Fatimah could not speak; she could only mumble like an infant. If you saw her you would never think that this village beauty was not like any other young girl. But when she walked you noticed the disharmony in her movements. She veered and lurched, vacantly smiling, spit dribbling from the corner of her full red mouth.

When she was fourteen Fatimah began to menstruate. Aai and the other village women tried to teach her to use cotton pads, but she only laughed and tried to play with them. Aai wept bitterly. The village women shared her grief. They made it
their collective responsibility to cope with Fatimah at her time of the month. They couldn't let her wander around in that state. The men would see her soiled clothes: They would laugh their obscene laughter, point to her, and look at other women meaningfully. This would humiliate all of them. Since all the women went out to work seven days a week, the one working closest to Aai's hut would take Fatimah inside and change the cotton pad as she would an infant's nappy.

(What dirty, disgusting details! But I remember what Leo Tolstoy says in one of his essays. “Write down everything, however shameful, however painful, because it is all worth writing about.” But Tolstoy was not a woman, otherwise he would have known better.)

Between Shahbano's house and Aai's hut wild reeds grow in abundance. Aai would leave her children to play there and cross the reeds to come to work. One day she came weeping and told my sister, “Fatimah is pregnant.”

“Who did it? When did it happen?” Shahbano was shocked and in tears. She slipped out of her house and went to see Fatimah. Several village women had gathered in that modest dwelling. All aghast, whispering quietly.

Aai had beaten Fatimah mercilessly, questioning her, “Who was he? Who did this?” The village women were caressing Fatimah's bruises, rubbing hot mustard oil and turmeric on her swollen limbs, and weeping, weeping quietly.

Fatimah mumbled and smiled.

It was decided quietly that the pregnancy be aborted at once. Aai took a week's leave and went to the next village with Fatimah to pray at the shrine of a saint—this is what they told the men in the village: It was important that they not have an inkling of the catastrophe that had befallen Fatimah. It would be a matter of their honor. They would come out with their axes and there would be several murders. The last time an illegitimate pregnancy was discovered here, two clans had fought for a year. There were several killings, leaving behind widows and
orphans and prolonged court cases that had drained the last rupee from the village.